Crain's Landing by Cayce Poponea Read Free Book Online Page B

I snapped my fingers in her face and gave her a look that said “I'm waiting.” I was completely annoyed and getting rather pissed off.
    "Brittney?" She answered in a questioning tone.
    "See, I knew you could do it. Do you have it written on your hand somewhere?" In a move that baffled me and made me chuckle under my breath, she looked at both her hands, turning them over as she inspected them. This one...was a real winner.
    Hearing the wheels squeaking on the book cart, I turned back to Ashley. "Hold it, Mary Poppins. I have something else for you to do." Ashley released the handle of the cart, her head remaining down. "In the time I've been here, it seems Ashley does all of the work. Which would tell me she knows what the procedures are around here." Ashley began to slowly look up at me. Clearly, no one had ever noticed this or taken the time to say anything to her. "Brittney, go and put those books away." I tossed my hand in the direction of the book cart. "Ashley, come and show me my office, we have things to discuss." I walked toward Ashley leaving Brittney to do some real work. I gazed back to see Brittney with her mouth hanging open and a look of confusion on her face. “Brittney, do you need something?"
    She looked from the cart to me and back again. "You want me to touch those?" She pointed at the cart, a look of disgust on her face.
    "No, little Ms. Wizard, I want you to stare at them and see if they'll put themselves away. Yes, I want you to actually touch them. Place them back where they go. Then come see me in my office for further instructions."
    I turned toward Ashley and noticed the sly grin growing on her face. I would find out the story there. I turned one last time to see if Brittney had moved, only to find her reaching for her phone again. "Motor mouth, you call one more person and I promise you it'll be the last thing you do as an employee here."
    She then looked to me, and I would swear to God this was what she actually said with a straight face, "But you said to see if they'd put themselves away."
    Oh, dear God in Heaven. After all I had witnessed today, I really hoped stupidity wasn't something they put in the water.

 

    “YOU KNOW WE WEREN’T EXPECTING you until Monday.” Behind closed doors, Ashley was a much more open person, willingly starting conversations and giving more information than I needed.
    “You will find I am always full of surprises. I’ve been known to do the opposite of what most people expect.” I could have quit college, put getting my masters on the back burner. But it wasn’t like me not to finish something I started; no matter how difficult or challenging it might be.
    My meeting with Ashley lasted much longer than I had planned. I looked at my watch only to discover an hour had already passed. The information, however, was worth the loss of time. It seemed the old director, Mr. Barrow, had received many grants for improvements in the past years on behalf of the library, but he had chosen to place all the money in an interest-bearing account instead of doing the needed repairs. The cheap bastard deserved a swift kick in the ass as far as I was concerned, and I wanted to know where the hell all that money had gone.
    We had four full-time employees on staff, yet the library was closed on the weekends, when it would have been the most prudent time to be open. Ashley shared with me that she had worked at the library since she was a senior in high school and felt at home here with no desire to go anywhere else. My blood boiled when she told me how she’d made the mistake of telling Brittney of her crush on Drew Foster, the owner of the local butcher shop. Brittney had told her sister, Kate, who had then told their aunt, whom I wasn’t surprised to learn was my neighbor, Janice. They had all teased Ashley relentlessly and now she avoided him at all costs. What did disturb me was how it was rumored that Brittney had intentionally seduced Drew with the intent to, and I