A Christmas Kiss Read Online Free PDF Page B

horizon. No one to hold in his arms and dance when the fiddle plays fast and sweet." She leaned forward. "No one to hold and start a family."
    "Laurette!" Joey's face was darkened with what could either be embarrassment or anger. "This is not the time or place. This is business."
    Laurette was totally unimpressed. She held up her hands and turned to Cori. "Business! Business!
    That's all I hear from my little brother. Everything in his life is business, and all the while he grows old and shriveled and his juices will dry before he produces a single son to carry on the Tio name!" She stood up.
    "Well, tend to your business, Joey. I'm going to decorate the front porch." She walked out of the room and let the swinging door to the kitchen flutter to and fro in her wake.
    Joey looked down at his hands for a long moment before he stood and cleared the dishes from the table. At the sink he ran hot water and squeezed detergent over their bowls.

    Cori had nothing to watch except him, even though the movement of his muscles beneath his cotton shirt made her slightly uncomfortable. When it was clear he could think of no way to get around the embarrassment his sister had caused, Cori spoke. "You're lucky to have a sister who loves you so much."
    He turned the water off and turned around. "I know." His smile was sheepish and proud. "We're the only two children. My mother was sick for a long time and died when I was twelve. Laurette felt she had to step in and take over, even though by then I was mostly grown."
    "I have a sister." Cori thought of Lane, the cool professional writer who lived in New York and worked as a producer on a network news show. Lane knew Cori was alive, and knew that in order for Cori to stay alive they could never be sisters again. That was how the WP program worked. Now, though, Cori felt as if it might be worth her life for one conversation with someone who loved her.
    Joey nodded. He knew all about Cori's family. Her sister, married with two daughters. Cori's parents were dead. Her father was killed in a traffic accident and her mother had died of a heart attack shortly after the DeCarlo murders. It was one of the reasons Cori had agreed to go into WP. That and the fact that her fiance, Kit Wells, had agreed to go into the program with her. She had not thought she would be so very much alone.
    "I've had enough of this," Cori said. Her decision was made.
    Without asking, Joey knew what she meant. He'd seen witnesses fall out of the program many times before. The loneliness, the isolation from family, sometimes it was just more than a person could bear.
    And a lot of times those people ended up dead.
    "Cori, stick it out until Ben DeCarlo is retried."
    She felt a flush of anger. She had nothing left of her life, while Joey Tio had a sister who worried about him, a niece, probably a hundred aunts and uncles and cousins. And all he was really worried about was having his witness available for the retrial.
    "I can't," she said, starting to rise. "Please take me back to my car." She checked her watch. She'd missed her appointment with Captain Blake, but she could still demand to see the investigation file on Kit.
    "Cori, you're not thinking about the danger."
    Her smile was sad. "No, I suppose I'm not. I'm thinking about the fact that I don't care about the danger. Don't you see, Mr. Tio, I just can't do it another single day. Kit is alive." She reached into her handbag and withdrew the chocolate kisses. She lined them up on the table in a neat row. "He left these for me. Three in my locked studio. Three in my locked car.''
    "Chocolate candy?" Joey picked them up and knew they could have been bought in any gas station or convenience store in the world.
    "It was a signal between Kit and me. He would leave three kisses for me whenever he came by the shop and I wasn't in, or sometimes on the pillow in the morning___" Her voice broke and she turned away from him, her hands on her face to hold back the emotion that almost