Cinco de Mayhem (16 page)

Quiet readers and laptop users claimed most of the other seats. I approached Junior's table and made an
Is this seat taken?
gesture. He smiled and nodded. Nice, but I wouldn't withdraw my negative judgment simply because he had good library manners. I recalled him maligning Linda, brandishing the tainted tamale for all to see.

As I sat, I realized that I had no book. I resisted the urge to peruse the shelves. I wasn't here for pleasure, unlike Junior, who seemed engrossed in a book about New Mexican petroglyphs.

“Neat stuff,” I whispered, nodding toward his book.

Junior's head remained buried behind the book.
His eyes lifted long enough for him to grunt an affirmation.

I couldn't blame him. I wouldn't want some stranger bugging me in the library. A more direct approach was needed.

“You're Junior Jenkins, right?” I asked. Taking his frown as affirmation, I continued. “I know about your dad's ‘business' and that you planted that cockroach in Linda Santiago's tamale.”

The petroglyph tome was lowered. Junior's cheeks burned as red as his hair. Was he mad or shy? I settled on ashamed, which he should be. He'd helped shut down Linda's business and position her as a murder suspect.

“I don't handle Dad's so-called business,” he said. “You have a problem, take it up with him.”

Ah, now this was something. “No, you tell me. Who's your father blackmailing? Tell me or I'll call the police.” I was bluffing. I had nothing.

“Leave me alone, lady,” he said, and not in a whisper. “This is a library!”

A woman at the next table scowled from behind purple horn-rimmed glasses. “The library!” she whispered for emphasis.

Junior, sensing support, added, “Yeah, stop harassing me!”

Horn-rimmed woman made a huffy sound, and other heads bobbed in affirmation. My attempt at a friendly smile worked on neither the woman nor Junior, who pointedly raised his book to block me out. The back cover featured the outline of a hand, one of the common symbols carved and painted by ancient peoples throughout the Southwest.

Risking further reading-room ire, I whispered,
“I know you took part, Junior. You and your father were in cahoots with Napoleon and now he's dead. Murdered! What do you know about that?”

Junior jerked his head back. “
I
didn't have anything to do with that! You work with Addie, don't you? Well ask her about me. She'll tell you. I'm a musician and an archeologist.” His outburst faltered. “Or I will be, soon as I get through school.”

A librarian walked by the doorway, eyes scanning the room. I fell silent, waiting for her to leave before I resumed my questioning. “I saw you hand that envelope to Don Busco. What was in there? Is your dad blackmailing Don? Junior, if you have evidence that can clear Linda, you
have
to take it to the police. Addie will say the same thing.”

He slammed his book down. “Leave me alone!” he cried, his voice echoing across the cavernous room. “And don't bad-mouth me to Addie! I mean it!”

Heads turned. The lady in the horn rims stood. “I'm getting security,” she announced.

“No—” I started to say, but she was already marching to the door with Junior close behind her. I jumped to my feet, causing my chair to tip into a man working on his computer.

“Careful!” he snarled.

Suddenly the silent reading room became of cacophony of chastisement. “Take it outside lady!” “Stop bothering people.” “Shhhhh!”

I fled more than followed Junior, and ran when I saw reading-room lady pointing me out to a bulky security guard. Bolting out the back exit, I hid behind an SUV in the parking lot. My heart thumped and a truly terrifying prospect struck
me. What if I'd become a wanted person in one of my favorite places? I pictured myself sneaking into the stacks wearing sunglasses and one of Addie's wigs. It was a dismal thought. I slumped against the SUV, feeling defeated, but only for a moment. My touch triggered the behemoth vehicle's alarm. Lights flashed, the horn blared, and a siren screamed. I ran as fast as my jogging-sore legs allowed to the nearest gelato shop.

I
slunk back to Tres Amigas a little after the lunch rush and volunteered for hazard duty as penance for missing work and disrupting the library. Deseeding Flori's extra-hot chiles required gloves. I added a plastic apron and wished I had a pair of Cass's goggles. My eyes watered from spicy pepper fumes, a dangerous situation because I kept catching my chile-contaminated hands reaching to wipe them. After preparing more than enough peppers for the hot chile cheeseburgers and salsas, I stepped outside for fresh air. That's when I spotted the official vehicle coming our way.

