Seams deadly, p.1
Seams Deadly, page 1
Seams Deadly
A MEASURE TWICE SEWING MYSTERY
Maggie Bailey
To Missy: As far as Lydia and I are concerned, you are the mayor of Peridot. You are the reason this book exists. And you deserve all the root beer floats.
Chapter One
“Did you at least put your hair up with a nice clip?”
“Fran!”
“Well, Lydia dear, messy buns are fine for the store, but I think you should look your best tonight. A nice clip might be a nice touch.”
Fran was being nice, Lydia reminded herself. And she had to admit she did have a habit of throwing her long, dark hair up in very messy buns. But a nice clip? Like one of those big claw clips from the eighties?
“Fran, I promise I’ll do something nice with my hair, okay?”
“What was that now?”
Lydia sighed and picked up her phone from her bed. She had tried to have it on speaker phone while getting ready for her date, but Fran’s house in the mountains had spotty reception, and she kept having to yell about her outfit choices. Looking in the mirror, Lydia repeated to Fran, “I will do something nice with my hair. I promise.”
“And what are you wearing?”
“A new make, a green linen Bardon dress by Peppermint Patterns.”
Her friend sighed. Even though it was Fran who had introduced Lydia to sewing, Fran stuck to quilts. Lydia, though, had fallen in love with garment sewing and constantly regaled her friend with new dress patterns and special fabrics, like the dress she was wearing tonight.
Turning in the mirror, she admired the sundress, tiered with a ruffled bottom. It was casual, but the lovely European emerald-green linen she’d ordered elevated it for an evening look. She hoped.
“Sounds lovely. I’ll see you at the shop tomorrow morning. I can’t want to hear all about it. Brandon is lucky you said yes.” And before Lydia could respond, Fran hung up.
Lydia placed her phone in her purse and headed to the front door of her apartment. Fran would never know she’d decided to leave her hair in a messy bun. She wanted to look nice, but she didn’t want to deceive the poor guy. What was the saying? Start as you mean to go on? She didn’t do fancy hair or fancy makeup, she made her own dresses, and too often she forgot to use the lint roller to remove the dog hair.
At least tonight she’d remembered to do that, though her rescue dog, Charlie, had watched her with a slightly offended look, as though his hair all over her clothes was a good look and she was just being absurd.
Now she looked at Charlie, asleep on her couch, happily twitching his feet in pursuit of the elusive dream squirrels. In real life, Charlie was more than a little lazy, but in his dreams, he really gave those squirrels a fair chase. She could join him on the couch, text Brandon, claim she was getting a cold or something equally lame.
When Fran had told her about the dinner, Lydia had tried to get out of it right then and there. They had been at work in Measure Twice, the fabric shop Fran owned. They had been happily chatting about how Lydia was adjusting to life in Peridot, having moved to the North Georgia mountain town earlier that summer.
Lydia loved Peridot. The old-fashioned town square. The huge magnolia tree. The apartment above the shop she rented from Fran. The whole time they were talking, Fran smiled a little too much. Fran was wildly kind but usually not the kind to grin like that. Then Fran spilled the beans and the grin’s reason became all too clear.
“It’s just dinner.”
That had been Fran’s refrain as Lydia tried to worm out of it. Brandon worked at the bookstore on the square, a few shops over from Measure Twice. Sure, he was in his thirties and Lydia had just turned forty, but that was fine, wasn’t it?
Leaving Charlie asleep on the couch, Lydia walked out into the heavy, early September evening air. Awkwardly, Brandon was her neighbor on the left side of her apartment, but he must have stayed late at the bookstore, Turn the Page, and headed to Rosetti’s straight from work. She had worried about having to walk to dinner together, a strange prelude to dinner, and was relieved to head down the stairs to the square by herself. Plus, she had made it past the apartment of her other neighbor, Jeff, without having to chat with him. Jeff was nice but between the brightly colored, silk, button-down shirts he always wore and his obsession with model trains, conversations with Jeff always had a way of being a little strange and a lot longer than she ever intended.
