Not having her usual enhanced senses was screwing with her, and bad. She should've heard him well before he started up the driveway. Should've rigged a perimeter alarm, and gone outside to check even if it was just the heavy snow setting it off. Dad would be furious. Rose retreats to the corner of the room, fist clenched, cursing inwardly. Stupid, stupid, rookie mistake.

The man who enters has a cane and glasses, but the cane's not immediately touching the floor. She narrows her eye.

'Please don't hurt me,' she says, making her voice high and frail. She's crouched next to the table, giving her cover from anything that comes through the door or window, the backpack sitting on the floor next to her. He's blind, but that doesn't mean anything. People will do anything to survive, that includes pretend to be more helpless than they are. It's a tactic she herself has been fooled by until she learnt to use it to gauge the real nature of whatever's in front of her. Some people will hurt women. Others will hurt kids.

Her heartbeat is the only thing that betrays her: it's not the rapid thrum of someone scared, but the steady beat of an ambush predator. She has a hand on the hilt of her knife, waiting, watching him.