“You know your mother. She’s good at multitasking.”
“Halloween is still a week away. She ought to be up to her neck in those plans and not have any time left over to fuss at me.” Struck by a singularly unpleasant thought, Liss lost her grip on her fork. It fell to the tabletop with a dull thump. “Please tell me she isn’t planning a party that involves costumes and masks.”
Dan grinned. “You used to love those costumed birthday parties when you were a kid.”
“My mother loved them. I endured them.”
His eyebrows lifted at that. “I’d never have guessed, but you can relax. You dodged that bullet. No costumes.”
“But there is going to be a party?”
“I’m afraid so. She’s invited about fifty people to help you celebrate. They’ll be waiting at our house when you get home from work tomorrow.”
“Hiding behind the furniture ready to leap out and yell, ‘Surprise! ’ ”
“That’s the plan.”
“Oh, goodie.”
It could be worse, she supposed. Thanks to Dan’s warning, she could freshen up and change into nicer clothes before she left the Emporium. But fifty people? The house would be full to bursting and she couldn’t imagine how her mother expected to sneak everyone in, given that Liss could see both the front and side of their house from her store windows.
“I’m not going to think about this right now.” This time, she was the one who welcomed the sight of their waiter. “Tonight is for us.”
“Works for me,” Dan said as their salads were set in front of them. “We deserve a nice romantic evening.”
They had just finished dessert when Dan’s father materialized beside their table. He clapped one hand on his son’s shoulder and sent a smile winging Liss’s way. “How’s my favorite daughter-in-law?”
“I’m just fine, but you’d better not let June hear you call me that.”
“When it’s her birthday, she’ll be my favorite,” Joe said.
Liss knew that June, who was married to Dan’s older brother Sam, would see the humor in Joe’s logic. The whole Ruskin family was remarkably easygoing. She envied them their ability to take things in stride, especially on those occasions when she had to deal with her mother.
“You look cheerful, Dad,” Dan said. “Business must be good.”
“Business is excellent.” Joe beamed at them. “The Thanksgiving Special is a big hit.”
For the first few years after The Spruces opened, profits had been slim to none, but slowly word had spread, customers had come, and the hotel had acquired a reputation for excellence that drew even more guests. Anything to do with tourism was still a chancy proposition, but Joe seemed to have found a formula that worked.
“Lots of bookings?” Dan asked.
“More than we hoped for when Tricia dreamed up this promotion. We should be able to fill all those rooms that are usually empty during the stretch between leaf-peeper season and ski season. Even though Thanksgiving is still a bit more than a month away, reservations have us almost at capacity already.”
Liss was pleased but not surprised to hear that Tricia Lynd had taken to her current job like a duck to water. By the time Joe hired that young woman to replace Liss’s aunt, Margaret MacCrimmon Boyd, as events coordinator, Tricia had worked just about every other job in the hotel. She’d started out as an intern eight years earlier, a sort of Jill-of-all-trades, and had paid her dues with long hours waiting tables in the dining room, tending bar, running the gift shop, working at the front desk, serving as concierge, and even taking a turn in the housekeeping department.
“Are you okay for staff?” Dan asked. “I won’t be able to spare many hours to help out.” While it might be off-season for hotels in the area, November was a busy time of year for Dan’s custom woodworking business and for Liss’s shop, Moosetookalook Scottish Emporium.
“I’m all set,” Joe assured him. “In fact, it’s uncanny how smoothly everything is going.” He chuckled. “The only flies in the ointment are the Pills.” He smiled at Liss’s puzzled look. “Remember that crackpot who was in here a month or so ago, name of Hadley Spinner? The leading light of the New Age Pilgrims?”
Light dawned. “The Pilgrims are the Pills?”
“You got it. Spinner showed up again the other day to inform me that, in his narrow-minded opinion, the Thanksgiving Special is an affront to family values. Can you believe that? He called the promotion an abomination and wanted me to cancel it.”
