as she was, she still felt overdressed for the early morning crowd eager for chicken biscuits. She recognized Vera Stark the moment she walked in the door and glanced around as if guilty of something. She was twenty-six years old, black, married, a mother of three, and for the past four years had worked as an orderly at the Glinn Valley Retirement Center. Her husband drove a truck. They lived in a neat trailer in a park just outside the town limits of Flora, Kentucky, population 3,600.
Lindsey had called her cell phone an hour earlier as she was dropping her kids off at her mother’s house for the day. Quite naturally, Vera was suspicious and didn’t want to talk to a stranger. Lindsey, using an alias, had offered her $500 cash for ten minutes of her time, plus coffee and a biscuit.
She coaxed her to the table with a huge smile and a firm handshake, and they sat across from each other. The fact that Lindsey was also black helped ease the introduction. Vera glanced around again, certain there was trouble coming. Her older brother was in prison and the family had a history with the police.
Lindsey handed over an envelope and said, “Here’s the money. I’m buying breakfast.”
Vera took the envelope and shoved it into a pocket. “Thanks, but I’m not hungry.” It was obvious she had not declined too many biscuits. “You a cop or something?” she asked.
“Not at all. I work for some lawyers out of Louisville and we’re investigating nursing homes throughout the state. We sue a lot of them for neglect and abuse, and, as you probably know, Glinn Valley does not have a great reputation. I need some inside information and I’m willing to pay for it.”
“And I need a job, okay? What I got ain’t much, but they ain’t no jobs around here.”
“You will not get in trouble, I promise. Nothing is illegal, okay? We just need a set of eyes inside to make our cases stronger.”
“Why me?”
“If not you, then we’ll simply find someone else. We’re offering two thousand a month cash for the next three months.”
So far, Lindsey had left no trail. If Vera suddenly bolted, drove to work and told her boss about the meeting, they would never find her. She would disappear from the sad little town and never come back. But Vera was thinking about the money. She earned just over ten dollars an hour for a forty-hour week with no benefits. Her husband was about to be laid off. They lived from paycheck to paycheck, and if they missed a single one there was nobody to help.
Lindsey, of course, knew all of this. She pressed on with “It’s easy money, Vera, and we’re not asking you to do anything wrong.”
“Well, it sure smells wrong.”
“I assure you.”
“And I’m supposed to trust you? Hell, we just met. You call me out of the blue and say meet me for a biscuit.”
“We’re offering a lot more.”
“What am I supposed to do? Be a spy?”
“Something like that. The lawyers I work for are experts in the field of nursing home abuse. You’ve seen the cases.”
“I ain’t going to no courtroom, no ma’am.”
“We won’t ask you to. That’s not part of your job.”
“And so what happens if these lawyers bring all these cases to court and Glinn Valley goes bankrupt? What am I supposed to do then? Like I said, lady, there ain’t no jobs around here. They pay me minimum wage to clean bedpans and you think I like it? No, I don’t, but my kids also like to eat, now don’t they?”
Lindsey was always quick to admit defeat. She would leave and go to the next name on the list. She raised her hands in mock surrender and said, “Thank you for your time, Ms. Stark. I’ve paid you. Have a nice day.”
Vera said, “Three thousand a month for five months. That’s