2 Mists of the Past Read Free

You should let it out more often.”
    Darcy grinned at her. “I haven’t felt like this for a long time. I really like Jon.”
    Grace raised an eyebrow. “Just ‘like’?’”
    Darcy felt her face flush. Darn it. She almost never blushed. She made sure to keep her eyes riveted to her coffee. “No, sis, it’s more than that. I really think I love him. He said it to me, you know. Just yesterday. It was really sweet.” She felt her face get hotter. “I’m not being silly, am I?”
    Grace was quick to shake her head. “No, Darcy. You’re not being silly. You’re being a woman. Look, I know Jon pretty well now. I’d wave you off if I thought there was some reason for you not to go after him. This isn’t me telling you not to do this. This is me teasing my little sister about her boyfriend.”
    She winked at Darcy and Darcy relaxed. Back when Anna and Jeff had been murdered, the whole investigation that Darcy had started into their deaths had gotten Grace’s husband arrested. She had thought at the time that it would be the end to their friendship. They’d come through it, though. It was good to know she still had her sister to depend on.
    “Can I fill that for you Darcy?” Darcy jumped a little and knocked her empty cup over, the white ceramic mug spinning on the tabletop before she could right it again. She had been in another world and hadn’t heard Lily come up to them.
    Lily Sutter had just started working at the bakery and was a young girl in her early twenties. Short blonde hair framed her delicate face and her pale blue eyes looked tired.“Thank you, Lily.” Darcy held her cup out as the girl filled it for her. Darcy studied her as she turned to fill Grace’s cup.
    “Do you like working here Lily?” Darcy asked, a sudden curiosity about the girl making her ask.
    “Oh yes, I like it very much,” she answered. “It’s so much better than the restaurant where I used to work in Edgeport. I was really worried when it closed. It’s so hard to get a job these days, you know, and I thought that I might have to move to the city to find one. Helen has been a lifesaver for me.” Edgeport was a slightly larger town, nearer to the coast, a few miles east of Misty Hollow. Darcy knew that Lily had lived in Misty Hollow all of her life, and had commuted to Edgeport each day for her job at the restaurant, but other than that she knew hardly anything about her.
    She smiled at the girl. “You know I don’t think you and I have ever had a chance to chat. How are things going for you?”
    “Things are going fine, except I got into a big fight with my brother, Robbie, this morning. It’s tough having him live with me.”
    Darcy didn’t know that Lily had a brother. “Is he an older brother?”
    “Yes, though you’d never know it. He couldn’t get a job after he finished college so he decided to come back here to live with me for a while. Lucky me, right? Problem is now that our parents are gone and the family home was sold he didn’t really have a home to come back to. So I couldn’t just turn him out on the street.”
    “That was good of you to take him in.” Darcy hadn’t even realized Lily had a brother. “I hope your argument with him wasn’t anything too bad.”
    “Nah, just typical sibling stuff,” she said dismissively as she left and went back behind the counter to serve some other customers.
     

Chapter Two
     
    Darcy peered at herself in the bathroom mirror as she painstakingly applied the new eyeshadow and blush she’d purchased. She almost never wore makeup. It felt so strange to see her face like this. She was quietly humming a tune to steady her nerves. She had a few butterflies in her stomach which she thought was quite ridiculous. It wasn’t as if she didn’t know Jon. Not like she’d never gone on a date before.
    Her cat Smudge came into the room and sat stoically watching her for a moment. Then he jumped up onto the vanity and tried to rub up against her. She gently pushed