I went to the bathroom. Brushed my teeth. With the light on, I checked the bedroom closet, to be sure no monsters were hiding there. I didn’t look under the bed, because once I was down on my hands and knees, I didn’t think I could stand up again. However, just to be sure, I found an old tennis ball in my nightstand drawer and rolled it under the bed frame. It came out the other side and bounced against the wall.

No one was there.

I knew what was wrong with me. It was Ajax. The body. The murder. The Ursulina. That was what had me alarmed. That was the bad moon rising.

Even so, I took no chances. When I closed the bedroom door, I took a chair from my makeup table and dragged it across the carpet and wedged it under the doorknob. No one could get in without making a hell of a noise. I also found my handgun on the closet shelf. I always kept the gun loaded and ready. Just in case. For months in the winter and spring, I’d slept with it under my pillow, but sometime during the hot summer, I’d felt confident enough to let it stay in the closet.

Not tonight.

I put it under my pillow again. With that protection in place, some of my anxiety began to ease. I felt a little foolish for letting my imagination run wild.

I began to get undressed. I took off my maternity blouse and bra and threw them into the laundry basket, and I let my oversize jeans fall to the floor, where I stepped out of them. In the closet, I found one of my nightshirts, sized like a bedsheet, and draped it over my body. The flannel was cool and loose.

All that was left were my socks, which always presented the biggest challenge, both on and off. I sat down on the bed and reached for my trusty yardstick, which I slid between my ankle and my left sock. I peeled it off and flicked it in the general direction of the laundry basket. I did the same with my right sock, but it stuck to the end of the yardstick and refused to be flicked. So I retrieved it with my hand.

That was when I noticed something odd.

The bottom of the sock was wet. I hadn’t realized it before, hadn’t noticed the dampness on my foot.

Why was my sock wet?

Yes, I’d gone outside, but the covered porch was dry.

I stared at the bedroom window again.

The rain had been blowing in while I was asleep in the living room. I’d stepped on the wet carpet while I was looking out at the backyard. I pushed myself off the bed and went to the window, and I let out a tiny sigh of relief when I confirmed that the carpet below the sash was damp.