The Miss Fortune Series: Overdue (Kindle Worlds Novella) (8 page)

“So that’s it?” I asked.

Carter nodded. “I’m the law. There’s only so much I can legally do.”

“Uh, huh,” Gertie said. “Ida Belle, could I have a word with you?”

Gertie skated ahead and Ida Belle joined her. They became animated, Gertie making little skating motions with her fingers, while Ida Belle shook her head vigorously. Gertie threw her hands in the air and jabbed her finger at Ida Belle, making a point.

“I don’t like the looks of that,” Carter said.

Ida Belle appeared in thought a moment then shrugged her shoulders and the two started skating together, moving away from us at a rapid pace.

“Whatever it is, Ida Belle agreed to it. She’s the sensible one. She wouldn’t say yes to something that was a bad idea.”

He lifted his eyebrows. “Whose idea was it to ride a motorcycle through a chicken coop?” Carter asked, referring to the time Ida Belle and I made a getaway from the Swamp Bar on her motorcycle and ended up plowing through a horde of chickens.

“Oh, crap.”

We watched as Ida Belle and Gertie approached their old Derby adversaries, who were skating at a moderate pace and deep in conversation. Gertie tapped Bunny on the shoulder. Some words were exchanged before Gertie and Ida Belle zoomed away, with Sadie and Bunny in hot pursuit. Gertie flashed me a thumbs-up as they passed us again. Soon, Bunny and Sadie sped by. I had a feeling this was going to go from “this doesn’t look good” to “disastrous” in a matter of seconds.

Bunny stuck her elbow out as they caught up to Gertie and Ida Belle.

“Watch out, Gertie!” I yelled.

Gertie turned, causing Bunny’s elbow to miss her side by inches. She then delivered a shoulder-blow into Bunny’s chest, letting out a war whoop and pumping her fist in the air as Bunny fell backward. Sadie then rushed over, jabbing Gertie sharply in the side.

Bunny recovered and was on her feet, heading for Gertie. But Ida Belle was quick, and ran interference, skating up to Bunny and getting her into a headlock, before releasing her and pushing her in the opposite direction.

“Something tells me that’s an illegal move,” I said to Carter.

“You think?”

Sadie was about to get another blow into Gertie when Ida Belle came from behind and pushed Gertie out of the way, using her arm to deflect Sadie’s jab as she skated ahead and joined Gertie.

Sadie skated over to Bunny. By the looks on their faces, this was war. They increased their speed, and were soon skating to the side of Gertie, who taunted them with words I couldn’t hear. Bunny responded by lifting her left skate and scraping it against Gertie’s right skate wheels, before she and Sadie sped off.

Gertie was thrown off balance, but quickly recovered. She turned her head to Ida Belle. Even above the organ music and sounds of skates gliding across wood we heard her yell, “Whip me, Ida Belle!”

Ida Belle grabbed Gertie’s left arm and they quickened their speed. Using Gertie’s arm like a bat, Ida Belle swung, then released Gertie, sending her hurtling around the track toward Bunny and Sadie.

And that’s when one of Gertie’s wheels broke away from her skate. Gertie screamed. The wheel shot across the rink, throwing a few skaters off their balance. Carter grabbed me and pulled me away from a three-skater pileup happening several yards in front of us.

I followed Gertie’s screams and saw she was skating on one foot, holding the disabled skate leg inches from the floor.

Heading straight for Andy and Anna.

“Will you be okay?” Carter asked.

“Yeah, yeah, go!” I yelled.

He tore off across the rink toward Gertie, dodging other skaters and getting cursed at in the process. Ida Belle was speeding toward her as well.

Gertie yelled for Anna to watch out, and as she passed Anna, Gertie grabbed onto her, pulling her along. Anna then grabbed onto Gertie for support. They sailed around the curve of the rink until finally starting to slow. When they were almost at a complete stop, Gertie began flailing her arms and she and Anna tumbled onto the skate floor. Carter, in the process of skating up to them, couldn’t brake quickly enough and he tumbled on top of them.

The organ music stopped. “Clean up on aisle one,” the organ player said dryly into the microphone.

