by Sophie Sharp
“Maybe he was keeping it close in case he needed it for his own blackmail someday. After all, your mom would do anything to keep this secret.”
“We have to take this and the ostrich feather and get out of here,” Mia said. As she turned to grab a Kleenex out of Molly’s purse to pick up the feather, a door slammed overhead and footsteps tapped across the floor.
They froze. Something buzzed on the wall. From a speaker they hadn’t noticed until now, a familiar voice crackled through.
“The two of you just couldn’t keep your noses out of it, could you?” said the mayor.
Furious, Mia strode across the room and jabbed the intercom button. “Call us addicted,” she said.
She beamed at Aunt Molly, proud of her quick wit. But before Aunt Molly could respond, the bookcase door swung shut with a sneaky whisper.
They were trapped.
Chapter Thirty
Molly had no time to berate her niece for being a hothead. She had to think quick if she didn’t want them to become the second and third murders in San Cosmas within the space of a week.
“Call Moat,” Molly hissed.
“I can’t get a signal.”
“Try the bed.”
Mia frowned, then seemed to understand what Molly meant. She hopped up on the bed holding the phone as high as she could. “Barely a bar,” she said, her voice panicked.
“Get closer to the wall, as high as you can,” Molly said. “Quickly, before the mayor comes down for us.”
Mia took a split second to look around, then grabbed for a rope, swinging herself within reach of the nearby harness. She stretched up her leg, in a way Molly could never remember being able to do, and hoisted herself up.
“I got it,” she called.
“FaceTime him so he can see the room.”
Mia jabbed at her phone, swinging gently in the harness.
A second later, Moat’s face appeared on the screen.
“I need to see you now,” Mia whispered fiercely.
Moat looked nonplussed but said dryly, “You move fast. Couldn’t we at least have a date first? And I definitely didn’t see the S&M thing coming.”
Mia’s face turned red. “Detective Mean Goat!”
Molly was furious. She climbed up onto the bed and stuck her face into the shot. “This is no time for jokes, Detective Dreamboat. That’s my little niece you’re talking to, and we are in a world of trouble.”
“I’m not little,” Mia said, but Molly shushed her.
“Mean Goat? Dreamboat?” Moat said. He acted shocked, but Molly could tell he was flattered.
“Detective Moat,” she said, attempting to bring order back to their dire situation. “Now is not the time for flirting. You need to come to the mayor’s house immediately. Our lives depend on it.”
Just then, Molly heard another door close, closer this time. A moment later, the bookcase began to move. Molly moved to jump off the bed but lost her balance. As she toppled onto the bed, she grabbed for Mia, who swung in the harness. The phone moved out of its sweet spot, and Detective Moat’s face grinned from Mia’s frozen screen. He was gone.
Molly closed her eyes. Opened them. Closed them. And opened them again. Nope. Her eyes weren’t playing tricks on her.
There the mayor stood before her, dressed in black leather pants, a black leather vest, his round hairy belly spilling out of the gap in between. He wore no shirt, but he did have a black leather collar with metal spikes. She didn’t like the butt-kicking Gene Simmons KISS boots or the looks of the whip in his hands as he slapped it in his palms.
She finally believed Sherman. There were aliens, and they’d abducted her mayor.
Mia untangled herself from the harness and dropped to the floor beside the bed where Molly now lay. Mia cowered against the wall, but Molly knew what she was doing. From the corner of her eyes, she saw Mia slip the phone into her back pocket. Their evidence was safe—assuming they got out of here alive. Molly prayed to the universe that Detective Moat would take them seriously and wouldn’t simply call the mayor’s cell to see what was what.
“You’ve been naughty girls,” the mayor said, stepping closer.
Ew. Gag me now. Wait, not literally.
“I’m going to need a barf bag,” Mia said. “Stat.”
“You’re going to need a body bag when I’m done with you,” Slayer Mayor said.
Molly exploded. “You will not go near my niece.” She’d never heard her own voice so fierce before. She scrambled off the bed and stepped toward him.
