Holding the Walther close to her shoulder, finger on the trigger, she stepped outside. Her heart was pounding as she moved toward the BMW, looking to one side and then the other. She went to the passenger door and looked in, relieved to see the shape of her bag on the seat.

No one had taken it. She was just paranoid and neurotic.

She grabbed the purse, but before she could pull back from the car, something caught her eye, something on the windshield on the driver’s side.

Lauren stepped back, slinging the strap of her bag over her shoulder. A piece of paper fluttered against the windshield, beneath the wiper blade. She looked around, adjusting her grip on the Walther. The wind seemed to slip inside her clothes and down her back.

She went around the hood of the BMW and snatched the paper off the windshield.

In the amber light from the sconces that flanked the garage doors she could tell it was a photograph. Black and white. Someone had come onto the property without her knowing and pinned a photograph beneath the wiper of her car.

She felt violated without even knowing what the subject of the photograph might be. She imagined she could feel someone’s eyes on her as she backed toward the garage, closer to the light. The shadows in the yard moved with the wind.

Lauren’s heart fluttered in her chest like a frightened bird. She didn’t dare to take her eyes off her surroundings and look at the photograph for more than a few seconds at a time.

A person. A person standing behind a car. Dark clothes. A dark cap.

Me.

Panic-stricken now, she walked backward as quickly as she could. Hurry, hurry, hurry. She felt as if a thousand eyes were chasing her as she went.

She fumbled with the doorknob, trying to turn it with the hand that held the photograph as she clutched the gun to her with the other. Tears blurred her vision. She was hyperventilating.

The knob turned and the door pushed in and Lauren almost tripped and fell in her haste to get inside and lock the door behind her. She banged into the console table, set the gun aside, and nearly upended a lamp in the attempt to turn it on.

Her hands were shaking like a palsy victim’s. She looked at the photograph again. It was her standing behind her car in the parking lot of the gun range.

Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God . . .

She turned around, looked out the windows, expecting to see a face staring in at her. There was no one there—not to be seen—but Lauren felt their eyes on her. She felt naked and exposed.