by Maia Chance
“Here comes Boyd with the U-Haul,” Chester said, peering out the window over the sink. He swigged Diet Coke. “I don’t know where we’re going to put this stuff Aunt Effie keeps buying. The garage is full, and we can’t have it inside the inn. Not when we’re about to start a major renovation project.”
“Well, no way is she going to stop buying,” I said. “I know. I’ll call and have one of those storage pods sent over. We can load it up as needed.”
“Good idea.”
I looked up a nearby storage pod company on my smartphone and gave them a call. They said they’d deliver one to the inn the day after tomorrow. After that, I checked my email. Phone bill, an invitation to a friend’s baby shower, assorted spam, and a message from my friend from college, Charlotte. We had both been anthropology majors, but after graduation she had gone off for a few stints in the Peace Corps while I had done hard time as a barista and hotel clerk. She had just started graduate school in anthropology in Seattle, and her email was raving about the program. I KNOW YOUR PLANS HAVE CHANGED, she wrote, AND I KNOW YOU’D LOVE THIS PROGRAM. THIS YEAR’S APPLICATION DEADLINE IS NOVEMBER 1ST. THINK ABOUT IT!
Reapply to grad school? How the heck could I do that? That would mean leaving Otis behind. Leaving the Stagecoach Inn behind. And I wasn’t sure if I even wanted to go to grad school anymore. It was so, I don’t know, elbow-patchy.
I wrote Charlotte a quick note—basically saying thanks, but no thanks—and deleted her email.
*
Hours later, I pulled the Dustbuster into a parking spot downtown. The Bermans sat in the back seat, and Chester was beside me. Aunt Effie lurched her Cadillac into the next spot over, with Hank and Dorothea, who needed a break from working, on board.
“Ready?” I said.
“Can’t wait!” Lo said.
“I’m hungry,” Hank said.
“You could enter the pie-eating contest,” Chester said. “I’m going to.”
I stuck the orange envelope Karen had given me into my shoulder bag, and we got out, joined the others on the sidewalk, and headed toward Main Street.
I had submitted to Aunt Effie doing my hair. There had been a few touch-and-go moments when the close proximity of the Aqua Net, the searing hair dryer, and the cigarette in Effie’s lips had made me fear for my life.
I had survived. My hair was a voluminous mass of artfully hairsprayed waves. They didn’t really go with my nearly makeup-free face, but oh well.
Now my problem was the vintage rust-colored dress with a belt cinched so tight I could barely breathe. My best friend Lauren, having been tipped off about my speech by Aunt Effie, had brought it over from her shop. She had also brought knee-high brown leather boots with three-inch heels. She said they were from the seventies. They pinched.
The first thing we noticed when we reached Main Street was a slowly revolving orange metal pumpkin on a stand in front of Dickens New and Used Books.
“What in the world is that?” Myron asked.
“That’s obvious,” Hank said. “It’s a broken finger waiting to happen.”
“Good thing you’re here, Dr. Li,” Dorothea said with a blush. “Ready to spring to people’s aid like a knight in shining armor. Goodness, I hope my fingers don’t get caught in a dangerous pumpkin.”
Hank looked confused.
“There’s a sign,” Lo said, speed-walking to the pumpkin. She had changed into a bright red velour tracksuit and a large sun visor. “Oh, how cute—it’s a ballot box for the Gourd Queen contest!”
Sure enough, the revolving metal pumpkin was set into a large wooden box with a padlock and a slot to accept paper ballots.
“Gourd Queen?” Myron stopped beside Lo.
“Don’t you remember anything, Myronie? We read all about it in the Naneda Gazer just this morning. The Gourd Queen will ride on a big, beautiful float during the parade.”
“Then she’s a beauty queen,” Myron said.
“It’s just a popularity contest,” I said.
“I suppose it’s a real boon to a lady’s social life, being the Gourd Queen,” Lo said.
“I guess, if she likes wearing a puffy orange dress and doing the royal wave,” I said with a shrug.
“Is there a tiara?”
“The Pumpkin Princess wears a tiara,” I said. “That’s the second-place winner. The Gourd Queen wears a golden crown.”
“Golden?” Lo said, eyes shining.
