Poisoned Pages by Lorna Barrett

Author:Lorna Barrett
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2018-07-09T16:00:00+00:00

SEVENTEEN

Not surprisingly, Angelica called that evening just as Tricia was peeling the potatoes to say that she was canceling their dinner date. “I just don’t feel up to company tonight.”

“Do you want me to bring something over for you?” Tricia asked.

“No. I have a lot of thinking to do, and I need some alone time to do it.” She sounded sad and utterly defeated.

“Call me if you need me.”

“Thank you. I will.”

She wouldn’t.

As Tricia hung up the phone, she thought about the little cooked bird sitting in her fridge that would never be warm again. Oh well, she liked chicken salad, and she was sure Miss Marple would enjoy a chopped chicken snack.

After a light and lonely dinner, Tricia went up to her new sleep suite and went to bed with a good book, reading far into the night.

The phone rang at 7:05 Saturday morning. Tricia opened one eye and reflected that calls that came that early never contained happy news, and she was filled with dread as she reached for the landline next to her bed.

“Hello?”

“Oh, Trish, why didn’t you tell me?” Angelica demanded, sounding terribly upset.

Tricia allowed herself to relax, if only a little. “So you finally got a chance to see the latest issue of the village rag?”

“Yes. Frannie gave me the mail last night at closing, but I didn’t bother to go through it until just now. Why didn’t you tell me at lunch yesterday or when I spoke to you last night?”

“You’re dealing with enough. I wasn’t about to dump any more crap on you.”

“Have you thought about consulting a lawyer over this?”

“Why bother? What Russ wrote is all pretty much true.”

“Yes, but it was his intent. It was vicious. I know he’s been worried about his newspaper’s bottom line; well, I’m going to make a definite dent in it by yanking all my advertising from that nasty fish wrapper. I’ll make sure he regrets his decision to smear the Miles family name.”

“Ange—”

“I’ve made up my mind.”

“Okay,” Tricia said in defeat. “But please, don’t make a scene about it. He could make it worse for all of us.”

Angelica said nothing for a long moment, and then, “You may be right about that. I’ll think about this for a while. But at the very least, I will not buy another ad from that terrible tabloid.”

Tricia wondered if she should tell her sister what Russ said about his marriage, or that he’d admitted his jumping into the Chamber race as a revenge tactic. Now didn’t seem the time.

Tricia sat up in bed, and Miss Marple got up, too, coming over to rub her head on Tricia’s shoulder, reminding her that it was breakfast time.

“Did you read the other story?” Angelica asked.

Uh-oh. “What other story?”

“About Bob’s trial.”

“No. I was so angry, I could barely see straight to read the one on me. What did it say?”

“Russ’s second hack job. He made it sound like Bob was some kind of victim, and barely mentioned Christopher’s death. He also pointed

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