“Mi Tio Nacho, er, my Uncle Ignacio left it to me when he died last year,” Oz said. “It’s been in my cousin’s garage down in Tucson, and they finally drove it up.”
“That’s great, Oz,” Mel said. “I’m so happy that you’re going to have some wheels.”
“No, it’s not just for me,” Oz said. “You two gave me my first job at the bakery, and I want to give back. Marty and I are thinking we can motor around the hood and sell cupcakes.”
“In that?” Mel asked. She had visions of her carefully cultivated image for the bakery going up, well, in a puff of blue smoke.
“Come on,” Marty said. He took Mel and Angie’s elbows and half guided, half dragged them toward the back of the van. “You just need to go for a ride, and you’ll see the potential.”
“All right, I’m going,” Angie said, and she shook Marty off. Oz hefted up the rolling door in the back, and Mel and Angie climbed aboard. Vintage steel freezers lined both sides, and Mel took in the scratched sliding window on the left side of the truck that appeared to have been retrofitted.
There was no seating. Angie plopped down on the floor, and Mel sat beside her while Marty and Oz scrambled into the front. Mel wrinkled her nose. Something smelled bad, like an expired dairy product. She suspected the smell lingered in the beige shag carpet, but she didn’t want to get close enough to verify her suspicion.
It took three turns of the key and a punch to the top of the dashboard to get it going, but the van finally coughed itself back to life, and Oz backed out of the parking spot, using the overly large side mirrors to guide his way.
The polyester shag carpet that covered the narrow strip of floor between the banks of freezers stuck to Mel’s sweaty legs and itched. She sat with her knees drawn up and noticed that Angie did the same.
They puttered around Old Town Scottsdale, and then Oz headed out to the open road.
“Let me show you what she can do,” he said as slick as any used car salesman.
“Really not necessary,” Angie said. “Around the block will do.”
But it was too late. Oz took Indian School Road out toward the highway. They were idling at the on-ramp traffic light when a big pink van pulled up beside them. Mel got a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach.
Marty and Oz had their windows down, because in addition to the sour milk smell, blue exhaust, and itchy shag carpet, the van’s air conditioner didn’t seem capable of cooling the van to a temperature of less than one hundred.
Mel peered out the window over Marty’s shoulder and groaned.
“What is it?” Angie asked. She rose and moved to kneel beside her.
“Olivia Puckett from Confections bakery just pulled up beside us.”
Berkley Prime Crime titles by Jenn McKinlay
Cupcake Bakery Mysteries
SPRINKLE WITH MURDER
BUTTERCREAM BUMP OFF
DEATH BY THE DOZEN
Library Lover’s Mysteries
BOOKS CAN BE DECEIVING
Death by the Dozen Page 25