“Not that sort of anything. She could do anything that was hard, that took a lot of work, anything she set her mind to, she would do that thing.”

“Could she be a movie star?”

“Yes.”

“Could she be a hot dog person who sells hot dogs?”

“Yes, she could.”

“And would there be any dragons? Would there be dragons chasing her and trying to get her?”

Miranda wrapped her arms around Katie, brought her in close to her, felt the rhythm of her heart coming into beat with her own, her curls against her cheek, and she put her mouth to Katie’s ear.

“No dragons,” she whispered. “No more dragons.”

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks, once again, to my agent Helen Heller, and Irwyn Applebaum, Nita Taublib, and Danielle Perez at Bantam Dell for their continued support.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

LINWOOD BARCLAY is the author of Bad Move, Bad Guys, and Lone Wolf. He is a columnist for the Toronto Star and lives with his family near Toronto.

NO TIME FOR GOODBYE

You wake up to an empty house.

Everyone you love has disappeared without a trace.

You will never see your family again.

And you had…

NO TIME FOR GOODBYE

Don’t miss
Linwood Barclay’s
next novel.

Available in hardcover from
Bantam Books in October 2007

Please turn the page for a preview.

MAY 1983

No Time for Goodbye On sale October 2007

MAY 1983

WHEN CYNTHIA WOKE UP, it was so quiet in the house she thought it must be Saturday.

If only.

If there’d ever been a day that she needed to be a Saturday, to be anything but a school day, this was it. Her stomach was still doing the occasional somersault, her head was full of cement, and it took some effort to keep it from falling forward or onto her shoulders.

Jesus, what the hell was that in the wastepaper basket next to the bed? She couldn’t even remember throwing up in the night, but if you were looking for evidence, there it was.

She had to deal with this first, before her parents came in. Cynthia got to her feet, wobbled a moment, grabbed the small plastic container with one hand and opened her bedroom door a crack with the other. There was no one in the hall, so she slipped past the open doors of her brother’s and parents’ bedrooms and into the bathroom, closing the door and locking it behind her.