Revenge of the Chili Queens (2 page)

I lifted the hem of my flowing black skirt and headed into the nearby tent where Sylvia and I would be serving chili to the crowds of people gathered that night for a charity event.

Read with the Chili Queens.

That’s what they were calling it, and this night—a Monday—the event was raising money for a local literacy center. On Tuesday, we’d be there with a bunch of warm-and-fuzzy types collecting money for an animal shelter; on Wednesday, the food bank people; and on and on through the week. The whole celebration ended on Sunday evening with a beauty pageant back at the Chili Showdown at the fairgrounds.

Charities aside and beauty queens ignored, I had a proud tradition to uphold.

Chili. It’s my life. And I do everything I can to promote it in all its wonderful, glorious, spicy-good incarnations!

The thought firmly in mind, I sidestepped a stack of
folding chairs that still needed to be set up around the tables under the tent designated for the Palace, and headed over to where Sylvia—dressed the way I doubt any real Chili Queen ever would be, in a flowered sundress in shades of pink and purple—was doing a last-minute check of our prep area.

“Chili. Spoons. Bowls. Napkins.” Just as I walked up, her jaw dropped and her baby blues bulged. “Napkins. There are no napkins. Where are the napkins?”

Rather than tell her not to worry (because Sylvia was going to worry no matter what; she’s just that sort of high-strung), I spun around and headed over to where we’d stacked the supplies we’d brought over to Alamo Plaza that afternoon.

“Napkins,” I mumbled to myself, and dug through a mountain of packing boxes in search of them. I found what I was looking for and gathered pack after pack of napkins into my arms.

“Need help?”

At the sound of the voice, I stood and found myself looking up into a pair of luscious dark eyes, a cleft chin, and a smile that lit up the quickly gathering twilight.

“Help?” I am not easily upended by good-looking guys. It must have been the heat that caused my voice to crack. “I’ve got it. Really.” As if it would prove my statement, I hugged the packs of paper napkins closer to my chest. “Thanks.”

The man turned his smile up a notch and added a wink to go with it. While he was at it, he strummed his right hand over the strings of the guitar looped around his shoulders. “No problem, senorita.” He made me a small bow
that was corny and gallant all at the same time. “I’m at your service.”

I gave him a quick once-over, but it didn’t take even that long for me to realize he was one of the entertainers who’d been hired by Tumbleweed Ballew, the administrative power behind the Showdown, to add a bit of authenticity to the evening. He fit the part. Tall, and with hair the color of the crows I’d seen around the city. “You’re . . . ?”

“Glad I stopped over.” Another of his smiles sizzled in my direction. “You’re Maxie, right?”

“You know me?”

“I’ve heard about you. But aren’t you supposed to be . . .” I’d given him a quick enough once-over, but when he looked me up and down, he took his time. “I was expecting the chili costume,” he said. “From what I’ve heard, it’s really something, and you . . .” Another once-over made heat rush into my cheeks. “You’re something in that costume.”

I wasn’t about to deny it.

“I’ll wear the Chili Chick costume at the Showdown over at the fairgrounds every day this week,” I told him. “But in the evenings when we’re here as part of the fund-raisers, we’re supposed to dress like the old Chili Queens. This outfit . . .” I put a hand on my long, black skirt. “It fits with the whole Chili Queen thing. A giant red chili costume, fishnet stockings, and stilettos? They don’t exactly go with the re-creation.”

“Maybe not, but . . .” He let go a long whistle. “It sure is something I’d like to see.”

“So stop at the Showdown.” Believe me, I wasn’t being
forward. The whole point of me wearing the Chili Chick costume and dancing outside the Palace was to draw in customers. And this guy would be a customer, right?

“I’ll be there,” he promised. “But only if you’ve got plenty of spice.”

He was talking about chili and the dried peppers we sold at the Palace, but the way his eyes sparked gave his words a certain little spicy kick of their own.

I told myself to keep my mind on peppers. “Abedul peppers to zia pueblo peppers,” I said.

“And selling pepper and spices, business is good?”

“We’re smokin’ hot!”

Another long look and he grinned. “I have no doubt of that. So . . .” Another strum of the guitar strings and he stepped away. “I’ll stop in at the Showdown this week to meet the Chili Chick, and later when I have a chance, I’ll come back here and get a sample of the chili you and your sister are handing out. But only if your chili is good.”