“I didn’t want to go near either one of you,” the mayor said, “but you’ve forced my hand.”
“Just like Veronica Corsello did,” Molly said matter-of-factly.
For a second Slayer Mayor’s face fell and she could see Mayor Tully. “It wasn’t just me. She was threatening many people I cared about.”
“Especially Nell,” Molly said. “I thought you’d do anything for Nell, but you threw her under the bus to save your own behind.” Ugh, maybe she shouldn’t reference any body parts while he held a whip.
Slayer Mayor was back. “Nell wasn’t quite so innocent. She was telling the truth when she said she fought with Veronica Corsello that morning. I was on my way to my meeting when I saw them in a catfight behind Glam Van. I flipped a U-turn to intervene, but by the time I got there, Nell had left and Corsello was sitting on the ground. I guessed Corsello was using Opal May’s funeral to deliver more blackmail messages—trying to ruin more lives than just mine. When I confronted her, she told me that she would make me and Nell pay. I saw the chocks and you can guess what happened next. Nell did us all a favor when she shoved Corsello. All I had to do was finish the job.”
“But why did you want Corsello dead?” Molly asked.
The mayor snorted. “No one is going to ruin my career. My reputation. She said she’d tell everyone about this room and SA.”
Hothead Mia said, “Yeah, ‘The Sex Sober Mayor Who Gets People’ doesn’t have the same ring to it, does it?”
If they weren’t in such an awful position, Molly would have laughed. That was funny. At least her sense of humor hadn’t died through all of this chaos.
Slayer Mayor moved toward Mia. “Now you know, I guess I’ll have to gag you.”
“You already are making me gag.”
What was Mia doing? She was practically drawing the maniac to her. “Mia,” Molly said, “let me handle this.”
“Neither one of you can handle me,” he said, menacingly.
Molly was afraid, but Mia just laughed like she was coughing up a fur ball.
And that was it for the control maniac. He lunged toward Mia, shoving Molly aside.
But Molly—and Slayer Mayor—had underestimated Mia. As he reached Mia, she didn’t resist, she pulled him forward, applying everything Molly knew Mia had ever learned from the Jiu Jitsu classes Lacy had forced her to take. In that moment, if Lacy had been there, Molly would have told Lacy she was the best mother in the world, with the bravest daughter in the world.
Just as Mia had secured Slayer Mayor to his own cuffs and chains to await Moat’s arrival, the Moat squad did indeed arrive.
The door crashed open above, announcing their arrival. Footsteps hammered. Mia rushed to open the room door for them. When Moat followed her in, he and the team froze.
“You gagged him?” Detective Moat asked Molly.
“Actually, I did,” Mia said, wiping her palms together. Her niece sounded more confident than ever, even with the detective’s wide-eyed response.
“Anything the two of you would like to say before I remove, the, um …” Moat cleared his throat. “The mayor’s muzzle?”
Molly started pacing the room like a lawyer. Mia came to pace with her.
“The mayor was never at his weekly meeting in San Francisco. He was right here, in San Cosmas.”
“And he killed Veronica Corsello,” Mia stated. “He admitted it.”
Molly did a single firm nod. “He left for his meeting. Not
an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, but a Sexaholics Anonymous meeting.”
Mia lifted one brow. “Only he never made it. Because as he was driving past the lot, he saw Nell and Veronica fighting.”
“Just as Nell said in her statement. She’d gotten in a struggle with Veronica Corsello over Veronica’s vicious threats to out Nell and her son. We believe Nell said she was no longer going to be manipulated. She was coming out and eliminating the blackmailer’s power.” Molly waved her arm grandly.
“Furious,” Mia continued, “Veronica lunged for Nell and tore her necklace from her throat. Nell pushed her back. Veronica knocked her head on the asphalt, but not dangerously so. And Nell left.”
Molly pointed at the man chained to the wall. “This guy, who actually cared about Nell, wanted to find out what had been going on. You see, he thought Nell had been secretive for some time and he wanted to get to the bottom of what might be bothering her. But when he saw Veronica, he saw an opportunity to free himself from her blackmail threats.”