The night was off to a good start. And as she walked the wide brick sidewalk of the square, lit with streetlights and busy with people out enjoying Labor Day Weekend, she realized it was just dinner. Right?
True, it was her first “dinner” since she’d left her husband. Her ex-husband. And Brandon was really cute: bookish and well dressed. Thankfully, by the time she reached Rosetti’s, the town’s nice Italian restaurant, she’d run out of time to psych herself out any worse.
How bad could one dinner be? It wasn’t a date—not really. It was just dinner with someone close to her age in her new hometown. She breathed in slowly, then exhaled and walked into the restaurant.
Brandon was already sitting at a table and stood up, smiling at her. Yeah. He was really cute. Lydia walked over, and they both said hello and sat down at the table. Lydia unrolled her silverware from the napkin, to buy her some time. Surely, Brandon would start the conversation? Nope. Lydia tried to tuck her stray hair into her bun and wondered if she should have found a clip to wear. The silence grew. Brandon stared at the menu. Lydia smoothed the napkin in her lap.
“Read anything good lately?” Well, Lydia would never win any awards for scintillating conversation, just like she would never be known for her pristine hairstyles. At least it worked.
Brandon looked up from the menu, beaming. “Oh, thanks for asking. I absolutely have. I read a book of poetry that really blew me away.”
Lydia opened her mouth to say that she also enjoyed poetry, but Brandon kept right on talking.
“And I read a great nonfiction piece that really explores the vital role of the hellbender in the region. Just fascinating.”
Lydia almost spat out her water. “The what?”
“Sorry—I keep forgetting you’re new to the area. The hellbender is a kind of salamander. They’re hard to find, but you can spot them around here if you look hard enough. I go with a group some weekends when I’m not needed in the shop. We meet up in the Walmart parking lot. It’s pretty great. You know, the hellbender is the largest salamander in North America. Fascinating creatures, really. Some locals have the best names for them. One guy who comes with the group, this older guy named Hank, told us his grandmother called them snot otters! So then, on the next outing, Darrel—have you met Darrel? From the bakery? Darrel brought this hilarious word game that generates your own hellbender nickname! It was a riot.”
Lydia tried to force a small laugh.
“Wait—hold on.” And Brandon stood, fishing something from the back pocket of his jeans. It was a piece of paper with columns of words. “Okay, perfect, I still have it. Lydia, what is your birth month?”
“June.” Lydia was filled with a sense of mild dread.
“And your favorite color?”
“Green.”
“That makes you a . . . hold on . . . slime puppy!” Brandon let out a laugh. “I got . . . wait—let me see . . . yeah, I got . . . muck dragon!” He kept laughing.
Lydia looked at the table, the gently flickering candle, the empty breadbasket. Then she looked around the room, at the women with nice jewelry and the stylized photos of Italian vistas on the walls. There was soft classical music playing in the background, and the lighting was dim and golden. Brandon was still looking over the nickname generator and laughing, quietly saying different combinations like “swamp gator” and “mud beast.”
Suddenly, Lydia realized Brandon had brought that list on purpose. He had planned to find and share their lizard nicknames. He had wanted the evening to go well, and this was his solution. Because?
This was a date. A real date. Fran had said Brandon could show her around Peridot. A new friend would be great. But now, as they looked at their menus at Rosetti’s, Lydia finally admitted to herself that this wasn’t a friendly get-together; it was a date. Of course it was.
“Sounds like that group is a lot of fun,” Lydia offered, trying to be nice in light of her realization.
“We have a blast.”
Lydia looked at the menu. “What do you recommend?”
The lizard topic had run its course.
“I really like the linguini Alfredo.” Brandon didn’t quite make eye contact, as if uncertain of what to talk about next.
Lydia nodded, hoping she wasn’t blushing, although the burning in her cheeks left little doubt that she was.
“Or, um, if you like burgers, the Town Square Burger is pretty good too. It has local onions on it.” Brandon seemed to still be looking somewhere between the menu and Lydia’s face.
