CLOUDS IN MY COFFEE by Julie Mulhern

Author:Julie Mulhern
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: amateur sleuth books, british cozy mystery, cozy mystery, cozy mystery series, detective novels, historical mystery, female sleuth, murder mysteries, murder mystery books, murder mystery books, mystery books, women sleuths, humorous mysteries
Publisher: Henery Press
Published: 2016-03-20T16:00:00+00:00

Twelve

The hours spent in a hospital waiting room are spent in a twilight world. Time doesn’t move at its customary speed. Instead, every minute drags as if each second is hauling a lifetime’s worth of pain and suffering behind it.

Time moves even slower when the people in the waiting room include Mother and Daddy, the son-in-law Mother suspected might have shot her daughter, me, and Aunt Sis, who arrived in a flurry and developed a case of nervous hiccups. Who could blame her? The silence was toxic.

An orderly appeared at the door and cleared his throat. We all half-jumped out of our chairs.

“You can see your wife now, Mr. Blake.” The young man offered Mother an apologetic smile.

As if a half-smile could stop Mother.

She rose from her chair and smoothed her skirt—a soldier adjusting her armor for battle.

Daddy caught her wrist. “Wait, Frances. We’ll see her shortly.” Daddy jerked his chin at Greg. “Go. Tell her we’ll be in soon.”

Greg followed the orderly into the hall and the door swung shut behind them.

George Washington probably looked at Benedict Arnold the way Mother looked at Daddy.

“Frances. Sit down.” Daddy’s voice brooked no arguments.

Mother sat, her displeasure evident in the tiny, tight lines around her mouth. The depth and number of those lines suggested there would soon be hell to pay.

Poor Mother. First a ruined gala and now a daughter in the hospital—add to that her husband embarrassing her in front of her daughter and sister. I steeled myself for something ugly.

“There’s no need for you to be here, Sis. You should go home.” Having lost one battle, Mother was apparently looking for a fight she could win.

Hiccup. “So I could wait by the phone?” Aunt Sis settled more deeply into her chair and the Naugahyde squeaked in protest.

The chairs at my house were more comfortable. And, given Mother’s mood, Max was definitely better company. I’d happily go and wait by the phone. But in her current mood, there was no telling what Mother’s retribution might be if I left.

“I’ve spent enough time—” hiccup “—in hospital waiting rooms to know it’s better not to be alone.”

Mother’s lips pinched at the implied criticism. “You could have called.”

“If I had, would you have come?”

The color of Mother’s cheeks was answer enough. “Go home, Sis. I have my husband with me.”

What was I? Chopped liver?

“If it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll stay.” Did Aunt Sis not see the glint in Mother’s eyes? Mother wouldn’t be happy until she drew blood.

With a lift of her manicured hand, Mother hid a yawn. “I’d think you’d be tired of hospitals.”

I glanced at Daddy and tilted my head. What were they talking about?

He answered me with a miniscule shrug.

Either he didn’t care or he wasn’t telling. He definitely wasn’t getting involved. He disappeared behind the pages of the sports section.

“You’d think. But here I am.”

Mother held herself erect as if she was enjoying high tea at the Ritz instead of sitting in a waiting room filled with Naugahyde chairs and particle board side tables.

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