I stopped there, because I knew I was standing on the precipice of something a lot worse than either of those things.

“How many times did you visit Lillian before you killed her?”

“Once, twice, three times. I wanted her to be scared.”

Suddenly, in one flashing instant, I understood the three Tarot cards Lillian had given me that day in the nursing home. I gave myself a mental slap on the forehead; everything I’d read in The Damn Fool’s Guide to Tarot suddenly jelled.

The Queen of Pentacles. Pentacles meant money, and worldly success, among other things, and of course the queen indicated a woman in midlife or later.

Barbara Larimer.

Lillian had been afraid of my uncle, too. I remembered her reaction that day, when he showed up at the nursing home.

Hope stirred in me. Maybe Lillian hadn’t believed I was guilty.

Maybe she’d been trying to protect me from deadly relatives.

It was possible that Mom had confided in her, way back when, about Clive’s drug-running operation.

Then there was the Page of Cups. A young man, standing on the shore, pondering a chalice with a fish flopped inside. Cups usually deal with human emotion—in this case, the distorted emotions of a maniac. Geoff had gone to prison in California—Lillian had loved the beaches there—and she would have remembered him as a sixteen-year-old.

She’d been trying to warn me about Geoff. And trying to save herself, because by the time she gave me those cards, he’d visited her at least once.

As for the third card, Death—well, that was a no-brainer.

Lillian had wanted me to know that both our lives were in danger.

“Oh, Lillian,” I said softly. “Lillian.”

“Shut up!” Geoff shouted, and backhanded me so suddenly and with such force that I crashed into the wall next to the bathroom door. I tasted blood on my lower lip.

I watched, sick with dread, as my brother pulled a roll of duct tape from the pocket of his dusty coat. Next came a brand-new box cutter, still in the blister pack.

I began to get some idea of his specific plans for me, and I bolted for the door, screaming. I made it as far as the living room.

Geoff was right behind me, and he caught me hard by the back of my hair and hurled me down again, all the way to the floor. This time, I fell so hard, I couldn’t catch my breath.

I knew when I did, I’d have no problem screaming again.

No problem at all.

But who was going to hear me?

Bad-Ass Bert’s was closed until further notice, and therefore empty.

My sisters were dealing with an “incident.”

Tucker was busy searching for his daughter’s lost classmate.

I was totally screwed.

I got to my hands and knees, tried to scramble away, launch myself onto my feet.