“Heath inspector!” I yelled, rushing back into the kitchen. “Jenkins Senior! All hands on deck. I mean, all hairnets on!”

I adjusted my own net, strung one as a beard covering on grumbling Juan, and doubled up the plastic coverings on Addie's wig. By the time Jen
kins Senior slouched in, we in the kitchen looked more like crazed surgeons than cooks.

“Inspector,” Flori said, holding up her gloved hands as if preparing to operate on a plate of enchiladas. “What can we do for you?”

He snapped on his own gloves and smirked. “Time for your inspection.”

H
e's taking a magnifying glass to our salt shakers,” I reported, spying from the kitchen. “He swabbed the mariachi players.” Most of our customers had left, opting for doggy bags when they saw the gloved man combing over the café. A few others had relocated to the patio.

Flori, her face hovering over a pot of posole, made tsk-tsk sounds. “Silly man. He's making a show, that's all.”

A show we'd have on video if he tried to plant anything. I'd instructed Addie to follow him with her cell phone set to video. She was currently shooting from a crouched position, seemingly getting an artsy, edgy shot.

“That's it!” I heard her say. “Nice! Good angle. You want, we can stop and powder your shiny forehead? What about that red nose? No?”

“Not good,” Juan said. He sat on a stool sucking red juice through a straw, his protective beard and hair coverings scrunched in a puffy ring around his forehead.

“Not good at all,” I agreed. I could have used a drink. A margarita would do, but it was way too
early. “Is that one of Crystal's juices? What flavor?” I asked Juan.

“Raspberry mint,” he said. “Free like yesterday, except then I got strawberry.”

My first thought was that Crystal was awfully nice. My next thought was that she wanted something. “Free? Like Flori gives away free food for information?”

Juan's broad shoulder rose and fell a few millimeters. “She only asked if Flori and you were looking for the murderer.”

I raised my eyebrows, silently encouraging Juan to reveal what happened next.

“I said, ‘
Sí
,'” he said. “What else could I say?”

True. Any local like Crystal would know of Flori's reputation for sleuthing. And despite my intentions to stay far away from crime and conflict, I was building the same reputation.

“How did Crystal react?” I asked Juan as he loudly extracted the last drops of juice from the ice chips.

He rattled the ice and thought. “She said that Napoleon tricked everyone. She said that she bets his death will too. I don't know what she means, but she asked me to keep her informed.” His lips twitched in the hint of a conspiratorial smile. “You want me to tell her something special, you let me know.”

J
enkins reached the end of his swabbing and analyzing about forty minutes later, wiping his
brow. His face was paler than usual, yet sweating. He slumped into a seat by the window, retrieved his thermos and a laptop from a satchel the size of a small suitcase, and began pecking at the keyboard with his index fingers.

“You want me to keep filming that bloke?” Addie whispered when I came out to the dining room, wearing a fresh apron and bearing a bleached menu.

I told her to save her battery, for now. “But sit behind him. If he reaches for his pockets or gets up, that's when he could plant something.”

“Jolly good, guv'ner,” Addie said. Having triple-watched all available episodes of
Downton Abby,
she'd started in on British crime dramas. Flori thought this was a great idea and had given Addie an entire Agatha Christie DVD set for Christmas.

Jenkins looked up as I approached his table. “Lots to write about,” he said, tapping away.

About how spotless Tres Amigas was? About how the air smelled of lemon bleach and baked goods? I forced a smile and asked if he'd like anything from the menu. “We're known for our green chile stew,” I said as pleasantly as I could muster. “Customers rave about our healthy muffins. We have some Mexican specials too, for Cinco de Mayo. Shrimp tacos?”

The inspector clutched his stomach and made a sound of disgust. “Shrimp?” He tapped a few words while I waited, wondering if seafood so far from the sea was some sort of infraction. “Fine,” he said, looking up. “So you'll leave me alone. Get me a bowl of chile stew. Flour tortillas on the side and a muffin for later. This is on the house, I assume?”

