Free The Coldwater Warm Hearts Club by Lexi Eddings

online?”
    â€œYou wish. Only starting about three years back. We got hooked up with that cloud thingy then. Before that, the Gazette is stored on microfiche and for the really old copies, there are paper files in the dungeon.” Wanda meant the musty basement.
    Words seldom failed Lacy. A few choice ones came to mind now—archaic, obsolete, and downright Paleolithic. But she couldn’t say them out loud if she intended to take the job. She thought about her looming loan payment and swallowed hard.
    â€œWhen do you want me to start?”
    â€œRight now. A few things may be different since you were here last. Let me give you the nickel tour.” Wanda shooed her out of her office.
    The Gazette was housed in a limestone brick structure, circa 1890. The ceilings were high and trimmed with dark oak crown moldings, a remnant of Victorian charm. The office was located near the Opera House. Lead glass windows on two sides allowed in a good amount of light. Unfortunately, sometime in the ’70s, Wanda had done a remodel. She knocked down most of the interior walls except the ones that formed her office, and left the relic of a water closet untouched. Unfortunately, that room really could have benefited from a wrecking ball.
    â€œThis, if you’ll remember,” Wanda said grandly as she swept around a space that was chopped into sad cubicles by half walls upholstered in beige fabric, “is what we like to call the ‘bullpen.’ That’s Georgina. She’s our office manager. See her about setting up direct deposit and filling out your tax stuff.”
    Georgina looked up from filing her nails and shot them a toothy grin. When she said hi, Lacy recognized her voice as the same Georgina who’d been gossiping with Heather Walker in the graveyard on Lacy’s first day back. Adorned with an eyebrow ring and an improbable pink streak in her hair, she must have been in middle school when Lacy graduated.
    Knocking on thirty suddenly felt old.
    â€œDeek here is our resident geek.” The gangly fellow flinched when Wanda clapped a palm on his shoulder. “He takes care of the office network and manages our online Gazette .”
    â€œLacy Evans.” She offered him her hand.
    From behind thick spectacles, he stared at her fingers for a few blinks but didn’t move to shake them.
    â€œThe human hand is home to one hundred and eighty-two different types of bacteria.” His voice crackled, the last gasp of a puberty that had gone on for too long and with too little positive effect. “And that’s if it’s a healthy hand.”
    â€œOh, er, good point.” Lacy resisted the urge to rub her undoubtedly germ-laden palm on her skirt.
    Wanda continued the introductions. “You remember Marjorie Chubb.”
    Lacy nodded. The Iron Lady, so called for her iron-gray hair, had been in charge of the Gazette ’s classifieds since the Flood.
    â€œBesides doing the classifieds, I’m also the captain of the Methodist prayer chain, so I hear about everything that’s important. If you ever need an idea for a story . . .” Marjorie laid a finger aside of her nose in the time-honored gesture of collusion.
    Deliver me, O Lord, from the Methodist prayer chain, Lacy prayed silently and with fervor.
    In the cube next to Marjorie was Tiffany Braden.
    Of the well-landed Bradens.
    She’d been behind Lacy in school by a couple of years. The pulled-together young woman was dressed in a tailored navy pantsuit. Compared to Tiffany, the rest of the staff seemed to have confused the concept of business casual with “business rumpled.” A degree in something from Bates College hung in Tiffany’s cube on the half wall.
    Coldwater Cove was proud to be the home of the tiny private school with a reputation for academic excellence. Of course, some folks equated excellence with snootiness, but the Bates College crowd didn’t care. Aside from its liberal