Strictly Business (23 page)

“Cass! Are you all right?”

She swallowed, then turned a wide-eyed gaze toward the voice coming from next door. Her neighbor, Verna Colson, was leaning over her deck railing, her expression showing the concern she felt.

“I’m okay,” Cass said, glancing down at the jagged bleeding scrape along her right calf. Her leg must actually have gone through the step and dragged against the split wood before she’d saved herself. She hoped there weren’t any splinters. She hated splinters. It took nerves of steel and a wealth of patience to work them out. “It’s just a scratch.”

“You sure, honey?”

She nodded. “I’m sure. The step must have rotted through.”

“Just as long as you’re not hurt,” Verna said. “That’s the important thing.”

Yet bet your bippy, Cass thought as her heart rate slowly returned to normal. She remembered that the step had been creaking lately. It was her own fault for not paying more attention to the warning signal. The continual moisture in the air wreaked havoc with the wood in the homes here. She should have had enough sense to realize that her place was no more immune than anyone else’s. She decided she’d call someone out to inspect the entire house for wood rot.

And it beat the heck out of falling through the bathroom floor to find out a checkup was definitely overdue.