title: Poisoned in Cherry Hills (Cozy Cat Caper Mystery) (Volume 3)
author:  Paige Sleuth 
description: Paige Sleuth is a pseudonym for mystery author Marla Bradeen. She plots murder during the day and fights for mattress space with her two rescue cats at night. When not attending to her cats' demands, she writes. She loves to hear from readers, and welcomes emails at paige.sleuth@yahoo.com. Please join her readers' group so she can keep in touch: http://hyperurl.co/readersgroup
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  **THE ROSE**
  
  IT BEGAN TO OPEN before his eyes. It disclosed a dark scarlet furnace, petal
  upon secret petal, each blazing with its own secret fury. Jake had never seen
  anything so beautiful, so intensely and utterly alive. Now, as he stretched
  one grime-streaked hand out toward this won-der, the voices began to sing his
  own name . . . and a dreadful, deadly fear began to steal in toward the center
  of his heart. It was as cold as black ice and as heavy as stone.
  
  There was something wrong here. He could feel it pulsing in dis-cord, like a
  deep and ugly scratch across some formerly priceless work of art. . . . Then
  the heart of the rose opened before him, exposing a bright yellow dazzle of
  light. ... It w