Onions? At least maybe he wasn’t hoping for a goodnight kiss. How did that even work these days? Lydia had only really dated her ex-husband, Graham. She had no idea what was normal now. She was getting ahead of herself. Again.
Although looking at Brandon, who was reading the menu as if it held the answers to all the questions of the universe, she thought maybe he didn’t either.
“The burger looks great! So, how long have you been working at Turn the Page?” Lydia grimaced slightly. Not the most inventive question, but it was better than silence. And a lot better than lizards.
“I started right when they opened, ab out five years ago. I’m from Jasper?” His voice rose, turning the statement into a question.
“Jasper? Is that near here? I’m afraid I’m terrible with North Georgia geography. I’m a transplant from the north.” Lydia smiled.
Brandon didn’t return the smile but continued explaining how he came to work at the bookstore. “I studied English in college and have always, um, . . . I want to be—well, um, I’m a writer?”
Again, his voice rose at the end. Lydia was starting to suspect this was just how he talked. Or did he want her to confirm he was an author?
“Really? Brandon, that’s so interesting. I taught junior high English for almost twenty—”
“I’m writing a novel. The next Great American Novel.”
Lydia stifled a sigh and pretended to rearrange her silverware. Not the NGAN, which was how she thought of the next Great American Novel. Whenever she told people she taught English and had a degree in literature, she risked being informed of the listener’s plan to write the NGAN. Half the time, the person in question had yet to write even a word. Still, Fran had gone out of her way to set up this date, and Lydia needed friends in her new town, so she tried to look as interested as possible, raising her eyebrows as if to say, “No way—tell me more!”
It worked.
“It’s a story of betrayal. Of lies. Of a small town and how people think they know each other, but of course they never really do,” Brandon expounded.
Lydia stifled a sigh. This was hardly uncharted territory, but she didn’t have it in her to be a downer.
“Wow, Brandon, that sounds gripping!”
“Thanks, Lydia. Would you want to read a few chapters?” Hope rang out in his words.
Oh goodness. The only thing worse than hearing about an NGAN was being asked to be a beta reader. Well, in for a penny, in for a pound, as the “M’s” would say.
Lydia smiled thinking about the two older women she had become friends with, Mary and Martha. Classic Southern ladies, well-coiffed and perfectly turned out, they might say, “In for a penny, in for a pound,” but they also might insist Lydia have a chaperone on her date.
Brandon must have assumed her smile was for him and not her prim and proper elderly friends. He smiled back. “Great! I’ll get the manuscript to you!”
The waitress came and they ordered their meals, both opting for the Town Square Burger. The waitress seemed irritated by their choices, but Lydia tried to ignore the woman’s sharpness. Then the waitress started to read out the side options. “Would y’all like green beans, a mixed salad, or French fries?” Looking directly at Brandon she added, “Let me guess, French fries with extra ketchup?”
Was that an insult of some sort? Was there a ketchup shortage in town? Maybe it was just a busy night at Peridot’s nicest restaurant. Maybe the waitress thought it was tacky ordering burgers at an Italian place.
Brandon, however, clearly noticed the sharpness and seemed unnecessarily put out by it. He kept glancing at the waitress as she made her way around the dining room, taking other orders. Was he the sort of guy who would be rude to a waiter? Lydia hoped not. That was a deal breaker in her book, far worse than having an NGAN.
Brandon ate the last piece of bread in the breadbasket, and they sat at the table in awkward silence. The waitress had somehow ruined the mood.
Maybe he was sensitive. A lot of novelists were, in Lydia’s experience.
“So, what brought you to Peridot?” Brandon got the conversation started again.
What had brought Lydia to Peridot? Where to start her answer? For a moment, she was back in her palatial house in Buckhead, walking into her bedroom, dropping her take-out diet lemonade on the floor.
