Red Hot Deadly Peppers (8 page)

“The other Bailey’s vendors and I have been talking about that, too. We’ve been here all four days, since Monday. I feel bad for the organizers, but us being here isn’t helping anyone. Potential fairgoers couldn’t care less about us, and we’re losing money by not being at Bailey’s. We aren’t scheduled to be here this coming Monday, but I plan on bringing out some pumpkins Wednesday for the decorating contest. I could easily leave now and then come back for that.”

“Who else is here?” Scott asked. During our marriage he’d met a number of the Bailey’s vendors. He’d actually become friends with a few of them, too. I hadn’t seen him visit Bailey’s once since our divorce, so I didn’t know if he’d kept in contact with any of them.

“Remember Brenton, who makes and sells dog biscuits? He’s here. So is Stella, the baker, and a new vendor who is all about squash. His name is Henry, but I still don’t know him well. He’s quiet.”

“Henry . . . squash? Is his last name Dennis?”

“I think so. You know him?”

“Yeah, I do. He’s a former mechanic, too. He used to talk about his farm all the time. Small world.”

“I’d say.”

As we approached the short line of Bailey’s vendors, I observed some less-than-happy friends. Brenton leaned back in his chair, his hands on top of the baseball cap on his head and his eyes tightly shut. Stella had her hands on her round hips as she surveyed her table full of fresh bread. She’d brought less to sell today than the previous days, and it looked like she might still end up going home with too much inventory. Henry, the new vendor, seemed to be texting, the look on his face telling me either that he wasn’t sending happy words or, perhaps, that his thumbs were too wide for the tiny keyboard.

“Scott, is that you?” Stella said as we approached. She looked at me quickly as if to see if it was okay to be friendly to him. I smiled. I didn’t relish the idea of hanging out with either of my ex-husbands, but I didn’t despise them either. I’d been the one to end both marriages, but neither Scott One nor Scott Two, this one, had been too heartbroken with the decision.

“Stella, Stella, the most beautiful baker to any fella,” Scott said as he reached over her display table and hugged her tightly.

“Oh, Scott.” She laughed. “You haven’t changed a bit.”

“Well, I hope I’ve changed a little. Maybe grown up a bit, but I’ll always be me, I suppose.” He looked at me.

I didn’t think he was searching for my approval, but I gave him a half smile anyway.

“Scott, is that really you?” Brenton leaned out of his small stall.

“Brenton, buddy,” Scott said as he sauntered over and shook Brenton’s hand.

“I haven’t seen you for some time. What’re you doing . . .” Brenton looked at me. “Are you two back—”

“No, heavens no,” I said too quickly. I cleared my throat.

Scott laughed. “No, sir, we’re way over.” He winked at me. “I own the shooting gallery over there. I’m working the fair just like the rest of you.”

“Are you having any more business than we are?” Brenton asked.

“No, this place is as dead as a snake on the highway. I don’t understand why they even opened the gates,” Scott said.

Henry had come out of his stall and stood next to me. I didn’t know if he was shy or just needed to get the lay of the land before he contributed to conversations, but he seemed comfortable just to stand next to me and listen.

“Yeah, we were talking about leaving, but we might be stuck,” Brenton said. “We’re not sure if Allison wants us to stay no matter what.”

“I’ve got a call into her,” I said. “I’ll give her the scoop. We’ll know soon.”

Scott looked at Henry. “You might not remember me, but we worked together at a dealership in Charleston.”

For a moment, Henry studied Scott doubtfully. He spoke right before his silence became uncomfortable. “Sure, sure, I remember you. You were great with brakes.”

“I do have quite the brake reputation,” Scott said proudly, but I thought he might be mocking himself slightly. If that was the case, then maybe he had matured.

“Didn’t you leave to—” Henry began.

“Well, I’m most definitely buying some bread, Stella. What’ya got?” Scott announced, cutting off Henry’s question. I wondered what that was about, but I didn’t ask.

“Ms. Robins, Ms. Robins.” A harried voice turned the group’s attention to a quickly approaching person.

Lucy Emory was somehow an important part of the Swayton County Fall Fair and Festival, though she’d never made it clear just exactly what her role was. She carried a clipboard and always had a writing implement in her hand or threaded atop her ear. She rarely smiled and had one answer to almost every question: “I’ll check on that and get back to you.”

