Read Online Strangers by Mary Anna Evans - Free Book Online Page B

touch of that one chosen someone. Every atom in both their bodies seemed to cry out, “Where is Glynis? How could something like this happen here?”
    She didn’t want to disturb their pain, but she’d waited as long as she could. Pregnant women can only go so long between visits to the bathroom, and Daniel and Suzanne were sitting directly between Faye and the facilities.
    She trudged across the lawn and up the porch steps. She wasn’t sure whether it would be better manners to exchange some quick pleasantries, or to just pass them quietly
    Daniel solved that problem by asking her a question as she passed. “Faye, do you know anybody on the city commission?”
    “The county,” Suzanne said. “I think it was the county.”
    He nodded. “Maybe so.”
    “Besides, this guy said he lost the election. So he’s not on any commission, anywhere. And I’m glad.” Suzanne crossed her arms across her chest and nodded hard.
    Faye wasn’t quite sure whether they were actually still talking to her, or whether she should resume her bathroom dash.
    “You probably come across these guys all the time, Faye,” Suzanne said, angrily pushing against the porch floor with her feet and setting the glider in motion.
    “I hope the police are grilling him right now,” Daniel said. “Poor Glynis.”
    “ Grilling who?” Faye said a little more forcefully than she should have. “And what did he do to Glynis?”
    “Last Friday, Daniel had to go out to the parking lot—right where they found Glynis’ car—and ask a man to quit badgering her,” Suzanne said, still pushing the glider back and forth, hard. “His name was Dick Wheeler, and he was a real horse’s ass.”
    Daniel looked gape-jawed at his suddenly foul-mouthed wife.
    “Well, he was!” Suzanne insisted. “Tell her.”
    “Dick Wheeler sat on the Board of County Commissioners for fifteen years,” Daniel said. “I figured he’d be there till he died. The developers loved him so much that I think they’d have kept him on the board even after that.”
    Suzanne giggled. “You think they would’ve just propped his corpse up and let him keep rubber-stamping their projects?”
    Daniel nodded.
    Suzanne giggled again.
    “Why was he bothering Glynis?” Faye asked.
    “Because her historic preservation group campaigned against him, and he lost.” Suzanne couldn’t keep from smiling as she delivered this news.
    “I don’t think his secretary’s sexual harassment lawsuit helped his campaign any,” Daniel pointed out.
    Faye still wasn’t completely sure she was part of this conversation, but it was interesting.
    Suzanne waved her hand in a dismissing gesture. “Oh, that. He flirts with anything in a skirt, but he’s all talk. The voters have always known what he was like, but they kept electing him. You stay away from him, Faye. He’d even hit on a woman in your condition. Nope. The lawsuit didn’t sink his political career. Glynis did.”
    Daniel nodded. “You’re right. She did. You should have seen her preservation group’s commercial, Faye. It just destroyed Wheeler’s façade of being a moderate when it came to growth management. Actually, the PR firm that Glynis’ group hired gave me a copy of it, since we were the corporate sponsor. It was just hilarious.”
    Suzanne nodded emphatically.
    “Glynis and her friends are very clever with computers,” Daniel continued, “so they put together some video that made it look like the developers had just trashed St. Augustine. The PR guys loved it, so they took the original idea and spruced it up into something TV-ready. Golden arches over the Castillo de San Marcos. Strip joints on either side of the Bridge of Lions. A casino in the Old Slave Market. Then they filmed footage of lovely Glynis walking through the real St. Augustine, talking about how the city’s preservation ordinances had saved it for all of us. She begged county residents to elect commissioners who would do the same for them.
    “And they