Elise Hyatt - French Polished Murder

French Polished Murder — read online for free the complete book (whole text) full work

Below is the text of the book, divided by pages. System saving the place of the last page read, allows you to conveniently read the book "French Polished Murder" online for free, without having to search again every time where you left off. Put a bookmark, and you can go to the page where you finished reading at any time.

Light

Font size:

↓

↑

Georgia Tahoma Arial Verdana

Reset

Interval:

↓

↑

Bookmark:

Make

1234567...56

Table of Contents

Yours, Always

I sat at the table and opened the letter, pulling out the paper gingerly, so it wouldnt fall apart. It took me forever to manage to get the sheet open without tearing it.

The writing inside was more faded than it had been on the outside, just a sepia tracery on the yellow page. I had to turn the light on over the kitchen table to be able to read what it said.

Dear Jacinth, it said. I had hoped things would never come to this pass. Pass was underlined five times. But Im afraid my husband knows. Or at least, he has enough reason to suspect. Sometimes he looks at me in such a way that Im not sure I can stand it (far less survive it). I will meet you next week, at seven thirty, at the fruit stand. I will bring the baby. I am afraid the time has come to take you up on your offer and leave as soon as possible. Yours, always, Almeria.

I looked at it, and I confess I felt shocked. Victorian peopleand I was almost sure that the letter was at least a hundred years oldwerent supposed to have complications like a husband, while being someone elses always.

Berkley Prime Crime titles by Elise Hyatt

DIPPED, STRIPPED, AND DEAD
FRENCH POLISHED MURDER

Acknowledgments

Thank you to Doctor Tedd Roberts for assistance with pharmacology research.

Thank you to my editor, Ginjer Buchanan, for work beyond the call of duty on this one.

And as always, thank you to my family and my critique group for putting up with the insanity.

CHAPTER 1

The Fast and the Electrically Furious

We were thirty years oldand, in his case, thirty plus a little more than six monthswhen I came to the sad conclusion that I would have to murder my friend Benedict Colm.

This was as sad as it was necessary, but there was no escaping the fact as my son, Enochwhom I call E in an attempt to save him therapy bills as he gets oldercame speeding into the living room, atop Bens Christmas gift to him.

The gift was a toy electric motorcycle with a top speed of ten miles per hour, an acceleration that might seem impossible for a small boy to achieve in a home that was less than seventy feet in either direction, but that E managed, quite often.

I heard the horn blare a moment before E came riding in and, with the practice born of two weeks of terror, dove behind the sofa, while Ben, who stood square in the middle of the living room, his arms crossed on his chest, became an impromptu traffic circle.

E sped around him once, twice, then headed the other way, at increased velocity.

What do you mean youll have to kill me? Ben asked obtusely, looking at me. And what are you doing behind the sofa?

I crept out and up to stand on the sofa itself, having learned that a large piece of furniture was the best defense against the toddler version of the fast and the furious. Isnt it obvious? I said as, from the kitchen, there came a now-familiar series of sounds indicating that E was either rearranging the kitchen chairs to use as slalom cones or simply hitting them and dragging them along with sweet disregard for what it might do to chair legs and seats.

I dropped to sit on the sofa, shaking slightly, with what I figured was a form of post-traumatic stress disorder only not particularly post, since the stress had started just over two weeks ago when E had first unwrapped the fully charged electric motorcycle.

If you were likely to have children, I told Ben darkly, Id already have started payments on the realistic drum set with electronic amplification.

You are making no sense at all, Ben said, in that even tone that made me want to strangle him with my bare handseven though I was aware that would be one of the stupidest ways to kill him, as I would be immediately discovered. What can the possibility of my having children have to do with this? Besides, surely you remember I used to have a garage band. In the unlikely event I ever have a child, Id be happy if you gave him or her a drum set.

I think that was when I picked up the nearest object a collection of mystery short stories, leather bound, weighing in at about three pounds, a Christmas gift from my parentsand flung it at his head. I missed, of course, just as E came back through the door from the dining room, in time to ride over the book and break its spine.

