Chapter 10
“Let’s look alive, everybody!” Miss Moody called as she lifted her camera to snap another picture. “The light out here is somethin’ special this morning, for true. Smile pretty now.”
It was just past seven, and the morning sun was low over the water, turning the marsh grass gold.
Adeline sat cross-legged on a blanket near the edge of the construction site with Herman nestled on her forearm, his tentacles loosely curled and his bubble eyes half-closed in contentment.
Around her, the eight centenarian protesters had arranged themselves in a semicircle, their signs propped up beside them.
Mrs. Abernathy had claimed the folding chair Emory brought and was knitting what appeared to be a tiny sweater in electric purple yarn.
“Is that for the squish-squid?” Adeline asked.
“It gets chilly out here in the mornings,” Mrs. Abernathy said, not looking up from her needles. “The little darlings deserve to be warm.”
Emory sat on the blanket next to Adeline with her guitar across her lap, strumming something folksy and slow. A few of the centenarians had started humming along.
“The squish-squids are our friends,” Artie suddenly sang in a warbling tenor. “Ivan is a mean old troll…who needs to fall down a hole.”
“That barely even rhymes,” Princess Muffin Top said from her perch atop the bulldozer.
“It does too rhyme,” Artie insisted.
“Not really,” Princess Muffin Top countered.
Miss Moody weaved through the group in her wide-brimmed hat, snapping photos and scribbling notes on a pad.
“‘Dis the kind of thing that makes people sit up and pay attention, for true.” She straightened and turned her camera toward the squish-squids playing in the shallow water near the bank. A cluster of them were chasing each other in small circles. “They odd lookin’, but they do good things and got heart.”
The first of the construction workers arrived around seven-thirty. Three men in hard hats climbed out of a truck, took one look at the sit-in, and stopped.
“Morning, boys,” Artie called out. “Pull up a chair.”
The foreman sighed and pulled out his phone. “Sorry, guys. But I have to call Ivan.”
“Tell him we said hello,” Princess Muffin Top called from the bulldozer.
The other workers stood around while they waited, and to Adeline’s delight, a couple of them actually wandered closer and started listening to Emory play. One of the younger guys was even tapping his foot. Another one crouched down near the water and watched the squish-squids play.
“They’re kind of cool,” the young worker said.
“They’re essential,” Adeline corrected.
Ten minutes later, Ivan’s truck came barreling down the gravel road. Adeline recognized it...what she hadn’t expected to see was all the glitter. The entire driver’s side of Ivan’s truck had been spray-painted in shimmering, pink glitter. Big, looping letters spelled out SAVE THE SQUISH-SQUIDS.
Ivan threw his door open and jumped out. Behind him, Chief Wolfe’s Tahoe pulled up, and Officer Casswell stepped out of the passenger side as well.
“You think this is funny?” Ivan screamed, jabbing a finger at the crowd. “You think this is some kind of joke? Well, this time you’ve gone too far. Someone went onto my property and spray-painted my truck!”
“To be fair,” Princess Muffin Top said, “it’s an improvement.”
“I’ve had it!” Ivan stomped toward Adeline, fists clenched. “You and your weirdo friends think you can just do whatever you want? I’m the laughingstock of this town because of you!”
“Now, now,” Mrs. Abernathy said, not looking up from her knitting. “You’re making yourself the laughingstock, Ivan. Nobody’s doing that to you.”
“You’re just a bunch of amateur thugs,” Ivan insisted.
Mrs. Abernathy scoffed. “Those new-model Cats have the battery tucked up behind the hydraulic reservoir. That’s not something an amateur would think to look for, Ivan.”
“All right,” Chief Wolfe said, stepping between Ivan and the protesters. “Everyone needs to calm down.”
“I am calm!” Ivan shouted.
Chief Wolfe ignored him and looked at Adeline. “Ms. Beaumont.”
“Chief Wolfe,” she said sweetly. “Fancy meeting you here.”
“You can’t keep doing this.”
“Doing what? Sitting peacefully in a marsh with my friends and a guitar?”
