A Rose From the Dead by Kate Collins

hallway, around the corner, through our tiny living room, and up another short hallway past the kitchen, where I found Marco leaning against the door, arms folded, looking like he’d just stepped away from a GQ photo session. As always, I had to stop to catch my breath. How could anyone be that scrumpti-hunkalicious?
    He looked me over and one corner of his mouth curved up in approval. “Nice.”
    “You’re not looking at me and thinking, ‘Hmm, I could really go for an ice cream sundae’?”
    “Not the direction of my thoughts at all.” He lifted an eyebrow suggestively.
    Good enough for me.

    As we wove through clusters of men in dark suits and women in cocktail dresses, hunting for table seventeen in the banquet hall, I found Max seated at our table with the Doves’ friends Mark and Jane Vale, and another couple, Alicia and Walt Tyler. Max explained that Delilah would be arriving momentarily. She’d had problems with her glue gun.
    At another front-row table I saw an older, more sophisticated version of Ross Urban, right down to his highlights. The only difference was that his hair was curly, where Ross’s was wavy. He had to be Conrad Urban. With him was a contingent of assistants watching his every twitch, eager to do his bidding. Surprisingly, the twins hadn’t yet arrived, and Conrad seemed edgy because of it, glancing from his watch to the wide, double doors in the back. There was also no sign of Chet Sunday.
    At seven o’clock everyone began to drift to their seats. Delilah, however, had yet to make an appearance, and by the frown on Max’s face I knew he was starting to fret. Delilah prided herself on punctuality. It would be unthinkable for her to arrive late.
    “Where’s the happy harpist?” Marco leaned close to whisper, his husky voice sending scintillating tingles to locations I could only describe as strategic.
    “She’s in the back at a table all by herself, draped over her chair like a black fog. I think her vampire costume is scaring people off.” My stomach rumbled, so I reached for the poppy-seed roll on my bread plate. “I hope Sybil starts this soon so we can eat. I’m hungry.”
    At that moment Ross and Jess came scooting through the crowd and plopped down across from their father, drinks in hand. At first I couldn’t tell them apart, as one had on a navy suit and the other wore a black suit, and both had neatly combed hair. However, one of the twins was sporting a tie that appeared to have been hastily knotted, with an unbuttoned collar to boot. I was guessing he was Jess the Mess. He got a fierce glare from Conrad, which prompted him to quickly adjust his tie.
    “It’s after seven o’clock,” Marco muttered, twisting in his chair to glance around the room. “Still think we’ll be out of here at eight?”
    At that moment Delilah swept up to our table. “I do beg your pardon,” she said breathlessly as Max jumped up to seat her. “I had a slight difficulty, but everything is under control now.”
    “Are you sure?” Max asked, which was exactly what I was wondering. Delilah’s pastel pink hat was askew, and several wisps of her blond hair had managed to break free of the hair spray and were flying about her face as though she’d been in a wind tunnel.
    “Of course I’m sure,” she said, tucking her hair in place. “I had a little delay, is all. I ran out of glue and had to go out to our van for more.”
    “You should have beeped me,” Max said. “I would have gone for the glue.”
    “Darlin’, I was in the storage room, just yards from the back door. It didn’t take long to get to our van from there. Now, don’t fret.”
    “Did you happen to see Sybil on your way in?” Mark asked her.
    Delilah leaned forward to say quietly, “Sybil was in the storage room when I went to fix the lace. She kept insistin’ that I leave because of some silly rule that says no one is allowed in after six, but I could tell by her jittery behavior it wasn’t about a rule. She