Well, you shouldnt have thrown it at me, Ben said, looking baffled when I howled in outrage. He picked up the book and tried to smooth the broken spine.

Ben stood six-three in his stocking feet, with reddish-blond hair and the sort of face that is pleasant to look at rather than handsome. Because this was the weekend and also still part of his Christmas vacation, he was in what he considered his relaxed attire: dark green pants, with a broadcloth shirt, a cashmere pullover just a shade darker than his pants, and the sort of tie he considered playful and holiday-likein this case green, with a barely discernable red dot. I would bet that were I to lift his sweater I would find his tie had been precisely arranged to fall just over the top half of his belt.

I thought, not for the first time, that it was a very good thing that Ben was gay because any woman worth her salt, forced into a romantic relationship with someone so unflappable, exact, and unemotional-seeming would have done the sensible thing and put a steak knife through his heart.

Not your steak knives, he said, when I communicated this sentiment. Theyd never get past the rib cage. You never sharpen them. He set the abused book on my coffee table, which is thirdhand and made mostlyI thinkof spit and cardboard. The legs bowed under the weight of the book, which wasnt exactly a surprise, since they bowed under the weight of a coffee cup.

Ben and I had been best friends since middle school, when I was Lancelot, Galahad, and La Belle Dame sans Merci rolled into oneor actually, considering that my parents were the owners of the largest used/new mystery bookstore west of Kansas, Miss Marple, Poirot, Perry Mason, and Nero Wolfeforever running off in defense of those younger than I or those in peril of some sort. Or again, perhaps not, since the only small, young, or shy teenagers that those four were likely to rise in defense of would be those who had been unjustly accused of murder, while I ran to the defense of any smaller person who was being bullied or otherwise abused or ganged up on by people bigger than them.

At five foot fivewhich was to be my adult heightand weighing less than a hundred pounds, soaking wet and with lead in my pockets, Id been constitutionally incapable of sleeping at night if I thought that someone, somewhere, was getting away with committing blatant injustice against his fellow man or woman, or snively, pimply middle school kid.

Ben had first come to my rescue when Id taken on three bullieseach of whom were twice my weightat once and had insisted on helping me despite my outraged howls that I had them surrounded.

Wed been best friends ever since and cooperated in an unusual wayI charged in and got way over my head, and he jumped after me to rescue me and incidentally finish off whatever dragon Id been fighting. But now, I thought, staring at him, my eyes misting with tears, I would simply have to kill him.

Why on earth are you crying? Ben asked, as E came back in and whirled around him three more times, before speeding back out to the dining room, causing a hollow sound in his wake that I was afraid was the knocking down and breaking of the potted plant my boyfriends mother had given me for Christmas.

Next page

1234567...56

Light

Font size:

↓

↑

Georgia Tahoma Arial Verdana

Reset

Interval:

↓

↑

Bookmark:

Make

Similar books «French Polished Murder»

Look at similar books to French Polished Murder. We have selected literature similar in name and meaning in the hope of providing readers with more options to find new, interesting, not yet read works.

Elise Kova

Air Awakens

Cassandra Clare

The Runaway Queen

Nicci French

Waiting for Wednesday

Natasha Kogan

The Daring Females Guide to Ecstatic Living: 30 Dares for a More Gutsy and Fulfilling Life

Virginie Manuel

Restoring and Refinishing Furniture

Susan Gillard

Chocolate Pomegranate Glaze Murder

Pourny Christophe

The furniture bible

Manuel

Restoring and refinishing furniture: an illustrated guide to revitalizing your home

Christophe Pourny

The Furniture Bible Everything You Need to Know to Identify, Restore & Care for Furniture

Brene Brown

Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead

Sylvie Kurtz

Broken Wings (Timeswept)

Elise Hyatt

Dipped, Stripped, and Dead  

Discussion, reviews of the book French Polished Murder and just readers' own opinions. Leave your comments, write what you think about the work, its meaning or the main characters. Specify what exactly you liked and what you didn't like, and why you think so.