“I’m home,” she told him simply.

“Terry?”

“Who else?”

“Quickest job you ever had, I’ll bet,” he said. “What happened?”

“You’d better come over, I think. I’ll tell you all the gory details when you’re here. We’ll have to puzzle it out.”

“I’m finishing up some stuff,” he said.

“How soon will you be through?”

“Soon as I can make it. I’ll hustle right over,” he said and hung up.

While she waited she changed her clothes again, getting out of the gown and into something less dressy, a polo shirt and a pair of black toreador pants. Then she settled down impatiently to wait for Lowry’s arrival. Less than an hour went by, and then there was a knock at the door.

“You finished up your work fast enough,” she said as she opened the door.

Then she gasped.

It wasn’t Lowry.

It was Carrol.

He stood in the doorway, big and menacing-looking. She started to shut the door on him, an automatic reflex. But he grabbed it and pushed it open again. He shouldered his way past her into the apartment and closed the door behind him.

“You ain’t the only one who moves fast, sister,” he said with an ugly grin.

“How did you get here? What do you want?” The questions tumbled off Terry’s lips.

“The cabbie was back at his stand in no time, if you really have to know. He didn’t mind another long fare. Sit down and relax,” Carrol invited.

“What do you want?” Terry repeated.

“I want to know what you wanted. Sit down, I said.” It wasn’t an invitation this time, it was a blunt command. Frightened, Terry backed up until she reached the high-backed chair, and she sat down in it. He plumped down on the divan and calmly lit a cigarette. His gaze rested on the fabric of her tight polo shirt, taut against the interesting contours of her breasts.

He said, “I almost spotted you—but not quite. Who sent you?”

“I don’t know what on earth you’re talking about,” Terry said.

Carrol slid forward to the edge of the divan. The glint in his eyes told the girl that he would very likely be interested in finishing his interrupted attempt at raping her. She shuddered in disgust at the idea of any kind of intimate contact with this man.

He said, “We won’t get any place that way. From what I heard, you had trouble on your mind. I don’t like trouble, do you understand?”

“Please leave me alone.”

“I said I don’t like trouble. Now, what’s up? If you want to know something, why don’t you ask me? Maybe I can tell you.”

She said nothing. His glance slowly moved up her body and then wandered away, coming to rest on the framed photograph of McKay. His face grew hard.