Children of the Storm by Dean Koontz Page B

always full of smiles, teasing, laughing; she could even cheer Henry when he was in one of his sour moods, which was more frequently-once or twice a week -than Bill Peterson had at first let on.
        Helga, the cook, remained quiet, shy, vivacious only when the subject was food in general or her cooking in particular.
        Leroy Mills, the handyman, also remained standoffish, saying little, making himself scarce when she was around.
        Each time she saw him, she tried to fit him to the shadow she had seen beneath the palms…
        On her second Saturday at Seawatch, Sonya was summoned to Joe Dougherty's airy study at the top of the house, where she was given her first bi-weekly paycheck, the first, she hoped, of many. Though she had worked at a number of part-time jobs during high school and college, this was the first full-time position she had ever held; the receipt of the check, therefore, was a special occasion, like a milestone in the journey toward complete maturity and responsibility. And since most of the check, except for some mad money, would be banked in a savings account-receiving room and board in addition to her salary, she had few outside expenses-she was especially pleased and excited by the sight of that first salary check, almost like a teenager on her first job.
        “You've done very well,” Joe told her. “Helen and I think that Dr. Toomey couldn't have come up with anyone better for the job.”
        She smiled and looked at her hands. “Thank you-Joe.”
        “The children feel the same way,” he said. “They're absolutely crazy about you, and therefore they're learning.”
        “I like them too,” she said. “They make it easy to teach them, to have fun with them. They're both awfully bright, as inquisitive as any kids I've ever come across.”
        He nodded, aware of his children's talents. He said, “For some time now, Helen and I have wanted to get away, by ourselves, for a short vacation, a week or two. We have friends in California we've been promising to visit for months now.”
        She knew what was coming, didn't like it, but said nothing.
        “We'll be going over to Guadeloupe tomorrow morning, in the Lady Jane, and we'll catch a private plane out of the islands, around eleven o'clock. That takes us straight into Miami, where we have an hour lay-over before the commercial flight to Los Angeles.”
        Sonya nodded.
        He said, “I typed out our intended schedule and left it with Rudolph, and I've got another copy of it, here, for you.”
        He handed her a gray, Xerox sheet of paper.
        She tried to conceal the trembling in her hands when she took the paper from him. She stretched it tight, holding it with both hands, and she thought she managed to appear relatively unruffled, though, all the while, she was thinking of the threats that had been made against Alex and Tina.
        Joe Dougherty leaned back in his desk chair and said, “We'll be staying with friends; the addresses are there at the bottom of the page, along with telephone numbers.”
        Sonya looked, saw them, cleared her throat and said, “Fine.” Her voice, even in that single word, did not sound so strong and calm as she would have liked.
        He hesitated, as if he did not know how to phrase what he must say next, swiveled to look at the blue sky that shone behind one of his large windows and, gaining strength from that view, turned to her once more. “If, for any reason, you should need to contact us, feel free to call at any hour of the day or night.”
        “Will I need to, do you think?” she asked. Her voice sounded small and shaky, but she did not care.
        “It's highly unlikely,” he said.
        She wondered…
        He said, “But those kids are awfully active, like a couple of young pups always scampering about. If one of them should fall out of a coconut tree or try to swim too far out toward the sandbars-or get hurt in some