Chapter Five --
“Ma’am,” said Sergeant Rushmore, “is there any chance you saw him? Can you give us a description?”
“I don’t know. Average, maybe. He had a dark baseball cap on and his collar up. I didn’t really see him. Once I got out of there, I just ran like crazy and hid. Gabby, I’m so sorry I told those guys you were a deputy.”
“Don’t worry about it, Nettie. Now, did you see him get into his car?”
“Yes, but I couldn’t see much. He parked way down there.” She pointed to the spot where I had seen the dark sedan. “I think it was a big car.”
There it was, the little piece of information I needed. We were being followed by a cop, not a thug. He saved our lives and then took off. This thing with Annette and Joe Fortuna must be a very big deal indeed, if we merited this kind of a professional tail.
Another half hour passed as we gave the cops all the information, wrote up statements, signed them, and bid them farewell. Even as I slid behind the wheel and got comfortable in my cousin’s car, I felt better about the rest of the journey. If that cop had protected us from a couple of punks, it wasn’t likely that he would just leave us now. Somewhere along the route, he would rejoin us. That meant three things. Folks knew we were heading to Vermont, those documents were important, and Annette might really be in serious danger, legal or otherwise. I was glad I tucked the roll of Frist concrete bids into the gingerbread house, safely ensconced in the trunk as we got back onto I-87.
We went another twenty miles on the interstate before I caught another glimpse of that dark sedan. By the time we crossed over into Vermont, I was having trouble keeping the pain of all those bruises at bay, but at least I wasn’t fighting exhaustion. All that agony was helping to keep me wide awake. Beside me, Nettie was dozing fitfully, shaking herself awake every ten minutes or so. Finally, taking pity on her, I told her to go ahead and sleep.
“At least one of us will get a little rest.”
“No, Gabby. I should keep you company,” she insisted, struggling to keep her eyes open. I glanced in the rearview mirror and saw the familiar headlights, keeping their distance.
“It’s okay, Annette. I’m fine.” Frankly, if there was trouble, I was probably a lot safer if Annette was asleep. I wouldn’t have to worry about her getting in the way, at least not until she was awake.
There’s an old gag line you sometimes hear on construction sites when someone who’s less than helpful volunteers to help. “Go wait in the truck.” That’s because in the time it takes to explain what needs to be done and how it should be done, you could already have it finished the job. Sometimes it’s not practical to waste time trying to teach a dog any new tricks. Annette and law enforcement weren’t really a good mix. She was too anxious about criminals to appreciate that cool heads prevail, too easily panicked to realize that incidents could be avoided if people were handled safely. Even though she managed to smuggle those documents out of Frist and Company under the noses of her bosses and the security guard, I was pretty sure that if the bullets started flying again, I’d be worrying about her sticking her foot in her mouth yet again. Annette had always been a very bossy kid, and that hadn’t changed with the decades. She often told people what to do and how to do it, even if she didn’t know what she was talking about. Normally, that wasn’t a problem. Most people shrug that kind of thing off. But in cop circles, sometimes a big mouth can get you into a lot of hot water.
Watching Nettie fall back to sleep, an idea popped into my conscious mind. Maybe part of the reason she was now in trouble wasn’t because she was involved in the bid-rigging scheme, but because she was such a busybody. What if Joe Fortuna was an FBI agent by the name of Mike Alves? What if he was worried she’d shoot her mouth off? Maybe he knew she had a deputy sheriff as a cousin, just like he knew that when things got complicated, she would call me to help her. Had he been counting on that? How else could you explain why the guy gave her his personal cell phone, even though he knew he would be using his real name, which would cause some confusion? Maybe he romanced her and then blew her off on purpose, leaving her in the lurch with the hope I would step in and take over the babysitting job. The more I thought about it, the more it made sense. If Annette thought there was something illegal going on at Frist and Company, she’d feel the need to fix it. And if this was part of an organized crime game, that might make her a victim. A victim with a brand new pair of shoes, made with the very concrete that was now in question. Had Alves had us tailed to make sure I got my cousin to Black Forest Farm safely? An FBI agent discharging his weapon during a convenience store robbery would be a problem, so that might explain why the guy made such a fast exit. Had Rufus gotten the FBI call as a way to ratchet up the pressure on me to take care of Nettie on my home turf? I was transporting her across state lines. If the bad guys came after her, it was likely they, too, would have to cross those same state lines. Was the FBI killing two legal birds with one stone and saving some budget money in the process? The bad guys would be compounding their crimes by coming after her in Vermont, allowing the Department of Justice to add charges to the indictment, and the FBI would skip witness protection procedures and costs, thanks to me.
