Never Wake by Gabrielle Goldsby

had done off and on for the last few hours. He wished that he had stopped to get food on his way in. Rather than risk missing Troy, he’d had to make do with the one edible thing in Desdemona’s house, popcorn. Not the microwave kind. Desdemona just had the kind you popped yourself, using a pan or skillet. Besides, she had no microwave. He had read the directions twice, but still burned the first batch. The second came out white and fluffy. It was apparent that Desdemona worried about her salt intake because he had to settle for No-salt and unsalted butter. Still, he had to admit it was better than the microwave stuff he treated himself to when Teresa wasn’t around to throw out comments about the small bulge that had appeared where his flat stomach had once been.
    Abe grunted. He had passed the annoyed stage hours ago. Where in the hell was she? They always went home, didn’t they? It made no sense to him that this Troy Nanson could screw up his study on his first outing—unless… He stared at the darkened cottage. Could she have come and gone while he was sleeping? He had dozed off twice and awakened to the sound of his own snoring.
    Maybe she’d seen him. No, that wasn’t possible. He’d been too careful. Even if she’d been home when he was breaking into Desdemona’s place, he would have seen her leave by now. He had been watching for three days and in all that time there hadn’t been any hint that she had ever come home.
    This was not going as he had planned. Jake Ostroph and Emma Webster were not the least bit interesting. He thought for sure that Troy would be worth his attention, but he couldn’t even find her.
    “Where in the hell…”Abe left the sentence unfinished. Crying about it would do him no good. He would just have to find her. He had waited long enough. He walked out of Mrs. Bernard’s house, and the woman who had been his sole companion—even though she didn’t know it—for the last three days was dropped from his mind like the unimportant memory that she was.
    The one person capable of holding his interest had been Troy. Why she had taken on a more important position than the others he didn’t know. But there was something about her that intrigued him. He felt she was the key to the answers he was seeking. The others meant nothing to him now, backups, if necessary, but not worth the time it would take to observe them.
    Abe tested the doorknob and smiled. Of course she hadn’t left the door open. That would be too easy. He thought about putting his foot through it, but instead went around the side of the cottage to look for a less obvious way in. Like he’d done at Mrs. Bernard’s. Troy’s bathroom would be small and prone to mildew if not aired properly and, sure enough, as Abe rounded the corner and walked down the two-foot walkway on the side of Troy’s cottage, he spotted the open bathroom window. Also, like Mrs. Bernard, Troy’s view was of brown siding that had seen better days twenty years before. The bathroom window was small, but Abe was tall, and contrary to what Teresa thought, still quite thin.
    He landed with a thud on the floor and lay there, struggling to catch his breath. What if she was in the house and he had just alerted her, like an idiot, to his presence? Abe forced himself to lie still even though his elbow smarted and the small of his back felt like someone had just pummeled it. His raspy breathing sounded loud in the tight quarters. Abe pulled himself to his feet with the help of Troy’s pedestal sink and opened the bathroom door. He heard the hum of an appliance, but nothing else.
    As he had suspected, Troy’s floor plan was the same as Mrs. Bernard’s, but it was obvious that Troy was not a believer in making things homey. From where he stood, he could see the living room and most of the kitchen. The living room consisted of hardwood floors, a black futon, a chair, a TV and TV cart, and dark brown walls that had no evidence of ever having pictures on