Page 112 of The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year

Ellie?Maggie and Ethan mouthed again.

But Eleanor never took her eyes off Maggie. “Can you get started without me, love? I’d like to show our guests the view.”

The courtyard was small, with plants climbing trellises and scaling the side of the house, an arching umbrella of green vines and red blooms shielding it from the rest of the world.

Eleanor looked at peace in that dappled light. “They’re called bougainvillea.” She fingered a soft red petal. “And, yes, parts of them are slightly poisonous, but let’s keep that between us.”

Her gaze fell on Ethan’s arm as it draped acrossMaggie’s shoulders. Her lips tipped up and her blue eyes sparkled, but Eleanor Ashley would never be so gauche as to smile. No. It was a look that saidWell, what do we have here?andI told you soandYou’rewelcomeall at once, and Maggie thought for the millionth time that she didn’t just owe her career to that woman. She owed her for everything. But, most of all, she owed her forhim.

“Well...” Eleanor raised an eyebrow.

Maggie had spent a whole year thinking about that moment, and she wanted to ask a million questions—say a thousand things. About the new imprint and the new books. About her life and her love and the way the world was more Eleanor-mad than ever.

Maggie wanted to ask her if she was happy. If it was worth it.

She wanted to say thank you.

But what came out was—

“How’d you do it? How’d you get out of the locked room?”

Ethan chuckled but Maggie couldn’t even scold him, not with Eleanor standing there, breeze in her hair, mischievous smile on her face. She’d disappeared in a blizzard but was reborn in the sun and there was no doubt, no question, no chance that the world would ever know her equal.

So it was perhaps fitting that she just shrugged. And said, “I’m Eleanor Ashley.”

And, somehow, that was answer enough. Ethan’s arms tightened around Maggie, pulling her closer as the sun set on the far side of the sea. And when she leaned against him, she couldn’t help but feel like maybe there are some mysteries that are better left unsolved, some questions better left unanswered.

Because sometimes it’s enough just to have been there for the most wonderful crime of the year.