Death, Taxes, and Pecan Pie

by Diane Kelly

  Over the next minute or two, Smith, Officer Rose, and I wrestled and wrangled, tossing each other around in the tiny trailer until it began to rock precariously back and forth with our movements. The metal creaked and groaned as the three of us slammed against the front wall. It creaked and groaned some more as our full weight slammed against the back of the tiny bathroom.

  A shout came from outside as the trailer rocked backward. “Watch out! She’s going over!”

  The camper rolled onto its side, taking the three of us with it. I could only hope we hadn’t inadvertently crushed a carnie in the process. Fortunately, the shift gave me and Rose just the opportunity we needed. We pounced on the woman and managed to get her hands pulled up behind her back. I sat on her and held her down while the officer cuffed her. Click-click.

  Chapter Nine: Home Is Where You Hang Your Hat

  Her house had already been knocked down, but Merry huffed and puffed anyway, like the big, bad wolf trying to get at the three little pigs. “You’ve got nothing on me! All you can prove is that I added up the scores wrong. It’s not a crime to stink at math.”

  “It is if you get paid for it,” I told her.

  “If I got paid,” she snapped back, “then where’s the money?”

  Good question.

  She sneered at me. “You won’t find any.”

  I sneered right back. “I’ll take that as a challenge.”

  Officer Rose and I pulled ourselves up and out of the bathroom, leaving Merry Smith behind.

  Once we were out, we found ourselves standing on the interior wall inside the overturned trailer. Rose turned her head my way and grinned. “What do you know. Things did get interesting.”

  We poked our heads up and out the main door, which had now become like a topside escape hatch on a submarine. I felt a bit like a rodent in a game of Whac-A-Mole. I only hoped I wouldn’t get bopped on the head by a big mallet.

  Officer Rose attempted to leverage herself up and out of the hole, but it wasn’t easy. “Little help?” she called to the carnies.

  The men came over and stretched up their arms to help us out. We pulled ourselves up and out of the RV. I slid down the side of the rounded trailer, my feet finally on firm ground again. Rose slid down, too, landing beside me.

  “Thanks, guys,” I told the men.

  One of them gestured to the trailer. “Want us to set that upright?”

  “That would be great,” I said. “We’ll push, too.”

  The men stepped around to the back of the trailer. Rose and I went with them. As we did, a mounted officer rode up on his horse.

  He looked down from his perch on the saddle. “I’ve got a whole bunch of questions for you, Officer Rose. But the first one is, are you trying to right this thing?”

  “Yep,” she replied.

  “Trigger and I can help with that.” He climbed down from the saddle, retrieved a thick rope from the saddlebag, and tied one end to the saddle horn. He tied the other to the stairs, which were sticking up in the air on top of the trailer.

  On the mounted officer’s “Heave ho!” we pushed with all our might. Between us six humans and our single horsepower, we managed to get the trailer back up onto its axle. It sat a little cockeyed now, though. Something must have bent when it went over sideways.

  Officer Rose went inside, helped Merry up from the floor of the shower, and brought her outside. She pointed to the ground by the trailer. “Sit.”

  “Don’t treat me like a dog.”

  Nonplussed, Rose replied, “I will when you stop being a bitch.”

  Merry sat down on the ground and leaned back against the trailer.

  Jordyn arrived with the scores from the evening gown competition. Her eyes went round when she saw Merry Smith in handcuffs and Officer Rose standing guard. “What’s going on?”

  I identified myself. “Officer Rose and I are working a case here.” I held out my hand for the scores. “I’ll take those.” After Jordyn handed me the score sheets, I said, “Can you contact Cathy and ask her to get over here ASAP?”

  She nodded and pulled her walkie-talkie from her belt. “Cathy, you’re needed at the tabulator’s trailer.”