Mia lifted her palms. “When she confessed that she’d been blackmailing Nell, his trusted aid, as well as the other truckies, he lost it. She’d been blackmailing him too. Over his sex addiction. She’d been party to his parties, so to speak.” She waved the ostrich feather in the air. “You, Detective Moat, were already aware that Veronica was here the night before her death.” Mia hiked her thumb over her shoulder to point at the grunting man behind her. “He believes this is his community and that he is the man in charge. Veronica could no longer wield the control over him or anyone else. Not in San Cosmas and not in this dungeon.”
Molly shook her head. “So when he saw her there, he grabbed the chocks and killed her.”
“And when Nell became the prime suspect—”
“He sacrificed her to save himself,” Molly said with flourish.
Mia grabbed Molly’s blackmail photo from her back pocket.
Molly wondered how Mia would handle this. The blackmail was sensitive, but it was a made-up photo. Or if it was real, no one except Lacy knew who was behind the shading.
Mia dangled the feather before Moat with a Kleenex. “Here is the left boot’s missing feather, Detective Moat.” And then she handed him the other piece of evidence. “And this is further evidence. I believe the mayor’s DNA will match the bloody prints,” she said with little respect. “And it proves that my Aunt Molly was going to be blackmailed by Veronica Corsello along with everyone else. In fact, Veronica had been at Glam Van that morning, while she knew everyone was at the funeral, to slide this photo in Glam Van’s mail slot.”
Molly stood in awe of her niece. When had she grown up? She spoke with such confidence and assurance. And she was facing Detective Dreamboat down. That she could hand over a piece of paper that could cause such emotion and vulnerability in her own life, without a doubt of what needed to be done, made for a beyond proud moment for this aunt.
Detective Moat strode over to Tully and removed the gag. “Anything to add to this Mr. Tully?”
Mr. Tully. Molly and Mia both nodded at his use of the name versus the honor of mayor.
Tully licked his lips and hung his head in shame. The chains rattled with him. “They nailed it.”
Ugh. Molly was afraid that everything she heard from now would sound like a sexual reference.
Moat asked a police officer to recite the Miranda rights.
Moat turned to them both. “Now, which of you ladies has the keys to his wall cuffs and chains?”
Mia dangled the keys from her pinky and dropped them in Moat’s palm. Molly wasn’t sure, but the way he smiled at her niece made her think Detective Moat was becoming a bit of a Mia fan too.
Three months later
Crank the wheel,” Mia told Molly while poking her head out the passenger side window of the Glam Van. “Harder. Now ease into it.”
Molly did as her co-pilot instructed and slowly pushed the gas to roll backward. Eventually, she’d get this parallel parking business down. What kind of truck owner couldn’t park her own truck? This lady, right here.
But after three months of being truly mobile, she was getting better and better, even if she left extra early now to find plenty of space in the neighborhoods they visited.
“Perfect,” Mia said. “Straighten her out.”
Molly couldn’t believe they were able to find a large enough parking spot at the curb of the old lot, and just in time for the ground-breaking ceremony.
As they crossed the asphalt toward the center stage where Max Harrison, Damion, and Nell, holding an overly large pair of scissors, stood behind a large red ribbon, Molly searched out Doug’s tent where he was selling pies and cookies. His smile was wide as he passed hungry clients, not to mention many of his construction worker cronies, his goods.
“If Uncle Doug keeps up that traffic, he’s going to need his own food truck,” Mia laughed.
Molly smiled. Her niece was right.
Just as Molly joined Doug and kissed his cheek, Max tapped the mic. “Welcome, citizens of San Cosmas.”
Doug and his fans stepped away from the tent, and they all walked closer to the stage. Doug squeezed Molly’s hand. Every day, Molly thanked the universe her hunk of a husband had loved her enough to forgive her.
“I, my son, Damion, and our mayor elect, Nell”—the crowd clapped wildly—“are excited to share the plans for the lot.”