I didn’t think she was much older than me, and from the first moment I met her I felt an immediate connection to her denim wardrobe and makeup-challenged ways. Her hair was brown, though, and cut even shorter—boyishly, in fact—than my blonde hair.

“Hi, Lucy,” I said as she stopped next to Brenton.

“Ms. Robins, I’ve heard you are all leaving the fair. Is that true?”

I looked around at my fellow vendors and Scott. Either we had been overheard, or someone had told on us. I didn’t like that neither Allison nor I had had a chance to talk to Lucy before she got the information elsewhere, but the damage had been done.

“Lucy, I’m sorry you heard that news through the grapevine rather than directly from us,” I began. I debated asking to speak to her privately, but it didn’t seem necessary. This was one of those situations that made me wonder what Allison would do. She could handle any situation with professionalism and grace. I wasn’t as polished, and I worried I’d offend someone, but I did my best. “We have discussed the fact that we don’t seem to be helping your business much. Maybe it would be better if—”

“No, no, no, you can’t leave. You just can’t. I know we’ve been slow, but things will pick up.”

I exchanged a silent look of doubt with Stella.

“Does the fair usually start off like this?” I asked.

Lucy’s eyes flashed, and she bit at the inside of her cheek. “Sometimes, yes, but tomorrow’s Friday. It always picks up on Fridays.”

“That would be good,” I said as I looked at my comrades. No one was convinced.

“Lucy,” Stella interrupted, “Becca’s being polite. I’m afraid I’m not on my best behavior, so I’ll just jump in here. We’ll stay tomorrow, but if things don’t look to be improving, we won’t be back. I’m sorry about that, but Becca’s right, we’re not helping the fair a bit. I’m mystified as to why y’all even wanted us here. I’m certain we haven’t brought one extra fairgoer.”

“But you’re all part of Bailey’s, and Bailey’s is so popular.”

“Maybe your customers aren’t the same as our customers. I don’t know what it is. Please don’t take it personally. We all have businesses to attend to. Not only are we not helping you, but our businesses are suffering, too,” Stella said.

Lucy cringed. “Yes, I understand, but I would appreciate it if you do give us tomorrow and then reconsider Saturday and Sunday.”

“Absolutely,” Stella said as she looked at the rest of us. “I’m sorry, Lucy.”

“We’re all sorry it’s not working out,” I added.

“Sure. Sure.” She smiled weakly until her eyes landed on Scott. “Shooting gallery guy?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You’ll probably be leaving, too?”

“I’m gonna try and stick around,” Scott said enthusiastically. I could tell he felt her pain.

Huh. Maybe he had matured. The Scott I’d been married to would have just said, “Yep, I’m outta here.”

Lucy looked as though she wanted to say something else but couldn’t quite find the words. Piped-in organ music played cheerfully in the background and mixed with the whirr and rumble of the less-than-reliable machinery of the rides. A wave of corn-dog-scented air made me suddenly hungry.

“All right, then. I guess I’ll let them know,” Lucy said before she turned and hurried away.

I’d asked her a few times who she meant whenever she said “they” or “them,” but she’d yet to tell me. I assumed she meant her bosses, perhaps the fair organizers or owners, or perhaps a manager. I thought about following her and talking directly to “them,” but it wasn’t going to change the outcome. Even though I hadn’t talked to Allison yet, I knew we would have to pack up. It wasn’t fair to my fellow vendors. In fact, I suddenly wished I hadn’t agreed to stay through Friday. There was still a lot of Thursday left to suffer through. My gut was telling me that the next day and a half was going to be long, awful, and bad for everyone’s business.

There were many reasons I’d come to wish I’d listened to my gut. The next day and a half
was
pretty awful, but not because our businesses suffered. In fact, Friday, early afternoon, business started to boom, and by then we all wished it hadn’t.

Continue on for a special excerpt from Paige Shelton’s next

Country Cooking School Mystery . . .

IF MASHED POTATOES COULD DANCE

Available in paperback October 2012 from Berkley Prime Crime!

“They want us to keep them all here?” Gram said. “Where in the Sam Hill do they expect everyone to sleep?”

“On the floor, I guess,” I said.

