“I’m the new reporter for the Scumble River Star.” He held out a tanned hand to Skye. “My name’s Kurt Michaels. I’m also starting a column called ‘Talk of the Town.’ ”
“Gossip?”
“I like to call it vital information.” He shrugged. “After all, it’s the lifeblood of any small town.”
“True, but considering you’re an outsider, will people give you the real scoop?”
“I guess we’ll see. My first column is in this week’s paper. But ask yourself this. You’re a native Scumble Riverite, correct?”
Skye nodded.
“And which of us knew about the feud between Annette and Evie for Promfest chair? Not to mention the rivalry between their daughters Linnea and Cheyenne for prom queen.” He got up and headed for the door. “I’m out of here.” Over his shoulder he added, “Nothing else interesting is going to happen.”
Skye watched him as he left, his powerful, well-muscled body moving with an easy grace. On second thought, considering his sexy smile, hot body, and oodles of charm, the ladies of Scumble River would almost certainly be willing to tell him all their secrets, not to mention those of their neighbors and friends. Heck, if he took off his shirt and gave them a look at his six-pack abs, they’d probably be willing to make up a scandal or two.
Kurt was right: The rest of the meeting was a snooze. It started with Annette explaining that the main mission of the Promfest committee was to solicit donations and raise money, and eventually led to her announcement, “The first fund-raiser of the year is our A Ghoul’s Night Out haunted house. We need volunteers to sell tickets, construct the set, and act as the monsters. I’m sending around a sign-up sheet, and I expect to see not only your name, but those of your spouse and teenager, as well.”
There was a murmur from the crowd, and several hands shot into the air.
Annette ignored them, passing the clipboard and a pen to those at the table closest to her. “Remember, in order for your student to fully enjoy Promfest, he or she will need a bank account full of Prom Bucks to spend on food, games, and activities. And you can earn these PBs with every hour you volunteer, prize you solicit, and donation you make. Just for attending today’s meeting you’ve earned your teen five thousand PBs.”
Skye watched in amazement as the parents vied to sign away their free time; then she quietly got up and slipped out of the room before the volunteer list reached her table. Not that she would have volunteered for any activity, but she particularly hated haunted houses.
She hadn’t been in one since she was six years old, when her brother, Vince, who was ten at the time, abandoned her to go play with his friends. She had wandered around lost and crying until some adult finally noticed her and led her to an exit.
Skye shuddered at the memory, quickened her steps, and nearly ran toward the safety of her own office. A few weeks later, when she stood over the dead body of someone who had been vibrant and alive just a few minutes before, she thought back to this instant and realized how silly her fears had been. Because no make-believe monster could possibly inspire the terror she felt in that moment, knowing that a real murderer was somewhere very near.
CHAPTER 2
From This Moment On
As Skye slid into her desk chair, panting, she noticed the phone’s message light flashing. The bell would ring in five minutes. Three minutes later, Brady Russell would show up at her door expecting to be tested. Did she have time to listen to her voice mail and get set up for him as well?
Cradling the receiver between her neck and shoulder, Skye punched in her password—she knew she couldn’t concentrate with that little red light blinking. While she waited for her code to be approved, she grabbed Brady’s file and reread the note his mother had written her.Dear Ms. Denison,Brady did not fail English last year. He is just passing impaired. Please find out why and fix him.Sincerely,Dodie Russell
Skye vowed to try her darnedest to comply with Mrs. Russell’s request, and started to fill out the identifying data on the IQ protocol. She was figuring out his exact age—the current date minus his birthday—when the mechanical voice said, “You have three messages.”
Shoot. She’d been hoping for hang-ups, but nothing was ever quick and easy in this job.
“Message number one, left Monday, September thirteenth, at eight fifteen.”
There was a slight pause; then Homer’s voice boomed from the receiver: “Where in blue blazes are you? Come to my office immediately.”
