Bentley Little: The Association

"Maybe not. You said--"

"I'll be fine," she repeated. She kissed him. "Get ready. Go."

He called her from the airport and then from the hospital when he got there. Things were looking up a little, he said. Not much, but a little. There'd be no need for a kidney, and it appeared likely that she'd pull through--the crucial period had passed--but the doctors were still uncertain as to whether or not she had suffered brain damage.

For Maureen, the day was long. She recalculated an estimated tax schedule for a client in California whose used record store income was below the initial projection, but that was it for real work. She spent the rest of the morning and the afternoon listening to music and rereading an old Philip Roth novel, waiting for another call from Barry. He phoned again that night. Sheri's condition was unchanged.

They talked for nearly an hour before Maureen gently told him he should go to bed, it was ten o'clock on the east coast and he needed the rest.

He hung up, after promising to call again in the morning after he visited the hospital.

She hadn't done much today, but she was tired, and Maureen went to bed after checking all of the locks and placing a chair under the knob of the front door. Despite what she'd told Barry, she did not feel comfortable remaining here alone, and she wished now that she had agreed to go to Salt Lake City.

Why had she stayed? What had made her do such a stupid thing?

Made her?

Now she was thinking like him.

Made her.

The thought was impossible to dislodge once it had crept into her brain. It really had been a stupid decision, and she could not for the life of her recall the logic or reasoning behind her choice.

Barry was the one who liked noise, who needed to fall asleep with the television on. By herself, she would have ordinarily gone to bed in a silent house. But tonight she was grateful for the voices and the light, and she fell asleep listening to the canned laughter of an unfunny TV show.

She was awakened after midnight by noises. The timer had long since turned off the television, but the house was not silent. From upstairs came loud taps and creaks and a subtle, persistent rattling. She wanted to pretend she didn't hear them, to pull the covers over her head, plug her ears, and force herself back to sleep. But she couldn't feign ignorance knowing that someone might be creeping through her house. She was responsible for two now, and it was her job to protect her home and child.

She reached over, flipped on the lamp atop the night stand.

A man stood in the doorway holding a coat hanger.

The scream that tore from her lips seared her throat with its intensity and she could not suck in enough air to sustain it, but she continued screaming nonetheless.

In three quick strides, he was next to the bed.

And he was smiling.

Still screaming, Maureen shoved off the covers and scrambled to the other side of the mattress. She intended to throw open the window and jump out through the screen, but a strong hand grabbed her left ankle before she had even made it off the bed. She kicked out with both legs, trying to hurt him, trying to connect, but her feet hit only open air, and then she was flipped onto her back.

The man was wearing a business suit. He was not someone she recognized or had ever seen before, and the impersonality of the attack made it that much more frightening. She knew why he was here and who had sent him, and she also knew who had informed on her.

Liz.

She tried to sit up, ready to scratch his face and claw out his eyes, but he punched her in the stomach, and as she gasped for air and clutched at her midsection, he straightened out the coat hanger.

"Article six," he said. "Section three, paragraph D."

"No-o-o-o!" she screamed.

Grinning, he shoved her legs apart.

And a crimson blotch exploded on his chest.

His eyes widened, and he straightened up, twisting around as he tried to clutch at his back, making a sickening gurgling noise deep in his throat. He'd dropped his coat hanger, but he made no attempt to retrieve it. Instead, he lurched to the side as a high, keening whine escaped from his mouth.

Liz stood behind him. She pulled out the knife she'd plunged into his back and shoved it in again, higher. No blood bloomed on his shirt this time, but Maureen could see it spraying behind him, coating Liz's arms, soaking the dresser and carpet. He fell on the bed next to her, jerking spasmodically. Maureen pushed herself over the foot of the bed, rolling onto the floor, and when she looked up again he was still.

Liz remained in place, covered with blood, hands at her side. "I'm sorry," she said, and she started to cry. "It's my fault. I'm sorry."

Maureen stood and hugged her friend.

"I was weak. I couldn't help it. I went to them." By now she was sobbing. "I just wanted it to stop."

Maureen looked at the body on the bed, Liz's knife still protruding from the back of his suit jacket.

"I didn't tell them," Liz said, wiping her eyes and smearing the blood on her face. "Honest. You have to believe me. I knew they knew, but I wasn't the one who told them."

The knowledge filled Maureen with relief. "I believe you."

"I should've done something, though. I should've ..." She trailed off, then took a deep breath. "I knew they'd send someone, and I

waited outside your house and followed him in when he showed up."

"Thank God you did." Maureen could not seem to take her eyes off the would-be abortionist's body. "But they'll be after both of us now."

"Not me," Liz said. "I went to them."

Maureen knew that was supposed to mean something to her, knew she was supposed to understand its implications, but she did not.

Liz seemed to straighten, to find some untapped reserve of strength within her. "But they'll be doubly anxious to get to you now. You'd better get out of here. Where's Barry?"

"At his sister's in Pennsylvania."

"Then go to a hotel somewhere, in some other town." She held up a hand. "Don't tell me where."

"But..." Maureen gestured toward the body. "... but you killed him.

And he's one of theirs. They won't let you get away with that."

"Don't worry about it."

"I can't just leave you."

"Get out of here," Liz ordered.

"But--"

"I'll take care of this. Just grab what you need and go. Now."

The Bonita Vista Homeowners' Association Covenants, Conditions, and Restrictions Article VI, Membership Rights, Section 8, Paragraph G:

A homeowner may justifiably use deadly force on any of the Properties whenever he or she deems it appropriate.

Maureen called him from a hotel in Cedar City.

Barry had just come back to his sister's house from the hospital and was bone tired, but he was wide awake as Maureen described the attack on her and Liz's last-minute rescue. At the old woman's behest, she'd packed what she thought she'd need into the Toyota and took off, ending up in Cedar City at dawn. She'd been trying to get a hold of him ever since, calling every five minutes for the last hour.

"They were trying to stop us from having a baby," she whispered, and the words sent a shiver down his spine. "They were trying to abort it."

There was nothing more he could do for Sheri--and Brian had his own sister, Margot, and her family there for support--so Barry caught the next plane west, an AA flight to St. Louis. He waited only an hour at the St. Louis terminal for a standby coach seat on a plane flying to Salt Lake City, and by late afternoon, Utah time, he and Maureen were hugging in her room at the Holiday Inn.

She told him again what happened, this time in more detail. After she finished, he tried to call Liz, but twenty rings later there was no answer and he finally hung up. He made a quick call to Brian at the hospital in Philadelphia to see if Sheri's condition had improved--it was unchanged then turned toward Maureen, sitting next to him on the bed.