by Sam Cheever
Since we were staring back the way we’d come I figured we were already perched on the cusp of a fast getaway. “Aren’t we going to just ask about the receipt? Why would we need a fast getaway?”
Ida Belle opened her door. “It’s not what we need…but unfortunately it’s usually what we get.”
Fortune opened her door too. “But Gertie’s staying in the car so maybe we’ll be able to saunter back at a leisurely pace this time. We’re way past due.”
“Uh-huh.” Ida Belle looked at Gertie. “Keep the motor running.”
I put my hand on the door handle, tempted beyond words to just stay in the car with Gertie. Fortune and Ida Belle had me seriously spooked. But in the end seeing the two of them start bravely toward the showroom building shamed me into following.
That, and the fact that Gertie had turned the radio up and was bellowing, “I like big butts and I cannot lie” as if she were auditioning for American Idol.
I leapt out of the car and ran to catch up with the others. “Hey, wait for me!”
CHAPTER FOUR
A big man with dark eyes and hair strolled over and nodded at Fortune and Ida Belle when we came through the door. He gave me the once over. “You ladies having another adventure?”
Fortune eyed him carefully as I’d noticed she did with just about everyone when they first approached. “We need to speak to Big.”
He kept his gaze locked on me until I glanced away guiltily.
“Where’s the third Musketeer? She take some youth serum or somethin’?” He laughed at his own joke. Mostly because nobody else was going to.
“This is Felicity. Gertie’s out in the lot.” Ida Belle told him. “We thought it was best after the inflatable alligator episode.”
The big guy grew serious, nodding. “You aren’t wrong on that one.”
Fortune lifted a brow. “Big?”
“He ain’t here.”
“You wouldn’t lie to us about that, would you Mannie?”
He placed a hand over his heart. “You wound me with your words.”
Fortune glanced around, her gaze stopping at a door with a sign on it that read, “Office”. “Big will want to talk to me. It’s important.”
Mannie cocked his dark head. “Mr. Little is here. You want I should ask him?”
Fortune glanced at Ida Belle and the older woman nodded.
While we waited for Mannie to fetch his boss, I wandered over to check out the airboat. Running my fingers over its shiny, aluminum surface, I pondered what it would be like to ride in one.
“They’re fun.” Fortune placed her hand on the side of the boat, a wistful look in her eye.
I blinked. “Did I say that out loud?”
“No. But you had the same expression on your face I was probably wearing when I first saw mine.”
My eyes widened. “You have an airboat?”
At the wonder in my voice she grinned. “Yeah. Maybe we’ll take it for a flight later.”
I laughed. “Flight, that’s funny.”
“Not really. Ida Belle will be driving.”
“Ladies. How nice to see you again.”
We turned to find a diminutive man wearing a shiny suit and a wide smile strolling toward us. He gave me a quick, full-body scan and his eyes widened. “New recruit?”
Fortune shook her head. “Temporary alliance. Felicity is looking for her dad. We thought maybe you’d seen him.”
Little’s small face folded into a frown. “Why would you think that?”
I pulled the boat repair receipt out of my pocket and showed it to him, along with a picture of my father. “He was apparently here. Do you remember seeing him?”
Little handed the two items back to me after barely glancing at them. “I don’t. But then I can hardly remember all of our customers.”
“Felonius Chance is not your everyday customer,” Ida Belle told him.
I realized I was going to have to fess up if we were going to get anywhere. Lowering my voice, I stepped closer. “He’s on the lam. Running from the police and the Russian mob.”
For a couple of beats Little seemed torn between smiling and frowning. Finally a frown won out. “Why would you think we’d know anything about a guy like that?”
Oh oh!
Fortune glanced around and lowered her voice. “We thought he might be interested in one of your other…erm…services.”
“He’s looking for a loan?” Little shook his head. “We wouldn’t loan money to somebody we don’t know. Even at twice the rate we usually charge.”
“Protection?” Ida Belle asked. “Maybe Big spoke with him.”
