Read Online Streak of Lightning by Clare O'Donohue - Free Book Online

on to the next suspicious death.” He rested his hand on mine. “Wasn’t much of a romantic weekend, was it? And I was thinking about what you said on the train the other day, about what you do on the first day of the year being what you do all year. Not a great beginning, was it?”
    I thought about how much I’d been looking forward to the weekend, and how strangely it had all gone instead. “I got to spend it with you,” I told him. “And you let me help you with a case without arguing about it, so that’s a pretty good omen for the year.”
    He laughed. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Read on for the first chapter to Clare O’Donohue’s novel
The Double Wedding Ring: A Someday Quilts Mystery Featuring Nell Fitzgerald
, coming soon from Plume.



Chapter 1
    It was dark. Whatever sliver there was of a moon had hidden behind the buildings along Main Street, leaving only the slightly open door to light my way. I grabbed the trash from the cutting table, bits and pieces of fabric so small that even seasoned quilters would find little use for them, and headed into the alley.
    I threw the trash into the Dumpster, my last chore of a very long day, and turned toward the back door to the shop. The wind picked up—an icy January wind that made me glad I’d thrown on my coat before venturing outside. I heard a noise behind me, and just as I turned to see what it was, the wind slammed the shop door closed, locking it. I had my car keys in my pocket, but my purse, cell phone, and, most important, the keys to the shop, were still inside.
    â€œEleanor is going to kill me,” I muttered, my breath forming icy circles in the night air. The question was would I call her, and let her kill me now, or leave it until tomorrow. It wasn’t a hard decision. Jesse was waiting for me at his place with a hot meal and a tall glass of wine. Tomorrow would do.
    I walked around to the front of the shop, checked the front door just to be sure. Also locked. I’d volunteered to stay behind and close up. We had post-Christmas markdowns out and everyone, especially my grandmother, had put in lots of additional hours. Eleanor Cassidy owned the shop and said the extra work was her responsibility, but she was in her seventies and had a lot on her mind these days. I wanted to help, both as a granddaughter and an employee. And now I’d locked my set of keys in the shop.
    Someday Quilts would be fine, I decided. The place was locked up tight and the only thing I hadn’t done was put on the new alarm we’d had installed. It was Jesse’s idea after a string of vandalisms hit the town during the summer. He’d had something similar installed at his house, and both alarms went directly to the police station in the event of a problem. Jesse, the town’s chief of police, was still careful about setting his, but at the shop, once the culprit had been caught, we’d pretty much forgotten about the alarm.
    Besides, Eleanor had made the bank deposit on her way home. There wasn’t anything to steal except some fabric and the twenty dollars in my purse. Assuming someone would bother to try. Things had been pretty quiet in Archers Rest lately.
    â€œIt’s fine,” I said to no one.
    But as I spoke I thought I saw something through the window. I clenched my jaw and kept looking. As the moon moved slightly I could see that a pile of small fabric pieces, known to quilters as fat quarters, had fallen over. Fat quarters I thought I’d stacked low enough to stay in place.
    â€œWhen the door slammed shut they must have gotten knocked over,” I said to myself. That made sense. One stack of fat quarters out of place was not a crisis. But my freezing in front of the shop was quickly becoming one. I headed to my car.
    â€¢Â Â Â â€¢Â Â Â â€¢
    The streetlight that normally lit the way to Jesse’s driveway was burned out. No matter. My