Who was I to miss an opening as perfect as that?

Heat flickered in my smile. “My chili is very good.”

His eyes gleamed. “I bet it is. I’ll be back later for some,” he said, and he strummed the guitar again and walked away.

“Chatting? You’re chatting?”

Sylvia’s high-pitched question came from right behind me and made me jump.

“You were supposed to be getting the napkins.” She grabbed them out of my arms.

“I was doing a little PR,” I told her. “Drumming up business.”

“With the entertainers. Who are working here just like we’re working here. So you know he didn’t pay his one hundred dollars for the ticket to get into the event and sample all the different chili, and how much you want to bet he’s not going to leave an extra donation even if he does come back here to our tent?”

I peered around the plaza, and in the glow of the thousands of twinkling white lights that had been strung between the tents of the fifteen organizations that were handing out chili in honor of the Queens, I saw the guitar player stroll over to the tent directly across from ours and accept a bowl of chili from a hot young cutie standing near the entrance. The banner over their heads announced that it belonged to Consolidated Chili Corp.

Call it gut reaction—my eyes narrowed, my mouth pulled into a frown.

“Get over it!” This from Sylvia, and this time, she wasn’t talking about tall, dark, and luscious Mr. Hot Guitar Player. If I ever needed any proof that she was not worthy of working at the Hot-Cha Chili Seasoning Palace (I didn’t), she provided it when she looked where I was looking and poked me in the ribs. “They’re a huge corporation and they give people what they want.”

“Mass-produced canned chili?” The very thought made me shudder. “They don’t belong at an event dedicated to the memory of the Chili Queens.”

“I heard they donated a bundle to be part of the week’s festivities. You know, for the publicity,” Sylvia informed me. “And look . . .” She wedged the stack of napkins under her chin so that she could retrieve something from the big
square pocket on the front of her sundress. “They’re handing out the cutest stuff. You know, as a way to advertise the big Miss Consolidated Chili pageant that will happen over at the Showdown on Sunday.” She dangled a bottle opener in front of my eyes.

It took me a moment to focus and see that the bottle opener had
Consolidated Chili
written on it in red letters.

“And coasters,” Sylvia added, pulling one of those out of her pocket, too. It was made of heavy cardboard and featured a picture on it that I—along with millions of other people—instantly recognized thanks to the commercials on TV. A can of Consolidated Chili’s chili.

“Tacky,” I said. “And not at all in keeping with the spirit of the evening.”

“Maybe not, but it’s plenty clever,” Sylvia insisted. “So’s their marketing strategy. You’re dressed as a Chili Queen. There are a couple descendants of the real Chili Queens over there.” She couldn’t exactly point, since she had all those napkins in her arms, but she looked across the plaza at another of the tents. “There’s even a tent being run by a couple drag queens.”

This, I thought, was hilarious, but Sylvia just rolled her eyes.

“None of that was good enough for the Consolidated folks. They’ve got beauty queens handing out their chili samples. Real, honest-to-goodness beauty queens. I saw Miss Texas Spice. And Miss Chili’s Cookin’. Chili’s Cookin’, isn’t that cute? It’s one of the names of the chilies they sell.”

“Trashy and flashy.” I ought to know, since I’d been
called the same things myself a time or two. I didn’t take it personally. At least not when the criticisms were aimed my way. I did take it personally when some big megacorporation stepped in and started messing with tradition and taste and everything else that’s near and dear to the heart of every true chili lover.

“They even have some bigwig here tonight overseeing the whole thing,” Sylvia added, standing on tiptoe so that she could crane her neck and get another look at the Consolidated tent over the heads of the workers who scurried around. “I didn’t see him, but I sure saw his limo. Big and black and shiny with a Tri-C license plate. Tri-C, get it? Consolidated Chili Corp. A big, shiny limo sure beats our RV and our food truck all to heck!” Sylvia gave an unladylike snort. “All these years, Jack has been wasting his time with the Showdown when he should have been concentrating on building a bigger business. Look what it did for those Consolidated Chili folks! And look . . .” In her megacorporation frenzy, she dropped the plastic-wrapped bundles of napkins so she could point. A tall man in a dark suit had just entered the Consolidated Chili Corp tent, and even though I couldn’t see his face, I could tell by the set of his shoulders and the angle of his white ten-gallon hat that he was someone to be reckoned with. Then again, the way the Consolidated Chili people started fawning and gawking and milling around him pretty much told me that, too.

