Page 1 of Colorado Christmas Carol

One of the assistants in the kitchen turned her head and the bells in her earrings jingled. Estelle Grancy chuckled. It was the holiday season and she loved Christmas.

The hotel where she worked, and lived, in Benton, Colorado, was a homey place.

It was beautifully decorated, with holly and ivy running up the elegant staircase bannisters and Christmas trees in every meeting room.

The biggest Christmas tree was in the lobby, a dreamy combination of red bows and golden balls, with white lights climbing up the tree and presents under it.

The staff got along well. And Estelle was a wonderful cook. She had a cushy job with plenty of free time, thanks to the retired cook who loved to fill in when Estelle wanted a day off.

But Essa, as she was called, wanted something more from life than spending it in a kitchen, regardless of how much she loved her job.

She was twenty-three and alone in the world. Both parents had succumbed to a killer virus three years previously and the grieving twenty-year old was left to take charge of their estate and do what was necessary to probate it. She was mostly over the shock, but the grief still hurt.

She pushed back a loose strand of pale golden hair from the tight bun atop her head, and her green eyes twinkled as she glanced toward the laptop computer on a lone table near the kitchen door.

She’d left her file open, after saving it.

She was writing a novel; a mystery novel.

Her one great ambition was to be a novelist, and she loved to read mysteries, so she hoped she might be able to write one that would sell.

Her late father had been a deputy sheriff, and he was a wealth of information about solving crimes. She’d listened to him by the hour, enjoying the methodical way he went about turning up lawbreakers. He hadn’t had much experience with murders, but he knew people who did, in big cities.

He’d wanted to sell a book, too. He’d worked hard at it, but none of his material was good enough. He had poor grammar skills, so Essa, even in her teens, was his copy editor. She polished his prose and made it literate. But his ideas were too run-of-the mill. They never sold.

Essa’s, on the other hand, were unique and complicated.

She’d had two notes from actual editors on proposals she’d sent in.

The book she was working on now had interested the editor of a publishing house that specialized in mystery novels.

So it was a chance, at least, to be published.

They say if you start getting personal notes from editors, who were notoriously busy, it was a sign that you might be able to sell a book.

Essa hoped so; she didn’t really want to spend the rest of her life in front of a stove.

She spent her breaks working on the book. It obsessed her these days.

She turned back to the dishes she was making for the evening meal, her head still in the clouds. She’d been floating since early that morning, when she’d opened the note from the editor.

She pulled her perfectly baked homemade rolls out of the oven and turned it off, admiring their lovely color. Just perfect.

“. . . it was a dark and stormy night?” came a curious little voice from the doorway. “You have got to be kidding!”

Essa turned. A young girl of about ten was standing at the computer, frowning as she read.

She was tall for a child, very skinny, with short, straight, thick, blond hair and big brown eyes that suddenly pinned Essa’s.

“You’re joking, right?” she asked. “I mean, starting a story with ‘. . . a dark and stormy night . . .’?”

Essa’s eyebrows arched. Talk about precocious kids! “It’s sarcasm,” she said, surprised by the comment.

“Oh! I get it!” The child laughed and her whole face lit up.

“Who are you?” Essa asked.

“I’m Mellie,” came the reply. “Mellie Marston. My dad’s name is Dominic, but everybody calls him Duke.” She cocked her head and smiled. “Who are you?”

“I’m Estelle Grancy. But people call me Essa.”

“I’m very precocious,” Mellie announced. “And I’m also ob . . . obnox . . . something.”

“Obnoxious?” Essa asked, amused.

“That’s it! Obnoxious! I drive Daddy nuts. He says he needs to carry duct tape around so he can shut me up.”

“Do tell.” Essa laughed. “Precocious and also obnoxious. It sounds very interesting.”

“Does it, really? Thank you!” Mellie said. “I’m going to try to be incorrigible next,” she added proudly.

What an odd child, Essa was thinking, but how refreshingly different.

“Why are you in here?” Essa asked. “It’s sort of off limits, you know.”

“Sorry. I’m hiding from Daddy.”

“Why?”

“Well, he has this iPad,” she said, “and he was putting stuff in it for work. I sort of messed it up.” She winced. “I just wanted to play mahjong, but I think I accidentally deleted the icon on the home page.” She sighed. “So can I stay here until he stops using words I’m not supposed to hear?”

“Is he doing that?” Essa asked, fascinated.

“I’m afraid so. He has a very bad temper. And there’s a boy at school who used those words, and they suspended him.” She frowned. “But I don’t think they can suspend Daddy. He’s too important to the agency.”

