Sink or Swim by Stacy Juba

Author:Stacy Juba
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: health clubs, television, reality tv, game shows, suspense novels, reality shows, Romance, mystery novels, personal trainers, amateur detective
Publisher: Stacy Juba
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

Cassidy positioned herself at the living room picture window, taking in the distant blue green mountains. Mist shrouded the sloped peaks, swathing balsams, hemlock and white pines. Flowers bloomed around the backyard porch, reds and yellows bright against a thin coat of fog.

Under other circumstances, Cassidy would have enjoyed a visit to the mountains, but not when she had so much to do. She swung around and crossed the wide-planked pine floor.

Overhead, exposed beams slanted down from the thirty-foot vaulted ceiling. Rosemary had recounted the history of the 1860s-farmhouse, which had undergone additions over the decades, finally connecting to the original barn. Handmade medallion quilts adorned the dark wood walls.

Chazz, an eight-year-old German Shepherd, dozed on the raised stone slab floor surrounding the Franklin stove, black ears twitching. Cassidy had given up on him as a guard dog.

She sank onto an overstuffed wing chair diagonal from a cherry wood armoire with a hideaway television. Aromas of pancakes and sausage drifted from the kitchen. She'd told Rosemary she ate light breakfasts, but her hostess didn't listen.

After three days, Cassidy hadn't adjusted to the farmhouse, nor to Rosemary and Donald, who bragged about hiking, bicycling, fly fishing, snowshoeing and cross country skiing as if they had carved out the mountains and lakes themselves.

Glenn had driven her to their home. Sherlock Holmes couldn't have followed undetected on the twisting back roads that wound past cows lounging in meadows, tall red silos on stretches of farmland and antique shops whose owners must consider three sales a good year. They'd passed the town offices, cramped in a shack smaller than Angela's Diner. Cassidy could have sworn the post office was in someone's garage.

Wiping her hands on a dishtowel, Rosemary appeared in the doorway. Close-cropped chestnut hair brushed Rosemary's ears in a slight curl at the tips. Her unlined face bore no makeup and a gentle smile.

Rosemary switched on the lamp, flooding the room with warmth. "Soup's on, kiddo. Humor me. You need meat on those skinny bones."

"I hope you didn't go to any trouble," Cassidy said.

"Not at all. Donald and I enjoy a hearty breakfast." She shepherded Cassidy into a light oak-paneled kitchen with pots and pans hanging from low beams.

Flowered yellow china filled a hutch built into the wall, and enough spices for a grocery store lined the baker's rack in orderly rows. Rosemary retrieved a pitcher of maple syrup off the sideboard and placed it on the knotted oak picnic table.

Cassidy dribbled syrup over her blueberry pancakes. She would force down a couple and reserve her cholesterol lecture for another time. She'd heard Donald leave for work an hour earlier. No hearty breakfast for him today.

Hackles tingling on her neck, Cassidy focused on the sliding patio door. The glass had been pulled back, a flimsy screen separating inside from outside. She swallowed a forkful of pancake.

Rosemary and Donald had no neighbors for a couple miles. The road drew little traffic; in fact a cow shot her and Glenn an odd look when they drove up.

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