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Rachel dug her hands into her coat pocket and lowered her head against the chill of morning. The faintest trace of fog hung like a shroud over the cemetery, its cold fingers somehow finding their way through her coat as she stood among the gathered mourners, looking toward the gravesite. The grass beneath her feet was stiff with frost, crackling softly with each subtle shift of her weight. Above, the sky stretched endless and gray, the color of old stone, a fitting backdrop for yet another funeral—one that felt more bitter than most. A sharp wind cut across the gathered crowd, carrying with it the scent of dying leaves and approaching winter.
The mourners huddled together in their dark coats, their breath visible in small, temporary clouds that dissipated into the cold air. Rachel recognized most of them from the hospice center—nurses, orderlies, a few administrators. Their faces were familiar from her many visits to see Scarlett, though she'd never learned most of their names. Now they stood in small clusters, sharing whispered conversations that the wind carried away in fragments…talking and reminiscing about Scarlett.
Rachel had attended more than her share of funerals over the years. Too many. Each one had carved away another piece of her, leaving behind a hollow space that could never quite be filled. First Peter, her husband, murdered by Alex Lynch in an act of revenge that had shattered her world. Then Grandma Tate, killed protecting Paige from Alice Denbrough's twisted scheme. The losses had accumulated like layers of sediment, weighing her down, reshaping her into someone harder, more cautious. And now Scarlett—sweet, vibrant Scarlett, who had beaten cancer only to have victory snatched away in what the police were calling a home invasion gone wrong.
The thought made Rachel's jaw clench and her stomach tighten in knots. A home invasion gone wrong. The words felt wrong in her mind, like pieces of a puzzle that didn't quite fit. She looked around at the other mourners—their faces drawn, marked by the particular grief that comes from losing someone who had just been given a second chance at life. A young nurse nearby dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. Two orderlies stood with their heads bowed, one occasionally shaking his head as if still unable to accept the reality of why they were gathered here. Rachel felt a bit bad because she found it hard to think of them as the same people she’d seen at the hospice center because they were dressed formally here at graveside.
Some of the mourners were sitting in stunted rows of chairs under an awning. Rachel was not among them, electing to stand off to the side. Ahead of the assembled crowd, a minister spoke, his words drifting through the cold. He spoke of hope and peace and better places, but Rachel barely heard those words. Her mind kept circling back to the timing of it all. Less than a week. Scarlett had been home less than a week after being released from hospice. The odds of a random break-in happening in that specific window of time seemed astronomical. In fact, it would have made more sense for a thief or robber to strike when the home was empty.
No, this felt targeted. Personal. But she hadn't voiced these thoughts to anyone, not even Jack.
Jack had offered to come with her today, but Rachel had declined. "You never even met her," she'd said, though the real reason was more complex. Sometimes grief needed to be faced alone, especially when it was tangled up with suspicion and doubt. Besides, she didn't want to have to maintain a composed facade for his sake.
The service drew to a close, the minister's final prayer carried away on a bitter wind that stirred the scattered leaves around the grave. The sound of dirt hitting the polished surface of the casket seemed unnecessarily loud in the morning stillness, each thud a final punctuation mark on Scarlett's truncated story. People began to gather in small groups, sharing memories and condolences. Rachel saw Martha, one of the hospice nurses, starting to make her way over to her. Before she could arrive, Rachel turned and walked quickly toward her car, her heels clicking against the cemetery's paved path. She was aware it probably appeared rude, but she simply didn’t want to speak with anyone who’d only want to talk about how great of a person Scarlett had been, how brave she’d been in her fight with cancer. It was all true, of course, but Rachel simply wasn’t up for that right now.
When she made it to her car, the silence felt oppressive. She sat for a moment, hands gripping the steering wheel, letting the engine warm up. Her breath fogged the windows, creating a barrier between her and the world outside. The thoughts she'd been holding back began to surface, demanding attention.
If Alex Lynch or Alice had still been alive, this would make sense. They had both come after her through the people she cared about, understanding that the best way to hurt Rachel Gift was to target those she loved. But they were dead. And gone. So, who else would have reason to hurt someone close to her? Who else would have known about Scarlett, about their friendship, about her release from hospice?
