Death Threads (2 page)

“Yoga-fied, Rose,” Tori whispered.

The elderly woman waved her off, opting instead to continue her tirade. “No matter what you do, Leona, no man that looks like Colby Calhoun is going to see you as anything other than what you are—an old snooty woman. Who can’t sew her way out of a paper bag.”

“We’re working on that though, aren’t we Leona?” Tori cast one final look across the room at Colby Calhoun before draping an arm around the thinner and more poised version of Margaret Louise. “In fact, we have our first lesson tonight, don’t we?”

The burst of pale crimson that had risen to Rose Winters’s cheeks for all of about thirty seconds retreated behind the normal pale pallor of her wrinkled face. “You’re teaching Leona how to sew?”

“And she wants to learn?” Margaret Louise chimed in with blatant disbelief.

“She’s willing to learn.” Tori gently tapped the side of Leona’s head with her own and squeezed the older woman’s shoulder. “Isn’t that right, Leona?”

“If you intend to hold me to a concession made under duress, Victoria, I guess I’m willing.”

“She won’t show up,” Margaret Louise said with a knowing shake of her head. “Learnin’ to sew means listenin’, and my sister is as contrary as they come.”

“I take offense to that.” Leona placed her hands on her hips and leaned forward, her eyes locked on her sister’s.

“Why? It’s true.”

“It is not,” Leona argued. “I’ve learned things. Lots of things.”

“Name two . . . no, three.” Margaret Louise ticked off three fingers on her right hand with the index finger of her left. “Name three things you’ve learned in the last five years.”

“I’ve learned my twin sister has gotten even more aggravating with age,” Leona hissed through clenched teeth. “I’ve learned how to run a business . . .”

“That’s true. Elkin Antiques and Collectibles is well respected,” Rose grudgingly acknowledged from the sidelines.

“And I’ve learned that just because someone carries the detective title doesn’t mean he’s particularly adept at detecting the truth . . . or what, exactly, makes a woman such as myself purr.” Leona folded her arms across her chest with defiance. “That’s three.”

“So you named three, congratulations. I’ll bet anything you won’t add sewin’ to that list.”

“Anything?” Leona prompted.

“Anything.”

“How about dinner every night for a month? Delivered to my door?”

Tori laughed. “Getting tired of eating out every night, Leona?”

The woman flicked her hand off to the side. “Sweet Briar is hardly a mecca of fine dining, dear. There’s not a restaurant within fifty miles of here that knows what good wine means.” To her sister she said, “Do we have a deal?”

“And if you don’t learn?” Margaret Louise asked, her eyes twinkling merrily.

“An antique from the shop.”

“I was thinkin’ more along the lines of you watchin’ all seven of Jake’s young-uns one evening so I can take him and Melissa out for supper.”

All eyes stared at Leona as her pallor drained to the color of freshly fallen snow. “All seven?”

“
All
seven.”

“Even the baby?”

“Molly Sue is number seven. So, yes, she’s included.” Margaret Louise’s pudgy hand patted Tori on the back. “I think I just freed up your evenin’, Victoria.”

“No you haven’t, because I accept that bet.” Leona’s chin rose into the air as she inhaled through her cosmetically altered nose. “And, as for what we were talking about before my character was called into question, I’m not old, I’m aging. There is a difference.

“In fact, as you astutely pointed out, Rose, I’m aging much better than either of you two”—she slowly and deliberately let her gaze roam between the elderly spitfire and her own sibling—“and I’ll take
snooty
over
backwoods
any day. At least I’ve been to the places Colby writes about. Unlike the two of you, who seem to think Sweet Briar, South Carolina, is the be-all-that-ends-all.”

“That’s because it is. You just try and show me another town—anywhere—that has the kind of rags to riches history Sweet Briar has. A history that saw this town destroyed by fire at the hands of those blasted Yankees and watched it rebound stronger than ever thanks to hard work, sheer determination, and the undying dedication of its founding fathers.” Rose stared back at Leona, her thick glasses magnifying her eyes to nearly twice their original size.

“ ‘Undying dedication’? Isn’t that a bit much?”

“It’s
fact
, Leona. And you can’t do it, can you?”

Leona crossed her arms in delicate fashion as her chin tilted upward once again, this time in quiet defiance. “Do what?”

