Horoscope: The Astrology Murders by Georgia Frontiere Page B

meanie,” Emma told him. “But you’ve got to come home now.” She looked at the terrier to see if he had a tag and found that he didn’t even have a collar. “Be careful crossing streets, you hear?” she advised him.
    As Emma pulled King back toward the brownstone, King gave his playmate a parting howl, and the smaller dog barked a bright goodbye.
    “You shouldn’t go running out like that, King,” Emma chided him. “You don’t want to upset Kelly, do you?”
    King glanced up at her as if to apologize.
    “You’re a good dog,” she said reassuringly. “I know you love her.”
    Emma found herself thinking about Kelly and what had just happened. It was the first time anything like that had occurred—the first time she had seen Kelly frozen in the doorway, the first time Emma had seen with her own eyes what she and Sarah had known intuitively was right: Kelly was afraid to leave the house.
    Climbing the steps to the brownstone with King, Emma sawthat the door was open and Kelly was waiting for them in the entry hall. Emma brought the dog into the house and let go of his collar. He ran up to Kelly and licked her hand.
    “Thank you, Emma,” Kelly said. There were a hundred apologies in her voice. “Thank you.”
    Emma closed the door and then turned to Kelly. Kelly looked awful. Her eyes were pink, and she’d obviously been crying. The worst part was that she looked so ashamed of herself.
    “Why don’t you go wash your face and get dressed,” Emma suggested. “That photographer’s going to be back any minute.”
    Kelly stood there, looking at Emma. She wanted to explain herself, but the words wouldn’t come. How could she make Emma understand her when she didn’t understand herself? Instead she just said, “I love you, Emma.”
    Emma’s eyes grew wet with tears, too. “Come on, now, darling,” she scolded softly. “You don’t want to keep him waiting.”

Fifteen
    HERNANDEZ WAS IN Jennifer McGraw’s living room. He’d just about finished looking through the books in her bookcase, and he was feeling discouraged. He’d taken each book from the shelves and opened it, looking for an inscription or something that might have been placed between the pages. Most of the books had been purchased during Jennifer’s college days, and she had written her name and dorm address on the inside covers. A scrap of paper fell out of the art history book he’d just pulled from the top shelf. He picked it up and read it. It was a long-ago note that Jennifer had written to herself; all it said was “library 7 p.m.” Not too helpful. He wasn’t eager to share his lack of progress with Giordano, who’d remained at the station, researching the database.
    “Tom!” Hernandez heard Officer Allen Kim calling him from the den. He could always tell when Kim was excited because it was the only time Kim raised his voice. “Come here!”
    Hernandez put the note back in the book and walked into the next room. Kim was holding an astrology magazine. He showed Hernandez the cover. Emblazoned across the top in large red letters were the words
You and Your Sign
.
    “This could be a link to the killer,” he said. “He wasn’t the only one into astrology. So was the victim.”

Sixteen
    K ELLY SAT ON THE living room sofa facing the camera. She’d taken Emma’s advice and washed her face. She’d also used eye-drops to wash away the pinkness from her eyes and put on eye makeup and lipstick, brushed her blond, curly hair so that it fell more or less behind her shoulders, and changed into her favorite blue silk dress. The dress had a scoop neck, which showed off her Pisces necklace, with the two delicate silver fish that symbolized her sun sign, against the pale skin of her chest.
    She reminded herself once again that the photographer’s name was Chris Palmer. She was still ruminating on the fact that even if it had meant losing King, whom she dearly loved, she had not been able to go out of the brownstone onto the