The questions tumbled through her mind as she pulled away from the cemetery and drove toward Scarlett's house. She wasn’t even aware that was where she was going until she took the turn several blocks away from her own house. The drive gave her too much time to think, to remember. She thought about how Scarlett had looked just two weeks ago, sitting up in her hospice bed, eyes bright with hope as she talked about the garden she planned to plant. "Spring bulbs," she'd said, "because sometimes you have to believe in tomorrow." And then Scarlett actually showing Rachel the flower bed where she’d place the bubs just a few days before she’d been killed in her home…just inside the front door.
Scarlett had been so animated, her hands gesturing excitedly as she described the colors she wanted to see blooming in her garden. The cancer treatments had left her thin and pale, but in that moment, her face had been flushed with life and possibility. Rachel had seen so many people fade away in hospice care, but Scarlett had been different. She had fought back. She had won. Until someone took that victory away from her.
The house came into view—a modest ranch-style home with white siding and black shutters. Yellow police tape still crossed the front door. Rachel parked in the driveway, knowing she couldn't go inside without a key, but needing to be here anyway. The neighborhood was quiet, almost eerily so. A child's abandoned bicycle lay on its side in a nearby yard. A single jogger made their way down the street behind her.
Ignoring the locked front door, Rachel walked around to the backyard. The crime scene photos flashed through her mind as she moved: the blood on the wood floors, Scarlett’s expressionless face and dead eyes. But nothing had been taken, no window broken and no lock tampered with. Every piece of evidence pointed to a robbery interrupted, a confrontation turned fatal. The lead detective had walked her through it all, pointing out that the killer had likely knocked on the front door and Scarlett had answered. And that had been that. Maybe there had been a struggle, but if there was, it had been very brief.
But something about it needled at her consciousness, like a splinter she couldn't quite grasp. The staging felt too perfect, too precisely aligned with what you'd expect to see. In Rachel's experience, real crime scenes were usually messier, less textbook. Real burglars didn't typically stick around to fight when confronted—they ran. And why would anyone choose to rob a house that had been empty for months on the exact week its owner returned home?
She reached the flower bed that wrapped around the back of the house. Scarlett had been so excited about it, had spent hours planning what would go where. Now the dark earth lay exposed to the November chill, with only a few newly planted bulbs waiting beneath the surface for a spring they would never see bloom. The soil still showed signs of recent work—Scarlett's final project, completed just days before her death.
Rachel knelt beside the flower bed, not caring about the dirt on her black dress pants. She could see where Scarlett had carefully marked the locations of different plantings with small wooden stakes. All roses, marked with the color. Each stake was labeled in Scarlett's neat handwriting, the markers arranged with the precision of someone who believed they had time to see their plans come to fruition. A garden planned with such hope, such certainty that there would be time to see it grow.
The unfairness of it all hit Rachel like a physical blow. Scarlett had fought so hard, had endured months of pain and uncertainty, had finally won her battle with cancer—only to die like this, alone and afraid in her own home. The tears came then, hot against her cold cheeks, and Rachel didn't try to stop them. She reached out and touched one of the wooden markers, its surface rough against her fingertips. A sudden gust of wind rattled the bare branches overhead, sending a shower of dead leaves spiraling into the flower bed.
"I'll take care of them," she whispered, though she wasn't sure if she was making a promise to Scarlett or to herself. When spring comes, I'll make sure they bloom, she thought to herself.
She knew it might not be possible—the house would likely be sold by then—but somehow that made the promise feel even more important. These bulbs were Scarlett's last act of faith in the future, and Rachel couldn't bear the thought of them withering away untended.
The wind picked up, sending more dead leaves skittering across the yard. Rachel stood, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. The hollow feeling in her chest had grown familiar over the years, a constant companion in the aftermath of loss. But this time felt different. This time, the hollow space was filled with questions that demanded answers, and a growing certainty that Scarlett's death was more than just a tragic coincidence.
As she walked back to her car, Rachel felt the familiar weight of determination settling over her grief. Someone had taken Scarlett's second chance away. Someone had turned a story of hope into another tragedy. And regardless of what the official report said about a home invasion gone wrong, Rachel intended to find out who—and why.
In her gut, she knew this was just the beginning. The question was: the beginning of what? As she started her car, Rachel couldn't shake the feeling that Scarlett's death was just the first move in a game she didn't yet understand—but one she was now unwillingly part of.