InSight

your actions were above reproach when you recused yourself. Even if a relationship develops, I think vindication is in order.”
    Don’s evaluation lifted her spirits, at least for the moment. The complaint still weighed on her mind, and she worked late into the evening, burying herself in current files to free her mind. Stressed and tired, she almost fell asleep at her desk. Time to call it a night.
    She called for Daisy, who’d been in the back yard for the last hour. “Come on, girl.” She waited, leaning against the doorjamb. “Come, Daisy.” Abby was dead on her feet and wanted to go to bed. She whistled and cajoled, but still no Daisy.
    A noise in the far corner of the yard drew her attention. She never ventured past the chairs on the patio but knew the grassed area stretched almost thirty feet deep, enclosed on three sides by a high wooden fence attached to both ends of the house. A locked gate on the right side let the yardman enter with his key. The sound persisted, now identifiable as Daisy’s whimpering. What happened? Abby felt her way along the boxwood hedges bordering the house until she came to the fence.
    One foot in front of the other. Working her way around, she followed Daisy’s mewls as they grew louder.
    Thirty feet to the left corner. A splinter from the fence slivered into her finger. She barely felt it as she continued along, hugging the slatted enclosure. Daisy rustled in the grass, her whines more pronounced.
    Movement on the other side of the yard. Daisy expelled a warning growl and shifted in what sounded like an attempt to rise, followed by a grunt and a thud as she dropped to the ground.
    “I’m coming, Daisy. I’m almost there.” Then, another sound from farther back.
    “Who’s there?” Abby cocked her head to listen, but all she heard was her own heartbeat thundering in her ears. The fine hairs on Abby’s arms stood erect like sentries warning of impending danger, exactly like the day in her office building.
    Footsteps in the grass advanced toward her.
    Slowly.
    Deliberately.
    She stood pinned against the fence, ears pricked to the sounds.
    “Please answer me,” she said, her words no more than a whisper. “Why are you doing this? Tell me. Maybe we can solve the problem. If it’s something I’ve done…”
    But what? What can I do to make it right? Is that what I should say?
    Nothing she’d ever done merited this intrusion into her life. She wouldn’t beg, and she’d be damned before playing the role of victim again. She wanted to scream. But as she stood frozen, a Pompeii victim in her own yard, her vocal chords were as paralyzed as her body.
    The steps in the grass came closer.
    A shift in the airwaves. That indiscernible feeling someone sighted doesn’t notice but a blind person is conditioned to sense. To hear. The difference between a closed room and wide-open spaces. Whoever invaded her home came with a purpose, and he stood right in front of her. She felt his heat.
    And she smelled cloves.
    She wanted to push him aside and run, but who was she kidding? One thing running on a track with a guide, another on unfamiliar, uneven ground. Before she could say anything, a gloved hand reached around her throat and squeezed, trapping her words inside her. She pushed his hand away and started to scream, but he grabbed hold again, snickering under his breath. His other hand pressed hard against her mouth.
    “ Shhh ,” her tormenter whispered. “ Shhh .” The force of his body crushed her to the fence. Evil radiated from him, surrounding her like the devil’s fire. She looked straight at him, conjuring up an image of his height and the mass of his body, but not his face. Never his face. How safe he must feel, knowing she saw nothing more than the blackness of night.
    She tried to wriggle away, to raise her knee into his groin, but she couldn’t move, her strength no match to his. His hand tightened around her neck, cutting off her air supply. She drew a ragged breath into her lungs. Not enough to scream.
    His breathing rose and fell like someone in a deep sleep whose heart beat half the rate of hers. The pungent smell of cloves made her want to gag.
    She lunged at him, pushing her body off the fence with as much force as she could muster, but lack of oxygen rendered her light-headed, and her body went limp, supported only by his hands. Breathe. She was slipping away. It can’t end like this. Not like this. Breathe, Abby, breathe.
    He released the pressure on