by Diane Kelly
We can’t let her leave!
Since we hadn’t found any cash in the trailer, it had to be with her. Without it, Merry was right—all we could prove is that she was bad at math. A good defense attorney could get her prior fraud conviction excluded from evidence, and spin the burnt check and score sheets as an unfortunate accident. Wyatt Coleman’s trip to the bathroom could be explained by the trips he’d made to the beer stand.
As the woman drew closer, she spotted Officer Rose walking with Wyatt Coleman. Her eyes popped wide and she reflexively stopped in her tracks before starting up again. If that reaction didn’t spell guilt, I didn’t know what did.
I stepped in front of her and held up a palm. It had worked for Rose. Maybe it would work for me. “Hold it right there!”
Chapter Eleven: The Long Tentacle of the Law
Despite my order, the woman didn’t “hold it right there.” Instead, she squealed, turned, and took off running. She must have realized the jig was up and that, unless she wanted to be fitted with a pair of handcuffs, she better get the heck out of Dodge.
I took off after her, my legs pumping as fast as I could make them go. She turned, saw me in pursuit, and dashed across to the other side of the midway. She was only my size, but the threat of arrest sure could make someone run fast.
Where the heck is Nick? Pursuing a fleeing suspect alone was difficult. The odds of catching a runner were much greater when more than one officer was in pursuit. But there was no way I could pull my phone from my pocket and call him. It would slow me down and I might lose her forever.
When the woman turned around again to see if I’d gained on her, Nick emerged from the crowd up ahead. He raised a hand to let me know he’d spotted us. When the woman looked forward again, Nick was coming at her from the other direction. Drawing on the football moves he’d used on the field back in his high school days, he spread out his arms to block the woman from getting past him.
She changed course, hooked a left between a funnel cake booth and a churro stand, and headed toward the busy, noisy row of rides. She probably figured she had a better chance of escaping into the crowd there. Every teenager in a fifty-mile radius seemed to have come out tonight to check out the rides and games.
The woman’s hat flew off as she sprinted, darting this way and that to avoid other people who were standing or walking on the midway. My feet pounding, I ran right over her hat, squashing it under my sneaker.
We’d passed through the food area and were now entering the much louder rides section. Beeps and buzzes and swishes and swooshes came from the rides, as well as clicks and clacks and clanks. Nick was nowhere to be seen. Where did he go?
We were approaching the spinning Octopus ride when Nick dashed out from behind the bounce house on the other side, blocking the woman’s way. She slowed and tried to turn, but the other way was blocked by a tight group of teenage boys.
We have her now! Neener-neener!
As Nick and I closed in, she slowed to a walk and backed up against the waist-high fence surrounding the Octopus.
The ride spun behind her, its arms going up and down while its lights flashed. Her weight against the fence moved it back a few inches, and a car came dangerously close to hitting her in the head.
I whipped my badge out of my purse again. Lest I cause a stampede of panic, I left my gun inside. “Undercover agents!” I hollered. Technically, we weren’t undercover, but it was a shorthand way of explaining why Nick and I were in civilian clothes. “Put your hands in the air!”
Her eyes darted around, but as we stepped even closer she seemed to accept that she had no chance of escape. Her face sagged and her shoulders slumped, but she complied, lifting her hands into the air. Next thing I knew, she’d been lifted into the air, too. The strap of her tote bag had been caught on an arm of the Octopus.
“Holy shit!” Nick yelled as the woman was yanked up into the air.
“Aaaaaaaah!” she screamed as the ride took her up, up, up, more than ten feet off the ground. She kicked her legs and flailed her arms to no avail.
As the ride’s arm reached its zenith, the car mounted on the end swung around and punted the woman dangling from the end into the air. The two adolescent boys in the car screamed as the woman flew twenty feet, soaring over the netted wall of the bounce house and performing an involuntarily flip before landing on her back in the middle of the inflated floor. Poom!
