Page 27 of Five Stolen Rings

It’s been a long, long time.

Just resist the Stella Effect when you see her tonight,I tell myself as a spike of anxiety hits me.And whatever you do, don’t let her find out about the phone call.

Easy. Easy peasy. I heave myself off the couch and grab my keys and don’t let myself think about it anymore.

Work is busy enough that I don’t have time to dwell on anything but the patients anyway. There’s a certain level of chaos innate to what I do, and I don’t mind it as long as I have peace and quiet in other areas of my life. I used to havenothingbutpeace and quiet; somehow Stella has changed that.

When the end of my shift rolls around that evening, I head out on tired feet and trudge to my car. I call Stella once I’m on the road.

“Hi,” she answers after several rings. Her voice sounds odd, strained and high-pitched.

“Hi,” I say slowly, my brow furrowing. “You…sound weird.”

“Do I?” she says. “I’m fine—everything is fine. But you know, actually, maybe you shouldn’t come over tonight. Just come by tomorrow. I’m probably—” She breaks off as a scraping sound filters down the line, and then she’s back. “Sorry!” She’s out of breath now, and my frown deepens. “Everything is good here,” she says, the words rushing out of her, “so just come by tomorrow, okay? Bye!”

The line goes dead, and immediately I press on the gas a little harder. Because something is obviously wrong with her, or wrong with the house, maybe, and she doesn’t want me to see—which means I probably should.

It’s maybe nothing. But…it’s also maybe something. My body, exhausted before, suddenly feels like it’s been hit with a jolt of electricity, and my hands tighten on the steering wheel.

She’s an even worse liar now than she was when we were kids; how is that possible? And why did she sound like she was in physical distress?

I arrive at Maude’s mansion in the foothills much faster than I should, technically speaking, and while my dignity would prefer for me to walk up the driveway to the door, I sprint across the lawn instead. I grab the door handle only torealize I don’t have the key code, and it won’t open without. I swear loudly.

“Stella,” I call, pounding on the door. I ring the bell a few times; I can hear it chiming throughout the house inside, but Stella doesn’t answer.

Crap. I’m going to have to go around the back and through that stupid window.

I hurry around the house—not a quick journey, given the snow and the size of the home—and emerge on the back lawn. I jump the fence like I’m a rebellious teenager again, turning my head this way and that, craning my neck to see if I can catch a glimpse inside the windows?—

Until my eyes catch upon the string of lights pooled at the base of a tree in the backyard, strands of starlight in a pile. My gaze goes up, up, up the trunk of the tree, until it finds a foot sticking out from the sharp, craggy branches, then a leg, and then?—

Relief crashes over me as my eyes find Stella, ten feet up, perched precariously on a tree branch, hair tangled around her.

This girl.

A grin splits over my face as I saunter over to the base of the tree, looking up. The mass of Christmas lights at my feet are the only source of illumination, but they’re bright enough and she’s low down enough that I can see her all right. “Well, well, well,” I say. “If it isn’t?—”

“Don’t you dare,” she calls down furiously.

“—a Partridge in a pear tree.”

“This is not a pear tree,” she says, shuffling her feet. “And I’m not stuck.”

“Didn’t say you were,” I say, folding my arms. I raise one eyebrow at her. “But now that you mention it…”

“I’m not,” she snaps. “I’m only—my hair got caught. So I’m untangling it. That’s all.”

“Mm-hmm,” I say as something bizarrely like laughter tries to bubble up in my chest. “How’s that going for you?”

“It’s going fine,” she says, “if you would just stopdistractingme—” But she breaks off with a yelp as her foot slips, and she falls, almost in slow motion?—

Down, down, down, crashing to the ground below.

STELLA

The man who walks through the door of my room in the ER is not Jack Piorra, childhood friend, smirking pain in my behind.

Nope, he isDoctor Piorra—complete with a white coat, a stethoscope, and clipboard.

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