“Well, spray-painted gold.” Was Lo picturing herself as Gourd Queen? Was she even qualified, since she was an out-of-towner? I decided not to burst her bubble.
I split up with them to go figure out the whole Peeper Prize judge–greeting thingy. They were going to shop, their plan being to show up at the ceremony in Fountain Square at three to see me greet the Peeper Prize judge.
I passed sidewalk sales, decorations, and games. People were setting up the pie-eating contest at tables in the blocked-off street. In Fountain Square, a stage and sound equipment were going up, and a red tent with a BOBBING FOR APPLES! sign stood in the far corner. The outdoor gear store was getting ready to raffle off a pair of binoculars that were, evidently, great for looking at distant foliage. Harries Stationery had piled their stock of Headless Horseman masks onto a sidewalk table. The Army Navy Surplus had a long rack of 20-percent-off plaid hunting jackets. A kids’ bouncy house was slowly inflating over by the Cup ’n’ Clatter, the bank had set up scarecrows and dried cornstalks outside their door, and Lauren was arranging a rack of colorful vintage garments in front of Retro Rags.
“Hi,” I said, pulling up next to her.
“Hey!” She straightened. “Wow, Agnes, you look … fantastic in that dress.”
“Why do you sound so surprised?”
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but everyone’s used to seeing you in sneakers and T-shirts. Sometimes we forget how cute you are.”
Lauren isn’t classically pretty with her long face, sizable nose, and bony figure. And yet she is amazingly glamorous. That day she was wearing cat-eye glasses and a vintage argyle sweater dress. Her straight brown hair was in a French twist.
“It’s not like I wear muumuus and a paper sack over my head,” I said.
“Well, actually, you practically do.”
“I’m going to grab a coffee. Want me to bring you anything?”
“Nope, I’m fully caffeinated. Thanks. I’ll try to pop over to see your speech. If you hear whooping, that’ll be me.”
I said good-bye to Lauren and then crossed over Main Street to the Black Drop, which, in my humble opinion, frothed up the best pumpkin spice lattes in town. I had been making an exhaustive comparative study since pumpkin spice latte season officially began a few weeks earlier.
Main Street was filling up with people, dogs, and strollers. The mood was festive. Lots of tourists. Some tourists were the Romantic Getaway variety—holding hands, relaxed smiles, leisurely. Others were the Family FUN type (grit your teeth determinedly when you say FUN), which usually included one whining kid and one flushed, pissed-off parent.
Amid the stream of people, I noticed a rangy guy with a potbelly, in black jeans and a black Adidas track jacket.
He was striding down the sidewalk and swinging his head left and right, as though looking for something. Or someone.
He wasn’t a tourist. Too businesslike. And I didn’t recognize him as a Nanedan, either. Something about his hostile intensity, his dark sunglasses, and the down-slash of his eyebrows made my skin crawl.
He disappeared into Harries Stationery.
Chapter 9
I was loitering by the coffee pickup area in the Black Drop when the cashier guy called, “Hi, Alexa.”
Alexa? As in, Randy Rice’s wife Alexa?
Trying not to be too obvious, I turned.
Yup. That was her, all right. The tipsy train wreck from the Chamber breakfast, wearing tall black boots over tight jeans with slashed-at-the-factory knees and a fitted black leather moto jacket. She went up to the PLACE ORDE
R HERE counter in a self-conscious way, tossed her high-and-lo-lighted blonde ponytail, and ordered a sixteen-ounce skinny latte, extra hot. When she said extra hot, she giggled at the cashier, which was kinda ooky since she appeared to be staving off forty, and the cashier was obviously a college student.
After Alexa paid for her coffee, she came over to where I was waiting.
I gave her a big smile. “Alexa Rice, right? I’m Agnes Blythe—I’m a new member of the Chamber of Commerce. I think we met briefly at the Chamber breakfast.”
“We did?” Smudgy black eyeliner ringed Alexa’s baby blues, already settling in the delicate fan of wrinkles on their outer corners. “I don’t remember, but I’m always so bored at those things.”
“How is Randy holding up?” I asked in a concerned-yet-casual voice.
Alexa almost … flinched. “He’s … okay. You mean about Mikey?”
