Sea Change (The Nina Bannister Mysteries Book 1) by T'Gracie Reese, Joe Reese Read Free Book Online Page A

like a vapor through the French and Russian troops dying on The Battlefield of High School Hallway and took her hand, smiling as he said:
    “Macy tells me you’re talking to one of her classes!”
    She shouted something as loud as she could, but couldn’t hear herself over the tumult of what seemed to be dozens of identical girls screaming into each other’s faces at the same time.
    He nodded.
    “Good.   Good.   Thank you so much for doing this!”
    “–––––––––––––––––––,” she screamed.
    “Yes, I think so too!”
    I wonder , she thought, what I must have said .
    “Come on into my office for a minute.   Macy will be down in a second to get you. Besides, there’s something I want to show you!”
    But I want to stay here , she thought.  
    “Come on!”
    She followed, amazed that the two of them were not trampled.
    The office was, as usual, filled with sullen teenagers who’d missed something or forgotten something or done something or not done something and thus were all standing by the counter waiting to be dealt with.
    Only after she and Paul were in the office itself, door closed securely behind them, could she feel safe.
    How had she done this every day for forty years?
    Paul was not a big man, but he exuded confidence.   Perhaps that confidence, and not pure muscularity, explained why he’d been one of the best quarterbacks in the high school’s history. Did the confidence cause this greatness, she wondered, or result from it?
    No matter.
    The main thing was he simply represented “PRINCIPALDOM”   in its purest form.   Starched white shirt, navy blazer, superbly tied club tie—the principal is your pal and such he was to everyone.
    “Look at this!   We can unveil it now!”
    She followed him toward a tripod standing beside one of the paneled walls, a towel hanging over it and covering what seemed to be a painting of some sort.
    There was something birdlike about Paul Cox’s movements, she found herself thinking. A delicate quality almost.   His high cheekbones, aquiline features, bright and inquisitive eyes—this was more an artist than a football player; yet somehow he’d managed to become both, as well as a visionary leader for the school.
    “Look!”
    He took the cover off.
    “Oh my—Paul!” Nina exclaimed.
    “Our new physical plant!   Elementary, middle, and high school, all conjoined.”
    The scene painted before her seemed almost something from a science fiction novel.   There were the trees, sidewalks, dedicated and happy young people, and blue skies always associated with model developments as depicted by optimistic engineers working with good painters,   fanciful planners and—on occasion––ruthless bunko artists.
    But here laid out before her was much more. This was not a school but a spaceport, with glass and chrome buildings sprouting high above the city, strange train like vehicles linking porches and archways, windows opening onto the brightest of ocean views, and light, light, everywhere light.
    “Paul, this is fantastic!”
    “I have,” he said, “been keeping it under wraps.   It was designed by a firm in New Orleans.”
    “Is it a moonscape?   Or the next Disneyworld?”
    “It’s our new school.”
    “How could it be, Paul?   This thing would cost a billion dollars.”
    “Not at all. We can get it at bargain rates:   a hundred and forty million.   And we’re going to have that much, from what I hear.”
    She was silent for a time, wondering how many seconds after Arthur Robinson’s demise it had actually taken for everyone in Bay St. Lucy—from adults to children to senior citizens to pets and porpoises—to know the old man was dead.
    “You’ve heard then.”
    “First thing this morning.”
    “Just out of curiosity, who told you?”
    “One of the janitors.”
    “So you knew it to be true.”
    “Of course. I don’t spread rumors. Good luck in New Orleans.”
    “You know about that, too?”
    “Not