"You're not getting it. I don't think our deal is going to work. I need to know what you're doing. And I need to know in advance, before you screw up something. Goodbye."
"Give me a chance, buddy," she said into her dead phone.
She opened her tablet and searched the Internet white pages for Elena Duarte. A phone number in Tampa came up. She punched in the number and got an answering machine with the default male electronic voice saying to leave a message. Sandy sat confused. So, we have a Norma Martin living in Park Beach with this Elena Duarte who doesn't actually live in Park Beach, and Norma uses Elena's car registered a hundred miles away in Tampa. Now she needed to talk to both Norma and this Elena.
She drove back into town and parked in the police station parking lot intending to visit Raymond at the jail. She had just parked when Miss Runway Glider in her white Buick pulled in fast and stopped alongside. She motioned for Sandy to come over.
She spoke rapidly with no trace of accent, "I followed you. Please get in so we can talk. I shouldn't be seen with you. I see your car parked here with police cars almost every day. I need help. What's your name?"
"Sandy. Hey, I'm not a reporter and I'm not police."
"You must know the police, you always park here."
"If that's good, I do. If that's bad, I don't," Sandy slid in beside her. "What's wrong?"
"I'm in trouble and my people can't help me. The police are going to arrest me. This is very strange. You must believe me. Everything was okay until Albert was killed."
"You can say that again," Sandy replied. "Okay, slow down. You called him Albert. You knew him from the restaurant, I suppose."
"No, we would never go to the restaurant together, never. The way it started, they told me he'd be speaking at a street fair one day, so I followed him around. I flirted with him like I was told and it worked. That was the plan. He didn't take the bait immediately, but I know how to get a man interested."
"No kidding."
The woman was excited. "They'll find some of my things in his apartment. They'll arrest me. I didn't kill him. It's all political and terrible and all screwed up."
"What plan? Slow down and start at the beginning."
"I was supposed to meet him and have an affair. I was to leave a trail of evidence so when people checked it out, it would look like he was having an affair with Norma Martin.