Free The Busy Woman's Guide to Murder by Mary Jane Maffini Page A

sign that said BRENNAN. The long driveway curved and twisted a quarter of a mile to a clearing before a small weathered cedar house, with a few new boards showing pale against the silvery walls, and a red metal roof giving it visual impact. The drive had also been well plowed and the long series of steps leading up to the door had been shoveled clean. A battered white van sported a graphic of a smiling red squirrel wielding a broom. OFFICE CLEANING SPECIALISTS was lettered below it. An even more dilapidated pickup with an attached plow was parked off to the side. You’d have to be able to dig yourself out to live out here, for sure.
    As I knocked and stood shivering, I glanced around at the outbuildings—a lopsided garage and an even smaller version of the house, which I took to be a workshop, as there was power running to it. The ribbon of smoke from the chimney told us that someone was home. Not that they answered our repeated knocking. I was too cold to enjoy the scent of wood smoke.
    Jack stood around as if it were a summer day, but I was stamping my feet to keep my toes from getting numb and asking out loud if those socks had been a rip-off. I was about to give up hope when the door finally opened. Haley stared blearily out at us. She was wearing the oversize men’s sweatshirt that said OFFICE CLEANING SPECIALISTS. Haley’s striped pajama bottoms rippled over her bare feet.
    She actually looked better half-asleep and without her makeup, even though her face was a bit swollen, her eyes unfocused, and her hair tangled like the squirrel might have nested in it.
    Now what? I had just wanted to know that she was alive. She obviously had not been killed, so I didn’t have much of a purpose there. Jack had even less.
    She squinted at me nearsightedly. “Charlotte?”
    “Haley,” I said, allowing a huge smile to escape. I can’t even describe the wave of relief that washed over me. I reached over and squeezed her rough hands.
    She stared at me like I had lost my mind, which was beginning to feel like a possibility. “What are you doing here?”
    Jack also gazed at me quizzically, as if wondering the same thing. I said, “For some reason, I just got worried.”
    “Worried?”
    “Yes. I wanted to make sure you were all right.”
    “Why wouldn’t I be all right?” Haley said—at least I thought that was what she said as her teeth had begun to chatter. The door was open and it was damned cold out.
    “It was just a silly notion, that’s all,” I said. “Sorry to disturb you.”
    She stifled a yawn. “Well, I am awake now. You came all the way out here. You may as well have some coffee.”
    “Coffee’s good,” Jack said.
    My own teeth were chattering by then. That meant yes.
    “You’re freezing,” Haley said. “Come in. I don’t know what I was thinking. We don’t get many visitors here and never in the morning so I just didn’t—”
    Jack said, “That’s great,” and walked through the door. I followed. The door led straight into the living room. The cozy fire in the woodstove was the focus of the room. A saggy sofa was positioned close enough to warm whoever was lucky enough to sit on it. The room was paneled in pine and the floors were made of wide pine boards. All that wood made the cabin feel even cozier. I liked the homeyness of it.
    “Nice fire,” Jack said, pointing to the woodstove and heading straight for it. I scurried after him and got as close as I could. Through the glass front of the woodstove we could see the red-hot logs glowing inside; a cheerful sight.
    “Have a seat,” Haley said. Jack sprawled on the sofa and I settled in a battered armchair with a crazy patchwork afghan covering the worn upholstery.
    Haley busied herself making coffee and soon that scent added to the wood smoke. When the coffee came, it smelled good. It might have been half-strength and it could have passed as last night’s dishwater, but, unlike last night’s dishwater, it was hot and it was there. Haley