Page 30 of A Dark and Stormy Night

Okay, it hadn't worked out this time. They weren't the kind who wanted to think that Cecily and Landon were evil. Except, looking back over the last interminable weeks, Gwen could see how she'd been manipulated, brainwashed, taken to the breaking point by exhaustion and a well-planned campaign to undermine her hard-won confidence.

Landon was nothing but a tool in Cecily's grasp, but he knew what his wife was, and he had done nothing to stop her. He had put Mario through hell; Landon was weak and guilty, and Gwen despised him.

Mario and Gwen went downstairs to the main level. To the level overlooking the living room. To the level of the kitchen, the pantry, and the festering stinkhole of a guest bedroom where Cecily and Landon slept.

They walked into the kitchen, and Gwen stood looking at the stove where she had worked like a galley slave these last few weeks. "Perhaps I should fix breakfast for them before—"

"No!" Mario said. "No more. You are my wife. You are done working for them. You are my love. My life. Let us never again forget how much we mean to each other."

She leaned against him, a sideways stretch that put her head on his shoulder. They stood together for a moment, gathering strength for the deeds ahead.

Then he straightened away from her. He turned his head to the side. "What is that noise?"

Gwen did the same. "That ticking? The battery in the clock must be going out."

"No. No! That is no battery. That is . . . " Mario looked around. "It's coming from the living room."

They walked to the rail.

The sound seemed to be coming from the wall by the fireplace.

"I don't know what that is." Mario ran down the stairs and stood listening. He walked toward the center of the room "It's from one of the sconces."

"The wiring has gone bad?"

"Impossible. I wired it myself." He headed for the utility room. "Let me get a ladder."

Gwen came slowly down the stairs. When it came to his work, Mario was obsessive and meticulous; for that reason he had no patience with Landon's incompetence.

Mario carried in the ladder and set it up by the wall.

Disquiet sat heavily on her shoulders, for Gwen wondered—had they read Landon wrong? Was he spiteful? Had he done something to sabotage the wiring in their house as revenge for Mario's firing him?

Mario climbed up until his head was level with the sconce and leaned closer. "Definitely a ticking. It sounds like a timer is in there."

Gwen watched him. She looked up at the chandelier. She loved those sconces. She loved the chandelier.

She loved Mario.

If Cecily had somehow realized their plans . . . overheard their plans . . . with that uncanny hearing of hers, and forced Landon to do something dastardly . . .

Now Gwen heard another sound. The tap tap tap of Cecily's stiletto heels on the hardwood floor.

Impossible. She was bedridden.

But Gwen glanced up, and there Cecily was, peeking around the corner of the kitchen. She wore headphones. She held a small disc-shaped transmitter in her hand. Her face was a gargoyle mask of cruel satisfaction.

Gwen looked at Mario.

He was reaching for the swirled blue glass cover to slide it off.

Gwen glanced back at Cecily.

Cecily ripped off her headphones and tossed them away. She ran backward toward . . . safety?

And in that split second, all was clear.

Gwen shouted, "Mario, don't touch it!"

---