Death, Taxes, and Peach Sangria (15 page)

“Got a package for you, Margie,” he said, holding the box out to her.

She pushed her glasses back once again and glanced at the return address, a smile
spreading across her face. “Oh, good. That’s the toy train I ordered for my grandson’s
birthday. He’s going to love it.” She took the box and thanked the man, calling, “Take
care!” as he headed back out the door to the large brown truck parked out front.

After she stashed the box under the counter, the woman I now knew as Margie returned
her attention to me and the gun in my hand. “What do you think?”

I engaged in a brief mental debate. I already owned a .38, a pretty pearl-handled
model. But thirty bucks was an awfully good deal.
What the hell,
I decided. Between Nick dating other women, Beauregard escaping out his window, and
me striking out at the money transmitter offices, it had been a frustrating week.
Why not treat myself to a little pick-me-up? “I’ll take it.”

“Okeydokey,” Margie said, stepping back to look under the counter. “I’ll need you
to fill out a form first.” She pulled out a manila file folder and peeked inside.
“Nope. That’s not it.”

This woman was friendly enough, but she really needed some help in here, someone with
good organization skills. After five minutes of searching, she finally found the required
Form 4473 Firearms Transactions Record in a two-drawer filing cabinet pushed up against
the back wall. “Here you go.” She handed me the form and a ballpoint pen.

We chatted as I filled out the form. She told me she had five grandchildren, two boys
and three girls, all under the age of ten. The grandson who would be the happy recipient
of the toy train was turning seven on Saturday. She showed me his most recent school
photo, which she carried in her wallet. He was an endearing kid, all freckles, with
a gap-toothed grin.

I pronounced him a “cutie-pie.”

She gazed lovingly at the photograph. “He’s growing like a weed.”

My mother said the exact same thing about my nieces and nephews.

“What’s it like working for the IRS?” Margie asked as she put her wallet away.

“Never a dull moment,” I lied. Actually, there were lots of dull moments. Like all
afternoon when I’d been looking through transaction records at the money transmitter
offices.
Urk.
Talk about tedious. Still, among my job’s many dull moments were some interesting
ones, too. Some thrilling, some even terrifying. I’d been attacked with a box cutter
and shot at several times during my short tenure with the IRS. But, hey, I’d lived
to tell about it. All’s well that ends well, right?

“I can’t imagine all the paperwork you have to deal with,” she said.

“Luckily, most things are computerized these days.” I cocked my head. “Have you considered
updating your record-keeping systems here? It might make things easier to find if
you kept your records on a computer.”

“Oh, honey, I’m a hopeless case. My son once hooked up a computer in here, but it
was a complete disaster.” She shook her head and rolled her eyes in a self-deprecating
manner. “I tried and tried, but I couldn’t get the hang of it. Like they say, you
can’t teach an old dog new tricks.”

“You’re not such an old dog.” I offered her a smile.

She offered me one right back. “That’s kind of you to say. Me and technology, though,
we simply don’t get along. Sometimes I think I was born in the wrong century.”

Once I’d completed the form, she pulled a telephone out from under the counter. Holy
moly, the old-timey thing had a rotary dial. Coming into this shop was like stepping
back in time.

The woman dialed into the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, otherwise
known as NICS, as required by the Brady Bill. The law required her to verify that
I was not a convicted felon, drug addict, or adjudicated psychiatric risk, and thus
eligible to purchase a gun.

The Brady Bill came into being after Jim Brady, President Reagan’s press secretary,
was shot along with the president and two others in an assassination attempt. The
shooter, John Hinckley, Jr., bought the revolver he used in the shooting at a pawnshop
right here in Dallas. Weird how the city had so many links to presidential assassinations,
huh? Something in the water here must make people want to kill government officials.
Hinckley had given a false home address and used an old Texas driver’s license as
proof he lived in the state.

The guy had been arrested four days prior to the shooting at an airport in Nashville
when he’d attempted to board an American Airlines flight bound for New York with three
handguns and ammunition in his carry-on bag. Hinckley had also been under psychiatric
care before he’d bought the gun.

