Chapter 18
Now
“Milly? Open up.”
A day ago she’d ordered me out of her life. Now she was begging to be let in.
As I listened to her knock, there was a whisper against the internal door. Sister, sister, sister. A gentle rattling of hinges. An uncurling. A yawn.
“Please, Milly. I can’t blame you for being mad at me, but I can explain!”
I shook my head, clearing away the overwhelm. I unlocked the apartment door and swung it open.
“Milly,” Frances gasped. “Oh thank God I have the right place. Let me in.” Frances glanced over her shoulder. “Please.”
I shuffled backward, and Frances stumbled past me into the living room.
“Close it. Please.” Her eyes were frantic. “Lock it.” She looked around, and I saw it, the slightest flicker of her judgment before she wiped it from her face.
I did as she asked and locked the door, then faced her. “What are you doing here?” I asked at the same moment she said, “Why did you ask me about Blake? About the girl?”
We studied each other a moment. This woman was a far cry from the perfect country-club housewife I stalked on social media, the woman who, only yesterday, stood on the front porch of her farmhouse McMansion in two-hundred-dollar leggings and laughed in my face when I suggested she come with me.
Who’d ordered me out of her life and out of her fate.
The version of Frances who stood before me now wore a frizzy ponytail and a cut along her lip. Her cheeks were tear-streaked, and her collarbones jutted like knives from the scooped neck of her linen blouse. My sister looked both expensive and pitiful.
“You first,” she said, as if she weren’t standing in my living room after begging to be let inside. But her voice packed so much confidence that I found myself talking.
“I tried to tell you yesterday.” I shook my head, scraping a hand down my face. “You wouldn’t listen.”
“I know. I wanted to. I promise I did. Tell me now, okay?” She bit her bottom lip. “Please?”
I swallowed. Nodded. “I’ve been getting calls saying things—pretending to be Shane, and—”
“Pretending to be Shane?” Frances’s watery eyes widened. “What do you mean? How?”
“Like, calling the diner where I work, saying crazy things…saying he knows everything.” I shook my head as Frances’s pale face slackened.
“Fuck,” she whispered.
“It gets worse. The first time it happened was the same day I heard about the body found near you in Moss Grove. Then I made the connection between Blake and our past. How he’s Shane’s stepson.”
“This is bad.” She stared into the space between us.
Her words from last night—crazy, wreck, a mess—echoed through my mind and I narrowed my gaze. “I told you this at your house, and you didn’t want to hear it.”
“I know. I know and I’m sorry. And you’re right,” she whispered. “It’s all connected. But just… Can you finish? Tell me everything you know…all of it.”
I’d been so desperate to warn her, to make sure she was safe. But also for her help. Frances had always been better at me than puzzles. I couldn’t turn away that help now over hurt feelings.
“Fine,” I said. “I knew the moment I saw you on television giving the signal, our signal, that something was happening, that you needed help.”
“I told you I didn’t do that on purpose.” She shook her head, the purple shadows beneath her eyes making her look haunted.
I still didn’t believe her, but I continued.
“I thought… I think somehow Blake knows what we did. I think he killed that poor girl to get our attention. Why else would he choose Moss Grove? And right there, where she’d obviously be found.
When I saw your photos on Instagram where you flashed the sign…
” I insisted, “I thought you were signaling me for—”
Frances shook her head, but I ignored her.
“I thought you were doing it because we were in trouble. Then, later when I checked again, they were gone. I panicked…” I inhaled a breath and pushed forward. “I don’t understand that part. I’ve tried to make it make sense, but it just doesn’t.”
“Milly, I swear to you, I didn’t know I was giving the signal.” She shook her head. “And I haven’t been in charge of my social media for over a year.” Frances didn’t blink. Her frown pulled at the angry cut and for a moment, when I looked at her, I saw our mama.
I clasped and unclasped my hands. “I thought you needed me. And the Sight, it showed me these flashes when I read your leaves. With the phone call and the body, that made me scared.”
Frances crossed her arms over her chest, but I didn’t give her the chance to interrupt. “If I’m being honest, the leaves haven’t been my friend since I left home. When I try to read myself, all they ever show me is you.”
“Me?”
I nodded. “They say ‘sister.’ And that’s it. That’s all I ever see.”
Her eyes widened. When she said nothing, I continued. “But then I got a call from someone pretending to be a cop from Puddle Creek. Said they got my number from Ruth. I called Ruth, and she didn’t know what I was talking about.”
Her brow furrowed, and she opened her mouth, but once again I cut her off, determined to get the entire story out in the open.
“I read my own leaves again—or I tried to—right before you showed up. Frances, it came back to me again, like it used to.” I paused. “Well. Not exactly like it used to, but it was so much more than it has been. So urgent. So present.”
Frances raised her gaze to my own. “That’s good, right?”
“Death,” I whispered. “They showed me death, just like before.”
“Oh.” Frances paled. “That’s… Can I sit down?”
I moved aside and she walked to the sofa, sinking into its cushions.
“I—” Her phone buzzed in her purse, and she fumbled inside and turned it off.
“When you showed up out of nowhere, I had to make you leave. I…he—Burt—was there. I couldn’t plant you in his crosshairs.
He’s mean. No, that word doesn’t do him justice.
My husband is a sadistic son of a bitch.
” Her fingers traced the cut on her lip as she spoke. “You were right about the bruises.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
“He was not happy you knocked on our door. Believe me, I wanted to hug your neck. To hop in your car and drive away, but…” She shrugged. “It was impossible. Then when you mentioned Blake and that poor girl’s body, I had to get you to stop talking. You had to go.”
The dead girl had been what sent me barreling toward Moss Grove to begin with. “Why?”
“Because.” Frances sniffed. Her hands trembled. “I think Burt killed her. And, I know I don’t have the family gift, but I think the leaves are telling you I’m next.”