Free The Beast House by Richard Laymon Page B

she had no trouble fixing her hair up enough to look presentable.
    Leaning against the table’s edge, she studied her face in the mirror. Her eyes needed help. Definitely. They looked haggard and slightly dazed. With a conceal stick from her makeup bag, she covered the smudges under each eye. She darkened her feathery lashes with mascara, then brushed her lids with light blue shadow. A vast improvement.
    As she put on lipstick, she wondered why she hadn’t bothered to do all this before driving out to look for Dan. Well, she’d been in a hurry. And nervous. Maybe it was something else, though. Maybe it was simply that she thought he wouldn’t mind her scruffy appearance. Or maybe, deep down, she had somehow known she wouldn’t find him.
    She got up from the table. Its edge had left a crease like a long red scar just below her rib cage. She rubbed it as she carried the towel into the bathroom.
    She had already decided what to wear. Though she would have preferred slacks because of the chill outside, she’d made up her mind to wear a skirt instead. Rummaging through her suitcase, she took out what she needed. She stepped into fresh panties, hooked her garter belt around her hips, and sat on the bed to put on her nylons. She’d selected a blue tweed skirt. It wasn’t very summery but then, neither was the weather. Not at night, anyway. With the skirt on, she slipped into a wispy bra. Its silken feel made her nipples rigid. She drew a white cashmere sweater down over her head. It wasn’t thick enough to hide the jut of her nipples completely, but her only other white bra was in the bathroom waste basket. A black one might show through the sweater.
    “What the hell,” she muttered.
    With Nora at the same table, who would be looking at her anyway?
    Abe, that’s who.
    She felt a rather pleasant, nervous tremor. It stayed with her as she stepped into her heels, put a few necessities into a clutch purse—including her room key—and approached the connecting door.
    “Nora?” she called. “Left yet?”
    “Five minutes ago,” came the answering voice, followed by a guffaw. “Want to come through? My side’s already open.”
    Tyler pulled open her door. The room was a twin of her own. Nora was seated at the dressing table, changing her earrings. “I’m just about set,” she said. She had on the same green gown she had worn to last night’s banquet. With her low neckline and spaghetti straps, she looked considerably more formal than Tyler.
    “Going to a prom?” Tyler asked.
    Nora eyed her, grinning. “My, don’t you look preppy. Going to a frat dance?”
    “Call me Muffin.”
    “I just figured I might as well give the boys something to look at.”
    “Where’s Jack going to pin your corsage?”
    “To my boobie, darling.” Finished with her earrings, she took a white, cable-knit shawl off the bed, wrapped it around her shoulders, and picked up a purse that matched her gown. “Shall we be off?”
    Outside, the breeze was mild. The sun felt much warmer than Tyler had expected. It hung above the distant treetops, blazing into her eyes. She lowered her head and watched her shoes move over the courtyard’s asphalt. “What time is it?” she asked.
    “About five thirty. The tail end of the Happy Hour.”
    “I hope Abe and Jack are the patient type.”
    “We’re well worth waiting for.”
    “Right.” She hesitated. “I’ve been thinking.”
    “What?”
    “I’m not sure about all this business…looking for Dan, digging up the past. Maybe it’d be better to call it off.”
    “Getting the jitters?”
    “I’ve had the jitters all along. But nothing’s been going right, you know? It’s almost as if I’m not meant to find him.”
    “Meant? That’s a cop-out.”
    “And if I do find him, and if he’s not married or something, who’s to say we’re still…I don’t know, the same people? I know I’m not. He’s probably changed, too.”
    “No harm in giving it a shot.”
    “Isn’t there? I