The next one, left at eight twenty-five was also from the principal, but the volume of his voice had risen considerably. “Opal said you signed in at seven thirty. Are you ignoring me?”
By the time the last message was recorded, ten minutes ago, his irritated baritone blasted in her ear: “Get your butt down here ASAP. I don’t have all day to babysit this woman.”
Apparently the first crisis of the day had materialized. Skye reluctantly locked Brady’s file in her drawer, taped a note to the door telling him to go back to class, and hurried to the principal’s office.
Behind the counter, Opal Hill, the school secretary, said, “Thank goodness you’re here. Mr. Knapik has been looking all over for you.”
“Why didn’t he have you call me over the PA system?” Skye asked.
“It’s broken, as is the furnace, again.” Opal’s watery brown eyes made her look as if she were about to burst into tears.
“So I take it Homer is in a foul mood.”
“Oh, my, yes.” Opal’s pink nose twitched. “You’d better go right in.”
Skye took a few steps down a dark, narrow hall, knocked on the principal’s closed door, then opened it a crack. “You wanted to see me?”
A gruff voice yelled from behind a massive desk, “It’s about time. Why are you standing in the hall? Get your rear end in here.”
Skye took a calming breath. Homer was Homer, and she couldn’t change him at this stage in his life, which, metaphorically speaking, was about five minutes before he signed his retirement papers. Putting a pleasant expression on her face, she entered the office. A plump woman in her thirties with long reddish brown hair was seated on one of the visitors’ chairs.
Homer waved toward the woman and said, “This is our new social worker, Jacqueline Jennings. She completed her internship a year ago, and before that taught for eight years in New York. Due to an illness in her family last fall, this is her first job as a school social worker, but she has very impressive letters of recommendation.”
Skye’s first thought was, Wow! She sounds almost too good to be true. Her second was, Why didn’t anyone tell me that the district finally hired a social worker? Bad enough that none of the principals mentioned it to me, but for crying out loud, my own godfather is the president of the school board.
Realizing her silence could be taken as rudeness, Skye smiled at the woman and held out her hand. “Nice to meet you, Jacqueline. I’m Skye Denison, the psychologist.”
“Call me Jackie.” The woman’s grip was firm and dry. “Mr. Knapik has been telling me all about you.”
“Not all bad, I hope.” Skye glanced at Homer.
“No, of course not.” The woman chuckled. “In fact, he was quite complimentary. He made it sound like the school couldn’t run without you.”
“Really?” Skye was shocked. She thought Homer was oblivious to all the work she did. “I’m flattered.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Homer lumbered up from his desk, reminding Skye of a dancing bear. Not because of his shambling movements or his rotund shape, but because of the hair that enveloped him like a fur coat. His eyebrows looked as if two furry worms were mating on his forehead, wiry antennalike strands protruded from his ears, and a thick pelt covered his arms and hands. Tufts even poked out between the buttons of his shirt. “So you do your job. You want a medal?”
“Yes, please,” Skye teased, a little giddy from Homer’s praise.
He grunted, then said, “Jackie, as I told you while we were waiting for Her Highness to s
how up, Skye will introduce you around and go over your duties with you.”
“Wonderful.” Jackie stood and shook hands with him. “It’s an honor to work for you and with all your wonderful instructors.”
“Right.” Homer snorted. “You might as well know right now that’s not how it is here.”
“How what is?” Jackie’s tone was puzzled.
“Think of it this way. In some schools, teachers have affairs with their students. In Scumble River High, it’s a lot more likely they’d have contracts out on them.”
“I see.” Jackie’s laugh was forced. “Well, remember, I’m here to do anything you need me to do.”
Skye kept her expression bland. Anything he needs? Boy, is she opening herself up for trouble. Out loud she asked Homer, “Where’s Jackie’s office?”
“Same as yours.” He smirked. “You two have to share.”
Dang. Skye had been begging the district to employ a social worker for the past four years, and they had always claimed that they couldn’t find anyone who would take the job. She hadn’t realized that hiring someone would mean sharing her office. Skye had wrested it away from the coach/guidance counselor only two years ago.
