Deeper Than Red (Red Returning Trilogy) by Sue Duffy

large live oak tree whose limbs spread above the house, they hid themselves and listened, neither one moving. Two sets of eyes locked on the two people inside seated in high-backed chairs, facing each other, the room hushed in a yellow glow from unseen lamps. Mona Greyson sat like a porcelain doll clothed loosely in a pale blue sundress and yellow wrap slung haphazardly around her bare shoulders. Before her was an older woman dressed in a plain shirtwaist dress, as if she’d just returned from grocery shopping. No gypsy fortuneteller stereotypes here. In all her secret forays into the compound, Tally had never seen anyone who fit that description. They all looked so normal.
    Just then, normal ended. Mona Greyson suddenly cried, “Daddy, don’t!”
    Tally flinched as she watched her mother’s arms fly up from her sides as if shielding her body. “Don’t do it again,” she wailed, then slumped forward, the other woman catching her and rocking her gently.
    Denise gripped Tally’s arm, digging her nails into the flesh. Refusing to tear her eyes from her mother, Tally released her friend’s fingers and patted her hand reassuringly. Tally had witnessed something similar another night, from another client of this particular medium who was rumored to be the matriarch of the colony. Tally hadn’t known her mother would be the client this night.
    The girls watched as Lesandra Bernardo calmed Mona, speaking softly, cooing over her. She made Mona lean back against the chair and rest. Then, Mrs. Bernardo resumed her straight-back position in her own chair and fell silent. Waiting. For something. After a moment, the slightest movement began in her torso, which rotated slowly, steadily, then stopped. The woman grabbed the arms of her chair and her head jerked upward. A man’s bass voice erupted from inside her, coursing through her open mouth. “I didn’t want to hurt you,” it said.
    “Yes, you did,” Mona answered, her own voice seething. “You did what no father should do to his little girl!”
    “Forgive me, Mona,” the voice pleaded. “It’s the only way you’ll ever be free of me and those things I did to you.”
    “I won’t forgive you. I want you to suffer like I do.”
    What had he done? Tally had never known her mother’s father. He’d died when Tally was a baby. She couldn’t bear to think the worst.
    With a smothering guilt for barging into her mother’s secret pain, Tally started to leave when Mona jumped from her seat and fled the room. Mrs. Bernardo didn’t try to stop or follow her. She appeared fixed in one position. Seconds later, though, she sprang from her chair and hurried after her client. That’s when Tally heard the car at the curb crank and pull away. With no thought of exposing herself, she ran from behind the tree and toward the street, watching the silver Lexus head toward the main gate. She felt like crumpling to the ground, surrendering herself to those who patrolled there. She wished she’d never asked Denise to come. She had no right to be here. Neither one of them did. But how could Tally have known what was coming, what wretched secret her mother had harbored for so many years?
    Across the green, someone moved. Tally caught sight of the security guard. She lunged back into the dark and returned to Denise. “We have to run. Now.” But Denise seemed too stunned to move.
    “That man’s voice—” she began in a strained whisper, seemingly unable to tear herself from the open window. She shuddered.
    Tally had seen similar things happen, always from her hiding places. It was why she’d brought Denise here, though now she regretted it. “Probably an act,” Tally lied. “I don’t know. But I do know we’ve got to get out of here.” Tally jerked against Denise’s arm and forced her away.
    Slipping house to house, scanning for the guard, the girls finally reached the back of the hotel and then the shed. When they got to the fence, Tally quickly unlaced the cording, opened