Leave It to Cleavage Read Online Free PDF Page B

report. Don’t you think a woman would file a report if her husband were missing? What possible reason would she have for keeping such a thing to herself?”
    “Now those are real good questions, Chief. And if I were you, that’s exactly what I’d be asking Miranda Smith.”
    Then there was a click, and a moment later he was listening to a dial tone.
     
    Miranda stayed in bed for two days. She crawled under the covers after her unsuccessful Nancy Drew imitation and just couldn’t make herself get out. She watched a
Brady Bunch
marathon, a documentary on sheepdogs and the herding instinct, the movie
Titanic,
followed by a special on the real-life tragedy, and back-to-back episodes of
Sesame Street
before she finally turned off the television and simply lay there listening to the phone ring. Around midnight of the second night she forced herself downstairs to play back the messages.
    “Miranda.” Her mother’s voice rang out in the silence. “You cannot continue to hibernate in this way. I want you out of that house and over here for dinner tomorrow night at six. No excuses.” She could hear Gran’s voice in the background. “Your Gran is threatening an intervention. Don’t make us come over there and drag you out.”
    The rest of the messages were from Ballantyne. “Uh, Mrs. Smith . . .” Leeta’s tone was tentative and laced with worry. “Mr. Smith didn’t come in yesterday like we expected and we, uh, have a few questions. Can you ask him to call the office?”
    The next voice belonged to Tom’s assistant, Carly. “Um, Mrs. Smith? We’re not sure what’s happening, but we really need to talk with Mr. Smith. There’s a problem in production and we’ve had some orders returned. Will you ask him to call in?”
    The last voice was Helen St. James’s and it held an odd mixture of panic and anger. “It’s imperative that I speak to Mr. Smith. Fidelity National is ready to set a date for the audit.” There was a pause. “I’m not sure how to proceed. They want to come in next week.”
     
    The early morning sky was steel gray and the promise of snow hung heavy in the air as Miranda drove through a just-waking Truro to Ballantyne.
    Even as she passed under the archway and parked in the employee lot, she wasn’t sure why she had come or what she hoped to accomplish. All she knew was the ship seemed to be foundering and there was no one at the helm. And although she was too ashamed to call her father, she couldn’t just lie in bed while the ship went down.
    She greeted Leeta in the lobby and walked toward Tom’s office, analyzing possible outcomes. Best-case scenario, Carly Tarleton would provide some clues to Tom’s whereabouts so she could hunt him down like the dog he was and make him fix whatever was wrong. Worst-case scenario, the crew would realize they’d hit an iceberg and their captain had not only deserted the ship but taken the only lifeboat.
    She really shouldn’t have watched that
Titanic
special.
    In Tom’s office, she closed the door behind her and took her place at his desk.
Do not panic,
she instructed herself as she placed her laptop on the mahogany surface and booted up. Only her self didn’t seem to be listening.
    At 9 A . M . muffled voices rose out in the hallway and phones began to ring. It was clearly time to
do
something, but the best she could manage was to swivel around in the desk chair and stare out the window at the distant peak where her family’s lake houses perched.
    She was still staring out the window when a sharp knock sounded on the office door. Before she could spin around, the door opened.
    “Thank goodness you’re back.” Quick footsteps tapped across the office floor and approached the desk. “I brought my diploma in, Mr. Smith, just like we talked about. And Myrna really liked my new drawings. I know you must be tired from your trip. Did you get held up in—”
    Miranda swiveled around to face her husband’s assistant.
    “Oh!” The young woman’s