8

Jerry was on edge. Totally. Dawn had seen him flare up before, but he'd always cooled off pretty quick. This was different. He couldn't sit still. He was like in a chair one minute and out of it the next, turning on the TV, surfing a few channels, then turning it off. He looked like he was ready to totally explode or something.

"You okay?"

He stopped between the TV and the easy chair and stared at her.

"Yeah, darlin. Why?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. You seem, like, tense."

"Got a lot on my mind."

"Something go wrong at the meeting?"

"Meet—?" He looked confused.

"You know. With EA?"

"Oh, that." He shook his head. "No, everything's fine with EA. I'm just bothered by all this friction with your mother. I wish there was a way we could straighten her out and get her on board."

"That's so not going to happen. Way too late."

Bui how sweet of him lo care. So lolally typical of him lo be worried about a crazy woman who'd accused him of awful things, then tried to seduce him.

Which made Dawn feel totally worse for what she planned to do about the baby.

She'd found a place called Women's Choice right here in Rego Park. They said's*he could come in for an interview and paperwork this afternoon. Then they'd schedule her for tests, and then…

She'd totally hate herself doing it, but she knew she wasn't ready to be a mother and couldn't see any other way.

"Why don't you play a game or something. Maybe that new FPS." Dawn couldn't remember the title—a new Doom or Half Life or Call of Duty? No matter. First-person shooters always relaxed him.

He shook his head. "Not in much of a gamin mood. Feel more like doin the real thing."

She blinked. "Shooting people?"

He grinned. "Just kiddin."

The look in his eyes… Dawn wasn't so sure.

He said, "Maybe I'll just check my e-mail and surf a little."

A spasm of uncertainty gripped her. Had she closed the Women's Choice Web site? She wasn't sure. God, if she'd left that window open…

"Good idea," she said, turning and dashing upstairs. "I've got some errands to run."

She ducked into the extra room and checked the computer screen. The screen saver was running. She hopped over and wiggled the mouse. The desktop appeared with no open windows.

Knew I'd signed off.

Light with relief, she passed Jerry on his way in. He was giving her a strange look, but she spoke before he could say anything.

"I'm running out. Need anything from Pathmark?"

After a couple of seconds he said, "Yeah. Pick me up some beef jerky—the peppery kind. I feel like chompin on something."

She gave him a quick kiss. "You got it."

She grabbed a sweater from the bedroom and hurried downstairs. She'd go to Women's Choice first, then swing by Pathmark on her way—

"Dawn!"

Something in his voice froze her. She didn't turn as she heard him race down the stairs behind her. He grabbed her shoulders and spun her to face him.

"Women's Choice?" His eyes were wild. "Women's fuckin Choice?"

She couldn't speak, only yammer.

He said, "1 thought it was kind of funny, you checkin the computer before

1 got to it, so 1 opened the browser history." His grip on her shoulders tightened as he shook her. "Women's Choice! I can't believe it! You want to kill my baby!"

"It's not like that! And it's my baby too! You don't have to carry it! I do! And I'm so not ready for that!"

He wrapped her in his arms and cooed in her ear. "Oh, darlin-darlin-darlin! If you only knew what this baby means to me."

The sob that had been building burst free. "I know, I know."

"And not just to me. To us. To the world. Our baby is the Key. He's gonna change the world!"

"You keep saying things like that and they're… they're totally scary. The key to what?"

"To the future. You'll be known the world over as the Mother of the Key. Millions of people will worship you and pray to you to speak to your son on their behalf."

He was getting scarier by the minute.

"What do you think I'm gonna be—the Virgin Mary? News flash: I'm so not a virgin and this was a totally maculate conception."

He pushed her back to arm's length. His face was filled with joy as his wild blue gaze bored into her.

"Darlin, you're gonna be better than any Virgin Mary. You know why? Because you're real. But the only way you're gonna get to be the queen mother is if you have our baby."

"Jerry—"

His grip tightened as the joy faded from his face.

"And you will have this baby—"

His grip tightened further and now she saw no joy in his face, only growing rage as he bared his teeth.

"Jerry, you're hurting—"

"—because if you don't… if you ever do anythin to hurt my baby, you will wish you'd been born dead, darlin. You'll wish it 'cause I will hunt you down like a bitch cur and I will see you dead. But before you die I will see you suffer the tortures of the damned for killin the prince of the Bloodline. You'll suffer so long and so bad that you'll pray to die, you'll beg to die."

His face had gone crimson, spittle speckled his lips, and his eyes… in their pale-blue depths she saw exactly what he'd do to her. A scream was surging into her throat when he suddenly let her go and stepped back. He licked his lips and smiled as his complexion faded to normal.

"But of course, that's all idle chatter 'cause nothin's gonna happen to my baby, right? Right?"

Dawn could only nod. He was back to talking normally now. She so wanted to scream and run but didn't dare move a muscle—couldn't. Her limbs were frozen in position.

He leaned closer and sounded like the SpongeBob pirate. "I can't heeeeeear you. Right?""

She found her voice and croaked out a feeble, "Right."

What had just happened? He'd gone from totally normal to totally insane, then back to totally normal again in less than a minute. She'd never seen that side of him, hadn't even guessed it existed.

Women's Choice… the idea of aborting his child—why was it always his child?—had like totally set off a bomb in his brain. Made him mad crazy.

Well, maybe he had a right to be pissed that she was going to end the pregnancy without telling him. The baby was half his, after all. But only half. What about her half? And he wasn't the one who was going to get all fat and bloated.

But he'd been totally more than just pissed. He'd been insane. And he hadn't been kidding about killing her. A shudder passed through her like an earthquake. She knew from his eyes and the way he'd said it that he meant every word.

"Well, darlin," he said with his usual warm, friendly smile. "Long as you've got your sweater and were on your way out, what say we take a trip down to Work. I feel like gettin myself a couple of cold ones."

"Not me. It's totally boring. And you won't even let me have a beer."

"That's right, darlin. No more booze for you. Like those signs in the bar say, When you're pregnant, you never drink alone. You're not going to get my baby boy drunk. You can have some of that Diet Pepsi you and your mother like so much."

"But—"

"Hush now. I've got another reason I want to visit Work tonight. Want to see if a certain someone is hanging around, waiting for me."

As he propelled her toward the door, Dawn wondered what she'd got herself into. And if there was a way out.