Missing Under the Mistletoe: Chandler County, #4

By Traci Wooden-Carlisle

She was a wedding planner. Dodging bullets and playing dead were not part of her skill set.

 

Up until now, Rosalynn's biggest challenge has been to convince Killian Kavanaugh to remain in her presence long enough to apologize for leaving him and town without a word seven years ago. What she wouldn't do to go back to the glares and obvious avoidance of her former best friend.

When Rosalynn's ex-boyfriend shows up at her door, bringing with him trouble of the more mortally perilous kind, she is forced to throw curtesy aside and seek help from Killian, if she can stay alive that long.

Sheriff Lieutenant, Kilian Kavanagh, has successfully evaded Rosalynn for the last two years, but one nearly hysterical call from the normally cool and sophisticated woman brings him running. Never mind that she hurt him more than he thought possible or that just looking at her reminds him of the most embarrassing night of his life. He has to make sure she stays safe, even if it's just to get the answers to why she left.

Ensconced in what used to be her second home, Rosalynn is reminded of all of the relationships she sacrificed. Now that she is practically glued to Killian's side, will she be able to get him to forgive her, save her, love her?

 

Missing Under the Mistletoe was formerly part of the Season of Suspense book set. It has been updated.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Traci Wooden-Carlisle
• Release date: Jun 24, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393175117

Traci Wooden-Carlisle

Traci Wooden-Carlisle lives in San Diego with her husband. She designs jewelry, writes as much as she can and freelances as a graphic artist. She loves her coffee in the morning and fuzzy slippers at night. She loves to read anything romantic – the more inspirational the better. For fun, she dances and teaches the occasional fitness class.

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

Rosalynn walked to her car with her shoulders hunched against the wind of the early autumn evening. It had been a long day. A very long day. She stifled a yawn as her fire-engine-red boots shifted the carpet of leaves on the sidewalk. At times, she couldn’t tell where her boots ended and the leaves started. There were so many colors. She marveled at the way they shone in the light of the setting sun.

As she had done hundreds of times before in the past two years, she slowed her progress to memorize the way the sun seemed to slow then sit on the horizon. She wondered why the sunsets here was so different than the ones along the eastern seaboard and how she could have taken it for granted when she was younger.

Rosalynn retrieved her keys from the pocket of her bright orange pea coat as she neared her car. A feeling of awareness came over her, giving her the sense the of being watched. She looked up, expecting to see any of the many people who frequented All Seasons Market across the way, but the street was as quiet as it was when she closed up I Do Wedding Planning a few moments before. She glanced around, feeling the back of her neck warm in unease. She took one more quick glance before quickening her steps to her car, opening the door, and sliding in.

Rosalynn checked her rearview mirror, backed out of the space, and headed north of Chandler Square toward her childhood home. She drove just over the speed limit but wasn’t too worried, since Chandlerville was almost closed up for the night. It was something Rosalynn had a hard time getting used to, even after two years. She had been born and raised in the small town, but adjusting to the early nights and earlier mornings was harder than she’d imagined.

After attending four years of college in Montana, she’d followed her boyfriend to New York and discovered that her eye for detail and talent for organization went perfect with her project creativity skills. Unfortunately, the skills that made her invaluable at work did nothing to help her personal life. She could see a problem a mile off when it came to project management, but was completely caught off guard when her boyfriend threw her out so he could move his new love interest in. Three years of love and devotion on her side got her pushed aside and moved out of their roomy two-bedroom apartment in three hours.

Rosalynn knew their relationship had taken a couple of hits with the slide of the stock market, but she held on and encouraged him, thinking he and their relationship would recover just as the market did. It didn’t.

She had been devastated, but wasn’t ready to come home to Chandler County with her tail between her legs. She couldn’t, especially after how she’d left.

She was able to use her need for escape from her personal life to work her way up the ranks of the posh event planning company she worked for and stayed on the couch of her friend and co-worker, Ariya. She loved New York. She loved the energy, the smell, the lights and sounds that lulled her to sleep many nights as she set up scenes in her head for events she was helping to plan and even for some she had no hand in.

Rosalynn approached each event like a puzzle. She observed the people she would be serving; many times getting more from just watching them than the answers they gave during her interview process. She could assess their true reason for having the event; whether it was to celebrate a milestone or show off their achievement of the milestone by having the celebration. A lot of times this was the deciding factor on how much they spent. In the beginning, she didn’t handle weddings, and her boss Frederica Vale of Vale Entertainment Planning didn’t force them upon her. Love was a game of chance she obviously wasn’t lucky in, but she wouldn’t forfeit the career she’d worked so hard for.

It took two years and the wedding of her best friend to a man even Rosalynn had to admit was the sweetest, most sincere man she’d ever met. She had forgotten they existed after her ex, Roderick, but Aaron not only proved to her friend but to her as well that there were men in the world who could love and be true to one woman. Ariya had begged her incessantly to be their wedding planner, and though Rosalynn flat out refused the first few times Ariya wore her down to a ‘maybe’.

She hesitated for two weeks more before getting a visit from Aaron. He’d very profoundly expressed his love for Ariya and willingness to do whatever it took to make his future wife happy, even if it meant pleading with her best friend to step out of her comfort zone and help them celebrate the merging of their lives, families, and futures. She had capitulated and planned a spectacular wedding for them. Ariya asked her many times after that day what had changed her mind, but she never told her friend about his visit. He’d done in one hour what no one had been able to do since before Roderick. He’d given her hope in love again.

