Free Shadow Dragon by Lance Horton Page B

she sensed it had been something external—something out of the ordinary—that had interrupted her slumber.
    She lay perfectly still, straining to hear the sound of the patio door being rattled or the creaking of the stairs as someone approached. The house remained silent except for the sound of her throbbing pulse in her ears.
    There was a faint click as the thermostat in the hallway activated, and the familiar shush of air through the vents as the heater came on. She reached over to the nightstand and slid open the top drawer. After she groped about blindly for a moment, she placed her hand on the Smith & Wesson .38-caliber Lady Smith revolver she had purchased last week. It felt as heavy as an anvil when she lifted it from the drawer.
    With the gun held tenuously before her, she slowly made her way across the bedroom to the door. Cautiously, she peered down the upstairs hallway leading past the stairs to the other bedrooms and the guest bath at the far end. She stepped across the threshold and cringed as the floor creaked beneath her. She quickly padded into the guest bedroom to her left. Moonlight angled in from the window, spilling across the bed, bathing the room in muted shades of silvery-blue.
    She moved in front of the closet, her heart fluttering. She kept telling herself it was just her imagination, but she kept envisioning Bret crouching within, waiting to pounce on her the moment she opened the door.
    She jerked the door open.
    The closet was empty except for the bed linens, pillows, and the shoeboxes sitting on the shelves above the hanging rod. A few slinky evening dresses, which she no longer wore, hung limply above a shoe rack that contained a half dozen pairs of high-heeled dress shoes.
    After she waited for her heart to slow a bit, she continued her search. Finding the upstairs unoccupied, she knew it would be impossible for her to sleep without being certain that he wasn’t lurking downstairs. She stood at the top of the stairs and peered down into the darkness. Her legs dimpled with gooseflesh as she crept into the cooler air downstairs.
    At the bottom of the stairs, she paused to wipe her sweaty palm on her T-shirt. She turned to her right and moved down the short hall toward the front door and the study on the right. The LED-indicator lamps on the security keypad by the front door glowed green, indicating that all zones were secure. She stepped into the study, checking under the desk and in the closet.
    Nothing.
    In the living room, the dark shadows of the sofa, love seat, and overstuffed chair could be made out. She crept around the sofa, careful not to stub her toe on the wooden corner. She made her way around the squat chair toward the back door.
    The drapes hung slack and motionless before the window. She just knew that the moment she pulled back the curtains, she would find herself face-to-face with Bret, separated by nothing more than a thin plate of glass. It was a nightmare she had suffered since childhood, when she would wake in the middle of the night, terrified to look out the window above her bed, where she just knew the boogeyman was standing, peering down at her through the folds in the curtains.
    With a trembling hand, she reached out and jerked back the curtains.
    A figure stood before her in the dark.
    She yelped and nearly fired off a shot before she realized it was her own reflection in the dark glass.
    Carrie took a moment to catch her breath and to allow her racing heart to slow. She checked to make sure the broomstick was still in the track of the sliding glass door and then, with a weary sigh, pulled the curtains closed.
    Once safely back in bed, Carrie lay there, wide awake. In spite of her relief, she hated the fact that she had become so terrified. She felt foolish for letting her imagination get the best of her, but the emotional wounds she had suffered were still too fresh and too easily reopened to be forgotten. At times, she felt as if she had been skinned alive, left to