The Glass Coffin by Gail Bowen Read Free Book Online

street, I felt a stab of anxiety that was as intense as it was irrational. Jill was an adult. If she needed me, all she had to do was pick up the cellphone. I went back upstairs, checked on the kids, reassured Willie that all was well, plumped my pillows, and crawled back between the sheets. After half an hour, I knew it was hopeless. The sandman wasn’t coming back to my house. I rearranged the pillows and picked up the remote control.
    On “All in the Family,” Gloria and Mike were getting married. Weddings all around. I had seen the episode at least five times, and the familiarity lulled me. I woke to a staticky screen and the heart-pounding sense of disorientation that comes in the small hours. Remembering the immediate cause of my insomnia, I walked down the hall to the guest room. Jill was sitting on the edge of the bed. She was wearing a pair of panties and Angus’s Mr. Bill sweatshirt.
    “Is that part of your trousseau?” I asked.
    “No, but at the moment, it’s the perfect choice,” Jill grimaced. “Like Mr. Bill, I am Dismembered, Squashed, and Melted Down.”
    “I take it this has something to do with your quixotic midnight ride.”
    Jill ran her fingers through her hair. “Quixotic is good,” she said. “Moronic would be even better. After you went to bed, Gabe called and said he’d just found out something I should know before the wedding. He didn’t want to talk about it on the phone, so I went charging off into the night. The roads were a mess and on the way downtown I hit a patch of ice and ended up in a snowbank. Of course, at that hour, Good Samaritans were in even shorter supply than usual, so I had to dig myself out. The Volvo is fine, incidentally, but by the time I got to the hotel I must have looked like something Willie dragged in. The prim little gent behind the reception desk was so horrified, I almost had to body slam him before he’d even ring Gabe’s room for me. Big surprise – there was no answer. Gabe had obviously given up on me and gone to bed.”
    “And you have no idea what he wanted to talk about?”
    “No, and you know what, Jo? I should have realized it was a fool’s errand. There’s nothing about Evan’s life that I don’t already know. That particular Pandora’s box has been open for a long time. By now, everything has flown out but Hope, and that’s what I’m hanging on to.”
    I put my arms around her. “You deserve better than this.”
    “Maybe so, but I’m forty-five years old, and I’m tired of waiting.” Jill’s smile was weary. “Is there a fairy tale about a girl who has to sleep with every loser on the planet before she finally gets her happily ever after?”
    “Maybe an X-rated one,” I said, smoothing her hair.
    “Not much fun being stuck in an X-rated fairy tale when everybody else is falling into these great love stories,” she said. “This is as close as I’m going to come, Jo, and I’m going to do whatever it takes to make it work.”

CHAPTER
    3
    It was still dark the next morning when Taylor crawled in beside me, and Willie lumbered up after her.
    “I couldn’t sleep,” my daughter said. “I’m too excited.”
    “What time is it?”
    “Time to get up. Besides Willie wants out.”
    “Willie always wants out.” I drew Taylor close, loving the gust of girl warmth as she snuggled in. “But he’s a reasonable dog. He’ll give us a break this morning.” Ever obliging, Willie inched up the bed, closer to the centre of power. “So what’s on our agenda?” I said.
    Taylor propped herself up on her elbow. “First we eat breakfast and have a bath so Rapti can do our hair before she goes to work, then we go to the mall to get that garter.”
    My daughter scratched Willie’s head absently. “Why does Jill need a blue garter?”
    “To bring her luck,” I said. “Brides are always supposed to have something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue.”
    “Does Jill know she’s supposed to have all that