Jake covered his mouth to hide the smile on his lips.
“You’re a Pinocchio,” Will retorted. His eyes finally met mine. “Isn’t it? Possible?”
“Yes, it’s possible,” I conceded. “But this probably isn’t the best topic of conversation before bed, is it?”
He made a face. “I guess.”
“I hope the ghost sleeps in your room,” Sophie said to him, her expression a mirror of similar looks I’d seen on her dad’s face.
“Enough,” Jake finally said. “All of you. And all aboard that’s coming aboard.” He looked at Will. “You in or out?”
Will hesitated, then sprinted for the bed. “In.”
The three of them squirmed in between us until they’d each claimed their own space in our king-sized bed. Grace snuggled into me and Will pressed against the other side of me and I was the middle of a kid-sized sandwich. Sophie had bedded down on the other side of Jake. I reached above their heads and found his hand. He squeezed gently, then reached over with his free hand and turned off the light. Darkness engulfed the room and Grace sucked in her breath and burrowed closer. If she’d been a joey, she would have climbed right back into mama kangaroo’s pouch. No doubt.
“I sure hope the new ghost doesn’t try to get in this bed,” Jake whispered.
All three tiny bodies stiffened.
“Kidding,” he said. He chuckled and squeezed my hand again.
I laughed and shook my head.
The happiest I’d ever been.
EIGHT
“Are they gonna be here all day?” Will asked.
It was the Monday morning after Olaf was found in the chute and we were headed to a 4-H meeting. The police and whoever else was involved in the investigation were just arriving as we trudged through the snow, making our way to the dilapidated, detached garage and the SUV that was parked inside.
The bitter cold had abated just a bit, a blanket of clouds providing a thin layer of insulation, but we were still fully outfitted for the elements, even for the quick drive to the church where our meeting was. Coats, hats, boots and gloves, all in various colors. We looked like a walking rainbow.
“Why are they staring at us?” Sophie asked. Her face was barely visible under the pink hat perched on her head.
I glanced at the group of people gathering in our yard. Sure enough, several sets of eyes were trained on us. Detective Hanborn was already there, a cup of coffee in her hand as she barked orders. She caught sight of us and lifted her to-go cup in our direction as a sort of greeting. I nodded my head primly and kept walking.
“They’re staring because we’re not in school,” Grace announced. Her coat was a hand-me-down from Sophie and was still a couple of sizes too big.
“No, they’re not,” Will said. “Lots of people homeschool.”
Our family stood out in Moose River for a number of reasons. The old house. The blended family. We we were one of a handful of families that didn’t belong to a church. And we homeschooled our kids.
Well, three of them. After ten years at home, Emily had decided that she wanted to go to high school and enrolled at a local charter school. She was having a great time and I was trying not to miss having her at home, but I was glad that she was getting what she wanted out of school. Not the academic stuff: she wanted more friendships and boys and a more complicated social life. She was getting it.
But the other three were home with me during the day. Jake worked in management at our local recycling plant and although his schedule could be a little flexible, it was usually just me and the younger three hanging out together. Sophie had gone to public school in Texas but had jumped right into the homeschooling after saying she wanted to try it when she and Jake moved. If anything, she’d energized all of us because I felt like she’d come to it with fresh eyes and I didn’t want to let her down.
So when we were at the grocery store in the middle of the day or at a museum or at the lake during warmer weather, we were used to the raised eyebrows and the unasked questions on the lips of people we encountered. As mainstream as homeschooling had become in recent years, there were still naysayers who felt the need to stick their noses in when it came to our kids’ education. I ignored them. We liked our lives and we’d carved out a great community of friends and families who also homeschooled.
“Then why are they staring at us?” Grace asked loudly.
Will frowned. “Uh, because they found a dead body in our basement?”
“No, they didn’t,” Sophie pointed out. “Daisy and Dad did.”
“Which meant they had to come and check things out,” Will told her. “So, technically, I’m right.”
“Well, I like them,” Sophie announced as I wrestled with the garage door.
“Why would you like them?” Will asked.
“They seem nice,” Sophie said. She climbed into the open passenger door and climbed into the car. “One man waved to me through the window.”
“He waved to me, too,” Grace said. She made a face. “I stuck my tongue out at him.”
“Excellent,” I said, hoisting myself into the driver’s seat. “That should win us some brownie points.”
“Brownies?” Grace’s ears perked up. “You’re making brownies?”
I just shook my head and adjusted the seat warmers to high. The inside of the car was so cold, we could see our breath. I let the engine warm up for a few minutes, just enough so that the needle on the temperature gauge moved a fraction of an inch. I turned the heat on and the air that blasted from the vents was finally a little warmer than the interior. I shifted the car into reverse and backed out of the garage.
We made the five minute drive on the freshly plowed roads to one of the local churches. I parked and the kids vaulted out of the car and hustled into the building, anxious to both get out of the cold and to see their friends. I was glad to see they were still excited about their normal routine and not focusing on what was going on at the house.
“There’s a dead man in our house!” Grace screamed as we got to the door of the meeting room.
All heads turned in our direction. So much for not focusing on what was going on at the house.
We shrugged off our coats and hung them on the pegs on the wall and the kids disappeared into the crowd of kids, no doubt to explain Grace’s announcement.
“Fun weekend?” Carol Vinford asked.
“I’ll just assume everyone knows already?” I asked, sighing.
Carol smiled. I’d met her shortly after Thornton and I moved to Moose River from Atlanta. We weren’t close friends but she was always sweet and helpful, the epitome of Minnesota Nice. She was one of the 4-H club leaders and her girls, Megan and Sara, sandwiched Emily in age.
“Pretty much,” she admitted. Her brown eyes were full of empathy. “You know how it goes.”
I nodded.
“Plus, if anyone didn’t know, pretty sure Grace has now informed them,” she said, nodding her dark head toward the group of kids. I couldn’t even see mine, tucked in the center of the throng of kids, but I could hear Grace. Her eight year-old voice could move mountains, it was so loud.
I chuckled. “Good point.”
“You and Jake okay?” Carol asked. “I was going to call last night, but I figured you had enough going on.”
“We’re fine,” I told her. As fine as we could be with an active crime scene in our house, I thought. “Thanks for asking.”
She patted me on the shoulder. “If you need anything, let me know.”
She stepped away and started organizing the kids so they could start the meeting. I had no doubt that if I’d told Carol I was too stressed out to cook, she would’ve had a month’s worth of dinners organized in fifteen minutes flat. If I’d said I was so busy with the investigation that I couldn’t get my kids to their next activity, she’d arrange for transportation, no questions asked. It was how most people in our tiny town were—eager to offer a helping hand to any stranger who needed it.
But friendships? Real, true friendships? Those were hard to come by.