  I thanked the girl and went back into the cockeyed trailer to search for the cash the entrants had paid in return for being guaranteed winners. I glanced around, looking for potential hiding places. Score sheets were scattered all over the floor. Three of them that had gotten wet were stuck to the ceiling. I rounded them up and set them on the small dinette. I also found what remained of the ten-thousand-dollar check that was to be awarded to the winner of the Pecan Princess Pageant. Unfortunately, the part where the payee had been written had been burned away before Officer Rose and I had been able to get into the trailer. But I’d bet dollars to donuts the name Cassidy Coleman had been written on the check before it went up in flames.

  I started my search for cash with the kitchen area. No cash in the small cupboard. None in the dorm-size refrigerator/freezer. None under the sink.

  “You’re wasting your time!” Merry called from outside. “There’s no money in there!”

  Ignoring her, I moved on to the itty-bitty bath. Nothing under this sink, either. Nothing in the medicine cabinet. My gaze went to the commode. Would she have flushed the money to hide it? Yuck. Still, I wouldn’t put it past her. People did crazy things when they were desperate.

  I pushed the lever that opened the trap at the bottom of the commode and activated my phone’s flashlight to see down the pipe. No cash in there, either.

  I squeezed back out the door and opened the narrow closet between the bath and the bed. There were a few items of clothing hanging from the rod, but no cash in the pockets. Nor was there any cash in the shoeboxes at the bottom of the closet. I stripped the bed and looked under the mattress but found no money there, either. I even plumped up the pillows to feel whether cash might have been sewn inside. Nope.

  Cathy arrived and poked her head in the door, a confused look on her face. “I was told you called for me?”

  “I’m a special agent with the IRS,” I said, waving her in. “I think there’s some hanky-panky going on in your competitions.”

  “She’s wrong!” Merry hollered from outside.

  Cathy glanced out the door before turning back to me. “Excuse me?”

  I sat down at the dinette and held out my arm, indicating that she should take a seat on the other side. When she did, I gave her a quick rundown.

  Her mouth gaped. “I can’t hardly believe it! I trusted an accountant to do things fair and square!”

  “I have my doubts she’s an accountant.” I told Cathy how Merry spelled her first name. “Looks like she was trying to confuse you with a similar alias.”

  The woman shook her head. “My word! You can’t trust anybody these days, can you?”

  “Not hardly,” I agreed.

  She glanced around. “If the tabulators were bribed, where’s the money?”

  “Good question,” I said.

  “You’ll never find it!” Merry hollered.

  I stood, went to the door, and stared pointedly down at her. “So you admit there is money.”

  She thought back over her words and seemed to decide that keeping mum was in her best interest. She turned her head away.

  I nudged her shoulder with my toe. “Does the woman in the straw hat have it?”

  Her head snapped back in my direction, her eyes wide and frantic.

  I couldn’t help but snort. “Didn’t think I put that together, did you?”

  Fortunately, Nick had eyes on the woman in the straw hat. She’d be critical to the case. She’d lead us to the money.

  I returned to the table, where Cathy was sorting through the score sheets. “I’ll re-compute the scores from the recipe contests in a little bit, but those girls and their parents are waiting at the stage for the results of the princess pageant. I better get to those right away.”

  Fortunately, though the edges of the sheets were uneven and brow
n like a pirate’s treasure map, the scores from the Pecan Princess Pageant’s talent and interview competitions were intact. Cathy used the calculator on her phone to add up the scores, reading them aloud to me so that I could add them, too, and verify her math.

  When she finished, she stood. “I’ve determined the winner and the first and second runners-up.”

  “Who are they?” I leaned over to look at the results.

  She held the paper to her chest so I couldn’t see it and wagged her finger. “Nuh-uh-uh! You’ll find out when everyone else does.”

  Chapter Ten: Royally Screwed

  Cathy and I exited the trailer. As Cathy headed off to the stage, I turned to Officer Rose. “Any chance you can pass Smith off to one of your fellow officers and come with me? We’ve got some other arrests to make.” Given that I was dressed in street clothes, it would help to have a uniformed cop along. Besides, a law enforcement officer never knew when they might need backup.

  “Be happy to.” Rose helped her scowling charge to her feet. “I’ll be right back.”

