Debbie Macomber - Cedar Cove 03 by 311 Pelican Court

Author:311 Pelican Court [Court, 311 Pelican]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Sixteen

W ith only a few days left before Christmas, Corrie McAfee was eager to finish the last of her shopping. She’d assumed that when Roy took early retirement from the Seattle police force they’d travel. Touring Europe was something they’d talked about for years.

Retirement had sounded so liberating. No alarm clocks; a come-and-go-as-you-please kind of lifestyle. It had been that way at first, but Roy had gone stir-crazy within eighteen months. Shortly after their arrival in Cedar Cove, he’d hung out his shingle as a private investigator.

Linnette, their twenty-four-year-old daughter, had predicted as much. The older of their two children, she was most like her father. She shared Roy’s insight into people; they both possessed an innate ability to read character and see through pretense. Linnette also had a genuine desire to help people, especially children. In fact, she was receiving her physician’s assistant degree in June. She’d be arriving for the holidays on Wednesday afternoon, and joining Corrie and Roy for the Christmas Eve worship service at church.

Mack was coming to Cedar Cove, too, but their son wouldn’t get there until Christmas morning. Mack was a mailman in the Seattle area. He’d never enjoyed school or succeeded at it the way his sister had. Corrie believed that, in time, he’d decide to further his education, but if he didn’t, that was fine, too. He was generous, hard-working and honest. Roy, however, had bigger aspirations for his only son, and it had caused a rift between him and Mack. A small one they both chose to ignore, but they weren’t close, and that troubled Corrie.

“Are you going out?” Roy asked as he left his office and found her wearing her coat.

“Peggy and I are meeting for lunch,” she told him. “Then we’re off to the mall.”

Her husband leaned against her desk in a relaxed pose. “You like Peggy, don’t you?”

Corrie nodded. They’d lived in Cedar Cove nearly four years now and hadn’t established a lot of friendships. In the beginning, Corrie had been busy setting up their home. Later she was involved with helping Roy establish the agency. There’d been overtures of friendship from their neighbors, but Corrie and Roy tended to keep to themselves. That was how it had been in Seattle, and they’d maintained the same approach here. They waved to the neighbors, collected their mail while they were on vacation, but that was about the extent of it.

Peggy Beldon, however, was someone who genuinely interested Corrie, for a number of reasons. Corrie had a small garden space at the back of their property. Her yard in Seattle had been shaded and too small for anything other than a few flowers. After seeing Peggy’s herb garden, she wanted to plant her own. But Corrie liked Peggy for more than her gardening expertise.

The day Bob came into the office and Corrie had chatted with Peggy, the other woman had graciously offered Corrie a few seedlings. That was the beginning of their friendship. Twice now, they’d met for lunch to chat, exchange recipes and get to know each other.

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