An Accidental Woman Read Online Free PDF

washed syrup off their hands and mouths, helped them back into their parkas and pulled on her own. Back outside again, she let them ride the lift with her up into the brand-new Blazer that her mother had insisted on buying her before the onset of winter. It was poppy red and had been adapted for her needs; once the three of them were inside, she patiently pointed to buttons and let the girls retract the equipment. Focusing solely on them, she made sure they were belted in, drove them to school, and gave them big hugs before sending them off.
    The instant they disappeared inside, she was on her cell phone calling John Kipling. Though born and raised in Lake Henry, John had spent most of his adulthood in exile. Given that he had left town at the age of fifteen—and that he was ten years older than Poppy—she had been too young to know him then. They had become friends only in the three years since his return. As of nearly six weeks ago, they were even related. On New Year’s Day, John had married Poppy’s sister Lily.
    But Poppy wasn’t calling him either as a friend or a brother-in-law. She was calling because he was the editor of the local newspaper, and she had an ax to grind.
    Since it was barely eight-thirty in the morning, she tried him at the little lakeside cottage that Lily had inherited from their grandmother, Celia St. Marie. The cottage was smaller than John’s a bit farther down the shore, but it had a history. So John had moved in, and they would be putting on a sizable addition once sugaring season was done. Micah was slated to do the work, which gave John an even greater incentive to help figure out what had happened to Micah’s significant other.
    No one answered the phone. Poppy guessed that John was either having breakfast at Charlie’s Café or already at work.
    She passed Charlie’s first. It was a cheery sight with snow capping the red clapboards of both the general store and adjacent café. The wide brick chimney exhaled a curl of smoke, and a smell tinged with bacon and birch wafted into the Blazer.
    She exchanged waves with the three men chatting out front, their breath puffing white against their dark wool jackets as they huddled into upturned collars, but she saw no sign of John’s Tahoe. Less than a minute later, she spotted it down past the post office, at the yellow Victorian that stood near the edge of the pristine expanse of snow on the lake. That yellow Victorian housed the newspaper office.
    Had it been summer—or spring or fall—she might have pulled in and talked with John face-to-face near the willows. But this was winter, and winter made maneuvering in and out of the Blazer over icy paths, much less unshoveled ground, harder to do. Besides, she wanted to get home to her phone lines. So she simply punched in the Lake News number as she drove past.
    â€œKipling, here,” John answered in the distracted voice that said he was buried in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, or Washington Post.
    â€œIt’s Poppy,” she said and jumped right in. “Do you know what’s going on?”
    â€œHey, sweetie.” His voice lightened instantly. “No. What’s going on?”
    â€œYou haven’t heard any news?”
    â€œUh, we slept late,” he said a mite sheepishly. “Just got in, actually.”
    Poppy felt a twinge of envy imagining the why of Lily and him sleeping late. It didn’t help her mood any. “And you haven’t had any calls?” she asked tartly.
    â€œYou’d know that better than me.”
    â€œJohn.”
    â€œNo. No calls yet.” He was cautious now. “Tell me what I missed.”
    â€œHeather,” Poppy announced, letting loose with her disgust at the situation in general and the need to place blame in particular. “You missed Heather.” She gave him the basics, then said, “I’m wondering how something like that could happen in a free