A Green Velvet Secret

Contents Cover Title Page Copyright Dedication Contents Warning!!!! Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Chapter 30 Chapter 31 Chapter 32 Chapter 33 Chapter 34 Chapter 35 Chapter 36 Chapter 37 Chapter 38 Chapter 39 Chapter 40 Chapter 41 Chapter 42 Chapter 43 Chapter 44 Chapter 45 Chapter 46 Acknowledgments Landmarks Cover Cover Title Page Table of Contents Start Copyright Print Page List ii iii iv v vi vii 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Text copyright © 2023 by Vicki Grant
 Cover art copyright © 2023 Annie Carbonneau
 Tundra Books, an imprint of Tundra Book Group, a division of Penguin Random House of Canada Limited
 Publisher’s note: This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
 All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the publisher — or, in case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency — is an infringement of the copyright law.
 Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
 Title: A green velvet secret / Vicki Grant.
 Names: Grant, Vicki, author.
 Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20210351888 | Canadiana (ebook) 2021035190X | ISBN 9780735270121 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780735270138 (EPUB)
 Subjects: LCGFT: Novels.
 Classification: LCC PS8613.R367 G74 2023 | DDC jC813/.6 — dc23
 Published simultaneously in the United States of America by Tundra Books of Northern New York, an imprint of Tundra Book Group, a division of Penguin Random House of Canada Limited
 Library of Congress Control Number: 2021949251
 Edited by Lynne Missen.
 Cover designed by Sophie Paas-Lang.
 www.penguinrandomhouse.ca
 
 a_prh_6.0_142813756_c0_r0
 
 
 
 For Colleen Kelly because, like Gidge, she’s shown how precious old friendships are. And for Edwina Richardson because, like Yardley, she would totally want the pantaloons.
 
 
 
 Contents
 
 Cover
 Title Page
 Copyright
 Dedication
 Warning!!!!
 
 
 Chapter 1
 Chapter 2
 Chapter 3
 Chapter 4
 Chapter 5
 Chapter 6
 Chapter 7
 Chapter 8
 Chapter 9
 Chapter 10
 Chapter 11
 Chapter 12
 Chapter 13
 Chapter 14
 Chapter 15
 Chapter 16
 Chapter 17
 Chapter 18
 Chapter 19
 Chapter 20
 Chapter 21
 Chapter 22
 Chapter 23
 Chapter 24
 Chapter 25
 Chapter 26
 Chapter 27
 Chapter 28
 Chapter 29
 Chapter 30
 Chapter 31
 Chapter 32
 Chapter 33
 Chapter 34
 Chapter 35
 Chapter 36
 Chapter 37
 Chapter 38
 Chapter 39
 Chapter 40
 Chapter 41
 Chapter 42
 Chapter 43
 Chapter 44
 Chapter 45
 Chapter 46
 
 
 Acknowledgments
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Bad things are going to happen in this book so be prepared.
 Someone’s going to die. Twice, in fact. (Or at least that’s what it felt like to me.)
 Other people are going to lie, cheat, steal, almost barf, break my heart and prance around in ridiculous outfits. (Normally, the ridiculous outfits wouldn’t bother me unless, of course, it was my parents prancing around in them, which it was, so it did.)
 I’m only warning you because I wish someone had warned me. But, ha! Like that was going to happen. Nothing Gidge loved better than surprises.
 Except, I guess, me.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 You’d never have known it from looking at her, what with the hair and the jewelry and everything, but Gidge was pretty practical. When she got the news, she just shrugged and went, “Bummer, man.” She hugged everybody goodbye then jumped on her kick-scooter and headed to Scoops Dairy Bar for an organic key lime fro-yo to eat on the way home. By the time she’d turned onto our street she was hot, and her knees were making weird squeaking sounds, but she had a plan. She had to do three things. She got started right away.
 Number One Thing: She took a spoon and began banging on this big old rusty triangle we have hanging next to the kitchen door. That’s how you call a family meeting at our place. I was upstairs in my underwear, on my bed, happily bedazzling the denim skort