Page 182 of Our Little Secret

Whoosh. The wind blew inside.

The fire burned bright for a second, fed with fresh air.

Frantically, she thought. She couldn’t be trapped up here. There was nowhere to hide. Even if she locked herself in the bathroom, he could break down the door.

He had an axe.

She had a knife.

Not good odds.

Shep let out a sharp bark.

What?

Then the dog started growling, and the thought of Gideon attacking Shep with the axe was too much. She ran down the stairs as she heard a yelp, then whimpering and the scrape of claws scrambling on hardwood.

“Stop!” she yelled over the whimpering. “Don’t you do anything to that dog!”

And she flung herself into the living room.

Which was empty, the coals of the dying fire casting a bloodred glow.

“Shep?” she said, then more loudly, “Shep!”

She spun around, bracing herself. Where was Gideon? Where was Shep?

Her pulse was pounding, adrenaline racing through her blood.

“Shep. Come!”

At the open back door she shouted into the night, “Shep, come!” Before she noticed the impressions in the snow. Not only paw prints running off the deck and into the surrounding forest, but fresh footprints in a direct path from the woodshed to the house.

She didn’t move a muscle

Shep’s name froze in her throat.

No human footprints were visible.

He hadn’t chased the dog.

Where was he?

Panic coursed through her.

She thought she heard the scrape of a footstep somewhere in the house behind her.

Muscles tensed, ready to spring, she slowly turned, her eyes searching the house with its eerie reddish glow. Was he standing in the umbra near the staircase? By the hutch in the dining room? In the darkness that was the kitchen?

Somewhere.

She couldn’t see.

But he was here.

She knew it.

Could feel him.