Bonnie frantically searched her memory for the first such occasion. "It was in the middle of the night. My brother had been over earlier. He'd made a spaghetti dinner," she said, the words tumbling out, her tongue tripping over them. "But n.o.body else got sick," she added quickly. "And my stepdaughter had been sick with the same sort of thing all week."

After Rod had helped with dinner, Bonnie remembered, a chill twisting through her body, like an electric shock. And Rod had been home the night Nick cooked his infamous spaghetti special. Was it possible he'd added some extra spice of his own?

She held her breath, trying desperately not to allow the thought circling her brain to land. Could it be that Rod and Nick were in it together? she asked herself when she could delay the question no longer. That together they'd conspired to kill Joan, just as they were conspiring to kill her now? That Lauren was at risk as well? Was it possible that everything her brother had said to her yesterday was a lie? That he had deceived her again, as he had been deceiving people all his life? "I have to go now, Dr. Kline."

"Mrs. Wheeler, you should be in a hospital. At the very least, you should contact the police immediately...."

Bonnie hung up the phone.

It couldn't be, she thought, rocking back and forth on the bed, trying to clear her head. She had to focus, get her thoughts in order, make some sense of what she had learned. She was being slowly poisoned, that much was clear. a.r.s.enic-found in any number of common household products. At first, the poison had been given to Lauren, either by accident or by design, as a way of averting suspicion, to make Bonnie think she was dealing with a simple case of the flu. And then she'd gotten sick. And stayed sick. Rod was always there, making sure she had enough liquids, making sure she drank her tea. He knew about her long-standing aversion to doctors.

But Rod had been away all the next week, and she hadn't gotten any better, even with the antibiotics, which meant she was probably still being poisoned. What did it mean? Was Josh somehow involved? And if he was, was he acting alone or was he working with Nick? Or with Rod? Possibly it was all three of them together.

"This is crazy," Bonnie moaned. "I'm thinking crazy."

What about Sam? Bonnie questioned with mounting horror, realizing that Sam was the one constant, the one person who was always around. He'd been so solicitous, making her tea, carrying bowls of soup to her bedside. It would have been relatively easy for him to add a little something unexpected to her food. Just as it would have been oh-so-easy for him to hide the snake, set it loose on her little girl.

"Oh G.o.d," Bonnie thought. "It can't be. It just can't be." Bonnie grabbed the phone, quickly dialed the Newton police. "Captain Mahoney, please," she said.

"I'm afraid the captain isn't in the station at the moment," came the response.

"Then let me speak to Detective Kritzic."

"I'm afraid she isn't here either. Perhaps someone else could help you."

"No, I'll have to call back." Bonnie dropped the phone into the receiver, stood up, sat back down, stood up again. She was running out of time. She had to get dressed and get out of here, she realized, running into her closet, pulling a blue jersey over her head and a pair of jeans over her hips, running out of the room. She didn't know where she was going. She didn't know what she was planning to do, but she had to get out of the house before anyone came back.

She'd stop by the day care center and pick up Amanda, take her.... where? She couldn't go to her father's house-Nick would be there. She couldn't go to Diana's house-Sam would be there. She couldn't go to Weston Secondary-Josh would be there. And she certainly couldn't stay here with Rod. She didn't know where to go. She didn't know whom she could trust.

She thought of Diana's apartment in the city and called Diana's office. Of course she'd let her use it. "Diana Perrin," Bonnie said clearly into the receiver.

"Ms. Perrin will be back in the office on Monday," Diana's secretary informed her. "If you'd care to leave your name...."

Bonnie slammed down the receiver. She didn't have time for this. She had to get out, go to the police station, hope Captain Mahoney and Detective Kritzic would be back. She grabbed her purse, feeling dizzy and weak, raced down the stairs, was almost at her front door when she realized she'd forgotten the bottle of soup.

It was hidden near the back of the fridge and at first, she didn't see it. It was only as she was closing the refrigerator door that she saw the tall bottle, with only a few inches left of the clear liquid inside it. She grabbed it, feeling it cold and slippery in the palm of her hand, and ran with it out the front door, almost losing her grip on it as she fished through her purse for her car keys. She found them, only to watch them tumble out of her fingers and fall to the driveway. "Oh no, please no," she wailed, grabbing for them and watching everything else fly from her hands, her purse, her house keys, her wallet, the gla.s.s bottle. "No!" she yelled, watching the bottle crash to the driveway and shatter, the clear liquid spilling onto the pavement and disappearing, like rain. "No, d.a.m.n it, no," she cried, bursting into tears as she knelt amid the large slivers of gla.s.s to retrieve her wallet and keys.

It was then that she heard the sound of a car approaching, slowing down, turning into the driveway. Rod was home, she understood. She'd waited too long. She wasn't going anywhere.

