The Unkindness of Ravens by M. Hilliard (readera ebook reader .txt) 📗

“Thanks. It was a gift from a friend. So were these, but they’re more suited to you.”

I handed her a little bag of cleansers, toners, and moisturizers. Based on her expression, it was more skin care product than she’d ever used in her life. I plucked a dainty bottle off the vanity.

“Go ahead, I get that stuff by the barrel. And take this, too.” I handed over the little atomizer. “It smells like you look. Outdoorsy. On me it smells like someone just cut the grass.”

All my adrenaline faded. I was as tired as I had ever been in my life. I washed the dishes while she changed. I was pulling out blankets when she came out of the bathroom.

“The afghan and the chair will be fine. I don’t sleep much. Thanks for all this stuff.”

She was no longer holding the bag as though it might explode. I took that as a good sign, and began my own nighttime ritual of potions and lotions. After giving her some hangers for her wet clothes, I tucked in. It was strange having someone else in my apartment, and I lay wakeful, listening to her moving around, checking locks and looking out windows.

I finally dozed. I found myself in a surreal landscape of twisting fog, where I raced down an endless corridor of doors swinging open and shut, pursued by thudding footsteps while skeletal hands plucked at my clothing. A coyote yipped, unseen. Danny and Joanna stood at the end of the hall, he in a suit, holding an envelope, she in her bright blue Raven Hill hoodie, a red fox between them, never getting any closer no matter how hard I ran. A raven swooped at me out the darkness, cawing “Nevermore!” and I jerked sideways into swirling darkness. I came awake with a gasp, my heart pounding. The dream image faded, leaving only my husband and my friend. They disintegrated into mist, and I was left with only the night around me.

I sat up and listened, relieved to hear only the usual calming night sounds.

It’s a message, whispered a voice in my head, it’s the answer.

I replayed the dream, but found no answer. If I let it go, maybe it would come.

There was a faint light coming from the living room. Jennie Webber keeping watch. I shifted slightly, angling so I could see the tri-fold vanity mirror, positioned so that no matter where I was in the room I could see out into the rest of the apartment. Jennie was visible in the dim light of a small lamp. She’d slid my reading chair close to the window. She held a pad, larger than the little notebook she always carried, and was moving a pencil with swift, sure strokes across the page. She stopped as something caught her attention outside, her head tilt reminding me of the ravens, who always seemed to be listening to something beyond my hearing.

Satisfied, she relaxed back in her chair. She put down her pencil and stretched, pushing her hair off her face. As she finished, she sniffed her wrist, and rubbed the back of her hand along her cheek. With a little shrug, she adjusted the afghan, rubbed each hand down the opposite arm, and picked up her notebook. Getting in touch with her inner expensive girl, I thought.

I spied a few minutes more, knowing that if Jennie looked toward the mirror in the dark bedroom, she would see nothing but shifting shadows.

Chapter Twenty-One

Jennie dropped me at the Java Joint mid-morning, warning me repeatedly not to wander off alone. As if. The goal was to always be in sight of a crowd or a police officer until whoever killed Joanna was caught. Whatever I knew, it was apparently too much for the murderer’s comfort. Jennie assured me the police were making progress but I had a niggling suspicion that waiting for someone to take another whack at me was a key part of their strategy.

Promising to pick me up in time for my afternoon shift, Jennie headed off for a change of clothes and a hunt for the files relating to the two deaths Joanna was researching. Glumly stating that anything useful was probably buried in storage, she left with an enormous cup of coffee and a bag of goodies to bribe the department’s tech wizard into dropping everything and devoting himself to the flash drive.

I settled in with my own jolt of caffeine and a large breakfast. While I was anxious to get back to the investigation, I had to admit it was pleasant to be somewhere sunny and bright, full of nice, normal people who seemed more interested in pastries than homicidal mania. My respite was brief. Felicity came in, attired in exercise gear and looking pale and tense. Apparently, her morning yoga class had not had the desired calming effect. She caught my eye as she got in line, and I gave a little wave. Within minutes she was at my side, gesturing at the empty chair across from me. I nodded. The minute she landed in the chair she erupted into speech.

“Greer, I heard you were in an accident. I’m so sorry! Are you all right? What happened? Did you see who hit you?”

Felicity’s hands on her coffee cup were white to the knuckle, and she was chewing on her lower lip as she waited for me to answer. I decided keeping her off balance was my best bet.

“Someone tried to kill me. It was no accident.”

She gasped, then got hold of herself and took a sip of her coffee.

“How can you be sure? Did you see who did it?”

There was that question again. Did she know who it was, or was she afraid to find out?

“Someone drove straight at me on a deserted road, so yes, I’m sure it was deliberate, and no, I don’t know who it was. I didn’t get a good look. It was foggy.”

“It was foggy,” she repeated, “yes, very foggy. It’s possible