A Flock and a Fluke (Clucks and Clues Cozy Mysteries)

  A Flock and a Fluke

  A Clucks and Clues Mystery Book 2

  #

  Hillary Avis

  Published by Hilyard Press, Eugene, OR

  ©2020 Hillary Avis www.hillaryavis.com

  All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real people, places, events, or organizations is purely coincidental, and all are the creation of the author.

  Cover by Mariah Sinclair www.mariahsinclair.com

  For permissions contact: books@hilyardpress.com

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  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  Saturday before Easter, Day 1

  “I don’t know why I let you talk me into this,” I said over my shoulder to my usually best friend and currently worst enemy, Ruth Chapman. The crowd pressed us forward and I grudgingly dropped my five-dollar bill into the coffee can and collected a paper scroll tied with a yellow ribbon from the table of Girl Scout volunteers who were set up in front of the bank.

  Ruth dropped her money in the can, too. Her wild, springy curls danced in the spring breeze as she plucked her own scroll from the table. “Come on—this is exciting! What else do you have to do, anyway?”

  I could think about a million better ways to spend a Saturday morning than running around town looking for pieces of plastic, but I chose the most pressing one. “I need to get my egg order ready for the Rx Café. They’re planning a big Easter brunch tomorrow and ordered twice as many as usual.”

  I was new to the egg business. My flock of hens at Lucky Cluck Farm started laying only six weeks ago. While their eggs were beautiful and perfect in my eyes, they were still pullet-sized, about two-thirds the size they’d be at full maturity. But happily, I’d already found a faithful regular customer for them in the small café that was attached to the pharmacy downtown. The little eggs were perfect for scrambles, omelets, and in pancakes and baked goods—plus, I sold them at a discount. I hoped that in the coming months, as the eggs became larger and more uniform in size, the Rx Café’s owner, Sara, would raise her egg budget.

  “Oh, hush. Sara already got her eggs for today and she won’t need more until tomorrow. You have plenty of time.” Ruth rolled her eyes at me and nudged me toward the podium that was set up in front of City Hall, right across the street from the Do or Dye, Ruth’s bohemian hair salon. The brick building had three front doors because it served as the fire station and sheriff’s office, too. Honeytree, Oregon, was too small to have its own police force. Even the mayor was only part-time, and the fire department was all volunteer.

  As I leaned to see between the heads of the people in front of me, I spotted Eli Ramirez, the sheriff’s chief deputy assigned to this part of the county, doing some crowd control.

  “Take a few steps back, now,” he said, flashing a grin when he spotted me. I blushed even though I had no real reason to. Eli and I had dated some four decades ago, but life had taken us on different paths in the intervening years. After high school, he’d joined the Marines and I’d opted for a glamorous life in Beverly Hills. Now that I was back in town, he was sure we were meant to be together, but I was pretty sure I was meant to be alone. We compromised by being friends with a dash of flirtation.

  Eli’s attention turned back to the growing group of townspeople and tourists, all eagerly clutching their beribboned scrolls. “You can stand in the street, folks, but keep the sidewalks clear for pedestrians.”

  Only in Honeytree was it A-OK to block Main Street in order to announce the rules for a dang Easter Egg Scramble.

  “This is silly,” I muttered. “What are we waiting for?”

  “Pastor Cal and his wife are hiding the treasure eggs,” Ruth explained. “They couldn’t hide them too early because they didn’t want people out hunting before the Scramble officially started. That’d ruin the fun.”

  The treasure eggs were new this year, or so Ruth had told me. The old Scramble, back when I was a kid and my dad supplied all the Easter eggs to the city, was held in the back garden of the Methodist church. The eggs were real, hardboiled in the school cafeteria, and dyed by the nice ladies in the Friends of the Library. When I was a teen, the Friends switched to plastic eggs with candy inside due to food safety concerns, much to my father’s chagrin. But this year, the mayor was taking things to a whole new level.

  The kids would still have their plastic-egg Scramble, but now the adults would have one, too. Twenty eggs, hidden around town, were filled with codes that could be redeemed for cash at the bank. Clues to their locations were listed on the scrolls that we all clutched in our hands as we waited for the official word that we could open them and begin the search. The idea was that a yearly treasure hunt would bring some much-needed tourism to our small town and inject a little cash into local business. Judging by the number of unfamiliar faces in the crowd, it had worked.

  I spotted Pastor Cal weaving his way toward the podium and breathed a sigh of relief. This would all be over soon.

  He cleared his throat, straightened his pale blue tie, and bent over the microphone. “Good morning, all.”

  “Good morning, Pastor Cal,” the crowd chorused, even Ruth.

  I elbowed her gently. “He’s not your pastor.”

  She looked at me all gooey-eyed. “He’s everyone’s pastor,” she said.

  Scanning the crowd, I had to admit she was right. All of Honeytree seemed enchanted by the young—well, relatively young—charismatic pastor. There was no shortage of churches in town, but his pews overflowed on Sunday. People hung on his every word. I was sure that had nothing to do with the fact that he looked like Jack Kennedy and was married to a woman who looked like Marilyn but had Jackie’s poise and style.

