Hemlock Bay

heels down the trail and landed hard at the bottom, not moving. His gun. His gun was her only chance. She’d seen it flying. She ran to his side in an instant. She picked up a big piece of driftwood, realized it was soggy and not heavy enough, and grabbed up a rock instead. She leaned over him and brought the rock down on his head as hard as she could. She slipped her hand inside his coat and pulled out his wallet. She shoved it into her pocket, then saw the gun some six feet back up the trail, just off to the side, lying on top of a pile of rocks.
    The man on top was yelling, firing, but she ignored him. She got the gun, turned, and ran for all she was worth down the beach.

    Washington, D.C.

    Savich felt his heart pounding faster beneath his wife’s palm. He shot up, turned on the bedside lamp, then faced her. “Tell me.”
    “I remember being scared for you when I saw you go into that conference room. Then I’m sure I saw Timmy Tuttle dragging Marilyn into that security room across the hall. I ran into the room, the three other agents behind me. The room was empty. At least that’s what I thought at first.
    “I saw this bright light, Dillon. It nearly blinded me, and I swear to you, for some reason I just couldn’t move. The light was right in front of that big window, and I know I saw Timmy and Marilyn in the middle of that light.
    “I could hear the other agents yelling at each other. I realized they weren’t seeing what I was. Still I couldn’t move. I was just nailed to the spot looking at that white light. Then Timmy Tuttle grabbed Marilyn tight around her neck, and . . .”
    “And what?”
    “Dillon, I’m not crazy, I swear.”
    He pulled her against him. “I know.”
    “They just disappeared. It was like they were right in front of me, then they were in front of the window, and the window was bathed in the white light. Then they receded through that white light until they were gone. Then everything just seemed to close down. That’s all I remember.”
    Savich said, “That’s just fine, Sherlock. Well done. It fits right into the rest of it. It seems logical to everyone that Tammy Tuttle used some sort of mass hypnosis. You know how David Copperfield walked through the Great Wall of China? How he got sawed in half with millions of people watching, most of them on TV?”
    “Yes. You think Tammy has this skill?”
    “It makes sense. There she or he was with Marilyn, and then she or he just wasn’t there. I think the whole thing was this big performance that she worked out to show us that we are dealing with a master. You know what else I think? I think Tammy knew I was trying to trap her and using Marilyn as bait. She knew we’d be at the airport waiting for her. She was ready for us. I also think she really wants us to believe that everything we saw was supernatural, beyond our meager brains. But it’s not. She’s just very, very good. She wanted to scare us all to death, paralyze us. I do wonder, though, why she didn’t try to kill me.”
    Sherlock pulled away, stroked her fingers over his jaw, and said, “I think it’s because she couldn’t get close enough to you. I’ve given this a lot of thought, Dillon, and I think you’re one of the few people Tammy’s ever met whom she can’t hypnotize or perform an illusion for when she’s up close to you. And if she can’t get close to you without your seeing exactly what she is, then she can’t kill you.”
    “You mean if I had been close to her, I wouldn’t have seen Timmy, I’d have really seen Tammy?”
    “Yes, it sounds reasonable. If she can’t get close enough to you without your seeing her exactly as she is, then she knows she’s at a disadvantage. When you were in the barn in Maryland with her, how far away were you standing from her?”
    “Maybe two dozen feet.”
    “And she was always just what she was? Tammy Tuttle?”
    “Yes. She called the Ghouls, but she didn’t change. When I shot her, I saw the bullet nearly rip her arm from her body. I saw her fall, heard her yells of pain. She remained exactly what she was and who she was.”
    Sherlock said, “Then at the airport, she just couldn’t get close enough to you to kill you. And she realized, too, that she couldn’t get too close or you’d see her as she really is and kill her. She’s being really careful after what you did to her at the barn.”
    Savich said, “Jimmy Maitland called me at the gym, told me that Jane Bitt in Behavioral Sciences allowed