Shitake Happens: (A Shitake Mystery Series Prequel)

by Patricia Mason

  Tracy's panting increased to hysterical sobbing. "How can you say that? We're engaged." She fell against Wallace, clutching at him. "Every day you tell me you love me. Are you denying that?"

  "I'd barely met you before you started after me. When have I told you I love you?"

  "You point at the camera and then you say 'that's the weather in your world'. That's our signal."

  Wallace shoved her back. "Get out of here. You're a crazy lady."

  Tracy rounded on Mo. "It's your fault. You were supposed to test him, but you weren't supposed to succeed. I didn't hire you to kiss him."

  Realization dawned. His face flushed with rage as Wallace shouted at Mo, "You're working for my stalker?"

  "Stalker?" Mo squeaked.

  "Tracy is a nutty fan who's been chasing me since I worked in the San Diego market. I have a restraining order against her. I moved to Savannah to get away."

  Lucianne stepped forward. "You should know that I've called 911. The police will be here any minute."

  "Noooooo. They'll just take me from Wallace," Tracy screamed as she reached into her purse. She pulled out a revolver and threw the purse to the floor in one motion.

  A collective gasp escaped the on-lookers. One woman even let out a scream.

  Abruptly stopping her crying, Tracy—holding the gun at arm's length with two hands—pointed it at Wallace. "We're meant to be together, darling."

  Wallace jumped back and held his hands up in surrender. "Don't! We can work this out."

  "You don't mean it." Tracy sniffed.

  Something had to be done. It was against agency policy for a client to kill the target of an investigation. Or if that wasn't an actual policy, it should have been.

  Mo sprang forward and grabbed Tracy's arms, pushing the gun toward the ceiling. The two women struggled together, wrestling against one another for a few moments. Finally, Mo got a hand on the gun's muzzle and twisted the revolver out of Tracy's grasp.

  "Agggggggggghhhhhhhh," Tracy screamed with outraged fury. Her eyes darted around wildly as if scanning for another weapon. Her gaze settled on the bar area of the table. Tracy then grabbed a bottle of whiskey and held it up with a weird smile twisting her lips. "Aha!"

  What was she going to do with that? Mo wondered. Break it? Use the jagged end to stab someone with?

  Instead, Tracy pulled off the top and tossed it away. She then poured the contents over her head. The golden liquid splashed over her face, down her neck and over her ample chest. Tracy's wild eyes turned to the candelabra on the table. Plucking up a lit taper, she screamed, "I'll do it. I'll light myself on fire."

  "Go ahead," Wallace yelled back. "I'd be happy if you did, you nutcase."

  Clarence came up behind Mo. "Don't do it, Tracy. Please, honey. You don't need him."

  "Yes, I do," she sobbed. "I can't live without Wallace."

  Before Mo could move to grab the candle, Tracy pressed the flame to her chest and...the flame snuffed out.

  "Aghhhhhhhh. No," Tracy screeched.

  "Dammit," Lucianne shouted at the bartender. "I ordered good quality liquor for this party, not watered down crap that won't even burn."

  When Tracy made a grab for another taper, Clarence locked his arms around her from behind. She struggled against him for a moment before turning in his arms to cry against his shoulder.

  Aw. Clarence isn't such a bad guy, after all.

  At that moment, a police officer burst in and soon took control of Tracy.

  Once Clarence had been relieved of his charge, he wandered over to Mo with a weary smile on his face.

  She put a hand on his shoulder and gave it a pat. "Good work."

  Wallace shot them both a glare and then marched over. He pointed a finger in Mo's face. "Don't think I've forgotten you. I'll be seeing my lawyer tomorrow. You're going to be added to my restraining order, Miss Angelina Jolie."

  "Borscht," Mo muttered as Wallace stomped away.

  "Look on the bright side." Clarence patted Mo's shoulder as she had done for him just a few moments before.

  "What bright side?" she grumbled.

  "At least Tracy pre-paid her bill. I'll still get my finder's fee even though she's in the loony bin."

  Mo pulled back a fist and punched him as hard as she could in the upper arm. "Clarence. You are such a spotted dick!"

  # # #

  Joe and Florence: A Tragic Tybee Love Story of Shakespearean Proportions

  Prologue:

  Two plumages, both alike in dignity.

  In fair Tybee Isle, where we lay our scene.

  One bravely breaks bias in mutiny.

  For star-crossed love, by his desire made keen.

