An usher recognized us from the guest list and positioned us in folding chairs on the right hand side of the aisle. We had an unobstructed view of the podium from where we sat.
The services started with a beautiful song that I didn’t recognize. We were asked to stand as the ministers, of which there were three, walked to the pulpit. I admit that I zoned out while they talked about the two women, suspecting that none of these men had ever met either woman before. They awkwardly used the full name of each repeatedly, like they were trying to remember it for a contest later. So I felt justified in tuning them out, as I didn’t expect to learn anything that might help me solve their murders.
Johnny Ruck stood up next. His speech was far more heartfelt. He talked about hiring Marsha and how she’d been with him for seven years. He talked about the good times they’d spent together and how invaluable she was to the operation. He even shared information about the last day that he’d seen her.
“I remember her going out to get some information for our next challenge. She had to gather some ingredients for the challenge and then she was going to return and finish the correspondence for the week. Marsha was so dedicated to her job, and I imagine that she was equally dedicated to her family and friends.”
He started to weep, and an intern ran up to the podium with a box of tissues. Johnny dabbed at his nose and then finished, “I don’t know who did this to Marsha, but I hope that they are quickly caught and severely punished.”
A few family members came up to the podium and spoke as well, remembering the two women. It felt slightly disjointed as the two women had shared so little in common that none of the family members could share anything about the other victim.
Still the event struck the right note of sorrow. Given the Hollywood feel of the cameras and press, it was a fairly heartfelt ceremony. I was surprised at the level of what seemed like real emotion there.
We shuffled out of the services to meet a horde of cameras and microphones. Land had warned me to keep quiet, and I tried. I had gone about fifteen feet before one of the hosts from a gossip show shoved a camera in my face and asked, “Are you going to solve these crimes? Rumor has it that you’ve been asked to look into the matter.”
I knew that my face had to show my surprise. I felt the shock of the question down to my feet. I was supposed to be doing this undercover, and now I’d just been asked this on national television. “I came here today to pay my respects to the dead,” I said plainly and without feeling. I kept walking, feeling like I’d had a load of bricks dumped on me. Once again, someone knew what Johnny Ruck had said to us and had repeated it to the press. There was definitely a leak in the office somewhere.
Land poked me in the side, and I poked him back. “What was that for?” I asked, feeling annoyed.
“Your face answered that question. I figured if I made you mad at me, that you’d get that expression off your face.”
It worked. Being irritated at Land made me stand up a bit straighter and walk face forward through the crowd. No one would guess that I was feeling anything more than annoyed with Land. As the gossip papers had us involved, annoyance would likely be an emotion that would be felt often when dating Land.
Since we were supposed to be trying to solve these crimes, Land and I had decided to attend both of the graveside services. We didn’t want to miss anything that might happen. I had hoped that seeing the people at the services would give me some insight into who had been responsible for the murders.
We learned the whereabouts of the two services from Detective Danvers, who had indicated that he would be there as well. Using GPS, we decided to start with Marsha and then move to Annabella’s service, which would likely be less publicized.
Marsha’s family was already milling around the grave when we arrived. The crowd was too big to fit around the grave, and many of the reporters and media circled the perimeter like wolves waiting for someone to move away from the pack. I tried to get a view of the family, but I couldn’t very well from my vantage point. Land, who was a good six inches taller than me, easily saw over the heads of most of the spectators.
At one point, he moved aside and said, “There’s something that you have to see.” He pointed to the place where I was supposed to look. I had to stand on my tiptoes to see, but he was right.
Anthony from the bagel truck was being dragged along by an older woman who appeared to want him to sit with the family for the services. The implications of this were huge. The producers had supposedly gone over the background and connections of every contestant, so that there would be no accusations of favoritism by the producers. I had thought it routine at the time, but now that I knew they were willing to throw the competition to a particular contestant based on their own goals, this was more serious. How much had nepotism played a part so far in the competition? I mentally reviewed all of the contests so far in order to try to find examples where Anthony had been given favors. He’d won a couple of the events, but in all honesty, the descriptions of his foods and ingenuity made me think that he’d won them fair and square.
Anthony sat down next to two young girls who bore a striking resemblance to Marsha, right down to their hair buns. It was obvious that he belonged to Marsha’s family. Even Johnny Ruck had said that she was the driving force behind the show. If she had wanted Anthony in the competition, then she had broken the rules to get him there. I wondered if this played into the motives for murder.
We waited around until the graveside service was done, and then we made our move. We said our kind words to the family and greeted Anthony. “I didn’t know that you knew Marsha that well,” I said, pretending to be naïve about the matter.
Anthony ran a finger under his collar. I figured it was a little tight, given what we had discovered. “I’ve known Marsha for a long time,” he said finally.
One of the older women spoke up from across the aisle of folding chairs, “I’ll say you have. She’s your sister’s oldest girl.”
The pronouncement deflated Anthony. He looked as if he’d been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. “Yes, yes, I know it’s against the rules,” he said finally.