She closed her eyes, pushed herself slowly to her feet, heard the car stop and a door open, then slam shut. Footsteps walked toward her, stopped just inches from her face. The stale scent of marijuana encircled her. Only then did she open her eyes.

Haze stood before her.

Was he there to put a bullet through her heart?

"Sam home?" he asked without further preamble.

Bonnie found herself laughing out loud. Haze regarded her strangely, took a step back.

"He's at Diana's," Bonnie said, still laughing. "He wanted to finish papering her bathroom before the weekend."

"I'll find him," Haze said, climbing back into the ancient dark blue automobile and backing out of Bonnie's driveway.

For an instant, Bonnie stood paralyzed, unable to move, barely able to breathe. In the next second, she was in her car and on the road, her hands tightly gripping the steering wheel, heading toward School Street and her daughter, still not knowing what she was going to do when she got there.

29.

"Where are we going now, Mommy?" Amanda asked, fidgeting in her car seat. They'd stopped at a drugstore, where Bonnie bought Amanda a bag of potato chips and had the pharmacist call Dr. Kline. Fifteen minutes later, she had her prescription, and two pills were already traveling through her veins, trying to rout the poison in her blood.

"I thought we'd go for a drive, sweetie," Bonnie told Amanda, swiveling toward the back seat, smiling at her daughter, wondering if the smile looked as false as it felt. How long could she keep driving? she wondered. Sooner or later, they had to go somewhere.

"I don't want to go for a drive," Amanda protested. "I want to go home. I want to see Sesame Street."

"We can't go home yet, sweetheart. There are some things I have to do first."

"What things?"

Bonnie decided to go to the police. Less than ten minutes later, they were in Newton. "We have to stop here for a few minutes," Bonnie told Amanda, pulling her car into the parking lot at the back of the station.

"I don't want to go here." Amanda folded her arms across her chest, threatened tears.

"Please don't cry, sweetie. This won't take long."

"I want to go home. I want to watch Sesame Street."

Bonnie unbuckled Amanda's seat belt, lifted her from her seat, Amanda's body stiffening with indignation.

"Come on, honey. Please cooperate. I'm not feeling very well."

"I want to go home." Amanda started kicking her feet.

Bonnie carried her daughter, kicking and squirming, toward the front entrance.

"You're not nice," Amanda told her. "You're not cool."

"I need to talk to Captain Mahoney," Bonnie announced to the officer at the front desk, as Amanda fell mercifully silent.

The young male police officer stared at her with no trace of recognition. "He's not here right now. Can I help you?"

"Is Detective Kritzic here?"

"Not at the moment. What seems to be the problem?"

Bonnie lowered Amanda to the floor, then leaned forward toward the officer. "I'm being poisoned," she said.

Well, that was a colossal waste of time, Bonnie thought, angrily pulling out of the police parking lot, checking the digital clock. Over forty minutes gone, and for what? So some cynical pimply-faced youth barely out of high school could ask her a bunch of inane questions, only to tell her that since the alledged poisoning took place in Weston, it was really out of his jurisdiction. "But I'm sure Captain Mahoney would be interested...." she began, then stopped, her energy drained. What was the point? She'd check into a motel somewhere for the night and call Captain Mahoney in the morning. She certainly wasn't about to drive back to Weston now.

"I'm hungry," Amanda whined after several more minutes. "Where are we going now?"

Bonnie looked around, startled to find they were on Lombard Street. Bonnie slowed down, inched her way up the street.

"Where are we, Mommy?"

The house at 430 Lombard Street looked exactly the same as it had a month ago. Even the FOR SALE sign hadn't been touched. The police had removed the yellow tape from around the premises. People could now cross with impunity. No doubt the house had been thoroughly cleaned. Joan's blood had been carefully wiped away. Only her ghost remained.

Bonnie stopped in front of the house, her eyes following the path to the front door. If only she hadn't taken that path, she thought now, wondering how different things might have been. If only she hadn't listened to Joan. If only she hadn't answered the phone that morning. So many if onlys. Would they have made any difference?

"Whose house is this, Mommy?" Amanda asked.

In response, Bonnie pulled quickly away from the curb. "No one's," she told her daughter, wondering how long it would take to sell the house now that it was the site of a homicide, if the Palmays had been forced to lower the asking price. She returned to Commonwealth Avenue, following it to Chestnut and then heading up into West Newton Hill.

The house at 13 Exeter Street also looked the same, with its greenish-beige exterior and enigmatic stained-gla.s.s windows. There were no outward signs that the house was empty. Even the gra.s.s had been kept well-trimmed, as if someone still lived here.

Bonnie stopped the car, turned off the engine. "Where are we?" Amanda demanded again.

Bonnie opened her car door, climbed out, and unhooked Amanda from her special seat, carrying her to the front lawn of Joan's house.

"Is this a church?" Amanda asked, eyes on the windows.