It turned out that he did her a favor. Rosalynn was a  good event planner, but she was a great wedding planner. It started with knowing her clients, and that was what she excelled at. She always knew what to ask her clients and how to transform their answers into the wedding of their dreams. What she hadn’t figured out was what questions to ask herself in the relationship department.

***

Rosalynn checked her rearview mirror as she drove the long dark road between Main Street and the outskirts of town. She squinted at the two sets of headlights behind her and decided to take the long way home. It added fifteen minutes to her drive, but it wasn’t as if she had any important plans. She did, however, want to feel safe by the time she got home, and there was no need for anyone else to take the out-of-the-way back road unless they lived on her street.

Rosalynn didn’t know what it was. For the last couple of weeks, she’d felt the prickle on the back of her neck. It was much like the feeling she had when Vale Entertainment Planning had a disgruntled client stalk and harassed her and two other employees for a week and a half before walking into their business right before closing one night and holding them hostage for four hours.

Rosalynn hadn’t known she had it in her to be calm and fully coherent during a crisis, but the moment the man walked into the storefront, her eyes were drawn toward him. Greasy dark blond hair that had once been cut to precision now lay flat on his head, and vibrant blue eyes that had stared adoringly at his fiancé only a month before were cold and calculating.

His gaze roamed over then passed her as he scanned the open floor plan of her job, and she knew instantly who he was looking for: her boss, Frederica Vale, who had left from the rear twenty minutes before on her way out of town.

Rosalyn backed up slowly, trying to place herself behind one of the huge display boards dividing the room into four types of offered entertainment planning. Paul, Bridget, Danica, Marvin, and Elise were all in different phases of closing when she noticed them become aware of the man’s presence.

Bridget’s eyes went wide, and Rosalynn knew she recognized him from the store, the coffee shop from a week before and the concession stand of the movie theater they’d went to a few days before.

Hey, have you been stalking me? Bridget called out, and it was all Rosalynn could do to keep from groaning and giving away her position.

Where’s your boss? the man asked, ignoring her question.

She’s not here. You didn’t answer my question. Are you stalking me because you can get arrested for that, Bridget said, beginning to move toward her desk.

Don’t move, the man said in a flat tone that sent shivers down Rosalynn’s spine. If she hadn’t been able to tell he wasn’t in any mood to play before, the gun he removed from a side pocket of his dirty cargo pants was definitely a giveaway.

Rosalynn slowly and quietly continued to make her way to the back of the store where her purse, and even more importantly, her phone lay on her office desk.

Everyone come out where I can see you. We’re going to play a game, the man said, not raising his voice. Rosalynn could feel the atmosphere shift in the room right before it went eerily quiet. It seemed she wasn’t the only one with the idea to hide. She moved faster, wanting to get to her phone before the man got to her since it was hard to hide with her auburn hair.

Heart beating a deafening tune in her ears and sweat trickling down the back of her neck, Rosalynn hunched over as she tip-toed into her office and retrieved her phone.

She breathed a sigh of relief after dialing emergency and reaching a live voice. That relief was short lived, however, when she was pull from under her desk by her hair and dragged to the middle of the middle of the front room. Thankfully, she had the peace of mind to stuff her phone in her shirt before grabbing and holding onto the fist wrapped in her hair.

Rosalynn sat back-to-back with her co-workers, bound by ropes of lighting taken from the baseboard of the shop, listening to the man rant and rave about how their business had ruined his life with their over the top and overpriced services. From what Rosalynn could gather, he’d gone broke behind the extravagance of his wedding, and his wife had left him.

He’d demanded they call Frederica and they had, dozens of times, but Rosalynn knew that if she was already in fight, there would be no reaching her for hours. She’d thought she’d left the line to the police open on her phone but wasn’t sure after hearing nothing but silence from that area of her shirt for fifteen minutes.

Ten minutes later, one of the office phones rang and Officer Cody’s voice came through loud and clear once their kidnapper pressed the speaker button.

What came next were three grueling hours of negotiation between the man and Officer Cody that Rosalynn was sure turned at least ten of the hairs left on her head white.

The man was eventually convinced to give himself up, and Rosalynn went home that morning with a story she could tell her grandchildren. Or not.

One thing Rosalynn could say about herself was she learned her lessons the first time. She’d listened to her feelings and logged what happened from the beginning to the end of that incident. What she’d felt when being stalked by the disgruntled client was much like what she’d felt the past two weeks and especially today.

Rosalynn turned the heat up in her car, not sure whether she was trying to combat the chill in the air or the one crawling over her skin. She slowed the car as she turned on to the gravel road leading her to the small path behind the houses on her block. The two cars that had been on the main road behind her had not turned off when she had, but she still couldn’t shake the feeling that darkness loomed around her and Chandler County.

When Rosalynn finally pulled into her garage, she allowed herself to relax a little. It wasn’t until she shut the door and entered the house that she breathed a sigh of relief. She disarmed the alarm her parents had installed before they moved to Florida. At the time, Rosalynn had thought it was a sweet, but wasted, gesture since most of the residents in Chandler County didn’t even