Mimosa Grove by Dinah McCall Read Free Book Online Page A

Before she’d gone fifty feet, Elvis glided down on outspread wings from a nearby tree. He landed between her and the mimosa grove, fanned his tail, then began to strut back and forth, blocking Laurel’s path with an intimidating series of shrieks.
    “Elvis, darling,” Laurel cooed. “Look what I have for you.”
    She dug into the small bag and pulled out some sunflower seeds, then tossed them on the ground between them.
    Elvis might as well have been blind for all the attention he paid to Laurel’s seedy bribe.
    “Fine, then,” she said, and started walking again, telling herself that it would be all right, that this RuPaul of the bird world was nothing but a bunch of noise and feathers, and that there was nothing to be afraid of.
    But the moment she moved, the bird gave chase. In a panic, she threw the sunflower seeds toward him, sack and all, and began to run. She didn’t look back, but she thought she could hear Marie’s laughter as she sprinted into the trees.
    Entering the grove was like entering another world. The humidity in the air seemed thicker. Moisture gathered on the leaves, only to drip on Laurel’s head and shoulders as she passed beneath the trees. The ground was littered with the fallen pink-and-white blooms, carpeting the floor of the grove in an exotic pseudo-Persian pattern.
    Every now and then a parrot would swoop across her line of vision in a startling flight of color and sound on its way to somewhere else. The rackety sound of cicadas blended with the intermittent croaks of tiny tree frogs, reminding her of Marie’s warning that it was going to rain.
    Intent on getting a little exercise before being shut in for the night with the storm, she took a moment to orient herself within the massive span of trees, then started to jog.
    Within minutes, both her hair and clothing were wet, as much from the humidity as from exertion. But it felt good to be working up a good sweat, so she pushed on through the grove, following a faint but distinct path without knowing where it led.
    She didn’t know how long she’d been running when she heard the first roll of distant thunder. She paused, her heart pounding, her muscles at the point of burning from the run as she bent over and grabbed her knees, bracing herself as she struggled to catch her breath. There was a slight stitch in her side, and she was mentally chastising herself for not bringing some water, when the thunder rumbled again, only closer. She straightened, swiping away straggling bits of hair that had escaped from her ponytail and now clung to her face, and began to retrace what she thought was the way back to the old mansion.
    She hadn’t gone more than a few feet when she looked down.
    “Oh, no,” she mumbled, realizing the path on which she was walking was untouched.
    She stopped, then turned around to retrace her steps, but she could no longer see the path. The wind was rising, causing blooms and the fernlike leaves alike to fall from the trees in wild abandon. The faster they fell, the more densely the old path was covered.
    Her heart skipped a beat.
    The storm was almost upon her, and she didn’t have the faintest idea which way to go. The wind was whipping through the trees now, and although the heavy canopy above her head might normally have formed a shelter, she could already feel the first drops of rain upon her face. It wasn’t as if she minded getting wet, but the gathering clouds had sucked up all the light. Between one moment and the next, night had come.
    Before she could focus, a bolt of lightning slammed to the ground, shattering the trunk of a tree less than fifty feet behind her. She screamed, then raced forward just as the rain began to fall in earnest.
    Not that way.
    Immediately, Laurel stopped, her heart hammering against her rib cage, her legs trembling with fear as she made a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree turn. No one was there, yet she’d heard the words as clearly as if the speaker had been standing right