Normally, I’d be pretty riled up about such a cheesy move, but ever since Paul died, Annette really did need the support of the Grimm family. I had little doubt that my dad and stepmom would be thrilled to take her into their home and keep her safe on the farm. And who knows, maybe she’d even enjoy it. After all, Christmas was fast approaching. What better place to be than on Black Forest Farm, where Ervina was baking night and day and Gerhard was about to harvest the frozen grapes for his ice wine. There was plenty to keep Nettie busy and there were lots of farm hands to deter any effort to kidnap her.
Just before six, I pulled into the driveway of Black Forest Farm, and it was a good thing. My right leg was stiff and cramped. I drove past my carriage house and headed for Gerhard and Ervina’s place. Driving up the back door, I put the car in park and turned off the ignition.
“Wake up, sleepy head,” I softly encouraged Nettie, hoping to rouse her from her slumber.
“Are we there?” she wondered, stretching out in the seat as she came awake.
“We are.”
Pablo came out of the cow barn and gave me a wave.
“Gabby, we have a new calf!” the dairy worker announced. “Healthy and hungry.”
“Wonderful,” I said. It was. There was nothing more delightful than an animal birth, whether it was a kid, a calf, a foal, a puppy, or a kitten. There was new life on the farm and we all took pleasure in watching the antics of the young. I introduced Annette. “My cousin is visiting for a few weeks.”
“Want a hand with the luggage?” he offered. It was too good an opportunity to turn down, especially with my fanny feeling the bruises of my roof tumble. I popped the trunk as Annette wiggled her sleepy limbs.
“What the....” The gingerbread house was gone. “Oh, come on!”
“What’s the matter?” Pablo wanted to know. Those accented words rolled off his tongue like a purr off a cat. He was Argentinean, raised on a cattle farm on the plain, and with his brown hair and dark eyes, he arrived at Black Forest Farm with the smoldering good looks of the soccer star he once was, a degree in animal science, and ten years of experience as a livestock expert. He and Steve handled the dairy business for Gerhard.
“We ran into a little trouble on the way here. Someone tried to rob a convenience store when we were getting coffee. Now it looks like someone took advantage and stole Annette’s gingerbread house. Damn!’
“It’s gone?” Annette came in for a closer look. “No way!”
“Way,” said Pablo, nodding as he used what he thought was still a popular American phrase. I caught the look pass between the widow and the cowboy. They were about the same age. They were both healthy, attractive people. Were those sparks I saw?
“Oh, shoot! Why would someone steal....” Even as her words trailed off, I could see th
e realization dawning in her eyes. Those documents were gone, too.
“Shall I?” Pablo pointed to the luggage.
“That blue one,” I answered. He lifted Nettie’s bag out of the car. I led the way up the back steps and into the kitchen.
“Nettie!” Gerhard was sitting at the big pine table in his work clothes as we entered. Ervina, in her bathrobe and slippers, was flipping pancakes. “What are you doing here?”
“I had some trouble at work,” she began to explain. I cut her off. There would be plenty of time to get into it later.
“She’s here for a few days. Feel free to put her to work,” I told them. “Make her a farm girl and maybe we’ll get her to give up her life in the city.”
