The Perfect Husband Read Online Free PDF Page A

golden and cheery. The air was hot. Her T-shirt stuck to her back, but maybe the sweat came from nightmares that never quite went away. She'd once liked mornings. They were difficult for her now, but not as difficult as night, when she would lie there and try to force her eyes to give up their vigilant search of shadows in favor of sleep.
    You made it
, she told herself.
You actually made it
.
    For the last two years she'd been running, clutching her four-year-old daughter's hand and trying to convince Samantha that everything would be all right. She'd picked up aliases like decorative accessories and new addresses like spare parts. But she'd never really escaped. Late at night she would sit at the edge of her daughter's bed, stroking Samantha's golden hair, and stare at the closet with fatalistic eyes.
    She knew what kind of monsters hid in the closet. She had seen the crime scene photos of what they could do. Three weeks ago her personal monster had broken out of a maximum security prison by beating two guards to death in under two minutes.
    Tess had called Lieutenant Lance Difford. He'd called Vince. The wheels were set in motion. Tess Williams had hidden Samantha safely away, then she had traveled as far as she could travel. Then she had traveled some more.
    First she'd taken the train, and the train had taken her through New England fields of waving grass and industrial sectors of twisted metal. Then she'd caught a plane, flying over everything as if that would help her forget and covering so many miles, she left behind fall and returned to summer.
    Landing in Phoenix was like arriving in a moon crater: Everything was red, dusty, and bordered by distant blue mountains. She'd never seen palms; here roads were lined with them. She'd never seen cactus; here they covered the land like an encroaching army.
    The bus had only moved her farther into alien terrain. The red hills had disappeared, the sun had gained fury. Signs for cities had been replaced by signs reading
     
STATE PRISON IN AREA.
DO NOT STOP FOR HITCHHIKERS.
     
    The reds and browns had seeped away until the bus rolled through sun-baked amber and bleached-out greens. The mountains no longer followed like kindly grandfathers. In this strange, harsh land of southern Arizona, even the hills were tormented, flayed alive methodically by mining trucks and bulldozers.
    It was the kind of land where you really did expect to turn and see the OK corral. The kind of land where lizards were beautiful and coyotes cute. The kind of land where the hothouse rose died and the prickly cactus lived.
    It was perfect.
    Tess climbed out of bed. She moved slowly. Her right leg was stiff and achy, the jagged scar twitching with ghost pains. Her left wrist throbbed, ringed by a harsh circle of purple bruises. She could tell it wasn't anything serious — her father had taught her a lot about broken bones. As things went in her life these days, a bruised wrist was the least of her concerns.
    She turned her attention to the bed.
    She made it without thinking, tucking the corners tightly and smoothing the covers with military precision.
    I want to be able to bounce a quarter off that bed, Theresa. Youth is no excuse for sloppiness. You must always seek to improve.
    She caught herself folding back the edge of the sheet over the light blanket and dug her fingertips into her palms. In a deliberate motion she ripped off the blanket and dumped it on the floor.
    “I will not make the bed this morning,” she stated to the empty room. “I choose not to make the bed.”
    She wouldn't clean anymore either, or wash dishes or scrub floors. She remembered too well the scent of ammonia as she rubbed down the windows, the doorknobs, the banisters. She'd found the pungent odor friendly, a deep-clean sort of scent.
    This is my house, and not only does it look clean, but it smells clean.
    Once, when she'd taken the initiative to rub down the window casings with ammonia, Jim had even complimented her. She'd