But Mavis left these dark thoughts in the car wash.

Her mind, like the car, was squeaky clean.

11

A Woman's Work

MARTIN SAT UP abruptly in the dead of night. Something had woken him. A sound, though he couldn't tell if it had been in his dream or in the room with him.

He drew his knees up in a panic, the sort of thing he would have done as a little kid, terrified of the monster under the bed. What better setting for it than his childhood bedroom?

Only the monster wasn't under the bed this time. Barclay was miles behind them, hiding in some abandoned building or rain-choked grotto, biding his time for the manhunt to die down to begin a hunt of his own.

We're safe here, he thought. Sheila wouldn't have said it if she didn't believe it. We're safe.

A floorboard creaked, startling him. The same sound that woke him. He peered into the semi-dark.

Stacked boxes. The closet door open, dark and full of old shoes and clothes on hangers. Was it open when he drifted off to sleep? No clue. It was open now and he couldn't see a damn thing in all that dark.

He took a deep breath. Old houses made noises all the time. Random creaks, snaps and groans. Like an elderly person without the gas.

Another creak. He rolled to his side, eyes wide in panic, heart thumping. Lying there in his boxers on the too-small bed with the Glock tucked away in the glove compartment of his Lexus he was entirely at the mercy of anyone who could have come creeping into the house in the dead of night.

Aunt Norma's Them? The old woman from the night of the fire, come back to finish the job after all these years?

The hall door stood open. He was sure he'd closed it.

The sound came from there.

He laughed at himself, mostly to bolster his own courage. Someone must have woke to use the bathroom. He waited for subsequent footsteps, heart pounding in his ears. The wind howled outside, rattling the windows. Otherwise, the house stood silent.

A dark shape in the corner of the room moved. He blinked furiously, praying for his eyes to adjust. Finally he saw her, hunched within her nightgown and ghostly pale. An apparition in the moonlight.

"Ma? What are you doing up? How did you get in here?"

The old woman said nothing. She shivered. He heard her hurried breath. Her teeth chattering.

He pulled off the covers. "Ma, are you okay?"

She ran at him, bare feet thumping, impossibly fast. Swinging out with one seemingly feeble arm, she cast aside boxes until she reached the foot of the bed.

He drew back and bumped his head hard against the wall, hard enough to see stars, to bite his tongue again and taste fresh blood. She leaped at him, gnashing her teeth, her withered fingers gnarled into claws.

He reached out instinctively with his right hand to hold her back, pressing his palms against her collarbones. Not wanting to hurt her. Only to protect himself.