Five years ago, however, on her twenty-eighth birthday, she began to realize that she had, if she was lucky, ten years left as a show dancer, and she decided to establish herself in the business in another capacity, to avoid being washed up at thirty-eight. She landed a position as choreographer for a two-bit lounge revue, a dismally cheap imitation of the multimillion-dollar Lido, and eventually she took over the costumer’s job as well. From that she moved up through a series of similar positions in larger lounges, then in small showrooms that seated four or five hundred in second-rate hotels with limited show budgets. In time she directed a revue, then directed and produced another. She was steadily becoming a respected name in the closely knit Vegas entertainment world, and she believed that she was on the verge of great success.
Almost a year ago, shortly after Danny had died, Tina had been offered a directing and co-producing job on a huge ten-million-dollar extravaganza to be staged in the two-thousand-seat main showroom of the Golden Pyramid, one of the largest and plushest hotels on the Strip. At first it had seemed terribly wrong that such a wonderful opportunity should come her way before she’d even had time to mourn her boy, as if the Fates were so shallow and insensitive as to think that they could balance the scales and offset Danny’s death merely by presenting her with a chance at her dream job. Although she was bitter and depressed, although — or maybe because — she felt utterly empty and useless, she took the job.
The new show was titled Magyck! because the variety acts between the big dance numbers were all magicians and because the production numbers themselves featured elaborate special effects and were built around supernatural themes. The tricky spelling of the title was not Tina’s idea, but most of the rest of the program was her creation, and she remained pleased with what she had wrought. Exhausted too. This year had passed in a blur of twelve- and fourteen-hour days, with no vacations and rarely a weekend off.
Nevertheless, even as preoccupied with Magyck! as she was, she had adjusted to Danny’s death only with great difficulty. A month ago, for the first time, she’d thought that at last she had begun to overcome her grief. She was able to think about the boy without crying, to visit his grave without being overcome by grief. All things considered, she felt reasonably good, even cheerful to a degree. She would never forget him, that sweet child who had been such a large part of her, but she would no longer have to live her life around the gaping hole that he had left in it. The wound was achingly tender but healed.
That’s what she had thought a month ago. For a week or two she had continued to make progress toward acceptance. Then the new dreams began, and they were far worse than the dream that she’d had immediately after Danny had been killed.
Perhaps her anxiety about the public’s reaction to Magyck! was causing her to recall the greater anxiety she had felt about Danny. In less than seventeen hours — at 8:00 P.M., December 30—the Golden Pyramid Hotel would present a special, invitational, VIP premiere of Magyck!, and the following night, New Year’s Eve, the show would open to the general public. If audience reaction was as strong and as positive as Tina hoped, her financial future was assured, for her contract gave her two and one-half percent of the gross receipts, minus liquor sales, after the first five million. If Magyck! was a hit and packed the showroom for four or five years, as sometimes happened with successful Vegas shows, she’d be a multimillionaire by the end of the run. Of course, if the production was a flop, if it failed to please the audience, she might be back working the small lounges again, on her way down. Show business, in any form, was a merciless enterprise.
She had good reason to be suffering from anxiety attacks. Her obsessive fear of intruders in the house, her disquieting dreams about Danny, her renewed grief — all of those things might grow from her concern about Magyck! If that were the case, then those symptoms would disappear as soon as the fate of the show was evident. She needed only to ride out the next few days, and in the relative calm that would follow, she might be able to get on with healing herself.
In the meantime she absolutely had to get some sleep. At ten o’clock in the morning, she was scheduled to meet with two tour-booking agents who were considering reserving eight thousand tickets to Magyck! during the first three months of its run. Then at one o’clock the entire cast and the crew would assemble for the final dress rehearsal.
She fluffed her pillows, rearranged the covers, and tugged at the short nightgown in which she slept. She tried to relax by closing her eyes and envisioning a gentle night tide lapping at a silvery beach.
Thump!
She sat straight up in bed.
Something had fallen over in another part of the house. It must have been a large object because, though muffled by the intervening walls, the sound was loud enough to rouse her.
Whatever it had been… it hadn’t simply fallen. It had been knocked over. Heavy objects didn’t just fall of their own accord in deserted rooms.
She cocked her head, listening closely. Another and softer sound followed the first. It didn’t last long enough for Tina to identify the source, but there was a stealthiness about it. This time she hadn’t been imagining a threat. Someone actually was in the house.
As she sat up in bed, she switched on the lamp. She pulled open the nightstand drawer. The pistol was loaded. She flicked off the two safety catches.
For a while she listened.
In the brittle silence of the desert night, she imagined that she could sense an intruder listening too, listening for her.
She got out of bed and stepped into her slippers. Holding the gun in her right hand, she went quietly to the bedroom door.
She considered calling the police, but she was afraid of making a fool of herself. What if they came, lights flashing and sirens screaming — and found no one? If she had summoned the police every time that she imagined hearing a prowler in the house during the past two weeks, they would have decided long ago that she was scramble-brained. She was proud, unable to bear the thought of appearing to be hysterical to a couple of macho cops who would grin at her and, later over doughnuts and coffee, make jokes about her. She would search the house herself, alone.
Pointing the pistol at the ceiling, she jacked a bullet into the chamber.
Taking a deep breath, she unlocked the bedroom door and eased into the hall.
Chapter Two
Tina searched the entire house, except for Danny’s old room, but she didn’t find an intruder. She almost would have preferred to discover someone lurking in the kitchen or crouching in a closet rather than be forced to look, at last, in that final space where sadness seemed to dwell like a tenant. Now she had no choice.
A little more than a year before he had died, Danny had begun sleeping at the opposite end of the small house from the master bedroom, in what had once been the den. Not long after his tenth birthday, the boy had asked for more space and privacy than was provided by his original, tiny quarters. Michael and Tina had helped him move his belongings to the den, then had shifted the couch, armchair, coffee table, and television from the den into the quarters the boy had previously occupied.