Free McKettricks of Texas: Garrett by Linda Lael Miller

exterminator’s giant tent still billowed around it like a big, putty-colored blob.
    Watching the thing undulate from within, Julie didn’t immediately notice Suzanne Hillbrand, of Hillbrand Real Estate. Her Mercedes was parked nearby.
    Wearing high heels, a pencil skirt and very big hair, Suzanne was examining the spiffy new For Sale sign out by the curb.
    The shock of seeing that sign struck Julie like a slap across the face. She cranked the Caddie into Park and got out, slamming the door hard behind her.
    â€œWell,” Suzanne trilled, beaming, “ hello, Julie Remington!”
    Suzanne’s outgoing personality wasn’t an affectation designed to sell properties; she’d always been that way. Even in kindergarten. The big hair only went back as far as high school, though.
    â€œHello, Suzanne,” Julie responded, not smiling. She indicated the sign with a motion of one hand. “Are you sure this isn’t a mistake?”
    â€œWhy, of course I’m sure, darlin’!” Suzanne replied, with exhausting ebullience, shading her perfectly made-up eyes with one perfectly manicured hand. “It isn’t as if there’s a real estate boom on here in Blue River, after all. I’ve got this cottage and the old Arnette farm on the books, and that’s it.”
    The flash of adrenaline-fueled annoyance that had propelled Julie from behind the wheel of her Cadillac dissipated in an instant. She bit down on her lower lip.
    â€œI take it Louise didn’t tell you she was putting the place on the market?” Suzanne asked quietly.
    â€œShe might have tried,” Julie admitted, picturing her very efficient and quite elderly landlady. “I’m not sure she has my cell number, and I keep forgetting to check my voice mail.”
    Suzanne’s smile came back full force. “We all know you and Libby and Paige came into some money a while back,” she said. “Things like that get around, of course. Well, here’s the perfect investment for you. Your very own cottage. Think how easy it would be. You wouldn’t even have to pack up and move!”
    In spite of herself, Julie smiled. She’d always liked Suzanne, and the woman’s enthusiasm was catching. Plus, she’d often dreamed of buying the cottage—back when she didn’t have the means, especially.
    â€œWhat’s the asking price?”
    Suzanne named a figure that would nearly wipe out Julie’s considerable nest egg.
    So much for enthusiasm.
    â€œNo way,” Julie said, backing up a step.
    Suzanne stayed happy. “Louise is firm on the price,” she said. “I told her she wouldn’t get that much, considering the state the market’s in right now, but she’s not about to budge. The place is paid for, and she doesn’t need the money. All that works in your favor, of course, because you’ll probably have all kinds of time before it actually sells—to find somewhere else to live, I mean.”
    All kinds of time to find somewhere else to live.
    Oh, right.
    There weren’t a lot of housing options in towns the size of Blue River.
    Let’s see. She could move in with Paige, who was in the process of renovating the small house they’d all grown up in, rent by the week at the seedy Amble On Inn on the edge of town, or make an offer on the Arnette farm, which was almost as much of an eyesore as the Wilkes’s junkyard.
    A fixer-upper, Suzanne would call it.
    In Julie’s opinion, the only hope of making that old dump look better was a bulldozer.
    For the time being, she’d have to stay on at the Silver Spur.
    Darn.
    Remembering the time, Julie checked her watch and turned to head back to her car. Calvin was in another mood, and she’d had to cajole him into getting out of bed, eating his breakfast, finding his backpack.
    By the time she’d dropped him off at Libby’s, so hecould ride to school with the twins, Julie had