Chapter 43

She regained consciousness hearing Paul’s voice in the living room. Groggily, she sat up, rose weakly and painfully to her feet, struggling to pull up her pants.

She had to get out, get away…She heard the front door slam. He was coming back.

She fled into the bathroom, stepped behind the door, flattened herself into the wall, squeezed her eyes shut as he came toward her and into the room. She heard the thud of his footsteps running into the living room.

Sidling out from behind the door she decided she would make a run for it, get past him and out on the street. She heard his footsteps again, coming toward her, and she retreated again.

There was a jingling sound: keys. And his footsteps running into the living room, the slam of the front door.

He thinks I’ve left.

She was out of the bathroom, pulling a sweater from a drawer. She heard his car start. She ran into the living room, seizing her purse as she fled out the patio door. Hearing his car roar down the driveway she let herself into the garage from the backyard door.

He would look for her on the street and soon know she was here. He would he back. She had to get away now, get away from him...

She pulled the sweater down over her head, jamming her arms into the sleeves. With one shaking hand supporting the other she unlocked the car, inserted the key into the ignition. She hacked out heedlessly, striking the garage door that was slowly descending after Paul’s departure, and skidded off the driveway into the Robinsons’ front yard. She glimpsed Jerry Robinson’s stupefied face, saw him dash across his yard as if she were coming after him. Reaching the street, she straightened the car and floored the accelerator, the tires spinning and shrieking, the smell of burned rubber in her nostrils. She careened around the corner, braked sharply at the sight of slow-moving taillights. Twisting the wheel violently to turn around, she skidded across the intersection. The car behind her had stopped, was beginning to turn; it was Paul’s gray Buick. Again she floored the accelerator. The car leaped ahead on the empty street.

She sped up and down streets devoid of traffic on this early Sunday evening, too terrified to look in the rearview mirror, zigzagging erratically until her vision was caught by a green freeway sign. She roared up the on-ramp, knowing that other cars were her best concealment. Finding the courage to look in the rearview mirror, she drove an outside lane of the Ventura Freeway, exiting several miles later.

Taking a circuitous route, she drove to Val’s flat, circled the block, parked two blocks away.

Glancing fearfully around for any sign of Paul or his car, she walked the two blocks.

Val answered her knock. Carolyn stepped over the threshold and collapsed.

Date: 2015-02-03; view: 538