A Christmas Howl (6 page)

“You're wrong,” Eileen said quickly. She spun back to face Peg. “Michael didn't steal anything. That's not what happened.”

“Is that what he told you? If so, it isn't true.”

“It's entirely true. The money Nana gave Michael was family money. It had been earned by his father. Nana inherited it upon his death, but it was intended to be passed on to the children when she died.”

“But—”

“But nothing,” Eileen interrupted briskly. “You, of
all
people, should understand. You who knew exactly what Nana was like. She expected everyone to obey her wishes, to adhere to her rules, to accept her standards of behavior as their own.”

In spite of herself, Peg gave a small nod.

“Nana was a force of nature. And woe to the child of hers who fell short of her expectations in any way.” Eileen nailed Peg with a hard stare. “As Max found out to his detriment.”

Eileen didn't say the words. She didn't have to.

“I believe we're discussing your husband,” Peg shot back. “Not mine.”

Eileen shrugged. “In their mother's eyes, both were guilty of terrible transgressions, were they not?”

“The two things weren't comparable at all,” Peg snapped. “Not even close.”

“And yet Nana never forgave Max for choosing you against her wishes, did she? Their relationship never recovered after that. And Nana certainly never accepted
you
.”

“That hardly matters now,” Peg said shortly.

“I think it does. Since you're the one who has the nerve to come into my house, and sit on my couch, and tell me what you think my husband has done wrong. As if you have the mistaken impression that you
deserve
to have an opinion on the matter. No wonder Nana didn't think you were good enough for Max. Your actions today have proven it.”

That complaint was an old one, ancient even. Peg told herself that the rebuke had long since lost its sharp sting.

“Those are fine words,” she said. “Coming as they do from the wife of a thief.”

“Oh please.” Eileen flicked a hand through the air, waving the accusation away. “There's no need to be melodramatic. Michael helped himself to an advance on his inheritance, so what? He was Nana's oldest son. The money was his due. Nana wasn't hurt by that. At her age, she had plenty of money left to live on.”

“If you think this is only about the money,” Peg retorted, “then you're deliberately missing the point. How can you possibly believe that Nana wasn't hurt when she found out that she'd been betrayed by her own child?”

A fleeting shadow passed over Eileen's face. In the moment before her expression cleared, she looked uncertain. And briefly troubled. Was it possible, Peg wondered, that even now—after Nana's will had been read and her remaining assets distributed—that Eileen had been unaware of the true extent of her mother-in-law's knowledge?

Peg didn't have long to ponder that, however, because Eileen was already moving on. “You ask entirely too many questions,” she said. “And I've already been too patient. You wanted answers and I've given them to you. If you don't like what you've heard, that's hardly my problem.”

Eileen cast one last withering glance at Peg, then turned and walked out of the room. Peg stood. She gathered her coat around her and followed.

“Why did you and Michael invite us here for Christmas?” she said. She wondered if her sister-in-law would reply, but Eileen just shrugged.

“That was Michael's doing. He asked me to extend the invitation. At first I was surprised by that. But then I thought about how stubborn Max is. Now that Nana is gone, he would never have made the first move toward a family reconciliation. It was up to Michael to be the bigger man.”

“Oh pish.” Peg snorted. “The bigger man indeed. Michael only wanted Max here so that he could show off what a success he was.”

“So what if he did? There's nothing wrong with that.”

Peg opened her mouth, then snapped it shut. She had nothing more to say.

They reached the front door together. Eileen placed her hand on the knob, but paused before turning it. “Earlier . . . when you arrived . . . you mentioned the children.”

“I did.” Peg wasn't proud of using that threat, but it had served its purpose.

“Frank and Melanie idolized Nana. And of course, they adore their father. If they were to hear of this conversation . . .”

“They might find themselves acquainted with the truth?”

“
Your
truth,” Eileen said sharply. “Not ours.”

Peg had always thought that truth was absolute. But apparently, according to her sister-in-law, it was open to interpretation.

“I'd rather you didn't tell them about this,” said Eileen.

Even without the request, Peg wouldn't have. There was no need. Still she relished the small moment of power, perhaps the only one she'd ever had within this family.

“You want
me
to do
you
a favor?”

“What I want,” Eileen said firmly, “is for you to behave like a responsible adult. Children process things differently. It's better to shield them from events that they're too young to think through for themselves.”

More duplicity, Peg thought. Michael and Eileen were the perfect couple. The two of them deserved each other.

