Nun Too Soon (A Giulia Driscoll Mystery Book 1) Read Online Free

stopped before he touched her.
    “It’s the only relevant part of the issue. They’re going to say that Lori and I were splitting up. They’re going to talk about that stupid restraining order her bitch of a mother talked her into getting. They’re going to say our friends were worried about her. Colby’s shown me video footage of the prosecutor in action. He’ll pick a fact here and an old email there. When he’s done cherry-picking, he’ll point to me and imply that I’m ‘Fitch the Ripper’ because of that stupid bar fight Lori and I had the week before my birthday.” His eyes never left hers. “I didn’t kill Lori. I swear to you. You might not like me too much, Ms. Driscoll, but that doesn’t matter, right?”
    Giulia didn’t unbend. “What does matter to you, Mr. Fitch?”
    “Justice. I didn’t even consider talking to another private investigator. You’re the only one who’d even try to find it at this point.” He slid the photograph of Loriela Gil over to his side of the table and stared at it.
    Giulia’s inner cynic rolled its eyes at the theatrical gesture, despite its kernel of truth. Her inner realist wrote Fitch’s entire mess off as hopeless. Her inner bookkeeper catalogued the extra time this case would add to their weekly schedule. Her traitorous hard-nosed inner business owner—a tiny aspect of herself she usually kept squashed under her sensible shoes—whispered that DI could find a reason both Fitch issues weren’t a conflict of interest after all.
    Her real self, the one controlling all those miniature Giulias, knew she couldn’t walk away from this. All of her selves wanted to curse.
    She turned to the lawyer. “Mr. Petit, Driscoll Investigations will take this case.”

Four

      
    Giulia ran up the narrow wooden stairs to her office as the alarm on her phone signaled five minutes to her first temp interview.
    She skidded to a stop on the doormat, dragged her fingers through her curls that she knew looked like Shirley Temple’s after a tackle football game, and slowed her breathing. Then she opened the frosted-glass door.
    The temp waiting in the chair next to Zane’s desk looked like she’d teleported here direct from Harvard Business School.
    As though the interviewee wasn’t sitting two feet to his right, Zane said, “Your two forty-five appointment is here, Ms. Driscoll.”
    Only relentless practice kept a smile off Giulia’s face as she hung up her jacket. Zane’s chocolate-brown eyes didn’t waver as he handed Giulia three printouts in a manila folder.
    “Thanks.” She smiled at the young woman in the gray pinstripe suit. “I’ll be just a few minutes.”
    Safe behind the closed door of her office, Giulia opened the folder and reread the cover letter and résumé inside. Ms. Pinstripe graduated from Duquesne more than a year ago. Ugh, all temp work and nothing really relevant.
    The often-useless “Awards and Interests” section at the bottom of the résumé caught her eye. Captain of the debating team. Captain of the women’s lacrosse team. Sang the role of Guinevere in Camelot her junior year and Maria in The Sound of Music her senior year.
    Giulia would have to turn in her ex-nun card if she didn’t give this candidate a smidgen of extra chance because of that last role.
    She buzzed Zane. “Please send in Ms. Reed.”
    Except Ms. Reed disapproved. Of pretty much everything. The secondhand filing cabinet—the first official piece of furniture Frank bought when he opened the office—received an “are you kidding?” look of dismissal. The more time that passed without Giulia turning to her computer, the more Ms. Reed’s incredulous look deepened. Within fifteen minutes, she was telling Giulia the Only Correct Way to run an efficient office.
    Within twenty, Giulia showed Ms. Reed to the door.
    No good deed goes unpunished, Giulia said to herself as she drew comparisons between Ms. Reed’s Fortune 500 style of perfection and her own clothes.
    Sidney