Oops. She was being rude again, thinking instead of speaking. She hurriedly said, “Great. Well, then, I guess that’s it. Should I show Jackie around the elementary and junior high, too?”
“Got me.” Homer put a hand on each of their backs and propelled them toward the door. “Ask Caroline and Neva.”
Once they were out of the office area, Jackie said, “I take it Caroline and Neva are the other two principals?”
“Yes. Didn’t you get to meet them at your interview?”
“No.” Jackie chuckled. “I really didn’t have much of an interview. I faxed my résumé to the district last Tuesday, Dr. Wraige called me on Wednesday, I came in on Thursday, and he and Mr. Patukas offered me the job on the spot. They seemed a little surprised when I accepted.”
“Wow. I guess they’ve been telling me the truth all these years. They really were trying to hire a social worker. Any idea why no one else wanted the job?”
“Nope.” Jackie shrugged. “It was exactly what I was looking for.”
“Oh?”
“I needed to be closer to my mother. She lives in Clay Center. I moved to New York right after high school and have lived there ever since, but my father passed away recently and I’m an only child. So . . . ” She trailed off, gesturing her lack of choice with her hands.
“I’m so sorry for your loss. Is your mother ill?” Skye asked as she guided Jackie down the hall.
“No, just elderly and alone.”
“Well, we can sure use you.” Skye motioned around her. “This wing holds the classrooms for all our fine and practical arts. The other two wings hold math and science, and English and history, respectively. And, of course, the special-ed rooms are all in the back.”
“Why’s that?”
“You know.” Skye made a sardonic face. “It just seems that principals like to keep those kids as far from the office as possible. Of course, our job is to make sure that although they might be out of sight, they aren’t out of mind.”
“The special-ed students aren’t integrated into regular classes?”
“Most of the day they are, but nearly all the kids have at least one or two periods in the special-ed room,” Skye explained. “And the ones with more severe challenges are there most of the day.”
“I see.”
After they had finished touring the school, Skye ushered Jackie into their office. She flicked on the light switch, illuminating a ten-by-ten room painted an unusual shade of yellow. Skye’s beat-up desk, a trapezoidal table, a few chairs, and a half dozen file cabinets occupied the meager space. There were no windows, and the overhead fluorescents cast a greenish light.
Skye plopped down into her old leather chair and pushed aside the piles of papers and folders that were stacked a foot high on the desktop. She pointed to one of the two folding chairs facing her and said, “Welcome to your palatial office suite at Scumble River High. We’ll have to get the custodian to find a desk for you.”
Jackie remained standing, her gaze slowly sweeping the small, crowded area. “Where would we put it?”
“Maybe we can get some of these file cabinets moved. All but one is filled with guidance records that date back at least ten years, which means they should have been destroyed long ago.” Skye could read the other woman’s disappointment, and was a bit confused by it. She would expect a seasoned educator to be used to appalling conditions. Lack of space was a problem in most schools.
Jackie nodded, a frown on her round face. “Where are the social work records?”
Skye shrugged. “It’s been so long since we’ve had a social worker, there aren’t any separate records. I’ve been doing the histories and all the counseling, so everything is in one file.”
Jackie finally sat down, her expression determined. “Well, now that I’m here, that will all change.”
“Uh, right.” This was what Skye had wanted. She had been asking for help, and would be happy if she never had to take another social history, but something about this woman bothered her. Skye couldn’t put her finger on it, but Jackie seemed . . . familiar. “By the way, have we met before?”
“I doubt it.” She shook her head. “I’ve been back in the area for only a few weeks, and I’ve spent most of that time with my mother.”
Hmm. Skye was puzzled. Maybe Jackie seemed familiar because Skye and Jackie looked a lot alike. They were close in age and physical appearance—similar hair, eye color, and build. Although Skye would bet her next home-improvement loan payment that Jackie was wearing colored contacts and her hair wasn’t naturally that shade.
