Free In Their Blood by Sharon Potts Page A

got chemistry.” He hesitated, as though he was going to kiss her, then stood back. “So I’ll see you around.”
    “Yeah.”
    Her friends had left their perches in the quad and were coming toward her.
    “And thanks,” Carlos said.
    “For what?”
    “For not ratting me out.”
    She wanted to ask him what he was talking about, but herfriends were swarming around her. “Poor baby.” Megan held out her arms. “Poor, poor baby.”
    Elise returned home a little after three, and got out of her silver Volvo, not even sure how the car had driven itself from school. Autopilot— she was on autopilot. Flora’s car was gone. Elise remembered the housekeeper had said she was leaving early today for a doctor’s appointment.
    She unlocked the front door. Her uncle had had the locks changed, but as she pushed the door open, her heart made a strange hiccup. Something told her to expect darkness, silence, an unfamiliar smell, a standing shadow. Like in her dream. And for an instant, she wanted to turn and run. But the foyer was brightly lit, classical music playing in the background. Geezer, lying by the entranceway table, wagged his tail but didn’t get up.
    Elise stepped back out on the front stoop, closing the door, but not locking it. She tried to steady her trembling. Why was she doing this? Why was she making herself relive the worst moment of her life? But that night was a black hole to her. That’s all she could see. Blackness. But there was something else. She knew there was something else.
    She remembered putting her key in the lock. But it hadn’t turned. It was already open. And she’d pushed on the door.
    She did it now. Pushing the door, trying to imagine the darkness, the silence, the smell, the shadow. But it didn’t work. She saw only the brightly lit foyer, the photos on the wall, the empty vase on the entranceway table, Geezer watching her.
    They’d left their luggage on the floor of the foyer that night. In a pile with their laptops and winter coats. The burglar had taken the laptops, her uncle had said.
    The burglar. But it hadn’t been a burglar. She knew at a gut level it couldn’t have been a burglar.
    The unlocked door. The laptops. Nothing else taken.
    Someone had planned to kill them. A voice in her head kept telling her so. It spoke to her in her sleep.
    It was the same voice that accused her. A soft voice, like an echo. Why did you disobey your parents? How could you have left them alone? Alone to be killed?
    But what if she’d stayed home instead of sneaking out? She’d be dead herself, wouldn’t she? Would that have been better? Sometimes, she wished it were so. At least she wouldn’t feel this pain. A pain that wouldn’t go away. But she hadn’t been home that night. And now she was here, alive, in this world. Could her living have some purpose?
    Like to find whoever had done this terrible, terrible thing?
    She ran up the stairs to her mother’s office. In here. There must be something in here. But what? What was she looking for?
    The blinds were partially closed and the outside light cast thin white lines over the desk, the walls, the small area rug. Her mother’s scent pulled Elise into the room. The same scent was on her mother’s tee shirt. The one Elise had found in the downstairs closet with three teardrops of blood. Her mother had worn it the day they came home from Madrid and Elise slept in it every night.
    She sniffed the room hungrily. If she closed her eyes— but no. She wasn’t going to do that now. She’d hold the memories for later. She focused instead on the details.
    On top of the desk were a Tiffany lamp, desk blotter calendar, paperweight, family photos, crystal clock, printer, and a docking station. No computer. Her mother had used only her laptop and brought it back and forth between home and work. Her dad had done the same. So with their laptops stolen, there was no way of knowing if either of them had anything on their computers that might lead Elise to the