Mountain Ice (David Dean Mysteries)

I am the most favored wretch among mortals! God has given me a second undeserved chance at happiness! All my dreams and longings have come to fruition in a single instant when dearest Joshua held me close and my world was sunshine. I smile and the other girls look at me as if I'm daft. Mrs. Rinaldi questions me and tries to read these lines, but all for naught. Only the two of us, dear Joshua and I, know our secret and so will it remain.

"We know where this is going, don't we?" he answered. "She only says he held her." But Cynthia's tone betrayed her disbelief in the words she was saying. Dean gave her a raised eyebrow. "I'll bet you a night of unbridled ecstasy against a week of doing dishes that they end up in the sack." She ignored his wager. "Do you think they marry?" Dean shook his head. "I think he's carrying his ministry a little too far and he's already a married man. That's the only thing that makes sense."

Cynthia frowned but didn't disagree. "She writes so differently than what you'd expect, given her circumstances-where she is and what she's doing. Her rhetoric is beautiful and I've yet to find a spelling error."

"Perhaps that's one of the reasons the good reverend was attracted to her. She's certainly a cut above the usual-lady of the night." "And how would you know that?" Cynthia asked with a sly smile. "I was a policeman. Policemen have to know all sorts of different things."

There was a noise at the back door and Fred O'Connor entered. He was in his stocking feet, snowy boots left by the back door after his day at the library and museum. Before letting him read the translations, the Deans filled him in on their activities, including their forest meeting with Jerome Shipton. They all agreed he was bad news.

"I checked him out some more on the computer," Fred said. "He's not a poor man. In addition to the storage buildings, he owns an insurance agency, a bank and a bunch of commercial real estate. His wife is in the bucks, too. It don't look like either one needs the other's check book."

"I have to wonder why he's so obsessed with Edith," Dean mused. "He's a good looking guy, wealthy, by the sound of it, and frankly, Edith isn't the catch of the day. That, and given the fact she was in the wrong line when they were passing out brains makes me think we're missing something."

"Perhaps he's in love with her," Cynthia said, a bite to her voice. "Did you consider that possibility?"