Grace Under Pressure by Julie Hyzy

what are you good at? Beside breaking people’s hearts, that is.”
    She hung up on me.
    I closed my eyes in frustration.
    My fingers were still curled tight around my cell phone when I heard Frances walk in.
    She hefted a small blue cooler up onto her desk and patted its handle. “You hungry?” She gave what, for Frances, constituted a smile. “I figured you’d be so busy today you might forget to eat.”
    Speechless, I nodded.
    Turning her back to me, she opened the cooler and began pulling things out.
    Ten minutes later, I had devoured half of my portobello mushroom sandwich, while Frances daintily picked at her turkey club. She’d allowed me first choice of the two, surprising me with her thoughtfulness. In addition to the sandwiches, Frances had picked up two fruit salads and two slices of carrot cake from the hotel’s kitchen. We sat at our respective desks, quietly enjoying the bounty.
    About halfway through dessert, Frances started in: “So who was that calling your cell phone so many times this morning?”
    I should have expected this, but the good spirits that resulted from a full tummy put me off my guard.
    Frances used a corner of her napkin to wipe a tiny bit of cream cheese from the side of her mouth. “Boyfriend, I bet. Am I right? Men are so impatient. Everything is always about them.”
    “Not a boyfriend,” I said, covering up the remaining dessert to take home.
    Frances speared a final forkful of carrot cake. “But you do have a boyfriend?”
    I didn’t answer.
    “If it wasn’t your boyfriend calling you all those times, who was it?”
    “Why do you need to know?”
    “Just making conversation,” she said and popped the last bite into her mouth. She chewed that cake a whole lot longer than it deserved, finally swallowed, and put down her fork. “Nothing wrong with that.”
    “Nothing at all,” I said blandly. Changing the subject, I asked, “Can you pull some personnel files for me?”
    Eyebrows shot up. “You going to fire somebody?”
    “Hardly. I thought I might take a look at the records of all the people on staff.” Although I wasn’t counting on taking over for Abe, if I did get the nod, I needed to be prepared. “I prefer to work ahead.”
    “Yeah, you seem that type.”
    I didn’t have the chance to ask what she meant by that. The momentary lull offered her opportunity to jump in with more updates on other employees and she clearly couldn’t resist temptation. I was learning very quickly that, more than food, gossip was what fueled Frances’s energy levels. “So, the housekeeping staff thinks you’re out to get them,” she said.
    “Where did you hear that?”
    “You spooked Yvonne by showing up there unannounced. She’s an interesting one, that girl. Did you notice all her piercings? Ears, lip, eyebrow . . . we make her take them out while she’s working but you can see . . .” Frances wrinkled her nose in clear distaste, “. . . all the little holes all over her. She used to be such a pretty girl, too. What a shame. She’s got a tramp stamp, too.”
    I was surprised Frances knew what that was.
    “Imagine what that will look like when she’s forty,” she continued. “Saggy, baggy. I’ll bet she’s sorry then. The things girls will do for their men.”
    At that, my assistant got such a gleam in her eye that I was afraid she’d start quizzing me on my love life again. “I talked mostly with Rosa and Melissa,” I said to hold her off. “They were outside the study when Abe was killed.”
    “Sad stories there, both of them.”
    I wondered if Frances knew any happy stories. “I guess I’ll find out soon enough when I go over their personnel files.”
    “Those are the ones you want?”
    “Who did you think I meant?”
    “You seem to spend a lot of time talking with Terrence Carr,” she said with a sly grin. “Let me warn you: He’s happily married.”
    I knew that. “He took the job here even though big-city departments were courting him. He said