Read Trouble Under the Tree (A Nina Quinn Mystery) for Free Online Page A

With his arthritis, it might take hours.
“Wait here. I’ll get it.”
    He patted my cheek. “You’re a good girl, Nina
Quinn.”
    “Yeah, yeah,” I mumbled, sliding over the
granite ledge.
    The crowd’s boos grew louder as I carefully
crawled across the tree skirt. I hoped that if anyone saw me,
they’d think I was trying to fix the lights.
    I carefully avoided the large boxes. As I
neared the ball, which had settled against the trunk of the tree, I
scooted around one last present and stopped short when I saw a shoe
laying next to the box. It was a sensible red pump.
    Odd.
    Then I noticed a clump of gray curls poking
out from under the box as well, and I started to get a bad feeling.
A very bad feeling.
    I gulped and oh-so-casually lifted the
box.
    Oh no. Oh. No. Ohnoohnoohnoohnoohno!
    “Nina!” Jenny yelled in a harsh whisper as
she crawled toward me. “What are you doing?”
    “We have a problem,” I said, leaning back
into a crouch.
    “No kidding. Did you figure out what’s wrong
with the lights?”
    “It’s a bigger problem.”
    Impatiently, she snapped, “What could
possibly be a bigger problem right now?”
    My gaze met hers as she reached my side. “I
found Mrs. Claus.”
    “Oh, thank God. Now Benny can stop freaking
out. Where?” she looked around the room.
    I pointed under the box.
    “Why would she be in there? I can just kick
myself for hiring those McCorkle sisters. Nothing but trouble. Is
she sleeping?”
    “Kind of,” I said. “She’s dead.”
     
     

Chapter Four
     
    “Dead?” Jenny gasped.
    Suddenly, the tree lit up over our heads and
the crowd cheered, a raucous roar. They were oblivious to the
trouble brewing under the tree, which was probably a good
thing.
    Jenny had gone pale, and the colored lights
on her face made her look polka-dotted. “Are you sure she’s dead?
Maybe she’s just sick or something?”
    “Not one hundred percent, but I’ve seen a few
dead bodies and she looks pretty dead. The bulging eyes, the puffed
out lips...”
    “Oh dear God, stop. I think I’m going to be
sick.”
    I clamped my lips together and looked around
at the crowd. They’d launched into “Jingle Bells” and were swaying
together like they were at a Bon Jovi concert. I expected lighters
to be held up any second now.
    “We need to call the police,” I said. Wait.
The police were here. “We need to find Kevin.”
    She clamped down on my arm. “Now?”
    “Yes,” I said slowly, drawing the word out
into four syllables. “They need to know what’s happened.”
    Jenny glanced around. “Can’t we wait until
later? Until after we close?”
    I stared at her.
    “What?” she said. “She’s already dead! What’s
a few more hours?”
    I forgave her thinking because she’d been
under a lot of stress lately, but there was no way I was leaving
Fairlane under that box all day.
    “We have to,” I said firmly, in my best
stepmother tone.
    “Oh my.” She began to rock.
    I felt movement to my left and saw Flash
belly-crawling over to us, slow as an inchworm. “Nina, where’s my
ball?”
    I reached over, grabbed the ball, and handed
it to him as he wriggled up to us.
    “Whatcha got there?” he asked, nodding to the
box.
    I was still holding the corner of it off the
ground.
    “A dead Mrs. Claus,” I said softly, still not
quite believing what I was seeing.
    Jenny wailed.
    Flash looked at me, gauged my sincerity, then
peeked under the box. He came up shouting, “Call 9-1-1! We need an
ambulance!”
    He could shout amazingly loud for an old
guy.
    “Jingle Bells” immediately silenced, and
Flash flipped the giant present over, revealing the body
beneath.
    Gasps went through the crowd in an echoing
wave. Mothers covered their children’s eyes. Gawkers moved in for a
closer look.
    Flash leaned over Fairlane to check for a
pulse but drew his hand back. A pair of elf tights was wrapped
around her throat, looking like a red- and green-striped scarf.
    My stomach flipped, then flopped.