Free Too Rich and Too Dead by Cynthia Baxter Page A

she stepped outside, Mallory was struck by the cool freshness of the mountain air. She inhaled deeply, meanwhile noticing how pretty the manicured, red brick town looked at night, with the streetlights and the glowing store windows casting a magical glow.
    She'd only taken a few steps when she spotted Gordon striding toward the opera house, his hands stuck deep in his pants pockets.
    “Good timing,” Mallory commented as he drew near. “The show should be over any minute now.”
    “Did I miss anything?” he asked, grinning. “A heckler, an unusual question… anything that might reveal my disloyalty?”
    Mallory laughed. “As far as I can tell the evening went exactly as planned. Although I have to admit that I didn't hang around for the Q and A.”
    “Shucks,” Gordon said, snapping his fingers. “If I'd known you were sneaking out, too, I'd have gladly traded watching the game for an after-dinner drink with you.” Teasingly, he added, “And you know what a huge sports fan I am.”
    “I'm afraid I wouldn't have been very good company,” Mallory replied. “I'm still on East Coast time, which means to me it feels two hours later. In about three minutes, my eyes are going to close—and stay that way for the next several hours.”
    “I could at least walk you back to your hotel.”
    “Thanks, but I'll be fine.”
    “Ouch!” Gordon cried. “Rejected again!”
    Laughing, Mallory insisted, “Don't take it personally. You just caught me at the end of an extremely long day.”
    “Aspen's a pretty small place,” Gordon assured her. “You may not have seen the last of me yet. And you can consider that a threat.”
    “I think it's a threat I can live with,” she replied, still laughing. “But for now, I've got a date with a pillow.”
    After they said good night, she turned and strode along the brick walkway, leaving the Wheeler Opera House behind. She was surprised at how much she'd enjoyed herself this evening. It had been fun reconnecting with Carly Meeting her husband and her friend Gordon, too. She was looking forward to Thursday's interview more than ever.
    But at the moment all she wanted to do was get back to her hotel room, climb into bed, and let her long day segue into a relaxing and restful night.
    Still, when she reached the Hotel Jerome, before stepping inside she couldn't resist glancing up at the dark blue sky. Studying the stars was something she liked to do when she traveled. Even though she didn't know the first thing about astronomy, she knew the configurations up above were different from the ones at home. Somehow, reminding herself of that simple fact always drove home the fact that she was someplace new, far away from all that was familiar.
    Tonight, she noticed that the stars twinklingabove looked exceptionally peaceful. The sight of them was reassuring, as if nothing could possibly go wrong in the world tonight.
    Certainly not in Aspen, where history had merged gracefully with the present, designer duds could be purchased at an altitude of eight thousand feet, and visitors could have anything they wanted—even the chance to be young again.
    Early the next morning, as Mallory surveyed the breakfast she'd had delivered to her room, she marveled over the fact that although she'd been in Aspen for less than sixteen hours, elk sausage already struck her as commonplace.
    The ease with which she'd come to consider wild game one of the Four Basic Food Groups was causing her to realize how much at home she already felt here. She wondered if what made this press trip different from the others she'd been on was that this was the first time she'd come to a destination in which she actually knew someone.
    But she wouldn't be seeing Carly again for several days, and as she took her first sip of coffee, she decided that right after breakfast she would get going on what she had come to Aspen to do: explore it with the eager eyes of a tourist.
    With that thought in mind, she grabbed the remote and