“Agency?”

“Daddy’s a senior investigator for a detective agency,” she explained. “He’s here investigating somebody who might have killed somebody.”

Essa’s eyes widened. “Wow.”

“That’s what I said.” Mellie chuckled. “Daddy has the neatest job! We go all over the place when he’s on a case. It’s school holidays at the private school I go to, so I get to go with him.”

“Does your mom go too?” Essa asked pleasantly.

The little girl’s face fell. “I don’t have a mom. Not anymore. She got cancer.”

“I’m so sorry!” Essa said, and meant it.

“I don’t remember her very well,” Mellie replied, moving closer. “She was real pretty. Daddy has a photo of her and me in our living room back home.”

“And where’s home?”

“It’s in . . . Oh, dear.”

A deep, irritated voice was calling, “Mellie Marston, where the hell are you?!”

Mellie winced. “Oh, dear, he’s found me!”

She ran behind Essa. “You have to save me!” she whispered. “I’m too young to die!” she added in a theatrical tone.

“You should go on the stage,” Essa murmured as angry footsteps came closer.

A tall, husky man came into view. He had thick, pale-gold hair like his daughter and the same dark eyes. He was very good-looking, but very somber. Make that homicidal.

“Are you harboring a fugitive?” he asked curtly.

Essa cleared her throat. He was intimidating. “Can you describe her?”

“Four feet tall, blond, brown-eyed, guilty expression. . .”

“Precocious?” Essa asked.

“Extremely.”

Mellie peered around Essa’s apron. “I’m really sorry,” she said. “I just wanted to play mahjong.”

“And destroy my career?”

“No, Daddy, honest,” Mellie said plaintively.

“What have I told you a hundred times about the iPad?”

She sighed. “Don’t touch it without permission.” She gave him a mischievous smile. “But you always say we should be curious about everything and explore things we don’t understand.”

“Not my notes when I’m on a case,” he replied curtly.

“She’s just little,” Essa interjected slowly.

He glared at her. “I’m talking to my daughter, not to you,” he snapped.

She drew herself up to her full height, which was far short of his. “In my kitchen,” she pointed out, “and you’re both trespassing!”

“Aren’t you a little young for a chef?” he asked.

Her eyes flashed. “You can ask the boss that,” she replied.

“Come on, Mellie,” he said, gesturing to his child. He glared again at Essa. “Before she curdles something.”

Essa gave him a mock smile. “Careful you don’t get something curdled thrown at you,” she said sweetly.

He made a rough sound in his throat and turned as his daughter followed him.

Mellie looked back at her. “Help!” she mouthed.

Essa just winced and waved goodbye. Poor kid , she thought as she turned to the stove. Imagine having a father like that!

* * *

The next morning, Essa was making rolls for lunch when Mellie peered around the corner, past the other cook and two helpers dressed in holiday motif.

“Can I come in?” she asked.

Essa grinned. “Of course. Make yourself at home.” She glanced at the child. “How did you escape?” she teased.

“Daddy was on a conference call about the case, so I slipped out.” She chuckled gleefully.

“What sort of case?” Essa asked idly as she kneaded dough.

“A murder. Daddy said he found evidence that the killer came this way.”

“What sort of murder?” Essa was interested.

“A really bad one,” she replied. “Daddy won’t tell me much, just that there was a woman they found who’d been hit with a bat many times.

There were two other bodies. One was a little boy, and one was a man.

Daddy said the boy was an old murder, but the man wasn’t.

And the woman was killed very recently. Daddy thinks the murders are all connected and there’s a suspect. But he won’t say who.”

Essa whistled softly. “That’s quick work.”

“Daddy knows his business,” Mellie said proudly. “His boss says it’s a coincidence that all the victims are together, but Daddy says it could be a serial killer.”

“A serial killer,” Essa said under her breath. “That’s scary.”

“But Daddy’s boss said it was a coincidence.” She laughed. “Daddy hung up and said that the killer already had a support system and didn’t even know it!”

Essa chuckled, too. “Sounds like it. Why does he think the killer might be in Benton?”

“Because his father came from here. There’s supposed to be an old ranch house somewhere that he inherited. It’s not in town. Out in the country. Daddy is going out there with the sheriff to have a look later.”

“So his boss isn’t going to make him go home?”

“Daddy wouldn’t leave. He said they could give the case to somebody else, that he’d just hire on as investigator for this sheriff’s department and go right on working it.”

Essa laughed out loud. “Your dad’s stubborn.”

“Oh, yes. He grounds me for two weekends sometimes if I’m bad.”