A Parfait Murder (13 page)

I looked at the people milling around the judges’ table: Garrett Simms with his perpetual hangdog expression, a harried woman with a clipboard and a pencil holding her hair in a bun, Tucker and Eloise shooting daggers at each other, a bored college-age kid with an Ed Hardy T-shirt and a press pass (undoubtedly an unpaid intern from the
News-Letter
).

“Positively thrilling, Jackie,” I deadpanned.

Her face froze in its fake smile for a second, and I could practically see the gears turning behind her eyes, before she doubled over in genuine laughter.

She grabbed my arm and pulled me close. “Lord a’mighty,” she whispered, “I’m so glad I’m not the only one who’d rather be elsewhere. When Kristen asked me to take over for her, I had no idea what I was getting myself into.”

Despite the smothering heat, I felt a chill slither down my spine. “Kristen?” I gasped.

Jackie tipped her head in puzzlement.

“I, uh, I just assumed someone had asked you to fill in after Kristen died,” I explained.

“Oh dear, no. Kristen didn’t ask me from the grave. She called me on the telephone the day before she died. Asked me to fill in for her on this judging panel and with the Rodeo Pageant. Not sure who gave her my name. Probably JoAnne Simms, getting payback for me roping her into that wretched charity auction for the greyhound rescue.”

She shivered dramatically. “If I’d given it any thought, I would have said no. This is torture, plain and simple. Garrett’s always so serious about everything, you know. And that one”—she jerked her head subtly in the direction of the woman with the clipboard—“she’s been buzzing around here muttering about rocks and hard places.”

“What’s wrong with her?” I asked.

“Not sure. But I think both Tucker and Eloise have been taking out their hatred of each other on her. Invoking rules and regulations in a petty bureaucratic war. That poor girl is just the cannon fodder.”

“What’s the deal between those two?”

“Eloise and Tucker? I don’t know,” Jackie said. “But they’re gunning for each other.”

“I know Eloise has it in for Tucker, but does the animosity run both ways?”

“Oh my, yes,” Jackie said, her eyes alight with glee. “As chair of the League of Methodist Ladies, Eloise is on the all-faith youth group coordinating committee with Tucker. I hear she’s even more tyrannical there than she usually is, because Dani is a youth group leader.”

Jackie’s head swiveled and I followed her line of sight. A teenage girl lurked at the edge of the crowd. Dani Carberry.

Dani resembled her mother just enough to eliminate any doubt of kinship. But in Dani, Eloise’s strong features were softened a bit, and the formfitting T-shirt and jeans she wore showed just a hint of curve to her slim figure. With a fall of thick mahogany hair, she looked like a Hollywood vision of Pocahontas: striking, athletic, strong.

The hair, though, I had to remind myself, was a wig. A really good wig. And she didn’t appear sick otherwise. She was thin, but thin the way teenage girls want to be, not bony. She was hiding her illness well.

“That Dani didn’t fall far from the maternal tree. She’s just as bossy and entitled as her mother. Though it is too bad about the cancer.”

Jackie
tsk
ed softly.

“Well, like I was saying, Tucker has it in for Eloise. She volunteered to chaperone a youth group camping trip to the Dinosaur Park this summer.” About an hour outside Fort Worth, there’s a big state park where you can see fossilized brontosaurus footprints. It’s a popular destination for youth campers. “Tucker vetoed it.”

“I don’t think the One Word Bible Church is down with the dinosaurs,” I suggested.

Jackie gave me a playful nudge. “True enough. Their contingent was planning a side trip to the creationist museum right by the park. Tucker didn’t veto the trip. He vetoed Eloise chaperoning.”

“Really? Why?”

“Apparently he wouldn’t say. But he was adamant, if Eloise was in charge, the One Word youth group wouldn’t participate. And since One Word’s group is the biggest, them pulling out would make it tough for the rest of the groups to cover the overhead—the bus, the campsite fees, and the like. Eloise backed down.”

“Ouch.”

“Yeah, major blow to her ego. Not to mention that it got all the churchy crowd tittering about what terrible sin Eloise might have committed to make Tucker react the way he did.”

“No one has any idea at all?”

“None. It’s a genuine mystery.”

“Huh.”

