Purchase
Simon and Schuster
November 2004
Featuring: Alvirah Meehan; Regan Reilly
224 pages
ISBN: 0743271556
Hardcover
Add to Wish List
Mystery Private Eye, Suspense, Fiction
You Belong To Me, November 2023
Trade Paperback / e-Book (reprint)
Pretend You Don't See Her, September 2023
Trade Paperback / e-Book (reprint)
Where Are the Children?, May 2023
Trade Paperback / e-Book
Where Are the Children Now?, April 2023
Hardcover / e-Book
Where Are the Children?, March 2023
Mass Market Paperback / e-Book
Deck the Halls, November 2022
Mass Market Paperback / e-Book
Piece of My Heart, November 2020
Hardcover / e-Book
I've Got My Eyes on You, March 2019
Mass Market Paperback / e-Book (reprint)
You Don't Own Me, November 2018
Hardcover / e-Book
Every Breath You Take, November 2018
Mass Market Paperback / e-Book (reprint)
I've Got My Eyes on You, April 2018
Hardcover / e-Book
All By Myself, Alone, April 2018
Mass Market Paperback / e-Book
Every Breath You Take, November 2017
Hardcover / e-Book
The Sleeping Beauty Killer, September 2017
Mass Market Paperback / e-Book (reprint)
All By Myself, Alone, April 2017
Hardcover / e-Book
As Time Goes By, April 2017
Mass Market Paperback
The Sleeping Beauty Killer, November 2016
Hardcover / e-Book
As Time Goes By, April 2016
Hardcover / e-Book
All Dressed in White, November 2015
Hardcover / e-Book
The Melody Lingers On, July 2015
Hardcover / e-Book
Manhattan Mayhem, June 2015
Hardcover / e-Book
Death Wears a Beauty Mask and Other Stories, May 2015
Hardcover / e-Book
The Mystery Writers of America Cookbook, April 2015
Hardcover / e-Book
The Cinderella Murder, November 2014
Hardcover / e-Book
I've Got You Under My Skin, April 2014
Hardcover / e-Book
Daddy's Gone A Hunting, April 2013
Hardcover / e-Book
The Lost Years, March 2013
Paperback / e-Book (reprint)
The Lost Years, April 2012
Hardcover / e-Book
The Magical Christmas Horse, November 2011
Hardcover
I'll Walk Alone, April 2011
Hardcover
The Shadow of Your Smile, April 2011
Mass Market Paperback / e-Book
Christmas at The Mysterious Bookshop, October 2010
Hardcover
The Shadow Of Your Smile, April 2010
Hardcover
Just Take My Heart, April 2009
Hardcover
Dashing Through The Snow, November 2008
Hardcover
Where Are You Now?, April 2008
Hardcover
No Place Like Home: A Novel, April 2008
Mass Market Paperback
I Heard That Song Before: A Novel, March 2008
Mass Market Paperback
Ghost Ship, April 2007
Hardcover
I Heard That Song Before, April 2007
Hardcover
Two Little Girls in Blue, March 2007
Mass Market Paperback (reprint)
Santa Cruise, November 2006
Hardcover
The Christmas Thief, November 2006
Paperback (reprint)
While My Pretty One Sleeps, July 2006
Paperback (reprint)
Two Little Girls in Blue, April 2006
Hardcover
No Place like Home, March 2006
Paperback (reprint)
Pretend You Don't See Her, February 2006
Paperback (reprint)
Silent Night & All Through the Night, December 2005
Hardcover (reprint)
Where Are the Children?, June 2005
Paperback (reprint)
Nighttime Is My Time, April 2005
Paperback (reprint)
The Christmas Thief, November 2004
Hardcover
The Second Time Around, April 2004
Paperback (reprint)
Kitchen Privileges: A Memoir, October 2003
Paperback (reprint)
Mount Vernon Love Story: A Novel of George and Martha Washington, June 2003
Paperback
Daddy's Little Girl, April 2003
Paperback (reprint)
My Gal Sunday, February 2003
Paperback (reprint)
He Sees You When You're Sleeping, October 2002
Paperback (reprint)
On the Street Where You Live, April 2002
Paperback (reprint)
Deck the Halls, November 2001
Paperback (reprint)
Three Bestselling Novels: Let Me Call You Sweetheart / I'll Be Seeing You / Remember Me, September 2001
Hardcover (reprint)
Before I Say Good-Bye, April 2001
Paperback (reprint)
The Cradle Will Fall, May 2000
Mass Market Paperback / e-Book
We'll Meet Again, March 2000
Paperback (reprint)
Stillwatch, March 1997
Mass Market Paperback
The Lottery Winner, November 1995
Mass Market Paperback
A Cry In The Night, December 1993