“Uh-huh.” I swallowed. “Weren’t they, um, friends?” Delilah had actually said frenemies, but I needed to get Alexa talking.
Her eyes welled with tears. “Poor Mikey. They said he…”
“I know,” I said. “You don’t need to … were you and Mikey close?”
“What?”
“You’re crying.”
“For Randy.”
“Oh.”
Why so defensive, Alexa?
“Randy and Mikey knew each other since they were babies,” Alexa said. “Their moms were best friends, so even though Randy and Mikey might not have chosen to be friends with each other, they ended up being together, like, constantly. They even went on family vacations together and stuff…” A sniffle. “Randy is just sick with all this. He got so drunk last night. He has the worst hangover. I haven’t seen him like this since he had his little midlife crisis a few years back and bought that stupid sports car that he never even drives.” Alexa’s voice took on a sharp, almost vindictive edge. “I told him a lot is riding on this week, with the Peeper Prize judge here and everything. Jeez. He has no self-control. None!”
Oh really.
“All of us in the Chamber feel the great importance of this week,” I said. Ugh. Who had I become, saying stuff like that? I felt as phony as Cheez Whiz. “Does, um, Randy have any idea who might’ve wanted to kill Mikey? Since they knew each other so well, I mean?”
Alexa glanced over her shoulder. The only other customers were busy chatting on the other side of the coffee shop. A man stood at the ORDER HERE counter, talking with the cashier, and the barista was frothing milk with such a loud hiss that there was no way she could eavesdrop. Alexa turned back to me, eyes wide, and lowered her voice. “Randy, doesn’t have any idea, but…”
Please-oh-please give me something good! Drop theories. Name names! I NEED this.
“About two weeks ago, Mikey suddenly had—” Alexa swallowed. “—all this cash.”
For some reason, it was at the precise moment that Alexa said cash that I noticed her large, sparkling stud earrings. Diamond? Cubic zirconia? I had no idea. Aunt Effie would’ve been able to tell in a second.
“How do you know about the cash?” I asked.
“Mikey was sort of flashing it, you know. Buying stuff. Bragging about the stuff he was planning on buying.”
“To … you and Randy?”
“Yeah.”
“Delilah Fortune—you, know, the owner of the new cupcake shop?—”
“Yeah. I know.”
“—she said Randy and Mikey were actually frenemies, not friends, so—”
“You’ve been talking to Delilah.” This was deadpan.
“Well, yeah. Just in passing, of course.” I swallowed. “You know, Chamber of Commerce stuff.”
Alexa was blinking faster than usual.
Were more tears coming? Or was it because I had mentioned the Chamber? Clifford and Belinda Prentiss, too, had gotten twitchy when I had mentioned it.
“Delilah and I are good friends,” Alexa said. “We were actually together when we found out the news about … Mikey. We were up in Brighton, visiting my grandpa in his nursing home—”
Brighton was a pleasant suburb of Rochester.
“—he has dementia—and Randy called me and…” Alexa didn’t continue. She was too choked up.
“Delilah goes with you to visit your grandpa?” I asked, trying not to sound incredulous. I mean, I could picture Delilah playing coy with a young guy, but not playing gin rummy with an oldster.
“She’s been really supportive. Of course, we always go shopping at the mall afterward. To cheer ourselves up, you know. Visiting Grandpa is depressing. God, I can’t stand the thought of getting old.” Alexa’s eyes welled with more tears. “I’m about to-to-to turn forty.”
Aunt Effie would’ve just advised her to stay thirty-nine till she went toes-up.
“What did Mikey buy with the cash?” I asked.
“Some totally ridiculous gold chains, for starters. I told him they made him look like a gigolo, the way he had them nestled in his hairy chest…”
“Real gold?” I asked.
“Yeah. I’m sure of it. And he bought video game stuff—he was addicted to video games. He bought his nephew some superexpensive sneakers.”
“Scootch.”
“Yeah. You know him?”
“Sort of.”
“I already told this to the police, and I couldn’t tell if they thought it was important, but I think it is. Maybe the police always act like that, to play it cool. I know they do on Law and Order.”
Did everyone watch that show? Jeez.
