The truck was barely stopped before Jesse had the door open and her backpack in her hand.
Joe’s brows rose, but he didn’t try to slow her exit. “Call me later if you need anything, or if you want to cash in that dinner I.O.U.”
She looked at him, wanting to respond with something that sounded halfway normal, but her feelings were still scrambled, and the right words wouldn’t come. He made her feel like a teenager with her first crush, and she resented that with everything in her.
“Okay.” She already had one foot on the ground and was easing her way through the pickup’s door.
“Welcome home, Jesse.” His smile was soft, and his words were a caress.
“Thank you for picking me up.” She could have kicked herself for such an awkward response, especially when his grin widened into that amused look she seemed to bring out in him.
With both feet on the ground, Jesse closed the door behind her, hefted her backpack onto her shoulder and headed up the sidewalk toward the house that she and her mother had divided into two small apartments upstairs and two businesses downstairs. Checking her watch, Jesse reminded herself that she had lost two hours on the flight home and that it was now early evening in Oklahoma.
She had barely reached the porch when the door opened and her mother stood there.
“Don’t get upset,” Sophia said, looking worried.
She seemed to be doing her best to block the door, but in the shadows behind her mother, Jesse could make out the vague form of someone else standing in the background at the foot of the stairs.
“We have company!” Her mother put a lot of effort into sounding happy. But her enthusiasm fell short and seemed forced, which wasn’t a good sign, because Sophia Camden excelled at being happy.
Looking from the frown that fought against her mother’s smile to the shifting, shadowy figure behind her, Jesse had a sinking feeling that Joe Tyler had just become the least of her worries.
Purchase A MISTY MORNING MURDER on Amazon
Excerpt
DEADLY PURR-SUASION:
A LITTLE BIT OF MAGIC MYSTERY
Loulou Harrington
Editor’s Note: Loulou Harrington is the author of the Myrtle Grove Garden Club mysteries, whose third book Murder on a Silver Sea, was the inspiration for this short story. When Loulou isn’t writing or gardening in her little piece of Oklahoma heaven, she and her husband are indulging their love of adventure on a small sailboat in the waters of Washington’s Salish Sea, home of the San Juan Islands featured in her new mystery series.
Chapter Two
Wow! Rhee Abbott paused in her trek up the winding path from the boat dock to take in the white Queen Anne Victorian sitting in solitary splendor at the top of the hill. The new bed and breakfast was bigger than she had imagined. And even more remote, she realized, after plane and boat hopping from one small island off the coast of Washington State to another. She had arrived but still wasn’t sure exactly where “here” was.
“You need help with your bag?” The other passenger on the boat, a young man named Tom, had stopped and turned back to wait for her. He already pulled one of her bags behind him in addition to carrying his own tools.
Rhee adjusted the travel bag she’d slung over her shoulder. “No, thanks. You’re already doing more than enough.”
Gordon Pitts, captain of the runabout that had brought them from Orcas Island, looked back over his shoulder. “Is there a problem?” He also pulled two more of Rhee’s bags.
“No. No problem.” She waved a hand vaguely in the direction of the house they were trekking toward while thinking that four bags had seemed reasonable when she’d left home. Now they seemed excessive and more than a little embarrassing. “Just taking in the surroundings.”
To make her point, she looked toward the house again, and it was then that she noticed the cat. A white cat, to be exact, sitting at the edge of the gravel pathway a few yards in front of the inn. It stared back at her with a single-minded focus.
“Beautiful cat,” she said in surprise. “Does he live here?”
“We don’t have a cat,” Gordon said. “Better keep moving. That ceiling needs to be fixed today.” He turned and continued toward the house.
When Rhee looked again, the cat was gone.
Purchase HAPPY HOMICIDES 5: THE PURR-FECT CRIME on Amazon
Murder on a Silver Sea (Myrtle Grove Garden Club Mystery Book 3) Page 26