Interpreting Peg's silence as refusal, Eileen said in a snide tone, “Then again, since you've never had children of your own, you probably wouldn't understand what I'm talking about.”

“I understand not wanting to hurt someone needlessly,” Peg said quietly. She ran her fingers quickly down the row of buttons on the front of her coat and opened the door herself. “You don't have to worry about my disillusioning your children. They won't hear the truth from me.”

Eileen placed a hand on Peg's arm. “Give me your promise.”

Peg lifted a brow. “Would it mean anything to you?”

“Just promise,” Eileen repeated. “Please?”

And Peg did.

 

 

“You'll never guess where I spent the afternoon,” Peg said to Max later that evening. They were sitting once more in front of the fire, both of them keeping a sharp eye on Bonnie, who was lying between them, panting.

The Standard Poodle had been growing increasingly restless all day. Despite the fact that a cozy whelping box had been set up in their bedroom for a week, Bonnie had been burrowing beneath the bed and trying to nest in the closet. It wouldn't be long now. Salute had been banished to the kennel for the time being, and neither Max nor Peg intended to let the black bitch out of their sight.

“Where?” Max asked. Truthfully, he was more interested in what Bonnie was doing than what Peg had to say.

“With Imelda Grissom.”

“Don't tell me she's signed you up for another committee.”

“No,” Peg replied. “We talked about something else entirely.”

Max lifted his gaze but didn't ask the obvious question. As the silence stretched between them, Peg realized there was a reason for that. He'd already guessed the purpose of their conversation. And why shouldn't he? Her husband had been sitting on his mother's last letter for a year.

“Nothing to do with me, I hope,” Max said finally.

All evening Peg had wondered what she would say when this moment came. She'd gone looking for information because she'd been sure that knowing would make her feel better. But now that she had the answers she had sought, she found she only felt worse. Where was the justice in that? Where was the justice in any of this?

Peg wanted to share the story she'd unearthed. It
needed
to be told.

But Max's answer was unambiguous. His expression was clear. His eyes reflected the trust they'd built between them through the years.

And Peg had never been able to deny her husband anything.

“No,” she said softly. “It was nothing to do with you.”

 

There's nothing lovelier than Christmas in Connecticut, but Melanie can scarcely find a moment to enjoy the festivities. With her youngest son approaching toddlerhood, she's decided to return to her old job at Howard Academy, a posh private school attended by the children of Greenwich's well-heeled gentry. Balancing work, motherhood, and the hectic dog show circuit takes some fancy footwork, especially when the headmaster taps her to be the chairman of the school's Christmas bazaar.

 

The bazaar is Howard Academy's biggest and most important fund-raiser, so Melanie feels pressured to make it a huge success. She even enlists her long-suffering sister-in-law Bertie to help with the Santa Claus and Pets Photo Booth. But everything goes awry when a prize show dog goes missing and Santa turns up dead. The dog's owner is one of the school's most perfectly pedigreed alums, and she enlists Melanie to help find the purloined pooch. But just as Melanie starts pawing at the truth, she digs up a sleighful of sinister secrets that leaves everyone feeling less than merry . . .

“Here,” said Bertie, handing me a slicker brush. “Don't just stand there. Make yourself useful.”

The directive involved a Poodle. Nothing new about that in my life.

This Poodle was a cream-colored Miniature puppy, sitting on a nearby grooming table. The puppy looked as though she'd recently been bathed and blown dry. Now she needed the dense hair on her legs raked with a slicker so that Bertie could scissor her trim. When I glanced her way, the Mini gazed at me with trusting brown eyes.

I can talk and brush a Poodle at the same time. I've been doing it for years. Sad to say, I could probably do it with my eyes closed. And since I'd shown up at my sister-in-law's house unannounced, interrupting her preparations for the upcoming weekend's dog shows, I supposed I deserved to be put to work.

Make yourself useful
. It's my family's rallying cry. We have my Aunt Peg to blame for that.

Dog show aficionados know Peg as Margaret Turnbull, breeder and exhibitor of some of the best Standard Poodles in the country over the past four decades. In recent years Aunt Peg has shifted her focus; now she's a much-in-demand Toy and Non-Sporting Group judge. But one thing hasn't changed a bit. Aunt Peg still has impossibly high standards and she blithely expects everyone in the vicinity—especially her relatives—to live up to them.