“What on earth is he upset about?” Liss asked. “Don’t tell me that a group named after the Pilgrims is against Thanksgiving.”
“Oh, he has nothing against the holiday. He’s all for it, in fact. What has him hot under the collar is that our promotion is designed to attract a niche clientele—childless couples who don’t want to celebrate Thanksgiving with their families.”
“Sounds like a great idea to me.”
Liss winced when she realized Joe might take her words the wrong way. Ever since their marriage, she and Dan had spent every Thanksgiving with the Ruskins. When she spoke, she had been thinking of long-ago Thanksgiving dinners, meals presided over by Violet MacCrimmon. As a child. Liss had loved the idea of having both sets of grandparents come to the house to share a meal, but the reality of those gatherings had never quite lived up to her expectations. Conversations had always been stilted and everyone had looked uncomfortable throughout. They’d left just as soon as they could without giving offense.
“It is a great idea,” Joe said.
“So what exactly is Spinner’s beef?” Dan asked.
“He’s got it into his head that most of the guests taking advantage of the Thanksgiving Special are unmarried or same-sex couples. According to him, I’m encouraging immorality.”
Liss just stared at him. There was so much wrong with Spinner’s complaint that she hardly knew where to begin.
“How did he come up with that notion?” Dan asked. “It’s not like you’re even allowed to ask for people’s marital status or sexual orientation when they book a room.”
“I wouldn’t share any information I did have, but not much stays private these days. I’m guessing Spinner or one of his followers has been reading the comments on the hotel’s Facebook page.”
“I wouldn’t have thought Spinner and his group held with computers,” Liss said, “but that’s neither here nor there. What business is it of his how other people conduct their lives?”
“He’s a bigot and a blowhard who only sees his own point of view.” Joe shrugged. “And I suspect he’s still ticked off at me for refusing to put the lavender ladies on my payroll. Oh, well. With any luck, now that he’s delivered his sermon on the subject of my business practices, he’ll move on to annoying someone else. You two enjoy the rest of your evening. Liss, you don’t look a day over thirty.”
Chuckling at her look of chagrin, he went on his way. Liss lost no time dismissing the odious Hadley Spinner from her thoughts. Even better, implementing Dan’s plan for part two of her birthday celebration, a plan which commenced as soon as they got home from dinner, succeeded in distracting her from worrying about the gathering her mother had organized. She managed to forget, until she awoke the next morning, just how much she hated surprise parties.
* * *
Liss took a deep breath as she climbed the steps to her front porch and prepared to open the door. She’d been a fool to think her mother would be too busy with the Halloween festival to remember her birthday. Belatedly, she realized that she should have made a preemptive strike and suggested that she and Dan and her parents go out to eat, or maybe take in a movie in honor of the occasion. Parties, surprise or otherwise, might be fun for kids, but even when she was younger, Liss had felt overwhelmed by all the fuss. Now that she was pushing forty, she liked being the center of attention even less. She preferred to avoid situations that threw her into the limelight.
This time there was no help for it. She had to go in and she had to pretend to be surpr
ised and pleased by what awaited her. Grin and bear it, she told herself.
She opened the door.
Relatives, friends, and acquaintances seemed to explode out of every nook and cranny. The noise of their shouted “Surprise!” was deafening. Liss hadn’t really believed Dan when he’d said her mother had invited fifty guests, but she couldn’t deny the proof when it was right in front of her eyes. People were packed wall-to-wall in the living and dining rooms and in the kitchen, too.
Dan’s brother and sister and their families were among the revelers. Liss’s parents, Violet and Mac, and Aunt Margaret were in the thick of things, handing out punch and cookies. As soon as she spotted Liss, Margaret set her tray aside to greet her niece.
“Happy birthday, my dear.”
She gave Liss an enthusiastic hug, briefly exposing her to the perfume of the day. Liss didn’t try to identify the light scent. Her aunt loved to experiment with little-known fragrances. In slim black slacks and a pale mauve tunic, her light gray hair newly styled in a sleek bob, she radiated vivaciousness. Retirement suited her. She looked younger and more energetic every time Liss saw her.
