Yesterday, David had been shocked and mystified that Maddison had visited Calista, that she had pretended to be Emily. When he’d come home, where Maddison was busy whipping up dinner, he had been reluctant to ask what motivated her to do such a thing, because he worried that their conversation would lead to the revelation that he’d been investigating her, that she would then withdraw from him.

He had assumed that her motivation had been ill-conceived if not even somehow suggestive of ill intent.

However, it now seemed that Maddison had visited Calista on a mission of mercy, to lift her heart and prepare her to endure the impending crisis of the aneurysm without fear.

Which meant Maddison had known Calista would soon die. Of an undetected, unsuspected, entirely natural arterial weakness.

How could she know? She couldn’t.

The morning breeze, wafting through the car from window to window, brought no answer to his question. Neither did the soft whispering of the water gum tree.

David put up the car windows and went into the funeral home to make arrangements for the disposition of the body, as well as to purchase a single plot and a headstone.

Later, he would need to plan a memorial service for Calista’s many friends, find a date two or three weeks hence. She had never wanted a traditional viewing and funeral with casket, which she’d thought too depressing. I’d rather be remembered with a wake, lots of wine and upbeat music and laughter.

When he came out of the funeral home following his appointment with Paul Hartell, the otherwise clear sky was scored by three thick white contrails, perfectly parallel from east to west, as though three celestial chariots had just passed over, escorting Calista’s spirit home.

And on the green lawn of memorials sloping up from the parking area, perhaps fifty feet away, stood Patrick Michael Lynam Corley, seven years dead but as solid as David himself. The contractor was a big man, with broad shoulders and a barrel chest. His glower, his stance, his hands fisted at his sides—the very fact of his presence—suggested malevolent intention. They stared at each other for a long moment. Then Corley turned away and ascended among the graves.

After a hesitation, David followed him.

| 56 |

By nature, David Thorne was not confrontational. Normally, if in anger another man braced him about anything, he would have stood his ground, but he wouldn’t have taken a first step toward conflict. If a potential adversary had second thoughts and walked away, David would not usually have pursued.

But these were not normal times. After all that happened in the past five days, after this morning’s bizarre encounter with Linette Ockland and the news of her husband’s possible murder, after Calista Carlino’s sudden death, David felt as if he were drowning in mysteries, suffocating in a quicksand of secrets.