Exponential

  *

  The hour and a half drive to her mother’s was relatively uneventful. She didn’t want to risk being followed, so she got off the exit before she normally would have and drove some of the back roads. This way she could keep an eye on the other traffic in the event someone with more surveillance skill could still be trailing her. Mara never did call her mother to let her know she was stopping by and in fact staying with her for a few days. But she knew mom would be happy to see her and if, by chance, she wasn’t home, Mara knew where she kept a spare key outside.

  The drive gave her some time to think and some time to notch up the paranoia to new heights. Just what she needed, another episode of gut-wrenching anxiety. The message from Chris was the most puzzling of all. Why didn’t he just say what he meant instead of all the mystery with this “Tomb of Rivest” stuff? And why not simply call or e-mail direct to her? It obviously had something to do with Viiradium and the obvious answer was that he simply couldn’t. Perhaps by sending the message through some sort of a relay service a message could be delivered to her at Viiradium without their knowledge of such a message. It would seem likely that Chris was crudely trying to get help while taking steps to protect her.

  Some protection. Somehow, they were on to her now since they had broken into her place. Why? Probably looking for something. But for what? Then there was the little episode where they violently tried to abduct her. Who knows where she would have ended up if they had succeeded. She would have to be extremely cautious.

  Now to decide what to do with the message. The police didn’t seem to be moving too fast on the case. Would this new twist be of any value? She wondered if going to the local police was a wise decision. Perhaps this case was bigger that she realized and going to the state police would have been better. Dell seemed concerned and she liked him, but what could he do?

  Since Viiradium was involved, should she go to Will? Could she even trust him? Of course. He had been helpful to her so far. He was likely unaware of the involvement of Viiradium. But he was, after all, upper management. How could he not know more? She felt a little guilty doubting the integrity of such a close friend and decided she had to trust someone and it would be good to have someone on her side that knew Viiradium well.

  In fact, it wouldn’t hurt to tell both. Let either of them do anything they can to help resolve the situation.

  Her stomach began to make its hunger demands known and she realized it had been quite a while since she had anything to eat. It probably didn’t help her gastric health much to be running on empty when she spent the day on edge so far. She still had a a few miles before reaching her mother’s so she pulled off into a small diner in Greenville which was the next town from her mother’s farm in Ashbury. It was classic ‘greasy spoon’ dining selection, but the tuna pita wrap didn’t sound too laden with harmful lipoproteins, so she ordered along with a lemonade.

  She kept a watchful eye on people as they came and went but nothing seemed suspicious or out of the ordinary. She actually ended up enjoying her meal and began to relax a bit. She thought that it would be nice to spend a couple of days with mom and sort of ‘catch up’ with each other. Although it would be rather tense trying to explain to mom why Mara thought Chris was likely dead.

  The afternoon was getting late and evening would come early this time of year, so she paid her tab and got herself moving again. By the time she pulled up the drive to her mother’s the sun was dancing it’s final good-byes at the rim of the western horizon.

  The place looked quite like it always had. Perhaps a little more tired, that’s all. She wondered when she last come up to visit and was alarmed and a little ashamed when she couldn’t even remember. She didn’t see her mother’s car around but she could have parked in the old carriage house. In addition to the main house and the old carriage house, there was a substantial sized barn as well as a couple of smaller sheds ‘out back’. None of the farm buildings were really used for anything anymore and in fact, the barn sagged to the point where it was probably too dangerous to even venture inside now.

  She stopped the car, grabbed her temporary purse and approached the house. Where the pillars supporting the roof over the front porch met the ceiling, there was an inside ledge where mother usually kept a spare key for emergencies. She found it without difficulty and pulled back the screen door.

  Someplace in the back of her mind, a warning bell seemed to sound. The door wasn’t quite latched and opened to her touch. After all the events of the past couple of days, she didn’t need this. What was going on? Was mom OK? It would be very odd indeed for her to not be home and leave the door not only unlocked, but open.

  She hesitated for a moment to consider what to do next. Could this have anything to do with the disappearance of Chris?