Read Death of A High Maintenance Blonde (Jubilant Falls Series Book 5) for Free Online Page B

small-town stories interspersed with the occasional breaking news piece—traced back to a small Ohio daily newspaper, the Jubilant Falls Journal-Gazette .
    The woman, once arguably the free world’s best journalist is in Ohio, of all places? It couldn’t be her, could it? I asked myself. And where the hell is Jubilant Falls?
    I dug through the Journal-Gazette’s website, looking for a headshot of her. Everyone on the staff except Charisma Lemarnier had one. Unlike a number of small town newspapers, there also was no article or accompanying photo on her first day of work: “The Journal-Gazette would like to welcome a new writer…” Instead, her byline just began appearing above stories.
    I read through a couple of them: A story on a local college student’s upcoming piano performance and her struggle to become the first in her family to graduate from college, a child seriously injured in a horseback riding accident and the family’s efforts to raise money to pay the rehabilitation bills, an early morning highway accident where the father was killed and the family seriously injured when their minivan rolled.
    The content was so much less than what she’d made her name on, but the writing was still solid. It had to be her.
    With a little more Internet exploration, I found Jubilant Falls on the map. A few more clicks on a few more websites and I had a plane ticket to Cincinnati, leaving tomorrow afternoon.

 
     
    Chapter 6: Charisma
     
    “You look like someone I’ve seen before.”
    It was Monday afternoon before I could get time to head over to the Jubilant Falls Police Department. Assistant Police Chief Gary McGinnis made the comment as he brought in a stack of files and a cup of coffee for me.
    “Yeah, a lot of people say that,” I said, taking the mug from him. I took a gulp before saying any more, letting my brown hair fall in front of my scarred face, hiding it from his piercing gaze.
    “No, seriously, you do,” Chief McGinnis was insistent.
    “Somebody once told me I look like Paula Abdul, only taller,” I lied. “I told them they were crazy.”
    “Maybe that’s it.”
    I had a pretty good weekend. With Monsieur Le Chat curled alongside me, I managed to get a full night’s sleep Saturday night on my tiny foldout couch. No bloody bodies flashed in front of my eyes; I didn’t wake screaming uncontrollably or crying out his name. It was progress, and I was thankful for that.
    On Sunday, I drove to one of the malls in nearby Collitstown, treating myself to what Dennis told me was a local confection: Cincinnati chili, a Greek-inspired dish flavored heavily with cinnamon and nutmeg, served on spaghetti, covered in shredded cheddar cheese, and served with a side order of oyster crackers. I sat in my booth, pouring over the Sunday New York Times , concentrating on the lifestyle section and the book reviews.
    I felt semi-normal.
    Now, with the chief’s one question, the walls were closing in again.
    I turned to the files on the table beside me.
    “So tell me, Chief, what’s the deal on this case,” I said, tapping the file with my pen.
    “Basically, we had the body of a white male, approximately eighteen to twenty-two years of age, discovered by a farmer and his son who were driving over the bridge on Yarnell Road early in the morning,” McGinnis began. “The bridge at that time was just inside the city limits, so we got the case. The body was face down in the water, hung up on a tree limb. The farmer sent the son to a pay phone to call the police and stayed behind until they got there. When the fire department retrieved the victim out of the water, he had no identification. He also wasn’t in the system anyplace—there were no fingerprints on record anywhere.”
    “Any wounds?”
    “He’d been stabbed several times, twice in the chest, and had several defensive wounds on his hands and arms. His throat was also cut, which the coroner determined was the fatal wound.”
    “Do you think he died