by Unknown
“What’ll it be?” Penny asked, perching beside Emma’s table.
“Hamburger, no fries and a dinner salad.”
“That’s it?”
“Decaf coffee,” Emma added. “Cream and sugar.”
“Coming right up sweetie.”
Penny poured Emma’s coffee before whirling around to pour refills at a half dozen other tables. Emma pulled a novel from her purse and opened it, ignoring the burst of laughter from Sam’s table, which wasn’t the only conversation she could hear in the crowded café.
“Know if there’s been a decision on the old Mansi place yet?” Emma turned slightly to see Mayor Crane and the banker, Darrel Masters, sitting three tables away. She turned and lowered her head to stare at her novel again.
“Nope, not yet,” another replied. “Seems the Mansi girl is holding out. Wants a tearoom.”
Male laughter floated to Emma.
“That’ll be a cold day in hades. The town needs the house and the cemetery, and they’re willing to pay for it.”
Emma noticed that Sam was unaware of the conversation, engrossed in his own.
“She’ll have to sell; otherwise the house is going to fall down one of these days,” another voice said. “Then we could get it for a song. I heard talk of some interest in time-shares or a condo complex. It would bring money into town.” Several voices agreed, but the mayor held out. “We need parking. Forget about time-shares.”
Emma peeked out of the corner of her eye at the mayor and the banker.
“A lot of people are interested in that land for various reasons,” the banker said. “Lully wouldn’t hear of selling, but maybe her sister will be smarter—”
“Shush,” someone said. “Emma’s sitting three tables away.”
Emma buried her attention in the book and forced the voices out of her mind. Was this why Sam wanted to sell the place? Did he have some interest in a time-share or a condo venture? Anger rose inside her. How could he consider such a thing? How dare he! Parking lot my foot.
“Here you go,” Penny said, setting the hamburger and salad on the table in front of Emma.
She concentrated on eating, forcing Sam and her resentment out of her mind. Sam and his buddies got up within a few minutes. Emma refused to look up from her meal, though her appetite had waned.
Time-share property. How dare he!
“Emma.”
She didn’t want to talk to him. Not now. “Sam,” she said, refusing to look up.
“Headed home?”
She picked up her coffee cup and drank. “Mmm-hmm.”
He was leaning on the table but she refused to look at him. “Had a busy day at the bookstore?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“You’re not going to talk to me?”
“I’m eating.”
“Okay.” His knuckles rapped lightly on the table. “Pout then.”
She did look up at that. “I don’t pout.” She had every reason to pout—he had lied to her. Parking lot. Right. And she’d believed him.
He leaned close. She could see the extraordinary hue of his sienna brown eyes. “Yes,” he said softly, almost in a whisper, “you pout. But on you, it’s … appealing.”
When she would have sputtered, he laughed and walked away, glancing back at her before opening the door and disappearing into the darkness.
Penny walked over to refill her cup. “You two got it bad for each other, haven’t you?”
“Don’t be silly.” Emma rearranged her fork and spoon. “Sam Gold is a jerk.”
“You’re the only single lady in town that gives him a hard time.” Grinning, Penny topped off the liquid and turned to serve another customer.
The temperature had dropped even more when Emma started walking toward home, but the weather was definitely not affecting the house temperature. The stove was going full force, and the downstairs was hot as an oven when Emma stepped inside the foyer. She left the front door open to let in fresh air and cool down the living room. Gismo trotted in from the kitchen, panting.
“Sorry, Gismo. One of these days I’ll get the hang of this thing.”
She patted the dog’s head and tossed her coat across the back of the couch. She let him out to do his business. When he scratched on the door, she let the little dog in and fed him. She freshened his water before returning to the living room and the long evening ahead of her. Deciding that continuing to read her book was about as entertaining as anything else available, Emma left the front door ajar and curled up on the couch. Licking his whiskers, Gismo came to join her.
As she idly stroked the dog’s head, her attention was drawn to the picture that had hung on the far wall ever since she could remember. The familiar print of Jesus cradling the lost sheep. Hurt swept through her as she studied the picture. It was a feeling she recognized, a feeling she’d lived with most of her young life.
