Kate White - Hush

Lake followed Hilary through the dining room into a sleek white-and-stainless-steel kitchen. Matthew was sitting in a high chair, banging on the tray with a spoon. He’d grown from a gorgeous chubby baby with huge brown eyes to an exquisite toddler. Lake felt a visceral rush of pure delight at the sight of him.

“Matthew, what a big boy you are,” Lake gushed. He offered a gummy smile back. Lake turned to Hilary. “He’s just so precious.”

“He is now ,” Hilary said, folding her arms across her chest. “He just started throwing temper tantrums, and you should see him then. She turned to her son. “You’re Mommy’s little terror, aren’t you?”

“Steve must be on cloud nine,” Lake said.

“Oh, he is. I just wish he were around a little more to help. Jenny, you can wash him up now-and then you can put him to bed.”

“Can you show us how tall you are?” the nanny asked him sweetly. Matthew’s arms shot up. The nanny grinned back and pulled him out of the high chair and left the kitchen.

“Oh, let me show you his playroom,” Hilary declared. “The decorator did an amazing job on it.”

“All right,” Lake said. Her head was beginning to pound. She wasn’t sure if it was the wine.

Hilary led her down a long hallway, past both the master bedroom and Matthew’s. At the end was a small, carpeted room lined with bookshelves and painted with murals. As they stepped inside, a phone rang in another room.

“Excuse me a sec,” Hilary said. “The murals were all painted by a children’s book illustrator,” she called as she hurried away.

Lake ran her eyes around the room. So this was where Matthew was parked so he couldn’t mess up the living room. How ironic, Lake thought. The woman who’d had no trouble conceiving could barely be bothered with her child. Suddenly Lake felt overwhelmed with the urge to just get the hell out of there.

“That was Steve,” Hilary said, reentering the room. “He’s really sorry but he won’t be home for at least an hour.” She rolled her eyes.

“No problem,” Lake said, relieved for the excuse. “We’ll do it another time.”

“You certainly don’t have to rush off,” Hilary said.

“Why don’t we just reschedule. I’m sure you have stuff to do.”

“Is something the matter?” Hilary asked almost petulantly.

“No, no. I-I’ve just been fighting off a cold lately.”

The two women walked back to the living room and Lake grabbed her purse and said goodbye. Her apartment was within walking distance but she didn’t have the psychic energy to get there on foot. She found a cab and climbed gratefully into the back. She wondered if Steve’s excuse had been legit. Or maybe he was trying to avoid her. Her snooping may have been reported to Levin, and in turn to Steve. For the past few days she’d felt she was up to her neck in water but still able to breathe; now she felt close to drowning. Her only hope had been to find evidence she could take to Archer, but she’d come up with nothing.

As Lake massaged her temples, she realized that her face was wet with sweat. She dug in her purse, searching for a tissue. Just beneath her patent-leather wallet she felt something unfamiliar-round and made of rough cloth. She pulled it from her purse. For a second she just stared, confounded. It was a small burlap pouch, about the size of a plum. The neck was closed with twine and the insides were filled with something twiglike that poked through the fabric in places. My God, she thought-is it marijuana? Had someone stuck it in her purse?

She noticed a tag attached to the twine, blank on the side looking up at her. Slowly she turned it over. On the back was a single word: Catnip .

SHE’D BOUGHT CATNIP once for Smokey ages ago-but she certainly hadn’t stuffed it in her purse. No, someone else had placed the bag there. It was obviously supposed to remind her of Smokey and what had been done to him. Was it a message? I was in your backyard. This time I got even closer to you .

A word shot like a bullet through her mind: Jack . She’d left her purse with him when she had to dash back up to the apartment because Jack had told her the wrong books on the phone. His whole visit may have been a ruse just so that he could slip the catnip in her purse. If that was true, it meant he’d also shaved Smokey.

Maybe Jack was trying to unhinge her, to make it appear that she was an unfit mother. But was Jack really capable of such sick behavior?

Another thought barged through her brain: If Jack was her stalker, then there was no reason to believe that Keaton’s killer was watching her after all. In fact, Keaton’s death might have no relation to the clinic at all. All the stuff she’d been doing to save herself-going through files, talking to patients-may have been pointless, and the real threat was the man she used to love.

But, she realized with a start, her purse had also been out of her sight at the clinic . She’d left it on the conference room table while she’d searched for the files. Anyone at the clinic could have dropped in the little sack of catnip. Which would mean that the killer did work at the clinic, knew of Lake’s involvement with Keaton, and was sending her another warning. But a warning to do what ? she wondered. To shut up or else?

Lake searched in her purse for a tissue and wiped the perspiration from her face. There was something else to consider: She’d left her purse in the living room at Steve and Hilary’s when she’d gone to the kitchen to see Matthew, and Hilary had scurried off alone for a minute or two when Lake was in the playroom. What if Hilary had been having an affair with Keaton? Lake remembered how flirtatious Hilary had been with him at the restaurant. And then there was the fight in the car Steve had alluded to. Perhaps Hilary had gone to Keaton’s apartment later and discovered he’d been in bed with another woman that night. In a rage she’d killed him. Now Hilary suspected Lake was the other woman but wasn’t sure and was trying to flush her out.

And yet that idea seemed as farfetched as Jack hurting Smokey.

“Is this it?” a voice said.

Startled, Lake looked up to see that the cabdriver was speaking to her through the Plexiglas divider. She hadn’t even realized that they had stopped in front of her building.

After climbing out of the cab, she glanced furtively up and down the street. The block was empty except for a woman pushing a stroller. As soon as Lake was in her apartment, she dropped the catnip into a plastic bag and shoved it in the back of a kitchen drawer. She couldn’t stand the sight of it, but she knew it wouldn’t be smart to throw it away.

As she slammed the drawer shut, her eye caught the calendar on the door of the fridge. The kids were due back in the apartment in just a few weeks. She couldn’t imagine how she could allow them to live here with the killer possibly closing in on her and the police breathing down her neck. Perhaps she could ask Jack to keep them longer in the Hamptons than planned. She could say she was swamped with a project and needed to work on it 24/7. But if Jack was the stalker, wasn’t this exactly what he was trying to do: create the impression of a mommy who was coming unglued?

I have to get a grip, she told herself as she stripped off her top. It was essential to keep her wits about her so she could watch her back at all times. That also held true with the police. She needed to keep a cool head if they showed up sweating at her door again. And if Jack was behind all the cat madness, she had to outsmart him, too. It all seemed overwhelming, but she had to do everything she could to save herself. If she didn’t, she would lose Will and Amy-and perhaps much more.