The Shadow Hunter by Michael Prescott Page B

breathed in the musty smell and saw the cheap, worn furniture and the dingy walls. She had spent a great deal of time in places like this over the past few years.
    Lying on the couch, she dictated what she had learned from Wyatt into her micro recorder Then she fixed herself a cup of herbal tea and drank it slowly, sitting on the fire escape and watching the night sky.
    Once, she saw a shooting star that traced a pale arc above the distant rooftops. It might be an omen—good or bad, she couldn’t say.
    Loud voices echoed through the parking lot below.
    The party crowd was leaving the spa area. She heard inebriated laughter, fading out.
    The hot tub must be empty now. She decided to try it. She could use some R ‘n’ R. Among the items of clothing she had packed, there was a one-piece swimsuit. She changed into the suit and took a large bath towel with her as she went downstairs to the lobby. She crossed the parking lot to the spa area. The gate was closed, but she discovered that the lock was broken, and she didn’t need to use her apartment key.
    A sign warned that the Jacuzzi was to be used only by residents of the Gainford Arms and only between the hours of 8 am. and 10 p.m. She checked her watch. The time was 10:15. Well, there was nobody around to complain that she was breaking the rules.
    The kids who’d partied here had left the place a mess. Empty beer bottles ringed the tub. Potato chips and pretzels were scattered around, and near one of the cheap lounge chairs lay the uneaten remnant of a Twinkie.
    “Slobs,” Abby murmured. She set down her purse and the towel on the lounge chair, then took off her wristwatch and her sneakers. Finally she eased herself into the tub. The water was still frothing and gurgling;
    the kids had neglected to turn off the jets when they left.
    Eyes shut, she rested her head against the concrete rim of the tub and let the hot bubbling water massage the small of her back.
    She had not rested, really rested, in much too long.
    The New Jersey case had been tricky, and then Travis had called her back to LA as soon as it had ended.
    There had been almost no downtime.
    She wondered if she had been wrong to accept the TPS case. True, she desperately wanted to prove herself to Travis, make amends for the Devin Corbal disaster, if she possibly could—but she might be driving herself too hard. Fatigue was the real enemy in a profession like hers. Fatigue could be fatal.
    After this one, she promised, she would take a vacation.
    Maybe head over to Phoenix and look up some old friends. Hike in the Superstition Mountains, ride a horse on a dusty trail, be a kid again.
    Yes, she would do all those things… when this job was over… She felt herself drifting into the alpha state on the threshold of sleep.
    Her thoughts fuzzed out and grew distant. All tension left her, and there was only a humming meditative sense of calm.
    Then a sudden lurch forward, water over her head, the hot jets stinging her neck-She was submerged in the tub, the surface only inches away but out of reach, because she couldn’t rise.
    Someone was holding her down with a strong hand clutching the top of her head, gripping her hair in tangled bunches.
    She tried to grab the hand that-held her, knowing she could inflict instant pain by bending back one of his fingers or squeezing the tender ball of flesh below his thumb, but with his free hand he deflected her attack.
    If she could only see him-But she couldn’t, she was underwater, blinded by the lights ringing the interior of the tub, and above her was only darkness and she couldn’t see anything, and there was no air.
    She struggled to duck lower, pull free, but he had her by the hair and wouldn’t yield. She braced both feet against the bottom of the tub and pushed hard, fighting to overcome the downward pressure that kept her submerged, but he had the advantage of leverage.
    A cry of frustration burst out of her in an explosion of bubbles, blending with the jets of