Fatal Deduction by Gayle Roper Read Free Book Online Page B

but ran to answer it, beating the barking Princess by a hair.With a sigh I collected our empty plates and cups and took them to the sink where I hand-washed them. No way would I put the Wedgwood in the dishwasher. I went back to the table and studied the puzzle. I could hear Tori’s animated voice from the living room over Princess’s happy yips.
    “Chloe’s upstairs, Jenna. Why don’t you go get her and tell her whenever she’s ready, we’ll leave.”
    I heard the clump of feet rushing toward the third floor accompanied by the
click, click
of little poodle claws. And I heard a deep voice.
    “I just wanted to stop and ask how you and your sister are doing.”
    “We’re fine.” Tori’s voice was bright and cheerful. You’d never know she’d just gotten a death threat or watched the police lug away a dead man.
    “I know that body this morning must have given you a jolt.”
    “It certainly did.” Now she was properly solemn. “Thank you for being concerned.”
    I heard a small laugh from Drew. “Jenna’s mad because she slept through all the excitement.”
    “Have no fear. Chloe will fill her in. I’m surprised the kid’s scream when she opened the door didn’t waken Jenna and all the rest of Philadelphia.”
    There was a clatter of feet as Chloe and Jenna rushed downstairs. How they made so much noise in flip-flops was an interesting question, though not one I cared to ponder.
    “Look, Dad,” Jenna said. “This is Princess. Isn’t she cute? Don’t you want one?” I imagined her cuddling the dog.
    Drew gave a noncommittal laugh and sidestepped the question.“Well, you girls have a good time shopping. And, Jenna”—his voice took on that reasonable parental tone kids so hate—“you do whatever Chloe’s aunt asks.”
    “Dad,” came her embarrassed cry.
    And I knew he knew Tori wasn’t me.
    Interesting, since everyone else tended to confuse us.

6

    D REW GRINNED BROADLY as he walked back to his home away from home. Jenna was so easy. And he was undoubtedly a terrible dad to enjoy teasing her like he did, but it was such fun to get a rise out of her.
    He hoped she had a good time with Chloe and Tori. He knew spending his sabbatical here was hard on her. She was away from her friends and would miss the first part of the coming school year, an eternity in the shifting cliques and clashes of eighth grade.
    And then there were the Conlin boys next door back home, to say nothing of the swimming pool. She swooned over the guys and enjoyed the pool. It used to be the other way around, and he longed for those safe days again.
    But it was a different story now that Jenna was no longer the tubby little kid next door. He lived in fear that the Conlin boys would see what she was becoming. If he had his way—and realistically heknew he wouldn’t, but a man could dream—there would be no males besides him in her life until she was at least thirty. It still unnerved him every time he looked at her and saw her rapidly developing a figure so like her mother’s, a two-edged sword if ever there was one.
    He sighed. The curse of every father of daughters was that he remembered all too well when he had been young and teeming with hormones.
    It had taken all the courage he possessed to have the purity talk with her, although she seemed to already know everything he told her, a very disquieting realization. He had sweated bullets and she had sat calmly, nodding her head as he stammered his way through the facts of life. He wasn’t sure he had yet recovered or ever would. It was probably the one time he’d missed Ruthie in years. His fragile peace of mind on the premarriage sex score came because Jenna willingly wore the purity ring he had gotten her, and she was still young enough to think sex sounded “yucky.”
    But…
    What if she didn’t just
look like
her mother? What if she
became
Ruthie?
    Even the thought made him grow rigid with tension. No matter how much he prayed, no matter how much he encouraged