The Edge of Normal Read Online Free Page B

cocks an eyebrow.
    “Okay, I guess that’s nonthreatening enough.” She looks down and sees that she has crossed her arms and legs. “I only look defensive. I’m actually a little chilled.”
    Smiling, he nods once in punctuation. “Good. I’ll see you next week. And I hope you have a very nice Thanksgiving.”
    “You, too.”
    They’re on their feet and moving toward the door when Dr. Lerner says, “Oh, have you given any more thought to getting a cat or a dog?”
    “I know you think it would be therapeutic, but I don’t need a cat or a dog. I have Persephone.”
    His lips compress wryly. “And how is the lovely Persephone?”
    “She’s therapeutic.”
    He chuckles and opens the door.
    The moment they step into the hall, the receptionist hurries toward them, clasping her hands in front of her as if in prayer. “Excuse me, doctor,” she says, “but you have an unscheduled visitor.”
    As the three come into the waiting room, a man wearing a crimped expression and a dark suit rises. “Dr. Lerner? I’m sorry to intrude on your schedule.”
    “You’re here about Jefferson County?” Dr. Lerner steps forward to shake the man’s hand.
    “I’m sorry to barge in on you like this.”
    Dr. Lerner’s voice drops to a low, serious tone while Reeve dawdles near the receptionist’s desk, straining to hear. She retrieves the key to the restroom from its place in a floral dish, stalling, but can’t make out more of the men’s conversation. At the door, she turns to glimpse them disappearing into Dr. Lerner’s office.
    Out in the hallway, she passes Dr. Lerner’s usual 10:30 appointment, a redheaded teen with fantastic freckles whose name, of course, she doesn’t know.
    When she returns from the restroom, the redhead is gone, and Reeve notices that the receptionist’s face is clouded with a strange expression. Her Cupid’s-bow mouth is a straight line. And as Reeve sets the key back in the dish, the receptionist looks up at her and says, “I’m terribly sorry, Miss LeClaire, but Dr. Lerner has to cancel all of next week’s appointments.”
    Reeve blinks at her, realizing that this is the first time the receptionist has ever spoken her name.

 
    FOUR
    Jefferson City
     
    By the time Duke turns toward home, he has already dealt with the first order of business. He has bought a new cell phone and transferred all the necessary phone numbers. He has dropped the new phone into the pocket of his leather jacket and placed the old phone in the colorful plastic bag with the new phone’s packaging and receipt.
    Now he is headed south. He turns off the old highway and drives parallel to the railroad tracks for a ways, then turns east toward the river, then right on Riverside Drive. For the first few miles, tidy houses are crowded behind manicured lawns, but the subdivision gradually exhausts itself, and then the road narrows. The few remaining houses squat on untamed lots of thick brush, old oaks, and tall pines. Street signs are pocked with bullet holes. Fences are thirsty for paint. Neighbors are scarce and make a habit of minding their own business.
    Duke turns his Chevy Tahoe off the road and presses the remote control clipped to the visor. The heavy wooden gate rolls open and his SUV bumps along the uneven driveway. At the far side of the twelve-acre lot sprawls the ranch-style house that he inherited from his parents. It’s riverfront property, so one problem is that there is no basement, but Duke prides himself on being resourceful.
    He parks in the carport next to his van and climbs out, carrying the plastic shopping bag with him. He never leaves trash in his vehicle.
    He climbs the steps at the side of the house, unlocks the deadbolt, and enters through the mudroom. The house is just as cold as outdoors so he does not remove his leather jacket as he heads straight through to the control room in back, where he unlocks a second deadbolt. He enters a wide room that has both a workout area with dust-free