  “Amelia’s been held up, but we’ll start shortly. As soon as she gets here.” He smiled broadly, his All-American white teeth glinting in the bright morning, instantly putting me at ease. It was no wonder that support for his mayoral campaign was growing. One could easily imagine him as president, let alone mayor.

  A woman leaned between him and the mic. It was the current mayor, Margie Morrow, squeezed into a pink tweed skirt-suit. Her teased, dye-box-red bob quivered as she glared up at him. “I don’t think it’s necessary to wait on her. She’s probably just in the ladies’ room. We don’t want to hold up the hunt, do we?”

  Something in Pastor Cal’s expression chilled, although the smile never left his face. “Sure, Marge. Whatever you say.”

  She shooed him backward a few steps and then turned to face the crowd. “Friends,” she said warmly into the
microphone, holding out her hands toward us. I snorted. If I knew one thing, it was that Margie Morrow wasn’t my friend. Even in high school, when I was a perky cheerleader full of school spirit and she was student council president, we weren’t friends.

  “Why’s Marge-in-Charge trying to be nice?” I asked Ruth under my breath.

  “You be nice,” Ruth admonished. “At least she’s trying.”

  Margie, having stretched out her dramatic pause long enough that people began murmuring restlessly, continued. “I’m so glad you all came to our little Scramble. In your hands, you hold the key to the treasure...all you need now is a pair of sharp eyes. Searching must be accomplished on foot, please. We don’t want reckless drivers tearing around town.”

  For some reason, it felt like she was talking to me personally. I have a little bit of a reputation for my lead foot. What can I say? I like the feeling of wind in my hair.

  “Stay off private property and leave everything as you find it. Only one other rule—conduct yourselves like ladies and gentlemen. If you don’t, your prize will be revoked by the sheriff.” Margie motioned to Eli, who stepped toward the mic.

  “You won’t be allowed to redeem your prize code if you’ve engaged in any unethical behavior. No cheating, stealing, or fighting, please. Remember, this is Honeytree, where life is sweet.” He recited the town motto with a hint of irony quirking the corner of his mouth. I might be the only one who spotted it. “I’ll be at the bank all day to ensure civility,” he added.

  An official announcement that there would be no sheriff patrol today? The criminals in town must be rejoicing. It might be time to take my little Porsche convertible out of the barn for some drag racing on the flat stretch of highway in front of my farm. I smirked and looked around to see if anyone else was thinking the same thing, but the crowd seemed more intent on what the mayor would say next.

  Margie held up one finger. “Oh, and before we begin, don’t forget to vote Morrow for Mayor on May twelfth during our special mayoral election. Every vote counts!” she chirped. Behind her, Pastor Cal opened his mouth, presumably to plug his own campaign, but before he could get in a word, Margie clapped her hands. “On your marks, get set, go!”

  A frenzy of chatter broke out. Ruth and I hurriedly untied our ribbons to look at the clues as all those around us did the same. I scanned the sheet of paper as quickly as I could. Each of the twenty eggs had a short, one-line clue. They were divided by color: red eggs were valued at $100, blue eggs at $500, and one golden egg held a code for a whopping $1000.

  My eyes nearly popped, and I heard gasps from others in the crowd, too, as they saw the amounts.

  “I told you,” Ruth said, her eyes dancing with excitement. “This is going to be fun.”

  I skipped the lower-value clues and read the first blue-egg clue aloud. “Near or far, or at the bar, you’ll find me where U are.” I instantly knew where the egg was hidden. “It’s the U-Turn Tavern!”

  I grabbed Ruth’s handknit cardigan sleeve and ran south down Second Street toward the dusty old cinderblock building with “U-Turn Here” painted in faded letters on the side. The dive bar wasn’t called the U-Turn anymore—now it had some other name—but it’d been U-Turn for so long that people still called it that.

  To my dismay, about twenty other people had deciphered the clue at the same time and barreled ahead of us. I guess two fifty-something women who eat a lot of apple pie and prefer chatting by a bonfire to doing Pilates aren’t exactly Olympic athletes. Ruth and I slowed to a stop and watched the pack of rabid egg hunters scour the building’s exterior and the thin strip of landscaping that separated the U-Turn from the highway. Then, a pimply young guy in a saggy gray T-shirt who’d been investigating the gutter downspouts held up a blue egg triumphantly.

  “Found it!” he hollered across the parking lot.

  There was a lot of muttering and cursing as all of the folks who’d been searching the bushes pulled out their scrolls and tried to decipher the next clue.

  “We’re not going to win a foot race,” I said to Ruth. “We need to be strategic so we’re not trying to outpace the Roadrunner. Maybe there’ll be less competition for the hundred-dollar eggs.”

  She nodded, scanning her scroll. “How about this one? It’s a red egg. ‘Under here, you’re without fear. Unless Coach Randall is near.’”

