Rituals of the Season by Margaret Maron

Author:Margaret Maron
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780446509527
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 14

Never, when advancing an opinion, assert positively that a thing “is so,” but give your opinion as an opinion . . . your companion may be better informed upon the subject under discussion.

Florence Hartley, The Ladies’ Book of Etiquette, 1873

I expected Dwight to be annoyed when I called to say I was bringing a law student home with me, but I hadn’t factored in his affection for Bessie Stewart. Not only was he not annoyed, he was actually pleased because Bessie had called him earlier that afternoon and asked him to help her granddaughter and “her young gentleman friend.”

“Kayra’s over at Bessie’s right now,” he said, “so I’ll tell her to meet us at the house and I’ll pick up an extra pizza.”

“Don’t forget my anchovies.”

“How you can eat those disgusting things, I’ll never understand.”

That’s what he says every time I ask for them. “Yours not to reason why,” I said.

“Yeah, well mine not to kiss you either.”

“Hey, what about for better or for worse and all that?”

“In sickness and in health, yes. In anchovies, no.”

I laughed, told him what landmark I was passing at the moment, and clicked off. Rain fell in slower, thicker drops, but so far the interstate was ice-free and I was able to keep it up to the speed limit. Nolan Capps’s headlights stayed right with me.

We passed the cutoff I’d taken Friday evening to get away from the backed-up traffic and, a few miles later, the overpass where Tracy had crashed. The lights from the cars around me picked up shards of broken glass, which twinkled briefly in the darkness. By the time we got to my usual exit, the wipers were clearing icy slush from the windshield. Driving became more iffy on the back roads and there was a definite fishtail effect when I cornered too sharply at Possum Creek. It was a relief to turn off the hardtop into the dirt lane that led to the house.

An unfamiliar car sat next to Dwight’s truck and both were sheeted with a thin glaze of ice. Dwight met us in the doorway. There might not be any post-anchovy kisses in my immediate future, but the pre-one would hold me for the moment.

I introduced Nolan Capps and he, in turn, introduced me to the young woman seated at the table in front of two large flat boxes that had filled the dining area with the entrancing aroma of tomato sauce, cheese, and oregano.

Kayra Stewart appeared to be in her early twenties. She wasn’t exactly beautiful, but she had good bones that would probably age well. I looked for a resemblance to Bessie but couldn’t see any beyond her yardstick-straight posture and her level appraisal of me as we shook hands. Her smooth skin was the color of mellow oak, her dark eyes were widely spaced and flashed with good-humored intelligence when she greeted Nolan. Her hair curled even more tightly than my friend Portland’s and she wore it clipped short like Portland, so that her shapely head sat elegantly on a long slender neck.

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