Cause For Alarm Read Online Free PDF Page B

her, stealing her breath. The past, her former life. John. All gone.
    Pulling her coat tighter around her, she turned and walked away.

3
    J ulianna awakened with a start. She opened her eyes, instantly alert, though she couldn’t say why. She darted her gaze around the dark room, looking for the shape that didn’t belong, the one that moved slightly, listening for a breath, a stirring.
    For the monster.
    John. That had been him on the street. He had found her. He was with her now. Fear took her breath; it became a living thing inside her.
    Inside her. She brought her hands to her swollen belly, half expecting to find it split wide, intestines and fetus and gore spilling out of her and onto the white sheets. Instead, she found herself intact, her belly round and hard and full.
    Thank God…thank God… She closed her eyes and struggled to slow her ragged breathing. If John had been here, he would have killed her. He would have cut her open, punishment for her disobedience. Her defiance.
    The way he had cut those other people open, the ones from Clark Russell’s photographs.
    â€œDon’t cross me again, Julianna,” John had warned. “You won’t like the consequences.”
    She brought her fists to her eyes. He hadn’t found her; how could he have? She had done almost everything Clark had advised her to do—she had run far from D.C., never stopping too long in one place; she hadn’t used her credit cards for fear of leaving a paper trail, hadn’t called or written home. She’d even had her car repainted in Louisville.
    But not everything. He had advised her to change her name, take on a new identity. But that had been impossible. She’d tried, but hotels wanted identification; she needed a driver’s license in case she was pulled over; Buster had demanded a social security number as a prerequisite for employment.
    Julianna shook her head. It didn’t matter that she hadn’t changed her name—John was not going to find her, not all the way down here. That man on the street had been a trick of her imagination, just like the woman in the bathroom at Buster’s.
    Shuddering, Julianna fought to free herself from the sheets, tangled around her legs, encumbered by her ungainly size. She rested her head against the headboard. A part of her still couldn’t believe John was a killer. Not John, who had showered her with affection, with gifts and attention and love. John who had held and stroked her, who had told her she was different, special, not silly, weak and stupid like so many other people.
    A part of her couldn’t believe it even after the nightmare of their last meeting.
    She closed her eyes and remembered how it had been with them, not that last night, when John’s face had been pinched and white with rage, his touch rough, his cruelty incomprehensible to her. No, she remembered how it had always been with them before, how gentle he had been as he held and petted her, how patient with her, how he had promised her the world.
    For nothing more than being his good little girl.
    His good little girl. Docile and sweet. The child who looked up to him as one would a parent, trusting, never questioning. The child who accepted his bidding as law.
    Tears flooded her eyes. John had been her everything for as long as she could remember. Her tears spilled over and slipped down her cheeks. She needed him. To love her. To take care of her. The way he always had.
    This was all a mistake; the events of the last months just a terrible nightmare. She could get rid of the baby, she thought, breath catching on a sob. As he had demanded she do. Go home and beg his forgiveness. For disobeying him. For taking his things. For going to her mother and believing her and Clark over him. She could promise to be his good girl again. He would forgive her, he would. He—
    No, she thought. He wouldn’t. He was angry with her. Furious. Julianna rubbed at her wet