Marta Perry - Hide in Plain Sight

Not much. She shared his concern.

“And there have been a rash of thefts. People breaking into isolated farmhouses. You know what this area is like—folks have lived here for generations, never giving a thought that Great-aunt Eva’s dough box might be worth a small fortune to a crooked dealer.”

She almost wished she hadn’t asked, but it was better to face the facts, no matter how unpleasant.

“What are we going to do?” It was good to feel that she had an ally. “Rachel and Grams want me to stay and open the inn. They don’t seem to understand that I have a position I can’t walk away from.”

He patted her hand. “If you make it clear you can’t, they’d have to face facts.”

“I’ve tried. Without success.”

“You’ll have to keep trying.” He rose. “Give my best to your grandmother, and tell Rachel that I’ll see her later.” He gave her a quick hug. “I know you’ll do the right thing. You always do.”

“Can I carry that for you, Andrea?”

Andrea stopped reluctantly. She’d noticed Cal down the block when she’d left Snyder’s General Store to walk back to the house, but she hadn’t been eager to talk to him. Just because he was right about her grand-mother’s finances didn’t mean she had to like it.

He caught up with her, and she handed over the shopping bag, taking in the dress shirt and neat gray slacks he wore. She blinked, exaggerating her surprise.

“You didn’t know I’d clean up this well, did you?” He smiled, apparently ready to forgive and forget.

“Have a hot date?”

“No, just out for supper at the Dutch Inn. It’s chicken and dumpling night. What about you?”

She gestured toward the bag he now carried. “Grams needed a few things from the store, and I didn’t want to drive to New Holland to the supermarket.”

“So you went to Snyder’s, where you get a hot serving of gossip with every bag of groceries.”

She couldn’t stop a smile. “Some things never change.”

“Did you get the latest popular opinion on who I am and why I’m here?”

She was surprised that he spoke so easily about it. “Opinion is divided. You’re either a famous author hiding from a deranged fan or a bank robber sitting on his loot until it cools off. That one came from Etta Snyder’s ten-year-old son. Her teenage daughter considers you a tragic figure recovering from a terrible loss.”

She felt a sudden qualm. What if any of them proved true?

But he didn’t seem affected. “I’ll let you guess which it is.” They walked past the Village Soda Shop and Longstreet’s Antiques, their steps matching. “Did you get the whole scoop from Bendick? I saw him come in.”

She stiffened. Her family troubles weren’t his affair. Didn’t he understand that?

His eyebrows lifted. “Okay. Right. I’m interfering.”

She fought with herself for a moment. Interfering. Aggravating. But he already knew, so who was she kidding by refusing to answer him?

“Uncle Nick confirmed what you said.” She bit off the words, resenting the fact that he’d known what she should have.

“Sorry. I wish I’d been wrong.” His voice had just the right degree of sympathy.

Some of her resentment ebbed away. This wasn’t his fault. “I can’t grasp it. When I was small, I thought my grandfather was the wisest, kindest man in the world.”

Her opinion about the kindness had changed when Grandfather let them go without a word, writing them out of his life except for the college funds he’d provided. Surely he could have mended the quarrel with Mom if he’d really cared about them. But even so, she’d never doubted his business acumen.

“You can still have good memories of him.” His tone warmed.

She could only nod, her throat choking up. She would like to remember Grandfather as she’d once seen him, without thinking about how he’d let her and her sisters down. Or how he’d apparently failed Grams.

“Why didn’t my grandmother tell me? I would have helped.”

She could feel his gaze on her face. “Maybe it doesn’t matter why. Now that you know, you’ll do the right thing.”

He sounded like an echo of Uncle Nick, except that they didn’t agree about what that right thing was.

“Uncle Nick told me he’s been worried about Grams. He said there have been problems with antique thieves. That prowler you mentioned—” She came to a stop, frowning at him.

He stopped, too, leaning an elbow on top of the stone wall that surrounded the church across the street from Grams’s house. “Could be connected, I suppose.”

“Nick said they hit isolated farmhouses. Grams’s place is right on the edge of the village.”

“It’s also big, concealed by plenty of trees and out-buildings, and for the most part has had only one elderly woman in residence. There aren’t any houses to the east, and in the back, the farms are too far away for troublemakers to be spotted.” His frown deepened as he looked across the road toward the house.

She shivered a little at the thought. He was right—the mansion was isolated in spite of the fact that it fronted on the main road. Crossings Road, where Rachel had been injured, snaked along one side, leading toward distant farms and making it easy for someone to approach from the back. “Surely no one would try to break into the house.”

“They wouldn’t have to. The outbuildings are crammed to the roof with stuff. Furniture, mostly. And that’s not including the attics of the house itself. No one knows what’s there.”

“You mean there’s no inventory?”

His lips twisted in a wry smile. “I’m sure you’d have a tidy inventory, with the approximate value listed for every item.”

“Of course I would.” Her voice was tart. He didn’t need to act as if efficiency were a sin. “For insurance purposes, if nothing else.”

“That’s how your mind works, but not your grandmother’s.”

“I suppose not.” Her grandmother was an odd mixture—clever about people, but naive about business, which had been her husband’s prerogative. “You’re trying to give me nightmares, aren’t you?”

He gave a rueful smile and shoved away from the wall. “Sorry about that.” He touched her hand in a brief gesture of sympathy. Warmth shimmered across her skin and was gone. “I figured I shouldn’t be the only one.”

Andrea was still wrestling with the difficulties when she went up to her room that evening, hoping to concentrate on some work. A half-dozen times she’d nearly confronted Grams about the financial situation, but each time a look at her grandmother stopped her. Grams looked so tired. So old.

She’d never thought of her grandmother as needing someone to take care of her. Now she’d have to, even though she suspected Grams wouldn’t take kindly to any suggestion that she couldn’t manage her own affairs.

Well, she’d let the topic ride until tomorrow, at least. Maybe by then she’d have come up with some tactful way of approaching the subject and Grams would, she hoped, have had a decent night’s sleep.

She opened her laptop. In an instant she was completely engrossed in work.

Finally the numbers began to blur on the screen. She got up, stretching, and walked to the window. Full dark had settled in, and her attention had been so focused on the computer screen that she hadn’t even noticed. Maybe she’d been trying to shut out the human problems that she found so much more difficult to deal with than figures.

Her eyes gradually grew accustomed to the darkness. She could make out the pond now, the forsythia bushes along it, and the pale line that was the flagstone path.

She stiffened. There—by the toolshed. That wasn’t a bush—it was a person. She froze, watching the faint gleam of a shielded light cross the door of the shed.