School's Out for Murder (Schooled in Murder Book 2) Read Free Page A

went black.
     
    *   *   *
     
    Emily awoke to Gabby patting her cheeks gently. From her prone position, the stars and carnival lights swam in a dizzying circle. With effort, she sat up, propping her back against a tree.
    "You okay?" Gabby asked softly. She held out a cold bottle of water someone had brought over.
    Emily took her time answering, twisting the top off the bottle and drinking deeply. Officer Carson had set up a perimeter and was keeping back the gathering crowd of lookie-loos. "This feels like the worst case of déjà vu ever," she finally told Gabby. Her best friend dropped down beside her, resting her head on Emily's shoulder. Her deep sigh told Emily that she understood more than any words could have.
    Earlier that fall, Gabby had helped Emily investigate the other murder—that of the beloved high school football coach, Jim Layton. Now, here they were again, with another murder victim on their hands.
    "How can this be happening again?" she finally asked, disgusted at the tremor in her own voice.
    "I don't know, Em. But if we're honest, Mayor McBain hadn't exactly been making a ton of new fans lately. This is probably something political," Gabby told her, then added, "Not that it being political makes this any less terrible."
    "At least this time we don't have to be worried about the murder being pinned on one of our dear friends," Emily said, referring to the fact that their good friend, and the high school counselor, Helen Burning, had been kidnapped and then framed for the murder of Coach Layton. In the course of her and Gabby's attempts to prove Helen's innocence, they had been in a fairly serious car accident together, the one where Emily had broken her arm. Emily had vowed then and there that she would never put her best friend in peril again. This time, she would leave the detecting up to the professionals.
    And speaking of professionals, Emily saw Detective Welks, or Gangly-Arms, as she thought of him due to his long, awkward-looking limbs, making his way over to their group. Emily would never have thought she would actually be grateful to see him again. He paused to speak with Officer Carson, but Emily saw him glaring at her out of the corner of his eye. She gave him a weak little finger wave. Whatever he said to Officer Carson had the school resource officer scurrying off to do his bidding, as he headed straight for Emily.
    "We really need to quit meeting this way," Emily tried to joke.
    Detective Gangly-Arms merely glowered. "How does a high school English teacher manage to stumble over not one, but two dead bodies in one year?"
    Assuming it was a rhetorical question, Emily didn't bother to answer. Instead she asked, "What do you think happened?"
    Raising a brow, he replied, "My fine detecting skills lead me to believe that she was shot at close range."
    Now who was being sarcastic? "Yes, but why? And by whom?"
    "That's precisely what I plan to find out. Once the crime scene techs get here and we have the carnival shut down, you're going to tell me exactly how you happened to find the deceased."
    "You're shutting down the carnival?" Emily yelped, ignoring the rest of his declaration for the time being.
    "Temporarily. We can't have people trampling all over the murder scene. And I highly doubt you want any of your students to have to see this."
    That shut Emily up. Her first thought had been the revenue the school would lose by shutting down the carnival, but naturally, she didn't want any of the students to have to witness this sight. With a satisfied nod that she understood, the detective turned back to the crowd of officials setting up lights and taking measurements around the prone body of the mayor.
    "I'm going to go send Greg and the girls home, and then I'll be right back. You gonna be okay?" Gabby asked.
    "Of course," Emily nodded. But as soon as Gabby's dark curls disappeared into the crowd, she hugged herself tight, feeling bereft and sad. She moved as far back as she could get from the