A uniformed security guard fell into step with them as they headed across the lot. “Is she dangerous?” he asked Melissa.
“I don’t think so.”
Daniel stared at Melissa’s grim expression. “What the hell is going on?”
She didn’t answer, striding forward as the driver-side door opened and Rose stepped from the car.
Rose’s eyelids fluttered briefly as she looked at Melissa, almost like a flinch, Daniel noted with surprise.
“I told you to stay away from me,” Melissa snapped.
Rose’s chin came up. “Not in those exact words.”
“Well, let me be clear. You need help. And, until you get it, I don’t want you anywhere near me, my home or my business.” Melissa folded her arms across her chest. “I’ve already talked to the police about you. They know everything you told me. It’ll take one call to get a restraining order.”
Rose’s lower lip trembled, but she didn’t drop her gaze. “I just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”
“What’s going on here?” Daniel asked.
Both women turned their gazes to him. Melissa’s fiery, Rose’s apprehensive.
Melissa was the first to answer. “There’s something you don’t know about Rose, Daniel.” She looked at Rose. “Should you tell him or should I?”
Rose’s gaze dropped, her hands trembling.
Melissa looked back at Daniel. “Yesterday, Rose informed me that I was going to die if I didn’t get out of town.”
Daniel frowned, not understanding. “What?”
“How’d you put it?” Melissa asked Rose. “Oh, yeah. She sees death.”
Rose looked at him, her expression a mixture of anger and shame. But there was no sign of denial, no hint of refutation.
“You see death?” he repeated.
Her mouth tightened, her eyes locking with his. “Right now, Melissa’s face is covered with a translucent image of itself. Sort of like a veil.”
Daniel couldn’t keep his gaze from shifting to Melissa’s face. He saw nothing but her pretty, even features.
“You can’t see it. Only I can.”
“And that’s all there is? The image of her face?” That made no sense, Daniel thought. None of this makes any sense.
Rose shook her head, her eyes welling with tears. “The death veil is covered with bloody slashes. Several crisscrossing gashes on her forehead and cheeks.” Her voice weakened. “And her throat is slit.”
Images flashed through Daniel’s mind. Body after body, disfigured by a killer’s escalating rage.
She was describing the marks of Orion.
Chapter Eight
Melissa held up her hand. “Enough. I want you off this property now or I’m calling the police.”
Rose dragged her gaze from Daniel’s narrowed eyes and looked at Melissa. “Okay. I’m going. But please, please be careful.” She looked at Daniel again, trying to read his dark expression. He was skeptical, obviously. Thrown by the whole thing. But she’d seen something else in his eyes.
Recognition.
She had described the killer’s handiwork perfectly, and he knew it.
“This is why I called you here, Daniel,” Melissa said, her voice low with anger. “To warn you about Rose.” She hooked her arm through Daniel’s, turning to the nearby security guard. When she spoke, her voice was cold. “See that she leaves.”
Daniel turned away, walking back to the building with Melissa. The security guard held his ground, his grim look making Rose’s stomach hurt.
She returned to her Chevy and slid behind the steering wheel, gripping the wheel with shaking hands before fumbling her key into the ignition.
But she couldn’t bear sitting at home, wondering if Melissa was even still alive. Though there’d been no report of a new murder on the news, she’d figured it was possible that the body just hadn’t been found yet. She’d tried all the numbers she had for Melissa, without any response.
She’d panicked, pure and simple. Acted before she thought. And now she’d paid a high price for her impulsiveness.
Daniel knew.
It had been foolish to think she could keep secret something so elemental to who she was, not if she wanted to use the death veils to make a difference in the lives of people at risk. She knew she could make a difference, if only someone believed her. But nobody believed her. Especially not Daniel.
She was on her own.
DANIEL STARED at the narrow road illuminated by the Jeep’s headlights, his mind still in the parking lot of Bannerman Publishing, reliving the scene between Rose and Melissa over and over again in hopes of making sense of what seemed nonsensical.
There was no chance Rose Browning was telling the truth. It was only a question of whether she was lying or crazy.
Daniel’s dealings with her argued against the latter; she held a job, paid a mortgage and was able to communicate clearly and rationally, so insanity wasn’t the answer.
But why would she have chosen such a crazy-sounding lie to explain her insider knowledge of Orion’s modus operandi?
He shouldn’t have gone back inside with Melissa after the parking lot scene. He should have followed Rose home immediately, caught her with her guard down and her emotions running high and gotten to the bottom of her deception. Instead, he’d given her several hours to calm down, to rethink her plan and come up with a different excuse.
Couldn’t be helped now, he thought grimly, pulling the Jeep onto Twentieth Street. She’d still be caught off guard to find him at her door at eight-thirty on a Thursday night.
Five Points South teemed with people taking advantage of the mild October night. He passed the Southside Pub’s neon-lit entrance, a reminder of his first encounter with Rose Browning. Wearing something sleek and red, her dark hair gathered in a neat coil at the base of her neck, she’d made an impact.
He stopped at the traffic light by the Storyteller fountain, his mind still replaying that first, brief meeting. No words exchanged, only a look that had set a fire in his belly, a need that lingered, unquenched, even now.
Whether she was a liar or not.
Lost in memory, he barely registered the small group of pedestrians crossing the street in front of him until a dark-haired beauty in a short black skirt and leather jacket dragged his attention back to the present. It took a second to realize she wasn’t a figment of his imagination, conjured up by his preoccupation with Rose Browning and her secrets.
It was Rose herself, dressed for clubbing in a flippy little skirt that hit her midthigh, exposing long, toned legs made sexier by a pair of spike-heeled pumps. Tonight she wore her hair down in sleek, dark waves that framed her heart-shaped face. She walked apart from the rest of the smiling, laughing pedestrians, her expression tense and focused.
As she reached the sidewalk on the other side of the street, the light changed. Daniel flicked on his turn signal and made a right onto a side road, following her.
He drove slowly, staying just behind her as she strode toward a pair of bars near the end of the block. She entered the nearest one: Sizzle. The bar where Alice Donovan had spent her last night on earth.
Scanning the street for a parking place and finding none, Daniel settled on the side lot next to Hannity’s, the Irish pub next door. He didn’t enter Sizzle immediately; he had a feeling she’d be watching the door. Instead, he