“Find a more impressive history than Sweet Briar’s anywhere in these parts.” Rose stamped her penny loafer-clad foot ever so slightly as she waited for a response.

“I’m sure, with a little research, I could—”

“Find nothing,” Rose finished with authority. “So you can take your fancy cruises and your airplane rides all over the world, Leona. I’ll take a town like this—one that was reborn on hard work and pride—any day of the week. Especially if it comes with someone like that.” The woman’s bony finger rose into the air, effectively aiming their collective focus back where it had started—on the dark-haired hunk sitting in the middle of the library.

“Amen.” Leona sighed. “Do you think he’s working on his next novel?”

Tori shrugged as she forced her attention back to the books in front of her, her hands expertly sorting each title into the appropriate pile. “He could be, I guess. But I suspect it’s more likely his newspaper column on account of the time he spent in local history.”

“I’ll get those, Miss Sinclair.” A petite woman with dark skin and even darker eyes breezed her way between the sewing circle members and the counter, setting down one stack of books and retrieving another. “I’m sorry I’m late. Duwayne’s car broke down off Route 25 and I had to go and fetch him. I can come in on Saturday if that’ll help, Miss Sinclair.”

“It’s not a problem, Nina. Things have been relatively”—she ran her gaze across the smattering of patrons around the room before returning it to her assistant’s worried face—“quiet here so far.”

“If you can call us quiet,” Margaret Louise piped in from her spot against the expansive countertop that surrounded three and a half sides of the information area. Within the boundaries denoted by the counter stood the branch’s main reference computer, a few filing cabinets, and a stool.

“True. I forgot about these three.” Tori motioned with her head toward her sewing circle buddies. “They stopped by to—wait. Why did you three stop by?”

“You haven’t figured that out yet?” Nina asked as her endearing yet tentative smile began to surface. “How long have they been here?”

“About as long as he has.” She lowered her head slightly, raising her eyes in the direction of the man they’d been gawking at for the past thirty minutes.

“He . . .” Nina looked over her shoulder, her timid smile giving way to a blush that began halfway down her neck before she finally turned back. “Ahhh.”

Tori laughed, the sound quiet yet still enough to turn a few heads in their direction. Including Colby Calhoun’s.

Shaking her thoughts back to a semirespectable place, Tori squeezed Nina’s hand gently and motioned toward the stack of books the woman had set down on the counter. “What are these?”

“There was a message on the machine in your office when I came in. Those are just a few titles Ella May Vetter asked us to set aside. She said she’d be in later today to fetch ’em.”

“Oh. Okay.” Tori pulled a small slip of paper from a rectangular pad and scrawled the woman’s name across the surface. “Not a problem.”

“So what exactly does someone like Ella May Vetter read?” Rose asked, her raspy voice suddenly light and giddy.

“Oooo, let’s see.” Margaret Louise’s chunky hand reached across the counter, scooted the stack of books to within an easy reach. “Hmmm. Well . . . there’s
Ten Easy Steps to Turn Your House into a Home
,
Sew Deadly
,
Misery
,
Peter Rabbit
, and—get this—
Keep Your Man Lusting
.”

“
Keep Your Man Lusting
?” Leona asked through lips that twitched. “You can’t be serious.”

Margaret Louise pulled the bottom book from the pile and held it in the air. “I can and I am. See for yourself.” She set the book back down on the counter and slid it across to her sister. “Maybe there really is a man.”

“There is. And has been for quite some time. He just resides in her head,” Rose offered as she, too, peered at the book Margaret Louise had placed in front of Leona. “That one is—and will always be—a strange duck. Or should I say bunny.”

Giggles erupted among the group.

“Who?” Tori asked feeling more than a little left out. Sure, she’d only been in Sweet Briar less than six months, but the circle members had done a fairly good job of getting her up to speed on the who’s who of the tight-knit town. Ella May Vetter, though, was a name she hadn’t heard before.

She watched as Leona slowly scanned the library, her heavily lashed brown eyes darting from one face to the next before coming to rest squarely on Tori. “Now dear, we realize you’re used to lunatics every five feet where you’re from and, in all fairness, I’ve certainly seen my fair share while traveling . . . but here, in Sweet Briar, we have just one. And her name is Ella May Vetter.”

