Read Online By the Light of the Moon by Dean Koontz - Free Book Online
Authors: Dean Koontz
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considered crying out for help, but she worried that her assailant, if still in the vicinity, might be the first to respond. She didn’t want another injection, didn’t want to be quieted by a kick in the head, and didn’t want to have to listen to any more of his droning monologue.
By focusing her attention and by bringing all her Amazonian strength to bear, she managed to lever herself off the floor and sit on the edge of the bed. This was a fine thing. She smiled, suddenly suffused with pride. Baby could sit up by herself.
Emboldened by this success, Jilly attempted to rise to her feet. She swayed on the way up, pressing her left hand against the nightstand to steady herself, but although she sagged slightly at the knees, she didn’t collapse. Another fine thing. Baby could stand upright, as erect as any primate and more fully erect than some.
Best of all, she hadn’t puked, as earlier she’d been sure she would. She no longer felt nauseated, just…peculiar.
Confident that she could stand without supportive furniture and that she would remember how to walk as soon as she tried, Jilly made her way from the bed to the door in a parabolic arc that compensated for the movement of the floor, which rolled lazily like the deck of a ship in mild seas.
The doorknob presented a mechanical challenge, but after she fumbled the door open and navigated the threshold, she found the warm night to be surprisingly more invigorating than the cool motel room. The thirsting desert air sucked moisture from her, and along with the moisture went some of her wooziness.
She turned right, toward the motel office, which lay at the end of a distressingly long and complicated series of covered walkways that seemed to have been patterned after any laboratory’s rat maze.
Within a few steps, she realized that her Coupe DeVille had vanished. She had parked the car twenty feet from her room; but it no longer stood where she recalled leaving it. Empty blacktop.
She weaved toward the vacant parking slot, squinting at the pavement as though she expected to discover an explanation for the vehicle’s disappearance: perhaps a concise but considerate memo—
IOU one beloved, midnight-blue Cadillac Coupe DeVille, fully loaded.
Instead she found an unopened bag of peanuts, evidently dropped by the smiling salesman-who-wasn’t-a-salesman, and a dead but still formidable beetle the size and shape of half an avocado. The insect lay on its glossy shell, six stiff legs sticking straight in the air, eliciting a far less emotional response from Jilly than would have a kitten or puppy in the same condition.
Harboring little interest in entomology, she left the bristling beetle untouched, but she stooped to pluck the bag of peanuts from the pavement. Having read her share of Agatha Christie mysteries, she had been convinced instantly upon spotting the peanuts that here lay a valuable clue for which the police would be grateful.
When she rose to her full height once more, she realized that the warm dry air had not purged her of the lingering effects of the anesthetic as completely as she’d thought. As a whirl of dizziness came and passed, she wondered if she had been mistaken about where she’d parked the Coupe DeVille. Perhaps it had been twenty feet to the
left
of her motel room instead of to the right.
She peered in that direction and saw a white Ford Expedition, just twelve or fifteen feet away. The Cadillac might be parked on the far side of the SUV.
Stepping over the beetle, she returned to the covered walkway. She approached the Expedition, realizing that she was headed in the direction of the vending-machine alcove where she would find more of the root beer that had gotten her in all this trouble in the first place.
When she passed the SUV and didn’t find her Coupe DeVille, she became aware of two people hurrying toward her. She said, “The smiley bastard stole my car,” before she realized what an odd couple she had encountered.
The
By focusing her attention and by bringing all her Amazonian strength to bear, she managed to lever herself off the floor and sit on the edge of the bed. This was a fine thing. She smiled, suddenly suffused with pride. Baby could sit up by herself.
Emboldened by this success, Jilly attempted to rise to her feet. She swayed on the way up, pressing her left hand against the nightstand to steady herself, but although she sagged slightly at the knees, she didn’t collapse. Another fine thing. Baby could stand upright, as erect as any primate and more fully erect than some.
Best of all, she hadn’t puked, as earlier she’d been sure she would. She no longer felt nauseated, just…peculiar.
Confident that she could stand without supportive furniture and that she would remember how to walk as soon as she tried, Jilly made her way from the bed to the door in a parabolic arc that compensated for the movement of the floor, which rolled lazily like the deck of a ship in mild seas.
The doorknob presented a mechanical challenge, but after she fumbled the door open and navigated the threshold, she found the warm night to be surprisingly more invigorating than the cool motel room. The thirsting desert air sucked moisture from her, and along with the moisture went some of her wooziness.
She turned right, toward the motel office, which lay at the end of a distressingly long and complicated series of covered walkways that seemed to have been patterned after any laboratory’s rat maze.
Within a few steps, she realized that her Coupe DeVille had vanished. She had parked the car twenty feet from her room; but it no longer stood where she recalled leaving it. Empty blacktop.
She weaved toward the vacant parking slot, squinting at the pavement as though she expected to discover an explanation for the vehicle’s disappearance: perhaps a concise but considerate memo—
IOU one beloved, midnight-blue Cadillac Coupe DeVille, fully loaded.
Instead she found an unopened bag of peanuts, evidently dropped by the smiling salesman-who-wasn’t-a-salesman, and a dead but still formidable beetle the size and shape of half an avocado. The insect lay on its glossy shell, six stiff legs sticking straight in the air, eliciting a far less emotional response from Jilly than would have a kitten or puppy in the same condition.
Harboring little interest in entomology, she left the bristling beetle untouched, but she stooped to pluck the bag of peanuts from the pavement. Having read her share of Agatha Christie mysteries, she had been convinced instantly upon spotting the peanuts that here lay a valuable clue for which the police would be grateful.
When she rose to her full height once more, she realized that the warm dry air had not purged her of the lingering effects of the anesthetic as completely as she’d thought. As a whirl of dizziness came and passed, she wondered if she had been mistaken about where she’d parked the Coupe DeVille. Perhaps it had been twenty feet to the
left
of her motel room instead of to the right.
She peered in that direction and saw a white Ford Expedition, just twelve or fifteen feet away. The Cadillac might be parked on the far side of the SUV.
Stepping over the beetle, she returned to the covered walkway. She approached the Expedition, realizing that she was headed in the direction of the vending-machine alcove where she would find more of the root beer that had gotten her in all this trouble in the first place.
When she passed the SUV and didn’t find her Coupe DeVille, she became aware of two people hurrying toward her. She said, “The smiley bastard stole my car,” before she realized what an odd couple she had encountered.
The
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