The town may be called Serenity, but it had hardly lived up to its name as far as she was concerned. She’d never felt serene here. The picture only highlighted that. She felt like that lost sheep.
Lost.
And there was no one to come after her.
Or to protect her.
Chapter Nine
Yawning, Emma dragged toward the kitchen Friday morning, half awake. Nightmares had wakened her twice. Once she got up and shook out the sheets and blankets to make sure no spiders found their way into her bed; then she totally remade the bed at three o’clock in the morning. And at five thirty.
Her slippers flapped against the cold floor as she pushed through the swinging door. She mechanically spooned coffee into the filter basket, then lifted the stainless-steel percolator and turned on the water faucet.
Oink.
Hmmm? A sound slowly began to penetrate her murky brain.
Oink.
Oink. Oink.
Not believing what she heard, Emma turned slowly while still holding the pot under the stream of cold water. Her eyes widened. Two gigantic sows were poking their heads out of the pantry.
Oink, oink. Snort.
Emma’s jaw dropped. She shut her eyes, and then quickly opened them again. She was still asleep—the nightmares continued. The biggest sow—eighteen hundred pounds if she weighed an ounce—peered up at her, beady eyes shining above a long snout.
Oink.
Dropping the coffeepot, Emma left the water running and fled the kitchen straight out the back door, the tail of her housecoat whipping in the wind. She dashed through the snow in her house slippers, yelling and flapping her arms, whirling occasionally to point at the house before she sprinted on. She ran down the lane and crossed the street, screaming. Heads turned. Eyes widened. Early morning errand runners gave the wild-looking woman clear berth.
“That crazy Emma Mansi,” they muttered to one another. Bursting into the sheriff’s office, she breathlessly pointed at Sam and yelled, “Pig!”
Sam and Ken had both been scanning faxes while they drank their first cups of coffee. As one, the men turned to stare at her.
Holding the stitch in her side, Emma, round-eyed, repeated, “Pig!”
For a moment Sam glared at her. Color crept up his neck, and he fiddled with a pencil. He then calmly set his cup aside, refusing to meet her accusing gaze.
Ken stared at her coolly. “Pretty early in the morning for name-calling—”
“No! Pig!” She whirled, pointing to Ken. “You—pig!”
“Hey, come on.” Sam shot her a dirty look. “Don’t drag him into this.”
She was hopping on one leg now, soggy slipper pulled up to her knee. “You don’t understand. Pigs—in my kitchen!”
Ken caught on first. “There’re pigs in your kitchen?”
Emma nodded, trying to catch her breath. Her feet were two blocks of ice, her slippers encased in snow. “In my kitchen!”
Both men scrambled for coats. The three ran out of the office and piled into the cruiser and drove the short distance to the Mansi house with siren blaring. When they arrived, the back do
or was standing wide open.
Sam drew his firearm and Ken covered him. “Go back to the car and keep warm,” Sam told Emma, “while we see what’s going on.
“Be careful, Sam—they’re huge! They could hurt you badly.” She didn’t know what a pig could do to a person, but anything that big must be dangerous.
He ducked inside, Ken backing him up. The men were gone a good five minutes before they returned to the cruiser.
“How did they get in there?” Emma asked, her eyes searching Sam’s for information.
Sam glanced at Ken, then back at her. “There’s nothing in there, Emma.”
She gaped at him. “There’s nothing—you’re nuts!” She stormed out of the car, shoving past the two men, and into the kitchen, eyes searching for the pigs. The room was empty. The half-filled coffeepot lay askew in the sink. Coffee grounds spilled across the counter. Someone had turned off the faucet.
She searched the room frantically while Sam and Ken waited at the back door, arms crossed. “They were here a few minutes ago—when I came into the kitchen they were standing right there—” she pointed—“and right there. Look!”
One old sow had left a faint wet trail with her snout.
Sam and Ken exchanged looks before Sam holstered his 9mm Glock. “Well, they’re not here now.”
