Page 50 of Call Off the Dark

“Mugged? You got mugged?”

“It’s a good thing I had my bank card in my shoe. They took my bag. I was mugged at knifepoint today.”

Blood on a pale blue T-shirt.

Isaac continued, “You were actually the second person to threaten me with a knife today.”

A pool of red soaking into the carpet.

Isaac took in Helen’s stricken expression. “Helen, I was just trying to tease you.”

“Did it happen near here?”

“Oh.” He gave her a reassuring look. “No. It was early this morning. A hundred miles from here. Don’t worry. There’s no madman wandering these parts.”

He smiled at her, but she couldn’t bring herself to smile back. There were people who roamed this earth who would take knives to the flesh of other people, rip loved ones from each other, and all for what? Stuff. Money. Pointless, meaningless things.

“You don’t laugh much, do you, Helen?”

“I used to all the time.”

“And then one day you stopped?”

“That’s right. One day I stopped. I’ll get you something more comfortable for sleeping.”

Helen left the room. It was that, or start sobbing.

Chapter Nineteen

Twenty-three months, four days, and eighteen hours ago

Not all love stories end happily ever after.

It was the middle of a November night, and there were empty Chinese food takeout boxes littering the kitchen counter inside the Seattle apartment that Helen shared with Tyler.

In the living room, there were two empty wineglasses sitting on the coffee table. A miniature half-eaten cake was still inside the bakery box. Two forks rested nearby, white frosting hardened on their tines.

Evil things aren’t supposed to happen to you when there’s rainbow chip cake on the coffee table.

Tyler was happy, and he was asleep.

Helen was happy, and she was asleep.

Looking back on that fated night, Helen would wonder if she’d heard something and that was the reason she’d awoken. But in the actual moment, it seemed she’d simply drifted far enough out of her dream state to recognize that she needed to use the bathroom.

Oblivious to the danger lurking, she padded half-asleep out of the bedroom and down the hall. She was wearing a long pink T-shirt that said Sometimes I pretend to be normal on it.

Inside the bathroom, she filled a glass of water and sipped it. That’s when she heard a noise that sounded like it was coming from the living room. Several months earlier, they’d had a mouse in the apartment. She hoped it wasn’t a damn mouse again. She set the glass on the bathroom counter and stepped into the hallway.

There was a shuffling sound coming from the living area, and a chill moved through her body. She peered toward the hallway entrance that revealed the edge of the living room, where the carpet ended and the tiles of the foyer that led to the kitchen began.

Soft thumps, as if someone was walking on the carpet.

Helen took one careful step back toward the bedroom, caught between staying frozen and retreating. If a person were to cross the threshold from the living room to the kitchen, they may or may not notice her standing fifteen feet down the hall in the darkness. She took another quiet step back.

And then a stocky figure appeared, facing away from her, a black ski mask covering his head.

In his hand, he held a large knife. The silver blade glinted in the soft light cast from the street through the window.