I soon caught up to the others at the crash scene as Carter pulled himself from the floor. He and Ida Belle helped Gertie stand. Andy had skated over and was helping Anna.

“You okay?” Carter asked Gertie.

“Nothing a good crack from a chiropractor won’t fix,” Gertie said, stretching her neck.

“Good thing you grabbed onto me,” Anna said after Andy helped her to her feet. “I’m an expert skater and was able to help us stop.”

Carter folded his arms and shot a look at Gertie. “Yeah. Convenient would be more like it.”

“The Lord was looking over me tonight,” Gertie said.

“Hallelujah,” Ida Belle added.

Carter shook his head. He had the same idea I had. This accident was planned.

“But, you’re an expert skater yourself, aren’t you, Gertie?” Andy asked. “Didn’t you and Ida Belle used to be on a Roller Derby team?”

Gertie shrugged. “I guess I forgot some of my skills. So nice to see you two here tonight. Together.”

Andy looked away from our group. A guilty man if ever I saw one. “Yeah. Who knew there’d be so many Sinful faces here tonight. And to think I didn’t notice any of you here.”

“You all right, Andy?” I asked.

He swung his face back at us. “You can’t tell my wife you saw me here.”

“And why is that?” Carter asked.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Andy,” Anna said. “They’re not going to spoil the surprise.”

“Surprise?” Gertie asked.

Andy sighed. “I’ve been taking skating lessons for several months now. For my anniversary. Darla always wanted me to take her skating. So for our twentieth, I thought I’d not only take her, but learn some dance moves.”

“My husband, Chuck, teaches him the fancy ‘guy’ moves. We trade off every other week,” Anna added.

“Though tonight will be our last night,” Andy said. “Hopefully I’m ready for my big anniversary surprise.”

“You are,” Anna said.

Carter patted Andy on the shoulder. “You looked good out there. Don’t worry, your secret’s safe.” Then to us, “We should be going.”

We weren’t more than a few feet outside the skating rink when Carter laid into Gertie. “You planned that accident, didn’t you?”

“Planned it? I have a sore butt that says I didn’t.”

“Number one, you’re too good a skater to have let a broken wheel send you sailing around the skating rink. Number two, you happened to collide with one of the people we were watching tonight. Number three, you used the crash to distract Anna from realizing you cleaned her pockets out.”

Ida Belle sighed. “It didn’t go exactly as planned.”

“You trash talked the two Mudbuggers so they’d come after you,” Carter said.

“Maybe,” Gertie answered.

“You wanted it to look like they knocked you off your stride so you’d run into Anna and it wouldn’t look planned. Luckily no one was hurt.”

“Luckily you can’t feel my butt. Because, yes, it does hurt. I took one for the team. You’re welcome.”

“Oh, I’m not thanking you.” He looked at me. “Walk me to my truck?”

“Sure.”

He took one last look at Gertie. “You should probably return the piece of paper we saw Andy give Anna. Most likely it’s a check for the dance lesson. But it doesn’t matter. Whatever it is, you stole it. I can’t use it as evidence. So return it.”

When we got to his truck we stopped. Despite the kiss we exchanged inside the roller rink, I knew nothing had really changed between us. In fact, the kiss may have made things worse.

He unlocked his toolbox and gave me back our weapons and smiled. “So… all those times I caught you with the Terrible Two and you had flour all over you, or you were pretending to fish, or Gertie was throwing dollar bills at the TV during a movie about male strippers… those were all just to cover up after disasters much like tonight’s, right?”

“No, most of those times went smoothly.” I paused. “Some of them.” I cringed. “Okay, just a couple.” And, actually, I was thinking of our dealings with the local mobsters, Big and Little. It helped when they provided their support. But some things still needed to be kept from Carter. And our involvement with the local mobsters? Definitely something he should never find out.

“I hope what happened didn’t compromise your investigation of Andy. I mean, even though tonight didn’t pan out, Lila Rose still overheard the mailman and Waddell talking.”

He shook his head. “I think it’s obvious it was all in Lila Rose’s head, don’t you think?”

“No, I don’t think. And what about Janice? Gertie shared our suspicions about her with you, didn’t she?”

