The Palaver Tree - Truth was never as deceptive as this ... #MysterySuspense #Thriller

The Palaver Tree

by Wendy Unsworth

The Palaver Tree Having made the decision to teach in Africa, Ellie desperately tries to persuade her friend, Diane to agree....

it’s pointless kidding myself. I’m not going to go off travelling the world on my own. This way I’ll be helping to teach all the children you raise money for. We’ll be a team. Wouldn’t that be great? Come on, I need you to come around on this or I won’t go!’ She put a hand across the table and squeezed Diane’s arm. ‘I’ll be a miserable hermit and it’ll be all your fault.’
Diane laid down her fork, placed her own hand over Ellie’s and gave it one last try. ‘Ducana is thousands of miles away stuck in the middle of the dark ages. The place is unhealthy; the water is full of horrible bugs. There are snakes and spiders and mosquitoes, Dysentery, malaria, AIDS, for God’s sake.’
Ellie let out an explosive snort, ‘I hope you’re not suggesting I’m going to catch that!’
‘Don’t be flippant Ellie. It’s my duty, as your loyal friend, to point out the bad bits.’
‘Would you like coffee? Or tea?’
‘Coffee, I think, good and strong.’ Diane had tried scaring her off and that wasn’t going to work. ‘Okay then, I would miss you,’ she said and gave Ellie a puppy dog look that was promptly ignored.
’Gabriel will look after me, you know him well enough to trust that he would never have asked if it wasn’t going to be safe. I’ll never get a chance like this again and I only even considered it because you’ve known Gabriel for a long time and think so highly of him.’ When Diane didn’t immediately jump in to agree she added, ‘you do, don’t you?’
‘Of course I do.’

From "Fire in the Blood" by Dale Ibitz

On her 17th birthday, Haley is contemplating the life of a boobless loner who owns sucky clothes, when she tumbles to a parallel world, called Eyidora:

Tuggin turned. “Follow me. Do not fall behind.”

“Wait!” I clamped my legs together to stop their shaking.

His gaze slid down his nose and captured mine. “Follow me.”

“But my mom...”

“I would be more concerned with your safety than hers.”

His words weren’t in sync with his lips, which had a woozy effect on me as they spun through my mind. I swayed toward him.

“You must come with me,” Tuggin said. “Now.”

In hazy confusion, I fought the urge to follow Tuggin like a lost toddler, but a desire to obey him welled inside me. I concentrated on blinking to break the mesmerizing connection, and my head cleared. “No.”

Tuggin’s eyes widened slightly, his nostrils flared. With one swift movement, his knife was pointed at my throat, and the cold pinch of steel triggered an avalanche of ice down my spine.

“You will come with me, now,” he said.

My brain made one last attempt to resist. I would not keep gulping in shaky breaths. I would not pick up that backpack. I would not follow him.

Of course, in the end, I did all of those things.

From "His Wife's Diary (Love Bites)" by Tess Allen

Don’t they realize I can hear them? Yes, I’m sick, but I’m not dead yet. How could he be so heartless? I can hear them!

India Reinhart couldn’t stand to read anymore, at least not now. Her heart was aching and she wished she had never found the diary. Wished she had never gone to the yard sale in Mission Hills last Saturday and picked up that box of autographed books. Little did she know that it also contained the diary wrapped in a piece of burgundy silk buried underneath them, this diary that now was driving her to tears.

She threw the leather-bound book with its gilded edges across the room. It hit the wall with a thud and she cringed. She hadn’t meant to do that, but the way it was making her feel she didn’t know what else to do.
 Shaking, she grabbed her phone and dialed her best friend Jewel Capri’s number. Moments later Jewel answered groggily but India barely gave her a chance to say hello.

“I took your advice, Jewel. I started reading that darned thing and I really, really, really wish I hadn’t.”

She could hear Jewel catch her breath.

From "Not to Us" by Katherine Owen

Ellie has recently discovered the betrayal of her best friend Carrie (Michael's wife) with her husband Robert. Now, she's learning from Michael that she has breast cancer...

“This is a joke; right? You just didn’t tell me I have cancer, because, frankly, if we’re being honest, Michael.” My voice wavers. I try to smile again, but can’t quite make it work. “I’ve got enough shit going on right now.”

“No.”

I can’t find any solace in his tone. I shift in my chair and just look at him. We’ve known each other for almost twenty years, since the days at the University of Washington when all four of us had been sophomores in college. I’ve seen him naked a half dozen times, in those innocent moments, when we had all gone camping together, drank too much, and let strip poker go a little too far. He is my best friend Carrie’s husband. He is best friends with my husband, Robert. My friend even.

And, yet, in this moment, all I can think of is that there is worse news than this—worse news that I will eventually have to tell him. My resolve gives way. My eyes betray me first and fill with tears, not for myself, but for Michael.