by Nicole Ellis
A bright light came at us on the water. The boat had returned.
“Adam, I have to go. See you in a few minutes.”
Desi and I climbed into the boat and got ourselves situated with life jackets, then the driver took off. We jetted across the water, leaving a white wake behind us. It was faster than I’d thought to get to the marina and we were soon passing the Ericksville Lighthouse and the Boathouse. My heart quickened at the familiar sights, places that I never thought I’d see again when Nurse Fluge had locked us in the cellar.
The driver pulled up to a dock at the marina and tied up, then reached his hand out to help me up. I grasped it and stepped onto the dock. I stood there for a moment while he helped Desi disembark, my legs shaking. He led us down the dock and up the ramp to the marina office, where the police were waiting for us. An ambulance was parked in the parking lot and Delilah was sitting in the back of it with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. We’d made it back alive.
“Jill!” Adam shouted as he raced over to me and drew me to him. “I was so worried.”
I buried my head in his chest, happy to have his arms wrapping me in safety. I tipped my head up.
“Where are the kids?”
“I dropped them off with my parents. My mom only let me leave after I promised that I’d call her as soon as I could confirm you and Desi were safe.” He looked around the parking lot. “There’s Desi with Tomàs.” He dialed his mother and told her we were both safe.
The police had given Adam and me a moment alone while they were talking with Desi, but now they beckoned for me to come over to them. Desi and I told them all about Nurse Fluge’s schemes and what had happened to the three of us.
The lead police officer raised her eyebrows. “You’re saying that this nurse caught you in the basement when you went looking for Mrs. Brown? And she locked you in the cellar?”
We nodded.
She talked into her radio and turned back to us. “They’re looking for her and they’ll search the basement too. I can’t believe you escaped through a tunnel into the gulch.” She shook her head. “I’ve heard rumors that there were tunnels in this area, but I never believed they were true.”
“Me neither,” said Desi. “Delilah had been telling us about the history of the building, and Jill thought to look behind a storage rack in the basement for a hidden door.”
I nodded. “We were lucky the tunnel hadn’t caved in over all of these years.” I thought about the rack. I wouldn’t have thought to check back there if I hadn’t seen the armoire in Nancy’s pantry. This wasn’t the first time something she’d done had ended up saving me.
“You certainly were lucky.” She snapped her notepad shut. “Ok, you’re free to go now. We’ll notify you if we need any other information.” She walked away, and Desi and I just stood there for a moment.
“What now?” I asked. “I wonder how the Christmas party went?”
“Seriously, you’re worried about that now?” Desi asked. “There are more important things to worry about, like dinner. I’m starving.”
“Maybe we can convince Tomàs and Adam to take us to the diner before we go home.”
“Sounds good to me.”
22
“How are there this many presents?” Adam’s arms were full of brightly wrapped Christmas gifts that were bound for his family’s Christmas Eve get together.
“Well, we bought one gift for each adult and two for each kid. There are five adults and seven kids. You do the math.” I picked up a present that had fallen on the ground. “I guess we don’t need this one.”
I placed Tania’s present on the kitchen counter to be dealt with later.
“Still, that seems like a lot,” he grumbled.
“Stop complaining, you didn’t have to shop for them.”
“True.” He smiled at me as he walked through the open front door.
While he was packing them into the car, I ran through my checklist again. Presents, veggie platter, fudge. We were good to go.
When we arrived at Beth and Lincoln’s house, Beth met us on the front walkway.
I got out of the car and she ran over to hug me.
“I can’t believe what happened to you and Desi. And Delilah too.”
“Me neither.” Although it had only happened the day before yesterday, the whole event was like a dream in my mind, one that I wasn’t quite sure had actually happened. The scratches on my leg burned in the cold air, reminding me that it hadn’t been a dream.
“Well, I’m glad you’re both ok.” She looked at Adam, who was fumbling with an armload of presents. “Do you need help with those?”