He looked at the blankets, the folding chairs, the knitting, the guitar. He then looked at Princess Muffin Top grooming herself on top of Ivan’s bulldozer and shook his head. “This is a construction site.”
“This is a marsh,” Adeline corrected. “It was a marsh before it was a construction site.”
She saw his lips twitch, and she was sure he was trying not to smile. And that made her stomach flip-flop.
“Obviously Ivan’s truck was vandalized last night,” he said. “Same glitter paint as the bulldozer.”
“I was home all night,” she said. “You can ask Princess Muffin Top.”
“I’m not asking the cat,” Chief Wolfe said dryly.
“She’s very credible,” Adeline countered.
“She’s currently sitting on evidence,” he said, pointing toward the bulldozer.
Adeline laughed. “You have me there.”
“Can you please pack up and take everyone home?” he asked. “I’ll deal with Ivan and the vandalism. But I need you to not be here when the crew starts work.”
Adeline pursed her lips. “I guess we—”
“You’re done, Beaumont!” Ivan said, pushing his way through the centenarian protesters. “I’m going to make sure the council shuts down your little bakery and your little protests and your little—”
“Now that’s just low, Ivan,” Princess Muffin Top said. “Threatening a woman’s bakery? Adeline, don’t just stand there. Throw something at him.”
Adeline bent down and scooped up a handful of mud.
She didn’t plan it. She really didn’t. But Ivan was red-faced and screaming about her bakery—her bakery, the thing she’d built with her own two hands and her own magic—and Princess Muffin Top had said to throw something, and the marsh mud was right there, cool and thick between her fingers.
“Adeline,” Chief Wolfe said, “don’t do—”
She flung it. Hard. The glob hit Ivan square in the face with a satisfying splat, and the marsh went dead silent.
Ivan slowly brought his hand up to his face and wiped away most of the mud. Rage flashed in his eyes as he stood there staring at her.
“Oh, that was magnificent,” Mrs. Abernathy whispered.
“I want to press charges!” Ivan finally sputtered, whirling toward Chief Wolfe. “Assault! You saw it! Everyone saw it!”
Chief Wolfe shook his head and sighed.
“I saw it,” Artie said. “We’ll be talking about it for years.”
“We all saw it,” Miss Moody said, snapping one more picture of Ivan. “And it’s goin’ be on the front page, for true.”
Chief Wolfe reached for his handcuffs. “Ms. Beaumont, you have—”
“I know, I know.” Adeline brushed the mud off her hands as Herman cooed in distress from the murky water.
“It’s okay, little guy.” She tried not to wince as Chief Wolfe slapped on the cuffs.
When her magic continued to hum inside her, she was pleased to know he hadn’t slapped on the PADA-issued cuffs that temporarily subdued her magic. “Mommy’s going to jail again.”
“Didn’t we talk about the handcuffs last night, Adeline?” Emory called from the blanket, grinning from ear to ear.
“Did you shave your legs again?” Mrs. Abernathy asked.
“Take the top bunk,” Artie advised.
Chief Wolfe gently took her arm and guided her toward the Tahoe.
Princess Muffin Top jumped down from the bulldozer and fell into step beside them, tail high...head even higher. And then she started singing. “I shot the sheriff...” Her voice rang out across the marsh, loud and proud and completely off-key.
“You know I’m not a sheriff, right?” Chief Wolfe said.
Princess Muffin Top didn’t miss a beat. “But I did not shoot the deputy!”
Officer Casswell, standing by the Tahoe, pressed her lips together so hard they went white.
Adeline knew she was trying not to laugh.
She slid into the back seat, and Princess Muffin Top jumped in after her and kept singing.
In the distance, Emory and Artie had picked up the chorus, and then Miss Moody, and then the centenarians, their joint voices carrying across the marsh.
Chief Wolfe dropped into the driver’s seat and gripped the steering wheel with both hands. He sat there a while before turning the key. “I had a perfectly good career with PADA.”
“And now you have us,” Adeline said brightly from the back seat.
He pulled onto the gravel road without another word.