"It's starting to warm up a bit," he said, "The county did a passable job on the road. The roads will be a bit slushy until tomorrow. I was going to s...ay until Sunday afternoon. Do you want to get back home today or would you like to stay until tomorrow? By tomorrow the roads will be a lot clearer."Ann paused before answering, "I can stay until tomorrow. I love it up here in the mountains. Brenda is at school, so there's no one at home waiting for me, and I have a lot of questions to ask you. He held out the grapes to her again. She bit off another and crushed it and swallowed. His deep voice rumbled sadly, "You're my favorite, you are so like your mother." I'm still hot and bored," she said.A voice from down the ravine, another of her sisters, called: "Someone's coming."The man stood and stared down the trail. "Hikers," the voice called.Sam and his daughter hiked up the trail. They'd been on it two hours. It'd crossed back and forth across the stream, through clearings where the. I.L.A. - synthetic, humanoid, enlightened, inquisitive, living, androidI quickly pulled the unconscious body of the dark brown-haired female in the building. Looking at Sheila I saw that she was still in shut down status. Cursing, I got the woman against the wall. I started to look for something to tie her up, shit this place was more bare than I thought.I finally found some cord that had been outside the door. Wrapping it around her arms and chest I suddenly noticed that the woman was somewhat. I had created my own rut. My routine, which satisfied me in so many ways, was the rut. I was predictable. I took Sandra for granted even though I admired her beauty. I must have forgotten to tell her often enough. My family and friends could count on me because I was predictable. I offered them little in the way of surprise because I was predictable. And then, when Randall came along, he used that against me.When I discovered Sandra's affair I did something completely unpredictable. I had.