“No, I’m fine. Help Jill with the kids.” He walked up to the house and nudged the door open that Beth had left slightly ajar.
She freed Mikey from his car seat and I lifted Ella out of hers. Together, we entered the house.
It hadn’t been that long since I’d been there for the last family dinner, but Beth had been doing some serious decorating in honor of Christmas Eve. The tree had been there before, but the decorations on the hearth were new, as were the neat line of ceramic houses on the windowsill. The aroma of turkey filled the air, mixing with the scent of the fresh pine tree. This was what Christmas smelled like.
I looked at Adam, who’d stacked the gifts under the tree. “Can we get a real tree next year?”
He shrugged. “Sure, honey. I thought you didn’t want to deal with having one.”
“I don’t, but I want the kids to grow up knowing what they smell like.”
He gave me an odd look that turned into a smile.
“Auntie Jill!” Maya said as she came upstairs wearing a fancy green velvet party dress. “Did you bring me a present?”
“Maya,” Beth admonished. “You shouldn’t ask things like that.”
“Oh, all right.” She moved closer to me and whispered, “But did you?”
“Yes,” I whispered back as I tried not to laugh. The girls were starting to grow on me as I got used to their high energy levels.
“Mommy went back home,” Maya said, suddenly serious.
I hugged her. “I know, honey. I bet she misses you lots and lots.”
“She does.” Maya’s voice held the certainty that only a child could feel. “But we’re going to celebrate Christmas together when we get back home too.”
“That’s great.” I smiled at her. “Two Christmases will be awesome.”
“Yeah!” Maya’s lips formed a wide grin and then she ran downstairs to join her sisters and Mikey.
“We’re here,” Desi sang out as the door opened.
“And we brought gifts,” Tomàs said in a less cheerful tone. “Way too many of them.”
Adam shot me a “told you so” look and said, “Let me help you with those. I’ve become quite an expert in being a present sherpa myself.” He grabbed the top half of Tomàs’s stack and moved them to the tree.
Anthony left his parents and ran off downstairs. Lina was asleep in her carrier, so Desi set her next to the couch where we could keep an eye on her and went back outside. A few minutes later, she came back inside, but she wasn’t alone.
I stood from the couch to greet the new guest at the front door. “Delilah!” I hugged her. “I didn’t know you were coming tonight, but I’m so glad that you’re here.” Desi and I guided her over to the couch and then Desi went into the kitchen to find her mom.
“Desi invited me. I hope it’s ok?” She looked around the room as she settled down into the couch pillows.
“It’s more than ok. We’re happy to have you, but I’m warning you, the kids can be quite loud.”
“That’s ok. It’s been years since I had the chance to see little kids at Christmas.”
“How are you feeling today? We saw you with the EMTs when we first got off of the boat, but then they whisked you away.”
“Oh, that.” She waved it off. “They took me to the hospital to get checked out, but released me later that night. There wasn’t anything wron
g with me that a good night’s rest couldn’t fix.” She rotated her ankle to prove her point.
Through the open doorway between the kitchen and the dining room, I heard Beth greet Desi like she hadn’t seen her in years. A few minutes later, Desi joined Delilah and me in the living room.
“You’ll be happy to know that the police caught Nurse Fluge last night when she tried to buy a plane ticket to Brazil,” she said.
“They did?” I asked. “When did you find out?”
“They called Tomàs and told him right before we came over here.”
“That’s a relief,” Delilah said. “That woman was pure evil. Those poor men.”
“What do you think will happen to Chas Pearson?” I asked Desi.
“Tomàs didn’t say. I assume that now that they have her in custody, they’ll start gathering evidence of her scams. We don’t even know if Chas Pearson was aware of the financial losses his father experienced prior to death. For all we know, he could be completely innocent.”
