Experience has taught Jessica to keep secret her ability to see character-revealing auras. When an inexplicable cloud over a murder victim’s grave leads her to a killer, her unusual perceptions pose a dilemma and place her in danger.

I tell this tale in “An Aura of Death,” one of 27 short stories that appear in That Mysterious Woman, a new Shaker of Margaritas anthology published by Mozark Press in paperback and e-book editions (available on Amazon). Among the other writers are Paula Benson, E. B. Davis, Sharon Woods Hopkins, Edith Maxwell, Harriet Sackler, and Donna Volkenaant. The writers come from around the country and tell a variety of tales.

I write few short stories, and rarely anything that includes a supernatural element, but the idea of identifying a cold-blooded murderer and having no way to prove his guilt intrigues me. So does the ability, or burden, of seeing auras, which stems from a neurological condition called synesthesia.

Maybe some day Jessica will see another disturbing aura.

—Carolyn Mulford