Still, they had a lot in common. Both of them had had to move back to small towns, and both worked in a helping profession. So what was troubling her? Skye bit her lip. Could it be that she felt displaced? First she had to share her office; now she was being told Jackie was taking over her duties. But they were tasks she didn’t want, so why did she care?
Skye resolutely pushed the negative thoughts away. She was happy Jackie had been hired, and she would do everything in her power to make her welcome.
Jackie interrupted Skye’s thoughts by asking, “How are we going to work this shared office deal?”
“Since we’re both responsible for the entire school district, we’ll set up a schedule that puts us at different schools most of the time,” Skye suggested. “I’m guessing we’ll be sharing offices in all the buildings.”
“Yes, that might work. But won’t there be times when we both have to be in the same school?”
“On those days, such as when the Pupil Personal Services teams meet, we’ll have to share the room. I guess we’ll have to think of it as having a college roommate. Someone to talk over our frustrations with. Let’s face it: The confidential nature of our jobs makes it kind of tough to socialize in the teachers’ lounge.”
Jackie nodded slowly.
“Why don’t you tell me a little about yourself, roomy?” Skye asked, hoping to help the other woman relax.
“There’s not much to tell.” Jackie shrugged. “I’m single, looking for Mr. Right, but usually end up with Mr. Right Now. No children. How about you?”
“About the same. Though I’m finally dating a very nice guy, Wally Boyd. He’s the police chief in town. I live in a big old money pit of a house that I inherited, I have a black cat named Bingo, and I’m related to most of the people in town. Are you living in Clay Center with your mom?”
“Uh, well, no.” Jackie pleated the material of her skirt. “She lives in that new senior housing and there’s no room for me, so I’m staying at the Up A Lazy River Motor Court while I look for an apartment.”
“That’s my uncle Charlie’s place.”
“Your uncle is the school board president?”
“Actually, he’s my godfather,” Skye corrected.
“You
said you owned a large house. Are you interested in renting out a room?”
“Sorry.” Skye shook her head. “I like my privacy too much.”
“No problem.”
Feeling a little guilty, Skye joked, “At least at the motor court you don’t have to clean, since you get maid service.”
“No, I’d rather do it myself. I don’t like anyone messing with my things. I just pick up fresh towels at the motel office.” Jackie stood. “Shouldn’t we get over to the other schools?”
“Sure. Why don’t you tell Opal where we’re going while I rearrange a few appointments? I’ll meet you outside. Where are you parked?”
“I managed to snag a spot in the front row.”
Skye grimaced. “Was it, by any chance, the space right next to the handicapped slots?”
“Yes. Why?”
“Uh-oh. That’s Homer’s spot. In most cases his bark is worse than his bite, but not on the issue of parking. Let me fill you in on the facts of life at Scumble River High. Number one—don’t park in the front row. Ever. Those slots are unofficially reserved for administration and department heads. The chair of the English department will eat you alive if you’re in her place.
“Number two—be nice to Opal, the office secretary. She may look like a mouse, but she’s the real power at this school.
“Number three—the transportation department rules above all. Never mess with anything having to do with the buses.”
“How do I get on Opal’s good side?”
“Food. For a little thing, she has the appetite of a linebacker.”
“Interesting.” Jackie paused on her way out the door and gave Skye an enigmatic smile. “It looks like a lot of things around here aren’t what they seem.”
CHAPTER 3
Carried Away
Skye normally loved Fridays, but this one wasn’t starting out very well. She had slept through her alarm, stepped on Bingo’s tail, and broken the zipper on her new pants. All of which contributed to her running late. Now she couldn’t get into her office.
She checked to make sure she had the correct key, then attempted to reinsert it into the lock, but it wouldn’t go in. Great. Skye kicked the door, but it didn’t magically pop open. Too bad the master key she’d managed to acquire a couple of years ago had broken last spring.
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