Read Online Judgment Call by J. A. Jance - Free Book Online Page A

one-man show and an auction, was booked for the clubhouse of Rob Roy Links, in Palominas, with art collectors from all over Arizona expected to attend.
    During the conferences, workshop participants stayed at local lodging establishments that, depending on their financial situation, ranged from economical rooms in private homes to upscale B and Bs. When the light was right—in the early mornings and late afternoons—attendees spread out around town to do their individual painting wherever they chose. During the middle of the day, they gathered in one of the foundation’s repurposed junior high school classrooms where the session’s moderator conducted workshop-style classes. At lunchtime, the fifteen Plein Air painters as well as their spouses and significant others gathered at Daisy’s to eat and chat. The back room at Daisy’s was the only place in town large enough to accommodate a group of thirty on a daily basis.
    Having Junior blow a gasket in the midst of Plein Air week had obviously created a problem.
    â€œI hope whatever’s going on with Junior isn’t serious,” Joanna said.
    â€œThat’s what I hope, too,” Eva Lou agreed, “but Moe and Daisy were both clearly upset.”
    â€œIt’s good of you to help out,” Joanna said, giving Eva Lou a quick hug on her way past.
    The fact that Eva Lou had taken it upon herself to step in and help out was typical. Jim Bob and Eva Lou Brady were good people who, in the aftermath of their son’s death, had continued to treat Joanna more like a daughter than a daughter-in-law. When their son’s widow had married again, they had welcomed Butch Dixon into their lives, and they were as much Dennis’s grandparents as were Joanna’s mother, Eleanor, and her husband, George Winfield.
    â€œIt’s a shame about that poor Ms. Highsmith,” Eva Lou said as she escorted Joanna toward the corner booth.
    Joanna stopped in midstride. “What about her?” she asked.
    Eva Lou seemed flustered. “Well, she’s dead, isn’t she?”
    â€œWho told you that?” Joanna wanted to know.
    She and Alvin Bernard had agreed that her department would be handling all media relations dealing with the Highsmith homicide. At this point, no official information about the homicide victim’s identity had been released, at least not as far as Joanna knew.
    â€œThose kids over there,” Eva Lou said, nodding toward a booth where four high-school-age kids were huddled together, their attention focused on a cell phone that they were passing around.
    â€œYou’re sure they mentioned Ms. Highsmith by name?” Joanna asked.
    â€œAbsolutely. When I came up to the table, they were all staring at one of those little cell phone things, talking and laughing and pointing at a picture. At first I couldn’t make out what was on the screen, but finally I did. It looked like one of those crime scene stories on TV.
    â€œAbout that time, one of them—the tall, lanky, string-bean guy in the corner next to the wall—was downright gleeful,” Eva Lou replied. “I heard him say something like, ‘Way to go, Ms. Highsmith! The wicked witch is dead!’ Considering the woman was their principal, I thought that was in very bad taste. One of the two girls—the one with the long, dark hair—was saying that maybe the school board would end up having to cancel school for the rest of the year.”
    Eva Lou had been leading Joanna on a trajectory that would have taken her directly to the corner booth where Jeff Daniels, Butch, and the three kids, now joined by Joanna’s former father-in-law, Jim Bob Brady, had all settled in for lunch. Instead, Joanna again stopped short.
    â€œThey were looking at a picture?” she asked.
    Eva Lou nodded. “On one of those little iPhone kind of things. When I walked up to the table the tall kid again—the one in the corner—tried to