Crimecaster Cold Case: A Christian Cozy Mystery in the Pursuit of a Serial Killer (Cozy Corner Mysteries Book 2) by Kathleen Guire

Author:Kathleen Guire [Guire, Kathleen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kathleen Guire, Author
Published: 2024-10-04T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 13

CELEBRATION AND EXPECTATIONS

Fifteen minutes after Jenny released her Crimecaster Podcast episode, Aunt Mary, and Sage rushed through the front door which chimed loudly for both of them. More loudly than normal.

“I can't believe you didn't call and tell me that you caught the college co-ed killer,” Aunt Mary said, hugging me. “Are you safe? Are you okay? Did he harm you? Did he threaten you? Did he molest you?”

“Calm down, Aunt Mary. He sat right here on a stool, ordered a coffee and then said ‘I'm the Killer.’”

“I said that on the podcast, Aunt Mary,” Jenny interjected.

“I haven't listened to it yet. I didn't need to. I started getting phone calls and then I had to call your mother and your father and tell them what happened. They're hopping on a plane right now, so we'll have company for Thanksgiving.”

“Aunt Mary, you didn't have to do that. I wasn't in any danger.”

Sage hugged me as well. “I'm so glad you're safe.”

“But that's not the only reason you're here,” I said.

“No, I heard there was going to be cake and balloons. And⁠—”

Gabrielle swooshed in the door wearing the latest fashion.

“I hear there's a party here for catching a the college co-ed killer,” she said before Sage could tell me the other reason she was here.

I said hello to Gabrielle. The cafe and bookstore filled up with the townspeople.

The twenty-five conversations going on sounded like buzzing bees as people ate cake, drank coffee and celebrated the safety of the town and the finality of a forty-year-old wound beginning to heal. It was as if Jenny's podcast episode, which lasted all of ten minutes, assuring the town that the serial killer was caught, meant people breathed a collective sigh of relief. Questions were finally answered. The town as a whole could move forward to a brighter future.

I joined in the celebration and after a while the conversation turned from killers to babies born, marriages, high school graduations looming in the spring, and the upcoming holidays.

When Gabrielle mentioned the upcoming holidays, she said, “Aunt Mary invited me for Thanksgiving. She says your parents are coming.”

My stomach knotted in a ball at the phrase “your parents.” It wasn't that I didn't love my parents. It's not that I didn't want to see them. It was the heavy expectations in the “Harper, why aren't you?” comments.

The most common comment was “When are you going to sell this little bookstore and stop writing those little books and come work with your mother and me? Someone needs to take over our business so we can…”

The thought of selling my bookstore and not writing anymore made me want to puke. It wasn't just the expectations and the questions, it was that word “little.” When you added the word "little” in front of anything of significance, that meant you were saying it was insignificant, it was nothing. As if my life was nothing and I hadn't started living it because I wasn't doing what was expected of me.

I shook off the feeling.

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