“Ladies,” Garrett called from across the room. “It’s time for us to get started. Grab your spoons, and let’s roll.”

I glanced over at Tucker and Eloise, facing each other like generals on the battlefield. I knew that there was a lot more at stake in that ice cream competition than a blue ribbon and bragging rights.

 

Jackie, Garrett, and I sat side by side at a table at one end of the pole barn. The table squatted atop a low platform, so we had a good view of the crowd sitting in ranks of folding chairs in front of us. Given the setup and the grim faces staring back at us, I felt as if we were the parole board facing a roomful of unlikely felons. Except our table was draped with star-spangled bunting, and instead of criminal case files, the harried clipboard-toting woman was bringing us little paper dishes of ice cream.

Each dish contained a single scoop of ice cream. We ate with small plastic spoons, a fresh one for each dish. And we were encouraged to cleanse our palates between entries by munching on small unsalted pretzel twists and sipping tepid water.

For each entry, we filled out a detailed scorecard, rating the scoops on a scale of one to ten for texture (the mouth feel of the ice cream), taste (the quality of the ingredients), and flavor (the originality and harmony of the component ingredients). We made detailed notes about iciness, gumminess, excessive carmelization of the lactose from overcooking, balance of salty and sweet.

The whole enterprise seemed very scientific. Though, of course, it came down to our personal preferences . . . and there was nothing scientific about that.

The audience seemed to hold its collective breath when the aide placed dishes of Tucker’s Pepper Praline ice cream before us.

I looked at the scoop first. It was a pretty ice cream, a lovely rich ivory color with clearly defined ribbons of a pale brown-sugar caramel and tiny flecks of rustcolored ground pepper.

But I knew as soon as I dipped my spoon into the scoop that Tucker was in trouble. The spoon stuttered as it moved through the ice cream. The texture lacked the silky glide of good ice cream, crumbling a bit as it rested in the bowl of my spoon. Sure enough, as I held the taste in my mouth, it felt too cold with the sandy feel of ice crystals.

And then the pepper hit me.

Maybe it was just the bite I got, but the heat overwhelmed me, scorching every taste bud in my mouth. I gasped and reached for the water, knocking over the cup in my haste.

As I snatched up the cup and fumbled with the pitcher to pour myself some more, I looked around in panic. My eyes found Eloise Carberry sitting in the very front row.

It might be irrational, but the look of smug glee on her face ticked me off. If I’d stopped to think about it, I would have realized she was rejoicing in Tucker’s failure. But that jolt of cayenne had well and truly stripped my good sense away, and in that instant, it felt as if Eloise was laughing at my discomfort.

Which was mean.

“You okay?” Garrett asked softly.

“Yes,” I gasped.

He reached out to steady my hand and took the pitcher from me, pouring me more water.

“Definitely not your recipe,” he deadpanned.

I glanced up and found Garrett’s eyes, the pale opaque blue of old milk glass, watching me with quiet amusement. I’d never thought of Garrett as having a sense of humor, but I guess when you look like an overgrown Howdy Doody doll, you have to adopt a certain wry attitude.

“No,” I choked. “Definitely not mine.”

Eloise’s peach-pecan ice cream came next. After Tucker’s brutal assault on my taste buds, I hoped Eloise’s sweet confection would hit the spot. But she’d overreduced the peaches with way too much brown sugar. The syrupy fruit overwhelmed all the other flavors in the dish. It wasn’t terrible, but it didn’t exactly light my fire.

It turned out the hand-cranked ice cream competition did not vindicate either Tucker or Eloise. Instead, much to everyone’s surprise, a thirteen-year-old girl swept the entire category, winning first prize for a piña colada ice cream I would have been proud to serve at the A-la-mode. She also won second place for her Mexican chocolate ice cream and third for an old-fashioned butter pecan.

Mentally, I made a note that I would either need to hire the child or face some serious competition in my future.

As Garrett read the results, I kept my eye on Tucker and Eloise. Not surprisingly, the two were splitting their own attention between Garrett and each other.

I just couldn’t imagine what had prompted this feud of theirs. I knew better than to think it had to be something big. After all, even the smallest slight or perceived injustice could work its way under your skin like a sliver and fester there. My mama and my aunt Jenny quarreled bitterly right up until the day my mama drank herself to death, and neither one of them could—or would—tell anyone what had soured their relationship.

