Fruit of the Poisoned Tree Read Online Free Page B

Emil shrugged and shook his head. “I’m sure that will take care of the problem. Especially since what he really needs is a boot in his rear. If you had a husband, like Sofia’s brother, Angelo, he’d know what I’m talking about.” He continued ranting in Sicilian as he walked back toward his shop.
    Peggy thanked him, not sure what else to say, then hurried into the Potting Shed to get away from his tirade. With her back against the door, she looked up to find Sam and her shop assistant, Selena Rogers, who’d come in for the afternoon, staring at her.
    “What happened?” Selena asked. “You look like someone chased you in here.”
    Peggy took off her heavy purple jacket, unwound the red scarf from her neck. “Mr. Balducci wants me to hire his nephew to run the shop.”
    “Does he want you to marry his brother-in-law again?” Sam laughed, his even, white teeth gleaming against his darkly tanned face.
    “Of course. I’m sure one day I’ll have to meet him.” Peggy picked up the mail and looked through it, tossing away some ads for life insurance. “How are you, Selena? How did it go while I was gone? Any strange requests?”
    Selena shrugged her thin shoulders, her blond hair sliding against her neck. “It was about like February. It’s cold outside. It’s hard for most people to think about planting yet. But there was this one guy. He wanted to plant a whole yard full of stuff right now.”
    “Oh yeah.” Sam zipped up his jacket. “I forgot to tell you about him. Mr. Crawford. He offered me a thousand dollar bonus if I could get enough plants in his yard to make his wife think they were there already when the house was built. I think it’s one of those treeless wonders from over in Pineville.”
    Peggy stopped opening her garden catalogues. “What did you say to him?”
    “It was hard, but we both said no.” Selena looked at Sam. “First of all, none of those plants would survive right now. How happy would he be after his wife pulled up into a yard filled with dead plants? It was a crazy, desperate idea.”
    Sam shook his head. “I offered to plant anything that might live, but none of it would have tons of flowers and green leaves. Apparently Mr. Crawford told his wife, who was still out of state, that everything blooms here all the time and their yard was filled with flowers and trees.”
    “If there had been any way at all,” Selena finished, “we would’ve shared that money. It would’ve made the Potting Shed’s bottom line skyrocket for the month, too.”
    “It’s just as well you didn’t do it.” Peggy put down the mail and picked up the phone. “It would’ve ended in disaster. And we all know he would’ve blamed us. So I guess we’ll have to do something the old-fashioned way to remind our normal customers spring is closer than they think. Pull up the customer list on the computer, Selena. Let’s come up with a sales flyer to send to everyone. By the way, I love your hair.”
    The younger woman smiled and fingered her new, shorter cut. “I was mostly trying to get that awful blue color out I put in over the summer when I went to that pool party. I’m thinking about going darker. Dark hair is really popular right now. What do you think?”
    “I already told you what I think,” Sam responded as he picked up a hundred pound bag of bulbs from the floor like it was a child’s toy. “You don’t have the coloring to go dark. Unless you’re going to dye your lashes and brows. You’d just look spooky.”
    “Okay, Thor. Thanks.” Selena turned to Peggy. “I meant what do you think?”
    “I agree with Thor, I mean, Sam,” Peggy replied with a laugh. “Sorry, honey. Let me make this phone call, and we’ll talk.” She dialed the number of one of their local distributors and ordered two fifty pound bags of Jerusalem artichokes.
    Selena and Sam were still bickering about Selena’s hair color when Peggy got off the phone. She ignored it. The two were good-natured, even