Part 27 (2/2)
”Um, so is this, Belinda.”
”Oh, please, honey,” she said, shading her eyes from the sun. ”These little girls care more about what's in the cooler after the game than the score. And these parents don't know a goal from a goose. You are a babysitter with a whistle. Get over yourself.”
Couldn't have put it better myself.
”What's up?” I asked.
”Moe's done and gone and disappeared.”
”Like, from the fields?”
”Like, from Rose Petal.”
Tara Little started crying and ran past me to her parents. We were now down a Fightin' Mermaid.
”Since when?”
”Today's Sat.u.r.day,” she said, swiping again at the sweat covering her face. ”Last anyone saw him was Wednesday.”
”Maybe he went on vacation,” I said.
”Nope.”
”Maybe he's taking a long nap.”
”Deuce. I am not kidding.”
The pimple-faced referee blew his whistle, and the girls ran faster than they'd run the entire game. They sprinted past me to the bleachers, where a cooler full of drinks and something made entirely of sugar awaited them. Serious soccer players, these little girls.
I took a deep breath, tired from yelling and baking in the sun, and adjusted the visor on my head. ”Okay. So he's missing.”
She nodded, oceans of sweat cascading down her chubby face. ”And there's something else you should know.”
I watched the girls, red-faced and exhausted, sitting next to each other on the metal bleachers, sucking down juice boxes, munching on cookies, and swinging their legs back and forth.
There were worse ways to spend a Sat.u.r.day.
”What's that?” I asked.
”Seventy-three thousand bucks,” Belinda said.
”What? What are you talking about?”
She s.h.i.+fted her enormous body from one tree stump of a leg to the other.
”Moe's missing,” Belinda said. ”And he took seventy-three thousand dollars with him.”
2.
”All the summer and fall registration fees,” Belinda said. ”Gone.”
The girls were now chasing one another, the parents were chatting, and Belinda and I were sitting on the bottom of the bleachers.
”How is that possible?” I asked. ”He just walked away with that much in cash?”
”The bank accounts are empty,” she said. ”They were full on Tuesday. Before he disappeared.”
”Could be a coincidence.”
”And I could be a ballerina,” she said, raising an eyebrow. ”It ain't a coincidence, Deuce.”
No, it probably wasn't a coincidence. She was right about that.
”Don't you guys have some sort of control in place for that kind of thing?” I asked. ”I mean, with the accounts. Multiple signatures or something like that?”
She shook her head. ”Nope. Last year, when Moe was reelected, he demanded full oversight. The board didn't like it, but he said he'd walk without it. So they gave it to him.”
”Why did he want it?”
”No clue.”
I spied Carly attaching herself to Julianne's leg. She was crying. Carly, not Julianne. Crying had become common after soccer games, the result of too much sugar and some physical exertion. It was less about being upset with something and more about it just being time to get home.
”I want to hire you, Deuce,” she said. ”We want to hire you. The board. To find him and the money. You and that little dwarf, or whatever he is.”
A smile formed on my lips. I wished Victor was there to hear her description of him.
”I'll need to talk to Victor,” I told her. ”The little dwarf. To make sure he's okay with it.”
”You two got so much work you're turning away business?”
As a matter of fact, we did. Or rather, Victor did. Since our initial escapade, people had been seeking us out left and right. My agreement with Victor allowed me the flexibility to work only when I wanted to. Fortunately, he'd been more than capable of handling most of the work and I'd been left alone to play Mr. Mom to Carly.
”No,” I said, attempting to be diplomatic. ”But we don't take anything on unless both of us agree.”
She thought about that for a moment, then nodded.
Then her stomach growled.
”There's one more thing,” she said.
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