I'll Be Seeing You by Mary Higgins Clark

was markedly slower than her usual spirited delivery. “Isn’t this nonsense, Mac?” she asked.
    He pulled up a chair. “Even stalwart daughters of Erin are allowed time out every now and then, Catherine.”
    Her smile was acknowledgment. “I guess I’ve been traveling on nerve for a while. You know everything, I suppose.”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œMeggie just left. She’s going over to the inn. Mac, that new chef I hired! I swear he must have trained at a takeout joint. I’ll have to get rid of him.” Her face clouded. “That is, if I can figure a way to hang on to Drumdoe.”
    â€œI think you’d better put aside that kind of worry for at least a little while.”
    She sighed. “I know. It’s just that I can
do
something about a bad chef. I can’t
do
anything about insurers who won’t pay and nuts who call in the middle of the night. Meg said that kind of sick call is just a sign of the times, but it’s so rotten, so upsetting. She’s shrugging it off, but you can understand why I’m worried.”
    â€œTrust Meg.” Mac felt like a hypocrite as he tried to sound reassuring.
    A few minutes later he stood up to go. He kissed Catherine’s forehead. Her smile had a touch of resiliency. “I have a great idea. When I fire the chef, I’ll send himover to this place. Compared to what they served me for dinner, he comes through like Escoffier.”

    Marie Dileo, the daily housekeeper, was setting the table when Mac got home, and Kyle was sprawled on the floor doing his homework. Mac pulled Kyle up on the couch beside him. “Hey, fellow, tell me something. The other day, how much of a look did you get at the woman you thought was Meg?”
    â€œA pretty good look,” Kyle replied. “Meg came over this afternoon.”
    â€œShe did?”
    â€œYes. She wanted to see why I was mad at her.”
    â€œAnd you told her?”
    â€œUh-huh.”
    â€œWhat’d she say?”
    â€œOh, just that Wednesday afternoon she was in court and that sometimes when people are on television other people like to see where they live. That stuff. Just like you, she asked how good a look I got at that lady. And I told her that the lady was driving very, very slow. That’s why when I saw her, I ran down the driveway and I called to her. And she stopped the car and looked at me and rolled down the window and then she just took off.”
    â€œYou didn’t tell me all that.”
    â€œI said that she saw me and then drove away fast.”
    â€œYou didn’t say she stopped and rolled down the window, pal.”
    â€œUh-huh. I
thought
she was Meg. But her hair was longer. I told Meg that too. You know, it was around her shoulders. Like that picture of Mommy.”
    Ginger had sent Kyle one of her recent publicity pictures, a head shot with her blond hair swirling around her shoulders, her lips parted, revealing perfect teeth, her eyes wide and sensuous. In the corner she’d written, “To my darling little Kyle, Love and kisses, Mommy.”
    A publicity picture, Mac had thought in disgust. If he’d been home when it arrived, Kyle would never have seen it.

    After stopping to see Kyle, visiting her mother and checking on the inn, Meghan arrived home at seven-thirty. Virginia had insisted on sending dinner home with her, a chicken potpie, salad and the warm salty rolls Meghan loved. “You’re as bad as your mother,” Virginia had fussed. “You’ll forget to eat.”
    I probably would have, Meghan thought as she changed quickly into old pajamas and a robe. It was an outfit that dated back to college days and was still her favorite for an early, quiet evening of reading or watching television.
    In the kitchen, she sipped a glass of wine and nibbled on the salt roll as the microwave oven zapped the temperature of the potpie to steaming hot.
    When it was ready, she carried it on a tray