“Did anyone else at the studio know about your relationship?” Land asked.
Anthony shook his head. “A friend and I had gone into the food truck business about a year ago. Three month ago, the friend filed for bankruptcy. He skipped out on some bills and left me with the truck. It was about to pull me under too, and Marsha got the idea to add me to the show. She thought that the added publicity might just help pull up sales enough to keep me afloat.”
“So she faked the paperwork?” I asked.
Anthony looked at me. I felt bad asking him these questions at the funeral, but if it hadn’t been for the services, we might never have known that he was related to Marsha. I doubted that he would come forward with a good motive to keep Marsha quiet. “Not really. She told the producers that I was good for the show, but her actual paperwork correctly listed me as a relative of one of the staff. She knew that none of the producers would ever pull the sheets to look at them.”
“They just relied on her?” I asked, thinking of the times that Marsha had given Johnny Ruck the clipboards and note cards. She could have put almost anything down on those pages, and he would have read it verbatim. She’d done Ruck’s work for so long that he trusted everything that she did. A trusted assistant was invaluable—as long as you could trust her. I wondered if there were any other violations of the show that Marsha had perpetrated.
“Yeah, she could do no wrong in that office. So she got me a spot on the show. And it was working too. Sales were way up at the truck. It was amazing how much business jumped after I put up a sign saying that I was on the show.”
I nodded, knowing that I’d gotten new customers from my own sign with the oversized photo of Johnny Ruck. People had stopped by just to ask about the show. Now they were coming around wanting to know who had killed two people on set. Still, any publicity is good publicity.
> “So what will happen now?” I asked. I wondered if Marsha had tilted the scales in his favor at any point in the competition. It didn’t bother me much, since we were still in the running, but I wondered how Betty would react to the news. She’d be furious to learn that Anthony’s bagel truck had illegally joined the contest. I could imagine the fit she would throw if she learned of the deceit.
“Nothing that I know of. She didn’t cut me any favors in the competition. She just got me in the door. So the show will go on, I guess.” Anthony looked genuinely sad, and I had a hard time believing that he’d killed his niece.
Someone shouted Anthony’s name and he turned. “I have to get going now. Even though Marsha was based in Los Angeles these days, her family is still from Capital City. So we’re having a thing back at our house.”
I noticed that we were not invited to the family event at the house. I could understand that, and I didn’t want to push. Anthony walked off and I looked at Land. “So what do you think?”
He shrugged and started walking toward the car. “I’m going to reserve judgment until we learn more. I’m not going to force the information to fit a particular theory.”
Walking side-by-side, we made our way through the cameras and reporters. I wondered what they would say about us. The show had built us up into a romantic couple, and here we were going to different events in each other’s company. I figured that there would be comments about this on the entertainment news later this week. At this point though, I was too tired to care.
I wondered how Land felt about all of this. He’d agreed to be on the TV show and raise his own profile; however, I don’t think that either one of us had thought about the show’s impact on our social life. While I wasn’t actively looking for a relationship with anyone, being tied to another person on national TV would likely reduce my chances in the dating pool. The same would go for Land, though he kept all details of his personal life very close to the chest. I didn’t know if he was dating someone or if he was interested in anyone. For all I knew, he could have three children and two wives.
I didn’t know anything about him outside of his work experience and background. I knew he’d come to the United States with his family at a young age, but I didn’t know if his family was still here or which members of his family had emigrated here. It would be awkward to be asked these questions by the press and have no idea what the answers were. It certainly would make me look like a terrible girlfriend—or even an uncaring boss.
Our next stop was Annabella’s graveside service. The press was less visible here. I wasn’t sure if they’d already filled their devices with as much footage as they could, or if the services for a contestant did not merit the same consideration as one of their own. Marsha had apparently been well-known to many of the reporters. Annabella had not.
Almost immediately upon arriving, I was grabbed and hugged by a large woman who had to be related to Annabella. She had the same features and a similar hairstyle, though this woman was a red-head. “Thank you for coming. It would have meant the world to Annabella,” she said in a whisper.
I felt a bit panicky. “You know who I am?”
She pulled back and nodded. “Yes, you’re the woman who found my poor dear Annabella. I mean, she had talked about you before that, but I’ve been praying for you since I heard it was you who found the bodies. How horrible.”
I didn’t know what to say. I hadn’t expected the family to react like this to my presence. I had thought it more likely that they would resent me attending the services, given my role in locating the bodies and calling the police. I had never thought for a moment that they would feel that I hadn’t deserved that fate. It was a kindness that I was unprepared for.
“Come up here with us,” she said. “My name is Rochelle. I’m Annabella’s sister—well, half-sister. We had the same mother but different fathers. Long story,” she said with an insincere smile and a wave of the hand. “Actually, I suspect you’ll be seeing a lot more of me. I talked to the producers. I was a silent partner in Annabella’s food truck. I put up part of the cash for the truck, and I’m going to take over the operations of the business once the will is read. We had it set up so that the truck would revert to me if anything happened to her. So legitimately I’ve been a bit player on the show all along.”