  “High school bleachers,” I said instantly. I couldn’t help darting a glance over my shoulder at Eli, who was strolling from City Hall toward the bank, an amused expression on his face as he watched the Scramble chaos around him. He and I had spent plenty of time making out under those bleachers between classes. Heck, sometimes during classes. The memory was so strong, I could almost taste the Doublemint gum that he always chewed.

  Coach Randall never caught us kissing, but we lived in fear of him. With one word, he could kick Eli off the football team for cutting class. One jingle of his keys in the distance, and we were running for our lives. “That’s way across town. You couldn’t pay me a hundred bucks to run that far—remember, we have to run back, too. Our best bet is to pick the hardest clue and hope nobody else figures it out.”

  “Cross your fingers the golden egg is hidden closer,” Ruth said, grinning. “I bet the gold clue is the toughest one.”

  I nodded and read the clue aloud. “It ain’t over ’til it’s over. We’ve got you covered.” Then I laughed. It couldn’t be that easy.

  “What does it mean?” Ruth’s forehead creased. “‘It ain’t over’? Is that some business that is closed? Or maybe the construction site on D Street? That project is taking forever.”

  I shook my head as I discreetly checked to see if anyone was heading in the direction I thought the egg was hidden. A couple of groups from the U-Turn Tavern splintered off toward the school, and others, who’d undoubtedly worked out another clue, ran uphill toward the Church of the Everlasting. Of course, Pastor Cal and Amelia had hidden one of the eggs at their home church. But nobody seemed to have solved the golden egg clue—yet.

  “‘We’ve got you covered,’” Ruth mused. “That could refer to insurance coverage.”

  “Hey!” A skinny woman with dark hair in two long, equally skinny braids waved her arms and called to her friend across the street. “This lady says there’s one at the insurance place!” The two of them made a mad dash down the street toward the blue building with striped awnings that advertised the Honeytree slogan with a twist: “Life is Sweet...When You’re Insured.”

  “I don’t want people to see where we’re going,” I murmured, and Ruth gave a quick nod.

  “I give up! Let’s go get a milkshake,” she said, her tone dejected but her voice loud enough to carry down the block. She crammed her scroll in the back pocket of her jeans. I grinned and did the same with my clues. Those years Ruth spent onstage doing school plays hadn’t gone to waste.

  Arm-in-arm, we strolled down the block and turned onto the highway like we were going to follow it to the diner for a bite to eat. But we didn’t. As soon as we were far enough that it was clear nobody was watching us, I pulled Ruth onto the side street by the library.

  I kept my voice low even though the street was empty, quickening my pace as we got closer to where I knew the egg was hidden. “You know how they moved the covered bridge over here?” The historic wooden bridge had once been designed for horse carts in its youth, and then even cars and log trucks trundled across one at a time, when we were kids. Now deeming it structurally unsound for loads that heavy, the city council had voted to move the bridge for use as a pedestrian walkway between the library and the public baseball field where a small creek divided the two properties.

  Ruth nodded. “The egg can’t be there, though. The bridge is closed until they build the on-ramps.”

  “Exactly! It ain’t over—over the creek—until it’s over. Until the construction is finished,” I explained.

  “Then it says, ‘We’ve got you covered.’ I guess that’s just because it’s a covered bridge?”

/>   “Maybe. Or maybe it’s another clue to where the egg is hidden.”

  I glanced over my shoulder as we entered the library parking lot. Nobody was following us, but it was only a matter of time until someone else deciphered the clue. We needed to work fast if we were going to uncover that egg. I broke into a jog and Ruth followed me, one arm clamped over her chest so her ample assets wouldn’t smack her in the chin.

  “Oh no,” Ruth wailed as we neared the bridge. We halted, dismayed by the scene in front of us. The bridge was totally cordoned off with chain link fencing. Signs posted on it said, “Stay Out — Under Construction — Trespassers Prosecuted.” There was no way to reach any part of the structure without disobeying the signs, and I had a feeling that disobeying city signage fell under Marge Morrow’s definition of uncivilized behavior.

  “Maybe it is at the insurance office,” Ruth mused.

  “No.” I shook my head stubbornly, narrowing my eyes as I scanned the area. “It has to be here somewhere.”

  I began searching the bottom of the fence line where clumps of Bermuda grass had grown up around some of the posts. It was temporary fencing, but like all the other construction projects in town, the bridge walkway build had been delayed due to heavy spring rains. The breeze whipped up again, swirling my blonde-and-silver ponytail and pushing a few dark, fluffy clouds over the sun. The weather could change so quickly this time of year—sometimes it seemed we got four seasons per day. A couple of warning drops fell onto my back.

  “Oregon liquid sunshine,” Ruth remarked, stooping beside me to join me in my search. “We better find this egg before it opens up, or we’ll be running for cover.”

  I stood up abruptly. “We’re looking in the wrong place.”

  “How do you know?”

  “‘We’ve got you covered.’ We’re not covered here. We can’t go on the bridge to get out of the rain, so where could we go?”

  “The library?” Ruth suggested.

  “No—the clue is definitely pointing to the bridge. But if we can’t go on the bridge, it can still cover us!”