One
Thou, Nina Colette Ceceri Quinn, shall never again break and enter. A commendable commandment if there ever was one.
Don''t get me wrong. I wasn''t above bending the law every now and again, sneaking into somewhere I didn''t belong, but I''d never actually broken anything to gain entrance. Until now.
Shifting my weight, I swung a grub hoe over my head, hitting the window above my head full force.
I ducked as glass shattered.
My breath plumed in front of my face in an icy cloud. A cold front swooping down from Canada had blanketed the Ohio Valley the night before. Forecasters predicted heavy snow to fall throughout the weekend, all but guaranteeing a white Thanksgiving in six days'' time. A rarity around these parts.
Ordinarily, snow would throw my schedule into a tizzy. As a landscape designer I was at Mother Nature''s fickle mercy.
Thankfully, come tomorrow, I had nothing planned, workwise, for an entire week. Plenty of time for
One
Thou, Nina Colette Ceceri Quinn, shall never again break and enter. A commendable commandment if there ever was one.
Don''t get me wrong. I wasn''t above bending the law every now and again, sneaking into somewhere I didn''t belong, but I''d never actually broken anything to gain entrance. Until now.
Shifting my weight, I swung a grub hoe over my head, hitting the window above my head full force.
I ducked as glass shattered.
My breath plumed in front of my face in an icy cloud. A cold front swooping down from Canada had blanketed the Ohio Valley the night before. Forecasters predicted heavy snow to fall throughout the weekend, all but guaranteeing a white Thanksgiving in six days'' time. A rarity around these parts.
Ordinarily, snow would throw my schedule into a tizzy. As a landscape designer I was at Mother Nature''s fickle mercy.
Thankfully, come tomorrow, I had nothing planned, workwise, for an entire week. Plenty of time for the snow to melt and fifty degree temps to return to this area of Ohio. But right now I had bigger things to worry about than snow.
Frost crunched beneath my Timberlands as I set the grub hoe aside, my feet leaving icy footprints amidst the almost naked shrubbery.
The building I was breaking and entering into sat far from the road, surrounded on three sides by dense woods. Absolutely no one was around. I didn''t have to worry about being seen or heard by nosy passersby.
My fingers flexed inside a pair of leather gloves as I knocked away jagged glass along the window frame, clearing an opening for me to climb through.
Only one problem. How did I get in?
I attempted to lift myself, but I barely made it a foot off the ground. It might be time to give pull-ups another chance at the gym, despite the fact that I almost suffocated myself trying them before.
Stepping back, I gauged the distance to the window and took off running.
I jumped, I leapt, I fell on my ass. Hopefully the shrubI landed on had already reached dormancy and would recover.
Before I seriously hurt myself, I looked around for something to help me up and in. I wasn''t exactly known for my grace. Or my height. I''m on the shorter side of five-foot-five, and the window was a good five feet off the ground.
In the end I leaned the grub hoe against the stucco exterior of the building and used the top of the hoe''s handle as a foothold.
My nerves were doing a jig in my stomach as I heaved myself up and perched on the window frame, balancing precariously. The muscles in my arms burned from the strain.
Definitely time to talk to Duke, my no-nonsense personal trainer, about strengthening my upper arms.
Wind howled as I peered inside a back room of an adorable ranch-style home that had been converted into Daisy Bedinghaus''s holistic therapy business, the Heavenly Hope Holistic Healing Center.
Maybe twelve-by-twelve, the interior space looked like it had once been a bedroom, converted now into a treatment room. Angled diagonally, a padded massage table took up most of the area. Swinging my feet through the opening, glass crunched loudly as I found my footing.
I''d have to work on my B&E skills.
No, no I wouldn''t.
This was the last time I was breaking and entering. It was a commandment now and forever. And once a commandment was etched onto my mental tablet, I rarely broke it.
Nothing seemed out of place. A tray of aromatherapybottles sat on a small granite-topped counter. According to the labels, every scent from lavender to jasmine to strawberry kiwi and eucalyptus were in the small brown glass bottles neatly aligned against the tiled back splash. Stacks of pristine white towels in every size lay folded neatly on shelves above the countertop.
The door to the room was ajar, and I crept over to it, peeking through the crack. Every few steps I''d stop and listen, but heard nothing but my own breathing.
Quickly, I checked the reception area out front, then backtracked down the hallway, sticking my head into two other treatment rooms. Both were empty. I nearly jumped clear out of my skin as the phone on my hip rang. My current ring tone, the theme song from the Match Game, echoed through the empty building.
My B&E skills definitely needed honing. I''d forgotten to silence my phone. How amateurish was that? But wait, I reminded myself. There would be no more breaking and entering, so no honing of any kind was needed.
Well, except for the muscles in my arms . . .The phone rang a second time before I could pull it off my hip. Quickly, I checked the caller ID screen and recognized my office number. "Did he show?" I asked, hearing the panic in my voice.
That morning, Taken by Surprise, Garden Designs, my landscaping company, had started a full backyard makeover in a swanky development near the office. Kit Pipe, my full-time landscape contractor, good friend, and current roommate, had never arrived at the job site.
It was the first time in four years he''d been a no-show.
"No one''s seen or heard from him," Tam Oliver said. I could hear the panic in her voice too. The jig in my stomach commenced to a full-blown hokey-pokey, shaking all about. It hurt.
"I take it he''s not there?" she asked. Tam was my part-time office manager, full-time friend, and all around go-to girl. I couldn''t run my business without her. Our friendship was just icing. She bore an uncanny resemblance to a young Queen Elizabeth, right down to the mannerisms and elocution. Except for her down-home Kentucky accent, she''d be a dead ringer. A hanging water feature burbled on the wall next to me; meant to soothe, I imagined. Soothing would be nice. But only one thing would calm me now.
Continues...
Excerpted from Weeding Out Troubleby Heather Webber Copyright © 2008 by Heather Webber. Excerpted by permission.
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