The Santa Slaughter - A Very Merry Murder Mystery

Chapter 11

"I just didn't see her! I mean, she came out of absolutely nowhere, and my car was already moving! When I hit that ice, I -"

"Shhh," I say soothingly to Ivy Barraclough. We're both sitting in the corridor of the small Silver Brook hospital, and she has a gauze patch taped over a small cut on her forehead. Maggie, it seems, wasn't so lucky.

The door to Maggie's hospital room opens and a capable-looking woman in hospital scrubs bustles out, looking at us with a vague frown.

"We're friends of Maggie's," I say before she can question us. "Is she going to be ok?"

"She's going to be fine." The doctor says, making a note or two in the chart she's holding. "But I'm not prepared to say anything more than that unless either of you is a family member." She raises her eyebrows, looking at us expectantly and both Ivy and I are forced to shake our heads. "Well, then you can content yourself in the knowledge that she's going to be fine." She looks at Ivy and compassion sweeps over her. "Just some bumps and bruises. Were you the driver?"

Ivy reaches up to press her fingertips against the thick gauze on her forehead and nods. She still looks as pale and anxious as she was when she climbed out of her car and saw Maggie lying on the street in front of her. I'd come running out of the hut to see what was the matter, and in the end I was the only one able to quickly bring Ivy to the hospital, following Maggie's ambulance in my car.

The doctor walks over and takes Ivy by the hand, smiling compassionately at her.

"Don't worry. Everyone knows it was an accident. With that ice on the ground..." She shudders. "It's just a miracle that you were both relatively unharmed." Her gaze flickers to me with a silent question.

"I just happened to be close by at the time," I say, gesturing to my elf costume with a grimace. "Working."

"Well, maybe you can take Mrs..."

"Barraclough," I volunteer when Ivy remains silent and tearful.

"Maybe you can take Mrs. Barraclough home. I will tell Maggie you came to see her, but she is resting now and won't be up to having visitors for some time yet." She smiles again and lets go of Ivy's hand, before marching down the corridor to the nurses' station to continue with her day.

Meekly, Ivy allows me to steer her back out to the parking lot and we make the journey home in near silence. She directs me to pull up outside a pretty cottage but doesn't immediately get out of the car.

"Won't you come in and have a cup of tea?" she asks at last, and I can tell from the rigid way she holds her head that she's really asking for company. I remember how cold and empty my house felt after Neil left and with everything this poor woman has been through in the last few days I can't say no. I peer into the back seat and reach for a sweater I pull on over my elf costume, and together we walk up the path to Ivy's house.

"Take a seat," she instructs me, pointing me to her living room, which is filled with the same over-stuffed suite my parents have in their lounge. The sight makes me feel instantly at home - and exhausted! I step into the room, stifling a yawn, and pause to admire the framed photographs that line one wall. My heart sinks when I see Bill and Ivy together in all of them. Bill and Ivy on their wedding day. Bill and Ivy standing under a palm tree on some exotic vacation. Bill and Ivy...Bill and Ivy...Bill and Ivy. And no children, I think, recalling Ella with a shiver. Did Ivy even know about her? Would it hurt her to know her husband had a child out there somewhere that he hadn't wanted anything to do with for the whole sixteen years she'd been alive?

Every stray surface is covered with ornaments, some of them Christmassy but many not. I spy decorative china houses and one large trophy with engraving on it that I squint to read. Silver Brook's Man of the Year, Bill Barraclough. It's dated last year.

There's a huge Christmas tree in one corner of the room, cheerily decorated with color-co-ordinated ornaments and warm white lights twinkling merrily. I can't help but feel a little sorry for Ivy Barraclough, widowed so close to Christmas. At least I had some warning that my holiday season wasn't going to be like all the ones I'd had before. I wrench my gaze away from the tree, finding it just as painful as Ivy's photographs, and as I hear her moving around in the kitchen I decide to clear some space for her to put down our drinks. I turn to a small end table between two comfortable chairs and lift the pile of papers sitting on top of it. I don't mean to look at them, but as I'm searching for somewhere to safely stow them my gaze rests on the front page, and something familiar strikes me. These are just like the papers I keep moving around my living room, putting off dealing with them until the last possible moment. I'm reading before I'm even fully aware that I'm reading and the blood rushes in my ears. Ivy and Bill were getting a divorce! Or they would have been if she'd signed the papers. I flip to the back and see Bill's untidy scrawl dated a week ago.

"What are you doing?"

My head whips up, guiltily, but it's too late. Ivy is standing in the living room doorway, a steaming cup of tea in each hand, and there's a strange gleam in the eyes she is fixing on me.

"I'm sorry," I stammer, shoving the papers onto the bookshelf beside me. "I didn't mean to - I was just clearing - "

Ivy sighs, crossing the room towards me and putting our cups of tea down on the table I'd emptied.

"I guess now you know, there's no point in me playing the grieving widow anymore." When she looks up at me, her kind smile and sad eyes are gone. In its place is an expression I can't quite make sense of until she speaks again. "I hated what that man did to me. I just can't believe it took me this long to make him pay."

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A/N - I hope you are enjoying this fun little Christmas mystery! I will be updating chapters regularly here but if you want to read the whole thing in its entirety for free it is available on my Ream page (see link on my profile page) - sign up as a follower (for free) to keep reading and find out about all my other projects :)