But by the third letter, the words were blurring. There was no excuse for being so tired so early in the day. Annoyed, she slid her fingers under her glasses to rub her eyes clear. But they blurred all the more, as if she'd swabbed them with oil. Her head spun once, sickly, and her arm fell heavily to the seat beside her.

So tired, she thought. So hot. As if in slow motion, she tried to shrug out of her coat. The papers fluttered to the floor, and the effort of reaching for them only increased the dizziness.

"Tim." She leaned forward, pressed a hand against the back of the front seat. He didn't answer, but the word had sounded dim and far away to her own ears. As she struggled to focus on him the half-

empty bottle of juice slipped from her numbed fingers.

"Something's wrong," she tried to tell him as she slid bonelessly to the plushly carpeted floor of the car. "Something's very wrong."

But he didn't answer. She imagined herself falling through the floor of the limo and into a dark, bottomless pit.

Chapter Twenty-eight

Deanna dreamed she was swimming up through red-tinted clouds, slowly, sluggishly pulling herself toward the surface, where a faint, white light glowed through the misty layers. She moaned as she struggled. Not from pain but nausea that rolled up, burning in her throat.

In defense, she kept her eyes closed, taking long, deep breaths and willing the sickness back. Drops of clammy sweat pearled on her skin so that her thin silk blouse clung nastily to her arms and back.

When the worst had passed, she opened her eyes cautiously.

She had been in the car, she remembered. Tim had been driving her home and she'd become ill. But she wasn't home now. Hospital? she wondered dully when she let her eyes cautiously open. The room was softly lit with delicate violets trailing up the wallpaper. A white ceiling fan gently stirred the air with a whispering sound of blades. A glossy mahogany bureau held a collection of pretty, colored bottles and pots. A magnificent poinsettia and a miniature blue spruce decorated with silver bells added seasonal flair.

Hospital? she thought again. Groggily, she tried to sit up. Her head spun again, hideously, shooting that fist of nausea back into her stomach. Her vision doubled. When she tried to bring her hand to her face, it felt weighted down. For a moment she could only lie still, fighting back the sickness. She saw that the room was a box, a closed, windowless box. Like a coffin.

A spear of panic sliced through the shock. She reared up, shouting, stumbling drunkenly from the bed. Staggering to a wall, she ran her fingers over the delicate floral wallpaper in a dizzy search for an opening. Trapped. She wheeled around, eyes wide. Trapped.

She saw then what was on the wall over the bed. It was enough to crush the bubbling hysteria. A huge photograph smiled sassily down at her. For several stunned moments Deanna stared at Deanna. Slowly, with the sound of her own heartbeat thudding in her ears, she scanned the rest of the room.

No, there were no doors, no windows, just flowers, bowers of them, wall to wall. But there were other photographs. Dozens of pictures of her were lined on the side walls. Candid shots, magazine covers, press photos stood cheek by jowl against the dainty wallpaper.

"Oh God. Oh God." She heard the whimpering panic in her own voice and bit down fiercely on her lip.

Looking away from her own images, her eyes glassy with shock, she stared at the refectory table, its snowy white runner stiff with starch as a backdrop for silver candle holders, glossy white tapers. Dozens of little treasures had been arranged there: an earring she'd lost months before, a tube of lipstick, a silk scarf Simon had given her one Christmas, a glove of supple red leather — one of a pair that had disappeared the winter before.

There was more. She eased closer, straining against the tidal wave of fear as she studied the collection. A memo she'd handwritten to Jeff, a lock of ebony hair wrapped in gold cord, other photographs of her, always of her, in elegant and ornate frames. The shoes she'd been wearing in the limo were there as well, along with her jacket, neatly folded.

The place was like a shrine, she realized with a shudder. The sound in her throat was feral and frightened. There was a television in the corner, a shelf of leather-bound albums. And most terrifying, cameras bracketed the upper corners of the room. The pinpoints of their red lights beamed like tiny eyes.

She stumbled back, fear soaring like a slickly coated bird. Her gaze sliced from one camera to the other.

"You're watching me." She fought back the terror in her voice. "I know you are. You can't keep me here. They'll look. You know they'll find me. They're probably looking already."

She looked down at her wrist to check the time, but saw that her watch was gone. How long? she wondered frantically. It might have been minutes, or days, since she'd passed out in the car.

