Tumbling Blocks Read Free Page A

that matched the house. I sat on the edge of their king-size bed and moaned out loud. “Amtrak is delivering Kathryn today, and I’m nowhere near ready for her.”
    Kathryn Smith Ortiz, my husband, Gabe’s, long-widowed mother, was a retired fifth grade schoolteacher. We’d met a few years ago when Gabe and I were first married and we’d flown back to Wichita so I could be officially presented to his mother, his twin sisters and a large array of friends and family. It was a second marriage for both Gabe and me. Because it happened so quickly and without her knowledge of my existence, Kathryn had, with great reluctance, accepted me as her new daughter-in-law. This year, when his two sisters ended up having other plans for Christmas, Gabe, in an uncharacteristically impulsive moment, invited Kathryn to our house here in San Celina on the Central Coast of California.
    “Come spend the holidays with Benni and me. It’ll be great,” he’d said on the phone to her last week while I stared at him in unbelieving horror. He completely ignored my frantic finger-across-the-throat gesture.
    “You’ll love San Celina at Christmas,” he continued. “There’s no snow, but the town really goes all out for the holidays. If you arrive on Friday, you’ll be able to see the Christmas parade Saturday morning. Benni and her dad are riding their horses in it.” When he hung up, his handsome brown face was animated with boyish excitement. “My mom’s coming here for Christmas!”
    “Did it ever occur to you to ask me before you asked her?” My tone and expression were somewhere between snappish and whining. It was not, I know, an attractive combination.
    He cocked his head, his blue-gray eyes confused and slightly hurt. “You don’t want my mom to come to our home for Christmas?”
    I sighed, shook my head and lied my socks off. “Of course I do. It’s just that it was so . . . unplanned.” I’m certain my smile was less than convincing. She’s my mother-in-law, I wanted to scream. Do you have any idea what kind of preparation is necessary to get ready for her visit? It occurred to me at that moment that she was arriving on Friday the thirteenth. How appropriate. The Wicked Witch of the West music from The Wizard of Oz echoed through my brain.
    “You’re always saying I need to be more spontaneous,” he said, his tone accusing.
    I smiled at him again, trying to tune out the ominous music in my head. To be honest, it was good to see my normally stressed-out, police chief husband excited about something. He’d been sad and quiet since the death of his cousin Luis last month. We’d both come through a tough time because of the tragic circumstances surrounding it and were just now tentatively talking about what happened. I’d been looking forward to a peaceful holiday at my dad’s ranch with my gramma Dove in charge of the whole shebang, something she still loved to do. Now, it looked like I’d have to switch to warp speed to prepare our house for my mother-in-law’s arrival.
    “It’ll be fun,” I lied again, wrapping my arms around his waist. What was that saying, fake it until you make it? Maybe I could fake it until I felt it.
    “Kathryn arrives at the Amtrak station at six p.m.,” I said to Elvia, lying back on her bed and throwing my forearm over my eyes. “Can I just stay here until New Year’s?”
    “Is she bringing her dog?” Elvia faced me, her hair fashioned into a classy French twist.
    “Bite your tongue!” I said, horrified at the thought. “If God has any compassion for me at all, that animal will not leave the state of Kansas. You know I love dogs, but I make an exception for Daphne. To be honest, I don’t think she’s really a dog. She’s a gargoyle come to life.”
    My mother-in-law’s Boston terrier, Daphne, had taken an instant dislike to me the minute I stepped over the threshold of Gabe’s childhood home in Derby, Kansas. Nothing I tried could win that dog over, which had made