“Ed sends his love,” Margaret added. Her grandson was away at college.
“I’ll bet he was heartbroken to have to miss the party.”
Margaret frowned, catching the sarcasm. “You know your mother means well, Liss.”
“I know.” But that didn’t make dealing with her any easier.
Retrieving the abandoned serving tray, Margaret began to circulate once more. Her departure signaled the start of a barrage of well wishes accompanied by hugs, kisses, and witty quips along the lines of, “How does it feel to join the ranks of the old and decrepit?”
Sherri Campbell, one of Liss’s closest friends, gave her husband a thump on the arm for that one. Although he had the solid, square build of a linebacker and she was even more petite than Liss’s mother, he winced and rubbed the spot. Sherri was tougher than she looked. She had to be. She was Moosetookalook’s chief of police.
“Liss and I are the same age,” she reminded Pete. “You’re the one getting on in years.”
“Not compared to most of these folks.”
When Liss took another look around, she realized he was right. Although there were younger faces, and even a few children, her mother had invited all the business owners who had shops facing the town square. With the exception of Sandy and Zara, Liss’s next-door neighbors, who had once been her fellow performers in a professional Scottish dance company, most of them were at least ten years older than she was and many were past retirement age, even if they did still go to work every day.
Dolores Mayfield, Moosetookalook’s formidable librarian, was the next to elbow her way through the crowd to offer her best wishes. She grabbed Liss’s elbow with bony fingers and had to raise her voice to be heard above the racket of dozens of people all yakking at the same time.
“I’d have brought you a present,” she bellowed, “but Vi said not to.”
“Good grief, no,” Liss said. “Just having you here is enough. Thank you so much for coming.”
Dolores adjusted the glasses perched on her long, thin nose. “Roger would have been here, but he’s feeling poorly.”
Translation: Roger “Moose” Mayfield was too drunk to walk the few blocks from their house to hers.
“What a shame,” Liss murmured.
She chatted with Dolores for a few more minutes before the librarian excused herself and left the party to go home and make supper for her spouse. By that time, Liss’s jaw ached from the effort of holding a smile in place. She brightened when she spotted Dan plowing a trench through the assembled company. He couldn’t rescue her, but once he was standing beside her, she felt less vulnerable.
He handed her the cup of punch he’d brought with him. He’d thoughtfully spiked it. Although the courage liquor provided might be false, at this point she welcomed anything that could bolster the belief that she’d survive the evening.
Without warning, her mother popped up next to them. Violet MacCrimmon had to stand on tiptoe to kiss her daughter’s cheek. A slender five-foot-four, she kept herself in good shape and looked far younger than she was. Her hair was the same color as her daughter’s, but where Liss’s was natural, Vi’s needed assistance to keep the gray from showing.
“Happy birthday, darling. Were you surprised?”
“That’s putting it mildly. However did you manage to sneak all these people in here? I never saw a thing from the window at the Emporium.”
Violet MacCrimmon’s pale blue eyes sparkled behind her stylish glasses. “It took some planning,” she admitted. “I knew it wouldn’t be easy to fool you, so I told everyone to park on High Street or in the lot at the grocery store and cut across the Farleys’ yard to your back door.”
Note to self for tomorrow, Liss thought. Apologize to the Farleys for all the people who trampled their lawn.
The couple in question were on the far side of the living room, deep in conversation with Audrey Greenwood, the tall, blond vet who took care of their poodle, Margaret’s Scottish terriers, and Liss’s two Maine Coon cats. At the thought of her pets, Liss’s breath caught. She grasped her mother’s forearm.
“Mom, where are the cats?” Glenora, the smaller and younger of the two, was coal black and could easily make herself invisible, most often by perching atop the highest piece of furniture in the room, but Lumpkin, large and yellow, was hard to miss.