“Oh, wouldn’t that be nice!” my stepmother sighed. “Gerhard, Annette could help at the winery. We have so many orders to fill at the gift shop.”
“Well, maybe she doesn’t want to be a shop girl. I could put her to work in the office. She’s used to doing paperwork. I’ve got invoices to send out.”
As they discussed the best way to utilize Nettie, I watched my cousin. She took it all in, listening to the comfortable banter. I noticed Pablo helped himself to a mug of coffee before leaning back against the counter as an observer. He definitely had eyes for my cousin.
“First things first,” I broke in. “We both need some sleep. Any chance you have a bed for her?”
My carriage house is a lovely little place at the foot of the farm’s main gate. It has all the charm of a tiny chalet in Germany, but it’s not really equipped for guests at the moment. I was using the second bedroom as an office, and I didn’t really want to pull out the sofa bed for Nettie, not if I was also going to have to work on the case and get her Frist and Company mess sorted out. The main farm house had lots of guest rooms, a couple of dogs, a trio of cats, and a kitchen that never closed. It was the perfect place for Annette.
“How about the yellow bedroom?” Gerhard suggested. “The green room is being used for packaging. Oh, that’s another possible job for Nettie. Ervina has all those knitted orders to go out.”
“Boy,” I laughed as we climbed the stairs, “you’re going to need your beauty sleep. It sounds like you’re going to be busy!”
“That will be nice,” she decided. “It’ll get my mind off worrying about...you know.”
We were in the cheerful bedroom with walls the color of fresh creamery butter, introducing my cousin to her home away from home when my cell phone rang. I had retrieved it from the bottom of my purse and turned it on when we were ten miles from home.
“Deputy Grimm,” I answered when I saw the Albany area code.
“Hey, this is Sergeant Rushmore. Any chance you lost a gingerbread house? We found it at the Mobil station.”
“You have it? Is it broken?”
“Nope. Everything looks good. Of course, I’m not an expert baker, but I think it still looks like a viable holiday decoration. You want to come get it?”
“I do. Any chance you can hold it until I can get a little shut eye? I’ll pop down later this afternoon.”
“Great. In the meantime, we’ll put it in the dispatch room, to keep it safe. If I’m not here, that’s where you’ll find it.”
“I appreciate this, Sergeant. Thanks for calling.”
“My pleasure. Merry Christmas, deputy.”
“You, too.”
Even as I hung up, the questions were rattling around in my brain. What in God’s name was going on? Had the FBI retrieved those documents and arranged for the safe return of the gingerbread house? Or was that guy in the dark sedan not an FBI agent? I needed to get that cookie confection back here, so I could go over it with a fine-toothed comb.
“Gabby?” Annette looked at me expectantly.
“The cops found the gingerbread house. I’ll go down this afternoon and collect it.”
“What a relief!”
“A gingerbread house?” Ervina’s interest was tickled. “Do you bake?”
“I do,” Nettie admitted.
“Gingerbread?”
“Yes,” she nodded.
“Do you like to bake?” my stepmother wondered.
“I do.”
“Gerhard,” Ervina said, turning to my father, “you know what I am thinking?”
“Yes, my love. I do,” he laughed, patting her shoulder. “You’re putting her to work in the kitchen.”
“I am.”
“Am I making a gingerbread house?” Nettie wanted to know.
“You are going to decorate the cookies. Oh, this will be wonderful,” said the lady with a twinkle in her eye. “I will bake while you sleep. We’ve sold out three times in the past week. Everybody loves gingerbread cookies.”
“And when the gingerbread house returns, you might want to display it in the shop,” I suggested. “Wait till you see it, Gerhard. It’s architecturally accurate, with trusses and braces. Utterly charming.”
“I am looking forward to that,” my father agreed. “Perhaps we will hire you to do a gingerbread village next Christmas.”
“Wouldn’t that be wonderful? I wish we had thought of that earlier!” Ervina sounded positively wistful over the lost opportunity.