  Act I

  Flying o'er the sparkling beach one mellow summer's day, with a bird's-eye view so true, a beauteous sight did catch Joe Seagull's notice. He marked the moment: "But soft," Joe said. "What pink through yonder treetops break? 'Tis a green lawn and she its jewel."

  He landed beside the flamingo basking in the sparkling Tybee sun. She was positioned atop the lawn in front of a human abode called by its signage The Breezy Inn. Garbed all in pink, with the green as her canvas, her beauty could not be compared.

  "Beauty too rich for grass, for beach too dear," Joe noted. But though the look of her first drew him and sparked his desire, 'twas her personality that secured his good opinion and deep affection.

  "Speak fair beauty," he said to her. "Tell me thy name."

  She did not reply.

  "Silence that be maidenly shy, yet not cold," he would report to his friends later. "At fetching conflict with her black-eyed stare so bold."

  Circling her, he saw the chain she wore about her neck, which spelled out the word Florence. Happy necklace for it told him the flamingo's name. By mental liberty he shortened it to Flo.

  "Did I love 'til now?" he asked himself. "Oh no, not so. For I ne'er saw beauty 'til I saw Flo."

  Joe's friends decried the match, saying she was not meant for him.

  "She is not our kind," Sam said. "She's of the grass and land, and you of the sand and sea."

  "You cannot nest with such a creature who is not one of your clan, your kith, your kind," agreed Albert.

  "She seems plastic and fake," Sam added.

  "She is garish," Albert squawked.

  True the garb of Joe and his fellows was elegant white, decorated only with soft gray wings tastefully dipped in black at their tips. Their modest plumage was ever in stark contrast to Flo's color. And while their beaks and legs were short in length and utilitarian in their purpose, the curve of Flo's beak and the length of her leg both bespoke the luxury of exotic climes. But where others might think she flaunted herself, Joe saw only innocent flirtation in the bend of her shapely leg.

  To every of their biased arguments, Joe made clear his rejection, replying, "I am but fortune's fool. I cannot change where my heart does beat."

  Finally, Joe pronounced enough debate.

  "Though you would disagree, I vow to fate. To woo and win dear Flo for my life's mate."

  Act II

  Joe's quest began with conviction made steely by strong action. In furtherance of the mating ritual, he flew about Flo's head the very next day. Making daring swoops and falls, he dove deeply before sharp climbs as he cawed. By his strength she would know him for a most worthy potential husband.

  Yet these mighty feats moved Flo not.

  By day's end, the realization of his mistake dawned upon an exhausted Joe. His Flo did not wish for empty buffoonery to prove his metal. He must be more practical in application to his love. With course of action decided, he bid her farewell.

  "Good night, good night. Parting is sorrow so sweet," he told Flo. "That I shall say good night and tomorrow bring you a treat."

  The next morning he arrived at dawn.

  Approaching with his most elegant preening, he laid the first selection on the grass before her: a shred of bread from a bag he'd scavenged from the dumpster of the IGA grocery store. Flo neither
recoiled nor did she jump for the morsel.

  "Not grand enough for my goddess so fair. How could I think such trash would thee ensnare?"

  Next, Joe approached with a kernel of popcorn stolen from 'neath the beak of Albert during their hunt under the pier. Still and silent as the grave, Flo regarded it.

  "Is that a glint of distain in her eyes?" he wondered. "Drat the meager morsel if she decries."

  What if his final offering should be as coldly rejected?

  But nay, he thought. I shall not doubt my success. And so with exaggerated flourish, he brought forth a bit of raw oyster and laid it upon the grass before Flo.

  Her sharp reproof was in every line of her stiff pink body.

  Crestfallen, Joe flew away without further discourse with her. But since Flo had not importuned him to cease his wooing, he would return on the morrow to build for her a nest of such fine construction that she could not help but succumb to his suit for her wing in matrimony.

  Later that night, Joe perched atop a beam beneath the pavilion boardwalk. As he drifted on the verge of sleep, he contemplated his love: Flo. How dear was that name to him for her sake. Never was there a name so sweet as his Flo, he thought. "Yet what is in a name? My flamingo by any other name would surely be as pink if not Flo called."

  Act III

  The next day started much as any other, with bright sunshine o'er the fair Tybee Isle. Little did our Joe know, as he labored about the business of gathering building supplies, that by night's falling, he would have marked the day as dark indeed.

