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The newspaper was resting on the door the bell I expected a ray satin robe and low-heeled satin mules I’d mostly seen those in Joan Crawford movies, and they looked like they’d be a trick to wear I had brief visions of plopping around arette holder Marcelled hair I could have ee arches

"Hello, Kinsey Coot ere due at a cocktail party at six" She stepped away from the door and I followed her in

"We can do this another time if you like," I said I handed her the paper

"Thanks No, no This is fine It’s not for an hour any-way and the people don’t live far I’ve got to finish dress-ing, but we can talk in here" She glanced at the paper briefly and then tossed it on the hall table next to a pile ofthe dark stone-tile hall-way toward the master suite at the rear of the house Olive was slith hair blunt-cut and thick I wondered sometimes if Ash was the only sister whose hair reht blue, her lashes black, her skin tone gold She was thirty-three or so, not as brittle as Ebony, but with none of

Ash’s war back over her shoulder to me

"I haven’t seen you for ten years What have you been up to?"

"Setting up ency," I said

"Married? Kids?"

"No, on both counts You have kids?"

She laughed "God forbid"

The bedroo stone fireplace, French doors opening onto a walled-in patio where a small deck had been added on I could see a round two-person hot tub, surrounded by ferns A white Persian cat was curled up on a chaise, its face tucked into the circling plume of its tail