Slowly, she cracked open the door, the wrench raised in one hand. Ready to slam the door closed again if he lunged at her. The lamp besides her bed was still lit. The window was still open, too. Night air drifted along the floorboards.
Actually, there wasn't a hint of sound coming from the bedroom at all. Iva waited another few moments, holding her breath, not making a sound herself. Wishing she knew where the noisy floorboards were so she could move forward undetected.
After several long moments, it appeared he really had gone. Maybe he was a wacko and had just been released from a mental hospital.
Although yesterday he'd seemed perfectly normal. Salting his fries, a dollop of ketchup on the side of his white fry box.
Calmly eating while he sauntered toward the bridge with his expensive professional camera hanging from his shoulder.
Didn't psychiatrists say that sociopaths often appeared perfectly normal and charming? Right before they killed you or raped you? There were entire books written about sociopaths and how to spot them. Iva wished she'd bothered to read one. Or maybe it was psychopaths that became murders. She couldn't remember.
Iva gripped the wrench tighter before swinging the bathroom door wide and peering around the corner. The air whooshed out of her lungs. The guy-man---intruder---psychopath was sitting in the rocking chair near the picture window overlooking the rear gardens.
"What the hell---?" Iva started. "You were supposed to be gone!"
He jumped up, holding up his hands as if to ward her off. "I'm not an intruder or a robber or a psychopath," he began.
How did he know what Iva had just been thinking? She raised the wrench above her head while scrambling over her phone.
"I'm calling the police right now, and if you aren't out of this house in the next three seconds I'm hitting you over the head with my weapon."
He surveyed the rusted old wrench while he slowly rose from the rocking chair. "My grandmother used to hold me on her lap in this chair when I was a little boy. Maybe six or seven. She'd tell me stories about the early days of Vancouver---"
"Are you certifiably insane now? This isn't your house."
He spread his hands, a hang dog look of innocence on his features, but he wasn't fooling her.
"Stay where you are!" Iva fumbled with the phone to dial emergency services. "You're trying to trick me or confuse me."
He shook his head, a shock of light hair falling over his eyes.
"Please. I'm just as shocked to see you here as you are to see me.
"I don't have a clue who you are. And shocked is an understatement. You just tried to attack me in the bathtub!"
"Now, you know that's not true," he said, making his voice calm and reasonable.
"No, you don't get to do that," Iva ordered, waving her weapon again. You don't get to act calm and reasonable after barging in on me in the bathtub."
A dimple in his left cheek appeared when he gave a faint smile. "Are you squatting in my house? Pretending to secretly live here?"
"What in the world are you talking about?"
"I see very few of your personal belongings and I know the furniture isn't yours. Or the dishes in the cupboard."