EXCERPT FROM BETRAYED - A romantic suspense novel | Page 37

BETRAYED

tree in the little vestibule. It wobbled on the hook, threatening
to fall off. She firmed it up and hurried through the hall to the
bathroom. There she grabbed the bottle of pink stuff from the
medicine cabinet and carried it to the kitchen to get a
tablespoon.
She and Mary Margaret sat together at the green Formica
kitchen table while a pot of coffee brewed on the old stove.
Then Maude poured a cup and let it warm her insides while her
daughter had a glass of milk.
Mary Margaret wrote down everything that could be
important on a lined yellow pad, but tears kept spilling out of
her pale blue eyes and trickled down her flushed cheeks to land
in little patches on the paper.
Maude ventured, “If this was one of them Nancy Drew
stories you’re readin’ all the time, what would happen now?
Would Laurie walk in the front door in a couple of hours and
make us feel like fools for worrying like we are?”
Mary Margaret thought for a moment. “No, Mama. I don’t
think that’s what would happen at all.” She pushed the chrome
chair back under the table.
Even though she had tried hard to act like Nancy Drew, she
finally put both arms around her mother and laid her head on
Maude’s shoulder. Her voice trembled. “I’m so scared for
Laurie, Mama. If this was one of my books, she’d be in real
trouble!”

31