“Not to worry. I locked them in your guest room, the one Mac soundproofed back when we lived here.”
That certainly explained why she didn’t hear Lumpkin howling in protest. Her father had undertaken that particular DIY project after the neighbors they’d had back then complained about the racket he made when he practiced playing his bagpipes in the house.
“Isn’t it wonderful how many friends you have?” Vi’s enthusiastic gesture encompassed the entire gathering. “Everyone I invited came except your father-in-law. He had to work.”
“Wonderful,” Liss echoed, straining to keep her lips curved upward. Some people had all the luck!
It was lovely that they’d turned up in her honor, but she couldn’t help but wish that her mother hadn’t asked them to come in the first place. This gathering felt more like a home invasion than a celebration. She took another swallow of the spiked punch and reminded herself that Violet hadn’t deliberately set out to make her only child uncomfortable. She never did.
“Where did Dad get to?” she asked.
Liss felt certain that Dan hadn’t been the only one who’d tried to talk Vi out of this party. Liss’s father was well aware that his daughter preferred small gatherings to large ones. Then again, Mac MacCrimmon had a long history of folding in the face of his wife’s determination. Violet had always been high-handed and she never listened to anyone else’s advice. Liss wondered, not for the first time, whose idea it had been to move back to Maine. So far, neither of her parents had given her a good reason for their decision.
“He’s in the kitchen refilling the snack trays.” Mini quiches, pigs in blankets, and crackers with a dab of herbed cheese on top had joined several varieties of cookies making the rounds.
As bodies ebbed and flowed around them, quite a few pausing long enough to congratulate Liss on being another year older, Vi kept up a cheerful patter. She was in her element. It wasn’t until there was a break in the litany of good wishes that Liss became aware that her mother had stopped speaking. Had she asked a question?
“Sorry. I was distracted.”
Vi’s censorious look instantly put her on the defensive.
“Give me a break, Mom. I was busy being gracious and charming to your guests.”
Her mother’s brows drew together, a sure warning of storm clouds ahead.
Be the grown-up, Liss told herself. That jibe was uncalled for.
Ever since her parents had returned to Maine, she had been struggling to learn the fine art of getting along with the one person wh
o had always been able to push her buttons. The middle of a party was no time to start an argument with her mother. Taking care to keep her voice pleasant, she tried again.
“Did you just ask me a question?”
“No. I said that it’s too bad Joe couldn’t be here, but I suppose he has his hands full with all the trouble at the hotel.”
“What trouble?” Joe had been in high spirits the previous evening. Liss couldn’t imagine how that could have changed in less than twenty-four hours.
“That man Spinner,” said Vi. “He’s been posting on social media, trying to get tourists to boycott The Spruces, claiming that the hotel discriminates against families.”
The sudden queasy feeling in the pit of Liss’s stomach had nothing to do with the drink in her hand or the press of people around them. “That’s ridiculous.”
Angry on Joe’s behalf, Liss spoke more loudly than she’d intended. Heads turned their way. The owner of Patsy’s Coffee House, one of the major way stations for the Moosetookalook grapevine, had been working her way toward the door to the hall. Reversing course, she called out, “Spinner’s wasting his time. No one will believe anything that nutcase says.”
“I’m surprised they have a computer out at Pilgrim Farm,” Stu Burroughs said from behind Patsy, who was blocking his path to the exit. “They’re so backward that they don’t even use lightweight modern snowshoes.”
“No sale, huh?” Liss’s face relaxed into a smile as she tried to imagine Spinner and a couple of his lavender ladies wandering through Stu’s Ski Shop, the store right next door to Moosetookalook Scottish Emporium.
“I can live with that.” Stu’s face, what Liss could see of it around a bristly gray beard, went from pink to red in a heartbeat, casting doubt on his claim.
At five-foot-two, Stu was even shorter than Liss’s mother, but where her build was petite, his was chunky. That he wore a bright orange shirt only emphasized his resemblance to a pumpkin.
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