Free Leave No Stone Unturned (A Lexie Starr Mystery, Book 1) by Jeanne Glidewell Page B

each morning, and to the Union
     Street Diner for supper.
    I had fallen into a comfortable routine. Harriet usually joined me on the back porch
     in the evenings for a quick chat. She allowed herself about ten minutes of downtime
     each day. She'd sit on her rusty bucket and smoke three cigarettes in ten minutes
     before rushing off to tackle another chore.
    During her ten-minute break on Wednesday evening, I asked her about her family. She
     told me she had one son living in Schenectady, and another son in Florida. Her husband
     had been killed in a boating mishap when her boys were both in high school. He was
     drunk one day, Harriet said, and capsized his fishing boat by running it into a submerged
     log. Her husband drowned when the boat sank to the bottom of the lake.
    "Oh, Harriet, I'm so sorry. That was really a terrible tragedy," I said.
    "Yeah, it shore were," she said and nodded. "It were a brand-spanking-new boat."

 
     
     
    Chapter 10

     
    I crawled out of bed early on Thursday morning, even earlier than Harriet. I knew
     it'd take me a while to drive to Battery Park in New York. From there I planned to
     take the ferry across to Liberty Island. I preferred to get there a bit early and
     wait for Stone than to get there late and have him waiting for me. I wasn't familiar
     with New York or the traffic there, so I didn't know with any degree of accuracy how
     to estimate the time it would take to drive there.
    Since my four and a half days were up on my fuss-free hairstyle, I had to spend a
     good twenty minutes with the curling iron. Then I had to spend another ten or fifteen
     minutes changing into every outfit I'd brought with me before finally settling on
     the first outfit I'd tried on. The thought occurred to me that getting back into the
     dating scene required almost more time and trouble than I was prepared to sacrifice.
    I bypassed my morning English muffin since we'd have an early lunch and I didn't want
     to run the risk of arriving late. Not to mention I was leaving Schenectady in what
     seemed like the middle of the night. As it turned out, I got turned around a couple
     of times in New York City, driving through a tunnel three times before I recognized
     it as the same Holland Tunnel I'd already passed through twice before. I finally arrived
     at Battery Park at about ten-twenty-five. I paid the ten-dollar fee to take the ten-thirty
     ferry across to the island. Crossing over to the island on the ferry, I overheard
     two young women chatting.
    One of them remarked, "Too bad we can't go up in the statue." I wondered why they
     couldn't. Neither one of them looked to be handicapped.
    I found out soon enough that no one could go up in the statue. It'd been closed to
     tourists since the September eleventh terrorist attacks in 2001. Because of the mob
     of people milling about the grounds, I wondered whether I'd even find Stone. I was
     too vain to wear my glasses, so I'd left them in my car's glove compartment. Now I
     had to get within about ten feet of a fellow to read the front of his T-shirt. I walked
     around for forty-five minutes staring at every man's chest that drew near me.
    I glanced at my watch and saw that it was already almost noon. Would Stone wait for
     me or had he left? I wondered. Maybe he'd decided I'd stood him up when I didn't appear
     at eleven. Then again, maybe he had stood me up! I didn't think he'd do something
     that inconsiderate. From what little I knew of him, it didn't seem his style at all.
     Mine, maybe, but not Stone's.
    I was just about to sit down on a nearby bench and sob when I felt a gentle tap on
     my shoulder. "Are you Lexie Starr?" I heard a soft-spoken voice ask. I recognized
     the voice from our previous phone conversation and breathed a huge sigh of relief.
    "Yes. Stone?"
    "Uh-huh," he replied with a nod. He gave me a brief, casual embrace. "I was beginning
     to think we wouldn't be able to find each other in this swarm of people. You were
     standing