“I’d be willing to bet he’s not,” I said. “He may not have helped Nurse Fluge dupe his father out of money, but he must have known it happened—he just didn’t care. Getting control of his father’s finances was more important to him than righting a wrong.”
Delilah nodded. “I don’t think he’s innocent either. From what you’ve told me about him, he would have known if money was missing.”
“Well, if that’s true, I’m sure the police will figure it out.” Desi picked up Lina, who’d begun to fuss.
Will and Adam came back in the room and Delilah fawned over them, telling them what handsome young men they’d grown up to be. After dinner, Beth put a spread of desserts out on the dining room table that would make a sweets shop owner swoon.
“You know there’s not that many of us, right, Mom?” Adam asked.
Beth glanced at Will’s girls, who were in the corner of the living room, happily munching away at the fudge I’d brought and the Christmas cookies and cakes that she’d made. “I wanted it to be special for the girls. It must be hard for them to not have their mother here this year.”
“I know, Mom.” Adam snaked his arm around her shoulders and squeezed her to him for a moment. “Oh! I think I hear Ella out there.” He walked off to the living room to check on her.
Will was engrossed in a conversation with Delilah and Desi, so I took the opportunity to ask Beth about Tania.
“Do you know what’s going on with Tania? I knew she wasn’t going to be here, but you didn’t say anything about whether that’s permanent or not.”
Beth sighed. “I don’t want to get too into it, but I think they’re separating, at least for the time being.”
“That’s rough, especially at Christmas.”
“It is.” She looked at me. “This hasn’t been the easiest of holiday seasons. When Tomàs called to tell me that you and Desi had been kidnapped, but were ok, it really threw me for a loop. I can’t believe I almost lost the two of you.” She wrapped her arms around me. “You’re like a daughter to me. You know that, right?”
I smiled. “I feel the same way.”
“Let’s go out to the living room to join everyone, ok?”
Everyone was finishing up their desserts and I gathered the dirty plates to stick in the dishwasher.
“Presents time!” Beth announced.
The kids cheered and rushed to the Christmas tree.
“Which of you is going to be the Christmas elf?” Lincoln asked with his camera in hand.
“Me!” Mikey jumped up and wildly waved his hand in the air.
Lincoln laughed. “I think you’re going to need an assistant elf who can read names.
“I’ll do it,” Bella said shyly. She stood from the floor, the skirt of her sparkly blue party dress floating in the air as she rose.
They handed out presents to everyone and it was a mad dash to open them. When everything was open and the floor was littered with wrapping paper, Beth clapped her hands. “In honor of having so many members of our family here this year to share in the holidays, I’d like us all to go around and say what we’re grateful for this year.”
The kids groaned.
“Do we have to?” whined Claire, who was bouncing on her knees. Her grandmother fixed her eyes on her and she sat back down.
We went around the room, each of us saying what we were grateful for. When it reached Beth, she said, “I’m grateful to have my family here for Christmas and that they’re all safe.” She laughed. “And that none of them are currently murder suspects.”
Desi’s jaw dropped. “You knew?”
Beth raised an eyebrow. “Of course I knew. You don’t think someone would mention to me that Will was suspected of murder?”
I guess I hadn’t needed to be worried about keeping it from her because she’d known all along.
“Mom, why didn’t you say anything to me?” Will asked.
She shrugged. “I figured you didn’t want to tell me for some reason.” She smiled at him. “And from now on, I’m keeping out of your personal life.”
“Now that is something to be grateful for,” Lincoln said. Beth slugged him on the arm, but he just pulled her close and kissed the top of her head.
We all know you only want us to be happy, Mom,” Will said.
“I do,” she said.
Will came over and hugged her. “Thanks, Mom.”
“Enough of this mushy stuff,” Desi said. “I want to see Dad try on his new tie.”
Lincoln owned enough ties to wear a different one every day of the year and I think he was the rare father who actually appreciated getting one as a gift. He turned away from us and carefully knotted the tie around his neck then turned back around.
