Chapter 4: Ringtone

I pressed my thumb on the side of the phone until it went dark.

The ringing stopped.

In the hall, nobody moved.

"It's the pipes," Whitney whispered. "Wes, come to bed."

"That wasn't the pipes."

His footsteps crossed the carpet toward the nursery.

I put one hand over my belly and the other over my mouth.

The door swung open, and the light from the hall cut a stripe across the floor an inch from my boots.

Wesley stood there, close enough that I could smell the whiskey on him.

He looked at the empty room and the three flat boxes.

"Somebody was in here," he said.

"The window's closed."

"The boxes moved."

My daughter kicked.

I stayed so still my thighs began to shake.

Then his phone rang in his pocket, loud and cheerful, and he swore and answered it.

"What? No. Nothing. Yes, I'm home."

He walked back into the hall.

I did not wait to hear who was calling.

I pushed the closet door wide, crossed the nursery in three steps and opened the window.

It let out onto the porch roof.

Mason's boots were too big for me, and my first step slid on the shingles.

I grabbed the gutter.

Behind me, Wesley said, "Whit. The window."

I went down the porch post on my hands and knees, with the rough paint tearing my palms.

I dropped the last four feet into the hydrangeas and my teeth clicked together.

Above me a flashlight beam swung across the yard.

"There!" Whitney screamed. "By the hedge!"

I ran.

The grass was wet, and my side burned, and the baby was a hard little knot under my ribs.

I did not look back.

I went through the neighbor's garden gate and over a row of tomato cages and down the dark road, with a man's shouting voice behind me.

"Stop! Hey! Stop!"

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