"Will I? I'm living in Kara now. Maybe Kara will die with me. And maybe my body will die but I'll go on living within Kara. The situation is unprecedented. Anything could happen."

And either way, I lose, Rob thought.

"The pistol, Harris. Slide it over."

But as long as he held the pistol, Rob knew he had a chance. There was a way to save Jill: kill Kara. Rob raised the pistol in the two handed grip and sighted at the middle of Kara's forehead.

She smiled at him.

"You'd have made a good general, Harris. Sacrifice one platoon to avoid losing both. Go ahead. Shoot. Can you do it? To Kara? She's in here with me, looking down that barrel just as I am. Pull the trigger... Rob Rob."

He lowered the pistol. He couldn't do it. Maybe if he just wounded her, the pain would free her from Gabor, but it was too risky. Most of her body was hidden behind Jill. He couldn't risk hitting Jill.

Rob could feel the balance of the stand-off shifting toward Gabor. Inevitable. Gabor controlled the two people Rob cared about most in this world. He felt as if he were being torn apart, slowly, one small piece at a time.

"Now, Harris!"

You've wasted enough time. The longer you let this drag on, the greater the chance something will go wrong for you.

I wish he'd pulled the trigger! Kara says.

"I doubt that."

At least Jill would be safe.

You sense her sincerity, and you wonder at the depth of a mother's feeling for her child. You can't imagine sacrificing your own life for anyone.

But enough talk with Detective Harris. He cannot be threatened into dropping his weapon, so it is time for action. You're not anxious to cut the child-it will be most unpleasant-but this is a desperate situation. You are fighting for your own existence. All it takes is one short jab. You need only move your hand an inch or less and the point will pierce the child's eye. That will bring Harris to his knees. And then you'll be in control.

This will teach Kara a lesson, too.

"Watch carefully, Kara. I'm going to demonstrate who is the master here."

Panic spews from her in a fountain.

No! You're not-!

"Watch!"

Kara's voice becomes an inarticulate scream in your mind as you draw the knife back a bit, preparing for the jab, then- You can't move it!

The knife is frozen in the air. Now it's moving away! Away Away! It's Kara! She's rea.s.serting control! But this is impossible! You knew she had a powerful self, but you never dreamed- You try to force her back but her rage is a living thing, clawing at you. Kara's protective instincts have been uncaged, released from some primitive part of her hindbrain, and they are now roaring through her like prehistoric beasts. Racial memories, encoded in every cell of her body, are bursting free. Every woman who has ever persevered through a life of domination... every mother since the dawn of time who has ever fought to save her child... it's as if they've all suddenly risen up and joined her against you.

You've misjudged this woman. You hope it was not a fatal error. You fight back with all your power, your greater experience. You must win! You must must!

Kara shouted with triumph as she forced the knife blade away from Jill's face. She could only control one arm at a time, it seemed-Gabor kept her left arm wrapped tightly around Jill-but Kara controlled the important one. The ferocity of her anger astonished her, and even frightened her. But it was the fuel she used against Gabor, and it was working. She could do it! She could beat Gabor!

"The panel!" she said to Rob in a voice so strained she barely recognized it as her own. "Slide it-uhn!"

The effort of speaking cost her some control over her hand and the knife blade darted toward Jill's eye again. She stopped it in time, but she didn't dare speak again.

Something was happening. Rob watched Kara's body tremble violently. Her right arm spasmed. She'd said something about the panel. Slide it Slide it?

He backed away to the panel and pushed against it. It didn't move back but it slid a bit to the left. He kept it moving, and then he was looking into a small room with a crib. Two steps and he was standing over it. Rob's gorge rose as he stared down at the mottled, bloated diapered thing looking up at him with opaque eyes.

Here he was. This was Gabor. Rob ratcheted back the hammer on his revolver and leveled it at Gabor's over-sized head. He squeezed the trigger but couldn't pull it. Gabor's words came back to him. What if killing Gabor's body left him alive in Kara's, and permanently in control?

Kara lurched into the room, still clutching Jill, still brandishing the knife. There seemed to be a tug of war going on. The knife would slash toward Jill, then pull back. Over and over.

As Kara struggled toward the crib, straining and jerking like someone moving the wrong way in the rush hour commuter tide, trying to go up the steps while the horde was flowing down, Rob stepped aside. He sensed a t.i.tanic struggle roaring beneath the surface, one he was barred from entering. He had no choice but to wait and see what would happen, and stand ready to grab Jill and pull her free at the first opportunity.

Close, closer. Kara pushed her body toward the crib. It was like moving under water. And the closer she got, the stiffer Gabor's resistance as she sensed him drawing strength from his own panic.

Within a yard of the crib, she stalled. Gabor seemed to have dug in his heels in a last desperate effort to hold her back. Even her unquenched fury wasn't strong enough to push her beyond that point.

Why didn't Rob shoot him? What was he waiting for? She didn't dare risk speech-it might allow Gabor the upper hand.

Hand... the knife was still in her hand, forgotten as they fought toward and away from the crib. She called up all her reserves. A garbled chorus, an unintelligible blend of an unimaginable number of voices echoed down the millennia and roared in her ears as she tightened her grip on the handle...

And plunged downward.

Kara screamed with the pain of the blade sinking deep into the muscles of her thigh. Jill screamed, too. But suddenly Kara's body was her own again. She pushed Jill child toward Rob.

