Buzz Off - By Hannah Reed Page 0,11

handing over a cloth grocery bag. I rang up her items and began placing them in the bag. “It’s probably going to cost a gazillion dollars to repair the damage, and I just don’t know where the money will come from or where to find anyone to help with the handy work.”

“Put a notice on the board.” I waved to the bulletin board next to the entryway where customers sold their litters of puppies and kittens, or looked for work, or offered to deliver topsoil and mulch in the summer months or plow snow in the winter.

Patti’s head swung in the general direction, but I could tell she had other things on her mind.

“I heard,” she said in front of everyone inside the store, “that Manny was murdered by killer bees.”

That’s all it took.

“Was Manny really stung to death by bees?” Stanley asked the group in general.

“We won’t know anything for sure until the medical examiner finishes up,” I said.

I counted on a favorable verdict, so I kept quiet, mainly because it was easiest. But looking back, I should have made it clear that there was no way honeybees could’ve been involved in Manny’s death. Yellow jackets were the most likely culprits, having the ability to sting multiple times. Yellow jackets were loners, not traveling as a group, but if one got angry and stung, it released a chemical that alerted other yellow jackets. Then they would arrive on the scene and join in the attack.

Whether venom killed Manny or something else caused his death, only Jackson would be able to say conclusively after performing his medical examiner’s miracles.

I felt so bad for Grace that my heart ached.

I heard a truck’s backup alarm and spotted Ray Goodwin’s delivery truck sliding in to park in the back of the store. Trent came out to unload produce. He carried in boxes filled with vegetables while Ray ticked things off on a supply sheet. I joined him.

“I need a signature,” Ray said, handing me the clipboard. “Awful about Manny and those bees.”

“His bees didn’t kill him.” I signed off on the order, thinking I’d be saying that a lot in the upcoming days.

“Sure looked like they did,” he said. “I’m the one who found him right after I stopped at Kenny’s Bees.”

I glanced up from the clipboard. Hunter had already told me that Ray found Manny, but that wasn’t what caught my attention. “Kenny Langley’s?”

Although I knew of the Langley family through my grandmother, I’d officially met Kenny just once, in the spring, when he and Manny sat down to negotiate sales territories. I didn’t like him from the start, because he’d treated me with an exaggerated indifference. Plus, he’d called me “the girl.”

I’d been working in the honey house right next to where he and Manny had had their little chat. So I knew what the old-fashioned handshake entailed. Manny would take Waukesha County, Kenny would stay in Washington County—a logical solution, since they each lived and worked in his own territory. It was a truce that seemed to satisfy both of them. As the two fastest-growing producers in both counties, they didn’t seem at all concerned about the little guys who operated hobby honey farms and dabbled in a sale here and there. Manny had introduced me to Kenny when they first sat down, Kenny more or less ignored me, then before the meeting broke up, Manny asked me to be the official contact person if there were any issues.

That had been a pleasant surprise, in spite of my not liking Kenny. Anything to be involved. Manny wasn’t interested in the sales and negotiation end of his business, which led me to hope that I would be able to take that burden off his shoulders completely in the future. Marketing was second nature to me after owning a small business like The Wild Clover. In any case, there hadn’t been any problems that caused me and Kenny to meet again, which suited me just fine.

“What were you doing at Kenny Langley’s?” I asked.

“Oops.” Ray looked uncomfortable. His eyes flitted away and his coloring deepened like he’d been caught with his hand in the cash register.

“You’re distributing honey from Kenny’s?” I said with narrowing eyes. Kenny’s Bees should definitely have been off-limits to Ray. Every since he took over deliveries two years ago, Manny and Ray had had an exclusive agreement regarding honey. Ray helped Manny get his honey onto other grocers’ shelves, and Ray received a deeper discount. Since I had