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house?”
    â€œNo, Jessie. What I’m saying is that I have next to no interest in our new neighbors. You and Allie go spy on them if you want. I’ll be out back, checking on my roses.” And taking a peek in the first mirror she saw on her way out, because her upper lip suddenly felt rather fat.
    â€œSpeaking of roses, I heard that the new owner is going to cut down all of Miriam Harris’s rose gardens and replace them with a second tennis court, or something like that,” Allie said as she walked away.
    â€œWhat! How—how could they do that? Miriam’s roses have been there for fifty years, at least.” Maddy followed after Almira, nearly jogging to keep up with her grandmother’s brisk steps, all thoughts of mirrors and her possibly fat lip banished. “I mean, are these people absolute idiots? Who needs two tennis courts?”
    Mrs. Ballantine stood at attention in the hallway, conveniently armed with a huge pair of vintage World War II field glasses, which she wordlessly passed to Almira before stepping back to let the three women pass. To an observant person, the two women performed like a well-trained tag-team wrestling duo. But Almira’s grandchildren weren’t being all that observant right now. At least one of them wasn’t, anyway.
    â€œWho needs two tennis courts? I don’t know, dear, why don’t you look and see?” Almira answered, already in the mostly glass-sided morning room, the door closed behind them. Besides being the best vantage point to the driveway next door, the large, wicker-filled atrium was a family favorite for resting, and curling up with a good book.
    Almira’s husband had added the room as an anniversary present years ago, and the only solid wall in the room was taken up with floor-to-ceiling bookcases stuffed three deep with romance novels. Sarah had them all cross-indexed and alphabetized, and a small card catalog stood in the far corner. Almira Chandler was very serious about her cherished books. Very serious.
    Almira shoved the binoculars into Maddy’s hands—it was either take the things or have them jammed into her gut. “Why don’t you take a peek, and then maybe you can tell me what an idiot looks like. Or didn’t I mention that the owner is already on the property, overseeing the unloading of what looks to be a small mountain of boxes?”
    Jessie, who had been watching all of this with a rather confused smile on her face—as she knew their grandmother never did anything without a reason—helpfully drew back the sheer curtains to give her sister a better view.
    Maddy lifted the binoculars to her eyes, knowing that somehow she had been roped into doing what her grandmother wanted, again. She blinked as she saw nothing but fuzzy greenery through the lenses, then adjusted both the knob on the binoculars and her direction, slowly moving her sight along the sweep of lawn, past the white-painted split-rail fence covered in trailing red roses that divided the two properties.
    Now more grass, trees and the start of the sweep of brick driveway that made a huge semicircle in front of the Harris house. She’d planned to plant white petunias and blue alyssum along both sides of that long driveway, as a complement to the blue-gray stone and creamy white wood trim of the house. With a couple of red geraniums mixed in, to pick up the dull red in the bricked driveway.
    So many plans. So many things she was going to do with that house. Holding on to the heavy binoculars with only one hand, she used the other to run her fingernails over the wedge of bared flesh above her vest.
    Feet. She saw feet. Male feet. Bare feet, standing on the brick driveway. Giving the powerful binoculars another small adjustment, she moved them slightly upward. Past remarkably straight legs, to a pair of khaki cutoffs and a white shirt with some sort of logo on it.
    Too tiny to make out, even with the field glasses.
    Maddy