LITMIR.BIZ

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and maybe Marty Stern, the program manager who gave her her assignments—knew that she was always running on half-empty, because her reason for everything was no longer there.

      Several times Ellie had toyed with the idea of just bowing out. Of not getting up, not going through the motions any longer. But she knew what that would do to her mother and she just couldn’t do that to her, so she kept up the pretense. Her mother, widowed shortly before Brett had been killed, would be devastated if anything happened to her, so Ellie made sure nothing “happened” to her, made sure she kept putting one foot in front of the other.

      And just kept going.

      “But sometimes it’s so hard,” she admitted out loud to the spirit of the man she felt was always with her even if she could no longer touch him.

      Ellie took a deep breath as she opened the front door. It was fall and the weather was beautiful, as usual. “Another day in paradise,” she murmured to herself.

      Locking the door behind her, she forced herself to focus on what she had to do today—even though a very large part of her wanted to crawl back into bed and pull the covers up over her head.

      * * *

      “I know that look,” Cecilia Parnell said the moment she sat down at the card table in Maizie’s family room and took in her friend’s face. “This isn’t about playing cards, is it?”

      Maizie was already seated and she was dealing out the cards. She raised an eyebrow in Cilia’s direction and smiled.

      “Not entirely,” Maizie replied vaguely.

      Theresa Manetti looked from Cilia to Maizie. She picked up the cards that Maizie had dealt her, but she didn’t even bother fanning them out in her hand or looking at them. Cilia, Theresa knew, was right.

      “Not at all,” Theresa countered. “You’ve got a new case, don’t you?” She did her best to contain her excitement. It had been a while now and she missed the thrill of bringing two soul mates together.

      “You mean a new listing?” Maizie asked her innocently. “Yes, I just put up three new signs. As a matter of fact, there’s one in your neighborhood, Theresa,” she added.

      “Oh, stop,” Cilia begged, rolling her eyes. “You know that’s not what Theresa and I are saying.” She leaned closer over the small rectangular table that had seen so many of their card games over the years as well as borne witness to so many secrets that had been shared during that time. “Spill it. Male or female?”

      “Female,” Maizie replied. She smiled mysteriously. “Actually, you two know her.”

      Cilia and Theresa exchanged puzzled glances. “Personally?” Cilia asked.

      Maizie raised a shoulder as if to indicate that she wasn’t sure if they’d ever actually spoken with her friend’s daughter.

      “From TV.”

      Cilia, the more impatient one of the group, frowned. “We’ve been friends for over fifty years, Maizie. This isn’t the time to start talking in riddles.”

      She supposed they were right. She didn’t usually draw things out this way. Momentarily placing her own cards down, she looked at her friends as she told them, “It’s Elliana King.”

      Theresa seemed surprised. “You mean the reporter on Channel—?”

      Theresa didn’t get a chance to mention the station. Maizie dispensed with that necessity by immediately cutting to the chase.

      “Yes,” she said with enthusiasm.

      “She didn’t actually come to you, did she?” Cilia asked in surprise.

      “A girl that pretty shouldn’t have any trouble—” Theresa began.

      “No, no,” Maizie answered, doing away with any further need for speculation. “Her mother did. Connie Williams,” she told them for good measure. Both women were casually acquainted with Connie. “You remember,” Maizie continued, “Ellie was the one who tragically found out on the air that her husband had been killed saving a couple being held up at gunpoint.”

      Theresa closed her eyes and shivered as she recalled the details. “I remember. I read that her station’s ratings went through the roof while people watched that poor girl struggling to cope.”

      “That’s the one,” Maizie confirmed. “As I said, her mother is worried about her and wants us to find someone for Ellie.”

      “Tall order,” Cilia commented, thinking that, given the trauma the young woman had gone through, it wasn’t going to be easy.

      “Brave woman,” Maizie responded.

      “No argument there,” Theresa agreed.

      Both women turned toward Cilia, who had gone strangely silent.

      “Cilia?” Theresa asked, wondering what was going on in their friend’s head.

      Maizie zeroed in on what she believed was the cause of Cilia’s uncharacteristic silence. Maizie was very proud of her gut instincts.

      “You have something?” she asked.

      Looking up, Cilia blinked as if she was coming out of deep thought.

      “Maybe,” she allowed. “One of the women who work for me was just telling me about her neighbor the other day. Actually,” Cilia amended, “Olga was making a confession.”

      “Why?” Theresa asked, puzzled.

      Maizie went to the heart of the matter. “What kind of a confession?” she pressed.

      “She told me she offered to clean the young man’s apartment for free because it was in such a state of chaos,” she explained. “And Olga felt she was betraying me somehow with that offer.”

      Theresa still wasn’t sure she was clear about what was going on. “Why did she offer to clean his place? Was it like a trade agreement?” she asked. “She did something for him, then he did something for her?”

      “It wasn’t like that,” Cilia quickly corrected, guessing at what her friend was inferring was behind the offer. “She told me that she felt sorry for the guy. He’s a police detective who’s suddenly become the guardian of his ten-year-old niece.”

      Maizie was instantly interested. “How did that happen?”

      “His brother and sister-in-law were in this horrific skiing accident. Specifically, there was an avalanche and they were buried in it. By the time the rescuers could get to them, they were both dead,” Cilia told her friends. “Apparently there’s no other family to take care of the girl except for Olga’s neighbor.”

      Theresa looked sufficiently impressed. “Sounds like a good man,” she commented.

      “Sounds like a man who could use a little help,” Maizie interjected thoughtfully.

      Maizie took off her glasses and gazed around the table at her friends. Ideas were rapidly forming and taking shape in her very fertile brain.

      “Ladies,” she announced with a smile, “we have homework to do.”

      * * *

      “But I don’t need a babysitter,” Heather Benteen vehemently protested.

      “I told you, kid, she’s not a babysitter,” Colin Benteen told his highly precious niece, a girl he’d known and loved since birth. Life had been a great deal easier when the only role he occupied was that of her friend, her coconspirator. This parenting thing definitely had a downside. “If you want to call her something, call her a young-girl-sitter,” he told Heather, choosing his words carefully.

      “I don’t need one of those, either,” Heather shot back. “I’ll be perfectly fine coming home and doing my homework even if you’re not here.” She glared accusingly at her uncle, her eyes narrowing. “You don’t trust me.”

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