When Snow Falls

“But we’ll be playing into it,” Eve argued. “And do you really think we have to go so far as to change the name?”

Cheyenne studied the Victorian-style building just beyond the black-iron filigree fence that surrounded the cemetery. All the Christmas garland and lights made the inn look magical, but underneath the decorations it needed caulking and paint and some dry-rot repair. New plumbing, too. “Saving the inn will require a total makeover, Eve. The place should get a new name to go with it. That feels like a clean start. And I like calling it Little Mary’s. Adding ‘Gold Country’s Only Haunted Bed-and-Breakfast,’ softens the darkness of it.”

“My parents don’t agree.” Eve kicked at the snow.

“Things are different than when they were in charge.”

“You mean the Russos hadn’t opened A Room with a View,” she grumbled. “Still…” She sighed. “I can’t help feeling bad about using what happened to Mary to book rooms.”

“We’re trying to save her home.” An idea occurred to Chey that brought her to her feet. “Hey, maybe we can save the inn and do her a favor at the same time.”

Eve’s eyebrows slid up. “What are you talking about?”

“What if we get Unsolved Mysteries or one of those shows to come out here and do a segment on Mary’s murder, see if they can convince forensic profilers and detectives to take a look at the scene and try to solve the case?”

Eve blew on her hands, then rubbed them together. “How would we even reach the right people?”

“Are you kidding? One of our best friends owns a PR company. If Gail can’t get in touch with the producer, I bet her movie-star husband has contacts who could. Simon might even be willing to do a guest spot on the show, to mention that this inn is in his wife’s hometown. We’d be a shoe-in if Simon’s name was attached.”

“I don’t want to impose on him, Chey. He already sent us those movie props for our new haunted house theme—not that we’ll be able to use them now that we’re going with a restoration.”

“He won’t mind,” she said. “It wouldn’t take more than an hour of his time. Just a quick cameo appearance. Come on. Getting the B and B on a show like that would be great PR for our grand reopening. We’d blow the competition away. It might also bring Mary some peace.” She bent closer to Eve. “Think about it. What if we finally solve the mystery?”

Grooves of concern appeared in Eve’s normally smooth forehead. “That would be great, but does it mean we hold off on the renovations until these forensic people have a look?” Now that her parents had retired and left her in charge, her first consideration was, and had to be, how to cover the mortgage payments, especially now that her parents had done all they could to help financially. “Because I can’t really do that,” she added. “Riley’s about the only one, besides you, who isn’t going on the cruise on Sunday and part of the reason he’s staying is to start the improvements so we can reopen in January.”

Eve and five other friends were taking a ten-day Caribbean cruise for the holidays. They were leaving this weekend and wouldn’t get back until the day after Christmas.

“We won’t have to change the schedule,” Cheyenne said. “We’re not renovating the basement.” No one had ever changed anything down there, which gave her hope that, one way or another, the mystery could be solved.

The darkening sky threatened another storm. Eve stood as she glanced up. “It’s a long shot that they’d be able to tell anything after a century and a half.”

“A long shot is better than no shot at all. Even if they don’t end up solving the crime, we’d get the PR. It’s a national show. You can’t buy publicity like that.”

Linking her arm through Chey’s, Eve pulled her toward the shelter of the inn. “Okay, fine. We’ll see what we can do to get their interest, but not until after I’m back and the holidays are over.”

“That should work,” Cheyenne said as they walked. “But why aren’t you more excited? It’s exactly what we need to get the word out.”

“You’re right. I’m just…stressed. It’s a great idea. Gail’s going to be mad she didn’t come up with it first.” Eve gave her a conspirator’s smile, but it disappeared almost immediately. “How’s your mother doing?”

Cheyenne didn’t want to dwell on the cantankerous woman who awaited her at the end of each day. She had only a couple of hours until she was off work, hours that would pass far too soon. Then Presley would head over to the casino and she’d be in for another endless night with Anita. “She’s hanging in there.”

“How much longer do you think she’ll last?”

“Who knows? The doctor says it could be a few days or a few weeks.”

Eve stopped, jerking Cheyenne to a stop with her. “Maybe I should cancel my trip. I’ve been thinking of doing that, anyway.”

“No.” Cheyenne wasn’t willing to let Eve miss the cruise she’d scrimped and saved for, the vacation she’d talked about for twenty-four months.

