Dr. Don Tatum paced in the dark, pausing long enough to glance out his living room windows, where Chicago’s last snow clung to spots the sun didn’t reach during the day. He squinted, checking the street.
No dangerous figures moved around, but his neighborhood was supposed to be quiet during the first hours of a new day.
Standing inside this much glass gave him a nervous life-in-a-fishbowl feeling. Not good for high blood pressure.
He’d loved this house from the first minute he walked in, happy with all the windows for natural light and to have his entire living space on one level. He’d wanted simple and convenient.
No stairs to carry his bulk up and down.
No attic to shove junk in that should be thrown away.
No basement with leaks.
He’d gladly trade the entire house for a safe room in a basement right now. He smoothed his hand over the bald spot on the back of his head and it came back covered in perspiration. The heat was down low since his girls weren’t at home. Sweat pooled under the arm of the blue cotton shirt he still wore, but now it was untucked from his dress pants.
Streetlight glow from outside stretched from the palladium window over to the blue sofa, and fingered the middle of the rosewood coffee table.
The light gave him some measure of security, a defense against buried childhood fears of the infamous bogeyman, but Don worried about a real bogeyman.
He glanced at the square sandwich-size panel on the wall. Two tiny red LED lights peeked through the dark, assuring him the security system was on and ready should an intruder try to enter.
His two little girls were safe with his sister, who thought he was having the house exterminated. She lived in Alabama on a farm with no mailbox, no visitors. Good place to hide his children. She’d been the one person he could turn to after his wife died three months ago.
Tears stung his eyes. He missed his wife every day. Missed his best friend and only true love.
What would she think of him now?
If she was watching over them, she had to know he was doing whatever it took to keep their two girls safe.
Don had no idea why this strange guy had targeted him.
He had never crossed the law. Never drank or gambled, not even a lottery ticket. Why was this guy threatening him?
Don lifted a trembling hand to cover his mouth.
What about Abbie Blanton? She was Meredith’s daughter. Didn’t Abbie’s safety matter?
Maybe she was okay. The guy hadn’t said-
A floor creak spiked the silence.
Don stopped pacing next to the coffee table and swung his head to check the security panel.
No red lights. No green lights. No lights period.
“Hello, Dr. Don.” The dark figure he’d watched for outside walked across the middle of the living room toward Don, wearing all black, a skull’s face covering the stocking-cap front.
“How’d you get in here?” Don fought the urge to scream for help. He couldn’t. He’d been warned.
Calm down. His children couldn’t lose another parent.
“Let’s not waste time on ridiculous questions, shall we?”
Don detected a hint of a British accent in the man’s speech. He didn’t care where this wacko was from. “Who are you?”
“Jackson, like I told you last time we met.”
“I don’t understand any of this.” Don had never been in any financial trouble or had an enemy he knew of, no reason to be blackmailed into this if not for his children’s welfare. This guy hadn’t asked him to do anything really bad, just convince Abbie to go to the fund-raiser and talk to Gwen Wentworth. Don thought the guy was helping at first, supplying information about the Kore Women’s Center Abbie’s mother had visited and come home sick from.
Then this guy’s tone had changed. He’d warned Don to tell Abbie his exact words, to give her details he bullet-pointed verbally about the Kore center and make her believe Don was speaking from personal knowledge.
Don hadn’t seen any real danger in telling Abbie and even thought with Gwen’s help they might figure out what was wrong with Abbie’s mother.
But why had this wacko Jackson come to him and not Abbie?
Don bumped the coffee table with the back of his leg. He froze, nowhere to go. “I did what you said. I told Abbie exactly what you told me to say. She went to the party. She called on her way and asked a couple more questions so I know she went.”
“Yes, she did. I saw her at the Wentworth house.”
Relief charged through Don. He put a hand to his heart. “Thank God. So you’ll leave me alone now?”
“I promise to never come back here again.”
“Good. Good. I promise not to say a word, I swear it.” Don wiped a line of sweat off his forehead.
“I have no doubt you won’t say a word.” Jackson sliced across the room, stopping in front of Don. “Open your hand.”
Don complied, lifting his hand palm-up. “Why?”
“Take these.” The intruder dropped two pills in his hand.
When he realized what they were, Don looked up, shaking his head. “No, these will put me in cardiac arrest.”
“Precisely.”
“I did what you asked. You can’t do this. My kids just lost their mother. They need me.” His hand shook. The pills rolled back and forth.
“You have a choice. Take the pills or I’ll bring you the hearts of both your girls in a jar so you can remember them.”
Don started crying. “No, I did what you wanted. I did it. You can’t do this.”
“So is that a yes? You do want souvenirs of your children?” Jackson continued musing. “As long as I’m at your sister’s house, shall I bring her heart as well? I haven’t worked with my surgical blades in a while. Didn’t need them for your wife. You’ll be happy to know she died immediately in the collision. Boring, but efficient.”