She prattled on as she moved us to the folding chairs near the grave. She acted like all of this was small talk, but in actuality, she’d just given herself two motives for murder. Rochelle could have wanted the cash that would revert to her if Annabella passed away. And as I’d seen today, there were a lot of people who took these shows seriously. If Rochelle was one of those people, then she could have done away with her sister to get the notoriety that would come with being on the show.
I had wondered what would happen to Annabella’s place. The show had been built around releasing one food truck a week from the competition, which meant that one missing food truck would have left the show a week short on the schedule. They would have either had to host one week with no one leaving or cut the series short because of the situation. While fans would have understood, I wondered if the advertisers would. This sort of publicity would drive millions to their TV sets.
Land sat down next to me near the graveside. The service was simple and short. A minister said a few words over the casket, and it was lowered into the ground. We left earlier than the rest, but the press patrol was smaller and less intrusive here. There were no questions and no microphones stuck in our faces.
On the way back to my car, I thought about the two services and the differences between them. There were stark contrasts even though we’d learned about potential motives at both events. I looked at Land, “What if all the emphasis is on Marsha, but Annabella was the real victim here? We just assumed that someone associated with the show would go after Marsha, but that doesn’t explain why they would kill Annabella too.”
Land continued to face forward. “I would guess that Annabella was killed because she got in the way of the killer doing away with Marsha. She was collateral damage in the murder.”
I thought about what he had said. It made more sense, but then I was living proof that life didn’t always make sense. I had inherited a food truck and was making a living from it, although I had a degree in business. I should be in an office somewhere, not collecting cash from people buying hot dogs and coffee. My life had not followed my plan at all.
I still wasn’t convinced. “Suppose Annabella had gone to Marsha with the name of the person behind the pranks. That would have been reason for both of them to be murdered—if the killer didn’t want to be named. Or there could be a reason for Annabella to be murdered and Marsha was the collateral damage in the case.”
Land glanced at me for a minute before turning back to the road. “You’re just determined to make this case twice as hard as it needs to be. You should stick to the obvious. We’ll get this done, and then take home the prize for best food truck. Business goes up and I get to run the second truck.” He gave me a smile that let me know that he really wanted the prize most of all.
Chapter 10
I made it to the truck first the following morning. I started my routine, and Land showed up shortly after I parked on Elm Street. He was looking the worse for wear, and I couldn’t really believe that he’d gone out drinking after we’d parted last night.
“What’s up with you?” I asked. Land’s face was an ashen gray color, and his hair was more unkempt than usual. He definitely hadn’t shaved, and I suspected that he was not trying out a new look, but rather there’d been a lack of time and energy this morning.
Land continued his preparations in silence. He didn’t even bother to look at me. I wasn’t sure if he had been really pissed about me trying to open up the investigation or if something else had happened.
We worked in silence most of the morning. I was busy with the customers, some of whom had seen me on the evening news or on the entertainment programs yesterday. While I hadn’t expected
it, I had become something of a minor celebrity as a result of the reality show. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. I liked the extra cash brought in by the notoriety, but I still preferred my privacy to the constant barrage of questions.
We were just starting to close up and begin the cleaning when Detective Danvers stopped by. I knew it was no accident that he came at a time when we would be free and able to talk. He ordered a coffee, which was practically the only thing he ever ordered from us, and leaned on the counter.
“How you doing, Land?” he asked of my cook. Land gave the detective a nod, but still didn’t utter a word. I wondered if Danvers knew where Land had been last night and was just ribbing him or if he genuinely wanted to know based on Land’s appearance.
Danvers raised an eyebrow, but didn’t comment on the lack of communication. He turned his focus to me. He gave me one of those momentarily brilliant smiles and then said, “So I saw you on TV last night. You’re hobnobbing with some pretty influential people these days. Did you just go to pay your respects, or were you hoping for a few minutes of fame?”
Land snorted. “The show told us to go to the funerals, and if possible to mention the next challenge for the competition.”
Danvers laughed. “And what is this not-so-secret competition?”
Land shrugged. “They’re going to give us a mystery ingredient that we have to incorporate into our dishes.”
Danvers practically smirked at me. “Nice. How hard can it be? They’ve practically told you what they’re going to do with the dish.”
I took a deep sigh. “It could be anything though. It’s one thing to add peppers to a sandwich. It’s another to add eggplant.” I thought about the fact that we’d already won the contest, but said nothing. I guessed that telling anyone that the contest was fixed would be the end of the agreement and likely our removal from the show. I had to preserve the image that each challenge could possibly be the end of us, even if the lawyers were writing up the papers to allow us to win.
MURDER IN THE SPOTLIGHT (Food Truck Mysteries Book 2) Page 8
