LITMIR.BIZ

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past couple of years she’d been sure she’d never cry again. She thought she’d seen everything—and done everything. But just as Great-Grandma used to say, life had a way of changing. Why couldn’t things just settle for once? Why couldn’t people learn to be nice?

      Fawn missed Bruce. He’d been good to her—as good as he’d known how to be. He wasn’t one of those fine, law-abiding citizens or anything. He had a business, and it wasn’t banking. But she’d also seen him give money to the soup kitchen down the street from the mall in Las Vegas, and he was a big tipper. He was good to a lot of people. So much better than her stepfather had ever been to her…considering Bruce didn’t know how old she really was…considering he’d never forced her to do anything she didn’t pretend to want to do.

      Teardrops joined the creek water on her face, and again she let herself cry. “Oh, Bruce,” she whispered. “Why’d you have to blow the whistle on those people? Why’d you have to make it such a big deal?” People broke the rules every day. He broke the rules every day. Why’d he have to pick yesterday to change his ways?

      And then she couldn’t help wondering about the big, ugly crime he said they were committing in Hideaway. What kind of danger were those people in? And what would happen to them now that Bruce wasn’t there to stop whatever was happening?

      Now she knew why he’d planned to take her there this weekend. He’d told her they could play—riding jet bikes and floating down a local river and hiking on some fancy new trail—but she’d known from the beginning he’d had something else on his mind.

      A loud truck muffler startled her with its racket on the road. She sniffed and wiped her face, then slumped back against the bank of the creek. “What am I going to do now?”

      She picked up the purse she’d used as a pillow last night, and pulled out the tiny lipstick with mirror Bruce had given her last week. From what she could see in the reflection, she had mud all over her face, and her hair was one big mat of tangles and dirt and leaves. One of her contact lenses had come out, and now she had one blue eye and one brown.

      She’d have to clean up before anybody saw her.

      She sniffed and blinked away the tears, then dropped to her knees and rinsed her hair and clothes as well as she could in the cold creek water to get some of the mud out. The gravel dug into her knees, adding to the pain of her cut and bruised feet.

      Last night, she’d scrambled through the deserted parking lot of a mall about a half mile or so up the hill from here. Maybe she could go back there and get some clothes before it got busy this morning. And maybe she could get some other supplies, as well.

      She pulled the cash from her purse and stuffed it into the pocket of her pants. She transferred the rest into her shirt pocket—including the teensy computer data storage device Bruce had told her to keep—and buried her pretty, blue-beaded purse that matched the dress she’d looked so good in. And so grown-up.

      Now it was time to be a kid again. Maybe she could get away with that here in Branson, at least for a little while. Branson was nothing like Las Vegas.

      Except there were murderers here, too.

      

      The rumble of Monster’s outraged cries still echoed in Karah Lee’s ears as she stepped through the entrance of the two-story Victorian lodge that held the main office where she had checked in last night. The cat did okay alone most of the time, but he hated new places, and he let everybody know about it. Karah Lee only hoped he didn’t blast the windows out with his caterwauling today.

      Maybe someone at the clinic could tell her how to contact that kid who treated animals. Monster didn’t appear to be injured, but she didn’t want to take any chances with the life of her grumpy roomie.

      Drawn by the irresistible aroma of a country breakfast, Karah Lee strolled through the comfortable-looking lobby, with its Victorian sofa and chairs and fireplace, to a wide hallway that led to a large dining area with fifteen tables decorated with cut-glass vases holding fresh carnations.

      This morning, the only diners in evidence sat outside on a deck overlooking the lake. Karah Lee glanced toward a steam table near the wall to her right. A white-haired octogenarian stooped over the table, stirring a pot of gravy. There were steel trays containing sausage patties, omelettes, waffles and all kinds of toppings, fresh fruit, biscuits, hash browns with onions…the aromas made Karah Lee dizzy with hunger.

      “There you are.” The lady set down her platter of biscuits and gestured toward a table beside a window that overlooked the deck—and the sparkling blue lake just a few yards away. “You’re Dr. Fletcher, ain’t you?” she called across the room.

      “That’s me.”

      She studied Karah Lee’s scrubs and lab coat. “Cheyenne sure is looking forward to seeing you.”

      “Good. I’ll walk over there as soon as I finish my breakfast.”

      “She’ll be glad of that.” The woman dusted her floury hands on her apron as she crossed to Karah Lee’s table. “Nobody can believe how fast her business grew this year, and what with her signed on to work down at Dogwood Springs for the rest of the summer, to boot, she’s been working night and day sometimes, it seems like to me.” She held her hand out.

      Karah Lee took it in a gentle grip, looking for a name badge that wasn’t anywhere in evidence. “You must be Edith Potts’s business partner.”

      The lady’s dark eyes lit with a gleam of amusement. “Called me that, did she? ‘Idiot partner’ is more like it. I’m the one who talked her into this fool idea last fall when the former owner retired.”

      “You mean this bed-and-breakfast?”

      “That’s right. Can you believe it?” She gestured around the room, then plopped a biscuit in a plate, split it in half, and stepped to the warming table to spoon some gravy over the top of it. “Two old women, each with a foot in the grave, and we’re buying this place from somebody younger than we are by ten years.” She shook her head as she set the plate in front of Karah Lee. “You look like a gal who likes rib-sticking food. Oh, where’re my manners? My name’s Bertie Meyer. I’ll get you some coffee and freshly squeezed juice. You can have anything here you want to eat, you don’t have to eat what I stick under your nose.”

      “I love biscuits and gravy.”

      “You sure? Red always griped at me for being too pushy.”

      “Biscuits and gravy are my favorites for breakfast except for waffles and strawberries and cream. Who’s Red?” Karah Lee took a bite of tender biscuit and perfectly seasoned gravy.

      “That was my husband,” Bertie said. “He died last year. He was eighty-five or eighty-seven years old, we’re not sure which.”

      “How could he not know how old he was?”

      “When he applied for social security he thought he was seventy, and those people told him he was two years older than he thought. We knew better than to argue with the government, so we just let ’em think what they wanted.”

      “Why do you think buying this bed-and-breakfast was a bad idea?”

      Bertie snorted. “You kidding? I must’ve lost my senses when I talked Edith into buying this place.”

      “Obviously Edith didn’t think it was a bad idea.”

      “Most folks didn’t at the time, but that was before a bunch of greasy-handed scoundrels called the Beaufont Corporation bought up most of the town.” She glanced toward the steam table, then leaned toward Karah Lee. “You like black walnuts?”

      “Love ’em.”

      Bertie’s face crinkled in a pleased smile. Nearly a foot shorter than Karah Lee, she moved with a quickness that contradicted her professed elderliness as she poured coffee and juice and decorated a plate with a thick Belgian waffle, strawberries, whipped cream. White running shoes peeped out from beneath crisp green slacks as she

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