Choosing to ignore the comment about her years in Chicago, Tori leaned closer. “Lunatic?”

Three heads nodded in unison with Nina grudgingly adding her own silent affirmative.

“Oh, c’mon, how bad can she be?” Tori asked.

“Well, she lives in that big old Victorian off Lantern Drive. You know . . . the white one with the—”

“Polka-dot mailbox?” Tori supplied as a picture began to form in her mind.

Margaret Louise nodded, taking over where Rose left off as she simultaneously sifted through the rest of Ella May Vetter’s books. When she found the title she was searching for, she turned it so Tori could see, tapping her finger on Beatrix Potter’s name. “Lest Ella May be known as the clichéd cat lady, she raises
bunnies
. A whole mess of bunnies. She sits on her porch for hours hand-feeding each rabbit their very own organically grown carrot.”

“Which, of course, she buys. Oh, and we can’t forget the frilly gloves.”

She looked at Leona. “Frilly gloves?”

Everyone nodded in sync as Leona offered the explanation that made Rose’s eyes roll upward. “Of course. We can’t have the carrots carrying any harmful oils from our fingers to the bunnies, now can we?” Leona lowered her voice to a near whisper. “But that’s not all. The last time I was in Leeson’s Market she was there, gushing about you-know-who as usual.”

“You-know-who?” Giving up on any hope of shelving, Tori simply settled on the stool. “Who’s that?”

“That, Victoria, is the million dollar question.” Rose bent forward at the waist ever so slightly as a deep cough rattled her frail body. “For going on ten years now we’ve all heard about this amazing man she’s been dating. He’s smart. Good-looking. Funny. Charming. Well traveled. Even famous. He is—to hear her talk—the epitome of every woman’s dream.”

She looked from Rose, to Margaret Louise, to Leona, to Nina, and back again. “I don’t get it. So what’s the problem? I mean the mailbox is funny and the bunny thing is definitely a little weird. But what’s wrong with this—this Ella May Vetter woman having a great guy? Milo has certainly made my life a lot more special.”

Just the mere mention of Milo Wentworth’s name made her smile—a genuine happy smile that started deep inside her soul and had a way of carrying her through an entire day no matter how crazy or mundane it may be. Officially dating for three months now, she found herself eagerly looking forward to each new day just to see what sweet surprise the local elementary school teacher had up his sleeve.

There’d been flowers on her front porch, surprise picnics in the town square, countless nights spent discussing books, candlelit dinners on her patio, and bakery treats at the end of a long day at work.

In short, Milo Wentworth was like opening a great big present with multiple compartments and memorable surprises every step of the way.

“The difference, dear, is that Milo is real.” Leona tsked.

“And this man isn’t?”

“Darned if we know. And it’s been ten years.
Ten years
, Victoria.” Rose pushed a trembling hand through her wiry crop of white hair and shrugged. “But whatever gets you through the day, I s’pose.”

“If he’s famous as you say—”

“I don’t say . . . she says,” Rose corrected.

“If he’s famous as
she
says,” Tori amended, “maybe she’s simply respecting his privacy.”

Rose shook her head, a motion copied by both Leona and Margaret Louise. “No, she’s just cuckoo.”

“Maybe she’s just a private person.” Tori had known several of those in her life. And they certainly weren’t lunatics. “Sometimes people are just different. They act differently, think differently, and behave differently. But it doesn’t mean they’re crazy. Or ‘cuckoo’ as you just said.”

Four sets of eyes cast downward like disobedient puppies who’d met the end of a rolled-up newspaper. Rolling her own eyes upward she stifled a laugh. “Look, I’m not getting on you guys. I’m just saying maybe there’s another explanation.”

“Excuse me, ladies. Victoria, may I have a moment of your time?”

Five sets of eyes flew upward as five throats swallowed simultaneously.

“Uh, hi, Colby. How are you?” She flashed a welcoming smile at the man standing less than two feet away, prayed he didn’t notice the way she wiped her hands on her charcoal gray skirt. It wasn’t that she was interested in the object of the group’s collective fantasizing—she wasn’t. She had Milo. And Colby had Debbie—a circle member closer to her own age whom she both admired and respected. But seeing him up-close was like having a plate of chocolate candies thrust in front of your face with iron-clad instructions not to touch.