Molly could hardly believe the three were standing together, open about their relationship, and the town loved them for coming out as a family. The truth about Nell’s pregnancy and giving her son up for adoption had not hurt her. The town had rallied to embrace her and to show empathy for the difficult choice she had made and how she’d spent more than the last two decades trying to remedy her actions by being a civil servant. Molly only hoped that someday Nell would forgive her and Mia for what they’d done and how they’d jeopardized this sweet family’s second chance.
Over the past three months, Nell hadn’t returned to Glam Van, and with Doug and Mia’s reminders, Molly was learning to accept that some things changed for good. At least her love for Doug hadn’t changed, and after a huge apology, neither had his for her.
“I shouldn’t have lied,” Molly had told him. “I just was so overwhelmed with the idea of all the change that could come with the truckies and Glam Van that I was blind to how everything, including having Mia come to live with us, was changing everything. I just was scrambling to keep life as I knew it together. I’ve never been so great about change. For years, it’s just been you and me, unless friends or family visited. The more the merrier, but that means embracing more change, including to the dynamics of our relationship.”
Doug had pulled her closer. “I hadn’t thought about it like that. I’m sorry, too, for not being more aware.”
“And you were right. I can’t treat Mia like an adult only when it suits me. She is an adult, period. And …”
“And?” Doug asked and kissed her head.
“It’s time to go mobile with Glam Van. I can’t hide in the lot anymore. I can’t hold onto my childhood fears that mobility means I’ll lose connections. None of my truckie family is leaving San Cosmas; we are simply not all going to be parked together all the time anymore.”
Doug had stood and taken her hands in his, pulling her to his feet. The feel of his thumb brushing back and forth across her wedding ring made her warm and fuzzy inside. He gave her a sweet kiss and then asked, “Now, how’s about I bake you some cookies?”
“I love you, Doug Locks, to Pluto and back.”
“And I love you, Molly, no matter what changes lie ahead.”
Molly had worried those changes might include losing Mia. Mia’s apology to Damion hadn’t gone quite so well. He’d told her a relationship couldn’t be built on mistrust and had returned Mia’s necklace.
Mia had cried so hard and for so long that Doug had whispered to Molly, “Thank goodness we never had kids. I couldn’t handle loving another person like Mia.” Molly had nev
er loved her hubby more.
Mia had been sad for days, and Molly had worried this would be the last straw that would send her back to Lacy and Los Angeles. But finally Mia had come to her and said, “Being an adult hurts, but that’s life. It doesn’t mean I made the wrong decision about moving to San Cosmas. I love it here, Aunt Molly, and I love that I get to work with you every day. I just need to find my own way, and staying in San Cosmas is the right thing right now. And when my mom’s ready, if she’s ever ready, she’ll tell me about my dad. I hope.”
Molly had pulled Mia into the biggest hug ever and hadn’t let go until Mia began to squirm.
Now, Max called Doug to the stage and, with a quick kiss to the top of Molly’s head, Doug bounded up the stairs and waved. Then he climbed into the backhoe conveniently parked to the right of the stage.
“Great cookies, Goldie!” his coworkers shouted with full mouths.
Nell and Damion moved to either side of a large board covered with a canvas sheet, and Max stepped closer to the microphone.
“And now, it is with great honor I’d like to reveal the plans for the …”
The crowd was silent, frozen, waiting to find out at long last what would be done with this precious real estate. Max had decided to maintain ownership of the property and had hired an out-of-state developer. It had been so hush-hush, no one even knew who the developer was.
Molly looked around the crowd, spotting the heads of her beloved Van Clan: Asil, Pam, Vicki, Sherman, Carl, Ben, and Anthony standing beside his forgiving wife, Jocelyn. They were all enjoying their new mobile business, and in fact, for most, business had improved. They’d all moved easily into the Tweet Trucky world and often coordinated where they’d be throughout town. The day they had all left the lot had been bittersweet, but also a bit exciting. It was nice to know it had all worked out for the best, unless, of course, they had a new strip mall or restaurants they were going in the lot that they’d have to compete with. Finally, they too would know.
Max continued, “The Opal May Community Park!”