LITMIR.BIZ

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sure, sure,” he said, though he made no move to raise the security arm. “Jail is just no place for a nice lady like Mrs. F. Why, you could have knocked me six ways to Sunday when my cousin Lou called to tell me what had happened at the Spring Fling. Too bad I was here working and missed everything.”

      Ross gestured to the gate. “Can you let me in, George? I really need to be with my nephew right now.”

      The guard hit the button with a disappointed kind of look.

      “You tell Mrs. F. I’m thinking about her, okay?”

      “I’ll be sure to do that, George. Thanks.”

      He quickly rolled his window up and drove through the gate before George decided he wanted to chat a little more.

      Lights blazed from every single window of the grand pink stucco McMansion he had always secretly thought of as a big, gaudy wedding cake. There was no trace of his sister’s elegant good taste in the house. It was as if Lloyd had stamped out any trace of Frannie.

      The interior of the house wasn’t any more welcoming. It was cold and formal, white on white with gold accents.

      Ross knew of two rooms in the house with a little personality. Josh’s bedroom was a typical teenager’s room with posters on the wall and clutter and mementos covering every surface.

      The other was Frannie’s small sitting room that hinted at the little sister he remembered. It was brightly decorated, with local handiworks, vivid textiles and many of Frannie’s own photographs on the wall.

      Lloyd had a habit of changing the security system all the time so Ross didn’t even try to open the door. He rang the doorbell and a moment later, Julie Osterman opened the door, her soft, pretty features looking about as exhausted as Frannie’s had been.

      “I’m sorry I’m so late,” he said. “I never expected things to take this long, that I would have to impose on you until the early hours of the morning.”

      “No problem.” She held the door open for him and he moved past her into the formal foyer. “Josh tried to send me home and insisted he would be okay on his own, but I just didn’t feel right about leaving him here alone, under the circumstances.”

      “I appreciate that.”

      “He’s in the kitchen on the telephone to a friend.”

      “At this hour? Is it Lyndsey?”

      Josh’s young girlfriend had been a source of conflict between Josh and his parents, for reasons Ross didn’t quite understand.

      “I think so, but I can’t be certain. I was trying not to eavesdrop.”

      “How is he?”

      She frowned a little as she appeared to give his question serious consideration. Despite his own fatigue, Ross couldn’t help noticing the way her mouth pursed a little when she was concentrating, and he had a wild urge to kiss away every line.

      He definitely needed sleep if he was harboring inappropriate fantasies about a prickly busybody type like Julie Osterman.

      “I can’t really tell, to be honest with you,” she answered. “I get the impression he’s more upset about his mother being detained at the police station than he seems to be about his father’s death. Or at least that appears to be where he’s focusing his emotions right now. On the other hand, his reaction could just be displacement.”

      “Want to skip the mumbo jumbo?”

      She made a face. “Sorry. I just meant maybe he’s not ready—or doesn’t want—to face the reality of his father’s death right now, so it’s easier to place his energy and emotion on his mother’s situation.”

      “Or maybe he just happens to be more upset about Frannie than he is about Lloyd. The two of them didn’t exactly get along.”

      “So I hear,” she answered. “It sounds as if few people did get along with Lloyd Fredericks, besides Crystal and her sort.”

      “And there were plenty of those.”

      Her mouth tightened but she refrained from commenting on his bitterness. Lloyd’s frequent affairs had been a great source of humiliation for Frannie. “How is your sister?” she asked instead.

      “Holding up okay, under the circumstances.”

      “Do you expect them to keep her overnight for questioning, then?”

      He sighed, angry all over again at the most recent turn of events. “Not for questioning. For arraignment. She’s being charged.”

      Her eyes widened with astonishment, then quickly filled with compassion. “Oh, poor Josh. This is going to be so hard on him.”

      “Yeah, it’s a hell of a mess,” he answered heavily. “So it looks like I’ll be staying here for a while, until we can sort things out.”

      She touched him, just a quick, almost furtive brush of her hand on his arm, much as she had touched Josh earlier. Through his cotton shirt, he could feel the warmth of her skin and he was astonished at the urge to wrap his arms around her and pull her close and just lean on her for a moment.

      “I’m so sorry, Ross.”

      He cleared his throat and told himself he was nothing but relieved when she pulled her hand away.

      “Thanks again for everything you did tonight,” he said. “I would have been in a real fix without you.”

      “I’m glad I could help in some small way.”

      She smiled gently and he was astonished at how that simple warm expression could ease the tightness in his chest enough that he could breathe just a little easier.

      “It’s late,” she finally said. “Or early, I guess. I’d better go.”

      “Oh right. I’m sorry again you had to be here so long.”

      “I’d like to say goodbye to Josh before I leave, if it’s all right with you,” she said.

      “Of course,” he answered and followed her into the kitchen.

      In his fantasy childhood, the kitchen was always the warmest room in the house, a place scattered with children’s backpacks and clumsy art work on the refrigerator and homemade cookies cooling on a rack on the countertop.

      He hadn’t known anything like that, except at the occasional friend’s house. To his regret, Frannie’s kitchen wasn’t anything like that image, either. It was as cool and formal as the rest of the house—white cabinets, white tile, stainlesssteel appliances. It was like some kind of hospital lab rather than the center of a house.

      Josh sat on a white bar stool, his cell phone up to his ear.

      “I told you, Lyns,” he was saying, “I don’t have any more information than I did when we talked an hour ago. I haven’t heard anything yet. I’ll tell you as soon as I know anything, okay? Meantime, you have to get some rest. You know what—”

      Ross wasn’t sure what alerted the boy to their presence but before he could complete the sentence, he suddenly swiveled around to face them. Ross was almost certain he saw secrets flash in his nephew’s eyes before his expression turned guarded again.

      “Um, I’ve got to go, Lyns,” he mumbled into the phone. “My uncle Ross just got here. Yeah. I’ll call you later.”

      He ended the call, folded his phone and slid it into his pocket before he uncoiled his lanky frame from the chair.

      “How’s my mom? Is she with you?”

      Ross sighed. “No. I’m sorry.”

      “How long can they hold her?”

      “For now, as long as they want. She’s being charged.”

      His features suffused with color. “Charged? With

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