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family, Annie thought. The Linwoods—and her niece's husband—didn't know she was in town. "Did you come back because you'd heard your family home was being sold?"
    "That's one reason. The catalyst, I suppose. I read about it in the papers, and I knew I had to come home. Again, it was impulsive, with the same certainty I felt when I knew I had to leave."
    "Then why not go buy the painting yourself? It would have been a way to let your family know you're back."
    She shook her head. "I couldn't. I—I'm not ready."
    "But you were willing to go to all the trouble of finding me, hiring me—"
    "That wasn't just because of the painting." She sat forward, just a little. "I want you to represent my work, Annie. When I'm ready." She looked toward the painting Annie had just delivered, the strawberry-haired girl smiling, innocent. "Soon."
    Annie didn't feel the thrill she'd expected to feel; it would have seemed greedy, selfish, given the circumstances. She'd never met anyone as strange and as compelling as this plain, soft-spoken woman. "When you're ready, I'd be honored. The painting—did you want it so much because it's your work?"
    "I'd thought my brother had destroyed it."
    "What? How could he—"
    "I'd painted it. It was of his only child whom he'd lost in such a horrible way. It had hung in the room where she and Father were killed. It was too painful to keep—but also apparently too painful for him to destroy." She inhaled through her nose, plainly holding back tears. "It's all I have of Haley. I wanted it for myself, Annie. There's no other reason."
    Annie nodded thoughtfully. "I think I understand. You were able to capture something—"
    "Not capture. When Haley sat for me, she gave me her spirit. She gave me everything she was. I suppose"—she bit her lower lip and sighed heavily—"I suppose I wanted some of her back."
    "Sarah—"
    She waved a hand, dismissing Annie's concern. "Now. About our deal. Can you keep my secret?"
    "Does anyone else know you're in San Francisco?"
    "No. Only you, at least for now."
    Annie glanced at the recent canvases, at the framed portrait of the strawberry-haired girl. Could she have guessed, then, that her life would be a short one?
    "I won't be committing a crime?"
    Sarah smiled sadly and shook her head.
    Annie glanced at the tattered furnishings in Sarah's tiny house, the decades-old appliances. A Linwood didn't have to live this way. "Yes," she said, "I can keep your secret."
    Sarah, spent, had closed her eyes. "We'll speak again, Annie. Soon."
    Seeing that the reclusive artist had nothing left in her, Annie quietly retreated. It wasn't until she was halfway down the stone steps, hanging onto the rickety handrail to keep from tripping on the ends of her skirt on the steep terrain, from going too fast, from utterly losing control, that she thought, once more, of Garvin MacCrae. As mortified as she was at her assumptions about his wife, he would have to know she hadn't deliberately bid against him knowing he'd merely wanted a profoundly moving painting of his murdered wife.
    "Look before you leap next time," Annie muttered to herself as she stumbled to her car. She suspected her reputation in San Francisco would take a hit until people realized she hadn't known the background of the man bidding against her. But she was in no mood to cut herself any slack, never mind ask anyone else in town to. She should have done her research before she'd walked into that auction room.
    Groaning, she climbed into her car and stuck the key in the ignition. The sun, she noticed, had given up and decided not to stay out. The skies were gloomy again, threatening rain. She glanced back up the steep hill, toward the little pink bungalow. It had been five years since the Linwood murders. Maybe, she thought, no one really cared whether or not Sarah Linwood was back in town.
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Chapter Three

     
    Annie had her gallery swept, dusted, and straightened by the time Zoe Summer arrived with the Sunday paper, two