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I hadn’t argued too much, though, since I was supposed to stay away from behind the wheel and I could tell she was eager to help. Calvin would have driven me, of course, but this just made more sense, especially since he’d already set out to meet Tom at the local nursery.
And I had to admit it felt good to put the murder investigation and my worries about the hex on my car aside for a while, and to simply be with good friends. My mother had outdone herself with the flowers and the table settings…although I had a feeling Victoria had offered some helpful advice along the way.
Everyone was there — Josie and Hazel and Victoria, and Terry Woodrow and Sofia Barnes and Joyce Lewis and Chloe herself. Once again, I wondered whether I should have invited Heather to brunch, even though I understood that we barely knew each other and it might have been strange to attend a brunch thrown by the woman who’d had a child with her husband so many years before.
Doubt was cast aside as everyone congratulated Chloe on having the charges dismissed. She flushed and then looked over at me, saying, “It was very good news. But this brunch is supposed to be about Selena, right?”
“It’s about getting together with friends and family,” I replied. “I’m not interested in being the center of attention.”
Victoria smiled. “You’re sure about that?”
“Positive.”
Her blue eyes twinkled. “Then I guess this is a good time to share the news. Archie and I are having a baby, too.”
Of course the table had to erupt in congratulations, with everyone asking her when the baby was due.
“Early October,” she said. “Just a week or so after Hazel.”
“It sounds like we’ve got a real baby boom going on here in Globe,” Hazel added, and Josie beamed.
“And that’s a wonderful thing. It will be so amazing to have all my good friends expanding our little family here that much more.”
It would. I looked around the table at all the smiling faces there and thought that Chloe had made a good choice. No, we didn’t have L.A.’s glitz and glamour, but we had a real community, one that was much more welcoming than I might have thought at first, considering the way Henry Lewis and I had butted heads from almost the very beginning. He’d come to accept me, though…well, mostly. And Sofia was doing very well, even though she’d only been here a few months. No romance in her life yet, but I supposed that was okay. It was going to take a while to undo the damage inflicted by her controlling, murderous ex-partner, and for now, she was just focused on making her charming brewpub one of our little town’s premier destinations.
We were all exactly where we were supposed to be.
But that didn’t mean I didn’t intend to find out who really killed Jack Speros…even if I had to continue the investigation from a hospital bed.
Chapter 14
PUT IT ON REPEAT
Chloe drove me home after brunch, a little past one o’clock. She couldn’t linger because she wanted to get back to Once in a Blue Moon and not miss out completely on all that Saturday afternoon prime shopping time.
“Will Calvin be back soon?” she asked, looking a little anxious as she seemed to notice that my husband’s big white Durango was still missing from the driveway.
“He texted me as he was leaving the garden center,” I replied. It was sweet of her to be worried about leaving me here alone, but I knew it wasn’t an issue. “He should be here in ten minutes or so. It’s fine.”
That piece of information made her expression brighten. “Oh, okay. Then I guess it’s all right.”
I assured her that it was, then pushed myself out of her VW and waddled over to the front door while she turned the car around and headed down the long gravel drive that led to our private lane. With any luck, she would be back out on the main road before Calvin got here; two cars could pass on the narrow street that led to our property, but it was something of a squeeze.
When I went inside, I paused for a moment to pet Sadie, who of course had come bounding up the second I entered the house, then glanced around. Nothing felt out of place, and yet something inside made me glad Calvin would be home soon.
It was silly to feel that way, though — I’d made sure the house was thoroughly protected, and there was no sign that anyone had been here in my absence.
Just the heebie-jeebies, I told myself. The accident and that horrible dream the other night have put you off balance.
Probably. I especially didn’t want to feel this way after spending such a lovely couple of hours with my friends and my mother. Just because I’d suffered a couple of shocks lately didn’t mean that anything was wrong.
My Jeep was still in limbo, since the mechanic hadn’t yet been able to find anything physically wrong with it and the insurance adjuster wouldn’t even make it out to Globe to look over the vehicle until Monday. Under normal circumstances, I would have gone to Gilbert or Mesa to rent a car so I wouldn’t be without wheels, but these weren’t exactly normal circumstances.
I headed into the kitchen, figuring a glass of water would help dispel some of my current hinkiness. And that was where Calvin found me a few minutes later, sipping some water as I leaned against the counter, even as I told myself I should have gone into the living room to sit down.
“How was brunch?” he asked.
“It was great,” I said. There didn’t seem to be any point in telling him about my recent bout of nerves, not when there wasn’t any physical reason for me to have reacted that way when I came into the house. No, I was just letting my imagination run away with itself again. “And guess what? Victoria’s expecting, too!”