The force of her impact made the floor billow up and sent the half-dozen small children inside sailing toward the heavens. While their parents screamed in fright, the children—who’d been unable to achieve such heights on their own—screamed in glee. Fortunately, they all came down safely, eventually bouncing to a stop.
Nick and I ran to the zippered entrance and called, “Get out, kids! Now!”
The last thing we wanted was for this woman to take a child hostage or to grab one to use as a human shield. For all we knew, she could have a weapon in her tote bag.
One look at her after the kids had exited told me my worries had been for naught. The woman clutched her ribs, barely able to move. No doubt the impact from the car had broken a few of them, maybe punctured a lung as well. “Get me an ambulance!” she shrieked through gritted teeth.
Luckily for us, an officer from the Pecan Crossing PD who had been strolling up the midway saw the commotion and ran over.
“We’re federal agents,” Nick said, showing his badge. “This woman needs medical care right away.”
The cop jumped on his radio and called for EMTs. “We need medical help at the bounce house. Stat.”
When he finished the transmission, I filled him in on the details. “We’ve got a matter to attend to with Officer Rose. Can you handle things here?”
“Be glad to.”
Before leaving, I went over to the Octopus ride and confiscated the tote bag, which was still hanging from the arm. Fortunately, the contents appeared intact.
Nick and I took quick strides to the mobile command center. Inside, we found Merry Smith sitting in a temporary holding cell at the back. She cast me a scathing look. I put my fingers in my ears and waggled them at her.
Officer Rose was sitting on one side of a table, Wyatt on the other. Rose looked up as we came in. “Mr. Coleman here was just telling me he had nothing to do with any sort of bribe.”
“Is that so?” Nick asked, taking a seat at the table.
I took a seat, too, and dumped the contents of the tote out on the table. Inside were a wallet, a tube of sunscreen, a pair of sunglasses, and three envelopes of cash, each with $250.00 inside. I opened the wallet to find a check in the amount of five thousand dollars made out to a Theresa Horvath. It was drawn on an account at a small local bank in the name of Wyatt Coleman. Looked like Merry and Theresa’s take had been fifty percent. That was quite a commission. My best guess was that Coleman had written a check rather than pay the women cash because a large cash withdrawal from his bank might raise a teller’s suspicions. People in small towns tend to gossip. A big withdrawal like that could lead to rumors of a gambling problem or drug addiction. Merry and Theresa probably figured that having the check made out to Theresa would prevent anyone from connecting the payment to Merry. They’d been wrong.
I held up the check and turned to Coleman. “You want to talk about this?”
“No.” His face turned purple. “I want to talk to a lawyer.”
Chapter Twelve: It’s Not Over until the Country Boys Sing
We summoned Cathy to the police trailer with the score sheets. The two of us quickly sorted through the pages. I found the sheet marked PECAN PIE CONTEST across the top. My eyes ran across the scores, which could range from 0 to 100. Each and every judge had given Bonnie’s pie a perfect score. My mother’s had ranked second, with one 99 score.
“I knew it!” I handed the paper to Nick. “You mother got the highest score possible.”
He perused the page. “This is going to make her very happy.”
The next page I found w
as for the praline contest. Mom had earned a perfect score in that contest, 500 out of 500 possible points. Bonnie wouldn’t be the only one who’d be happy soon.
The score sheet for the cookie contest had been burned, but even though part of it was unreadable, it appeared that contest had been fixed, too. The scores showed that the pecan brittle contest was legit. The candied pecan competition also appeared to be valid. Seemed that nobody who’d entered those contests had cared enough about winning to pay a bribe.
“So two of the contests weren’t rigged.” Cathy exhaled sharply. “Thank heaven for small favors.”
Nick and I phoned our mothers and told them to come to the police trailer. When they did, we handed them the score sheets.
Bonnie read over the paper before looking up. “I won!”
My mother squealed. “Me too!”
“Yay!” Jesse cried. “I’m getting a trampoline!”
