Read Out Cold for Free Online Page A

wearing baggy overalls, green rubber boots, and a black T-shirt. Her frizzy brownish hair was streaked with gray and cut short all around her head.
    â€œLet’s go sit,” said Skeeter, and he led the woman and me over to one of the booths against the wall.
    I slid in one side. Skeeter gestured for the woman to sit across from me. She frowned at him, then shrugged and sat down.
    â€œThis is Mr. Coyne,” Skeeter said to her. “Mr. Coyne, meet Sunshine.”
    â€œHello, Mr. Coyne,” Sunshine said. She gave me a shy smile.
    I smiled at her. “Hi.”
    â€œSunshine lives in the shelter,” Skeeter said. “I give her as much work as I can, but it ain’t enough for her to get by on her own, you know? She’s trying to save up to get her own apartment, get her kids back.”
    â€œWhich shelter?” I said to Sunshine.
    â€œThe Shamrock,” she said.
    â€œIt’s off Summer Street,” Skeeter said. “She’s been there quite a while. Since they took her kids away from her. Close to a year now, right Sunshine?”
    She looked up at Skeeter. “It will have been a year on Ground-hog Day,” she said. “They came at three-thirty in the afternoon.”
    Skeeter looked at me. “I was wondering…”
    I nodded. “Can you give me and Sunshine a few minutes?”
    He grinned. “Take your time.”
    Sunshine frowned at him. “I don’t…”
    â€œMr. Coyne’s a lawyer,” he said.
    She looked at me and nodded.
    Skeeter ambled away.
    â€œYou don’t have a lawyer?” I said to Sunshine.
    â€œNo,” she said. “I don’t have any money for a lawyer. I’m saving everything so I can get my kids back. So I can’t—”
    â€œDon’t worry about that,” I said. “Tell me about your kids.”
    She looked away, and a little smile appeared. It instantly took ten years off her appearance. “Franny, my daughter, she’s fifteen. Bobby’s twelve. No. Thirteen. He just turned thirteen.” The smile faded and died. Sunshine dropped her chin onto her chest and gazed down at the tabletop. “I didn’t see him on his birthday. They’re in foster homes. I can visit them. I mean, I have permission. Except I can’t get there. Franny’s in Medford and Bobby, he’s with a family in Fitchburg. I haven’t seen them in almost a year. How’m I supposed to get there?”
    â€œThat can be arranged,” I said. “Do you want to tell me what happened?”
    â€œWhy they—why I don’t have my own kids?”
    I nodded.
    She let out a long breath. When she looked up at me, her eyes were wet. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It makes me sad.”
    â€œOf course it does.”
    â€œArtie Quinlan—that’s my husband—one day he just left. He ran off with some woman. Never said good-bye. Not even to the kids. Just left. This was April three years ago. Next thing I know, my bank account’s empty and they won’t take my credit cards, and then I lost my job….”
    â€œWhy’d you lose your job?” I said. “What happened?”
    She flapped her hands. “I just couldn’t do it, Mr. Coyne. I was a teacher. I couldn’t go.” She looked up at me. “Okay. I started drinking again. I’m supposed to say it, admit it, and there it is. I started drinking and not showing up at school, so they suspended me, and then they got rid of me, and next thing happened, the bank foreclosed on my house and my kids were skipping school….”
    â€œI want to make some notes,” I said. I flipped over one of Skeeter’s paper menus. The back was blank. Then I slapped my pockets, but I hadn’t brought a pen with me.
    â€œHere,” said Sunshine. She handed me a ballpoint pen. It had red ink. “What do you think you can do?”
    â€œI can see about arranging