Page 77 of Tell Me (Savannah 3)

Her instincts were on alert, her nerves strung tight as she started downward again. Her ears were straining as she reached the first floor, and her heart was thudding wildly.

Letting out her breath, she started across the room when she heard a low, warning growl.

What?

Something was inside?

Oh, God.

The saliva dried in her throat as she strained to see.

Where was it?

What was it?

Heart in her throat, she swept the beam of her phone screen across the floor, making certain she had a way out.

Again the rumbling growl, and she froze, the hairs on the back of her neck raising one by one.

Was it an animal? A deranged person?

Passing the beam of her flashlight over the floor, she saw nothing. No glittering eyes and bared fangs. She eased across the room and tried to ignore the fact that she felt as if she were being observed, her every move noted.

Don’t be such a–

The growl rumbled again.

Heart thudding, she twisted her flashlight in the direction of the noise, near the archway to the kitchen.

Reflecting the light, bright eyes glared at her from the shadows. “Oh, God,” she whispered, frantic for a second. Another growl, and she realized she was looking at a gray cat crouching near the cabinets.

“It’s okay,” she whispered, as much to calm herself as anything else. “We’re fine here.”

The feral cat gave out that soul-numbing growl again, then hissed, showing its teeth.

“No worries, kitty,” she said and realized it wasn’t looking directly at her, but at something near her, something on the floor near her feet, something . . .

Oh Jesus!

From the corner of her eye she caught movement, a rapid slither. She whirled, the beam of the cell phone landing on a snake as it eeled toward the fireplace, its smooth scales glistening in the light.

Her heart turned to ice as she noticed the hourglass pattern of its scales and recognized the sibilant creature as a copperhead, the same kind of snake that had struck Amity O’Henry in this very room.

The cat let out a piercing cry, and the pit viper coiled, its reptilian eyes tracking the animal.

Nikki backed toward the door, but even as her mind screamed at her to run, she had the presence of mind to hit the button on her phone and take pictures of the copperhead coiled and ready to strike near the old stone grate.

The cat finally got smart and scrambled away, through the kitchen.

Nikki too couldn’t get out of the cabin fast enough. Her fingers fumbled as she relocked the door behind her, ran down the porch steps, and squished her way through the mud to her car. Rain was still falling and darkness had descended, the lake barely visible. Climbing into her car, she tossed her phone into her cup holder and her uncle’s set of keys onto the passenger seat near her purse, then jabbed her key into the ignition, threw the gear shift into reverse, and hit the gas.

The Honda’s tires spun, the engine whining.

The car didn’t budge.

“No way!” Panic was taking over. Being in the dark cabin and stumbling on first the cat and then the snake had stretched her nerves to the breaking point. She jammed the car into drive and this time slowly touched a toe to the

accelerator. Again her tires spun, spraying out mud. “Come on, come on,” she said as the rain poured from the heavens. A little movement. Then more spinning. The car had all-wheel-drive, thank God.

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