"Get her out!"

And then she lunged at the crib.

Ahead of her, she saw Gabor's body rear up and look at her with its blind eyes. His slack mouth hung open, his tongue moved, as if trying to form words.

Kara didn't hesitate. She shoved the blade forward between the bars and rammed it into Gabor's barrel chest. He made a hoa.r.s.e cry like the squeal of a pig and then Kara was leaning over the crib, slashing and stabbing. There were no more cries after the first, and the thrashing stopped soon after. The only noise was the hiss of the knife slicing in and out of him and the small whimpering noises coming from deep in her own chest. But she kept driving the knife into his body, over and over. She slashed him for Jill, and she slashed him for her father whose memory he had defiled, but mostly she slashed him for herself. She closed her eyes so she wouldn't have to see the carnage she was causing, but she couldn't stop... couldn't stop... couldn't stop. She had to keep it up until there was nothing left of him, until there was no chance that he would ever defile her or threaten Jill ever again. And even now when she knew he had to be dead, and her wounded leg was threatening to give out under her, her arm kept stabbing, as if it had a life of its own.

Suddenly Rob was there, holding her arm, pulling the knife from her hand.

"It's over, Kara," he said. "Christ, it's over. You can't kill him any more."

Her leg gave way and she fell against him. Rob lifted her and carried her from Gabor's room up to the first floor where he stretched her out on the settee in the foyer. She saw Jill staring at her from the kitchen doorway, her fingers jammed into her mouth.

"It's all right now, honey," Kara said, reaching out her good hand to her. "I'm okay, now. The man in the cellar won't make me do bad things any more. He's gone for good."

Rob went over to Jill and she clung to him, using him as a shield between herself and her mother. That hurt Kara, but what else could she expect? It was going to take a long time to heal the trauma of this morning.

"It's okay, Jill," Rob said, drawing her toward Kara. "Your mother's okay now. It was like you said, like Freaky Friday Freaky Friday, but the bad man who was in your mother is gone, and he can't come back. Give her a hug. She's a very brave lady, and she needs you now."

With a small cry, Jill rushed forward into her mother's arms. Kara crushed her against herself and began to sob. They stayed locked together while Rob got a hand towel from the bathroom and tied it around her thigh. Then he headed toward the bas.e.m.e.nt stairs.

"Where're you going?"

"Some unfinished business."

He closed the door to the bas.e.m.e.nt behind him. A few moments later she heard a series of m.u.f.fled retorts from below. Like gun shots. Rob reappeared a short while later.

"What ... ...?"

"Five to the head," he said grimly. "Insurance."

Kara, closed her eyes. 'Thank you."

February 28 6:48 P.M.

"What did you do with his body?"

Kara had been afraid to ask, but she had to know.

Rob looked at her from the other end of the couch in the front room of his apartment.

"Food for the fishes. Even if he's found-and he won't be-he can't be identified. Gabor Gati is officially dead. The crib and its mattress were left in a vacant lot in the South Bronx. And the b.l.o.o.d.y sheet went up in flames in the fireplace. It's done. Over. Finis Finis. We can now go about getting our lives back on track."

"Amen," Kara said.

She leaned back on the cushions. The sutures in her left palm and right thigh were starting to pull. The wounds had been easily explained as gla.s.s cuts, and luckily she hadn't severed any tendons in her hand. The wounds to her body would be healed in a week or so. But the rest of her... she didn't know if she'd ever get over the past three weeks.

And Jill. She was worried most about poor Jill. But the child appeared to be bouncing back better than either Kara or Rob. She was having a ball playing nurse to her mother. She came out of the kitchenette now holding a gla.s.s of cola.

"Here you go, Mom."

"Thank you, Nurse Jill."

Kara would have preferred something stronger, but with the Percodan running through her system for the pain, she decided to stick to soft drinks.

"I'll think I'll make myself a refill," Rob said, jiggling the ice in his scotch gla.s.s.

"And I'll pick up this mess," Jill said. She straightened the newspapers, the magazine, picked up Rob's key ring- -and twirled it on her index finger. Twirl-twirl-stop. Twirl-twirl-stop.

Kara's stomach plummeted. She leaped up from the couch and grabbed her arm.

"Jill! Jill, look at me!"

The big blue eyes turned toward her, wide and innocent. Kara could barely hear her over the pounding of her heart in her throat.

"Mommy, you're hurting my arm!"

Kara loosened her grip but did not let go.

"Why did you do that?"

"Do what, Mom?"

"Twirl those keys on your finger? Tell me!"

"I... I saw you do it! Mom, why are you mad at me?"

Kara released her arm and hugged her.

"I'm not mad, bug. I'm just frightened."

Oh, G.o.d, was she ever going to be free of this?

Yes! she thought. Yes, she would get free of Gabor's lingering taint on her life. She would put this all behind her and start out anew with Jill. And with Rob. And eventually, she would be able to look at the world without seeing Gabor's shadow everywhere. Eventually, this would all become a dim memory, a barely remembered nightmare. she thought. Yes, she would get free of Gabor's lingering taint on her life. She would put this all behind her and start out anew with Jill. And with Rob. And eventually, she would be able to look at the world without seeing Gabor's shadow everywhere. Eventually, this would all become a dim memory, a barely remembered nightmare.

But for now, for a while-she hated herself for even thinking it, but she had no choice-she was going to have to keep a close watch on Jill.