“Maybe they’ve gone to Brisco’s for breakfast,” Ken joked in what Emma knew was an effort to lighten the situation.
She stared at the spot where the sow had stood looking up at her. The animal hadn’t been fifteen feet away. She was certain of it. She hadn’t been dreaming.
“Emma?”
Her gaze lifted to Sam.
“Are you okay?”
Running a hand through her hair, she realized her state of dress. Housecoat, slippers, no makeup, a virtual bed-head freak. Ken studied her appearance, and she had the feeling he was trying to decide how she had once so captivated his brother.
“I’m fine.” Sighing, she cinched the belt on her housecoat tighter. “Sorry I bothered you.” She lamely surveyed the empty kitchen. Pigs had been there earlier. Two of them.
Sows.
Two of them.
Big ones.
Sam came near and tipped her chin. “Try to get some rest today. You’ve had a lot on your plate lately.”
“Thanks. But there were two sows in this kitchen fifteen minutes ago.”
He smiled. “Get some rest. I’ll talk to you later.” He trailed Ken out the back door.
Two days later disaster struck a third time. Sam stopped by the house without calling first.
When Emma saw his face she knew something was wrong. “What is it?”
“We’ve got a problem,” he said, tossing his coat over a chair. “Got any coffee?”
“Sure—what’s going on?”
Emma followed him into the kitchen, where she poured him a cup of coffee. She sat across the table from him.
“What is it?” she repeated.
“Ned did some investigating after he got the one offer on the house.”
“Investigating?”
“Before a house can be sold there has to be a title search. With an old property like this that can take some time, so Ned thought he’d get a jump on the process. Didn’t want any potential buyers to get cold feet in case a title search took a while.”
“And?” Emma prompted.
“It seems the title isn’t clear.”
She blinked. “What do you mean?”
“Well, the abstract wasn’t brought up to date, way back when your great-grandparents bought the place.”
“And that means?” She was getting a bad feeling.
“That you don’t really own the house.”
“I … don’t … own the … house?” Emma repeated.
“Nor did Lully.”
“Nor does Emma.” She was numb.
“Nor did your folks … or your grandparents.”
“I don’t understand.”
“In effect, there’s no record that your great-grandparents ever bought this place, so they couldn’t will it to your grandparents, who couldn’t—”
“I get the picture,” she said grimly, thrusting both hands into her hair. “I get it but I don’t believe it.”
“Believe it. This property can be deemed abandoned property, and the city can take it over.”
“And do whatever they want with it.”
“I’m afraid so.”
She closed her eyes. “There’s got to be a mistake. I remember my parents talking about my great-grandparents buying this property. The city wanted them to buy the lot across the street, because of the cemetery, but my great-grandfather didn’t like that piece of property because there were no trees. I know it was purchased legally.”
His hand closed over hers on the table. “But we’ve got to prove it.”
“We? This would fit right in with what you want, except there’d be no money from a sale.”
“That was uncalled for.”
He was taking a drink of his coffee when she looked up. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I’m saying half the time anymore.”
“Lully meant for you to have this house; whether I agree with what you want to do with it is beside the point.”
“What can we do?”
“The only thing to do is find a bill of sale or a deed proving your great-grandfather paid for this property.”
“That’s all?” Right now that sounded practically the same as climbing Mount Everest. Backwards.
Or getting Ray to tell her Lully’s password.
“That’s all.”
Emma put a checkmark beside the date on the counter calendar: November 26. Thanksgiving eve. Halloween had come and gone without incident. She had fully prepared herself to endure a night of childish pranks, but the evening turned out to be relatively quiet. She bought candy for trick-or-treaters, but none had shown up. Around nine thirty she had turned out the porch light and gone to bed. Now it was November, and not only did she and Sam still have differing opinions on what to do with the house, she didn’t own the house. She’d searched every nook and cranny upstairs, and neither the deed nor the bill of sale could be found.
