Shop and Let Die (26 page)

I tried to smile, as if I
weren’t panicked. “He was here.”

She glanced at the girls,
and asked softly, “Here?”

“
Yes.” I nodded. “At the
cake walk.” I lowered my voice. “He recognized me. Is that odd? I
mean, I looked different as Serena, didn’t I?”

She narrowed her eyes, as
if comparing the today me with the the Serena me. “Yes. You looked
very different. Did he say what brought him?”

“
Fun.”

Deb took out her little
notebook and a stubby pencil. “What else did he say?”

“
Just that he had a book
he wanted to show me at the mall.”

She looked up, alarmed,
when I mentioned mall. “I’m going to let Connery know. He wanted me
to keep him informed. Can you handle this alone for a little while
longer?”

“
I can. But can you make
sure the girls get someplace safe. He may have seen
them.”

She stiffened and looked
around, as if she thought she might see him lurking in a corner.
“I’ll ask Nancy to watch them. I’ll tell her I saw an Uncle Creepy.
She won’t let them wander.”

“
Thanks.” I started the
music as soon as she led the girls away. There were quite a few
more cakes to give away. At the beginning of the day that had
seemed like a great thing. More money spent on the games, more
money to spend on school needs. But now it seemed they’d never all
be won and gone.

Norma came by just as I
awarded the biggest cake to a very tiny young boy. She signaled her
son, Elliot, to help the boy carry his winnings safely to his
parents. “Deb said to ask you if you need a break.”

“
Five minutes?” I really
needed to visit the restroom and spend a few minutes without having
to listen to that infernal carny music.

“
Take fifteen, Elliot will
help me when he gets back.”

“
Thanks.”

I slipped away, wondering
if I should try to find Nancy and the girls, just to make sure they
were okay.

As I turned the corner of
the building, heading to the row of porta-potties set up discreetly
in back of the school, I found myself face-to-face with
Hammond.

“
Having fun?” I asked, though I didn’t like the
way he was looking at me.

He had a very strange
expression. Half little boy who’d had his balloon popped, and half
angry man who wanted revenge. “Not as much as you,
mommy
.”

I held up my hands as if
in surrender. “You caught me. I have kids, and I’m not a blonde
bombshell. I’m sorry. I won’t bother you again. I’ll turn myself
into the dating service and they’ll ban me. I promise.”

He pressed, “If you’re
really sorry, you’ll let me show you that book I was talking
about.”

I backed away. Or tried
to, but there was a brick wall behind me. “I can’t leave. I have to
be back at the Cake Walk booth in five minutes.”

“
They’ll manage.” He took
my arm and started to push me toward the parking lot.

I put all my weight into
resisting him. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”

He stopped pushing me and
backed off. “You’re all the same, you know?”

“
All?”

“
You mommies.” He said the
word with contempt. “You say you won’t go, but all I have to do is
threaten your family, and suddenly, you do.”

He took a pocketknife out
and flicked it open to reveal a wickedly curved blade. “Your little
girl is very pretty. Do you want her to stay that way?”

I knew I didn’t want to
get in the car with him. But the fair was swarming with people.
Even if he didn’t hurt Anna, he could hurt someone else.

Deb had to be looking for
me soon. I hoped. I decided to stall. Maybe someone would notice us
and he would get scared off. “When did you know I was lying about
not having kids?”

“
When you talked about
stumbling over toys. I knew you were a bad mother, right then.” He
smiled. “And bad mothers need to be punished.”

“
Mothers are bad because
they date?” What else is new? Mothers are not allowed to have
lives.

“
They don’t just date.
They find new men. They pick the new men over their children. They
let the men turn them into bad mothers.”

Why is it always the
mother’s fault when someone turns bad? Do father’s get a pass
because they just didn’t bother most of the time? “I’m not a bad
mother. I always put my kids first. Always.”

I didn’t say it with as
much conviction as I should have, because I wasn’t really sure it
was true. I still remembered the semi-nervous breakdown I’d had not
that long ago. My reluctance to homeschool Ryan.

He waved the knife at me.
“You’re lying.”

I shrugged, and tried to
disarm him by agreeing. “I am, I guess. I try to do the right
thing, but it isn’t always easy.”

He snarled. “You could
start by not shopping. Shopping is selfish.”

“
People need food. Kids
need clothes.” I shouldn’t have argued, but it just popped
out.

He started to get angry,
but when a mom with a crying toddler rounded the corner and hurried
past us, he shifted his expression to that of a non-threatening
friend. He said mildly, “You weren’t shopping for kids’ books with
me. You were looking at novels.”

I held my breath until the
mom and her toddler were safely past us and out to the parking lot.
“I didn’t think you’d be interested in kids’ books. You don’t have
kids. Do you?” The thought was appalling.

He frowned. “I don’t. You
do. You should only shop for them.”

“
Okay. I will.”

He seemed taken aback by
my agreement, but then he scowled. “Too late. Too late for
you.”

I was beginning to think
he was right, when I saw a handsome, chiseled jawline and a pair of
green eyes staring at me from the porta potty area. I just needed
to stall a bit longer.

“
Wouldn’t my kids be
better off with a reformed mom?” I reasoned with him. “I promise.
No more dating. No more shopping.” The first was easy, the second
more problematic, since it was currently how I earned money. I made
a vow to apply to the Admissions office on Monday, if I escaped
death today.