Though many people believed a three-day waiting period was required to purchase a
gun, such was not actually the case. After intense lobbying by the NRA, lawmakers
had caved and replaced the proposed waiting period with the instant background check
system. Thus I could take my gun home with me today. The gun nut in me was happy about
that. The law enforcement agent in me thought that perhaps a waiting period wouldn’t
be such a bad idea.

Margie and I chatted while she was on hold with NICS.

“I noticed the sign on the door,” I said. “This place has been in your family for
over sixty years?”

She nodded. “My grandpappy started the business back in the day; then my father took
over. I’m an only child, so when Daddy got too old to take care of the store he turned
it over to me and my husband to run.”

I wondered if Nick and I would get tired of each other if we not only worked together
but also dated. “Does it get tiresome?” I asked. “Working with your husband?”

“I never thought so,” she said wryly. “He must’ve felt differently, though. He took
off two years ago with some floozy he met right here in the store. She came in to
look at our jewelry selection and the next day he left me a note on the cash register
telling me he needed to go ‘find himself.’”

“Let me guess. He ‘found himself’ between the floozy’s thighs?”

“Exactly.”

We laughed together about her man troubles. Maybe someday I’d be able to laugh about
mine. Right now? Not so much.

The woman raised a finger to let me know an NICS agent had finally picked up the line.
She identified herself as Margie Bainbridge, the owner of Strike-it-Rich, then read
my information into the phone, rattling off my name, gender, and date and place of
birth. She was silent for a moment as she waited for a response. A few seconds later
she jotted down a transaction number and hung up the phone. “Good news,” she said.
“You’re approved.”

Goody, goody gumdrops.

I paid for my gun in cash.

“Nice chatting with you,” she said as she handed me a plastic bag with my gun in it.

“You, too. Have fun at your grandson’s birthday party.” I bade the woman a fond farewell.

chapter fourteen

Second Chances

Thursday evening, Alicia and I headed out in her sleek black Audi, once again tracking
Nick. Tonight he’d be taking out his ex-fiancée, Natalie. Nick had once loved the
woman enough to propose to her. I had to do what I could to make sure he didn’t fall
in love with her again.

I filled a thermos with peach sangria and brought it with me, sipping it as I pulled
up the GPS app on my phone. The dot on the map led us to a neighborhood of starter
homes in Irving. Nick’s truck was parked at the curb in front of Natalie’s house,
a one-story model with salmon-colored brick. White picket fencing outlined the flower
beds underneath her front windows. A whitewashed rocking chair sat on her front porch
next to a terra-cotta pot filled with yellow pansies. The front door bore a wreath
of autumn-colored silk leaves adorned with plastic pumpkins and wooden letters that
spelled: “HAPPY FALL, Y’ALL!”

Everything about the place indicated that Natalie was the Suzy Q Homemaker type. In
other words, my complete opposite.

Alicia and I drove by the house, circled the block, and drove by it again.

I narrowed my eyes as I looked at the pristine house. “I bet Natalie’s fridge is full
of fresh vegetables and homemade apple pie and milk that’s still within its expiration
date.” My fridge contained only a pitcher of peach sangria, a quart of skim milk that
smelled iffy, and something green and fuzzy that had once been either a lemon or a
kiwi. I’d gone to throw it out earlier but had instead slammed the crisper closed
when the thing seemed to move on its own.

I turned to my friend as we drove past the house a third time. “You think that’s what
Nick wants? A woman who will take care of him? Cook and clean and all that?” If so,
our relationship would be doomed. I could hit a target from a hundred yards and take
down a man half again my size, but when it came to domestic skills I was sorely lacking.

“I don’t know,” Alicia said. “He does still live with his mother, so yeah, maybe that’s
what he wants.”

I cut angry eyes her way. “Lie to me next time, okay?”

“Absolutely not.” She cut her eyes back at me. “Best friends are always honest with
each other. Even when it hurts.”

Natalie’s front door opened and she and Nick walked out onto the porch. Natalie was
dressed in ballet flats, a long skirt that flowed loosely around her ankles, and a
white sweater set. She looked prim and proper, perhaps even prudish.