The car. Her breath began to hitch. "Tim." She pressed her lips together until the ache snapped through the need to weep. "Tim, you have to let me go. I'll try to help you. I promise that. I'll do whatever I can. Please, come in here, talk to me."

As though only her invitation had been required, a section of the wall slid open. In reflex, Deanna surged forward, only to bite back a moan of despair as her head spun in sickening circles from the drug. Still, she straightened her shoulders and hoped that she hid the worst of her fear.

"Tim," she began, then only stared in confusion.

"Welcome home, Deanna."

His face flushed with shy pleasure, Jeff stepped into the room. He carried a silver tray on which rode a wineglass, a china plate of herbed pasta and a single red rosebud.

"I hope you like the room." In his unhurried and efficient way, he set the tray on the bureau. "It took a long time for me to get it just right. I didn't want you to be just comfortable. I wanted you to be happy. I know there's no view." He turned toward her, eyes too bright though apology quavered in his voice. "But it's safer this way. No one will bother us when we're in here."

"Jeff." Calm, she ordered herself. She had to stay calm. "You can't keep me here."

"Yes I can. I've planned it all carefully. I've had years to work it out. Why don't you sit down, Dee? You're probably feeling a little groggy, and I want you to be comfortable while you eat."

He stepped forward, and though she braced, he didn't touch her.

"Later," he continued, "after you understand everything, you'll feel a lot better. You just need time." He lifted a hand as if to touch her cheek, but drew it away again as if he didn't want to frighten her. "Please try to relax. You never let yourself relax. I know you might be a little afraid right now, but it's going to be all right. If you fight me, I'll have to…" Because he couldn't bear to say the words, he slipped a hypo out of his pocket. "I don't want to." Her instant recoil had him pushing the needle out of sight again. "Really, I don't. And you wouldn't be able to get away."

Smiling again, he moved a table and chair closer to the bed. "You need to eat," he said pleasantly. "You always worried me when it came to taking care of yourself. All those hurried or skipped meals. But I'll take good care of you. Sit down, Deanna."

She could refuse, she thought. She could scream and rant and threaten. And for what? She'd known Jeff, or thought she'd known him, for years. He could be stubborn, she reminded herself. But she'd always been able to reason with him.

"I am hungry," she told him, and hoped her stomach wouldn't rebel. "You'll talk to me while I eat? Explain things to me?" She gave him her best interviewer's smile.

"Yes." The smile burned across his face like a fever. "I thought you might be angry at first."

"I'm not angry. I'm afraid."

"I'd never hurt you." He took one of her limp hands in his and squeezed lightly. "I won't let anyone hurt you. I know you might be thinking about getting past me, Deanna. Getting through the panel. But you can't. I'm really very strong, and you're still weak from the drug. No matter what you do, you'll still be locked in. Sit down."

As if in a dream, she did as he told her. She wanted to run, but even as the thought communicated from brain to body, her legs folded. How could she run when she could barely stand? The drug was still in charge of her system. It was precisely the kind of detail he would have thought of. Precisely the kind of detail that had made him such an invaluable part of her team.

"It's wrong to keep me here, Jeff."

"No, it's not." He set the tray on the table in front of her. "I've thought about it for a long, long time. And this is for the best. For you. I'm always thinking of you. Later on, we can travel together. I've been looking into villas in the south of France. I think you'd like it there." He touched her then, just a brushing caress on her shoulder. Beneath her blouse her skin crawled. "I love you so much."

"Why didn't you ever tell me? You could have talked to me about the way you felt."

"I couldn't. At first I thought it was just because I was shy, but then I realized that it was all like a plan. A life plan. Yours and mine."

Anxious to explain, he pulled up another chair. As he leaned forward, his glasses slid down his nose. While her vision blurred, then cleared, she watched him shove them up again — an old habit, once an endearing one, that now chilled her blood.

"There were things you needed to do, experiences — and men — you had to get out of your system before we could be together. I understood that, Dee. I never blamed you for Finn. It hurt me." Resting his hands on his knees, he let out a sigh. "But I didn't blame you. And I couldn't blame him." His face brightened again. "How could I when I knew how perfect you were? The first time I saw you on TV, I couldn't get my breath. It scared me a little. You were looking right at me, into me. I'll never forget it. You see, I was so lonely before. An only child. I grew up in this house. You're not eating, Deanna. I wish you would."