Page 85 of Christmas Mittens Murder

Arthur joined me, examining each pair of mittens. “What do you think, Auntie Cee? Dad is always saying how cold his hands are. And Mommy would love these pink ones.”

Just . . . no. “Maybe not, Artie. I happen to already know they’ll both have new mittens under the tree on Christmas morning.” I winked at him. And set myself a mental reminder to quickly find two pair of non-murderous mittens, stat. “Sorry,” I said to Mooncat, except I wasn’t.

Franklin bought a small glass ornament for his mother, one featuring a Western bluebird. He paid a price I was pretty sure the vendor had discounted for him. We continued on our way.

I tried to put on a good front, but I wasn’t feeling much in the holiday spirit. I wished I knew what Quan wanted from Allie. And what he’d quizzed Otto about to make him storm away mad, not to mention what the detective had said to Rafael that resulted in worrying Arthur as it had. Maybe my nephew thought the running coach he looked up to was in trouble with the sheriff’s detective or, worse, had killed Val. At least Artie had bounced back nicely. I’d try to get him to open up later, at home, when it was quiet and he’d had time to process his experience. Or Allie could.

“Where’re the candy canes?” Arthur asked Cam, bouncing on his heels.

“You’re in deep doo-doo now, my friend,” I murmured to her. The last thing he needed was a blast of sugar.

“I don’t know,” she said to the boy. “Maybe the next row over?”

We strolled to the end and looped back up the next row. Franklin stopped halfway along to buy socks with Einstein’s picture woven in. Cam purchased a pair of Sherlock Holmes socks for her detective husband, and I bought identical pairs featuring Marie Curie’s image for my science-inclined daughter and mother.

“Still nothing, Arthur?” I asked.

“Nope. I’ll know it when I see it. Just not mittens.”

I spied a tall woman with a much shorter one strolling hand in hand. I peered at them. Yes, it was Thea and Narini. They paused at a jewelry vendor.

Arthur stopped to look at a booth full of items featuring dogs and cats. They were embroidered onto pillows, woven into scarves, printed on floor mats, you name it. There were also collars and tiny pet jackets and fun handmade toys for actual animals to play with.

Allie and I had had a cat for only a short time before she was consumed by sneezing, an allergy she’d passed down to Franklin but not to Arthur.

“I’m going to get a present here for Mom and Dad,” he said. “They want to have a cat and a dog, but they can’t because the Frang will sneeze his head off.”

Which really meant Arthur wanted a pet, badly. Allie had confided they were considering adopting a hypoallergenic dog when the boys got a little older.

“Arturo wants somebody else to beat up on besides me.” Franklin grinned and elbowed his brother.

“I’m going down there to talk with Thea and Narini for a sec,” I said.

“I’ll watch these guys,” Cam said. “Hey, boys. The dog on this pillow looks exactly like Dasha, Pete’s Siberian Husky mix.”

“You have a dog at home?” Arthur asked, excited.

I wandered toward the tall and the short. Narini’s puffy jacket hid her pregnant belly, mostly. She fingered silver earrings on a display tree. Thea, today in tennies and what looked like a high-end wicking shirt and calf-length running pants, examined an array of bracelets slung on a dowel hanging sideways.

“Hey, ladies.” I nodded to the proprietor. “Nice jewelry.”

Narini twisted her head. “Hi. Cece, wasn’t it?”

“Yes.”

Thea gave me a look I couldn’t interpret. “Where’s your private-eye friend?”

“She’s down the row a bit, with my sister’s kids. She’s a farmer, you know, not a PI.”

Thea scoffed, “As if. Shouldn’t you two leave the detecting to the sheriff, who actually knows what he’s doing?”

Thea took a step nearer, looming over me. I felt threatened, even though we stood amid hundreds of other shoppers and vendors.

“Of course we’re leaving things to the able Detective Quan.” I mustered a smile I didn’t feel. “It’s too bad he hasn’t made an arrest for the homicide yet, though.”

“It’ll be too bad when he busts your twin sister for the crime.” She turned back to the bracelets.

Narini raised a dark eyebrow, the tiny silver ring threaded through it glinting in the light, but didn’t say anything.

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