Nun But The Brave (A Giulia Driscoll Mystery Book 3) by Alice Loweecey Page B

the gossip.” He took out his cell phone and showed Giulia a screenshot. “They started an office pool, like when someone’s pregnant and everybody puts in a buck to guess the time and date of birth.”
    Giulia took a picture of the screenshot and read:
    “Pregnant.”
    “Won the lottery.” Someone had written next to that, “Lightning never strikes twice.”
    “Secret reality TV show contestant.”
    “Spy called out to a covert rescue mission.”
    “Eloped.” Three different names followed; Eddie’s wasn’t one.
    She handed back his phone. “It that all?”
    He shook his head. “We make decent money here, but Joanie started to hit the casinos. She never did before. Chapers went with her a couple of times. They never let on whether they won or lost. Sometimes Joanie would play poker with some of the more with-it residents. I got the feeling she let them win.” He stood. “One more thing. Joanie changed the way she dressed too. She used to wear plain pants and tan or black shirts. I used to tell her she’d look good in red or yellow, but she only altered her pattern for the summer picnic and the Christmas party. When all her other changes happened, she started to wear camouflage and Army-Navy surplus stuff. I asked her about it, but she switched on her new attitude and wouldn’t answer me.”
    Giulia walked back to the parking lot with him. “The police are convinced Joanne vanished voluntarily.”
    “No!” Eddie glanced up at the windows and lowered his voice. “Chapers said that too, and so did the police who came here. The rest of the staff gave up on Joanie. Never mind all the times she listened to them and helped them out with some trouble or other. I don’t know why everyone’s pretending she doesn’t matter. She got in an accident and is in a coma in a hospital in the sticks somewhere. Has to be.” He put a hand on the doorknob and said in an even lower voice, “When you find Joanie, tell her she matters to me.”

Thirteen

      
    After Giulia spoke with the other breakfast staff, she learned the big pool money was on Joanne either having an unknown boyfriend’s secret love child or eloping with a billionaire who’d met her while visiting one of the residents. Third in line was a James Bond scenario from the nursing students, who were thrilled to talk to a real-life private eye.
    “Ms. Philbey was really quiet,” a pale blonde with polka dot fingernails said.
    A redhead with classic green eyes and freckles said, “You know what they say about quiet ones.”
    “It had to be a cover,” from a brunette several inches taller than everyone in the group, including Giulia.
    “Right, because she was a good cook.” A second blonde, this one with a voice squeaky enough to dub Alvin the Chipmunk. “She had the perfect cover story.”
    The pale blonde: “We heard she liked to go hunting, so she knew how to shoot.”
    The tall brunette: “So she wasn’t kidnapped because she could defend herself.”
    The squeaky blonde: “See? The perfect secret agent.”
    The redhead: “It’s so cool.”
    All four crowded closer to Giulia.
    “We liked her a lot, but please don’t tell anybody,” the brunette said.
    “We’re only supposed to interact with the nursing staff and the patients,” the redhead said, “but Ms. Philbey used to sneak fresh doughnuts to us.”
    “She was such a great cook,” the chipmunk blonde said.
    “We miss her.” The pale blonde pouted. “The new morning chef is a real workaholic. He never does anything for us. The assistant cook is a real—”
    The redhead elbowed her.
    “Shut it, moron.”

      
    When the Nunmobile passed the “Welcome to Cottonwood” sign two hours later, Giulia’s first stop was her favorite food truck for a barbecue hoagie. Her second was home. She opened the windows, poured a humongous lemonade, and set up her laptop at the kitchen table to transfer all her notes. King-sized beds were lovely to sleep in, but real work was best performed