by Judy Clemens
I pushed it out with my foot. “By you.”
“Um. Thanks.” He set his tray down, paused for a moment, then perched on the edge of the folding chair. His food consisted of a bowl of chicken noodle soup, two packets of crackers, and a bottle of water.
“Making up for Carla?” I said.
“Huh?”
“Nevermind.”
He picked up his spoon, then set it down. Then picked it up again. And looked at his bowl.
“What’s wrong?” For Pete’s sake, was I really so terrifying the man couldn’t even eat soup?
He set the spoon down again. And took a deep breath. And let it out.
“Bryan.”
“It’s Carla,” he blurted. “I think…I think…”
Oh, Lord, I was going to strangle him. “You think what?” That she was going to dump him? No way that could be it. I wasn’t that lucky.
“I think someone’s trying to get her license taken away.”
Chapter Eighteen
“Her veterinary license?” I had to assume he meant that, and not her driver’s license. Because who would care about whether or not she could drive?
“Yes.” He poked at his soup with his spoon.
“How? Why would you think that?”
He finally gave up on his food and set the spoon down very deliberately, beside the bowl. “She got some threats last night.”
I sat up. “From who?”
“Don’t know. They were texts. She wouldn’t show them to me at first, but when one of them made her cry I grabbed her phone. It said—” he shook his head “—that she didn’t know what she was doing, and they’d prove it today, or something like that.”
Hmm. One of those vets at the Greggs’ stall, maybe?
“What did she say?”
“That I shouldn’t take it so seriously.”
Of course she would tell him that. He obviously didn’t agree, or he wouldn’t look so upset. Okay, so score one for Bryan.
“You going to hang out with her today?”
For a second I thought he was going to cry, too, and I wished I hadn’t asked. “I offered, but she said she’s so busy, and she doesn’t want me to feel like I have to, so I should just do my own thing for a while. It was obvious I’d just be in the way.”
“Bryan, when a woman says you should go ‘do your own thing,’ she doesn’t really mean it.”
He frowned. “Carla would not lie.”
“Of course she wouldn’t. But what she meant was that she would love for you to be with her, but she won’t be able to pay attention to just you. She’s afraid you’d be bored, and she doesn’t want to put you through that.”
“So it’s not that she doesn’t want me around?”
Hardly. Not the way she was looking at him the night before. “Bryan, if I were you, I’d find out where she is and go there. Do what you can to help her today, and just…be glad to be with her, even if tending sick animals isn’t the most thrilling activity in the world. That’s all she wants.” He stared at me blankly, and I was afraid something had short-circuited. “Bryan?”
He blinked. “Yeah. Thanks. I think…I think I’ll do that. You’re…that was…nice of you.” He got up and walked away, leaving me with his tray of uneaten soup.
“Stella?”
Holy crap, I was Grand Central Station.
Daniella Troth eased into the chair Bryan had just vacated. She looked terrible. Well, terrible for her, which was a normal day for anyone else.
I pulled Bryan’s tray to the side so she wouldn’t have to smell it. “I’m surprised to see you.”
“Yeah, well.” She sighed and rested her elbows on the table. “Taylor has to be here because of the Lovely Miss competition, so I really have no choice. I mean, I guess I could have brought her here and gone home, but I already took off work until after the pageant on Wednesday night, so I might as well stick around. Sorry, I’m babbling.”
“No, that’s fine.” I finished my lemon shake-up, then wished I hadn’t. I was still thirsty. I looked around for one of the kids cleaning up tables and waved her over. “Can you get me another one of these? And one for her, too.” Daniella, I meant.
The girl’s forehead wrinkled. “Well, I’m not really—”
“Here.” I pulled out a few dollars and stuck them in her hand. “Two. Thanks.”
She hesitated, but I smiled, and she went away, apparently still not sure how fetching lemonade was in her job description. She’d figure it out.
“Rikki was such a nice girl,” Daniella said, as if the lemonade interruption had never happened. “I just can’t believe…” She pressed her fingers against her lips.
“Do they have any idea what happened yet?”
She shook her head. “They said they couldn’t tell. That it didn’t look like anything was wrong with her.”
Exactly what Willard had said.
Daniella slumped. “It doesn’t make any sense. None of it does.”
“Gregg records her, right? I mean, he puts out her records.”
“What? Oh, right. Yes, he does. He likes to make such a big deal about how he ‘took a chance’ on her.” Anger flashed across her face, then disappeared. “She was a sweet country girl who got noticed, and he wanted to make her just another one of his harem.”
“His harem?”
