Iris’s smile was pained. “A lot’s changed with you. I wish I’d known before now. I wish you’d told Lily or me something so we could have helped you out.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“You want me to tell Lily so she’ll know what’s going on?”
Rose shook her head. “I’ll tell her. I’m a big girl.”
Iris tugged Rose’s hair. “I brought a bag, just in case. I can stay here tonight. We could do each other’s hair and watch cheesy movies.” Her eyes took on a teasing glint. “That is, unless you’ve got a date with the wonderboy profiler.”
Relief bubbled up in Rose’s throat; her self-imposed estrangement from her sisters had hurt more than she realized. Why had she thought keeping secrets from them would make her life easier? “No date,” she assured her sister. “But I have a whole tin of chocolate.”
Iris laughed. “I’ll go get my bag!”
“HOW MANY of the death veils have you seen?” Iris asked Rose over breakfast Thursday morning.
Rose washed down her bite of bagel with milk. “Twelve.”
Iris cocked her head. “Exactly twelve?”
Rose put down the rest of her bagel, her appetite gone. “It’s not something I could forget.”
Iris reached across the table and squeezed Rose’s hand. “I’m sorry, I know this isn’t a topic you want to talk about, especially over breakfast, but-”
“But I’ve been running away from it long enough,” Rose finished for her. “I know. You’re right.”
“Do you remember who those twelve were, how they died-”
“Only eleven are dead, but I can even tell you the dates they died.” Those faces, those names were etched in Rose’s memory.
“Melissa’s the twelfth?”
Rose nodded, the memory of Melissa Bannerman’s death veil making her stomach roll.
“Okay. So tell me who the others were.” Iris crossed to the refrigerator and removed a magnetized notepad with attached pen that hung on the door. She sat across from Rose. “I know about Dillon. Who’s next?”
Pushing aside her revulsion, Rose answered, “Jenny Maitland. She died in a car accident on New Year’s Eve. Drunk driver hit her. I saw her earlier in the day, at the grocery store. I tried to tell her to be careful, but she looked at me like I was crazy.”
“Nothing new for us Browning girls, right?” Iris smiled, but her eyes were full of empathy as she jotted down a few notes on the notepad. “Who else?”
As Rose named the others, a pattern began to appear. “All foul play of some sort,” Iris pointed out.
She was right. Of the twelve death veils Rose had seen over the past ten months, none of the eleven had died of natural causes or simple accidents.
“Violent deaths that might’ve been prevented.” Iris pushed the notepad toward Rose. “Maybe that’s why you’re seeing them.”
“To stop their deaths?” Rose grimaced. “Then, I’m failing miserably.”
“Nobody ever said having a special gift would be easy-” A soft trilling sound interrupted Iris. She crossed to the counter where she’d left her purse and answered her cell phone. “Oh, hi, Shelley. What’s up?”
Shelley Daniels was a college student who helped Iris at the plant nursery Iris owned. Probably some business question. Rose turned her attention to the list of names.
Eleven people dead. Melissa in grave danger. And apparently Rose was seeing death veils because there was a chance to prevent the deaths.
But how was she supposed to do that?
“And you can’t get it going at all?”
Rose looked up at the sound of concern in her sister’s voice. Iris’s mouth tightened. “No, I know it’s a hunk of junk, but it’s all I can afford at the moment. I can be there in an hour. I can usually get it running again.”
The generator, Rose guessed. Her sister had been fighting with that piece of machinery for four years, ever since she’d started growing tropicals at her nursery.
Iris disconnected and gave Rose an apologetic look. “That was Shelley. The storm that blew through last night knocked out the power at the nursery and she can’t get the generator going. I’ve got to get there within a couple of hours or we’re going to lose all the tropicals in the hothouse.”
“Go. I’ll be fine.”
Iris frowned. “Are you sure? Maybe I could call someone to go check on it-”
“You know you’re the only one who can ever get that old thing going. Hurry, before the orchids die.”
Rose helped Iris pack up her things and walked her to the back door. “Drive carefully, and call me when you get there.”
Iris hugged her. “I love you. Thanks for telling me what was bothering you. I promise, you’ll figure everything out. You’ll know exactly what the veils mean and what you’re supposed to do about them. I have faith in you.”
Tears pricked Rose’s eyes, and she gave her sister a second, fierce hug. “I love you, too. Thanks for everything. You’ve already made me feel so much better.”
Wiping her eyes, she watched her sister drive down the back alley, wishing she could return to Willow Grove with her, back to the life she used to know, the security of a world where the only thing she saw was happiness and hope.
But that world didn’t exist, anymore, and Iris was right about one thing: No matter how much she hated the death veils, they obviously weren’t going away. The only thing left was to figure out how she was supposed to use them.
And she had to start with Melissa.
“I WAS SURPRISED by your call,” Daniel confessed as he entered Melissa Bannerman’s office. He’d figured Rose would have already clued her in on his real reason for seeking her out.
Melissa’s knowing look as he took the seat across the desk from her gave him little reason to think otherwise. “I wonder why that could be?”
He didn’t bother to feign ignorance. “I really am in the market for a publisher for the book we discussed, but you’re right, that wasn’t my primary reason for coming here.”
“You could have just told me that.”
“Maybe I should have. Wasn’t sure at the time, and I needed information.”
“About my relationship with Alice Donovan.”
“Someone said you and Alice had plans to go out the night before she died. I wanted to know what you knew.”
“What about Rose Browning? You seemed awfully interested in her when I saw you together at the meeting Tuesday night.”
He kept his expression neutral, though the memory of Rose Browning’s lips, soft and warm beneath his, still lingered. “You mentioned that she was there at the club, as well, and that she’d left soon after Alice.”
“You wanted to pump her for information, too?”
“Yes.” And he’d wanted to know what she’d been looking for in the bar where he’d seen her earlier, and why she’d fled Alice’s apartment when the police had arrived. But he wasn’t going to share that information with Melissa.
“There’s something you need to know-” Melissa’s phone buzzed, stopping her midsentence. Frowning, she picked up the receiver. “Melissa Bannerman.” Her frown deepened as she listened to whoever was on the other end. She rose from her chair and walked to the window behind her desk, the phone cord stretching out behind her. “Oh, for God’s sake-”
Daniel craned his neck, trying to follow her gaze, but from his seat, he could see little more than the building across the street.
“No, just make sure she doesn’t leave. I’ll be right out.” Melissa hung up the phone, meeting Daniel’s curious gaze with flashing blue eyes. “Come with me. I have to deal with something, and I think you may find it of interest.”
Puzzled but intrigued, Daniel walked with Melissa outside to the fenced-in parking lot behind the redbrick loft building that housed the publishing company. There were about twenty cars in the small lot.
One of them was Rose Browning’s Chevy Impala.