SLAY PAIRS WITH ROSE (The Kelly's Deli Cozy Murder Mysteries Book 3) by Sophie Brent (phonics reading books .txt) 📕

though the air inside her delivery van was getting hotter by the second, she needed time to calm down and lower her heart rate.

Mum! Erin knew that her mother never meant to be hurtful. Far from it, but every conversation they had seemed to add more pressure for her to sell the deli.

Tears pricked the corners of Erin’s eyes, but she blinked them away.

Her mother was right about one thing. She should hire another baker. Her father had worked himself into the ground running the deli. Once her mother had left to work for her family there had been no going back. All of the hard work, cooking, and preparation had fallen onto his shoulders, seven days a week. No holidays, no breaks, just work.

He was so passionate about his work and loved talking to the customers and delighting them with his food, just as she did.

That was the legacy that she was trying to continue as best she could, even if it did mean working every hour of the day. And once the new bistro was up and running, the work was going to get even harder.

Everything she had worked and trained for rested on the success of her deli and the new bistro. Everything.

Erin sniffed, lifted her head and peered at her reflection in the reversing mirror.  Considering the limited amount of sleep she had enjoyed over the past few days, she looked a lot better than she had expected.

Now all she had to do was deliver Emma Wilson’s luggage to a complete stranger and break the news that she had been there when his wife’s body was found. Any questions?

How did she get herself into these situations?

Then out of the corner of her eye, she noticed a flash of movement in the front seats of the car in the far corner of the car park, closest to the boundary line and facing the open fields.

From where she was parked, Erin could clearly see the couple in the car, and what they were up to.

With a shock, she realized that the woman in the driver’s seat was Maya.

Only she looked different. Her hair was messed up, her eyes and skin glowing, and there was a handsome man with short brown hair kissing Maya’s neck.

He was sliding his hands up into her hair, holding her head and tilting her face toward him. Then he was kissing her, and Maya angled her head to give him more access.

Eyes closed, they sat locked together, his arms taking the weight of her body, enclosing her in his loving, sweet embrace.

Erin smiled, delighted that this lonely and isolated woman had some company at last. She had looked so bereft the last time they had met. Maya needed the support of her boyfriend or husband, and she was certainly getting it now.

Okay, definitely time to move and leave these two in peace! Erin thought and pushed open her door.

Up until this point, Maya had her eyes closed, but just as Erin slipped out of her van, Maya lifted her head and their eyes met.

The horror on Maya’s face said it all.

It was only then that the man lifted away from Maya’s neck and looked over in her direction.

Then it all became clear.

The man kissing Maya in the front seat of her car was the same man she had seen in the photo of Emma Wilson’s wedding.

Harry Wilson glared back at her, as though daring her to do or say anything at all.

Erin paused for only a moment before looking away as though nothing had happened. She walked briskly to the back of her van, opened up the double doors and tugged out two suitcases which had belonged to Emma Wilson.

Maya was going to take these cases and pass them to Harry whether she liked it or not, and from what she just seen, it was probably not.

So much for the grieving widower! For once, Zoe had got it wrong. Maya and Harry Wilson were still very much an item.

Dragging the trolley suitcases behind her, Erin did not care one jot about the amount of noise that she was making on the hard brick pathway leading up to the front reception desk at the Manor House. She had been here so many times before, making deliveries to the hotel kitchen as well as seeing guests, that the reception staff recognized her immediately.

They had no problem taking two extra suitcases up to Maya’s hotel room for her. In fact, they would do it straight away while she was out of the hotel.

Erin watched the suitcases being wheeled away, with a sense of such relief that if felt like a great weight had been lifted from her shoulders.

Well, that was done! Perhaps she could finally go home and sneak past the reporters and get some sleep!

No chance.

Just as she strolling out of reception, Maya walked in, thankfully alone.

She looked at Erin, smiled and said in a faint voice, “I think we need to talk. Can you spare a few minutes?”

Erin leaned across the coffee table in Maya’s hotel room and looked hard into the face of the young woman still trying to blink away the tears that had started the second she had come into the room and saw Emma’s suitcases.

“Maya.  Why didn’t you mention that you and Harry had dated before he married Emma?”

“Why does it matter now?” Maya replied, between sips of a glass of water. “That was years ago. We were both so young back then.”

“Things end with Harry and then he marries your friend, Emma. That must have been very hard on you,” Erin suggested.

“It wasn’t like that. I had an amazing chance to study in California and I took it. Harry had just started an exciting new job, so we agreed that we should