Mass Market Paperback
Loves Music, Loves to Dance, March 1992
Mass Market Paperback
Gypped, May 2013
Paperback / e-Book (reprint)
Mobbed, April 2012
Paperback / e-Book (reprint)
Mobbed, April 2011
Hardcover
Wrecked, April 2011
Mass Market Paperback / e-Book
Cursed, April 2009
Hardcover
Dashing Through The Snow, November 2008
Hardcover
Hitched, March 2007
Paperback (reprint)
Santa Cruise, November 2006
Hardcover
Hitched, April 2006
Hardcover
The Christmas Thief, November 2004
Hardcover
He Sees You When You're Sleeping, October 2002
Paperback (reprint)
Deck the Halls, November 2001
Paperback (reprint)
Chapter 1
Packy Noonan carefully placed an x on the calendar he had
pinned to the wall of his cell in the federal prison
located near Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love.
Packy was overflowing with love for his fellow man. He had
been a guest of the United States Government for twelve
years, four months, and two days. But because he had
served over 85 percent of his sentence and been a model
prisoner, the parole board had reluctantly granted Packy
his freedom as of November 12, which was only two weeks
away.
Packy, whose full name was Patrick Coogan Noonan, was a
world-class scam artist whose offense had been to cheat
trusting investors out of nearly $100 million in the
seemingly legitimate company he had founded. When the
house of cards collapsed, after deducting the money he had
spent on homes, cars, jewelry, bribes, and shady ladies,
most of the rest, nearly $80 million, could not be
accounted for.
In the years of his incarceration, Packy's story never
changed. He insisted that his two missing associates had
run off with the rest of the money and that, like his
victims, he, too, had been the victim of his own trusting
nature.
Fifty years old, narrow-faced, with a hawklike nose, close-
set eyes, thinning brown hair, and a smile that inspired
trust, Packy had stoically endured his years of
confinement. He knew that when the day of deliverance
came, his nest egg of $80 million would sufficiently
compensate him for his discomfort.
He was ready to assume a new identity once he picked up
his loot; a private plane would whisk him to Brazil, and a
skillful plastic surgeon there had already been engaged to
rearrange the sharp features that might have served as the
blueprint for the working of his brain.
All the arrangements had been made by his missing
associates, who were now residing in Brazil and had been
living on $10 million of the missing funds. The remaining
fortune Packy had managed to hide before he was arrested,
which was why he knew he could count on the continued
cooperation of his cronies.
The long-standing plan was that upon his release Packy
would go to the halfway house in New York, as required by
the terms of his parole, dutifully follow regulations for
about a day, then shake off anyone following him, meet his
partners in crime, and drive to Stowe, Vermont. There they
were to have rented a farmhouse, a flatbed trailer, a barn
to hide it in, and whatever equipment it took to cut down
a very large tree.
"Why Vermont?" Giuseppe Como, better known as Jo-Jo,
wanted to know. "You told us you hid the loot in New
Jersey. Were you lying to us, Packy?"
"Would I lie to you?" Packy had asked, wounded. "Maybe I
don't want you talking in your sleep."
Jo-Jo and Benny, forty-two-year-old fraternal twins, had
been in on the scam from the beginning, but both humbly
acknowledged that neither one of them had the fertile mind
needed to concoct grandiose schemes. They recognized their
roles as foot soldiers of Packy and willingly accepted the
droppings from his table since, after all, they were
lucrative droppings.
"O Christmas tree, my Christmas tree," Packy whispered to
himself as he contemplated finding the special branch of
one particular tree in Vermont and retrieving the flask of
priceless diamonds that had been nestling there for over
thirteen years.
Copyright © 2004 by Mary Higgins Clark and Carol
Higgins Clark