“But what if your mother dies while we’re gone? You’d have to deal with that all by yourself.” She lowered her voice even though there wasn’t anyone around to overhear. “Lord knows Presley’s not much support.”

“Presley does what she can. And your folks are here. I’m sure they’d offer me whatever I need.” The cold was beginning to seep into Cheyenne’s bones. Suddenly anxious to get inside, she tugged Eve to get her moving again. “Anyway, I don’t think any of our friends particularly want to go to Anita’s funeral.”

“We’re all too angry at her to like her very much,” she admitted. “But we want to be there for you.”

“You are. Always.”

“I can’t believe the cancer came back, and that she went downhill so fast.”

“It’s bad timing, what with Christmas and all. But you can’t miss the cruise. There’s no canceling at this late date. You wouldn’t be able to get a refund.”

Eve made a sound of impatience. “I had no business spending that money in the first place. If I’d had any idea we wouldn’t recover after A Room with a View opened…”

Chey held the gate as they passed through. “I know. But look at it this way. The money’s spent. We have a plan for rescuing the inn. And Anita will probably survive until the new year. She may have her faults, but she’s tough. No one could argue with that.”

Once they reached the welcome mat, Eve stomped the dampness from her boots. “I wish you were going with us.”

So did Cheyenne. But she hadn’t even made an effort. She’d known from the onset, when the idea had first been proposed during one of their Friday morning get-togethers at the coffee shop, that she’d never be able to afford the trip. The Harmons paid her what they could, but she didn’t make a lot. And either her mother or her sister always needed financial help. “I don’t have a birth certificate, remember? I can’t get a passport without one.”

“We could’ve gotten a copy of your birth certificate somehow.”

“Not if my mother can’t remember where I was born!”

A roll of the eyes told Chey what Eve thought of that. What mother didn’t have this information? “There has to be another way to find it. We just need to do the research.”

Cheyenne knew it would be a lot harder to come up with than Eve imagined. There weren’t even many pictures of her and Presley as children. For several years they’d lived out of a car, which made it impossible to collect much memorabilia. Even Presley’s birth certificate had fallen by the wayside when, shortly after Anita was diagnosed with cancer for the first time, they’d come back to the motel where they’d been staying to find the manager had thrown all their stuff away because Anita hadn’t been able to come up with the payment.

Cheyenne had shared that incident with Eve and the others. But she hadn’t told them about the blonde woman in her dreams, how any type of snowfall made her feel bereft, or the suspicions that went along with her earliest memories. Intimating that her mother might’ve kidnapped her would be a very serious accusation. And she wasn’t sure she could trust that the images in her mind were accurate. She needed some sort of proof before she went that far.

“I’ll be fine here,” she said. “I’m overseeing the renovations for you.”

“My folks could’ve done that. They’re not leaving to visit my aunt until February.”

Cheyenne slipped into the warmth of the inn and was immediately enveloped by the scent of the expensive pine-and-mulberry potpourri they purchased to impress their guests. “This way they won’t have to,” she said, but she knew it wasn’t going to be easy to face Christmas with all her friends gone, her mother dying and the inn closed for remodeling.

3

Presley sat next to her mother’s bed, chain-smoking while watching her sleep. Part of her felt guilty about spewing carcinogens into the air Anita was breathing. She knew Chey would have sent her to the porch if she were home. But it was cold outside, and Presley didn’t see how a little secondhand smoke could make any difference now.

The small TV on the dresser droned on in the background. They were supposed to be watching The Bold and the Beautiful. It was their favorite soap; they’d followed it for years. But her mother was so drugged she could hardly keep her eyes open. She drifted in and out of consciousness, scarcely aware that Presley was in the room.

Once again, the morphine on the nightstand drew Presley’s attention. She’d already taken a swallow of it, but she was tempted to drink more—or head over to the blue shack down the hill where she could buy crystal meth. She had to be careful not to take too much of her mother’s supply. The state would provide only a limited amount. The hospice nurse, who came in every Monday, kept a close eye on it, and so did Cheyenne.

Anita moaned, shifting as if she couldn’t get comfortable, and opened her eyes. Then she saw Presley and made an attempt to rally. “What’s happening…on our show?”

She recognized the voices of the actors, knew what she was supposed to be doing even though she’d been asleep for twenty minutes or more.

“Nothing new,” Presley replied to cover for the fact that she hadn’t really been watching, either.