The next morning in front of the Master Ketchup factory, things were pretty much the same as they had been the day before. People trickled up to the food trucks to grab a breakfast or cupcake or much-needed coffees. They finished their cigarettes, got in their morning gossip, then headed inside once the factory whistle blew.
“I don’t know if I’d like that kind of job,” Lila offered as she washed the morning’s mixing bowls. “Stopping and starting to the sound of a whistle reminds me too much of school.”
“Really? You strike me as the kind of gal who would have liked school.” Amelia took a drink of water.
“Ugh,” Lila replied. “I hated school. There was nothing they could teach me that I couldn’t learn faster and better on the street.”
“I’m not sure how to interpret that, Lila.” Amelia looked at her suspiciously.
“Please, I wish I was that scandalous.” Her shoulders bounced as she chuckled. “No. I mean I just don’t like the confines of a cube.”
“You’d hate this place. That’s what they have in there. I saw them when I went peeking in there yesterday.”
“Did you see anything else?”
“No. Heard a few things, but nothing I can really sink my teeth into.”
Just then, loitering outside the factory, pacing back and forth between the alley and the Pink Cupcake’s rear bumper, was the guy in the overalls who had sprinted across the street yesterday.
Amelia watched him as he strolled back and forth, looking at his watch and puffing a cigarette down to the filter. Finally, he saw what he’d been waiting for.
As everyone else was going into the building, the tight-skirted woman from yesterday emerged and began to walk across the street. Without nearly as much discretion as yesterday, they both headed off across the street.
Amelia watched.
“A little rendezvous before the nine o’clock conference call,” Lila mused.
“Right? Did you see them go that way yesterday, too?”
Lila shook her head, but her right eyebrow, which she’d drawn on with care, arched deviously high and up to her forehead as she looked from Amelia to the couple.
Within minutes, the pair had come back into view. He jogged to the factory entrance off the alley, and she went through the front door. Amelia and Lila worked with no more noise than the bustle of the neighborhood around them.
Before she knew it, Amelia heard the midday whistle blowing.
“Can you handle the restless natives?” Amelia asked, pulling off her apron and stepping down the back steps of the truck.
“Of course. Where are you going?”
“Nowhere. But I’ll be back in a minute.”
Lila shrugged and went back to arranging the final batch of PB&J cupcakes next to the new Breakfast Dessert cupcakes, which had quickly become popular among the big-boned construction workers down the street.
Without wasting any time, Amelia ran down the same gangway she had seen the couple retreat down yesterday and this morning. It came to a dead end, unless a person wanted to scale the chain-link fence and risk the barbed wire at the top, or didn’t mind giving their position away by yanking down the rusty fire escape ladder attached to the other building.
If Amelia didn’t find a hiding place, she’d be seen by the shady couple.
“No,” she mumbled as she stared at the large dumpster. The letters WM were painted in white on its dark-green body. Her heart was racing. Time was running out. Just up and in. Climb that box, swing a leg over and, once you’re inside, just crouch. Don’t touch the sides. Simple.
Looking over her shoulder, she saw people starting to emerge from all the buildings to take advantage of the weather and their fifteen-minute breaks.
Just do it!
Without thinking, Amelia stepped onto a red plastic milk crate, lifted the plastic lid of the dumpster, and swung one leg over before the smell hit her. Gasping a little, she took a gulp of air, swung her other leg over, and carefully pulled the lid down over her, just as the man in the overalls appeared at the street entrance.
There wasn’t a ton of trash in the dumpster. Thankfully, most of it had been tossed to the side opposite Amelia. But as she crouched inside, she did start to feel herself sinking.
“What took you so long?” she heard the man say. Throwing caution to the wind, she put the very tips of her fingers against the lip of the dumpster and peeked out.
The woman was hurrying along. “I couldn’t help it.” She rushed up to him and, as Amelia predicted, kissed him full on the lips. “That detective called and said he wanted me to come down to the station.”
“What? Why?” the man asked.
“I don’t know. I think…” She hesitated. “Dean, I think they know.”
“They would only know if you told them.” Dean held her by her shoulders and looked in her eyes. “Did you tell them?”
“I don’t think I did,” she muttered.
“Well, what exactly did you say? You said something that’s got them wanting to talk to you again. How come they aren’t asking to talk to me?”
