Buzz Off - By Hannah Reed Page 0,43

and broke it in two. Then I took her hand and jammed the pieces into it. “Suit yourself,” I said before stomping inside.

I didn’t look back but I could hear Carrie Ann sputtering behind me.

“Hey, sis,” Holly said, grinning like she was very pleased with herself. “I’m getting the hang of the register. I’m a natural!”

I forced a smile in spite of the extremely bad day I was still trying to get through and greeted the customers in line, determined to rearrange my attitude as we exchanged pleasantries.

Laughter floated down from above. The sheepshead games were in full swing. The market was filled with beautiful light from all the stained glass. Milly’s bouquets of flowers were right next to the checkout, where their fragrances wafted in the air and customers picked them up on impulse. Bins brimmed with corn, raspberries, and multicolored squashes, completing the picture of bliss and bountifulness.

“Story needs a waggle dance,” Carrie Ann said, coming over to the register.

“Huh?” Holly said, waving good-bye to her last customer in line.

“That’s what Story’s bees do when they find a new pollen patch,” Carrie Ann said. “Tell her, Story.”

“Once a field bee discovers a new source of pollen,” I explained, “she will fly home, crawl into the hive with the news, and do a dance in certain patterns, like a figure eight. That tells the other bees the exact location of the newly discovered flower field.”

“It’s kind of done like this,” Carrie Ann demonstrated to Holly by thrusting out her back end and shaking it. At first I was surprised that she knew about the waggle dance, then I remembered that she had been working the day I burst in with the exciting news that I’d actually seen a honeybee waggle dance and had gone on to demonstrate it. Carrie Ann remembered! How cool was that?

Holly mimicked Carrie Ann, shaking right along. The three of us must have looked ridiculous to anyone peering through the window and to the customers in the store, but we didn’t care as we wiggled and waggled down the aisles until we were laughing and the world wasn’t tilting quite so far into the shadows.

A few minutes later, I settled at my tiny desk in the storage room and prioritized. I was surprised when the very first item on my list turned out to be the very subject I didn’t want to pursue. I guess my subconscious took over. My to-do list went like this:• The current rumor about Grace and Clay was substantial. Had she really cheated on Manny? And if so, when and where?

• Prove that Manny was killed by yellow jackets, although that would be difficult without an official autopsy by the medical examiner.

• Find Gerald Smith, the bee association member who took Manny’s beehives, and convince him to return the honeybee hives to me.

• Once that was accomplished, figure out how to transport eighty-one hives and where to stash them if everybody in town remained hostile toward honeybees.

• Convince Grace to sell Manny’s equipment to me, all of it, including the honey house, now that Holly would loan me the funds.

• Calculate how long it would take to pay my sister back, so I could get out from under my family’s thumb.

• Respect Grace by waiting until after tomorrow’s funeral to begin negotiations for the equipment.

I started with bullet point number three, since that seemed easier than one and two—find the beekeeper who had made off with Manny’s honeybees. I picked up the phone and called Eric Hanson, the president of the county bee association.

“Hi, Story, long time no talk,” said Eric. “It’s such a shame about Manny Chapman.”

“I can’t believe he’s gone. It’s like a bad dream,” I agreed. “Listen, Eric, I’m actually calling about Manny. I heard that someone from the association named Gerald Smith took all his hives, and I’m trying to find the guy. Can you get me his contact information?”

“Don’t know that name, but we have a lot of inactive members. Let me check and get back to you in about ten minutes.”

While I waited, I wandered upstairs into the choir loft. Most of the seniors were wearing shirts with playing cards on the front of them.

Grams gave me a wink. She had her trademark daisy in her hair and a fistful of queens, a very good place to be.

Sheepshead is an intense game. The players don’t chitchat much while they’re wheeling and dealing, so I was spared all the questions that might have come up