10 Never Mess with Mistletoe by Edie Claire

Author:Edie Claire [Claire, Edie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: garden club, animals, family relationships, vintage seventies, holiday mystery, Christmas decorating
Publisher: Stackhouse Press
Published: 2016-12-07T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15

Pet therapy.

It was best stress antidote Leigh knew of. Within ten minutes of her sitting on the couch, she had a geriatric cat purring in her lap and a well-fed corgi asleep on her feet. Now she never wanted to move again.

Her tasks for the kids’ twelfth birthday party had been completed. She had wrapped the packages, performed her standard perfunctory cleaning pass, set the table, and put up the few low-key, gender neutral decorations both kids had been willing to agree on. Her duties in the kitchen, thank God, were nil. Ethan and Allison, in their infinite wisdom, had specifically asked their father if he would fix all their favorite foods, so the meal was Warren’s problem. She always enjoyed these yearly family get-togethers for the kids, and she was determined that everyone would enjoy this one, too, despite the awkward timing. This moment was the most relaxed she’d felt in days. But her respite was doomed to be brief.

“She is coming before the party, isn’t she Mom?” Allison asked in a voice underlain with tension. The girl was standing at the window again. She’d been watching out of it and pacing in front of it for the last forty-five minutes.

Leigh tried hard to maintain her zen. “Allison, if Maura said she would interview you today before the party, she will interview you today before the party. I really wish you would stop thinking so much about it. It’s your birthday! Wouldn’t you like to do something else while we’re waiting? Something fun?”

Allison turned from the window and regarded her mother with a sober expression. As she reached up and adjusted her glasses, she looked so much like her grandfather Randall it was uncanny. “Mom,” she said firmly, “this is serious. I have things I need to tell her.”

Leigh sighed and sat up a bit, much to the consternation of Mao Tse, who dug in her claws as her bed shifted sideways. Leigh’s feet moved as well, but the loudly snoring Chewie was oblivious. “I don’t suppose I can convince you to forget about everything that happened yesterday, just for the next few hours?”

Allison stared back at her. “You know what I really want for my birthday, Mom?”

For a second, Leigh felt a faint flicker of hope that she was about to hear a request for a shiny new phone or a bedroom makeover or maybe even a bicycle. But then she got real. The girl’s only request to date had been for subscriptions to boring software services, which Warren had thought perfectly sensible. Leigh had thrown a new comforter set into the mix anyway, just to give the girl something solid to unwrap. But she doubted it would be received with much enthusiasm. “What’s that?”

Allison stepped closer to her. “I want you to talk to me about this case. Like you would if you didn’t still think of me as a little kid.”

Icy terror gripped Leigh’s heart. No. Allison was her baby. She’d only been born a

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