Silence of the Lamb's Wool (A Yarn Retreat Mystery) Read Online Free Page B

were always on the weekend, which meant our lives would be intersecting when I was doing my best to keep some distance between us. So when the Amazing Dr. Sammy offered to do an encore to his audition, I extricated myself from the group. Cora and Madeleine were front and center and I heard them talking as I walked away.
    Cora spoke directly to Kevin St. John, saying, “You’re doing such a wonderful job with Vista Del Mar. I like all these changes. Edmund would so approve,” she added with a bright sound in her voice.
    Edmund?

3

    “Hey, Casey, long time, no see,” Alison said as I sailed into the gift shop. I used to see her almost daily when the shop had a coffee wagon, where my muffins had been offered along with the coffee drinks and assorted other snacks. But once the café opened, the gift store had been rearranged and a display of T-shirts and fleece jackets with the Vista Del Mar insignia had taken over the spot where the coffee wagon used to sit. Two sides of the shop were almost all windows, which gave a good view of the grounds.
    As I greeted Alison, I looked through the window behind her and noticed Burton Fiore rejoining Cora and Madeleine. It was interesting watching him without hearing what he was saying. His gestures seemed a little over the top as he greeted the sisters.
    “I’m here about the yarn,” I said, turning my attention back inside. When I’d first made the arrangements for the retreat, I’d talked to Alison about carrying yarn and supplies for the retreaters, but also for the other guests of Vista Del Mar. It turned out that when other guests saw the retreat group working with yarn, it inspired them to do the same.
    “All taken care of.” Alison came from behind the counter and walked me over to an empty gondola that already had a sign that read YARN . There were empty baskets just waiting to be filled with colorful fibers, and containers for needles and hooks. “Someone from Cadbury Yarn is supposed to come by today.”
    I was a little disappointed, because I’d been hoping the yarn would already be there. But my early birds weren’t arriving until the afternoon anyway. “I’m stopping by Cadbury Yarn. I’ll double check with them.” Two men wearing matching red polo shirts came into the small store and began to look around. A moment later a woman in sandals and a pale green stretchy outfit walked in.
    I left Alison to her customers and was startled by the change in the main room of the Lodge when I exited the store. There were more people in the red polo shirts milling around near the registration counter. There seemed to be a lot of others who resembled the woman in stretchy clothes as well. Kevin St. John was in the midst of it all and I figured out these must be two retreat groups he’d made the arrangements for.
    I played my own game of “let’s figure out what kind of retreat were they here for” as I got closer. The yoga mats were a giveaway for the people in stretchy clothes. There were a lot more of the red polo shirt crowd and they were a little harder to figure out. But after hearing a few bits of conversation, I got that they were from all over the country and were here for a managers’ retreat. I wondered if the business group had heard that their cell phones were useless and it was ixnay on the Wi-Fi.
    The morning was slipping away and I still had things to do before I got back here to greet my pre-retreaters. As I neared the café, the pungent smell of freshly ground coffee reminded me that I’d planned to stop there. I’d just get the coffee to go.
    There was a hum of voices as I walked into the corner room and I noticed that Jane was talking to someone standing at the counter. The room was almost the mirror image of the gift shop, with the same two walls of windows, making it feel like it was almost outside. I noted the sky had turned a brighter shade of white. As I got closer I heard something about a problem just before the man standing by the counter