Nick had once planned to spend the rest of his life with this woman. Why? If you asked
me, she looked straightlaced and boring.

Alicia punched the gas before they could spot us. We turned the corner and waited
on the next block with the engine running. A couple minutes later we consulted the
GPS map and headed after them, following them to a nearby Tex-Mex restaurant. Apparently
Nick had a hankering for chimichangas tonight. I hoped the night wouldn’t end with
him slipping Natalie his beef enchilada.

We sat at the end of the lot and watched them walk inside. Nick held the door open
for Natalie and put a hand on her lower back as he followed her in. A familiar gesture.
Not surprising, I guess. The two had once been very familiar with each other.

I felt a twinge of pain at the thought of Nick being intimate with another woman,
that corkscrew in my heart again.
It didn’t work out between them before,
I reminded myself.
Maybe they’re only getting together to talk about old times.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t much good at convincing myself this date would go nowhere.
Maybe the timing had been wrong earlier, but now it would be right. Maybe whatever
had gone wrong had reconciled itself. Maybe things had changed and their relationship
would work the second time around. It happened often enough, right? Heck, my own parents
had split up for a while before tying the knot.

Was it possible I wasn’t the woman for Nick, after all? Was it possible I was only
his Candy Cummings?

What a kick in the pants that would be.

Alicia and I debated tactics, deciding it would be too suspicious if either of us
went inside the restaurant. Running into Nick two nights in a row in a city as big
as Dallas could never be passed off as mere coincidence. But thanks to modern technology,
I could interrupt his date without having to step foot in the place.

Neener-neener, Natalie-ner.

I closed the GPS app and sent Nick a text.
Bought a new gun. Want 2 hit the range tomorrow?

How’s that for chalupas interruptus?

A few seconds later Nick’s terse reply arrived.
Sure.

I texted back:
I’m going to buy ammo. Need any?

This time his response didn’t come for two minutes.
No thanx.

The new gun’s a Cobra .38.

I waited three minutes, but Nick didn’t respond. I felt a stirring of panic in my
gut. I wished I had an extra-large flyswatter so I could put a quick end to Gnatalie.
I put my thumbs to work again.
The gun’s red. Really cool.

No response.

Got a good deal at a pawnshop.

Still no response.

A sick feeling oozed through me. Nick was ignoring me. And not just ignoring me, but
ignoring me so that he could interact with his former bride-to-be, the wholesome princess
of fresh vegetables and unexpired milk and seasonal door wreaths.

My thumbs desperately worked the keys on my phone.
Only paid 30 bucks.

Nothing.

Terror wrapped its hand around my throat and squeezed.

“What should I do?” I asked Alicia. “This isn’t working.” I supposed I could lob a
Molotov cocktail into the restaurant. After all, I knew how to make them now and could
easily improvise one by shoving my day-of-the-week panties into the top of the sangria-filled
thermos and igniting it with the car’s cigarette lighter. But I wasn’t sure that trying
to extinguish Nick’s old flame warranted a felony arson conviction.

“Maybe I could call in a bomb threat,” I said, thinking out loud. Unfortunately, a
bomb threat would also be a felony.

After more thought, I settled for sending Nick a link to a Web site about bedbugs.
If he’d had any thoughts about taking Natalie to bed tonight, the thought of those
nasty bloodsuckers taking a bite of his bare ass ought to having him thinking twice
about getting naked with her. I followed it up with a text that read:
Oops! I meant to send that to someone else.

“You’re an evil genius,” Alicia said. “It kind of scares me sometimes.”

“It kind of scares me, too.” If not for my Baptist upbringing, I probably could have
turned to the dark side.

We waited and waited, growing bored and turning to YouTube to occupy our time. We
watched all of the Simon’s Cat cartoons, viewed some music videos, laughed at some
clever movie spoofs. Really, how did people entertain themselves before the Internet
and smartphones?

“You know,” I said to Alicia, “Nick, Josh, and Lu have had success with that dating
service. If you’re serious about putting yourself back on the market, maybe you should
give it a try.”