“Of course,” I said through my frozen smile. “Any coffee with that? Tea?”

He reached for his thermos. “No drinks. Just bring me that soup. Make sure it's hot. Then get me the owner of this place and we'll talk.”

His attitude made me think that we wouldn't be chatting about the A+ rating we were about to receive. I glanced at Addie and she gave me a thumbs-up with one hand. In her other hand she aimed her cell phone at Jenkins.

Back in the kitchen, Flori threatened to add habaneros to Jenkins's bowl of green chile stew. “That'd fix him,” she chuckled.

“That's all we need, more for him to write up. He seems to disapprove of shrimp, and he says that he wants to talk to you.”

Flori ladled out a bowl of stew, a flavorful mix of green chiles, tender lamb, and creamy potatoes. “He can have stew, but no payoffs.” She placed the bowl on a tray and tightened the sash around her karate top. My elderly boss was dressed for battle, from her orange sneakers to the karate-style band wrapped around her hairnet.

I delivered the food along with a shiny spoon, a falsely perky “Enjoy,” and a failed attempt to read over Jenkins's shoulder. He snapped the laptop closed and held the spoon up to the light. I was glad I'd repolished it and that Addie was filming.

Jenkins peered up at me through narrowed, watery eyes. “You want to stand here and stare at me while I eat? Your funny friend already has a recording.”

“Funny? Who are you calling funny, you . . . you . . .” At a loss for Britishisms, Addie muttered
a few choice words of Spanish. “Don't worry, Rita love,” she said to me. “I'll bleep that bit out of the film.”

I took a seat by Addie and watched Jenkins slowly sip soup.

H
is son's nothing like that shifty one,” Addie whispered, keeping her eyes on Jenkins Senior. “Junior's a good lad. I asked him about his dad and he told me to stay clear. I said, ‘not if he's messing with me friends, I won't.'”

Worry jolted me from the monotony of Jenkins's sipping. “Addie, please be careful,” I said, aware how prickly I'd felt when Jake said the very same thing to me. Addie was young, though, and trusting.

She also wasn't deterred. “I told Junior, I said someone hid that cockroach in Miss Linda's tamale and set you up to find it. He was kinda angry that I knew, but he agreed that that's what must have happened. Not that he knew firsthand.”

“That's one possibility,” I said. Telling a friend that her boyfriend is a jerk, or a potential accomplice to murder and cockroach treachery, rarely works out well. I squeezed Addie's free hand. “Promise me you won't trust anyone,” I said.

Her eyes widened. “Even Miss Flori and Linda?”

“No, no. I mean anyone who could be a suspect or close to a suspect, okay?”

“Right. Just like with Miss Marple,” Addie said, seriously. “Anyone could be the killer. Too bad we don't have a butler to pin it on.”

We had a shifty food inspector, a questionable hot dog guy, and a generous juice lady. That seemed like more than enough suspects to me. The door chimed, announcing new customers. I got up, ready to seat them as far from Jenkins as possible. Maybe they'd choose the patio. Out of habit, as I passed Jenkins's table, I asked if he was doing okay. I seemed to have interrupted a sip. He gurgled, then coughed. Sweat beaded on his pasty face.

“You okay?” I asked with real concern. “Would you like a drink? More water?”

“No. No drink,” he stuttered, his voice raspy. “What did you put in this?”

Addie had come up beside me, her cell phone held low to her side.

“Did you get a hot pepper?” she asked. “They give some people the sweats, they do.”

Jenkins's head bobbed and wobbled until a final backward fling that sent him toppling from his chair. Addie and I grabbed his arms and sat him upright against the table. His breathing came in ragged jags interspersed with groans.

“Water, Addie!” I commanded. “And get Flori!”

One of the new customers, a slight man in a leather-fringed jacket, appeared at my side. “I'm a doctor,” he said, lifting Jenkins's head and peering into his rapidly blinking eyes. His words calmed me, until he added, “Call 911! This man needs to get to the hospital, fast!”