Her husband, Graham, was in her bed, their bed. Next to him was her teaching assistant, Emma Grace. Lydia was home early from a boring meeting at the Junior League of Atlanta. A meeting Graham had suggested she attend. He had wanted her to do those things: tennis round-robins, dinner parties, charity fundraisers. In retrospect, maybe he had just wanted her out of the house.
Brandon looked at her expectantly.
She wasn’t about to explain that she had fled her disaster of a marriage in Atlanta for this small mountain town in order to have a chance to start over. Too cliché. Too depressing.
“Well, I started sewing a few months ago and really fell in love with it. And I . . . needed to make a change . . . and after I found Measure Twice, I was spending so much time in Peridot, it just made sense to move here.”
Brandon, thankfully, didn’t ask for any details about why she had left Atlanta. Lydia sipped her water, trying to shake off the memory of that diet lemonade pooling all over the floor. Not the memory of another woman naked in her bed with her husband. Diet lemonade.
“So, are you working at Measure Twice now that you live in town? Or . . .”
The waitress came by and refilled their water glasses. Slowly.
Brandon wasn’t looking in the direction of the waitress, but he was looking so firmly away from her, it gave the same impression. Why did she bother him so much?
“Yep! Fran has been a complete angel and hired me to work part-time, in addition to letting me rent her apartment above the shop. As you know.” Lydia smiled since Brandon lived right next door and knew exactly how she had come to be his neighbor.
“Do you like working there?” Brandon finally seemed to be warming to the pattern of conversation.
“I love it! Have you ever been in?”
Brandon shook his head but at least had the decency to look chagrined.
“Well, you have to let me show you around one of these days.” Was that awkward? She decided to keep going. “I actually have some big ideas for Measure Twice, if I can get Fran onboard. Right now, Measure Twice is really a quilt shop, not a fabric shop . . .”
Brandon looked at her blankly.
“. . . so it carries all the cotton fabric you need to make a quilt, but not the other sort of fabrics you need for, say, making clothes.” Lydia raised an eyebrow and asked, “Does that make more sense?”
He shook his head.
“Right, so this dress I’m wearing? I made it. It’s the Bardon dress pattern, and I made it out of European linen. Lots of people make their own clothes these days, so I’m trying to convince Fran to carry the stuff to make dresses like this. In the shop.”
Brandon smiled. “That’s really cool you made your dress.”
“Thanks. I really think I can help the store move in a new direction. I’m just really excited about being here and starting a new chapter, so to speak.” They both chuckled at her lame book pun.
Their burgers arrived. The waitress didn’t put the plates in front of them so much as she dropped them, letting them clang on the table. Lydia’s burger was deconstructed, all the ingredients spread out across her plate. She quickly glanced around the room and confirmed her suspicion: the burger wasn’t normally served this way. Even stranger, while Lydia had a heaping portion of fries on her plate, Brandon had three. Three French fries. Each fry had its own spot on his plate, followed by a few empty inches and then another fry. After the third fry was an absolute lake of ketchup. Was Brandon going to address his fry shortage?
“What does Fran think about your ideas for the shop?” Brandon seemed to be ignoring their bizarre plates.
What did Fran think of her plans? Brandon meant it as light conversation, but the truth was, Lydia wasn’t completely sure of the answer. Meeting Fran was the best thing that had ever happened to Lydia. Thanks to Fran, she had a place to live and a dream job. But was Lydia the best thing that had ever happened to Fran? Was she anywhere close?
Brandon ate his burger, and Lydia tried to follow suit, but it was awkward as she piled the ingredients back on her bun. She wanted to be at least a little ladylike and wasn’t having any success. Next time, if there was a next time, she’d order something easier to eat.
After a few bites, Lydia answered, “I think Fran likes the new ideas. I haven’t totally convinced her yet, though. She’s run Measure Twice the same way for twenty years. Change can be hard.”
Brandon looked up from his dinner, his eyes lit with a sudden intensity. “Change can be really hard.”
For a heartbeat, Lydia felt like Brandon was about to confide in her. But the moment passed.