"No, honey. This is where Sam and Lauren used to live."

"Are they here now?"

"No." Bonnie led Amanda up the front walk to the large wooden double door.

"Are we going inside?"

Were they? Bonnie reached inside her purse, pulled out her keys, found the right one, pushed it into the lock. She'd all but forgotten she had a key to Joan's house. Until she'd dropped the keys in her driveway, seen Joan's house key winking at her from underneath a piece of broken gla.s.s.

Had she known from that moment that she was headed here?

The door opened easily, and Bonnie stepped inside, Amanda darting into the front foyer. Bonnie remembered her first visit to this house, heard the echo of Lauren's voice calling down the stairs for her mother, recalled the look of confusion on Lauren's face as she peered over the top railing and saw her father, felt her angry fists on her face, tasted the blood at her lip.

What was she doing back here now?

Amanda skipped into the living room. "This is a funny house, Mommy," she said, jumping from one Indian rug to another, as if they were chalk squares on pavement, stopping in front of the large brick fireplace.

"Be careful, honey," Bonnie cautioned. "Try not to disturb anything."

"What's disturb?" Amanda asked.

"Don't touch anything," Bonnie explained, continuing through the medieval-looking dining area into the kitchen at the back of the house. She quickly located the pantry, and opened its doors.

It was almost empty. A few boxes of dry cereal, some instant coffee, a box of raisins, a five-pound bag of sugar sat on the shelves, but little else. An iron, still in its box, lay on the bottom shelf, next to a stack of unopened white paper napkins.

Bonnie simultaneously closed the doors to the pantry and opened the one to the broom closet beside it. Two brooms fell forward to greet her, one electric, one regular. Bonnie propped them back into position, then closed the closet door, continuing on to the sink, moving like an automaton, as if every move had been carefully programmed for her in advance.

"Can I have some milk?" Amanda asked.

"They don't have any milk." Bonnie knelt down, opened the cabinet under the sink.

"Don't they like milk?"

"No one lives here now, sweetie, remember? The milk would go bad." Bonnie's eyes scanned the contents of the cabinet-a dark green garbage pail, a plastic container full of a.s.sorted sponges and scrubbing pads, two kinds of dishwashing detergent, a small bottle of Mr. Clean.

"Can I have some water?"

"No, honey." Bonnie pushed the bottle of Mr. Clean aside.

"Is the water bad too?"

"It's not our house," Bonnie reminded her.

"Then why are we here?" Amanda asked logically.

Because I'm looking for something, Bonnie thought, but didn't say, watching as two imaginary white rats scurried in front of her conscious mind. Insecticide, rat poison, weed killer, Dr. Kline had said. Bonnie didn't keep any insecticide or weed killer at home. She'd never had the need for rat poison. She'd never had rats until Sam came to live with her. Bonnie reached into the back of the cabinet toward a cylindrical tin can cramped in the far corner.

"I want to go home," Amanda pouted, leaning her full weight against her mother's back, upsetting Bonnie's precarious balance. Bonnie fell to the floor, her hand knocking over the boxes of dishwashing detergent and the bottle of Mr. Clean, scattering the sponges in all directions.

Amanda giggled. "Mommy made a mess."

Bonnie regained her equilibrium, quickly gathering up the sponges and returning them to their container, then righting the boxes of dishwashing detergent and the bottle of Mr. Clean, before extricating the cylindrical tin from the back of the cupboard.

She saw the skull and crossbones before she saw anything else. DANGER, POISON, it said above it in bold black capital letters. SUREKILL, the orange letters announced over black and white stripes, then in somewhat smaller letters beneath it, RAT POISON. A drawing of a dead rat occupied the center of the label.

Bonnie swallowed, feeling dizzy and cold and numb and hot as she turned the tin around. "Precaution," she read. "Harmful if swallowed. Keep out of the reach of children. Do not use in any areas where food may be exposed. Do not use in bulk food storage areas. Do not use in cupboards where food or cooking utensils are stored. If swallowed, do not induce vomiting. Princ.i.p.al ingredient: a.r.s.enic."

Bonnie dropped the tin to the floor, watched it roll just out of reach. Amanda ran after it, grabbing for it.

"Don't touch that," Bonnie yelled, frightening the child, who jumped back, tears filling her eyes. "It's okay, sweetheart," Bonnie said quickly. "It's just very dangerous. You mustn't touch it."

"Why did you touch it?" Amanda asked.

"I shouldn't have," Bonnie agreed, stretching toward it, grabbing hold of it, her fingers covering the warning.

"Put it away, Mommy," Amanda cried. "Put it away."

Bonnie returned it to the rear of the cabinet, made sure everything else was where she had found it, then washed her hands.

"I want to go home, Mommy. I don't like this house. I want to go home." Amanda was already out of the kitchen and into the front hall.

"Amanda, wait," Bonnie called after her. "Wait for me."