Another panic hit her as she thought of the keys. Then she felt them in
a pocket of her jeans, where she had slipped them last night after using
the bathroom at the farmhouse. One key for the farmhouse, one key for
his house in Laguna Niguel, two keys for the car, all on a simple
brass-bead chain.
She threw the purse and tablet into the back seat and got behind the
wheel, but didn’t close the door for fear the sound would wake him.
She was not home free yet. He might burst out of the windmill, The
Enemy in charge of him, leap across the short expanse of gravel, and
drag her from the car.
Her hands shook as she fumbled with the keys. She had trouble inserting
the right one in the ignition. But then she got it in, twisted it, put
her foot on the accelerator, and almost sobbed with relief when the
engine turned over with a roar.
She yanked the door shut, threw the Ford in reverse, and backed along
the gravel path that circled the pond. The wheels spun up a hail of
gravel, which rattled against the back of the car as she reversed into
it.
When she reached the area between the barn and the house, where she
could turn around and head out of the driveway front-first, she jammed
on the brakes instead. She stared at the windmill, which was now on the
far side of the water.
She had nowhere to run. Wherever she went, he would find her. He could
see the future, at least to some extent, if not as vividly or in as much
detail as The Friend had claimed. He could transform drywall into a
monstrous living organism, change limestone into a transparent substance
filled with whirling light, project a beast of hideous design into her
dreams and into the doorway of her motel, track her, find her, trap her.
He had drawn her into his mad fantasy and most likely still wanted her
to play out her role in it. The Friend in Jim-and Jim himself might let
her go. But the third personality-the murderous part of him, The
Enemy-would want her blood. Maybe she would be fortunate, and maybe the
two benign thirds of him would prevent the other third from taking
control and coming after her. But she doubted it. Besides, she could
not spend the rest of her life waiting for a wall to bulge outward
unexpectedly, form into a mouth, and bite her hand off And there was one
other problem.
She could not abandon him. He needed her.
Part THREE From childhood s hour I have not been As others were I have
not seen As others saw.
Alone, F,Edgar ALLAN POE Vzbratzons in a wzre.
Ice crystals in a beatzng heart.
Cold fire.
A mind s frzgzdzty: frozen steel, dark rage morbzdity.
Cold fire Defense against a cruel life death and strzfe: Cold fire.
-that. HOOK OF counted SOHROWS
THE REST OF AUGUST 29 Holly sat in the Ford, staring at the old
windmill, scared and exhilarated.
The exhilaration surprised her. Maybe she felt upbeat because for the
first time in her life she had found something to which she was willing
to commit herself Not a casual commitment, either. Not an
until-I-get-bored commitment. She was willing to put her life on the
line for this, for Jim and what he could become if he could be healed,
for what they could become together.
Even if he had told her she could go, and even if she had felt that his
release of her was sincere, she would not have abandoned him.
He was her salvation. And she was his.
The mill stood sentinel against the ashen sky. Jim had not appeared at
the door. Perhaps he had not yet awakened.
There were still many mysteries within this mystery, but so much was
painfully obvious now. He sometimes failed to save people-like Susie
Jawolski’s father-because he was not really operating on behalf of an
infallible god or a prescient alien; he was acting on his own phenomenal
but imperfect visions; he was just a man, special but only a man, and