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

much.   Just the sketchy details I’ve heard.”
    “Which are?”
    “You leave from here by private car at eleven fifty eight tomorrow morning. The city’s private jet flies you from Biloxi to New Orleans. You view the body at McWilliams funeral home sometime around noon.   You hear the official dispensation announcement at Raymer Peabody and Fontenot Law firm at two tomorrow afternoon.   And after you sign some documents, acting as the city’s representative, we’re all rich. That’s just the basics that are going around town. None of us really know any more details.”
    “Well, thank you for telling me. I wasn’t as yet certain about the proper spelling of “Raymer.”
    “It’s with an ‘E.’   I checked.”
    “One can’t be too careful with such things.”
    “No. So how are you and the rest of the city council going to divvy up the dough?”
    “We’re planning on keeping it all for ourselves.”
    There was a moment’s panic in his eyes, making her wonder if her sense of humor had become too subtle in her old age, or whether it actually was a sense of humor at all.
    What if no one else in the world thought funny the same things she thought funny, and, instead of becoming charmingly eccentric, she was simply going insane?
    But the panic disappeared from his face an instant after its inception, and his smile broadened.
    “You wouldn’t be very popular.”
    “We are now, though, going to be very popular, I suppose.”
    “You are with me; and with the rest of the school board.”
    “Where would this school be, Paul?”
    “Right here.   We have the land. We just tear down what’s here now, and start from scratch.   It would all be state of the art, from the classrooms right down to the lunchrooms. People would come from all over the country to look at it.”
    She shook her head.
    “It’s a marvelous conception, Paul. You should be proud that you had this done.”
    “We need it, Nina.   What we have now is…”
    “I know. What we have now is what we had when I started teaching.   It wasn’t much, even then.”
    “And now it’s about to fall down.   It will fall down, some day, and I don’t want to be under it when it does.   Nor my teachers.   Nor my kids.”
    She liked the way he thought of them as his teachers, and his kids.
    He saw them, she could tell, not as his underlings but as his responsibilities.
    There was a difference.
    “I wish I could promise you, Paul, that the city will choose to go this way. I can’t, you know.   Not everyone in town views education as the highest priority.”
    He nodded.
    “I know. But I talked to several people on the school board. We all thought it good to proceed with a drawing, a conception. I assume there will be a meeting when everyone in town makes various proposals.”
    “More than one meeting.   I think we can all be sure of that.”
    “Then we’ll get our chance.”
    “Of course.”
    “And when we do, we’ll have this to show you.”
    “Yes.   And it’s truly impressive, Paul, it really is.”
    “Can we count on your vote?”
    “Of course.   You know that.”
    “Good.   Because––”
    “Nina!   Nina!”
    Through a door suddenly flung open, rushed Macy Peterson completely out of breath.
    “I’m sorry I’m late!   We had a few crises!   Are you ready? Sorry to interrupt, Paul!   Oh gee!   Did you show her?   What do you think of it, Nina?   Isn’t it great?   I know already where I’m going to be teaching!   Right over there, in that tallest building, the one with a view of the ocean.   So when do you think the money will be available?   Paul says the construction could start next spring!   And we wouldn’t have to have it all up front!   Just, what was it, Paul, twenty percent?   And the rates they’re willing to give us are phenomenal. Also, the state may be willing to kick in a certain percentage, given how the elections turn out next month.   But Paul is optimistic.”
    She took two or three