"Mary Taffs - Martha's Madness" - читать интересную книгу автора (Taffs Mary)

She nodded and bounced out of her seat. "I am. Oh, Tony, this'll be great! I'll just draw you a map in
case we get separated on the drive - " She pulled open the drawer on the small desk and grabbed a
piece of hotel stationary and a pen, then started sketching.

"If you're going to the trouble of doing that, I think I'd like to drive out first thing in the morning. My
body's still on East Coast time, you know. I can probably leave here about seven, so we'll still have
plenty of time. And if something comes up, you can give me a call not to come." Something like Michael
throwing a fit, for example, something he'd been known to do.

Her mood shifted back to somber. "That's a good idea."

CHAPTER TWO
Brittany took the curves in the road through the mountains faster than was wise. Now that she was on the
road, she was desperate to get back to Martha's Madness. She had so much to do before they could
leave! She'd better use this time to make a mental list of everything and plan how she'd accomplish it.

As she'd told Tony, packing wouldn't be too bad. They'd only brought clothes and books with them, and
she could leave the books she'd read behind. Michael undoubtedly thought it would take a considerable
number of hours to pack their clothes, but she'd done a ton of packing over the years and knew
differently.

The more difficult part was closing up the house. She'd never been there when Aunt Martha closed up
the house for the winter, but she knew it was fairly complicated. In addition, she needed to clear out the
refrigerator and freezer, clean the rooms they'd been using, and wash their sheets and towels.

Wait a minute. Maybe she didn't. Aunt Martha always had a local man, Fred Pool, watch the house
while she was away. He also handled any needed repairs. His daughter Angela, who'd become a good
friend over the last few months, had often cleaned for Aunt Martha. She'd see about hiring them to clean
and close up the house. Michael would be annoyed at her spending money for something she could do
herself, but she didn't have time to learn what to do and how to do it in the next twenty-four hours. The
house belonged to her, anyway, so it wasn't really any of Michael's business.

She laughed, a bit hysterically. What a ludicrous idea - that Michael might accept that something she did
wasn't his business! Especially since he must be furious with her already, and would be even more ticked
off when she told him Tony was coming . . .

Well, damn it, she was ticked off that he'd moved their departure two days earlier. Besides which, it had
been rude to refuse to go to Carolyn's wedding at the last minute like that. Since he obviously assumed
he could get away with crap like that, she wasn't going to back away from her perfectly reasonable
plans.

A nagging cynical voice in the back of her head asked, "Oh, yeah? You're really going to stick to your
guns this time, as opposed to the last three thousand times? Even when Michael slices you up in that
vicious way of his and makes you remember how much worse your life was before you met him?"

To silence the voice, she turned the radio on loud and sang along with the bouncy inoffensive songs on
the local station. From time to time, the announcer gave the weather report or read an ad about one of
the local stores. He sounded completely sincere, and she had the sense that he was a regular customer of
each store he advertised.