Read Online The Coldwater Warm Hearts Club by Lexi Eddings - Free Book Online Page B

You’ll cover school activities, the Rotary Club, town council meetings, that kind of crap.” Wanda Cruikshank, publisher, editor and Coldwater Cove media maven, stopped rattling off Lacy’s proposed list of assignments long enough to blow a long stream of smoke at her office’s dingy ceiling. Wanda was rail thin with leathery skin, a testimony to too much time in a tanning booth frying her outsides while too many Marlboros crisped up her insides.
    Knowing how ridiculously easy it was to make the front page of the Gazette, Lacy had dropped by to make sure Wanda didn’t run a piece about her return to Coldwater Cove. Somehow, the conversation had turned into an interview for the open reporter position.
    â€œWhat about the crime beat?” Lacy asked, wondering if the job would put her in contact with Daniel too often for her comfort. He had promised to come if she called, but separated was still married. She wasn’t going to mess with that.
    No matter that Jacob Tyler thinks I will.
    â€œThe sheriff’s office sends over their blotter, you know, tickets, fines, and whatnot. We print them on page four once a week, but we don’t generally do anything more with it.” Wanda ran a hand through her impossibly dark hair. Sure enough, a thin strip of silver glinted in her part. “Our readers don’t want hard news. They want feel-good stuff. If they want to be depressed, they can always watch CNN.”
    â€œWell, at least there’s a bit of local politics in the council meetings,” Lacy said. That qualified as hard news. It provided a sop to her conscience and might help her when Uncle Roy, the real journalist in the family, came down from Des Moines for a visit and demanded to know why she was selling out by writing for a small-town paper. “Can I do a design column?”
    â€œFine, kid. Go with that. Just remember who sells furniture and paint in this town and where they spend their advertising dollars. No directing Gazette readers to some dot-com site.” Wanda smiled at her as if she were a not-too-bright child. “I’m sure you’ll get the hang of it.”
    Then she offered Lacy a salary that would be an insult in Boston, but was considered a living wage in Coldwater Cove. It would keep body and soul together.
    So long as she didn’t mind renting out her soul from time to time.
    â€œI’d liked to use a pen name for my byline,” Lacy said, remembering Daniel’s warning about someone Googling her. She explained—off the record, of course, and as cryptically as possible—about her unsettling business in Boston and the need to keep a low online profile.
    â€œOK, but the pen name needs to be something locals will still get. Gazette readers like to feel they’ve got the inside track about town. What’s your middle name?”
    Oh, no. Anything but that.
    Hand-me-down family names were a good way to remember someone special. Lacy understood that, but unfortunately, her dad had been really attached to his maiden great-aunt on his mother’s side.
    â€œDorie,” she admitted.
    â€œDorie it is, then. And your mom was a Higginbottom, wasn’t she? We’ll use Dorie Higginbottom for your byline.”
    She sighed. Her mom always claimed the best thing about marrying Lacy’s father was getting to change her name to something as ordinary as Evans. Her dad liked to joke that if his last name had been Filpot he’d have never caught her.
    â€œOh, you’ll be in charge of the ‘Ago’ columns, too,” Wanda added.
    â€œâ€˜Ago’ columns?”
    â€œYeah, people like them a lot. Every Friday we run articles from past editions of the Gazette —you know, a hundred years ago, seventy-five years ago, fifty, and so on. Gives the historical flavor of the area.”
    I bet even a hundred years ago “a good time was had by all.” “Are back editions archived