Marty Ambrose - Mango Bay 02 - Island Intrigue Read Online Free

believe
she still wants to edit every line of my stories.” I thumped
my large canvas bag onto the desk. Two pens and a can of
Diet Coke rolled out. I shoved them back into the black
hole that passed for my purse. “I’ve been working here
almost six months, and I think I can write a simple story
without her second-guessing everything I’ve done”
    “Anita is a Capricorn, ruled by Saturn.” A smile tipped
the corners of Sandy’s bow-shaped mouth. “She likes
control and order…. You have to let her do her thing, or
she’ll feel like she’s losing her sense of authority.”
    “Do you know her rising sign?” the painter piped up.
    We both turned in his direction.
    “Huh?” I couldn’t imagine anything “rising” out of
Anita except curses and mutterings.
    “My mom is Madame Geri-short for Geraldine.”
He placed a hand across his heart and, in a quaint, oldfashioned gesture, gave a slight bow.
    “Our newspaper astrologer?” I asked.
    “Yep. And I gotta tell you, she knows her stuff. Really awesome. She taught me a lot about the planets and
how they influence people.”
    Sandy’s features kindled in sudden interest. “I love
Madame Geri’s column. I mean, she isn’t just your average, run-of-the-mill astrologer. She … she’s clairvoyant.”

    I listened to the two of them praising Madame Geri for
a few minutes, wondering if they were talking about the
same person whose column rarely said anything more
specific than Avoid arguments today and you’ll feel much
happier. Who couldn’t predict that?
    “If I could get the date and time of Anita’s birth, do
you think Madame Geri could do her chart?” Sandy
asked, her voice rising in excitement.
    “Sure,” he said.
    “But, Sandy-” I began.
    “No ‘but’s about it. Listen, Mallie, if we can find out
what makes Anita tick, it could make things work a lot
smoother around here,” Sandy pointed out.
    “I don’t think-“
    “It could even help you find a way to get your articles
written without her breathing down your neck.”
    She had me there. “I … I guess there’s nothing wrong
with just checking out her birth date.”
    “I’ll get right on it-after my diet bar.” Sandy pulled
out a six-inch bar with the words LOW CALORIE blazoned across the silver foil.
    “Are you dieting?” the painter asked.
    Sandy chomped a large bite out of her bar and nodded.
    “Me too” He gestured toward his potbelly. A youngish
guy probably in his midtwenties, he had the beefy good
looks of a guy who ate his frosted cereal flakes every
morning rather than checking to see if his planets were
aligned.
    As they conversed about the merits of their present diet for a few minutes, I rooted around in my desk drawer
for my Official Reporter’s Notepad. Once I found it, I
tossed it into my canvas bag along with the new addition
to my journalist’s arsenal: an iPod. I thought it gave me a
certain panache to whip it out when I was conducting interviews. As long as I remembered to hit Record and
then Save.

    “I’m driving over to the elementary school now.” I
threw a couple of extra pens into my bag, since I still primarily took hard-copy notes. “Let me know if anyone
calls.”
    “Will do,” Sandy said absently. Elbows propped on
the desk, she was still absorbed in her conversation with
the cute painter.
    I grabbed my bag, zipped my cheap blue Windbreaker right up to my chin, and ran out to my truck. As
I pulled out of the parking lot, I glanced over at the
small police station that stood alone across the road.
A neatly landscaped, one-story, wood-frame building, it
looked like Detective Billie-sleek and remote. I imagined his sitting at his desk, methodically sifting through
paperwork. That little vertical line between his eyes
would appear as he frowned in concentration. He might
even shove his dark, straight hair back from his forehead
with an impatient hand-
    A horn honked.
    “Get a move on, missy. We