Little thought about this for a beat. Then he jerked his head toward the receipt I still held in my hand. “I tell you what, since you’re a friend of these ladies, I’ll take a look.” He stuck his hand out for the receipt. “Wait here for a minute.” Little Hebert took the receipt and returned to his office. Mannie followed him in and shut the door. A few minutes later Mannie returned with something clutched in his big paw. He handed it to me. “I have no idea what this means but the boss told me to give it to ya.”
I took the empty plastic cough syrup bottle and looked at Ida Belle.
She shrugged. “That’s not one of ours. Isn’t that the kind you found on Number…”
The front door crashed back on its hinges and Gertie came flying in, her hair sticking straight up in the air like she’d styled it with a cement mixer. “We have to go!”
Fortune and Ida Belle sighed.
“What’s wrong?” Ida Belle asked.
Gertie slid Mannie a look, her eyes widening. “We…um…we have to go, now!” She turned around and ran out the door, leaping into the driver’s seat of the Caddy, which I noticed was percolating right in front of the door.
I followed Fortune and Ida Bell toward the Caddy, my heart pounding so hard in my chest I thought I might pass out. I’d barely pulled my foot in and closed the door before Gertie slammed her foot down on the gas and laid rubber out of there.
The back of the big car fishtailed for a few seconds, sending it more sideways than forward and then grabbed asphalt and shot toward the front gate just as two men with small chins and big foreheads converged on the opening.
One had hair so blond it looked white in the bright sunshine and the other’s close-cropped hair was jet black. They stood with legs spread, eyes locked on the oncoming car in the most lopsided game of chicken I’d ever seen.
Gertie made a tiny sound of alarm and Ida Belle grabbed her arm. “Don’t think about it, just blow through. They’ll get out of the way.”
Gertie’s jaw tightened and she lowered her head as if she was going to head butt the two men out of her path. But, despite the fact her face lost some of its color, her foot on the gas didn’t waver. She barreled toward them, fortified by Ida Belle’s hand on her arm.
The two men looked confident until the tied-up bumper of the Caddy surged within ten feet and then I watched their eyes widen. Still, they didn’t leap out of the way.
Gertie yelped as the car roared closer and closed her eyes.
I screamed as the bumper found the spot on the pavement where the two men were standing and braced myself for impact.
No bodies bounced off the hood and flew past.
At the last possible second the two men leapt aside and the Caddy barreled on through the gate.
We were an eighth of a mile down the road and heading for an enormous cypress tree before we all realized Gertie still had her eyes closed.
“Gertie!” We all screamed her name at once and her eyes snapped open just in time to find our world disappearing behind a thick veil of Spanish moss. She jerked the wheel hard to the left and threw on the brakes.
I flew forward and hit the back of Ida Belle’s headrest. Beside me, Fortune slammed into Gertie’s headrest. We crashed back into our seats as Gertie let up on the brake and the car shot out of the moss, heading toward the swamp on the other side. There was a big log jutting out of the swam
p into the road ahead and Gertie shrieked as she threw on the brakes again.
Fortune and I did the dual seat smack one more time and we both crashed to the floor as the Caddy slid to a brutal stop, kicking up gravel and dust all around us.
Except for the happy twittering of the little birdies circling my head, the car was silent for a long moment. Then Fortune groaned and shoved back into her seat. I grabbed the headrest I had imprinted on my forehead and pulled myself up beside her. “What just happened?”
Gertie was frowning at the log in the road.
Ida Belle skimmed Fortune and me a look. “You cursed us with all your talk about gators in the road.” She cocked an eyebrow. “You two are gonna need pancake makeup.”
Fortune rubbed her forehead. “Does it fill dents?” She glared toward the front seat. “I’m never getting into a car with Gertie driving again.”
“Hey!” Gertie objected.
“Trust me,” I said. “It’s no better when the other one’s driving.”
“Don’t I know it,” Fortune agreed.