* * *
We all went outside a few minutes later and watched as Officer Rose loaded Merry Smith and Wyatt Coleman into the back seat of her squad car. Arrest warrants had been issued for Pauline Lang, Marlene Blakely, and Rosario Garza. All of them appeared to have already left the festival. Officers were en route to their residences to round them up. Their half-baked plan to win the baking contests had blown up in their faces.
After Smith and Coleman had been hauled off, my mother turned to me. “What a day!”
Bonnie let loose a whistle. “You can say that again.”
Nick and I exchanged glances. While a wrestling match in a trailer and a foot chase that ended with a woman being flung by an Octopus into a bounce house might seem like a wild and crazy day to our mothers, it was all in a day’s work for us.
When Jesse rubbed her eyes and opened her mouth in a wide yawn, my mother said, “I think it’s time we got this little one home.”
Nick, Bonnie, and I planned to stay for the concert and street dance. We bade my parents and niece goodbye with hugs.
I chucked Jesse under the chin. “Take good care of that unicorn.”
She gave me a final, sleepy smile and hugged the stuffed animal closer. “I will.”
* * *
The concert was a blast. Armadillo Uprising was a relatively new band and had only one album under its belt, but in addition to their limited selection of original songs they played a slew of classic covers by George Strait, Willie Nelson, and Alabama, as well as some of the newer hits by Dierks Bentley, Brad Paisley, and the lead singer of their former band, Brazos Rivers.
Nick and I worked up a sweat two-stepping and twirling our way across the asphalt that served as the dance floor. Many of the pageant contestants had elected to remain in their gowns, kicking up their heels in elegance. Bonnie proved to be quite popular with a couple of older men, both of whom were widowers. They took turns around the dance floor and argued over which one of them would get to buy her beer.
As they headed off to get her drink, she grinned. “It’s been decades since I’ve had men fighting over me.” She lifted her shoulders. “It’s kind of fun!”
Nick shook his head. “I never knew my mother was such a shameless flirt.”
She cocked her head, a teasing grin playing about her lips. “There’s other things about me you don’t know, either.”
“Let’s keep it that way,” Nick shot back, fighting off a grin himself. I knew he was happy his mother was having a good time.
When the band played its last note, spotlights illuminated and a voice came over the loudspeakers. “Thanks to everyone for coming out for Pecan Palooza! We hope y’all had a great time. Drive safely and come back and see us next year!”
* * *
The headline on the front page of the following week’s Pecan Crossing Chronicle read “Payola at Pecan Palooza!” The article detailed the shady dealings surrounding the baking and beauty contests. Those who’d paid off Merry Smith and her cohort got their photos in the paper like they’d wanted, except the photos were their mug shots. Alongside them were photos of the real winners, including my mother and Bonnie.
After a little more digging, it was determined that Merry and Theresa had likely met while waiting for appointments with their criminal defense attorney in Missouri. Like Merry, Theresa had a rap sheet, though hers included only misdemeanor charges for petty theft. She’d be adding a felony charge or two soon. Once I’d looked over their banking records, I discovered that the two had run their scam at a dozen small town fairs and festivals, and had earned nearly seventy-five thousand dollars in the process. Of course none of that money had been reported on their tax returns, which could add tax evasion to the list of charges they’d face.
My mother mailed me a big box of pralines as a thank-you for my efforts in ensuring she got the recognition and prize she deserved. Bonnie thanked me and Nick by taking us out to dinner with some of her prize winnings.
Though Pecan Palooza had barely passed by, I was already looking forward to returning to the event next year. I only hoped next time things wouldn’t get so nutty.
Read on for an excerpt from the final installment in the Tara Holloway series.
Chapter One: Bride to Be . . . Killed?
Early on a Sunday morning in mid-August, I sat at my fiancé’s kitchen table and placed a stamp on the last of our one hundred and thirty-eight wedding invitations. Done! Yay!
In a few short weeks, Nick and I would be tying the knot. Woot-woot! But until then, we’d be busy with our jobs as special agents for the Internal Revenue Service, fighting tax evasion and white-collar crime. Criminals don’t take a day off, and neither would we—at least not until after the wedding, when we planned to spend a romantic week in Cancún, Mexico. Margaritas. Cabana boys with sexy Spanish accents. Beautiful Mexican beaches. Life doesn’t get any better than that.
