Current Affairs (Tiara Investigations Mysteries) Read Online Free

tee off. Mrs. Taylor had one more question for me, “By the way, what is your hourly rate?”
    “Fore!” Tara says this each time she tees off just in case.
    “Four hundred an hour? That’s fine. I’ll see you this afternoon.”
    “Wait, I, I …,” but she had hung up.
    And just like that our fee went from one hundred an hour to four hundred.

 
     
     
     
    Two
     
    C ontinuation of statement by Leigh Reed. The three of us arrived at the Cracker Barrel before our client, Kelly Taylor. I found a parking space near the entrance to this little piece of heaven. The asphalt lot was surrounded by contrived landscaping. The trees were mathematically equidistant from each other, and the leaves were burgundy, orange, gold, and salmon. Along the front porch the world’s most comfortable rocking chairs were lined up. I guess management’s afraid they would be stolen, because they’re bolted down. Mingled in with the plain rocking chairs were a few with the University of Georgia Bulldog insignia and two church pews.  
    When Kelly Taylor approached the table, I stood up and shook her hand. She was African-American, and I noticed she was about my height. She looked me in the eye, and her handshake was firm. She wasn’t embarrassed to be there. No wife should be; the husband is the one who should be mortified. I liked her right away. Later, looking at her seated, she seemed, well, shorter and smaller. That day her hair was pulled back in a chignon, and she wore tiny pearl earrings. That’s pretty much how the rest of the meeting went, my impression of her switching back and forth. Some of her mannerisms reinforced a demure façade, and some contradicted. One minute she was hard and tough as steel, and then with the next glance you thought she was going to cry. Who was the real Kelly Taylor?
    I started the interview by asking her to tell us about her husband. “He’s thirty-three years old, four years older than me. He’s very intelligent. He owns his own consulting firm.”  
      She said she loved him even though he was not romantic or demonstrative. When asked to give a more complete physical description, she had to think for a few seconds. Me, I can describe every hair on The General’s head. Still, she claimed to be in love with him.
    As I went about getting the information we needed to begin a case, I noticed she was pulling back into her chair. This made me wonder if I was coming across like I was grilling her. That was certainly not my intent. I stopped speaking, knowing that one of my colleagues would pick up on this.
    Victoria took over. “What has made you suspect your husband of being up to no good?”
      “Sometimes when I come into a room and he’s on the telephone, he hangs up.”
    “Anything else?” I was glad Vic asked this because I hate wild goose chases.
    “David used to work in his home office about half the time. In the last few months he’s been spending more and more time at his office in Peachtree Corners. Lately he’s been going there at night, or so he says. My husband has changed. That’s all I know.”
    Most of her concern was due to a vague, but unmistakable, feeling that something was altered. We took the case based on that fact. She’d noticed this change a few months after they bought their new house in Duluth, Georgia. This was to be their dream house. We wrote down the license plate number of his car and all the addresses we might need. As we passed around the photo of the black, tall, slender man in glasses, I was pretty sure we were all thinking the same thing, “There is no type.” Anybody can try their damndest to screw up their life, and there’s no better way than infidelity.
    Victoria continued on with the interview. “Might he have clients on the west coast that would necessitate him being at the office at night for teleconferences with them?”
    “I know his biggest client is in Atlanta, that’s why we moved here. But I don’t know where the rest of his