“On the floor? In the kitchen? I don’t understand, Isabelle. How in the world did they even think to ask us? This is a cooking school, not a hotel, for Jack’s sake.”

Gram had been cleaning. Her short gray hair was hidden by a red bandana, and her Harvard T-shirt had a giant wet spot right in the middle. She wore bright yellow rubber gloves and smelled of bleach. We were conducting our annual midsummer ritual of scrubbing every single spot of her cooking school. Midsummer was the perfect time. We were on a one-week hiatus from our nighttime classes, and our daytime classes weren’t set to begin for another month and a half. We’d already sent out acceptance letters to our fall students, and we had this small break before our night class on everything potatoes, “Mash Away, but Respect Me in the Morning,” was to begin.

“I believe it was Jake’s idea,” I said.

Jake was my best friend and Broken Rope’s fake sheriff and town historian. He was very active with the tourism bureau as well. When you’re a self-made millionaire you can do pretty much whatever you want.

“Jake? What was he thinking?” Gram said as she snapped off one of the gloves.

“He thought it would be bad business to turn away a tour bus. It’s only for one night and then the hotel will have the rooms available. Someone messed up the reservations. The tour group was going to cancel their stop, but Jake heard they were a bunch of foodies on a trip across country. He told them your school was here and thought we might work in a free lesson of some sort and have a sleepover.”

Gram blinked. “I’ll ask again, what was he thinking? Sleeping on the floor and offering a lesson? Won’t we be breaking about a thousand food safety regulations? Come on, Isabelle, you should know this stuff.”

Gram was referring to my short and incomplete time in law school.

“I didn’t make it to the food safety stuff,” I said. Food safety wasn’t a part of law school, so even if I hadn’t dropped out I wouldn’t have been any better versed in the ins and outs of slumber parties held in cooking schools, but I didn’t want to go into detail when she was so riled up.

Gram sighed. “What kind of lesson?”

Maybe she was warming to the idea.

“Don’t know. I was thinking something slumber-party-like. Fondue, dips, twice-baked bacony potatoes. We’ll be teaching all things potatoes in a week anyway. We could practice a little,” I said.

“Well.” She hesitated a long time. I’m sure she was turning it every which direction in her mind, but bottom line, Gram liked to be cooperative, in a stubborn Gram way, but cooperative nonetheless. “I guess that might work. Foodies, huh?”

“That’s what Jake said.” It was my turn to pause. “You haven’t mentioned how you feel about the
free
part.”

“Oh, I’ll make Jake pay. He’s got plenty of money. He can buy the supplies. I’ll happily provide the lessons free of charge, but he can buy the groceries.”

“I’m sure he’ll do that.”

Jake’s fortune had been obtained via the stock market. While most of the rest of his friends, me included, were off at college, Jake was mastering things like calls and puts and annual reports. I was sure he would have bought the groceries anyway. He would probably also want to pay Gram, but we hadn’t gotten that far in our earlier quick but succinct phone conversation.

“Yes, he will. Now, we can’t allow people to sleep on the floor. We’ll have to gather some cots. Call Teddy, get him on the job,” Gram instructed.

“That’s a good plan.” I pulled out my cell phone.

Teddy was my younger and much wilder brother. His reputation as Broken Rope’s Don Juan had mellowed slightly this summer, but finding him might still be difficult. He sometimes answered his phone, he sometimes didn’t. His reasons for not answering were as simple as the phone was turned off to the too-often-used he was no longer in possession of it because some woman threw it out a window, or into a pool, or ran over it, or stomped it to death. Teddy’s ways as a lothario were embarrassing, but at least he never pretended to be something he wasn’t.

My call attempt was halted by a big gust of wind that blew through the kitchen’s open windows. It was so strong that it rattled the glass and knocked a couple pots off a shelf, the metallic crash as loud as a gun.

The wind brought a scent with it. The distinct smell of lavender filled the long room. I looked at Gram, who looked back at me with a tight mouth.

The last time I’d experienced a gust of wind and a distinct smell, I’d been visited by the ghost of Jerome Cowbender, one of Broken Rope’s long-dead historical figures. Jerome’s appearance had caused a number of problems, the biggest one being that I’d developed an unhealthy crush on him. He’d been gone for a month and a half and I still missed him, though I tried to hide it. Missing a ghost was not a good way to live life. I knew this. I hoped my emotions would catch up with my intellect soon.