“All I know is that Mikey was pretty broke,” Alexa said, “and then boom! Cash. And then, two weeks later, he’s dead, and no one knows where the cash is.”
“What do you mean, no one knows where it is?”
“Well, the police said they never saw any big money. Like, in his house or in his wallet, or in his bank account.”
“Wait,” I said. “Hold on. Are you saying that you think Mikey was murdered over this cash?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Like, because he stole it from someone, and they wanted it back?”
“Uh-huh.” Alexa leaned in and whispered, “I’m scared.”
“Alexa!” someone roared.
Alexa and I both started, and turned to see Randy, Alexa’s husband, poking his head through the coffee shop door. He was wiry, with a surprisingly lush head of chestnut hair on his oversized head, and sunglasses. His face was puce. Even from a distance, I could see the pitted acne scars on his cheeks.
“Coming, Randy,” Alexa said in a meek voice.
“Could you take any longer?” Randy slammed the door. The bells jingled.
Alexa didn’t meet my eye. “Randy gets bored waiting.”
“Oh.” What else could I say?
Then my pumpkin latte was up. I gave Alexa one of the Stagecoach Inn business cards and told her to call if she needed someone to talk to. It felt pretty inadequate, considering she had to go out and contend with Angry Randy.
On the other hand … whoa. Mikey Brown’s boatload of cash. Can you say Pivotal Clue?
When I stepped out of the Black Drop, latte in hand, Randy was sitting on a sidewalk bench, arms folded tight, joggling one of his small legs up and down. A bright-eyed corgi sat on the bench beside him, panting. The two of them made the most bewildering contrast of creepy and cute.
Despite my pinching seventies boots, I powerwalked away.
*
At three o’clock sharp, Dad lumbered up onto the stage in Fountain Square to clamorous applause from the crowd.
Dad has been the mayor longer than I’ve been alive, and he’ll probably be the mayor until he retires. I’m guessing his approval rating would be somewhere in the 90s if the Naneda Gazer did a poll. He’s like a cross between a teddy bear and Perry Mason, and he exudes this fatherly warmth that makes every last person in town feel reassured and heard. No, he’s not perfect, and neither is his cholesterol. That sometimes keeps me up at night.
While Dad was giving his
speech—it was all about community and how lucky we were to live in such a magical place; obviously no mention of murder—I wove my way through the crowd to the area beside the stage.
To say I had butterflies in my stomach is an understatement. It felt as if I had pterodactyls swooping around in there.
“Hi,” I whispered to a lady with a clipboard who looked In Charge of Everything.
“You’re the Chamber’s Peeper Prize liaison?” she whispered.
“Yeah.”
Just then, Dad finished his speech to more applause.
“Well, it’s show time,” the clipboard lady said to me. “You’re late.”
“Oh. Sorry.” I set down my coffee, took out the orange envelope Karen had given me, and dropped my shoulder bag on a folding chair.
Clipboard Lady dumped a bouquet of orange and yellow chrysanthemums into my arms and gave me a push. “Make it snappy.”
The crowd fell silent as I climbed the stairs onto the stage. I felt as if I was wearing stilts, not three-inch heels. I stopped behind the microphone.
Right in the front row stood Aunt Effie, Chester, Hank, Lo, Dorothea, and Myron. They all smiled and waved. In the very back, the rangy, Adidas track jacket–wearing out-of-towner stood, his sunglasses turned in my direction.
Eek.
I cleared my throat, and the resulting rumble in the microphone was deafening.
“Get on with it,” Clipboard Lady whispered.
“Good afternoon, Naneda,” I said. My words boomed through the speakers. “I’m Agnes Blythe. Most of you may know me simply as the mayor’s daughter, but I am also, along with my aunt, Euphemia Winters, and my cousin, Chester Blythe, one of the newest members of the Naneda Chamber of Commerce.”
“She’d make a great Gourd Queen!” Lo shouted.
Next to Lo, Chester tossed a piece of caramel corn into his mouth and waved.
Lo went on, “And she’s basically single, too!”
At that precise second, I saw Otis. He was off to the side, standing with his arms folded, in worn jeans and a red-and-blue plaid shirt. Our eyes briefly met. I saw the hurt in his eyes. I had to look away.