Even though the invitations wouldn’t be picked up until tomorrow, I figured I might as well get them in the mail. There was a blue collection box only a quarter mile away, at the entrance to the neighborhood. Besides, Nick’s Australian shepherd mix Daffodil had been dropping not-so-subtle hints that she wanted to go for a walk. She’d pawed the inside of his front door, nudged my leg and, when that failed, she’d retrieved her leash and brought it to me in her mouth, dropping it at my feet as if to say Hey, dummy. Am I making myself clear now?
I reached out and ruffled her head. “Okay, girl. I give in. We’ll go for a walk.”
After clipping the leash to her collar, I stashed the invitations in my tote bag and slung the straps over my shoulder. Nick was still asleep in his bed upstairs. He’d had a tough week, learning the ropes as he prepared to move up the ladder at the IRS, taking on his new position as codirector of the IRS Criminal Investigations Division in Dallas. I let him continue snoozing. He’d earned it. Besides, he’d need to be well rested for later. We planned to spend the day packing for our upcoming move, and he’d be the one doing the heavy lifting.
Daffodil dragged me to the door, prancing happily on the floor, her nails clicking on the tile and her fluffy tail whipping back and forth. We eased past the stack of empty boxes in the foyer, headed out onto the porch, and made our way down to the sidewalk. When she stopped to sniff the tree out front, she took advantage of the opportunity to multitask and simultaneously crouched to relieve herself.
We continued down the sidewalk, pausing on occasion so she could smell a bush here, a curb there. It wasn’t unusual for cars to be parked on the street in our neighborhood of townhouses, so I paid little attention to the white pickup sitting halfway between Nick’s townhouse and mine down the block. It looked just the same as thousands of other trucks in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex.
We continued on, passing my place across the street. In the yard was a recently erected FOR SALE sign with the phone number of my realtor, whose tax returns I’d prepared while working my former job at the CPA firm of Martin & McGee. Nick and I were in the process of buying the house next door to his mother in another part of town, so I hoped my place would sell q
uickly. Couldn’t hurt to get my equity out of my current home and put more down on the new place, lower our monthly payments.
We also planned to hold a garage sale at my place next Saturday to get rid of the things we’d no longer need once we were married. Given that we’d both lived on our own for several years, we had duplicates of some items. Two living room sets. Two sets of pots and pans. Two gun cabinets. We’d begun sorting through our things and separating them into piles of stuff to keep and stuff to put out at the garage sale.
While we hadn’t yet agreed whose living room furniture or pans we’d be selling off, there was no doubt we’d be keeping my gun cabinet. Nick had bought mine for me for Valentine’s Day. It was painted a glossy red and held my extensive collection of handguns and rifles, even a sawed-off shotgun. But there would be room for Nick’s guns in it, too. He had fewer than me. He’d grown up in the country where he might need a rifle to shoot into the air to scare off a wandering coyote before it went for the chicken coop. I, on the other hand, grew up in a family of gun nuts who liked to hunt. While I’d inherited their affinity for the sport of shooting, I had no killer instinct and couldn’t imagine taking aim at an innocent deer or bird. I preferred target practice only, putting a bullet through a paper target or a root beer can. That’s not to say I’d never shot anyone. I’d put bullets in the legs of suspects after they’d first shot at me, and I’d even put a bullet through the brain of a member of a dangerous drug cartel. My one and only kill. I hoped it would stay that way. I derived no pleasure from having to use my weapon against people. I hoped I would never have to do it again.
“This way, girl,” I told the dog as I rounded the corner. Daffodil turned up the street, too, trotting a few feet ahead of me as we made our way onto the main road.
We reached the mailbox and I circled around to the front of it, grabbing stacks of invitations out of my bag and slipping them through the slot, where they plunked to the metal floor inside. Finished, we began to head back down the sidewalk.
