1

The Cisco triplets stared at one another across the table, shivering inside their warm ski jackets. They ordered hot chocolate from a weary-looking waitress.

Sam, the youngest of the triplets by seven whole minutes, finally spoke. "Will somebody please tell me what the hell we're doing here in New York City, anyway? We should have gone to the mountains like we planned. I hate it that we switched up, and Cisco is spending Thanksgiving by herself. I thought we had more guts than to kowtow to our father and his new… squeeze."

Hard-Hearted Hannah, as she came to be known during their childhoods, punched her brother's upper arm. "We're here because Granny Cisco insisted we do what Dad said. It's one of Dad's command performances, so let's just make the best of it. It's a lousy day and a half out of our lives, okay? I think we're tough enough to handle whatever he throws at us."

Sara, a.k.a. Sassy Sara, folded her arms across her chest, still unwilling to remove her down jacket. She looked around, knowing they were causing a small stir in the coffee shop. It was uncanny the way the three of them mirrored one another. They had the same curly reddish-brown hair, the same smattering of freckles across the bridges of their noses. Their eyes were a startling blue that turned a pearl gray when something distressed them. At present their eyes were pearl gray, their well-defined jaws grim. And their noses twitched, another sign of anxiety. People did tend to stare at identical twins, and their brother looked so much like the girls that it was sometimes difficult to tell them apart when they were dressed in bulky clothing with their woolen hats on. When the caps were removed, of course, Sam stood out like a beacon, because of his close-cropped hair. Once, in their senior year in high school, Sam had let his hair grow when they did a skit pretending to be the McGuire Sisters. Not that any of their peers knew who the McGuire Sisters were, but they did bring down the house. "We're outta there the minute they serve dessert. Do either one of you have a problem with that?" Sara's tone clearly said they'd better not have a problem with it. She was the oldest by seven minutes, and as such was the ringleader of the trio.

As one, they cupped their hands around the steaming mugs of hot chocolate. As a rule, they moved in sync, and this time it was no different. They even sipped the hot drink on cue.

"I'm pissed. Not just a little bit pissed but big-time pissed," Hannah growled, menace ringing in her voice. "How could he do such an ugly thing and not tell us until after the fact? We aren't little kids anymore. We're seniors in college. We're grown-ups," she clarified, her freckles bunching into a knot over the bridge of her nose.

Sam poked at the tiny marshmallows in his cup with his index finger. His lips compressed into a tight line across his face at his sister's words. "Slapping Granny Cisco into an assisted-living facility is not my idea of a united family. We need to spring her. Why'd he do it? All I need is one reason. Just one lousy reason."

It was Sara's turn to make a comment. "Because he wants to take control of Cisco Candies without interference from Cisco. He has a new playmate now, and he probably needs to feel important. Men his age do stupid things like this when they go through a midlife crisis. I read that in a book somewhere. She's only twenty-nine, seven years older than we are. Cisco said Dad met her in a health club."

"The best part of this, if there is a best part, is Cisco is allowed to have Freddie with her," Hannah said, referring to her grandmother's seven-year-old golden retriever. "What I don't understand is why she couldn't continue to stay at the cottage. Hell, she could afford to have a whole team of medical people help her twenty-four/seven. So she stumbles around a little because of her cataracts, so what? I know, I know, they have to be ripe before they can be removed. She knows that cottage by heart. So she broke her arm, so what? She slipped on the kitchen rug. She's only seventy-four and not ready to be put out to pasture, which is what I think Dad wants. Why didn't she fight? Cisco has weathered all kinds of storms, but she caved on this. I just don't get it." She was so breathless in her anger, she deflated like a pricked balloon.

"Damn it, Hanny, she didn't fight because Dad blindsided her. She didn't see it coming. No pun intended. Her own son, our father, did that to her, and he broke her heart by doing it. His explanation was, it was for her own good. He said broken bones at her age never mend properly, and he didn't want to feel responsible if she took another tumble.

"Dad also said the cottage is so isolated Cisco could take a bad fall and no one would know because she's too stubborn to have help. We all know she refuses to wear her hearing aids. He made a big deal out of that, too. He got three doctors to sign off on it and was prepared to go to court if Cisco balked. She just caved, it's that simple. You do that when someone breaks your heart. I say we take off the next semester and stay with her at the cottage. Let's take a vote."

"Yesss," Hannah and Sam said, their fists shooting in the air.

"Okay. Now, which one of us is going to break the news to good old Dad?"

"You're the oldest. Take a guess," Hannah said.

"Okay. Before or after dinner?"

"Let's play it by ear. We'll know when the time is right. I want to make sure we're straight on something. We're going home for Christmas, right? Who cares what Dad and his nubile squeeze do. We spring Cisco and take her back home even if we have to kidnap her, right?" Sam's face was so fierce, his siblings reached out to him as they nodded.

"That's right, little brother. We've never missed a Christmas with Cisco yet, and this is not the year to start," Sara said tightly. Three hands slapped down on the table, one covering the other. "If Dad has other plans, we can live with it."

"It's time to go," Hannah said, fishing money out of her pocket to pay for the hot chocolate. "I can't wait to see what this one looks like," she said, referring to her father's latest companion. "Anyone want to bet she has big tits, collagen lips, and a tight ass?"

"That's a sucker bet," Sam snarled as he struggled with his backpack, gloves, and jacket.

Hannah shrugged into her jacket, aware that the other customers were staring at them. Their smiles were forced as they left the warm, steamy coffee shop for the walk to their grandmother's apartment at the Dakota, the historic apartment building on Manhattan's Upper West Side.

Forty-five minutes later, they rode the elevator to the ninth floor. Hannah reached into her pocket for her key.

"Forget it, the locks have probably been changed," Sara said. "We ring the bell and wait. Don't you get it, we're guests now? It's a whole new ball game this time around."

Copyright © 2005 by Mary Higgins Clark