The “log” in the road lifted its snout and peered at us, as if just realizing several thousand pounds of battered Caddy was hovering over it, and then turned and, with a swish of its muscular tail, disappeared back into the swamp.
“What happened back there, Gertie?” Fortune asked.
Gertie blinked as if she’d forgotten the original reason we’d been tearing away from Hebert’s and started the big car forward again. “Russians. I heard them talking on the other side of the metallic red cabin cruiser parked at the back of the lot. They were talking about taking a woman hostage.”
“How do you know they were Russians?” Fortune asked.
Ida Belle answered for her friend. “We bumped up against a few of them in Vietnam.” She shook her head. “Trust me, we don’t want to meet up with those thugs unless we’re armed and have a plan.”
I gulped. “Nicolai Ruchoff knows I’m here.”
“Unless you know some other Russian thugs,” Gertie agreed.
“But how did they find me?”
“They’ve probably been watching you since your father disappeared,” Fortune said. “Hoping he contacts you.”
I shook my head, not because I disagreed with her, but because I didn’t want to believe it. Cal had been right. What had seemed at first like a fun adventure had just taken a seriously dangerous turn.
Suddenly the headrest-shaped bruise on my forehead and my near death experience in the swamp seemed like the least of my worries. I’d just become target number one for the Russian mafia.
CHAPTER FIVE
“It’s not safe for you at the Backwater,” Gertie told me.
We were sitting at Gertie’s kitchen table and she was heating up pot roast. Fortune had a bag of peas on her forehead and I was trying to make frozen green beans conform to the giant red U shape under my hairline. I was pretty sure peas molded better to the dents in Fortune’s forehead than my green beans were fitting into my swollen ruts. “I’ll be okay.” Though I was trying to sound brave, the idea of staying alone in the musty old hotel room without the intrepid Cal as backup was terrifying.
“She can’t stay with me,” Fortune said. “Unless she wants to spoon with Ally.”
Ida Belle took the bag of green beans from me and hit it a few times with the bottom of her beer bottle. “Try it now.”
“Hey!” Gertie objected. “What am I gonna do with minced green beans?”
Ida Belle shrugged. “My house is being fumigated. But you can stay with Gertie and me here.”
I wasn’t sure how to tell her that I didn’t think a couple of old ladies, though feisty and seemingly resilient, would be much help against Nicholai Ruchoff’s guys.
“Are you armed?” Gertie asked.
I blinked. “Yes. I have two arms and two legs.”
The older woman narrowed her gaze at me. “I think that headrest addled her brains.”
Ida Belle shook her head. “Her brain’s just swollen. The minced green beans will shrink it back down.”
Gertie’s lips tightened at mention of the minced green beans.
“I’m not addled.” Sighing, I put the half-melted package of beans on the table. “I don’t have a gun. I have no problem with them, they just scare the heck out of me.”
Gertie dragged her purse across the counter and started digging through it. She pulled a small canon out and set it aside on the counter. Next came a pair of brass knuckles, a weighted black leather bludgeon, a small knife, a baton, a canister of mace, handcuffs, something that looked like a leather whip and last but not least, a bottle of water and a hand towel. She looked at me. “Take your pick.”
“What are the water and towel for?” Fortune asked.
I was glad she asked because I was dying to and was afraid I’d look stupid.
“Water boarding.” Gertie said it like she was telling us the color of the sky.
We all stared at her.
“What? You never know when we’re gonna need to torture some information out of somebody.”
“Good idea,” Ida Belle said. “We can start with Celia.”
I grinned. From listening to the three women rant and rave on the drive back to Sinful, I knew that Celia Arceneaux, the town’s temporary mayor, was not their favorite person.
Fortune nearly spit beer across the table. When she’d finally forced it down her throat she nodded. “We can make her tell us how she managed to rig the votes to beat Marie.”
“Word,” Gertie offered as if the response clarified everything.
I wasn’t sure it did, but I loved the way she said it anyway. “I’ll just take the Mace. I feel reasonably confident I can handle that without maiming anybody.”
