Page 1 of Christmas Past
Chapter 1
Christmas Town, Maine. 2006.
She felt the fear first. That spear that strikes through a body, leaving no room for anything else. Including air. An electrical sensation that prevented movement, or awareness.
Panic followed. And then before she could catch her breath, another surge of debilitating emotional current.
Consumed with a sudden sense of weakness, Bella Potter leaned on the counter, letting her arms, and the old wooden structure against her thighs take her weight.
She knew better than to fight. The feelings wouldn’t dissipate, they’d only grow more confused.
Out of the blue, shefelt as though she’d wet herself.
That was a new one. And broke the connection as she looked to see if she needed to go change her jeans.
She did not.
And she was no longer afraid.
She didn’t have to pee, either. What she did have to do was reassess where she was in her soap making process. Had she added the Vitamin E oil? She stirred. Sniffed. And picked up the bottle of essential oil. The one-hundred and thirty-gallon batch of soap– split between two stock pots on her commercial sized old stove – was going to be rose scented. She’d sold out of the Rose over the weekend and had orders for another hundred sixteen ounce containers.
Measuring cup in hand, suspended over one of two stock pots on the stove in front her, Bella paused when her hand started to shake. She couldn’t afford to lose an entire batch of soap.
Didn’t have time for nonsense, either.
But it came again. Swamping her with panic. She was lost. Scared to the point of disorientation. Unable to process. To think. Her right foot seared with pain, like it might be broken. And her elbow stung. Sweat beads popped out on her forehead. And she shivered with cold.
Dropping the bottle and measuring cup she slid down to the drafty old linoleum floor, hugged her knees up to her chest, buried her face against them, and hung on.
~*~
“You’re sure you didn’t see anyone unusual in the area.” Sheriff Chad Andrews was aware of his brusque tone as he interrogated the young woman who’d just started waiting tables at Posey’s diner. Stella was the last person to haveseen Camille Posey, themissing three-year-old, blond, blue-eyed second cousin to the diner’s owner.
“No one,” Stella said. The twenty-two-year-old mother of twin boys looked close to tears. He was sorry. But had no time to be sensitive.
Seventy-six percent of child abductions that ended in murders took place within the first three hours. Eighty-nine percent within the first twenty-four. He only had twenty-three hours left.
She started to list again, the customers in the diner, the people she’d seen, but he already had that information. Leaving the diner, he moved down the street to the Christmas Town Workshop, otherwise known as a hardware store.
It was fine for Christmas Town, Maine to have its whimsy, its faith in the season, its Christmas spirit and holiday cheer. He didn’t begrudge them. To the contrary. He was quite fulfilled byhis job of keeping the town safe so they could have their revelry.
Having a three-year-old child abducted from right under their noses just two weeks before Christmas was unfathomable.
Geoff Posey and his wife, Gabrielle, were just visiting the area where, as a kid, Geoff had come to visit his grandmother, Cara Posey, who’d been a maternal aunt to the Posey who owned the diner. Geoff had wanted his two children, seven-year-old Geoff Junior and three-year-old Camille, to grow up knowing the magic of Christmas through Christmas Town. They’d stopped into Posey’s Diner before lunch and while while Geoff had been in the back with Posey, Geoff Junior had been having trouble deciding between two cookies from the glass case at the front of the diner – a Christmas decorated sugar cookie and his favorite, chocolate chip.His mother had bent over to help him and Camille had disappeared.
Vanished into thin air according to the people who’d been in and around the diner that snowy morning during the lull between breakfast and lunch. She’d been standing next to the case with her mother and brother, and then she hadn’t been.
The city was already filled with foot soldiers, volunteer and otherwise, canvasing every neighborhood, in case the child had actually found a way to open a door with a handle she couldn’t reach and had wandered out alone in the snowstorm without anyone hearing the bell over the door ring.
Hunching his shoulders against the cold, not slowing enough to turn up the collar of his department-issued brown leather jacket, Chad trudged through the snow that was falling so thick his footsteps were concealed almost before he’d stepped out of them, and pushed inside Christmas Town Workshop.
The three seniors who ran the place were sitting in rockers just inside the door, flanked by Christmas trees. Holiday music played softly in the background. Gus in his wool cap – even indoors – Marv with his thick glasses, and Barty with those goofy ear flaps on his hat, all looked up the second he came in.
“You find out anything?” Gus asked, his notepad and a pen in hand, taking notes.
Chad shook his head. “I need you to think, guys.”
It hadn’t taken him a month in Christmas Town to know that the three could be counted on for information. With Marv’s military background, Barty’s ability to draw nearly anyone into conversation, and Gus’ penchant for scribbling everything on his notepad, they were generally in tune and accurate. They spent all day everyday rocking on their front porch across from the town square and chatting with anyone who walked by.
