Free An Uplifting Murder by Elaine Viets Page A

ears.”
     
    “I can come over now. We could have lunch or coffee,” Josie said.
     
    “My break is at twelve fifteen. Lunch is my treat. I’ll meet you at the Venetian Coffee Bar in the food court.”
     
    Josie fortified herself with coffee before she went for coffee, a move that was redundant but necessary. She couldn’t face the cold morning again without hot caffeine. While she drank her first cup of the day, Harry curled next to her on the couch, shedding companionably on her brown sweater.
     
    “At least I’m learning to wear cat-colored clothes,” she told the cat. Harry gently bumped her elbow, asking for another scratch.
     
    Plaza Venetia was a self-contained world, tropically warm and inviting. When Josie arrived at the coffee bar at 12:10, Laura was waiting. The shop manager was still large, but Laura now seemed collapsed at her core. Her eyelids were red from crying and her nose was raw.
     
    “Do you have a cold?” Josie asked.
     
    “No, I’m crazed with worry,” Laura said. “I expect the police to show up any minute. Let’s order. I can at least eat a decent lunch. I hear jail food is terrible.”
     
    They ordered grilled-chicken salads and coffee. Laura’s hands shook slightly as she lifted her coffee cup. She waited until the waitress left, checked the nearby tables for potential eavesdroppers, then said, “I think the police are going to arrest me.”
     
    “Are you sure?” Josie asked.
     
    “Of course I’m not sure,” Laura said. “But the way they’re asking questions, they definitely see me as a person of interest. That’s what they call someone they’re going to arrest, right?”
     
    Josie leaned forward. “Tell me why they’re interested. I can’t help if you keep being mysterious.”
     
    “I haven’t told this story to anyone but my husband,” Laura said. “Husbands, actually. My first husband left me in the lurch, so he doesn’t count. But he knows, too.”
     
    She sipped her coffee as if it could give her courage. “Frankie ruined my teaching career. She got me fired.”
     
    “Was that during my junior year in high school?” Josie asked. “You just up and left.”
     
    “And you never knew why?” Laura asked.
     
    “We were told it was for your husband,” Josie said.
     
    “I guess my story didn’t get into the rumor mill.” She took a bite of her grilled chicken. Josie noticed her ex-teacher’s sharp white teeth. “Frankie wanted to be a nurse. She was on track for a scholarship. With her grades, it seemed like a shoo-in. Frankie took this honor as her due. She seemed to think she could do anything she wanted and the scholarship was guaranteed. She’d had two warnings about smoking and drinking on campus. The school was strict back then. It had a zero-tolerance policy.
     
    “One Wednesday, I went for my lunchtime walk. I caught Frankie sitting on the hood of a blue Camaro, laughing and drinking beer with three boys in the student parking lot. The boys didn’t go to our school. They took off like scalded roaches.
     
    “I reported the incident to the principal. This was Frankie’s third offense. Frankie was looking at expulsion. That would have ruined her chances for a nursing school scholarship.
     
    “I figured the issue was over. She’d been warned twice and this was her third offense. Most of the teachers would have been glad to see her go. She was nasty to the other students and disruptive. No one liked her but the principal, who was proud of his future scholarship winner. She made him look good and he got bonuses if the school produced scholarship winners.
     
    “I thought I’d caught her red-handed, but Frankie fought back. She told the principal that I’d touched her ‘inappropriately’ in gym class. She said I’d watched her undress in the locker room and invited my gay sister to see her get dressed after the mandatory showers.”
     
    “But that’s not true,” Josie said. “Not when I was there. Frankie was mean to