Read Online The Cabin by Carla Neggers - Free Book Online Page B

Dolly’s reclusive baby-
    sitter, had stayed home and worked on Tess’s
    nineteenth-century carriage house. She took possession
    of it last May and promptly found a skeleton in the cel-
    lar—something that hadn’t sat well with Jack Galway,
    Texas Ranger. Not that Susanna had told him about her
    involvement. The girls had let it slip. She remembered
    his call. “You and Tess Haviland crawled around in a dirt
    cellar looking for a body?”
    “We didn’t find it.”
    Small consolation.
    Tess’s move to the North Shore, her marriage and new
    family seemed to agree with her. Her blond hair was
    longer these days, her dedication to her graphic design
    work still high but not as all-consuming. She’d hired an
    assistant. She had balance in her life. She also had strong
    opinions, which made her more like her pub-owner fa-
    ther and plumber godfather than she would ever admit to.

    The Cabin
    69
    She’d brought her own latte, Susanna’s coffeemak-
    ing abilities the only source of conflict between them.
    She had on her business-in-the-city clothes. “I like the
    leather,” she said, sweeping a critical glance over the
    conversation area Susanna had set up in Tess’s vacated
    half of the office. A contemporary leather couch and
    chairs, an antique coffee table and three orchids pains-
    takingly chosen for their forgiving natures. Tess
    smoothed one hand over the soft leather. “I didn’t think
    I would. I really wanted you to go with a Texas theme.
    At least it’s not stuffy.”
    Given that her office was on the fourth floor of a late
    nineteenth-century building overlooking Boston’s old-
    est cemetery, Susanna had rejected a Texas theme. She
    hadn’t bothered to confront her friend on her ideas of
    what a Texas theme would entail—all spurs and Lone
    Stars, probably.
    “Susanna, do you mind if I speak frankly?”
    Susanna sat on one of the chairs, the sky outside her
    tall windows gray and gloomy. She’d worked at her
    computer most of the day. She smiled at Tess. “Since
    when would it make any difference if I minded?”
    Tess didn’t return her smile. “Your computer’s
    dusty,” she said.
    “That’s what you wanted to tell me?”
    “It’s part of a larger pattern.” Tess leaned forward,
    holding her latte in both hands. “It’s like your brain’s
    gone inside your computer and won’t come out. It can’t.
    It’s all filled up with numbers and money things.”
    “Money things?”
    “Investments, annual reports, interest rates, bond

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    Carla Neggers
    prices—God only knows what. I’ll bet you know to the
    penny what each of your clients is worth.”
    Susanna took no offense. “That is my job, Tess.”
    She shook her head, adamant. “You go beyond what
    the average financial planner would do.”
    “Good. I’d hate to be an ‘average’ financial planner.”
    Susanna glanced over at her desk, her monitor filled
    with numbers, which was probably what had unnerved
    Tess. “I want to be very above average.”
    “You see? You’re driven. You’re a perfectionist. It’s
    causing you to lose perspective on the rest of your life.”
    Tess set her jaw, aggravated now. “Damn it, I’m mak-
    ing a good point here. Your life is out of balance.”
    Susanna slid to her feet and walked over to the table
    where she had her coffeemaker, a tin of butter cookies,
    pretty little napkins and real pottery mugs for herself
    and her clients. “I’ve hired a part-time assistant,” she
    said. “She comes in two mornings a week.”
    “You should have at least two people working full-
    time for you. You told me so yourself last fall.”
    “Did I?”
    “Yes, you did.”
    Susanna poured herself a half cup of stale, grayish
    coffee and turned back to her friend. “All right, I’ll dust
    my computer. Promise.”
    Tess groaned. “You are so thick. ”
    “Hey, that’s my line. That’s what I tell Jack—”
    “There. Jack.” Tess set her latte on an antique table
    Susanna had picked up at an