Page 105 of Hello, Summer
Conley leaned against the kitchen counter, unashamedly eavesdropping on her grandmother’s telephone conversation.
“Harriet, Harriet. Let me stop you right now,” Lorraine said. “Is there anything in that article that’s untrue? You might not like what we published, but that does not make it filth. So no, I’m not going to fire my granddaughter, who happens to be an award-winning investigative journalist. And I’m not going to ‘make’ Grayson publish a retraction. She’s the managing editor, not me. And I happen to trust her judgment implicitly.”
“She’s been getting calls like this all morning,” Winnie whispered. “Can’t even drink her coffee in peace.”
G’mama listened patiently. “I’m sorry you feel that way. TheBeaconvalues all its subscribers, but of course, if you don’t want to get the paper anymore, we’ll cancel your subscription. Which means you won’t get any more grocery store coupons. No, I don’t think we do offer refunds. All right, Harriet. Love to Smitty. See you at church.”
G’mama put the phone down and penciled a hash mark on the back of an envelope. Conley counted eight of them.
“Winnie says you’re having a rough morning?” She pointed at the envelope. “Are those all cancellations?”
“No. These are people I’m making a note to shun after this. Harriet Steinmach is the only one who actually canceled.”
“Well, thanks for sticking up for freedom of the press,” Conley said, brushing a kiss on her grandmother’s cheek. “Are you mad at us for running the Robinette thing?”
“Of course not! That special edition you all put out last night was wonderful! It’s making people sit up and take notice, which we haven’t done in a long time. Pops used to say that was a newspaper’s job—not just to report the facts but to get them thinking about the facts, asking questions, get ’em riled up. I loved the ads too, once I got used to them flashing and blinking at me.”
“That’s all Michael’s doing,” Conley said. “He really is a whiz kid.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t awake when Sean left last night,” G’mama said, picking up her coffee cup. “Did you two have a nice walk?”
Conley poured her own coffee, avoiding meeting her grandmother’s probing eyes. “Very nice. We sat out on the beach for a long time, just drinking our wine and watching the sunset.”
“I saw he finally bought an ad too,” G’mama commented. “Maybe that’ll make some of our other local businesses do the same.”
“Hope so,” Conley said, swallowing her coffee. “I’d better get in to the office. Lots to do before the print deadline tonight.”
“Wonder if they’ll show Symmes Robinette’s funeral on television,” Lorraine said.
“I happen to know NBC will have somebody at the service today,”Conley said. “And that reminds me. We’ll need to pull photos of the memorial service off the wire.”
She rinsed out her coffee mug and set it on the counter.
“When are you seeing Sean again?” G’mama asked.
“Not sure. I’ve got a crazy-busy week ahead.” She debated whether to tell her grandmother about the deal she’d worked out with the Atlanta paper and the network but decided to clear her arrangement with Grayson first.
She was driving down Main Street, headed for the office, when she saw a blue-and-white Bronson County sheriff’s vehicle parked in front of Kelly’s Drugs. She parked beside the cruiser and pushed through the door, setting the bells tied to the door handle jingling.
Skelly was behind the pharmacy counter, deep in conversation with the deputy she remembered from the accident scene and from her later encounter at the sheriff’s office, Walter Poppell.
Poppell looked up and gave her a smirking finger wave. Conley sat down at the soda fountain counter and turned her back to him, although she could still see the conversation in the back-bar mirror.
After a moment, she got up, went behind the counter, and fixed herself a glass of water. Ten minutes later, she saw Poppell leave, and Skelly walked over slowly, installing himself behind the counter.
“What was that all about?” she asked.
Skelly fiddled with a stack of laminated menus. “I guess it’s okay to tell you. I mean, he didn’t say not to. They wanted a list of all the prescriptions I filled for the Robinettes, going back for the past two years.”
She leaned in. “Really? Plural? Symmes and Vanessa? Did you give it to him? I mean, are there any HIPAA regulations prohibiting that?”
“He said it’s a criminal investigation.”
“I know you can’t tell me anything about Vanessa’s meds, but what about Symmes’s? He’s dead now, so the rules don’t apply anymore, right?”
He poured himself a mug of coffee. “Want one?”
“Thanks, but I’m already buzzed, and it’s got nothing to do with caffeine. Come on, Skelly,” she pleaded. “Vanessa herself told me aboutSymmes’s cancer and said he was on chemo. She even blamed ‘chemo brain’ for the fact that he’d get up in the middle of the night and go driving around. She said he wasn’t thinking right when he deeded over the quail-hunting plantation to Toddie.”