I folded my arms over my chest when I raised my chin and leveled her with a look. “They can act like big shots all they want. And they can pretend they’re upholding some long Texas tradition, but anybody who knows
anything about chili knows the truth. There’s nothing better in the world than honest-to-goodness chili and nothing better than real people making it, not machines and cans and conglomerates.” My lips puckered at the thought. “And there’s nothing better than the Showdown, Sylvia, don’t you forget that. Jack was doing what Jack loved to do. What he still . . .” Like I often did, I teared up thinking about Jack. Over the last couple months, I’d tried my best to find out what happened to my dad, but so far, I’d had no luck.

I bit my lower lip to control myself before I said, “There’s nothing better than traveling with our friends and fellow vendors. Nothing better than meeting chili lovers and spreading the word about chili.”

“Whatever!” Sylvia rolled her eyes. “You keep telling yourself that, Maxie. Me, I’ll keep dreaming of that wonderful someday when I work for some real company like that Consolidated Chili.” Thinking, she cocked her head. “They must need PR people, right? I’ve got plenty of experience as a food writer. And they must need admin types, too. Obviously, we wouldn’t have done as well as we have with the Palace these last couple months if it wasn’t for me. You have no head for business.”

“You have no head for business.” Yes, it was juvenile of me to repeat her criticism in a singsongy voice, but hey, Sylvia and I had been fighting all our lives, and maybe on some ethereal plane, even before. See, my mother had won Jack’s heart when he was still married to Sylvia’s mother. Sylvia had spent her life convinced that it was my fault.

His back was still to me as I watched the man in the dark
suit and the big hat make his way through the crowd in the Consolidated Chili tent, and the way everyone bowed and scraped, I was surprised I didn’t see anybody kiss his ring. “You think real business is about some stuffy executive everyone sucks up to? That a real company is all about beauty queens and little bottle openers?” The irony of my questions was lost on Sylvia. Which is odd, since I’m the one who would normally find a bottle opener plenty useful, and she’s the one who usually thinks things like that are vulgar. Then again, I guess vulgar takes on a whole new meaning when it’s being orchestrated by some mega-rich corporation.

“I think real business is all about making connections with people,” I told my half sister.

The nod she gave me in return was filled with pity. “Like the connection you were trying to make with that guitar player? I see disaster ahead. Again. You’re always picking the wrong kinds of guys.”

“And you’re so good at picking the right ones? Like the one who got killed back in Taos.” Oh, there was a story there, all right, and it wasn’t a pretty one, since Roberto (whose name wasn’t really Roberto and who wasn’t really a Showdown roadie like we all thought he was and who, not so incidentally, turned up dead) was once engaged to my oh-so-perfect half sister. “Do me a favor and keep your advice to yourself,” I told her.

Her shoulders went rigid. So did that simpering little smile that was second nature to her, even when she was saying something hurtful and cruel. Which was a lot of the time.

“All right. If that’s the way you want it. But oh, Maxie, when will you ever learn?”

Good thing Sylvia gathered up those packages of napkins and walked away. Otherwise, I would have had to point out that I had already learned. I’d learned from Edik, the guy back in Chicago who emptied my bank account and broke what I have of a heart. Just like I had learned from a string of losers before him.

Speaking of guys, Nick Falcone, a former LA cop and now the Showdown’s head of security, picked that moment to stroll over to the Consolidated Chili tent. Yeah, Nick was delectable. And as cuddly as a cactus.

I’d bet anything he was after one of those little bottle openers.

Or one of those perky beauty queens.

I didn’t really care, right? I mean ever since Edik, I’d sworn off relationships.

Tell that to the sour thoughts that pounded through my head while I set up folding chairs, covered tables with plastic tablecloths, and—while Sylvia wasn’t looking—added some dried Aji Amarillo peppers and ground pasillas to the too-bland-for-me pots of chili she’d made for tonight’s event.

By the time I was done, the sun had set and the fund-raising event had officially opened to the public.