Death hits the fan Read Online Free PDF Page B

put in.
    "Winona, are you okay?" Neil asked, squeezing his way into the circle of chairs to take his place beside her. He patted her freckled hand tentatively.
    "Neil," Ivan tried again, raising his voice.
    "I'm sure your son's presence won't harm our process," Captain Xavier boomed benignly. He smiled in Neil's direction.
    "Who the hell is he?" Neil demanded of his father.
    "He's the captain of the Verduras Police Department," Ivan answered quickly, a high note of warning in his usually low tone. "Please, Neil, will you cooperate?"
    "Sure, Dad," Neil answered more quietly, looking around the group. "But what—"
    "Shayla wasn't just a writer," a deep, quiet voice interrupted suddenly. Everyone's attention shifted toward the gray-bearded man with his jade pendant still cradled in his hand. His eyes stared out from beneath his dark brows beyond us, focused on something visible only to him. "She was a human. A kind and compassionate human, though she

    had her problems, Lord knows. And a friend. Don't you understand? She was a person. Zoe knew her, she can tell you."
    "And your name?" Captain Xavier asked softly.
    "Dean Frazier," the gray-bearded man answered succinctly.
    "Dean's a friend of Shayla's," Zoe added, turning her head to the side as if embarrassed. She pushed her oversized glasses farther up on her nose. "Well, really a friend of Shayla's husband, Scott Green. Oh phooey, I mean he was a friend of Shayla's. And Scott. Or is, of Scott. Or . .. whatever."
    The dead woman had a husband? Suddenly, the meaning of Dean's words were real to me. Real like the woman lying on the floor. Not just an author. A real woman with real friends. And a husband. Damn. I felt the pressure of imminent tears behind my eyes. For a woman I didn't even know. But others had known her. And probably loved her. Who was going to tell her husband she was dead?
    Zoe Ingersoll introduced herself briefly, then went on. "I was a friend too, I guess. Maybe you'd say an insignificant other." She rolled her eyes. "Of Shayla's, I mean," she finished up awkwardly.
    The group was silent then. No one else volunteered any information. So the captain began asking each of us formal questions. Ted Brown identified himself as a fellow author. Phyllis Oberman simply as a reader. And Marcia Armeson said she was the store manager.
    When Captain Xavier got to me, I decided on the name, rank, and serial number approach. "Kate Jasper," I said. "I live in Mill Valley. I'd just read Ms. Greenfree's books, and Wayne and I know Ivan—"
    "Holy shi-shift! Shayla called out 'Kate' right before she fell over!" Yvette yelped, popping out of her seat with the realization. She pointed her finger at me accusingly. I glared back at her. I knew there was a reason I didn't like the lep-

    rechaun lady. "Didn't Shayla, huh?" she insisted, looking to her husband, Lou, for support. He looked down at the floor. "I mean, like she was—"
    "I heard her say 'Kate' too," I cut back in, keeping my voice as calm as I could, while everyone's eyes turned toward me. Everyone's but Dean's. He was still focused on the unknown. "But I don't think she could have meant me. As far as I know, we'd never even met before."
    Captain Xavier gazed at me. Somehow his smile didn't look as congenial as it had before.
    "Well, Ms. Jasper," he began, his booming voice sounding like thunder now. "Do you have a reasonable explanation—"
    Officer Dupree came marching through the door at that moment, looking more officious than official with a roll of yellow crime-scene tape in his hands, along with tape and scissors and other implements of construction. I was grateful for his interruption. And for the cool air he brought with him. My face felt hot. And I was beginning to sweat again. Captain Xavier hardly glanced over as Dupree circled Shayla's body with the crime-scene tape and then began on the authors' table. The captain was still looking at me. And his smile seemed to have awfully big teeth all of a sudden.
    "And