Kate White - Hush

As she slid into bed that night she thought she might fall asleep instantly from sheer mental exhaustion, but it was clear after thirty minutes of thrashing in the sheets that sleep wasn’t going to arrive. She tossed and turned a little while longer and then finally dragged herself out of bed, leaving Smokey still draped over a pillow. In her white cotton nightgown, she paced the long hall of her apartment like a ghost. The apartment was deadly quiet, except for the drip of a faucet somewhere-in Will’s bathroom, she guessed.

At one point during her lonely, restless prowl, she stopped in the foyer and studied the silver-framed photos on the hall table. There were shots not only of her kids but of friends, too-sitting on the porch in Roxbury, celebrating a birthday, laughing together in Riverside Park. If only she could turn to one of those people now, she thought. But since her split with Jack, she’d let her friendships drift, out of embarrassment, or, in the case of people like Steve’s sister, Sonia, because their coupled-up lives now seemed out of sync with hers.

Suddenly, out of the corner of her eye, she registered movement on the ground to her right. She jerked her head in that direction, thinking it was Smokey, but there was no sign of him. As her eyes swept around the foyer, she realized with a jolt what she’d seen. On the parquet floor by the door, the narrow strip of light from the outside corridor had just been broken. There was a shadow in the middle now. Someone was standing on the other side of her door.

It was after two a.m. Who could possibly be there? she wondered anxiously. She stood frozen in place, staring at the slightly ragged strip of shadow. And then the doorbell rang.

THE SOUND MADE her reel backward. Who would come to her apartment at this hour? And why hadn’t the doorman rung up first?

“Who’s there?” she called out from where she stood.

The doorbell rang again. This time longer, more insistent.

“Who is it?” she called, louder now. After a few seconds she forced herself toward the door and squinted into the peephole. There was no one in view.

Tiptoeing backward, she saw that the shadow was gone now. She put her ear to the door, straining to hear. She thought she could hear the faint sound of footsteps moving away. She waited for the deep purr of the elevator but it never came.

She stabbed at the intercom button. While she waited for a response, she pressed her ear against the door one more time. Silence.

“May I help you?” a sluggish male voice answered.

“This is Lake Warren in 12B. Someone just rang my bell. Did you send someone up here?”

A pause followed, as if he had to think about it.

“No-no, I didn’t. No one has gone up for a while.”

“Well, who do you think it could have been?”

“What did the person look like?”

“I didn’t see,” she said in frustration. “When I looked through the peephole, no one was there.”

“Some people went up a while ago to a party on eleven. Maybe someone got off on the wrong floor. Do you want me to come up?”

“No, that’s okay.”

She wondered if it was like he said, someone just ringing the wrong bell. Or had the doorman fallen asleep at the front desk, allowing a stranger to slip by in the night? Had it been Keaton’s killer standing on the other side of her door? Someone from the clinic, or a person paid to stalk her? Whoever it was, maybe they’d started with her cat and were now proving they could get even closer.

She stared at the door. There was a security chain but it seemed so flimsy now, like popcorn strung on a piece of string for a Christmas tree. After setting the pictures on their side, she dragged the hall table in front of the door. Still, she felt too anxious to go back to bed. She fell onto the couch in the living room and pulled a throw blanket over her. The dull light of dawn was seeping through the windows when she finally drifted off to sleep.

She woke feeling achy, with the back of her throat raw. I can’t get sick right now, she told herself. Scenes from the previous night flooded her brain. For a few moments she wondered if the ringing doorbell had been just a dream. She lifted Smokey from his perch on top of her feet and stumbled toward the front door. The hall table jammed against the front door told her she hadn’t been dreaming.

She dragged the table back to where it belonged and opened the door, with the chain still in place. She could see her New York Times lying on the mat. After taking the chain off, she opened the door more fully and checked the hall. It was empty.

As she was scooping up the paper, she heard the locks being unbolted on the door catty-corner from hers, the apartment belonging to the Tammens. From what she knew, the wife and kids were out in the Hamptons for all of August, and the father, Stan, was commuting out on weekends. It was Stan who stepped out in the hallway now, stifling a yawn.

“Morning,” he said. “You guys aren’t on vacation this month?”

“No, not this year. Listen, I’m a little concerned about something that happened last night.”

“What is it?” he asked.

“Someone rang my doorbell around two this morning. And when I called out, the person just left. I didn’t see who it was.”

Stan scrunched his mouth and slowly shook his head.

“Can’t help you with that one,” he said. “I mean, I was here, but I didn’t hear or see anything.”

After closing her door, she popped three ibuprofen and gargled with salt water. Then she made coffee and forced herself to eat a bowl of yogurt. She hadn’t eaten right in nearly a week.

Staring out her kitchen window, as the summer air shimmered around the gray and red brick apartment buildings to the north, she thought of the day ahead. Her plan was to stay home and scramble to finish the presentation-until it was time to meet Kit Archer. It was a relief not to have to go into the clinic today-and wonder if the killer was watching her every move. But she needed to call in, at least. Levin was waiting for an answer about when she’d give the presentation. At eight-thirty she picked up the phone, knowing that most people would be in by now.

She asked the receptionist for Steve first, hoping that he’d somehow managed to buy her more time.

“I’m sorry, I tried,” he said when she reached him. “But Tom seems to be on a tear right now and thinks we need to see the plan ASAP.”

“No problem,” she said, not wanting to give even a hint she was agitated. “I’ll set up an appointment for the presentation.”

“I hope you don’t feel like he’s bullying you. I think this murder has him really on edge.”

Because he might have been the one who orchestrated the whole thing, she thought to herself.

“I’m sure he’s worried about all the police scrutiny,” Lake said. She waited, wondering if Steve would mention the keys.

“Of course. We all are,” he said, sounding suddenly distracted. “Wait-before I let you go, I’ve got a proposition for you. Ever since last week, I’ve felt things have been a little awkward between us. I’m really sorry about that situation with the police. Sonia would strangle me if she knew I upset you.”

“Why don’t we let it go, Steve,” she said, bristling at the memory. “It seems the police accepted my explanation.”

“Okay, but here’s my proposition: Hilary and I would love you to come by for a drink tonight. You haven’t seen our place since we redid it-and you haven’t seen Matthew since he was a baby.”

“Tonight’s not good,” she said, almost too quickly.

“How about tomorrow night?”

“Um…okay, sure.” There would be no way to put him off indefinitely without him sensing something was wrong.