That wasn’t going to happen today, though, because as the wind brought in the lavender, the first thing I said was, “Jerome?” And the first thing I did was run to the window and look out at the neighboring cemetery. I saw green, mostly trimmed grass, a few old trees, and a number of tombstones, some of them still upright, some of them not so upright, some of them carved with serious and sad words, and others with funny ones. However, there was no sign of the dead cowboy. Anywhere.

“Betts, dear, I told you that he probably won’t be back for some time. You need to get over him.” Gram stood behind me and put her hand on my shoulder.

I nodded. “I know.” I’d developed a habit of touching the very small scar on my neck that I’d received as the result of being grazed by a bullet when Jerome and I fought off a killer, someone who’d fooled us all and murdered Broken Rope’s historical theater owner, Everett Morningside. I touched it now with the fingers on one hand as I reached into my pocket with the other and twirled the coin that had come from Jerome’s long-ago buried treasure. If Gram knew I kept it with me and considered it a good luck charm of sorts, she’d probably just tell me again to get a grip and get over him.

“Besides, the only smell Jerome brings is wood smoke. This is flowery—lavender, I think,” Gram said. “I’m trying to remember who brings lavender.”

Since Jerome left, Gram had tried to explain the ghosts of Broken Rope. She told me they come and go, they couldn’t be controlled, they were mostly not dangerous, but some of them could cause “a whole bushel of trouble.” She also mentioned that I should never, ever get attached to any of them. They weren’t alive and never would be again.
They come and they go
,
she’d repeated a few times
.
They didn’t have free will. They had no will. They were the remnants of dead people.

I understood this all, and yet I still wished for the time when Jerome might come back.

“I know, Gram, but something just happened, didn’t it?” I looked out the window again.

“Yes, someone’s here, but I can’t remember who. They’ll show themselves soon enough, I suppose. Shoot, there are so many.”

“You’ve mentioned that, but you haven’t told me how many yet.”

Gram had been torn about my introduction to the Broken Rope ghosts. She was glad to have someone to share her haunted experiences with. But she also thought the ghosts were sometimes a nuisance, and she didn’t want me to have to deal with any nuisances. I was just curious enough that I didn’t see the harm. Maybe someday, after I’d gotten to know a few more, I’d feel differently, but not now.

“Let’s not worry about that until we really have to,” Gram said. “Come along. Let’s check the cemetery and see what we’re up against.”

I didn’t follow her right away, but watched the doors swing closed behind her. I was curious, of course, but I wasn’t ready. I’d been telling myself that if I ever again had dealings with a ghost, I would do exactly as she had been telling me to do—not get attached. I would let them be what they were: stuff left over from life, stuff that’s dead, stuff that our unusual town of Broken Rope somehow held on to. I knew it would be difficult, though. There was something inherently appealing about being able to communicate with a ghost.

Gram had been dealing with the ghosts all her life. She knew nothing different. If she thought it was amazing to be able to see and talk to them, she didn’t show it. She was pretty matter-of-fact about the whole thing.

It was still all new to me. I needed to be able to accept this
gift
or
talent
or perhaps even
curse
and make it work for me. I took a steadying breath, ignored my drying mouth, and followed her path through the kitchen and out the front doors of the school.

I had to put my hand up to shade my eyes from the bright sun, so I didn’t immediately see why Gram exclaimed, “Don’t worry, you won’t feel it!” as I joined her in front of the school.

It took me only a second, though, to see the ax being swung in my direction, at my head more specifically. I was too stunned to do much of anything, so it was a good thing I wouldn’t feel it. The ax landed right on my neck. And then went right through it.

“Betts, meet Sally Swarthmore. She’s harmless now—even her ax isn’t real any longer—but she was one wicked woman in her time.”

Sally Swarthmore was blond and top-heavy. She was also strikingly pretty, even in the bright sunlight that caused the ghosts to be a slightly faded version of what they were in the dark.

My heart had taken an express route to my throat, but now it began to sink back down to the right spot. I wondered if Ms. Swarthmore would have liked nothing more than for the ax to still be sharp and lethal.

