Der Schädelring: Thriller (German Edition)

been dropped. The faces in the passing cars showed no signs of comprehending the conflict of this particular scene. And the script, well, apparently the script could be rewritten at any time, to alter the opening scenes and therefore change the meaning of everything that came after. Even though the later scenes contained the exact same sequences and dialogue as before.
    As she left the office district and came to the outskirts of Elkwood, some of the tension fell away. Fewer cars closed her in, fewer traffic lights ordered her to stop. The trees were more numerous, and the colorful leaves provided momentary distractions from her rage and pain. By the time she pulled onto Buckeye Creek Road, she had almost convinced herself that the session had never happened, that the vision of her father's face beneath the hood was just one more misleading memory.
    She went straight to the phone.
    "Hello?"
    Good. He was home, probably watching golf on television, a Chivas Regal and coke sweating cold in his hand.
    "Hi, Mitchell, it's me."
    "Julia!" He sounded pleased to hear from her. She very rarely called him, and she felt a brief shiver of shame at her diffidence. After all, this man had stood by her through her adoptive parents' death, through her reluctance to offer her heart fully, through her budding disorder and relocation.
    "How are you doing?"
    "Fine, fine. Is something wrong? Your voice sounds strange."
    "I've just been busy. Absentminded. What's new with you?"
    "Nothing since the last time we talked, what, two days ago?"
    "The reason I called is . . . I'm coming down."
    " Here ? Hey, that's really great! I can't wait to see you," he added. "When are you coming?"
    "I hope I can get an afternoon flight."
    "Wow. That's short notice. You want me that badly, huh?"
    She couldn't tell if he were joking. "No, it's not like that, Mitchell. I'll be getting a room."
    Petulance entered his voice. "You should stay with me, honey. It's been months."
    She wondered if he’d managed to resist temptation in her absence. He was handsome and wealthy, the kind of big catch a lot of women were trolling for. But he sincerely seemed to be willing to wait to marry her. Predictable. She didn't deserve him. Perhaps no one did.
    "I need a favor from you," she said.
    "I can't figure you out."
    Neither can I . "Will you check with some of your contacts in the police department and the D.A.'s office?"
    "Look here, Julia. My friends are starting to think I'm weird, turning down dates with sweet, young, interested women so that I can save myself for you. And I'm starting to get tired of waiting. I mean, I love you, but–"
    "When you love somebody, you don't impose conditions," Julia said.
    "Where did you get that little nugget of wisdom? From one of your shrinks? As if you know the first thing about love."
    "Mitchell—"
    "Have you ever loved anybody, Julia? Besides yourself, I mean? And the little voices in your head?"
    "Mitchell, please don't get mad." Her voice cracked. "I'm trying—"
    "Jeez," he said, exasperated at her tears. Surrendering. "Okay. What do you want me to do?"
    Say you're sorry, for one thing.
    But she knew he wouldn't. Mitchell was never sorry. "Could you check around, see whatever happened with the investigation into my father's disappearance?"
    "Julia, we've been through that a hundred times. The case is dead. No leads. He just walked off the face of the earth. Why can't you let it go and get on with your life? Sometimes I think you wouldn't be so crazy if you left the past alone. Hooded men and all that crap."
    She squeezed the phone until her knuckles were white. Eight years. She'd known him nearly a third of her life. In those early years, they had made passionate love often, and she had unfolded like a flower beneath the sun of his affection. Then her problems had started, tiny paranoid thoughts, a nervous stomach, a sense that she had forgotten something important. Soon came the little surprises, the bad dreams, and the blame.
    Mitchell had encouraged her when she first started seeing Dr. Danner. He had already elaborately planned their future and saw therapy as only a minor detour on the road to their eternal bliss. Over the years, though, as he became more mercenary in his law practice, he'd grown stubborn and possessive, angry at her both for her weakness and for her refusal to marry him. He'd given her an obscenely large engagement ring that she kept in a safe-deposit box. What was scary was that she couldn't let him