In the Arms of Stone Angels - By Jordan Dane Page 0,49

saying goodbye to her mother. I found her alone in my grandmother’s bedroom sitting on the bed. And from the reflection in the mirror, I saw she was crying as she looked into a box. I turned to leave and creaked down the hall. Being really sad wasn’t exactly a team sport, but Mom heard me.

“Brenna, you got a minute?”

“Yeah, I was just…” I came back to the bedroom and sat next to her. “What’s up?”

“I saved some things for you. If you don’t want them, let me know.”

Mom had set aside the best stuff for me. I had my own box and everything. My grandmother’s costume jewelry was in a shiny onyx jewelry case that opened into tiered velvet drawers. And every piece I picked up reminded me of playing dress up with Grams on rainy Sunday afternoons or stolen hours when she had spent time with only me.

“And I picked out her funkiest clothes. You can sew them into something new, with your special touch. I think Grams would love that.” Mom ran a hand through my short hair. “I’m sure of it.”

Grams had been into real drama when she was younger. And her taste in clothes showed it. She had great hats, stylish vintage evening jackets, and belts and scarves that looked glittery and magical. Of all the things Mom could have given me to lift my spirits, I wouldn’t have asked for anything better. She’d boxed up the best of Grams—and she’d given it all to me.

“I don’t know what to say.” I felt my eyes water as I stared into the box. “Thanks, Mom.”

She kissed me on the forehead and smiled.

“I’ll help you load the boxes for Goodwill. You mind dropping them off? I’ll get you the address.” Mom got her purse and handed me the car keys. “And if you feel like it, you want to pick up a pizza?”

“Yeah, sure.” I nodded.

I’d have my freedom and Mom’s car again. Although that should have made me happy, it didn’t. Sneaking behind her back to see the Euchee Shaman felt wrong, especially after what she’d done for me today, but I really had to do it.

I was scared to face a man who could shed light on White Bird’s secrets. My friend had been up to something that he couldn’t tell me and he’d needed tools to do it. And by week’s end, he would be charged with a vicious murder. I had to know what he had been up to.

Yet even though Joe Sunne might have answers for me, I wasn’t sure they’d be something I’d want to hear.

Outskirts of Shawano

After I dropped off the boxes of Grams’s life at Goodwill, I checked out the internet directions to the home of Joe Sunne. I figured pizza could wait. Even though I liked it best cold, Mom didn’t. I could pick it up on my way home. When I got to the address I had listed for Joe Sunne, I couldn’t drive up to the place. I don’t know what I expected to find—maybe more suburbia like Grams’s hood—but the man didn’t live in an old Victorian with neighbors close by.

He lived on the fringes of town where the houses were more like ranches with barbed wire instead of cyclone fences and dirt roads replaced asphalt. I saw a house hidden by trees in the distance, but I wanted to be sure. House numbers weren’t exactly posted on imaginary curbs.

Here I stood out, me and my little Subaru. I’d have no place to hide once I drove onto the man’s land. I clutched the steering wheel tight as I sat parked on the road outside his property.

“Oh, White Bird. How did you find this guy?” I muttered. “And what kind of stuff were you into with him?”

The dusty gravel road I was on led to a few turnoffs behind fences. I put the car into Reverse and checked out a stand of mailboxes behind me. When I saw “Sunne” written on one, I figured I’d come to the right place, but what I hadn’t counted on was driving smack into the middle of Deliverance country. Hell, I even heard banjo music in my head—that’s how edgy I was. I stared out the windshield at the turnoff for Joe Sunne and ran my tongue over my cut lip.

“What are you gonna do, Bren?” I whispered and gripped the steering wheel with sweaty palms.

It didn’t take long to decide that I’d driven too far and taken too