I've long since accepted the fact that Aunt Peg is always going to find my efforts wanting. But Bertie, bless her heart, she keeps trying. Maybe that's because she's a relative newcomer to the family. Married to my younger brother, Frank, Bertie is also a successful professional handler. She has a thriving business and a competitive string of dogs, several of which were currently in the process of being prepped for the weekend shows.

It was Friday, so I'd known that Bertie would be busy. Still, that hadn't stopped me from dropping by without warning. I needed someone to talk to. Someone with an impartial opinion who would either take my side and commiserate or else do exactly the opposite—tell me to grow up, stop complaining, and get to work.

Either way, I knew I could count on Bertie to talk me down off the ledge. She always had before.

So there I was, standing in Bertie's finished basement—which doubled as her kennel and grooming room—on that cold December morning. A French Bulldog was air drying in a crate with a towel draped over its back. Two Schip-perkes, a Briard, and a pair of Toy Poodles were observing the activity from inside the long runs that lined the room's walls. Bertie had a silver Bearded Collie out on a second grooming table. It looked as though she'd been getting ready to grind the dog's nails when I arrived.

It was no wonder that I'd barely gotten my coat off before Bertie was already putting me to work. Tit for tat, Aunt Peg would have said.

I took the red slicker brush from Bertie's outstretched hand and raised the Mini puppy into a standing position on her tabletop. Lifting a hind foot, I began to brush upward through the plush leg hair with a sharp, practiced, flick of my wrist. Bertie turned on the Dremel tool and quickly shortened and shaped the eight nails on the Beardie's front feet.

Then she put down the grinder and said, “Well? You drove all the way over here, you might as well spit it out. What's the matter now?”

I didn't stop brushing, but I did angle my body in Bertie's direction. “Do you want the long version or the short version?”

She let her gaze drift around the room of half-groomed dogs. “It's not like I don't have time to listen. Tell me everything.”

“You know I went back to work part-time, right?”

“Sure. You got your old job back at Howard Academy. Special needs tutor just like before.”

By
before,
Bertie meant prebaby. My younger son, Kevin, had been born two and a half years earlier, and the single semester I'd taken for maternity leave had stretched to several by mutual consent. The school had been happy with the teacher they'd hired as my replacement and I'd been delighted to be a stay-at-home mom. It was a luxury I hadn't been able to afford when my older son, Davey, was born.

But over the summer my replacement had left and at the start of the current school year, I'd found myself teaching once more. I loved my job; I always had. The kids I worked with were wonderful and it was enormously satisfying to know that I could make a difference in their lives.

For three happy months, I'd been juggling part-time work at Howard Academy with my family life at home. In fact, the transition had gone so smoothly that I'd agreed to step up to a full-time position when the new semester began in January.

Bertie reached around for a back paw. The Beardie lifted its leg obligingly. “So what's the problem?”

“The Howard Academy Christmas Bazaar.” I snorted with annoyance. “That's what.”

“If you want me to bitch and moan convincingly on your behalf,” Bertie said, “I'm going to need more information than that.”

“How much do you know about Howard Academy?”

“Pretty much just the basics.” She paused, then added, “Considering that
my
child goes to public school.” Bertie and Frank's four-year-old daughter, Maggie, was in her first year of preschool and enjoying every minute of it. “Exclusive private school in Greenwich, Connecticut. The kids that go there are all like Richie Rich, trust-fund babies getting started on the educational path that will take them straight to the Ivy League. Am I close?”

“Yes, and no,” I told her. “That may be the school's history and its reputation but it's no longer entirely correct. Actually, Mr. Hanover would be very disappointed to hear his beloved institution characterized in that way.”

“He's the Big Cheese, right?”

“He is indeed. Not that anyone would ever dare call him that. Our headmaster is quite dignified, and very much aware of the significance of his position.”

“In other words,” said Bertie, “a prig.”

I wished I could tell her she was wrong, but Russell Hanover II didn't just govern Howard Academy, he also shared the school's conservative ideology and its firm belief in its own importance. Fortunately, however, that was only one side of my boss. He was also a man who worked hard, played fair, and stood up for his teachers when they needed his support. All of which made me feel compelled to defend him.

“He may be a bit of a prig,” I said. “But it's not on purpose.”

Bertie shot me a look. “Is there any other way?”

I thought about my answer as I moved around the grooming table to work on the puppy's offside legs. “Mr. Hanover honestly wants what's best for his school and for his students,” I said after a minute. “He's aware that both he and Howard Academy are in a position to influence the next generation of this country's political and financial leaders. And he doesn't take that responsibility lightly.”

