A Carnival of Killing Read Online Free

‘off you.’”
    Kitty gave me a half-smile, brushed a wisp of dark-brown hair away from one of her green eyes and handed me the large manila envelope in her left hand. “Thanks,” she said. “Here’s the statement and the photo I promised you. If you have any questions I’ll be in the office until five.”
    I did have questions. “How well did you know Lee-Ann?”
    “I got acquainted with her after I got the job as coordinator six months ago, but I didn’t know her as well as the other girls. All the past and present Kates are pretty tight. It’s like a sisterhood.”
    “Can you have one of the sisters who was really close to her call me?” I asked.
    “I can try. It won’t be a popular request.”
    I handed her my business card. “I’d like to be able to describe Lee-Ann as she was in life, rather than as the victim of a tragedy.”
    “That’s nice of you. I’ll tell her friends that when I ask them to call you.” She shook hands, slung her coat over her arm and walked away before I could tell her how nice I really am. Every male eye in the newsroom followed her until the elevator doors closed behind her.
    I opened the envelope and pulled out a color photo of a round-faced blonde with wide blue eyes, a snub nose and a dazzling smile that said she loved life. She was wearing the same short-sleeved purple dress that I’d seen in the frozen driveway.
    “It’s always the pretty ones that the bastards kill,” said a voice behind me. I turned to face Fred Donlin, the night city editor, who’d been peeking over my shoulder.
    “I can’t imagine looking into this face and having the urge to kill her,” I said. I handed Fred the picture and went to work on my computer, inserting the official Kates’ statement into my story. I’d just punched the send button when it occurred to me that John Robertson, Jr., had never returned my call.
    I punched in the Capitol number and the extension. A man answered and identified himself as Ray Walker. I asked for John Robertson and was told that he’d left for the day. “He was in early for one of those stupid sunrise breakfasts that our governor loves so much,” Walker said.
    “Who was the governor stuffing with doughnuts this morning?” I asked.
    “Gun nuts,” said Walker. “They were stuffing him with bullshit about the need for allowing folks to carry concealed weapons. Only for self-protection, of course.”
    A few years previously, the Minnesota gun lobby had won a well-financed campaign to allow people to carry guns in public as a means of self-protection. Facilities that wanted to be gun-free, such as churches and hospitals and gambling casinos, were required to post signs to that effect. Now the gunners were firing the next shots at their target of universal hidden armament.
    “Oh, goodie,” I said. “My tax dollars at work so we can all pack pistols in our armpits.”
    It was past time to go home. I put down the phone and picked up my coat. I had one arm in a sleeve when the phone rang. I contemplated letting it go back to the central operator but succumbed to curiosity.
    “Brownhere,” said the caller. “Don’t you ever go home?”
    “People like you keep me here at all hours,” I said. “If you want, I can go home right now and you could call me there.”
    “I already called you there. Your sweetie said you were so late she’d been thinking about calling me to see if we had any bodies that looked like yours.”
    “Well, here I am, alive and relatively well. What’s up?”
    “I’ll tell you something that you can’t print yet if you’ll promise to give me some help.”
    “What kind of help?” I asked. I rarely dealt with sources off the record. This sort of cooperation would not come cheap.
    “You’ll be covering a lot of the Winter Carnival crap, right?”
    “Right. Of course I won’t describe the gala carnival events in quite so crude a manner.”
    “I’m sure. What I’m asking is that you keep your eyes and ears open for