Der Schädelring: Thriller (German Edition)

go, couldn't grant both of them their freedom. This was love held hostage, love with a gun to its head, love in a straitjacket.
    "Will you do it for me?" Julia asked when she had regained control of herself. She didn't want to prostitute herself by tempting him with her flesh when her heart and mind wasn’t fully ready, but she could appeal to his ego. "You know how to get things done. People jump when you call, Mitchell."
    "Well, I'll give it a try.” He sounded mildly assuaged. “No promises, though.”
    "Thanks, Mitchell. I'll call when I get in to Memphis International."
    "Can we at least have dinner together?"
    "I'd like that," she said. And she realized she did look forward to seeing him. Mitchell had helped her get through the car-crash death of her adoptive parents, providing moral support in his own domineering, Leonine way. Sometimes she wished she could adopt more of his philosophy, just give in and be his country club ornament, the one who completed his image of the successful young professional.
    "See you in a few hours," she said. "Bye."
    She made flight reservations and took a shower. Her suitcase was nearly packed when she heard a knock on the front door. She tightened her bathrobe and went to the living room,  peering through the crack in the curtains. Walter's Jeep was parked at the curb.
    She hadn't called Mr. Webster about any repairs. What was the handyman doing here?
    "Hello?" she called from behind the closed front door. Perhaps she should have waited to see what he would do first. If he were a Creep, he might try to break in one of the windows. Then she remembered that he probably still had the key to her house, the one he had gotten from Mister Webster.
    "Hello, Miss Stone?"
    He could come right in if he wanted, and she couldn't do a thing about it. She considered what Mabel Covington had said about Walter’s wife.
    She glanced at the phone. The cops might need fifteen or twenty minutes to respond to a call this far from town. Plenty of time for Walter to do whatever he had in mind, unless he was one of those meticulous Creeps, the kind who liked to slowly peel his victims like ripe peaches—
    She pressed her fist to her forehead.
    "Miss Stone?" Walter repeated.
    "What is it?" she asked, careful to control her voice, trying to sound unconcerned.
    "I was just on my way into town, and I had something I thought you might like."
    A knife to the throat, maybe? Or a screwdriver punching me a third eye socket? Or whatever you did to your wife when you took her to the woods on Cracker Knob?
    In jurisprudence, suspects were innocent until proven guilty.
    Julia remembered the kindness with which he’d treated her.
    "Hold on a second," she called.
    She glanced at the phone, decided against it, went to the bedroom and slipped off the robe. As she slid into a T-shirt and jumper, she thought she heard something bump against the window. The glass was misted from the shower's steam, so she saw nothing. She collected the mace from her purse and held it behind her back, and then returned to the door and opened it.
    Walter stood off the edge of the stoop, by the snowball bush. He looked ill at ease, without his baseball cap and wearing a short-sleeved knit shirt instead of his usual flannel. Like a starched golfer instead of a carpenter.
    "Sorry to drop by unexpected," he said, his cheeks crinkling as he tried to smile.
    Julia pushed her wet hair behind her shoulders. "Is something broken that I don't know about?"
    "Uh, no. I was just passing by, and I thought of you."
    "The electricity has been fine," she said. Did Elkwood handymen drop by to check up on their work? Was that another of the maddening unwritten rules of mountain pride, along with extending invitations to church?
    "Good. Wouldn't want the house to catch on fire."
    "Thanks for checking," she said. "But I'm afraid I'm in a hurry. I've got to make a flight."
    Walter nodded, the smile frozen on his face, squinting in the day's brightness. "Where you fixing to go?"
    "Memphis."
    "Oh. Old friends, I guess."
    "Something like that."
    "I won't keep you, then. I brought something I thought you might like." He pulled an envelope from the rear pocket of his jeans and gave it to her.
    Julia looked across the street to the apartments, and then shifted her gaze to Mrs. Covington's house. She peeled back the flap and peered inside the envelope, expecting one of those cartoonish Bible tracts that showed the car-crash victim wandering through the flaming