Day Zero. Chris Jayne

reasoned it through: It was highly likely that Mr. Saldata wasn’t even home. She had the gate pad PIN and the electronic lock PIN for the back door, which she assumed would disengage the security system. And even if it didn’t, most of the systems had a ten or fifteen second lag on the motion detectors. She could grab her bag and be out the door again in half that.

      All told, she could be down the driveway, into the house, and out of the house again with her bag in under two minutes. And then she could be done with the Raoul Saldata once and for all.

      Lori arrived at the Saldata residence ten minutes later. The street was quiet, and through the foliage she could just see the waterway that fronted the property. Like most of the mansions along this street, the back of the house faced the street, and the opulent front faced the water.

      Outside the gate, there was a standard call box: a pin pad with a call button to buzz the house. She hesitated one final time. After only a second of thought, decisively, Lori reached over and punched in the codes. After all, Lori justified, the housekeeper herself had given Lori the key codes. In the unlikely event that she did get caught, she could always fall back on that. She acknowledged, a bit guilty, that that would be throwing the housekeeper under the bus, but at this point, with her objective so close at hand, this was the only smart decision. After last night, she didn’t want to see Mr. Saldata, and what she’d just heard on the radio decreased her desire even more, if that were even possible.

      The gate opened, smoothly silent on hidden rollers, and the gate closing behind her as she eased down the driveway. She’d seen this type of gate before; to open it from the street, you entered the code but once on the property, when a vehicle wanted to leave, the gate would open from the inside just with a motion detector.

      Lori parked at the back of the house, where she’d been less than ten hours earlier. With a final, “I’ll be right back,” to Sasha, she headed to the back door.

      Thirty seconds later, Lori was in the kitchen. She looked at the stove in astonishment. Whatever had happened here last night, dessert had not been on the agenda. The individual apple pies she’d so carefully prepared were still sitting on the cookie sheet, untouched in their ramekins.

      Lori tamped down a brief moment of emotion at the “rejection” of her hard work; it was none of her business. This had been a $100 a plate dinner, $100 a plate in addition to the $500 event fee that Lori charged, and if the customer wanted to dance the Macarena naked using her pie for a hat, it was none of Lori’s business. Decisive, she grabbed her catch-all, which was right where she’d left it on the desk, her lap top sitting beside it. She stuffed the computer into the bag, and slung it over her shoulder.

      Then, Lori froze, realizing she’d forgotten one other thing. She turned slowly and looked. The individual pie ramekins themselves were also the property of Top-Hat Catering. The fully-equipped Saldata kitchen had not had anything suitable for the planned dessert, so Lori had brought her own. Lori looked at them, hesitating. They were high-end French cookware, enamel baked on cast iron. She couldn’t remember what she’d spent on them, but she was quite certain it was $50 per. That math was easy: ten of them cost at least five hundred dollars. No way could she just let them go. And no way did she want to come back.

      Should she just grab all ten of them now and take them home, pies and all? Obviously, Mr. Saldata wasn’t at all interested in apple pies; he’d never miss them. Or should she just walk out the door and get these later from the housekeeper?

      She hesitated…

      …and then she heard it.

      At first, Lori could not identify the sound, but then, horrifyingly, she did. It was a plea, a hoarse incoherent plea. And it was coming from the dining room.

      Was someone hurt? The sound was almost inhuman in its desperation. Lori froze, a harsh bitter taste coming into her mouth, her stomach clenching so hard it hurt, and then it came again. Words sorted themselves out: “Please,” the raw voice begged, “please no…” After a second of complete silence, a scream came, a scream so awful that Lori nearly fainted. Countless times, in movies, she’d seen scenes that had played out very much like what she as hearing right now. Someone was being tortured, and nothing could ever have prepared her for hearing it for real, in person.

      Get out, she whispered to herself. Oh my God, get out, get out, GET OUT! They don’t know you’re here…. No one knows you’re here… There’s nothing you can do… Get out and call the police….

      Her breath coming in ragged bursts, Lori backed stealthily towards the door, one silent step at a time, never taking her eyes off of the swinging door that separated the kitchen from the dining room. Almost there, and then Lori tripped backwards over a stool that had been pulled out from the breakfast bar. The stool went down in a crashing clatter against the tile floor. Off-balance, with her foot caught in the rungs, Lori followed.

      She fell awkwardly, catching herself against the hard tile floor with her wrist, the rung of the stool twisting viciously into her Achilles’ tendon. A sharp pain lanced up her arm. Terrified, no need to be quiet now, Lori scrambled to her feet. The stool skittered away noisily across the kitchen tile.

      A bellow sounded from the dining room, and barely a second later, just as Lori regained her footing the swinging door between the kitchen and dining room crashed open. In the doorway stood the most terrible thing she had ever seen, the most horrifying thing she could ever imagine seeing. Raoul Saldata, his white shirt covered with blood, a knife in his hand, locked gazes with her.

      And then, in the next instant, she saw what was beyond him in the dining room. The dining room table was gone. A man, or what was left of a man, sat strapped into one of the dining room chairs with duct tape. He was so covered in blood for a millisecond Lori thought he was wearing red shirt.

      Lori exploded into action in the same instant that Saldata did. He howled out something in a language that Lori did not recognize, and instantly Lori heard a responding shout.

      He was separated from Lori by the large long kitchen island; she was barely five feet from the back door. Lori turned and ran out the door, which she threw shut behind her with a force so hard she heard glass break. She shrieked at the sound of the breaking glass, then covered the distance to her car in four long strides.

      The driver’s door was away from house’s back door and she’d barely made it into the car when Saldata burst out behind her. Sasha had been watching for Lori to come back, but instantly the dog knew something was wrong, and when Saldata came out of the house, she began barking furiously and snarling, snapping her teeth against the glass.

      Lori’s hands were shaking so hard she was afraid she couldn’t turn the key, but she did. Saldata lumbered towards the car. Screaming, she hit the door locks on her Range Rover just as Saldata reached the passenger side of the car.

      He pressed his florid fat face against the glass. “Get out. Get out now. I will kill you,” he screamed. Sasha threw herself against the glass again, barking frantically.

      Lori slammed the car into gear and punched the gas pedal. The powerful car shot forward, tires squealing. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Saldata, whose hand had been on the door handle, jerk and spin, and then fall to the ground. Then behind him, another man emerged from the house, a man with something in his hand. The back glass of the Range Rover exploded.

      Chapter 6

      They were shooting at her.

      Lori screamed, Sasha barked furiously, and the powerful Range Rover took out the closed gate with a clatter, never slowing a bit. She flew past the brick gate posts onto the street beyond, wheels squealing and sliding as the car barely made the turn from the driveway to the street.

      Lori drove, not sure she was breathing, staring ahead. Her hands shook so hard she could barely hold the wheel. Sasha jumped into shotgun position, whining at the window, looking at Lori expectantly. The dog knew something had happened but obviously had no capacity to understand what.

      Lori continued to fly down the street, checking the rear-view mirror every couple