where you pay someone to criticize your weight, your hair, your skin, etc.? My mom does that for free.”
Trixie choked on the mini Snickers bar she had just shoved into her mouth. After she took a sip of her Coke, and stopped coughing, she said, “No one at the spa will benegative to you about your looks, unless you ask them to be. Just don’t select the fitness evaluation or sign up for time with the personal trainer.” Trixie grabbed another Halloween candy bar from the dish on Skye’s desk. “Sign up for massages, and facials, and manicures, and pedicures instead.”
“Easy for you to say. You don’t mind people seeing you naked.” Skye glowered at her friend, who was still stuffing her face with chocolate. “You’ve been a size four since I met you our freshman year in high school. You don’t exercise, you eat your weight in snack food, and you never gain an ounce. The spa people would love you.”
Trixie got out of her chair, walked around the desk, and bent down to hug Skye. “No one will say anything about you, except to comment on your amazing eyes, your fantastic hair, and your beautiful skin.” Trixie straightened and curled both hands into fists. “And if they do say anything that upsets you, I’ll take care of them.”
Skye swallowed, touched by Trixie’s fierce loyalty. “I know you would, but that’s not the point. I still—”
“Please, please, please, say we can go. Together we can help the new owners, plus I need you! If I’m home for Thanksgiving, I’ll have to cook for Owen’s entire family—all forty-eight of them. I’ll have to clean the house from top to bottom, and Owen and I will get into a big fight because he’ll be too busy with the farm to help me. And I swore the last time it was our turn to host the holiday, if his uncle and aunt and their five bratty kids stayed with us, I was divorcing Owen.” Trixie hugged Skye. “Please save my marriage.”
Skye had never noticed how little time there was between Halloween and Thanksgiving, until she woke the morning of Wednesday, November 26, and realized that the Bruefeld Mansion vandal was still at large, and Trixie had not been talked out of spending the holiday weekend at the spa with Skye, acting as Scumble River’s newest Charlie’s Angels.
Groaning, Skye pulled the covers up over her head. She’d been blocking this day from her thoughts for the past couple of weeks, hoping the spa owners would catch their vandal, call, and tell her they had no need for her services.
Unhappily, Margot hadn’t phoned, and Trixie hadn’t suddenly decided she’d rather be with her relatives for Thanksgiving. Willing or not, Skye was spending her long holiday weekend at the Scumble River Spa. On a positive note, she’d always wanted to stay in a cursed mansion with a hidden treasure. Heck, maybe she’d even meet a prince, or a duke, or at the very least an earl.
Yes, that was the attitude to take. This was an adventure. She’d just need to be firm about the spa treatments, and decline any that required nudity or stepping on a scale. She’d spend her time at the indoor swimming pool, and show up only for fun activities like facials and pedicures.
As she often told her students—occasionally, everyone had to do things they didn’t want to. How you handled those situations was what defined you as a person.
Which meant, she’d better get moving. She kicked the bedclothes off and sat up. A brief phone call to her brother secured his services as a pet sitter for her cat Bingo, and after a quick shower, she ran some errands and packed. Skye was lugging her suitcase out the front door when Trixie’s car roared into the driveway. It was exactly eleven forty-five, check-in was at noon, and Trixie had made it clear that she didn’t want to miss a moment of her free weekend.
Skye was still fretting over what she had packed when she climbed into the passenger seat. Maybe she should have bought some of those fancy exercise outfits