Elaine Orr - Jolie Gentil 04 - Any Port in a Storm by Elaine Orr Read Free Book Online

her own clothes. On anyone else it would look like someone stuck in time warp, but she pulls it off. “Ignore them,” she added.
    “I wish.”
    Roland’s oversized radio was playing softly, and I caught the tail end of a weather report. “…not expected to do much more than create a rougher high tide very late Saturday, with minor flooding in low-lying areas…”
    “I thought it was supposed to stay offshore,” I almost squeaked.
    “Take it easy,” Ramona said, wiping her hands on a paper towel as she finished with the toner. It’s not going to be anything up here. It’s only supposed to be a category 1 when it hits Virginia, and all we’ll get is some wind and rain Saturday evening.”
Soggy would be okay for the end of Talk Like a Pirate Day on Saturday; torrential rain would not be good. I followed Ramona to the front counter. “I have to talk to Jennifer. We’re adding a game for some of the high school kids to run.”
    Ramona gave me a raised eyebrow. “Whose idea was that?”
    I ignored her question. Ramona would just tell Jennifer I was the one who added a game to Jennifer’s already finished plans. “Megan’s worried about the kids Alicia’s hanging out with, and Scoobie and I thought it would be good for Alicia and some of her new friends to have more to do than maybe hang out in vacant houses.”
    “Scoobie would know,” she said.
     
    IT WAS FOUR-THIRTY and I was tired and hot. I had to finish my second house visit of the day and then go by Harvest for All with the sixty pounds of apples in my trunk that Mr. Markle had special-ordered for the food pantry.
    The house I was to appraise on Ferry Street was several blocks from the center of town, in an area of primarily rental homes. Now that beach season is mostly over it’s a quiet area. An older man was watering his postage stamp-size front lawn across from the house I was going to appraise. He glanced at me and went back to his begonias.
    I parked one door down so I could take exterior photos from a good vantage point. I guess that’s why whoever was in the house didn’t hear me until I put the key in the lock.
    “Out the back!” a boy said.
    “Hurry!” said a girl.
    I jumped down the two front porch steps and raced around back. This is not a good idea . As I got to the back a tall boy and very slight girl just about knocked me over as they made for the alley behind the small house. I didn’t even have a second to see their faces. My eyes were on the girl still on the porch.
    “Don’t even think about it, Alicia,” I said, trying to sound stern at the same time I tried to catch my breath.
    She looked at me sullenly and sat on the top step of the small concrete porch. Her jeans had deliberate holes, she had more eye shadow than I’d seen her wear, and her fingernails were purple. She had also tried to put streaks of red in the back of her long black hair, but hadn’t done it very evenly. Yep, Megan’s going to have her hands full.
    I sat on the step below and studied her for a second. It looked as if she had added a second piercing, at least in the ear I could see, and she had on a tighter fitting tank top than I’d seen her wear.
    “Who are they?” I asked, sitting next to her.
    She shook her head.
    “I’m not calling the cops,” I said. I studied her profile. “What do you guys do in these houses, anyway?”
    She shrugged. “It’s just a place to go where no one tries to tell us what to do.”
    “Just you three?” I asked.
    She gave me a sideways look. One other time I had told her I wouldn’t tell Megan something, but it wasn’t something that involved Alicia, just something I thought Alicia had seen. I hoped she’d remember I kept her confidence.
    She sighed. “There’s a bunch of us. We try different houses.” She glanced at me directly. “Half of them have open windows on the first floor.”
    “I don’t need to tell you how dangerous that is,” I said. Which was dumb, because probably half the fun of