There was no time for more finagling. Her breath was coming in rapid bursts and was infernally loud, echoing around the dark, silent kitchen. She took a breath and then held it, then another, sweat starting to stream down her face and neck.
Ellie sucked in her stomach and stuck one arm and shoulder through the crack. If anything violent was going to happen, she would rather lose her arm than stick her head through the door and be left completely vulnerable.
She held it there, shaking so hard, her elbow kept bumping against the door, making a loud thumping sound. One, two, three, four, five, six . . . No shots, and no one shoved the door shut.
The fit was tight. She turned her head to the side, ponytail toward the opening, cheek pressed hard against the cool metal door. With one last shove, Ellie slipped through, her paramedic’s badge catching and ripping audibly as she stumbled out and into the office of Broadlands Roofing.
It was brighter in there, a splash of sun peeking in from the sloppily closed vertical blinds, and Ellie wondered if the rain had stopped. But the sun didn’t make it easier to see. No. The room was filled with smoke and a sulfur smell. There was another smell too, one she was very familiar with. It was the tangy, metallic scent of blood.
As the scene came into focus, filtering through the smoke and sun, the world went still. There was no more pain in her shoulders from carrying the bags, the place on her cheek that would surely be a bruise was numb, and the ripped shirt didn’t even register in her mind. All she could see, the only thing that she could even acknowledge, was a crumpled human form on the floor to her right—one leg half-bent, half-twisted, arm strewn across the face, tangled in a mess of dark brown hair, a once-yellow blouse soaked through with blood. She didn’t have to get a closer look; she didn’t have to see the face to know.
Lying there in a pool of blood was her sister, Amelia.
CHAPTER 6
AMELIA
Monday, April 4
Five weeks earlier
By the time Steve changed and lit the grill, it was nearly six and Amelia had most of the food on the table. Ellie, Collin, and their dad would be there soon. As much as she loved both her sister and her father, Amelia always got a pit in her stomach when she knew they were coming for dinner. Especially when other guests would be there.
Caleb was no stranger to the Brown/Saxton family, and his brother, Collin, had been around nearly as long, but still—no one could know how difficult caring for Richard Brown had become unless they lived with his condition day after day. Even Collin, the future doctor, and Caleb, the ever-present employee, had no idea.
Today they’d be using paper plates, since all the dinner plates sat in a day-old pile in the sink. Amelia prayed that the reinforced plastic would hold up to steak, salad, and corn on the cob.
“Cora, Kate!” Amelia called her girls. At ages ten and six, they were still willing helpers, still finding setting the table a new reason to play pretend rather than a chore. As she counted out eight off-white plates from the stack on the counter, a rush of footsteps spilled down the stairs.
“No fair, you started early!” Kate yelled, out of breath.
“Early? Mom called us and I went. Totally fair!” Cora shouted back between steps.
“Girls! Stop fighting,” Amelia called out in a singsong voice to the girls, who jumped onto the landing in near unison. “There are plenty of plates for everyone.”
“I totally won,” Cora whispered to her sister before sauntering over to the counter.
“Cora,” Amelia chastised in her most mom-like voice, “you are the big sister. Be kind to Kate. She’s your best friend.”
“I’m not her best friend. No way. Never,” Kate said, her wild brown hair sticking to the corners of her mouth. Kate was pretty much a miniversion of Ellie, and as a result Amelia always felt a tiny bit of a twinge when she looked at her. Cora’s hair and coloring were much lighter than Kate’s, like Steve’s mother, and she was almost an inch shorter than her little sister. Sometimes the girls didn’t even look like they were related, more like two friends out on a playdate. Amelia couldn’t believe the number of times she’d been asked if she was babysitting when Cora was a toddler.
“Girls, come here.” Amelia set down the plates on the counter and put a hand on a shoulder of each girl. “Cora, Kate, I want to show you something. See this?” She fingered the delicate gold chain she never removed from her throat. Hanging off the end was a tilted M, also in gold. “Your grandma gave this to me when your auntie Ellie was born. She said that it meant I was a big sister now and I’d never have to be alone again.”
“I know, Mommy, I know,” Cora mumbled, reaching out to touch the miniature letter. “M for mommy.”
Amelia laughed. “No, baby, M for Amelia. It was your grandma’s nickname for me. You know Daddy sometimes calls me that. Auntie Ellie has an L.” Amelia rubbed the smooth letter between her thumb and forefinger before dropping it and pulling Cora in for a hug and a quick kiss on the top of her frizzy hair. “It’s silly, right? But it still means the same thing. That’s why I got you girls your special necklaces.” She got very quiet and leaned in to her daughters. “Sisters are forever. Even after an epic stair battle. But now”—she glanced between the girls, looking deep into one set of blue and one set of brown eyes—“it’s time to make things right.”
The girls pressed their foreheads together and whispered, “I’m sorry.” Kate’s bottom lip quavered like she was about to cry. That would never do. A meltdown from Kate usually meant the loss of at least twenty minutes.
“Hey, Kate, it’s okay. Sisters also forgive each other, right, Cora?”
“Right, Mom.” Cora played along like a pro. “Maybe we should switch necklaces, Kate. We would have silly letters like Mom and Aunt Ellie.”
“No!” Kate’s tears disappeared, and she hopped back, her lopsided skirt wrapping around her legs and tangling at her knees. Amelia reached out to steady her wobbly six-year-old.
“Whoa, careful there.”
“Cora can’t have my necklace,” she said, covering the swinging pendant with her hand defensively. Amelia resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Kate was the worst at taking a joke.
“I don’t want your stupid K,” Cora added, more an adult than a nine-year-old was meant to be. She put out her hand expectantly. “Can I just set the table already?”
“Mom, Cora just called me stupid.”
“I called your necklace stupid.”
“Same thing.”
Amelia opened her mouth to interrupt, when Steve cut in from the stairs.