“Sorry.” She made a face. “That’s what we call them over at the salon. You know, we want to think the best of everyone, but the truth is, some of those girls…” She picked at a perfect fingernail. “They’ll do anything to achieve their dreams. What they don’t understand is that when they do those things the rest of it all becomes meaningless. Or…tainted.”
“But Rikki wasn’t like that?”
“Not yet. Oh, I know that sounds awful, but I’ve seen it happen so many times, with all the business we get from the studio.” She smiled sadly. “I had hopes for Rikki, though. She’d toughed it out this long. She had a supportive group of friends from home, a strong family. A wonderful aunt who raised her. I really thought she would make it, and keep her own identity. I don’t know.” For a moment I saw how old Daniella really was. She was still beautiful, but also aged.
“I saw her arguing with Gregg last night,” I said. I had seen Daniella arguing with him, too, of course, but I wasn’t going to mention that. “After the concert.”
“Where? At the barn? Near the…trailer?”
I could tell by the way she said it that she meant the manure trailer. It’s hard for city people to understand that cow poop is just part of the life. We farmers don’t even think about it, except for in extreme cases. Cows make it, we shovel it. That’s about as simple as it gets.
“No, they were still in the arena, by the stage.”
“So she was wearing her concert clothes?”
“Yeah.” It struck me then that Rikki hadn’t been in those clothes when I’d dug her out of the manure pile. If she had been, I would have recognized her immediately from her white boots. Even covered in cow crap those would have been familiar. Instead, she’d been wearing stuff I would have expected at the calf barn. Jeans and work boots. I tried to remember what shirt she’d been wearing, but it had been so filthy I hadn’t even thought to check. Plus, I was busy trying to get her face cleared so she could breathe. Until I realized she was dead. “Where did she go after the concert? Why had she changed clothes?”
“No one knows.”
Someone did. It couldn’t really be a coincidence that the most famous person at the fairgrounds had been murdered and hidden on the trailer tons of people used every day.
“Any idea what she and Gregg were arguing about?”
She shook her head. “I couldn’t be sure, but I wonder if—”
“Here.” The high school girl set two lemonades on the table.
I took the straws she handed me. “Thanks.”
“Um, anything else?”
“Nope. This is great.”
She hesitated.
“What? You w
ant a tip?”
“No. Aren’t you the one who found Rikki Raines? And you’re on YouTube. With her.” Her eyes widened as she recognized Daniella. Her mouth flopped open, and she ran back into the kitchen.
“Time to make our escape,” I said.
Daniella seemed in a daze, so I grabbed her and our drinks and shoved her out the tent flap. We were gone before the girl got back with whatever rubbernecking friends she’d gone after.
When we were a safe distance away, I pulled Daniella into the coolness of the home crafts building. “What were you saying?”
“About what?”
“What Gregg and Rikki might have been fighting about.”
“Oh, I don’t know if I should—”
“It wasn’t a friendly argument. He was really angry, and I guess she was, too, but he grabbed her. I was about to go help until someone else came up and distracted him. Rikki got away, and he wasn’t able to follow.”
Daniella closed her eyes, and for a second I thought she was going to pass out. I grabbed an empty chair from behind one of the tables—“Yes, knitting booth lady, I will bring it back,”—and sat Daniella on it.
“Here, take a sip.” I handed her one of the lemon shake-ups.
She took a drink, then let out a deep, shuddering breath.
“Their argument?” I prompted.
She hesitated, then said, “He wanted her to take part in this marketing thing, and she didn’t want to.”
“What kind of thing?”
“She’d already said yes to one big thing this summer, and other places were starting to call. Magazines, cable shows, you know. She was afraid of filling up too much of her time. Plus, the thing Gregg wanted her to do wasn’t something she felt good about.”
“What was it?”
Daniella shook her head. “Really, Stella, I don’t feel comfortable talking about it. I’m sorry.”
“Okay, how about this? What was the thing she’d already said yes to for this summer? Can you tell me that, at least?”
“Oh, sure, that wasn’t a secret. She was spending all her spare time being one of the judges for the Lovely Miss Pennsylvania pageant.”
“The one one your daughter is in?”
“Yes. She’s been judging all summer. She seems…seemed…to be enjoying it.” Her eyes filled with tears. “Rikki would come into the salon before the pageants, sometimes, to get a manicure or touch up her hair.” Her mouth twitched. “She may have been a down-home girl, but she still wanted to look her best, especially when all the contestants would be dressed to perfection. Plus, the girls in the competition like to think their judges know what they’re talking about.”
The girls—and their mothers—also became fanatical about winning. I thought about that crazy Summer girl and her fake boobs and lips. What mother allows her sixteen-year-old daughter to mutilate herself that way?
Not Daniella.