  With that, she took Smith by the upper arm and pushed the woman ahead of her to the mobile command center. The two went inside, and when Rose returned less than a minute later sans her prisoner, the two of us made our way to the stage. Though I kept a lookout for Nick and the straw hat, I saw neither of them along the walk or in the stage area.

  Next to the stage, Cathy huddled with Mayor Ledesma. The look of surprise and concern on his face told me she was filling him in on the irregularities.

  The aspiring princesses were lined up across the back, looking beautiful but anxious in their evening gowns. We scanned the crowd for Cassidy’s parents. My eyes found them seated in the middle of the front row of hay bales. No surprise there.

  “Wyatt Coleman’s front and center,” I whispered to Rose.

  Her gaze shifted as she got a bead on him. “Should we go get him now before they make the announcements?”

  “No. Let’s not do anything that will detract from the pageant. We can grab him when he gets up to leave.”

  She nodded. “Good call. Just in case he tries any monkey business, we might might to block him in.”

  I returned her sentiment. “Good call.”

  While she staked out a spot to the right of the Colemans’ row, I waited off to the left. With the stage to the front of him, a crowd behind, and law enforcement to both sides, there’d be no way Wyatt Coleman could make an escape, even if he were dumb enough to try. I took advantage of the brief lull in action to pull one of Mom’s pralines from my purse. Yum!

  The mayor climbed back to the stage, where the anxious girls waited, their smiles strained. He held up the folded piece of paper that contained the name of this year’s Pecan Princess, as well as the names of the two runners-up, who would win no money but could likely cash in on their fame in the form of dance partners at the street dance later.

  “In my hand here,” said the mayor, “are the names of the three girls who will be recognized here tonight.” He lowered his hand. “But before I announce them, I’d like to take a moment to say how proud I am of all these fine young ladies. They’re a beautiful and talented bunch, with some great futures ahead of ’em.” He turned his head to look back at the girls. “I wish each and every one of you good luck in your future endeavors.”

  The girls murmured words of thanks.

  The mayor turned back to the crowd. “Let’s give them one more hand, shall we?”

  The audience applauded.

  When the noise died down, he unfolded the paper. “The second runner up is . . . Miss Hillary Hansen!”

  Hillary squealed and swept forward in her emerald green gown, her hands over her mouth in surprise. She gave the mayor a hug, accepted the savings bond, and said, “Thank you so much! This is amazing!” into the microphone.

  The mayor directed her to stand to his side. Once the crowd had quieted, he announced the next name. “Our first runner up is . . . Ainsley Drury!”

  A sweet, sincere smile on her face, Ainsley lifted the hem of her purple polka dot dress and daintily tiptoed to the front of the stage. After receiving a hug from the mayor, she stepped up to the microphone. “Thanks, everyone! Today has been so much fun for all of us girls. We hope it’s been fun for you, too!”

  As the crowd clapped enthusiastically, I shoved the last of the praline into my mouth.

  Now that I knew Ainsley was out of the running for Pecan Princess, I had my fingers crossed for Jackie. I knew these types of pageants could be very subjective, but Jackie had certainly impressed me with her dance skills, maturity, and eloquence.

  The preceding year’s Pecan Princess climbed up to the stage, carrying a dozen red roses and the prized tiara she would bestow on her successor. She stepped into place next to the mayor.

  “And now,” the mayor said, “the moment you’ve all been waiting for. Pecan Crossing’s new Pecan Princess is . . .”

  Wyatt Coleman had already risen a few inches from his seat, ready to giving his daughter another standing ovation, when the mayor announced the name. “Miss Jacqueline Geroux!”

  Coleman froze in place, his face turning red with fury as up on stage his daughter burst into sobs. The applause drowned out her cries, as well as the expletive Wyatt shouted—which, if I’d lip-read correctly, was, “Son of a bitch!”

  His wife frowned up at him, grabbed him by the arm, and yanked him back down onto the hay bale.

  As if fueled by the nearly deafening applause and shouts of support from her friends and family, Jackie floated to the front of the stage, looking stunning in her ruffled red satin gown. She accepted the mayor’s hug and the dozen roses from her predecessor and gave them each a “Thank you.” He leaned in to whisper in her ear and she nodded. He’d probably just told her that her check was in the mail, metaphorically speaking.

