Page 51 of Always Murder

“What Santa?”I asked.“You saw someone dressed as Santa?”

Millie sniffled and nodded.“Going around the far corner.I only got a quick look, and then he was gone.”

“Height?Age?Race?”

“He wasSanta.”

“Did he have a bowl full of jelly?”

Millie frowned.“No, he was skinny.”

“Anything else?”

“I don’t know.He had the red suit and the beard and the hat.”

“Okay.Did you tell the sheriff?”

She nodded.

“Good.If you think of anything else—anything, Millie—tell the sheriff immediately.”

“Okay.”Her expression tightened with a fresh wave of emotion.“See?It really is my fault—”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”The words came from the opening to the waiting room, where Christine stood.“This isn’t your fault, Millie.It isn’t anyone’s fault except Paul’s.”

Even Kassandra and Angeline looked up from their phones at that.

Ryan’s jaw dropped.“Mom,” he said.But that was all.

“Close your mouth before you catch a fly, Ryan.And Millie, you couldn’t change clothes?Wash up a little?My God, you’re covered in blood.And your hair.”Christine didn’t miss a beat before wheeling toward Keme.“I suppose it was too much for you to help her.”

Keme didn’t blush easily, but color rose in his cheeks now, and he dropped his gaze to the floor.

“Kassandra, Angeline, thank you for holding things together while I was gone.”

“The nurse wassuperrude,” Kassandra said.

Angeline piped up with “I think I left my straightener plugged in.”

Christine dismissed this with a wave as she crossed the room.Holding out both hands to JaDonna, Christine crooned, “You are anangel.”And then, confusingly: “I’m sorry you were stuck out here.”And then evenmoreconfusingly: “Matthew, you better not have been bothering her.”

“He had his magazine,” JaDonna informed Christine.

For some reason, that made both of them laugh.

I was considering laughing too—if only because it felt like I’d stepped into an episode ofLooney Tunes—when Christine noticed me.The politest word for her expression wasfrosty, and there was a winter crackle in her voice when she said, “Why are you here?”

Can you believe my mind literally went blank?

Apparently, my celebrity status as the town sleuth no longer carried any weight with Christine because she said, “Paul wants ice cream.”

It seemed like a non sequitur until Angeline made a little sound of contempt and Kassandra rolled her eyes and Millie poked me and Keme gave me this look like he was begging me, this one time, to be a normal human.

“Oh, you want me to—” I stopped.“Uh, right.Where do you get ice cream—”

“I don’t know, Dashiell,” Christine said with the exaggerated delivery of someone whose patience had run thin.“If I knew, I wouldn’t need you to get it.”

Ryan nodded like this made perfect sense.

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