Gertie handed me the canister. “I think you’re missing the point of having a weapon.”
“Word,” Ida Belle agreed.
We all chuckled.
“So, what’s with the cough syrup bottle?”
I touched the empty bottle sitting in front of me before answering Fortune. It was grimy with sand and there was about an eighth of an inch of clear liquid in the bottom. “I’m guessing it means I need to go back to Number Two. Cal and I found several bottles like this one when we were looking for Father the last time.”
Fortune wrinkled her nose. “Fun times.”
“At least we get to use the airboat again,” Gertie offered with a grin.
Ida Belle and Fortune shared her smile, their eyes sparkling. “There is that,” Fortune responded.
“First thing in the morning?” Ida Belle asked.
Fortune shoved to her feet, handing the peas back to Gertie. “I need to go. Carter and I have a date tonight.”
Gertie’s eyebrows did a disturbing little dance. “What’s it gonna be tonight? A moonlight stroll through the park?”
“Don’t be stupid, woman.” Ida Belle frowned over at Gertie. “You burned down the park, remember? It looks like Mount Vesuvius puked all over it. Not very romantic at all.”
Fortune grabbed the keys to her Jeep. “I don’t know what he has planned. He says it’s a surprise.”
I remembered Deputy LeBlanc from the last time I was at Sinful. He was a handsome hunk of a man who drove the world’s biggest truck. “I didn’t know you and Carter were an item.”
Fortune flushed when I grinned at her. “We’re not. I’m not exactly sure what we are.” She shrugged, clearly embarrassed.
“Well, have fun,” I said.
As soon as Fortune left, Gertie grabbed plates and silverware. “The pot roast is hot. We can eat now.” She bent down and opened the cabinet under the sink, pulling what looked like a chocolate cream pie out and placing it on the counter. When she turned and caught me looking at the pie she must have read the surprise on my face. “I have to hide some of my sweets from Fortune. The woman’s like a pie piranha. Chomp, chomp chomp…it’s all gone.”
“Cookies too. She’s a real cookie monster,” Ida Belle agreed. Then she seemed to
realize they’d told me something that could get them in trouble with their friend. “We share most of our goodies,” Ida Belle assured me quickly.
Gertie nodded. “But we always hold a little something back.”
“We’re actually doing her a favor.”
I nodded but something must have given me away because Gertie frowned. “It’s true. She’s been complaining about gaining five pounds since she came to Sinful. If we didn’t hide some of our goodies she’d have gained a lot more than that.”
I finally let my grin escape. Making a motion like a key locking my lips, I told them. “Your secret’s safe with me.”
Ida Belle eyed me suspiciously but Gertie, always ready to find a good time, seemed happy enough to trust me.
I found that knowledge strangely happy making.
###
We polished off the pot roast and I was on my second slice of chocolate pie when I noticed the room had gone quiet. I looked up to find Gertie and Ida Belle staring at me, one eyebrow lifted each. “What?”
“I guess we’ll have to hide the pie from you too,” Gertie said, her eyes sparkling.
I put my fork down guiltily but my gaze kept sliding to the tiny rectangle of rich chocolate still staring at me from my plate. “Sorry. I eat when I’m stressed.”
“What would you have to be stressed about, Felicity?”
I slid Ida Belle a disbelieving look, my mouth opening to ask her if she was serious. But her lips quivered and I realized they were just teasing me. I picked up my fork and speared the last bite of pie, shoving it into my mouth with dramatic flare. “If you’re going to cut me off I might as well finish this piece.”
The two older women chuckled. “Don’t worry, you’re okay. But if you’d had a third slice…” Gertie shrugged.
The front door slammed closed and we jumped. Gertie was on her feet, reaching for the canon when the kitchen door opening suddenly disappeared behind a wall of flesh. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Miss Hebert.” The man looked to be in his fifties and enormous both vertically and horizontally. He was probably six foot three and over five hundred pounds. He wore a silk, pin-striped suit that fit his bulky form like it had been made for him.