“
Oh my God
.” Bertie swept the Beardie off his table and led him across the room to an empty run. “I can't believe you just said that. This Hanover guy must be turning you into a prig, too.”

“Hardly.”

Bertie cocked a brow. “Are you
sure?
”

“Be quiet,” I said with a laugh. “And listen to what I'm trying to tell you. At one time, what you said about HA's student body would have been true. But things have changed dramatically in the last couple of decades. Now the byword in education is diversity, and that includes extending a helping hand to those less fortunate. In the current school year, nearly one third of Howard Academy's students receive either full scholarships or financial aid.”

“So what? That place has the money.”

“That's just it,” I told her. “It doesn't. The endowment funded by the Howard family a hundred years ago when they donated their property and founded the school is pretty much gone. So every dollar that's given away in scholarships has to be raised, primarily through alumni donations and school benefits.”

Bertie fastened the latch on the Beardie's pen, then straightened and stared at me across the room. “I thought we were going to be talking about you. Why is any of this
your
problem?”

“Normally it wouldn't be.”

I sighed. Loudly. And mostly for effect. The Mini puppy who, like all Poodles, was attuned to the people around her, tipped her head to one side and cocked an ear in my direction.

“Let me guess,” said Bertie. “We've finally worked our way back around to the Christmas bazaar.”

“Bingo. It's one of the biggest fund-raisers of the whole year. Mr. Hanover called me into his office earlier today. Apparently you're looking at its new chairman. As of a few hours ago, I'm in charge of the whole shebang.”

“That sounds like a big job.”

“It is!” I wailed. “It's
huge
.”

“And when does this happy event take place?”

“Next weekend. Saturday.”

Her eyes widened. “
Eight
days from now? You must be kidding. How are you ever going to pull the whole thing together by then?”

“Well, there's good news and bad news about that.”

“Shoot,” said Bertie.

“The good part is, most of the advance planning has already been done. The committees were formed six weeks ago and everyone is already working on their assignments. The whole school has been buzzing about the event for the last month.”

“Okay.” She nodded. “So what's the bad news?”

“The woman in the middle of all that activity, a parent volunteer who was the former chairman, eloped to Cabo San Lucas yesterday morning. Apparently she tendered her resignation as chairman of the bazaar by e-mail. Mr. Hanover was
not amused
.”

Bertie and I grinned together.

“Maybe you should follow suit,” she said. “E-mail Hanover and decline the position.”

“That's not an option,” I told her. “The parent was a volunteer. I'm an employee. Mr. Hanover thought that giving me the position was a great idea. He said it would ease me back into full-time work before the next semester starts.”

“Right,” said Bertie. “Because that's what every mother wants before Christmas. More stuff to do.”

I lifted my hands helplessly. “I didn't have a choice. Mr. Hanover steamrolled over all my objections. He said the event was already primed and all I had to do was step in and make sure that nothing went seriously awry.”

“
Awry?
That's the word he used?”

“You betcha.”

“Prig,” Bertie said again. “With a capital P.”

The Mini's puppy's legs were finished. I moved on to the rounded pompon at the end of her tail. “He's actually a pretty good guy,” I told her. “You'd probably like him if you met him.”

“Well, that's not going to happen,” Bertie replied. She reached into a pen and scooped out a Toy Poodle. Then she turned and looked at me, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. “Is it?”

“I don't know,” I said innocently. “Could be.”

Bertie crossed the room and plunked the Toy Poodle down on the other tabletop. “Melanie Travis, what are you up to now? And what makes you think there's even the slightest possibility that I might want to be involved?”

I gestured toward the Mini, now brushed, and fluffed, and ready to scissor. “This one's good to go. Don't you want to work on her next?”

“If you think I would even dream of letting you change the subject, you must be delusional.” Bertie retrieved a cloth case from a nearby shelf, unzipped it, and set a pair of Japanese scissors down on the edge of my grooming table. “Here you go. Your trims are every bit as good as mine. Have at it.”

Aunt Peg would have disagreed with that assessment. Not me. I accepted the compliment with pleasure, and went to work.

The Mini Poodle was young, but she already knew what was expected of her. When I slid my fingers beneath her chest, lifted slightly, then dropped her front legs into a square stance, she raised her head and held the position. I picked up the scissors, ran the long blades lightly up the puppy's leg to lift the hair, and began to trim.