As Garrett awkwardly hung the winners’ medallions over thirteen-year-old Emma Christy’s pigtailed head, Eloise stood up from her chair too fast, causing the steel legs to clatter against the concrete floor. She reached down to her daughter, who sat at her side, and grabbed Dani by the wrist.

When her mother yanked her to her feet, Dani reached up a hand to steady her wig on her head in the same way a person might clasp a hat on tight in the face of a strong wind.

I couldn’t hear their exchange, but mother and daughter seemed to be sharing some sharp words.

After a moment of back-and-forth, Eloise stalked across the front of the audience, heading toward the door at the far side of the room.

Tucker Gentry, still sitting quietly with hands folded as though in prayer, sat at the far end of the front row. Eloise and Dani had to walk past him to get out.

As they did, Tucker raised his chin. He faced forward, head never moving, but I could see his eyes tracking their progress. Eloise didn’t condescend to spare him a glance.

But Dani did.

She raised her free hand, the one not clasped in her mother’s fierce grip, and waggled her fingers in Tucker’s direction. A wave. Small, but unmistakable.

Then she took a running step to catch up with the brisk pace set by her mother, and the two of them disappeared from sight.

“Weird, huh?”

I jumped at Jackie Conway’s voice at my elbow.

“I’ll say,” I replied.

“Lot of weird stuff in Dalliance these days.”

Sonny Anders waltzing back to town.

A zombie cowboy killing a gorgeous young lawyer.

Finn Harper telling me he loved me.

Weird stuff, indeed.

A
s I schlepped my way to the fair parking lot after the competition, a posh mica gray Audi slid up beside me. The tinted window on the passenger side glided down with a soft
whoosh
and a wave of arctic air wafted out.

“Hey, hot stuff, can I give you a lift?”

My friend Deena Silver peered at me over the rims of her bright purple sunglasses. One plump, persimmonmanicured hand rested lightly on the Audi’s leather steering wheel, a tangle of copper bangle bracelets swaying gently in the gale-force blast of the car’s air-conditioning. As usual, Deena was garbed in flowing, gauzy robes, veils of periwinkle and aqua draping her earth-mother roundness.

Deena and I were fellow travelers. We’d met when we’d worked together to cater my ex-husband’s company picnic. I did dessert, and Deena’s popular catering company provided the rest of the food and drink. Deena and I discovered that our kinship transcended a love of tasty food. We’d quickly become genuine friends.

“Where you heading?” I asked.

“Just over to Jackson and Ver Steeg with a Bundt cake. Jason’s been clerking with them while he waits for the results of his bar exam.” Deena’s daughter had just married Jason, a recent law school grad, earlier in the summer. “Under the circumstances, I thought you might want to tag along.”

“The circumstances?”

“Oh, don’t play coy with me, young lady. I know your penchant for snooping, and I’ve heard a thing or two about how Ms. Ver Steeg died.”

I’d been relieved that Jackie didn’t mention Bree’s arrest, but I knew it was just a matter of time before the whole town heard. I phrased my question carefully. “Anything particular?”

Deena sighed. “I play canasta with Vonda Hudson from the 911 call center. I got the skinny about Bree last night. I’d say the news will go viral by late this afternoon.” She patted the black leather passenger seat. “Come on. I’d bet good money you’d appreciate an excuse to visit Kristen’s office. Besides, a slice of my lemon Bundt is worth a little detour on your way home.”

With a grateful smile, I pulled open the passenger door and slid into the blissful cool of the car’s front seat. As I tugged the door closed, Deena used one acrylic nail to raise the window, sealing us inside.

“I didn’t know Jason was working with Madeline and Kristen,” I said.

Deena slid her glasses back up her nose and edged forward through the dusty parking lot.

“Well, he’s cheap labor right now. Poor kid graduated with a law degree when law jobs are thin on the ground, and until he gets that letter from the State Bar saying he passed, he really can’t do much of anything. They’ve been paying him minimum wage to do legal research and draft motions.”

“Minimum wage? Heck, I pay Kyle better than that.”