BY FRIDAY, Matt felt confident to make his move. The Techer routine was simple. David went to work each day at eight o’clock, although he came home at odd hours. He could be back by six in the evening, or stay out as late as midnight. Had Matt not been so preoccupied, he would have followed David. Probably the creep was banging one of his secretaries. Matt fantasized of taking pictures and mailing them to Amy. It was possible there would be time for that later. Amy’s pain need not emanate from one source alone.

The point was that David was gone all day. Amy and the baby’s timetable also appeared set. She did indeed have a nanny, but the woman only came in the morning to help with the child. Even then Amy was usually with her son. There was no question she was an excellent mother, that she poured her heart into her baby. The nanny would leave at one sharp and Amy would breast-feed the infant and put him down to rest and then take a nap herself. But as far as Matt could tell, Amy never slept in the same room as her son. For an hour each afternoon they were separated by a distance of two rooms. If she did happen to go out, nap time was always late in the afternoon.

While stalking them before he had jumped out of the plane, Matt had never paid attention to the neighbors behind David and Amy. He had always figured when the big day came he would climb their front gate. But these neighbors were never home in the daytime. He decided their front and back walls would be the best point of entry. True, the stone walls were high but the twenty-foot aluminum ladder he had just purchased from Home Depot would take care of that. Of course walking down the street with a ladder under his arm would look suspicious, but a can of paint in the other hand would allay most doubts. Plus, when he left the house, he could leave the ladder. Gloves would take care of any fingerprints.

Friday looked perfect and he was psyched but a team of gardeners showed up and he had to swallow his nerves and wait until Monday. That weekend was one of the longest of his life. When he was not in his motel room, he drove into the Santa Monica Mountains and hiked until his legs crumbled. He kept worrying—what if Amy woke up when he was in the house? What would he do to her?