He grabbed my arm and
started pushing me again. I felt myself slipping, his knife so very
close to my throat, and then he launched backward, and lay
sprawled, groaning on the ground.

James Connery stood over
him, Deb straddled him, handcuffing him before his momentary shock
had passed.

“
Good job, Molly,” Connery
said.

“
No problem,” I said,
sliding bonelessly down the wall, feeling each brick nudge my spine
on the way.

CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE

Life in the Massage Chair

“
They caught him!” Anna announced when I picked
her up from school on Wednesday.

“
They did?” I feigned
surprise. I was strictly forbidden to speak of my involvement. Even
Seth was only allowed to know the barest of details. Or so said the
FBI. I was relieved that the news was finally out,
though.

Sarah nodded. “He
confessed, too, so my mom says he’ll go to jail and never get
out.”

“
I told you your mom would
get him,” I said to Sarah.

Sarah nodded. “She has the
best job in the world. I want to do her job when I grow
up.”

“
She’ll be pleased to hear
that,” I lied, knowing that Deb wanted Sarah to be a doctor or a
lawyer. Anything but a cop.

“
Are we going to pick Ryan
up today?” Sarah asked, not able to hide the longing in her brown
eyes.

“
We are. And then we’re
all going to take a ride to the university. I need to drop off an
application for a job.”

Anna gasped. “You’re going
to get a real job?”

“
I hope so,” I said,
afraid to jinx it by counting my chickens before they were even
eggs.

“
But who will take us fun
places on mini-Wednesday? And how will I get to my piano lessons?”
Her little brow furrowed with a weighty litany of
worries.

“
We’ll work it out, don’t
worry, munchkin,” I comforted her, wondering if we would work it
all out. I knew, at least, we’d try.

My phone rang. Sue. I
picked up, intending to let her know I was done
shopping.

“
Molly. I have the massage
shop for you, at last!”

“
You do?” I decided I
could do one more shop, if it were a massage shop. I really,
really, needed it.

She sounded apologetic,
“It isn’t a fancy shop. A nationwide chain of gyms had a
“satisfaction guaranteed or your money back” chair massage policy.
But it is a massage.”

“
A massage is a massage,”
I said.

“
Great! She sounded
relieved that I was not going to quibble. “But I still owe you a
spa trip.”

“
I know. I know.” She
hesitated and then said quickly. “Can you do the massage shop
today? It’s kind of a rush.”

“
Of course.” What else was
there to say? I’d never get the spa shop, otherwise.

It turned out that I had a three month membership to the gym
because of a previous shop I’d done for their customer
service.

I looked around at the
gleaming equipment, the sweating, fit women, and I decided it was
as good a time as any to start a workout regimen. Dierdre would
approve. Norma would, too, come to think of it.

The girl at the desk took
my membership card. As required, she used my name, gleaned from the
card. “Oh, Ms. Harbison, have we disappointed you?”

“
No.”

“
But you haven’t visited
us in two months. If there’s anything we can do...” She seemed so
sincere, I gave her a bonus point.

“
I was on vacation, and
then I had a lot of work to catch up on.” It was the first thing I
thought of. Apparently, it was an understandable excuse. I hoped I
didn’t stand out. That wasn’t a good thing for a mystery
shopper.

“
Well, if there’s ever
anything more than we can do for you, you let us know.”

“
I will. I just wanted a
massage.”

“
Do you have an
appointment.” She asked, just as if she were reading from the
approved script.

I stuck to the script,
too. “No, do I need one?”

She answered promptly, “I
can make you one. When would you like your massage?” She even
managed not to seem annoyed. If I had her job, I’d have been
annoyed at me.

But I had a script to
stick to, and it was meant to maximize her annoyance. “Right
now.”

“
I’m so sorry,” She looked
distraught. “I have one in 30 minutes. And while you’re waiting, I
can show you some of newest machines—they might appeal to you more
than the traditional machines.”

“
Sounds good.” The
customer service here was certainly phenomenal. Not just on paper,
but in person.

She showed me a machine
that practically worked a person out while they slept, and one that
did your stretching for you. It looked like a medieval rack, but it
was gentler, at least at the setting I tried.

The chair massage was
heaven. They even used a warm towel on my neck for five minutes
after the massage. Heaven. And, even better,
they
paid
me
to have it.

I thought about my
application for the Admissions office position. If I got the job,
I’d make sure to budget for one massage a month, in addition to the
maid service.

Until I got the new job,
though, I’d keep being a secret shopper. After all, Sue owed me a
spa massage, and she wouldn’t pay up if I stopped shopping for her
before she scheduled me for one.

Don’t stop reading. Kelly has some bonus content
coming up for you.

About the Author

About the Author

Kelly McClymer fell in love with Cinderella,
Sleeping Beauty, and Snow White as a child. Her most prized
possession is her copy of The Complete Tales of the Brothers Grimm.
These are the stories which gripped our ancestors as they huddled
around the fire at night, which taught countless children to
persevere through hardship and succeed against the odds. Her
favorite fairytale remains "The Six Swans" -- where a young sister
must not speak a word for six years in order to save her brothers
from their stepmother's evil spell.

Where to Find Kelly McClymer:

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