Coldheart Canyon. Clive Barker

so badly that she might have ploughed into the back of it had she not acted quickly to avert the collision. She swung wide of it, glancing back to see Caputo manually opening a pair of immense gates. The thief started to look round at her, but she put her foot on the accelerator and was out of sight before he could fix his gaze. She drove on a considerable distance, but the road came to a dead-end, which left her with two options. One, to turn round and make a conspicuous retreat past the gates, so that he was certain she’d gone; or to hope that the urgency of his mission would make him careless about her presence, and by the time she’d trekked back to his thieves’ lair she would have been forgotten. She decided on the latter. She’d come too far to turn and run off now with her tail between her legs.

      The first thing she noticed when she got out of her car was the deep hush of the Canyon. Though the Bel Air house was nicely situated, away from the din of any major thoroughfare, she’d still been aware that she was in the middle of a city. But here the only sound was the music of birds, and insects in the grass. She was careful not to slam the door. Leaving the key in the car, and the door just slightly ajar in case she needed to make a fast getaway, she headed back down the street to the gate.

      There were no cameras mounted along the perimeter this time, which surprised her; but then perhaps she was walking into a nest of infamous felons, and everyone in the vicinity knew to keep their distance. If so – if the people Marco was doing business with were real villains – then she was in trouble. She was alone up here; and nobody knew where she’d gone.

      This is insanity, she thought to herself as she walked. But she kept on walking. The prospect of coming out of this the unlikely heroine was simply too attractive to be turned down. Yes, there was a risk. But then perhaps it was time she took a few, instead of hiding away in her house and doting on her picture collection. She was in the thick of things now, and she wasn’t going to allow herself to turn her back on this adventure. If she did – if she got in her car and drove away – wouldn’t she always wonder how different things might have been if for once in her life she’d had the courage of her instincts?

      Arnie had always called her a dreamer, and maybe he was right about that. Maybe she’d been living in a dream world for too long, with her little museum of photographs to dote on; hoping – though it could never happen, of course – that one day, when she flicked through the pictures, Todd would look at her and smile at her and invite her into his world, to stay. It was a silly dream, and she knew it. Whereas being here now, walking on the hard street in the hot sun, with an old cracked wall to the left of her – all that was real, perfectly real. So perhaps today was the day when the photographs became real too; the day when she finally found her way to a man of flesh and blood; to a Todd who would return her look, finally; see her and smile at her.

      The thought made her quicken her step; and she arrived at the gates breathing a little faster, exhilarated by the prospect that with the hazards she imagined the house contained there was one possibility she could not properly imagine (though Lord knows she’d tried to conjure it over and over): the image of her idol, appearing before her, and her with so much to say she wouldn’t know where to begin.

      Chapter 10

      She scanned the area around the gates (the bars of which were exquisitely interwoven with both wrought iron vines and the living variety), in search of the inevitable security cameras, but to her surprise found none. They were either extremely well concealed, or else the owners of this house were so certain that their Canyon was safe from visitors that they didn’t feel the need of them. More surprisingly still, the gates had no locks; she was able to push one of them open wide enough for her to slip through.

      She could see some of the house from where she stood, though it was mostly hidden by the great riot of shrubs and trees that lined the curving driveway. Caputo’s car was parked close to the front door. The trunk was open, and he was now unloading his loot. She wished she’d brought a camera; then she could have simply photographed him in the middle of his illicit transaction, and left with her evidence. But as it was, she felt obliged to get a little closer, and find out who he was dealing with. If she didn’t have some further evidence, it was going to end up being his word against hers; and she, after all, was the trespasser here. Her accusations weren’t going to carry much weight unless she could be very specific about what she had witnessed. She waited until Caputo had gone into the house, and then crept towards the front door, covering perhaps half the distance between door and gate before the thief strode out of the house again, and returned to the car. She ducked for cover behind a Bird of Paradise, its sickly sap gummy beneath her heels. From there she watched while Caputo hauled another load of booty up out of the trunk. As he did so there was a shout from inside the house; the voice curiously muted.