“What do you all think?”
We all started laughing when Rudolph’s nose flashed on and off, highlighting the reindeer’s goofy grin.
“It’s perfect,” I said.
And it was—well, perfectly the Andrews family. Sometimes kooky, sometimes serious, but always protective of their own. After a night with them, I couldn’t wait to see what Christmas Day with my family would bring.
23
I picked my parents up at the airport early on Christmas morning. Becky wouldn’t be in until afternoon as she was driving up from her home in Portland. Mikey had wanted to open his Christmas stocking as soon as he woke up, but I made him promise to wait for us to get back from the airport. Adam had taken the stocking and hidden it to help him keep his promise.
“How was the flight?” I asked my parents as I helped them pull their bags off of the conveyor belt at baggage claim. Hundreds of people were crammed into the small area and I had to fight to stay upright as people dragged multiple suitcases tied together behind them.
“Good,” my mom said. “Not too much turbulence.” She hitched up the long strap of her purse over her shoulder and selected a small bag on rollers to carry.
“Beats driving across the mountain pass at this time of year.” My father grabbed a large olive green suitcase and set it on the ground. “I remember one time when we got stuck on I-90 for three hours waiting for them to do avalanche control.” He shuddered. “Never again.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re here. The kids have been looking forward to seeing you.” I extended the handle on the remaining bag and motioned to a door at the far end of Sea–Tac airport. “This place is a madhouse today. I had to park pretty far away because I couldn’t find anything closer.”
We walked out to the car, making idle chitchat as we towed their roller suitcases behind us. When we were seated in the car, my mother asked from the backseat, “So what’s this I hear about you and Desi getting stuck in a tunnel or something?”
I cringed. After how upset they’d been when I’d been in danger at Halloween, I’d hoped she wouldn’t find about what had happened at Ericksville Heights. I peeked at her in the rearview mirror before I merged onto the freeway. “How did you find out?”
“Beth and I do talk, you know. B
ut I shouldn’t have to find something like that out from someone else.” She narrowed her eyes at me.
“We worry about you,” my father said. “It seems like you keep getting into these scrapes.”
“Eh, it’s no big deal. Desi and I got stuck in a basement and had to get out via a tunnel. We’re fine now.” I peeked at her again. Had she bought it? How much had Beth told her?
Judging by the frown on her face, she hadn’t found my explanation convincing. Maybe it was time to change the subject.
“It’s nice that Becky is able to come up for Christmas this year,” I said. “I missed seeing her last year.”
“She’s had a rough year,” Mom said. “I think she really needs her family around her right now. She seemed pretty down last time we were in Portland to see her.”
Becky hadn’t confided in me much and all I knew was that her husband had left her a few months ago. Now that the holidays were almost over and work was easing up, I hoped I’d be able to spend some quality time with her. We’d been close as kids, but our lives now were very different and I sometimes had a difficult time relating to her.
“How are the kids doing?” Mom asked. “Is Mikey still enjoying preschool? Did Ella get any more teeth? You’ve been so busy lately that I haven’t had a chance to catch up on everything.”
“Sorry. Things have been crazy at work with all of the Christmas parties.” That and almost getting killed.
I told them all about what Mikey was up to in school and the cute things Ella had done that week. Soon, we were pulling up to our driveway in Ericksville. Adam had turned the Christmas lights back on and the house looked cheery and warm, with smoke puffing out of the chimney.
We went inside and I got my parents situated in our guest bedroom, then we let Mikey open his Christmas stocking. Santa had left stockings for Adam, Ella, and me, as well as my parents because he must have known they’d be there for Christmas. Santa knows everything, after all.
We were all sitting down to lunch when there was a knock at the door. Goldie barked and trotted over to the door. I checked to see who it was, then pushed Goldie out of the way so I could open it fully. My sister Becky stood on the steps. I smiled and pulled her in for a hug. “It’s good to see you sis.”