Free In This Life by Terri Herman-Poncé Page B

seeing them strewn across blue and green and yellow tiled floors and festively ribboned over massive granite columns.
    And I remembered them floating in a cup of red wine.
    “We’re not trying to belittle you,” David said. “And we’re not trying to tell you what to do. It’s just that — “ He pushed the flowers away from me. “Are you even listening?”
    “Of course I am.”
    But I couldn’t break away from the bouquet. I pulled out one single stem and held it to my nose. Something about the scent made me breathless and aroused.
    “What’s with you?” David asked.
    “Nothing,” I said. “These smell wonderful. Want to try?”
    I held the bloom to David’s nose but he pulled away. “Have you been hitting the wine or my mother’s brownies again?”
    “Oh come on, David.”
    “Those flowers may be beautiful, Lottie,” Lori said, “but they’re creepy. And they need attention.”
    I shrugged. “Maybe a little water.”
    “I meant that they need the
police’s
attention.” The three of us turned to find Lori holding up her cell phone. “I called my uncle’s precinct and a car’s on its way.”
    “Why?” Nat asked.
    Lori looked at him as if he’d lost his mind. “We need professionals to handle this situation.”
    “We
are
professionals.”
    “Police,” she reminded him. “We need the police.”
    “They’re going to do jack,” Nat fired back.
    “Maybe, maybe not, but what happened should be on record.” Lori picked up a couple of dishes and handed them to Nat. “So get over it and start cleaning up.”
    Nat’s face reddened but he took the dishes and headed into the kitchen. David hesitated but followed Nat’s lead, cleaning up what remained. I smiled as I watched them both load the dishwasher, recognizing that although she wasn’t the aggressive type, Lori had managed to pull David’s and Nat’s need for control right out from under them. When they were out of earshot she leaned to whisper in my ear.
    “They’re pretty ticked at me right now.”
    “I know,” I said. “And I love it.” I twirled the fine, pointed petals against my nose, and Lori hovered a little longer.
    “What’s the deal with you and those flowers, anyway?” she asked.
    “I don’t know.” I inhaled the bloom and sighed. “They just smell really good.” I offered the flower to Lori but she shook her head, too.
    “You don’t know where they came from,” she said. “Don’t you think the way you’re handling them is a little weird?”
    “They just seem familiar to me,” I told her. “And I’m trying to remember from where.”
    Lori grinned. “An old boyfriend?”
    I grinned back. “Maybe.”
    “Who?”
    I kept twirling the petals, thinking.
    Lori leaned in closer. “Come on, Lottie. Who?”
    “I honestly don’t know,” I whispered, “but the memory’s a hot one.”
    With mischief in her eyes, Lori glanced at David storing leftovers in the freezer. “I’m guessing it’s not him.”
    I shook my head and laughed.
    When the doorbell rang, I slipped the bloom back into the vase. David greeted the police and ushered them inside. Officer Jim McKarren, Lori’s uncle, strode in first. He was a fit man in his late forties with a wide forehead, brown hair, and eyes as blue as the flowers. A blonde officer who looked twenty years his junior followed. His brass tag read Llewellyn.
    “I understand there’s been a situation?” Jim looked to Lori for direction and Lori gestured toward me.
    “Yes,” I said.
    David shoved his hands into his jeans pockets and leaned against the counter that separated the kitchen from the den, shoulders squared and eyes alert.
    Jim McKarren sent him a cursory glance and bypassed him in favor of one of the leather chairs near me, taking a quick visual inventory of the den. I wondered if his appraisal came from personal curiosity to see what had changed since his visit last year or from professional training to find something out of place. His eyes never went to