He touched my shoulder. “I know you have a great set of skills. I’ve witnessed them first hand. But this is my arena. I grew up with Janice. I can’t see her murdering someone. It’s time for me to pursue other leads.”

“Other leads?”

He smiled. “Nice try.” He held my gaze and cleared his throat. “Hey, uh, about the, uh, kiss back there…”

“We had to,” I said quickly. “So they wouldn’t notice us.”

“Oh… Yeah. Yeah, that’s all it was.” His eyes flashed a mixture of anger and disappointment as he unlocked his door and opened it.

Could I have admitted the kiss was real? Sure. But then that might lead to more kisses. And those kisses would lead to something even more wonderful. But sooner or later we’d end up having the same discussion we had a couple days ago. Was I willing to stop being a CIA agent? No. Did he want a woman who had my job? No. Best not to go there again. Just too painful.

I could tell he was having the same internal discussion with himself. He touched my hand lightly. “Goodnight, Fortune.”

“Goodnight, Carter.”

There was no kiss between us. His eyes hinted at the sadness inside him. I’m sure mine were doing more than hinting. I felt my throat constrict, hoping he would leave before I started to tear up. But he didn’t leave. So I touched his hand and turned and walked away. The tear came streaming down my face as I heard him get inside his truck and start up his engine. I wiped the traitorous tear from my face and joined Gertie and Ida Belle.

“Were you crying?” Gertie asked, touching my shoulder.

“No. Yes. Just one tear.”

“I was hoping that kiss in the rink was real.”

“Oh, it was real.”

“And that’s the problem,” Ida Belle said.

I nodded and did what I always did, focus on work. “So what was the paper they exchanged?”

Gertie held it up. “Carter was right. It’s a check for tonight’s dance lesson. I bruised my butt for nothing.”

“Maybe not,” I said. “Lila Rose got it half right. There’s still her observation of Andy and Waddell having a heated argument behind the bushes.”

“Andy’s shoes,” Ida Belle reminded me. “Lila Rose said she didn’t see Andy, but remembered his shoes.”

“The wild, jungle-print hi-tops?” Gertie asked. “I saw Andy changing his shoes tonight. He wasn’t wearing anything like that.”

I sighed. “I don’t think Carter’s putting much stock into what Lila Rose saw.”

“Or thought she saw,” Ida Belle said. “I’m sorry, but I tend to agree with him.”

Our ride back to Sinful was spent tossing out more theories. Ida Belle and Gertie were leaning toward Lila Rose’s daughter, Janice.

“She has a motive and the knowledge of needles,” Gertie said as she, Ida Belle and I trudged up the walkway to my house.

I agreed that Janice looked good on paper. “But Lila Rose said she didn’t think her daughter was capable of murder.”

Ida Belle and Gertie shot one another a look. “You know, she may not have the best judgment. Even before her breakdown Lila Rose was always a little kooky,” Gertie said. “She once challenged Sheriff Lee to a duel.”

“I would think in Sinful that would be considered normal.”

Ida Belle held a finger in the air. “With a pistol, yes. Her weapon of choice was a pickup truck full of fruit.”

Gertie’s eyes grew wide. “We had to clean Sheriff Lee off with a fire hose. The next day the city council voted that fruit was off limits as dueling weapons.”

As we approached my front door I noticed a manila envelope sitting on one of the patio chairs.

“You expecting something?” Ida Belle asked.

I instantly tensed. An innocent-looking manila folder could pack quite a punch, either in explosives or biological material. A note on fancy letterhead, with
Lila Rose
printed in large, block lettering at top, was paper clipped to the envelope.

I picked it up from the chair. “It’s from Lila Rose.”

Gertie couldn’t help but snicker. “Maybe she’s challenging you to a duel.”

Ida Belle and Gertie looked over my shoulder as I read the note:

I searched my notes and found this exchange between Jack the mailman and, I’m hoping, our mystery lady. Her name is Andrea Marston. Not sure of the date, but you’ll note her physical description. She owns the Nickel and Dime Café on Fifth. Read it and tell me what you think, kiddo.