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“The sigh. I heard it, too.”
“She’s sad.”
“I don’t think many people are happy to be dead.”
“Maybe it’s Astrid. Getting murdered on your wedding day’s bound to make you sad. The song…” Wandering to the piano, Cleotried to pick it out. “Sort of like that, right? The basic notes. I really think I’ve heard it before, but I can’t place it.”
“And that’s the most important element in this scenario?”
“Could be a clue.” Cleo brightened. “It’s like we’re Nancy Drew and this isThe Case of the Haunted Piano.”
“I’m going back to bed.”
“Good idea. The candle wax is still a little soft in these tapers,” she said as she poked a finger in one.
“You’re not the least bit freaked out.”
“Not yet. Right now I’m freaking fascinated. Hey, don’t forget your poker.”
“Ha ha. You’d’ve been glad I had it if we walked in here to an axe murderer.”
“That would be the axe murderer who takes time out to play the piano? The axe murderer who sweetly turns down the beds at night? That one?”
Sonya let out a sigh of her own and took Cleo’s hand as they walked upstairs. “I’m glad you’re here.”
“I’m gladder of it every second. Oh, when I was falling asleep, I had this thought.”
“Don’t tell me if it involves calling in Paranormal R Us.”
“Not that. When the lawyer and the cousin come tomorrow to move those things you wanted, can I ask them to move anything else if I see something?”
“I don’t see why not. Did you see something?”
“We went through before we talked about me staying, and working in that fabulous turret space. I could look, pay more attention, with that in mind. Anyway, tomorrow.”
They paused at Cleo’s door.
“There’s a desk, a great desk. The one you use now, it’s serviceable, but you could have better. And you need some seating.”
“Got a mental list going on it, and a couple other things. Tomorrow,” Cleo repeated. “We’ve got men coming, so I need sleep so I don’t look like a hag.”
“And that happens never.”
“If you hear something and I don’t, come get me.”
“Count on it. Good—I hope—night.”
Sonya expected the same restless, patchy post–three a.m. sleep she’d experienced the night before, but she dropped off in seconds.
And woke to soft morning light.
Since she expected Cleo would sleep at least two more hours, she went to make coffee. She’d squeeze in a little work, then they’d do a kind of brunch before they went on a hunt for what Cleo could use in her studio—and anywhere else she wanted.
The idea that her friend would live there gave her such a boost. And it didn’t hurt, really, to know she hadn’t imagined things, forgotten things.
Optimism ruled the day as she sat at her desk.
Even her tablet deciding to play “Come Saturday Morning” didn’t dim it.
