Lucy and the Valentine Verdict by Rae Davies Read Free Book Online Page A

again.
    I took that as a challenge. I pulled back my
linen runner, but remembering my outfit, stopped short of sticking
out my chest. “I didn’t say it wasn’t appropriate, I said it wasn’t
from the Jazz Age. It was obviously Victorian.” And so did
not go with her dress. “Since the Jazz Age was later, someone could
have chosen to wear it but it wouldn’t have been a ‘modern’
choice.”
    Feeling I’d made my point, I tossed my hair
and took a slug of my martini.
    Peter gave me a sideways look and took the
glass from my strangely wobbly fingers. “I think it’s time to call
it a night.” He set the glass on the bar and, with his hand on my
back, guided me toward the door.
    Giddy with my victory... I couldn’t remember
for what... I leaned against him and giggled.
    Lady York wasn’t cowed. “Aren’t you going
to...?”
    Peter stopped. “What?”
    “Investigate? Search everyone?”
    I could feel annoyance running through
Peter’s body, like electricity humming through a wire. I put my
hand on his chest and sighed. He glanced down at me and
laughed.
    When he looked back up at Lady York, some of
the humor was still there. “If you want to file a formal report, I
suggest you call the local deputy sheriff. Maid Ann and I, however,
are going to bed.”
    He handed me Kiska’s leash, and we walked
out of the house.
    o0o
    I woke up the next morning to a malamute
stretched out beside me and a 12-piece jazz ensemble blowing Dixie
in my head.
    I groaned and rolled over. No Peter. I
started to sit up, but thought better of it. I rolled the other
direction. There was a note on the bedside table.
    Breakfast is in the armoire. Be back
soon.
    The armoire was a strange place to keep
breakfast, unless a malamute was sleeping beside you. Then it was
an ingenious place to keep breakfast.
    I stumbled out of bed and opened the
armoire. A brown grocery bag sat inside, filled with a bacon and
egg croissant sandwich, a thermos of coffee, two bottles of water
and a bottle of ibuprofen.
    I had the best boyfriend ever.
    The ibuprofen and water were first. Then,
immunized against the worst of my post-alcohol adventures, I crept
out of the bedroom to have my coffee and sandwich away from begging
malamute eyes.
    I had just finished both and was on my way
to feeling human when I saw Peter get out of his truck and walk
toward our cabin.
    He smiled when he saw me watching him from
the couch. “You’re alive.”
    I couldn’t help but be a little insulted. I
hadn’t drank
that
much. “Of course I
am.”
    “Uh huh.” He picked up the thermos and
turned it upside down. One lone drop of coffee dripped onto the
polished wood. He shook his head and walked into the kitchen where
he went about making more coffee in a small four-cup maker that had
been hidden inside a cabinet.
    “Where were you?” I asked.
    “Out.”
    The coffee dripped into the carafe with a
slow steadiness that, if I hadn’t already had two cups earlier,
would have driven me insane.
    “The others seem to be up,” he commented,
reminding me that there’d been brunch promised.
    Seeing my face, he laughed. “No food until
11. There was a note under our door when I got up.”
    I didn’t bother asking him what time that
was. Knowing him, it had probably been pre-dawn. I snorted and held
out my cup for the coffee that had just finished brewing. He filled
mine and then before filling his own, handed me a handful of little
plastic half-and-half cups.
    “Out where?” He might have thought the
aftermath of the previous night’s martinis had allowed that to slip
past me, but he’d been wrong. Seeley Lake was beautiful, but it was
also in the middle of nowhere. I wasn’t even sure there was a
decent-sized grocery store within an hour’s drive. Which made me
think... “Where’d you get my breakfast?”
    “Mrs. Peabody.”
    I cocked a brow.
    “She brought it by.”
    “And where’d she get it?”
    He took a drink of coffee. “I didn’t
ask.”
    I rounded my eyes