“Taylor seemed to like Rikki,” I said.
“Oh, she did. She got to know Rikki a little at the salon. After school sometimes Taylor will come by until I’m done with work, and she happened to be there one time when Rikki was getting her nails done. Rikki was very sweet with her, and Taylor became an instant fan. She was so thrilled that Rikki was one of the judges. I don’t know how she’s going to respond to all this.”
“Stella!” Miranda strode up and planted herself in front of me, fists on her hips. “Where have you been? I’ve been texting you forever. I even called.”
“Sorry. Didn’t hear it. I suppose you’re ready to go.”
Her eyes flicked to Daniella, who had recovered from our conversation so quickly she was back to looking perfect. Miranda’s face betrayed her confusion. “Are you a friend of Stella’s?” The tone of her voice made it clear she couldn’t imagine how that could be.
“Daniella Troth.” Daniella stood up and shook Miranda’s hand. “A pleasure to meet you…”
“Miranda Hathaway. I’m Stella’s…her boyfriend’s sister.”
“Fiancé,” I said. “Nick is my fiancé.”
Miranda rolled her eyes.
Daniella gripped Miranda’s hand with both of hers. “You’re Nick’s sister? He’s such a sweetheart. He was absolutely wonderful with Taylor last night.”
“What do you mean?” Understanding lit Miranda’s face. “Wait a minute. You’re that lady. The one on YouTube with Stella. Your daughter’s in the Lovely Miss Pennsylvania pageant.”
Daniella smiled. “That’s right.”
Miranda grabbed Daniella’s hands, her eyes gleaming. “And, you own a salon!”
Heaven help us.
Chapter Nineteen
Twenty minutes later, during which I heard more words about cosmetics and nails and hair and facials and jewelry than I ever wanted to, or could possibly understand, Miranda had extracted Daniella’s cell phone number, work hours, and a discount for an appointment at the salon later that week, once Daniella got back to work. Miranda was still going strong—happy to have found a woman who spoke her language—but Daniella’s façade of strength was beginning to slip.
“Miranda,” I said, interrupting some list of scents, or colors, or something else involving girly words like sandalwood and jasmine nectar.
I distracted her, but just enough for her to change subjects. “So you do hair and makeup for all of the Philadelphia recording artists?”
“Not all. Just the ones who record on the Sunburst label. And some individuals.”
“But that’s got to be so crazy having all of those stars come in there! What are they like? Are they amazing?”
Daniella smiled, but her eyes looked weary. “They’re just people, Miranda.”
“But—”
“Miranda,” I said. “We need to go.”
“Stella, I’m not—”
“Daniella has responsibilities. Her daughter, remember? The Lovely Miss pageant?”
“Oh, right.” She went pink. “I’m sorry, Daniella.”
“Not a problem. It’s been fun talking with you. I’ll see you at the salon when you come in, if I don’t see you before.”
Miranda smiled. “Can’t wait.”
“Stella,” Daniella said. “Thank you.” Her gratitude weighed so heavy I knew she actually meant, “Please take this insanely energetic woman far away and let me go free.”
“Anytime. See you around.”
“You’ll be at the pageant tomorrow?”
“Oh. Well…”
“Of course we’ll come!” Miranda said. “You can count on us.” She threaded her arm through mine. “Right, Stella?”
Daniella smiled at me, her eyes knowing. “Whatever works with your schedule. I’ll see you later.”
Miranda kept a hold of my arm until Daniella was gone, then turned on me. “When were you going to tell me about her?”
“What’s to tell?”
“For heaven’s sake. The woman is the answer to our problems.”
“What problems?”
“Your wedding problems!”
I refrained from punching her in the throat, and strode away.
“Stella!” She ran to catch up with me. “What is wrong with you?”
I swung around so quickly she bashed into me. I pushed her off. “What’s wrong with me? I’ll tell you what’s wrong with me. I was up until God-knows-when talking to cops and taking care of that woman and her grieving daughter, I found a murdered girl in a shit pile, my best friend has someone out to get her in trouble, Zach’s calf is in a place where people are playing possibly dangerous pranks on animals, and we don’t have wedding problems. You’re the one who called Nick my boyfriend, instead of fiancé. Apparently you’re the one with the wedding problem.”
I stared her down until she dropped her eyes, then continued marching toward the parking lot.
“That’s your phone,” she said, jogging along.
“What is?”
“That sound. Oh, my gosh, you still use that generic salsa beat?”
I slid out
my phone. Yup, it was ringing, and it was Zach. “What’s up?”
“You didn’t answer my texts.”
“Sorry. You know me and this stupid phone. Everything okay?”
“I think so. You still here? Can you come over?”