Free The Big Cat Nap by Rita Mae Brown

taken?”
    “Fifteen, twenty minutes. I really don’t like them.”
    “It’s the squish that gets you. You can’t move. Still, it’s a wonderful tool. When I look back on some of our parents’ friends who died of breast cancer, I wonder if they’d have been saved if only they’d had mammograms. The technology we have today,” Susan mused out loud.
    “Bet a lot would. And a hundred years from now, even these methods will look primitive.” Harry crossed one leg over the other. “Much as we dislike the boob squisher, it beats a prostate exam.”
    They laughed.
    “Been back to ReNu?” Susan asked, a slight accusatory note in her voice.
    “Why would you ask that?” Harry asked, suspicious of her longtime friend.
    “Because I’ve known you all your life. Spill it, sister.”
    “You’re just fishing. You don’t know anything.”
    “I ran into Nick Ashby at Fresh! He mentioned that he’d seen you. He has a good memory, because he remembered my face from that awful day.”
    A slight pause followed Susan’s revelation. “I take it Nick flashed his big smile for you,” Harry said.
    “Did.”
    “Sometimes I hate this town. People talk too much,” Harry grumbled.
    “They talk too much in Istanbul, in Paris, France—and even up the road in Paris, Virginia, too. Human nature.”
    “Yeah, yeah.” Harry leaned back against the wall.
    “I’m waiting.”
    “Me, too. I hope my X rays don’t need a second reading.”
    “This place is packed today. Aren’t you glad Ruth let me back here to find you?”
    Ruth was the head nurse, who had gone to high school with them.
    “I have to think about that.”
    Susan punched her in the arm. “Why did you go back to ReNu? Harry, you are out of your mind. How do you know the killer doesn’t work there?”
    “I don’t, but I keep seeing that body sprawled out, faceup. Bothers me. We must have missed something. The sheriff must have missed something.”
    “It’s not your job to find Walt’s killer.”
    “I know, but …” Her voice trailed off.
    “Just think about it, Harry. That man didn’t stand a chance. Maybe he stole some money, slept with another mechanic’s wife—who knows? Nosing around there is not too bright.”
    “Motive always explains, defines a crime.”
    “That’s exactly what I’m talking about.” Susan’s voice was firm. “You don’t know the motive, but if it involves one of his co-workers, that guy has just seen your face again. Sometimes I swear you have no brains.”
    Hearing steps approaching, Harry did not reply.
    Ruth called, “Harry.”
    Harry rose, pulled aside the curtain to face the nurse. “How’d I do?”
    “Clean as a whistle. I’ll see you in six months. You, too, Susan. I checked your records and you, BoomBoom, and Alicia—along with Harry, who had her mammogram when you all did last winter—you will all be due then. I’m keeping tabs.”
    “I’m grateful. It’s a lucky thing we did come for that mammogram. Caught Harry’s suspicious spot early.”
    Susan couldn’t bring herself to say “cancer.”
    After Ruth returned to the front desk, relief flooded Harry’s face. “I wasn’t worried.”
    “Liar.”
    “Well, just a tad,” Harry confessed.
    “Come on, girl. Put your bra and your shirt back on. Let’s blow this joint. I’ll wait outside.”
    “Where are we going?”
    “Starbucks. I’m buying you a giant Frappuccino, double chocolate, to celebrate.”

    From Central Virginia Medical Center to the Starbucks in Waynesboro off Route 340 took all of fifteen minutes.
    Never one to fret over calories, Harry ate the mound of whipped cream before sipping through the straw.
    “At least the woman behind the counter didn’t call me ‘Sir,’ ” Harry mentioned.
    Susan laughed. “People don’t pay attention if you come in wearing overalls with mud on them, a baseball cap, no earrings, and a bandanna around your neck. They can’t imagine a woman farming, I guess.”
    “Remind me to wear my tiara