Between the Sheets Read Free Page A

kissed.” Because even if there was a likely suspect out there, he wouldn’t be looking at me.
    She jumped off her bunk and grabbed my arm. “Strap that dress on and let’s get out of here, because it won’t happen sitting in this cracker box.”
    In the end, I let her tie my dress and lend me some lipstick and even fix my hair in a semi-cute little up-do. Giving in was easier than fighting Hurricane Krista.

Chapter 4
    “I feel naked,” I murmured in Krista’s general direction. She was half a step ahead of me on her way into the lodge’s dining area.
    She turned and glared over the top of her glasses, a look made even sterner by the hard line of her bangs. She’d taken out the ponytail and her straight dark hair fell to a precise finish just above her shoulders. “Ball up.”
    The sun-dress and hoodie combo hadn’t bugged me during the ferry ride, and sitting at the edge of a conference room had been okay, but wearing something so far out of character in front of a group of professional acquaintances, coworkers, and friends made me want to hide under a trench coat. The cleavage had dropped at least two inches since we’d left the cabin, and without shorts I’d have no crotch protection if my skirt blew up.
    “P. Kirk at ten o’clock,” Krista said,
sotto voce
.
    I locked my knees to keep from bolting. “What’s the P stand for, anyway?”
    “Performance.” In her pink dress that looked like it was borrowed from a ’60s housewife, Krista smirked and strutted off in the approximate direction of ten o’clock.
    Rather than follow her, I glanced around the room for some other familiar faces. My fellow music teachers filled about half the seats in the dining hall, a huge room with windows looking out onto the beach and a bar in one corner. Each of the round tables could hold eight or ten people. The color scheme was built around watery greens and blues, with the kind of easy-to-clean, indestructible furniture found in places catering to the anonymous public.
    The grade-school teachers had congregated in one corner so I headed in their direction, ignoring Krista’s hiss. Predominately middle-aged and female, they were a safe group on which to try out my new look. I’d accrued several compliments and at least one person had asked where I shopped when something large and warm tapped on my shoulder.
    I jerked around. “Yeah?”
    Kirk Ringdahl handed me a glass of white wine. “Krista sent me over with this. You should come join us.”
    My jaw dropped open, though in the back of my mind I could hear Mom telling me to shut my mouth because I looked like a fish. “Sure.”
    His jovial smile forced his chin deeper into his neck, and though his hairline might have receded since the last retreat, he’d spent more time in the gym to compensate. And his smarmy attention implied I was some kind of prize.
Eek
.
    While I was still floundering, he brushed my arm with his fingertips and led the way to his table. I followed, doing my best not to stumble on my sandals’ tiny heels. Krista greeted me with a little round of silent, mission-accomplished applause.
    Which wasn’t obvious at all, except to anyone sitting at the table with two eyes and as many brain cells to rub together.
    Kirk made an overproduction out of pulling me into the chair next to his, giving me yet another reason for embarrassment. Across the table, Jessica Freeman kept her beady hawk’s eye on every move I made. She was a high school choir director, therefore closer to Kirk in social standing, and her vibe made it clear she did not appreciate my presence.
    In addition to Jessica, four other members of P. Kirk’s rooting section were taking me in with varying degrees of hostility. They all had good solid music-teacher names, like Jenny, Elaine, Karen, or Theresa. Except those weren’t their actual names. I forgot them as soon as Kirk said them, and decided, at least in my own head, they were all named Sue. Old Sue, Not-As-Old Sue,