“Sally,” I said cautiously. No matter what Gram said about the ghosts being harmless, I had learned something about them during Jerome’s visit that made me ponder just how
harmful
they could be if they really wanted to. I still hadn’t told Gram what I knew. I wasn’t sure I ever would. If, in fact, she didn’t know what could happen to the ghosts when they were surrounded by the dark, that lack of knowledge might be the very thing keeping her peace of mind intact. At the moment, I didn’t want to be the one to shake her sense of security.

“Who are you?” Sally asked roughly, though her face softened one tiny bit.

“Isabelle Winston. I’m Missouri’s granddaughter.”

“Miz, your granddaughter can see me?”

“Seems that way,” Gram said. “Maybe we could drop the theatrics, Sally. You’ve attempted to haunt people since you died. It hasn’t worked with me, and it isn’t going to work with Betts. You’re too silly to pull it off anyway.”

Sally put the ax to her side. “I’m silly? Well, that’s a fine bundle of sour oats.” She looked at Gram and then back at me. “I guess I’m glad there’s more than one of you. Maybe you’ll be more fun than your grandmother. This could be interesting. Tell me, Miz, where did we leave off?”

The ghosts arrived with spotty memories, having mostly forgotten their lives along with their previous visits. Jerome, and it seemed that Sally, too, remembered Gram, though. She must have been their touchstone. I supposed that was better than starting at absolute zero every time.

Gram thought a moment. “I seem to remember us discussing a diary, your diary. You said that you wished you knew where it was so you could prove that your homicides were justifiable.”

“Really?” Sally’s eyes opened wide. “My murders were justifiable?”

“That’s what you said last time.”

Sally shook her head. “I hope it comes back to me, but right now I don’t . . . oh, hang on, maybe . . . no. We’ll see. Until then, what should we do?” She smiled and swung the ax up to her shoulder.

Gram looked at me. “You’ll find that Sally likes to ‘do’ things. She’s a curious ghost and doesn’t always go away when you’d like her to.”

“Hey, I’m right here,” Sally said.

“Oh, I know,” Gram said. “We’ve got work to do, so you may come into the school and join us, but stay out of our way.” Gram pushed past me and hurried back into the building.

“Nice to see you, too, Missouri,” Sally muttered.

“You want to come in?” I asked.

Sally shrugged and tried to look nonplussed. “I guess there’s nothing else to do.”

The inch-by-inch cleaning we’d originally planned transformed into just a good cleaning. I called Teddy, who answered his phone and said he’d be able to round up the cots and other bedding we’d need.

Sally, her ax seemingly permanently attached to her gripped hand, mostly complied with Gram’s order to stay out of the way as we hurried to get the school ready for the guests. She was a talker, though. She asked about everything—the appliances, the utensils, the mop, my hair, Gram’s bandana, the cars out front, everything.

“I don’t understand why people will be sleeping here,” she said after we’d given her a brief overview of how transportation had changed since she was alive.

“There’s no other place,” I told her. “The hotel is booked. I even checked on the high school gymnasium, but it’s busy with a volleyball tournament.”

My dad was the high school principal, and my mom was the auto shop teacher. They were currently on vacation somewhere in Arizona, but the high school building was constantly being used for something; summer camps, sports tournaments, etc.

“We’re just going to have an all-night cooking class. Those who want to participate will learn everything there is to know about potatoes. Those who want to sleep will have cots in the reception area and the back classroom that we rarely use.” Gram paused and looked at Sally like she couldn’t believe she’d taken the time to explain the circumstances to the ghost.

“Hmmm,” Sally said.

“Sally, if you try to haunt our guests, you’ll only end up irritating Betts and me. We’re the only ones who can see and hear you. You might want to work on ‘demure’ this evening.”

Both Sally and I laughed. Gauging from the short time I’d known her, I doubted she’d ever been demure, and even though she couldn’t remember the details, she probably was pretty certain she hadn’t been either. It was that one shared laugh, that small connection, that made me think I was fated to become at least partially attached to these traveling ghosts forever. I couldn’t say that I liked Sally really. It wasn’t possible for me to so quickly befriend someone who’d axed her family to death, even if her actions might have been justified. But there was something more than just my ability to talk to ghosts that made them appealing to me. I wondered about the connection and hoped I might someday understand it. For now, I thought that maybe it was simply that I could see them
because
I was somehow predisposed to feel tied to them.