  For as he toiled, a green and yellow monster called John Deere did arrive upon the isle. Towed, it 'twas, upon the back of a larger but less ferocious beast. And to the vicinity of The Breezy Inn cottage it was pulled. Joe arrived upon the scene to see the monster looming behind flimsy gate. A human departed the wheelhouse of the larger beast and opened the gate to set John Deere free, moving the beast slowly down the inclined ramp. The human soon mounted the saddle upon the beast's back, causing the monster to roar to life. John Deere did, thereafter, growl and snarl in menace to the general neighborhood.

  Joe landed upon the grass beside Flo, ready to do battle with the fearsome animal. At first, The Breezy Inn seemed in safety as the monster chose to eat its way over a lawn many houses away. But soon it had consumed all there and began to prowl closer and yet ever closer toward The Breezy Inn.

  "Flo," Joe cried as the snarling monster made toward them. "Greater power than bird can defeat comes nigh. We must away else be ground up and die."

  The terrible monster continued in relentless advance. Flo seemed frozen and no amount of squawking, pecking and flapping, could break her from fear's spell. Joe could only look on in horror as the John Deer monster made its attack.

  A hideous grinding and chewing was testament to Flo's messy end.

  Completely lost to all aid, she was sucked inside the monster's yawning mouth. There, John Deere's teeth munched and did make horrible work of her.

  In apparent glee for its victory, the monster let out a great and high keening. And just as it seemed the triumphant wailing would ever continue, it halted. The human, yelling words Joe could nay comprehend, jumped from his saddle and ran to the front of the monster, braving its wrath. Going down upon one knee before the great beast, the human reached inside the mouth and pulled from between the teeth a body...a mangled and ruined body...That of Joe's darling Flo.

  "O woe! O woeful, woeful, woeful day!" Joe cawed in lament. "Most woeful day that ever, ever any seagull did yet behold. O day, O day! O hateful day! Never was seen so black a day as this."

  Joe screamed his pain to the sky. Flo. His sweet love. Gone. Gone before her time. Gone before their destiny together could be fulfilled. A grief stricken Joe swooped and swayed in the air, going ever closer, closer, closer to the sun.

  Might I fly inside its fiery depths and join my Flo in the afterlife? "From this world-wearied bag of feathers, I say: eyes, look your last!"

  In the end the sun would not swallow the gull up and he did live on. But mourning his loss, the places that met his eye each day thereafter did all inspire such memories of his dead beloved as to cause soul pain. And so, despite the pleadings of his fellows, Joe resolved to banish himself forever after from the fair Isle of Tybee and head south.

  "But should we tell him of its name?" queried his friend Albert to Sam.

  "No," came Sam's swift reply. "It would surely grieve Joe that the very name of the place he goes to escape doth contain that of his flamingo. Instead, leave Joe to his hope."

  Albert replied, "Yes, you are most right. For in that new and undiscovered place called Flo-Ri-Da there surely could be no other reminders of the pink beauty Joe loved and lost."

  And so Joe did depart and brought the sad story to an end.

  For never was there a tale of more woe, than this of Seagull Joe and his pink lawn-art Flamingo Flo.

  # # #

  Author's Note

  **Thank you for reading Shitake Happens. If you enjoyed it, I hope you will post a review at Amazon.com. And if you would like to know more about me, please visit my websites (http://www.patriciamason.net and http://www.prmason.net ) where might find out about some fun freebies.

  More from Patricia Mason

  If you enjoyed the humorous suspense of Shitake Happens, you'll love these books by Patricia Mason:

  In Deep Shitake (humorous romantic suspense- Shitake Mystery Series #1) - More Mo Tuttle. This time she just might find love...if she can stay alive.

  Take one devastatingly attractive movie star. Add one outrageously sexy female private eye with a penchant for food-word obscenities. Mix in a dose of mistaken identity and a handful of Russian mobsters...And they're all in deep shitake. http://amzn.com/B007VDZ0JA

  A Very Shitake Christmas (Shitake Mystery Series #1.5) - Coming in November 2012. Two factors combine to ruin Mo's holiday: Ross's obnoxious father, and a mad bomber out for revenge.

  A Girl, A Guy and A Ghost - Giselle has three days to find a ghost and save her job, will sexy private eye, Ry, help her or just provide a distraction that could cost her life. http://amzn.com/B0034KC3WG

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  Table of Contents

  It Keeps Getting Shitakier

  When the Shitake Hits the Fan

  Joe and Florence:

  Author's Note