It was like being woken from a dream. One moment Tammy had been staring into Zeffer’s stricken face, while the men closed in on him from behind, and the sky seethed overhead. The next the door had shut this terrible vision out, and she was back in the little hallway with Todd at her side.
The sight of Zeffer’s execution had momentarily distracted Katya from any further mischief. She was simply staring at the door as though she could see through it to the horror on the other side.
Tammy didn’t give her a chance to snap out of the trance. She started up the stairs, pulling Todd after her.
“Christ … ” Todd muttered to himself. “Christ oh Christ oh Christ … ”
Five stairs up, Tammy chanced a backward glance, but Katya was still standing in front of the door.
What was she thinking, Tammy wondered. What have I done? Did a woman like that ever think ‘what have I done’? With Zeffer gone, she would be alone in Coldheart Canyon. Alone with the dead. Not a pretty prospect.
Perhaps she was regretting. Just a little.
And while she regretted, (if regretting was what she was doing) Tammy continued to haul Todd after her up the stairs.
Six steps now; seven, eight, nine.
Now the escapees were on the half-landing. Through the window off to their left Tammy could see the sight that had held Zeffer’s attention just minutes before: the occupants of Coldheart Canyon pressing against the glass.
Why didn’t they simply break in, she wondered? They weren’t, after all, insubstantial. They had weight, they had force. If they wanted to get in so badly, why didn’t they simply break the glass or splinter the doors?
The question went from her head the next instant, driven out by a wail of demand from below.
“Todd?”
It was Katya, of course. She had finally stirred from her fugue state and was coming up the stairs after them. Speaking in her sweetest voice. Her come-hither voice.
“Todd, where are you going?”
Tammy felt nauseous. Katya could still do them harm. She still had power over Todd and she knew it. That was why she put on that little girl questioning voice.
“Todd?” Katya said again. “Wait, darling.”
If she let go of him, Tammy guessed, he would obey Katya’s request. And then they’d be lost. Katya would never let him go. She’d kill him rather than let him escape her a second time.
There wasn’t much advice Tammy could give to Todd except: “Don’t look back.”
He glanced at her, his expression plaintive. It made her feel as though she were leading a child rather than a grown man.
“We can’t just leave her here,” he said.
“After what she just did!”
“Don’t listen to her,” Katya said, her voice suddenly a siren-song, the little-girl lightness erased in favor of something more velvety. “She just wants you for herself.”
Todd frowned.
“You can’t leave me, Todd.”
And then more softly still: “I won’t let you leave me.”
“Just remember what she did down there,” Tammy said to Todd.
“Zeffer was a nuisance,” Katya said. She was getting closer, Tammy knew; her voice had dropped to a sultry murmur. “I never loved him, Todd. You know that. He hung around causing trouble. Listen to me. You don’t want to go with this woman. Look at her, then look at me. See what a choice you’re making.”
Tammy half-expected Todd to obey Katya’s instruction. But Todd simply studied the stairs as they climbed, which under the circumstances was a minor triumph. Perhaps he still had the will-power in him to resist Katya, Tammy thought. He wasn’t her object yet.
Even so the murdering bitch wasn’t ready to give up.
“Todd?” Katya said, now casual, as though none of this was of any great significance. “Will you turn round for a moment? Just for a moment? Please. I want to see your face before you go. That’s not asking much, now is it? Just one more time. I can’t bear it. Please. Todd … I … can’t … bear it.”
Oh Lord, Tammy thought, she’s turning on the tears. She knew how potent a well-timed flood of tears could be. Her sister had always been very quick to turn on the waterworks when she wanted something; and it had usually done the trick.