Snow fell outside the bookstore window, softly backlit by the streetlight. Last-minute shoppers ducked into Willis’s Grocery for cranberries and whipped topping. Sighing, Emma returned to her work. She clipped the day’s receipts together, dated the packet, and dropped it into a metal cash box, then closed and locked it. She could hear Elizabeth shoving boxes around in the workroom, doing some straightening before the holiday. Here Emma was in a bookstore about to call it a day, and she didn’t want to go home. Everyone else would be putting a turkey in the oven, rolling out piecrust, making those rich fruit, cream cheese, and nut salads that people ate only at holiday meals when everyone was allowed to splurge a little.
When she felt a plop of something wet hit her head, Emma looked up. “Elizabeth?”
“Yeah?”
“The roof is leaking.”
Elizabeth stuck her head around the door frame, peering up at the ceiling. “Get a bucket,” she said wearily. “If this keeps up all night, we’ll have a flood in here by morning. I’ll get the plastic sheets.”
Emma got a pail from the bathroom and set it beneath the slow drip, then mopped water off the floor.
“Old roof should have been replaced years ago, but the landlord is so stingy he keeps patching it. Says it’s got years of use left in it … yeah, and I’m twenty-five again,” Elizabeth snorted, starting to spread heavy plastic sheets over books and bookshelves. “Years my foot. It’s gonna cave in on me one of these days.”
Emma helped with the plastic before finishing the nightly closing chores. She snapped out the lights over displays and checked the lock on the back door, then carried Elizabeth’s coat to her and shrugged on her own. They wrapped warm scarves around their necks before braving the cold night.
“Got plans for tomorrow?” Elizabeth asked, pulling on a pair o
f wool-lined leather gloves.
“Nothing. What about you?”
Elizabeth picked up the cash box. “Nothing. Warm a TV dinner, watch the Broncos play.”
Sounded like Emma’s usual holiday. Only she warmed a can of clam chowder, ate oyster crackers, and drank strawberry soda. She had the same menu every Thanksgiving. It made the day special.
“Why don’t you come to the house?” Emma invited. “After all, it might be the last opportunity I have to invite someone there. I don’t roast a turkey, and I have no idea how to make a pie, but I do open a mean can of clam chowder.” Emma paused. “You’re welcome to join me. We can watch the game together.”
Elizabeth’s brows lifted. “You like football?”
“Love it!”
The two women laughed companionably and stepped outside into the falling snow.
“Isn’t this lovely?” Elizabeth said, peering up into the sky.
Emma breathed deeply of the crisp air. Their words left puffs of steam in the air. The snow tires on passing vehicles beat a hollow sound against the pavement. Colorful candlelight twinkled from storefront windows, and icicle-shaped lights trimmed awnings.
“People decorate for Christmas too early,” Emma said. “It takes the fun out of Thanksgiving when Christmas comes on the tail of Halloween.”
Elizabeth had locked the store door when a sheriff’s department cruiser drove by slowly. Sam was behind the wheel. He tipped his hat but kept on driving. Emma’s gaze followed the car until it turned the corner and disappeared. What did Sam do on Thanksgiving? Spend the day with Ken and their mother?
“What can I bring?”
Emma forced her thoughts back to the moment at hand. “Nothing. Really. I meant it when I said my Thanksgiving dinner is clam chowder and crackers with strawberry soda.”
“Strawberry soda?”
“Yep.” Emma grinned. “I adore strawberry soda, but I only drink it on Thanksgiving. It makes the day special. It’s something Lully and I started doing after our father left.”
She and Lully had made a production of the peculiar menu. Lully liked sardines and cauliflower. Ever since that one Thanksgiving they’d given their traditional meals a try, they’d eaten their favorite things for the holiday celebration meal. The two of them would go to the store on Thanksgiving eve and shove the rattling cart down the aisles, gathering their bounty. Sardines, crackers, and cauliflower for Lully; clam chowder and oyster crackers for Emma, and two big bottles of the best strawberry soda they could afford. Then came the pièce de résistance—a package of Mallomar cookies. They ate the entire package on the way home. After the first such “celebration,” Emma had thrown up beside the porch steps twice, so she took it easier the next year.
