Ask Anyone Read Online Free PDF Page A

with a lofty look. “I have no idea what you mean.”
    â€œHarvey’s out for blood. He claims Bobby is trying to stage a coup and take over the whole blessed town.”
    King gritted his teeth. So he wasn’t going to be able to ignore this after all. “Where would he get a numbskull idea like that? Bobby’s not interested in taking overanything. That boy doesn’t have a political bone in his body.”
    â€œThen why did he go and buy up all that property? Whoever develops it is going to set the direction of Trinity Harbor for decades to come. And Harvey’s bound and determined that it’s not going to be your son. He says Spencers have been in charge for too long as it is, that it’s time for fresh blood to take this town into the future.”
    King clung to his temper by a thread. “Just how does that pompous fool propose to stop Bobby?”
    â€œThe way I hear it, he’ll tie him up with zoning regulations and red tape until Bobby gives up and walks away from the whole deal. Then I imagine he’ll try to snap up that land for a pittance and do whatever he wants with it. You ask Will what he thinks when he gets here. I heard a rumor he sold a couple of parcels to the mayor a while back before Bobby could snap ’em up. My guess is Harvey would like to see condos all along the waterfront. Next thing you know, none of us will be able to stick a toe in that river without being charged with trespassing.”
    King stared at his oldest friend. “Harvey told you this?”
    â€œNot about the condos, that’s Will’s idea. But Harvey told a whole roomful of people about the rest at lunch yesterday. I was eating crabs over at Wilkerson’s at Colonial Beach. Harvey was holding forth like a preacher. He was talking so loud and his face was so red, I thought he was going to keel right over onto the seafood buffet.”
    â€œDid you set him straight?” King asked.
    â€œMe?” Pete looked baffled. “What was I supposed to say?”
    â€œThat no son of King Spencer’s would ever walk away from a fight, for starters,” King declared fiercely. He might not be entirely in tune with Bobby’s plans, but no upstart like Harvey Needham was going to sabotage them. “Did you tell him that?”
    â€œNo,” Pete admitted.
    â€œThen you’re as big a damned fool as he is,” King said, sliding out of the booth and tossing some money on the table for the coffee he’d never touched.
    â€œNow, King—” Pete began.
    â€œDon’t you try to placate me, you old coot. I thought loyalty still counted for something in this town. Guess I was wrong.”
    He stalked off to the sound of Pete’s sputters of protest and the hushed whispers of everyone else in Earlene’s. The way things were going, the entire conversation would be reported in The Weeky, right alongside that spread of pictures Richard had taken over at Bobby’s.
    Once King got outside in the hot, muggy morning air, he sucked in a deep breath and tried to calm himself down. He was going to kill that boy of his with his bare hands. He didn’t have time to waste an entire morning on this kind of nonsense. He needed to get home. Somebody had to run that Black Angus operation that his sons didn’t give a hoot about.
    But first, maybe he’d go on over to the Social Services office and see if Frances could spare him a little time. The woman had been driving him up the wall since she’dstolen first place in a spelling bee from him a half-century ago, but she had a level head on her shoulders. In the last year, he’d begun to count on that.
    Frances had kept him from strangling Daisy and given him some sound advice and pleasant company along the way. Maybe if he offered to take her out to play bingo tomorrow night, she’d keep his mind off of Bobby until his temper cooled down. The last place King wanted to spend his golden