Our Red Hot Romance Is Leaving Me Blue Read Online Free PDF Page B

nothing.
    Debbie Sue rubbed one of the rose petals between her thumb and fingers, leaned in and smelled them. “They’re real,” she said.
    “Yeah, we’ve got some yellow roses growing in the backyard,” Justin said.
    “Did you check to see if someone had cut any today?”
    “I didn’t have to. I think they came from one of our, uh, my bushes.”
    “Well, let’s be sure. Ed, you want to check the rosebushes? See if there are fresh cuts.”
    “I think you should check the rosebushes,” Edwina said. “I don’t know a damned thing about flowers.”
    Debbie Sue sighed. “Okay.” Justin showed them the patio door leading outside from the dining area and followed them to Rachel’s rose garden, where several varieties of roses grew. Sure enough, fresh cuts showed on the stems of the bushes that produced the yellow blooms. “Damn,” Justin said when he saw them. He was starting to get that crawly feeling up his spine again.
    “Hmm,” Debbie Sue said.
    “Shit,” Edwina mumbled.
    Debbie Sue raised her camera and snapped a picture.
    “And you have no idea who might have cut roses from these bushes? Or when?”
    “No,” Justin answered, slowly shaking his head. “Honest to God.”
    “Shit,” Edwina mumbled again.
    “What other unusual things have happened?” Debbie Sue walked around the rose garden, snapping pictures, while Edwina stayed a few feet away.
    “Out here, not much,” Justin said. “Most of what I’ve noticed has been inside the house.”
    Debbie Sue started back toward the house. Inside, she circled the coffee table and snapped more pictures of the roses in the vase from every angle. Edwina looked under lamps and behind furniture.
    “That blue afghan on the sofa was Rachel’s,” Justin said.
    “She liked to curl up under it and read. Several times a week I fold it up and put it on the end of the sofa. But sometimes, when I come home from work, it’s moved and heaped in a pile, like someone has used it.”
    “The hell,” Edwina said. She walked over to the sofa, lifted the cushions and peered under them.
    “Hmm.” Debbie Sue fingered the afghan and snapped more pictures.
    Justin wasn’t sure what they expected to find, but since they were the professionals, he decided to just let them work.
    Edwina moved from the living room to the dining room and disappeared into the kitchen. “Well would you look at this?” she called out. “I haven’t seen these in a hundred years.”
    Debbie Sue followed the voice and Justin trailed behind. “What is it?” she asked.
    Justin was curious, too. He and Rachel had no hundred-year-old antiques that he was aware of.
    Passing through the kitchen doorway just behind Debbie Sue, he saw Edwina studying the refrigerator door where Rachel had placed magnetized alphabet letters. “My kids used to have these when they were little,” she said. She set her purse on the counter and plucked a letter from its place. “My oldest would sit on the kitchen floor and practice her ABC’s while I cooked.”
    “It must have been a hundred years back,” Debbie Sue quipped. “Because I don’t believe I’ve ever seen you cook.”
    Justin smiled. “Rachel told me she’d done the same thing as a little girl. She saw these at a garage sale and bought them. She was hoping our little one would do the same one day. But a few letters are missing.”
    A profound sense of loss threatened to overpower Justin,as it sometimes did when the future without his wife and the hopes and dreams they had shared became even more starkly clear. An uncomfortable, almost unbearable, silence fell. He returned to the living room and sank to the sofa, staring at the vase of yellow roses, regretting all that would never be.
    Debbie Sue and Edwina came back from the kitchen. “Hey, you okay?” Edwina asked.
    “I’m fine,” Justin said a little too brightly. “Sometimes things just—” He shook his head and blinked away moisture, certain these two women didn’t want to see a