  As the mayor moved aside to allow the outgoing princess to put the tiara on Jackie’s head, Cassidy Coleman let out a fresh wail.

  Oh, for goodness sake! The girl certainly had some growing up to do. Lest she spoil Jackie’s moment, Cathy hurried onto the stage, put an arm around Cassidy’s shoulders, and led her off the platform.

  Properly crowned now, Jackie stepped to the microphone, her eyes bright with delight and pride. “I can’t even begin to tell you what this means to me! I’ve watched these pageants since I was a little girl, and dreamed of one day wearing this tiara. Tonight, that dream has come true for me.” She choked up for a moment, cleared her throat, and wiped a happy tear from her cheek. She looked around in acknowledgment. “I’d like to give a big thanks to everyone on the Pecan Palooza Planning Committee, the sponsors of the pageant, the judges who gave their time to be here today, and all of you who have supported us girls as we prepared for today’s pageant. We couldn’t have done it without you!”

  As the crowd applauded again, my phone vibrated in my pocket. I pulled it out to find a text from Nick. Lost straw hat in crowd. It was followed by the poop emoji.

  Crap, indeed. If we lost her, we could lose the case! She might escape with the cash, the evidence that the tabulator had been paid off.

  As Jackie cradled her flowers and waved to the crowd one final time, Wyatt Coleman stood and stormed toward me. As tempted as I was to go look for the woman in the hat, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, right? Even if we never found the money, maybe we could get an admission out of him. Then again, maybe he’d be smart enough to keep his mouth shut or realize our case against him was weak and simply deny everything.

  The rest of the crowd rose from their seats and began to flow to the ends of the rows, too.

  As Coleman approached me, I said, “I need to speak with you, sir.”

  He ignored me and marched right on past. I rushed after him.

  “Mr. Coleman!” I called to his back. “I need to speak with you right now!”

  When he still made no move to slow down, I darted up next to him and put a hand on his arm. “You need to step aside with me.”r />
  He yanked his arm out of my grip and continued on. “I’m in no mood to talk!”

  “I don’t care!” I snarled right back. I whipped my badge from my purse and showed it to him on the go. “I’m federal law enforcement. I know you paid a bribe to have your daughter win this contest.”

  He hesitated only a moment before striding forward again. “Well, she didn’t win, did she? That ought to tell you that you’re out of line here.”

  Ugh. Was I going to have to jump on this man’s back to get him to stop moving? Trip him? Under other circumstances, I might pull my weapon on him. But I didn’t want to pull out my gun here, with so many people around. It was too risky.

  Luckily for me, by that time Officer Rose had circled around the back of the crowd and intercepted us. She stepped in front of Coleman with her palm raised. “Hold it right there, Mr. Coleman.”

  He stopped for her. In fact, he said, “I’m glad to see you, officer.” He hiked a thumb at me. “This girl is full of nonsense. She claims she’s from the federal government and is accusing me of rigging the pageant.”

  I was tempted to kick the guy in the shins. I was neither a “girl” nor “full of nonsense.” I was a woman, full of bad-assery and pecan pralines.

  Officer Rose knew better how to handle him. “I’m sure we can get to the bottom of this,” she said. “Let’s head on back to our mobile lounge and discuss this where we can hear ourselves think.”

  Smart move. She’d lure him right into the lion’s den where it would be easy to arrest him. Or would it be? Cassidy hadn’t been declared the winner, and all I had to prove he’d tried to buy her the title of Pecan Princess was a trip to the toilet and a burned check with no name on it.

  We have to find the money!

  We have to nab Merry’s accomplice in the straw hat!

  But where was she?

  Rose motioned for the two of us to follow her.

  As we headed up the midway, I drew an involuntary breath when I spotted the woman in the straw hat heading our way. Given that it was now dark, she’d removed her sunglasses, but her tote bag was still on her arm. She appeared to be aiming for the exit behind us.