Page 56 of The Sisters of Crimson House

Laverne looked at her cohost. “What does that mean?” she asked him as Roger began shaking his head in denial.

“No,” he said. “No, no, no. Not possible.”

“What’s not possible?” asked Laverne, still trying to salvage some part of an interview.

“My ring, Roger?” Charley asked again in that weird high-pitched singsong. “Can you help your Ninnifer find it?”

“Is this some kind of joke?” asked Roger, who had gone very pale under the studio lights.

“Ninnifer?” asked Laverne. “Who is Ninnifer?”

“How do you know that name?” Roger shouted at Charley. “Who put you up to this?” He wheeled on Laverne. “Laverne, was this you?”

“Roger, you need to watch yourself,” warned Laverne, looking out to the cameras with an uneasy smile.

Roger had unconsciously begun twisting a band on his right hand. “Nini,” Roger sputtered. “He told me I could have it. He said it was okay.”

“I beg your pardon?” asked Laverne.

“My pop said I could wear his dad’s ring,” he said weakly to Laverne, unable to take his eyes off Charley. “Nini always wore it on her thumb because it was too big. When she died, Pop gave it to me. He gave it to me, Nini,” he said defensively, looking up at Charley, who stared back at him with big watery eyes.

“Where is my ring, Roger?” Charley asked again, starting to cry.

“It’s my ring, Nini!” he shouted at her, standing so forcefully that he knocked his chair over. He angrily yanked out his lavalier microphone from his suit jacket, throwing it on the floor as he stormed off the set. “It’s mine!” he called out.

A fraught moment in the studio as no one said anything. Miranda shuddered again and raised her head as if waking from a nap. She let go of Charley’s hand.

Charley blinked, startled to find her face wet from tears. She looked around her, surprised. “Where did Roger go?” she asked Laverne.

“Well,” said Laverne after a very long pause. “We’ll be back after this quick message from any remaining sponsors.”

Thirty

October 22, 2008

She didn’t know the house exactly, but she knew the house. One of those fancy East Parkway Tudors set back from the road with a twisty driveway and owners who likely donated a chunk of change to the “arts.” They’d probably dropped in on a Spectacular or two back when Sadie was in charge, Charley thought as Astrid steered them into the driveway before putting her ancient Subaru in park.

“You sure somebody wasn’t murdered here and we did a ghost tour about it?” asked Astrid, lowering her sunglasses to study the house.

“No,” said Charley, frustrated that the house did not immediately give up its secrets upon viewing. “But there’s still time.” It was a quick trip. A recon mission. In and out to get her tarot deck back. She hated that Sy had it, but in leaving it behind, she had unwittingly provided herself the perfect cover for one more meeting. She ran her finger over the two lines of her palm. How soon before a third mark joined the others?

Miranda dozed in the back seat. This was increasingly her preferred state, and if Charley was being honest, it was easier to ponder the questions that swirled around her sister while she was asleep. She had no memory of what had happened at the studio, only that she’d blacked out after yelling at a beloved local anchor on live television. Hopefully Zavier could unearth some kernel of positivity out of the shit show she’d handed him.

“Shall we wake up Sleeping Beauty?” Astrid asked her, touching up her makeup in the mirror.

Charley sighed. “Do we have to?” She glanced at her sister’s sleeping form in the rearview mirror. She had a reflection. Miranda was not a vampire. It was the only creature she could confidently cross off her list.

They walked toward the front entrance, maneuvering around the FOR SALE sign that explained the immaculate landscaping and paint so fresh that the house seemed to glow. Sy had sent her a mysterious address for their rendezvous, a stately home whose burnished-copper lamps and leaded glass windows failed to disclose any immediate connection to Sy Prescott.

Astrid examined a sculptural hedge lining the walkway, a boxwood pruned into the shape of a torch. “I think one of these plants might cost more than my car.”

Miranda yawned, stretching as she studied the house. “Looks like a chalet we visited in oh-four. I channeled a scullery maid who’d been murdered by the original owner of the house.”

“And where was this chalet?” said Charley, stopping just short of the front door.

“Luxembourg,” she said. “In Dasburg. You know it?”

“Of course I don’t know it!” she snapped. She had a map marked up in red Sharpie, a crimson portrait that followed news snippets and threads of Miranda’s purported shows and appearances. In her mind’s eye, she was circling a town in Germany. One in France. Was Luxembourg on the map? Did it matter? At the end of the day, her sister was alive and was home. Charley hated Sy for making her doubt her sister, hated him more for being so instrumental in her plans.