The woman shrugged. “If only Danielle would have kept her mouth shut. Why did she have to stick her nose in our business?”
“So you told them Danielle knew about us? Is that it?” Dean asked. “Mindy? Is that what you said?”
“Well, if they found out and knew I lied, they might dig deeper. I didn’t want them doing that. Right?” Mindy took a step closer to Dean. “I didn’t want them to know that you’ve been in jail before.” She reached up and ran her hand through Dean’s sandy hair. “I mean, I helped get you this job. If they knew I put in a different background check, we’d both be in trouble. This way it keeps that safe.”
Breathing through her mouth, Amelia listened to Dean and Mindy. It was only when she felt something cool and wet touch her ankle that she held her breath again.
“If they call me in to the police station, my wife is going to find out all about us,” Dean whined. “She’s going to know I was with you when I said I was with Kirk. The whole thing is going to blow up in our faces.”
“Baby, no, it isn’t.” Mindy shook her head. “Baby, look at me. Neither one of us killed Danielle. They aren’t looking for us.”
“But our alibis are each other. My wife isn’t going to understand if she finds out this way. We had a plan, remember? When my wife got back from having her shoulder surgery, I was going to tell her.”
Amelia tried to control her gag reflex and stood stone still, making sure whatever was touching her ankle wasn’t creeping up higher on its own. With every sense on high alert she felt something fall on her head. It didn’t move. But there was definitely something stuck in her hair.
“Why do we have to wait?” Mindy whined. “Why don’t we just go march down to the police station together? Holding hands. They’ll see we are a united front and nothing can break us apart. Like Bon Jovi says, ‘Never Say Goodbye.’”
Had Amelia not been partially distracted by what had fallen on her head and what was touching her ankle, she would have burst out laughing. This was daytime drama at its very best.
Before they could find any more lyrics to match their love, the break-time whistle blew. Amelia watched through the grimy slit between the lid and lip of the dumpster as Dean and Mindy quickly canoodled as though they were on the Titanic and it was getting ready to go down into the icy abyss.
Finally, they tore away from each other and, in a single file, headed back.
Amelia pulled herself out of the dumpster, brushed herself off, and slowly walked back to the Pink Cupcake.
“Did that girl beat you up?” Lila asked, squeezing lavender petals onto a fresh batch of vanilla-lavender cupcakes.
Amelia shook her head, reached into the emergency locker, and pulled a fresh hot-pink t-shirt from behind the first aid kit, an extra blanket, and couple of extra sets of oven mitts. “No.” Amelia sighed and walked to the only private corner, behind the driver’s seat. She pulled off her shirt and quickly slipped into the XL Pink Cupcake t-shirt of the same design that Lila was considering ordering in bulk for a special promotion around Christmas time. “I was hiding in the dumpster.”
“You know, I really admire your hutzpah.”
“Hutzpah? Where I come from, it’s called stupidity.” Amelia looked at her dirty shirt and stifled a gag. “Man, what is this? I tried not to touch anything. I didn’t think I did, but I guess I was totally wrong. Totally.” She wrinkled her nose and grimaced. “I’ll bet I stink, too.”
“I didn’t want to say anything but, well… since you brought it up...”
“Oh, Lila, I’m sorry.” She went to the sink and began to scrub her hands and arms, all the way up to her shoulders. She doused a clean wash rag with water and scoured her face, neck, and hair. “Thank goodness for this short haircut. I may not smell great, but this should at least make me bearable.”
“No worries. I was with Rusty at the Twisted Spoke last night for their monthly Harley H.O.G. meeting. Believe me, some of those guys would do well to wash off in a sink once in a while.” Lila pinched her nose while squeezing the frosting tube with the other. “Now, the real question is, what did you find out?”
Amelia stopped and looked at Lila, still holding the wet rag in her hand to drip, drip, drip on the floor. “You were with Rusty last night?”
“Please, get that Peyton Place look off your face. We became good friends after that whole event at his restaurant.”
Amelia shrugged, giggling.
“I’m just glad you made a friend. That’s all.” Amelia told Lila about the dramatic exchange she overheard in the alley, complete with reenactments of their romantic gestures and, of course, “Never Say Goodbye.”
“Okay, well, we know those two are probably too stupid to know anything more about the murder, not to mention being too stupid to know good music from bad.” Lila shook her head. “Oh, how youth is wasted on the young.”