Stitched in Crime (A Craft Fair Knitters Mystery, Band 2) - Softcover

Caldwell, Emmie

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0593101707 ISBN 13: 9780593101704

Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group, 2021

Inhaltsangabe

When murder pierces the fabric of the close-knit Crandalsburg Craft Fair, it's up to the Ninth Street Knitters to make a killer slip their stitch.

The Craft Fair may have hit a few snags lately, but knitting enthusiast Lia Geiger is hopeful her quiet life will return to its usual patterns in no time. Her daughter has officially moved back home, and sure, the house is a little crowded with Hayley's take-home work from the alpaca farm, but that's a price Lia will happily pay. All seems well until Cori Littlefield, a new vendor with a gift for crochet, is found dead, sending shock waves through all of Crandalsburg.

What begins as a tragic accident turns into a snarled spool of lies that only the combined efforts of the Ninth Street Knitters can untangle. When Lia makes a connection between Cori's death and a decades-old murder, it's up to her to weave together the clues and find the truth.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Emmie Caldwell is the national bestselling author of the Keepsake Cove Mysteries, the Pickled and Preserved Mysteries, the Craft Corner Mysteries, and the Maggie Olenski Mysteries, written under the name Mary Ellen Hughes. A native of Wisconsin, she's lived most of her adult life in Maryland, which has inspired many of her stories.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter 1

 

It was the dream again. Cori could only watch as Jessica walked away. She wanted to call out, No! Stay here! But she couldn't. She could only follow. As she did every time.

 

Jessica had always been her favorite babysitter. She made her laugh and played games with her. And she read to her better than anyone. She'd do funny voices and make up things that Cori knew weren't really in the story. They made the story so much better!

 

But Jessica didn't come to babysit anymore. She told Cori she was getting too busy. She was in college now, and she had a boyfriend. Was that where she was going? To see her boyfriend? That was why Cori followed. She was curious.

 

At first, Jessica caught her following and told her to go home. "You can't come with me, Cori," she said, her hands sternly on her hips.

 

"Why not!"

 

"Because you can't. Now, go back!"

 

But Cori didn't want to go back. She started to cry.

 

Jessica hesitated, and Cori thought she might relent and let her come with her, until Jessica said, "I'll come see you another time."

 

"When?" Cori asked.

 

Jessica looked impatient, but she said, "Tomorrow. Okay?"

 

Cori sniffed hard. "Promise."

 

"I promise. Now, go home."

 

Cori turned around, but after a few steps she stopped and looked back. She saw Jessica walking again, and she hid behind a tree until Jessica got far ahead. Then Cori followed.

 

She wasn't supposed to go there, she knew that. There were lots of trees that made it dark and places where you could fall down real far. Her mother told Cori not to ever go there unless she or someone big was with her. But Jessica was a big person, wasn't she? She didn't know Cori was there, but that didn't matter, did it? It only meant she wouldn't tell Cori's mom, but that made it even better.

 

It was a long walk, a lot of it was uphill, and Cori got tired. She had to sit down. Jessica kept walking, but she wasn't going very fast and there was the path to stay on. Cori could catch up. When she felt better, Cori ran up the path but stopped when she heard voices. She hid behind a clump of bushes and crouched way down. She recognized Jessica's voice, but she didn't know the other one. Jessica was talking the most, so Cori listened to her. She liked listening to Jessica, and after a while Cori decided to come out. Maybe Jessica would tell her a story-like the ones she used to read aloud to Cori. Jessica would be so surprised to see her, but she wouldn't mind. It would be such a good joke!

 

The sun blinded Cori when she came out from her hiding place, shining right into her eyes. She put her hands up to shade them, but it didn't help. She was standing still and blinking from the sun when she heard Jessica scream.

 

"Jessica!" Cori cried, and she ran blindly toward the scream-until she saw the big, dark figure. It wasn't Jessica. It was the other voice. It started to come toward her, and Cori screamed, and screamed, and screamed.

 

Until she woke up.

