It's Never too Late - By Tara Taylor Quinn Page 0,32

as a professor, he became convinced of her death and, leaving a note to the effect that if he couldn’t be with her in life, he’d be with her in eternity, he shot himself. Someone who worked for him, but was loyal to Tory, got word to her that he was dead and she immediately came clean.”

They were nearing the parking lot.

“Before the end of the semester?”

“No. Word came during semester break.”

“What happened to all of those students who took her class? A class she didn’t have credentials to teach?”

“They received full credit for the courses they took from her.”

“Can you do that?”

Legally, if the institution determined that they’d met class qualifications of learning, they could. It would be the same as though they’d all tested out of the classes. But ethically?

“They did it.”

“Students could have sued, couldn’t they?”

“Yes. But because they all turned in work to exhibit their mastery of the subject matter, their damages would probably have been negligible.”

Addy froze inside for a second. A college freshman who’d only read an article wouldn’t know that. Would she?

“Did anyone try?”

He didn’t miss a beat—either on the sidewalk, or in their conversation. She started to breathe easier again.

“The article didn’t say.”

And she couldn’t ask Will.

“What about Montford? The university pressed charges, didn’t it?”

“No.” Not that she’d been able to find. There’d been nothing filed, that much she knew. And he’d just hit on the other problem she had where Will was concerned.

Not only did Tory Evans get away with her deceit, she was still right there in town. Married to a Ben Sanders, according to the records Addy had pulled up the previous afternoon. She’d adopted Ben’s daughter and the couple had had a child of their own, too, Phyllis Christine, born in 2001. The child would be twelve now.

More damning, though, was that Ben Sanders was a descendant of the Montford family—town founders and Montford University patriarchs.

And based on what she’d found in the local paper, the Phyllis Tory had stayed with when she’d first come to town was one of Becca Parsons’s best friends. Becca Parsons, as in Will’s wife.

“I’d say they’re lucky no one pressed charges.”

Not the words she’d wanted to hear. But exactly the same conclusion she’d drawn.

It appeared to Addy, with sickening dread, that Will Parsons had played favorites. That if his anonymous threats had anything at all to do with Tory Evans, he could have a tough road ahead of him. She figured he had a fair chance of winning—but the battle wouldn’t be easy. And he could lose his job.

Addy was really beginning to regret coming back to Shelter Valley.

For more reasons than one.

* * *

ON THURSDAY, NONNIE volunteered Mark to change Addy’s oil. The truck was due. He’d mentioned taking care of it before work. And before he knew what was happening, his grandmother had called Addy and told her Mark would be changing the oil on her car, too, while he was at it.

He could only hear one half of the conversation, but figured Addy was trying to refuse when he heard the old biddy say, “I can’t let you do for me if you won’t let us do favors back,” in a pleading voice that didn’t come naturally to her at all. She’d never have gotten away with it if she’d been talking to him.

“No, really, he’ll have the oil pan out there, anyway. Won’t matter if he lets a little extra drip in.”

Sitting at the table, finishing the tuna sandwich she’d had waiting for him when he’d come in from class, Mark shook his head. He was going to have a serious talk with his grandmother.

Words at the ready, he waited for her to get off the phone. Seeing him, she wheeled down the hall toward her bathroom, assuring Addy that he’d know what kind of oil to get and she could settle up with him later.

By the time she hung up, she was in the bathroom with the door firmly locked behind her.

The ploy might have worked if he hadn’t just helped her change her padded undergarment half an hour before.

“Nonnie.” Standing outside the door, he used his most serious tone on her.

“I’m busy.”

“No, you aren’t. Come out here.”

“Nope.”

“What you do in my life is our business,” he said through the door. “You can’t interfere in someone else’s life.”

“Who’s interfering? I’m being neighborly, is all.”

The toilet flushed. She could be going. It wasn’t as if she couldn’t lift herself onto the seat and back to her chair. On