Champagne and Catastrophes by Agatha Frost

Author:Agatha Frost [Frost, Agatha]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pink Tree Publishing LTD
Published: 2018-10-21T05:00:00+00:00

10

Julia woke with a fire in her belly the next morning. Roxy’s arrest had made her even more determined to get to the bottom of the case. She had no doubt the police were jumping to the same wrong conclusion she had.

On her return from Fern Moore, Julia had filled half a notepad, piecing together the story of Leah’s past. All the grisly details seemed even worse on paper, but Julia had decided to be objective in her search for the truth; Roxy was now her focus.

The timeline in her notes started in late 1994 with Leah accusing Gary Williams. In mid-1995, Gary was found not guilty. Later in 1995, it moved onto Roxy’s confession to Leah, which resulted in Leah’s game for two years, ending in the summer of 1997 when Leah ran off with Craig. According to Craig’s claim that he hadn’t seen her for seventeen years, which Julia assumed was at the hearing for their divorce, their relationship had ended sometime before 2001. She added in a second marriage somewhere between 2001 and 2009 because Leah said she had entered her thirties with two divorces under her belt. Between 2009 and 2018 she had Leah planning weddings, and the timeline finished with Leah returning to, and then vanishing from, Peridale.

Deciding to tackle what she hoped would be the easiest gap to fill in her notes, Julia closed the café an hour early and gathered Katie, Sue, and Dot for an impromptu dress shopping trip. They were surprised she was so keen to look at dresses again, and even more surprised when she suggested they revisit Brooke’s Bridal Boutique.

“She’s crazy!” Dot cried as they pulled up in front of the shop on Mulberry Lane. “She’s going to attack us the second we walk through the door.”

“There are other shops.” Sue checked her watch. “If we hurry we can catch the one in Riverswick before they close for the day. I drove past their window display yesterday after I took the twins swimming. They have some really gorgeous dresses.”

“I want to shop locally,” Julia insisted, locking her car after they all climbed out. “They have nice dresses here. I’m sure everything will be fine. We didn’t do anything wrong.”

Julia was not sure at all; in fact, she was almost certain they would be thrown out and banned for life on sight, but she had a secret weapon up her sleeve that rarely failed to win people over. She opened the small paper bag and peered at the two pieces of leftover lemon drizzle cake she had packaged up for Brooke and Max.

Taking the lead, Julia pushed on the door and greeted Brooke with a smile. She was behind her desk, writing in a large, leather book. It took Brooke a moment to recognise Julia.

“No!” Brooke cried, throwing her pen on the desk as she darted up. “I’m not serving you.”

It was the reaction Julia had expected.

“We came to apologise.” Julia offered the bag of cakes and placed them on the desk, careful not to get within grabbing distance.

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