 

Chapter 2

 

Lia heard the shout and looked up from her booth.

 

"Everyone! Your attention, please." Belinda, the Crandalsburg Craft Fair's manager, stood in the center of the fair barn, a folded newspaper held high. "Our craft fair got some great publicity today!" she announced as she turned toward the vendor next to Lia. "Thanks to our new member, Cori Littlefield. It's a full-page story loaded with color photos of Cori's creations!"

 

The vendors clapped and cheered as Belinda handed out extra copies of the paper to pass around.

 

"Cori, that's wonderful!" Lia cried from her knitting booth.

 

Lia had been delighted to hear about their new vendor, especially when she learned that the stall would be filled with crocheted items. Not your usual shawls and throws, though. Cori Littlefield crocheted artistic and wonderfully realistic vegetables, flowers, whimsical animals, and just about anything that happened to come into her creative mind and through her nimble fingers.

 

Other vendors came over to congratulate the crochet artist. Cori certainly deserved the praise, and she looked genuinely pleased. But when, after a few minutes, Lia saw

the young woman's smiles along with her posture stiffen, she stepped in.

 

"Cori needs a little time to get ready, guys. Let's save the rest of this for later, okay?"

 

Lia had recently given up her end-of-the-row spot to Cori, after Belinda, her longtime friend as well as the craft fair manager, approached her about it. Lia had at first hesitated. She'd grown accustomed to her spot. But after learning that Cori needed to be near an exit to avoid feeling closed in, she'd readily agreed.

 

"The easiest for everyone, of course, would be to just put her in the empty booth farther up the row," Belinda had said. "Everyone else, that is, not Cori. But besides the advantage of the side exit, I think you're the perfect person to be next to her. She's, well, just a little different; anxious, you might say. She'll be fine, really, but she might need to leave the barn once in a while to be alone for a few minutes. I fell in love with her work and felt any inconvenience that might cause would be well worth it. She'll be a great addition to the craft fair."

 

Belinda hadn't added what Lia knew must be going through her mind: that the craft fair needed a boost after what it had gone through only a few weeks earlier. The discovery of Belinda's murdered ex-husband in the middle of the empty craft fair barn had not been good for the fair's business, to say the least, and Belinda had been in grave danger, financially and otherwise, when suspicion was cast her way. Attendance numbers had dropped drastically, only slowly recovering after the actual murderer had been arrested and the news media turned to other stories. An exciting new vendor for the fair, therefore, was a definite plus.

 

"Need some fresh air?" Lia asked Cori after the other vendors left to go back to their stations.

 

Cori shook her head. "I'm okay. Thanks." She brushed back the bangs of her short brown hair. "It was nice of them."

 

"We're all really happy for you, Cori. This'll be so great for your booth. You just might sell out this weekend!"

 

"Then I'll have to get busy working on more things!" Cori said it with a laugh, which Lia was glad to hear. The first weekend that this young woman-thirty-two in Lia's book was still young-had joined the fair, she had struggled as a salesperson, an important skill that all the vendors had to learn. Lia had given her tips about dealing with customers, but because of her intense shyness, Lia was sure it had required much concentration and effort. She could only imagine the exhaustion it brought on and understood the need for occasional recharging breaks.

 

"Yes, crochet lots of your beautiful art," Lia encouraged her. "The world will be eager for it."

 

Cori laughed again, and Lia decided her neighbor was fine. Once the craft fair barn doors were opened and shoppers rushed to Cori's booth, she would be ready to deal with them. And with a little luck, Lia's booth would catch a bit of spillover, not that her Ninth Street Knits needed much help. Over the months, its sales had been steady, both from returning customers and from newcomers drawn by word of mouth-the best kind of publicity.

 

Lia's late husband, Tom, would have been proud of how she'd turned her knitting skills into a new career, with the help, of course, of...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Penguin Publishing Group
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2021
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0593101707
• ISBN 13: 9780593101704
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 304
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: gpsr@libri.de; gpsr@libri.de; ; Friedensallee 273; Hamburg; 22763; Deutschland