Chapter 18
Eighteen
The mayor’s float is a winter wonderland scene with frosted pine trees, inflatable Emperor penguins, and twinkling blue snowflakes.
“Holly.” Mayor Thornberry nods curtly as we climb to our spots.
“Ivan,” I say, firing back with the same sassy energy.
“Your dress blends in with the float.” He gestures to the icy-blue backdrop. “No one can see you. Probably for the best.”
I smile sweetly, my gaze flicking to the gemstone embedded in his bolo tie. “Nice sapphire. Sale at the dollar store?”
Straightening his bolo tie, Mayor Thornberry brushes past me. “Merry Christmas,” he says, then mutters something nasty under his breath.
I frown. “What’d you say to me?”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You muttered something that sounded suspiciously like ‘twatwaffle.’”
“Oh that,” he dismisses me with a cavalier wave of his hand, “I said ‘hot waffle.’”
I prop my hand on my hip. “I hope you didn’t just call me a ‘hot waffle.’ That’s sexual harassment, you know.”
Mayor Thornberry snorts. “Don’t flatter yourself. If you were any kind of waffle, you would never be a hot one. Lukewarm, yes. Hot?” He looks me up and down, sneering. “Not in that monstrosity you call a dress. Not that it’s any of your business, but I said ‘I could really go for a hot waffle.’”
“No… I’m pretty sure you just called me a ‘twatwaffle.’”
“You’re hearing things, Holly,” he says. “Not everything is about you.”
I gesture to the food stalls at the Christmas market. “There’s literally no waffle stall. You should know. You approved the vendors’ permits yourself.”
Mayor Thornberry sniffs, looking affronted. “Well, there should be. I’d give my kingdom for a hot waffle.”
“Places people! Five minutes till show time,” the parade organizer waltzes past us, simultaneously speaking into her headpiece. “Hey!” She barks at Elliot as he hops onto the float. “You can’t be here.”
“Five seconds.” He holds up his hand. “I just need to give her this…” Elliot joins me in the back and dumps a bouquet of bright red poinsettias in my arms.
“You got me flowers?” I melt at the gesture. “They’re beautiful.”
“Remember what we talked about?” Elliot lowers his voice, his eyes scanning every fake tree and plastic penguin.
“I scoped out every inch of the route. The security detail is a joke. There is no security detail. So I want you to wear this…” He hands me an ear piece and taps the matching one already hooked to his ear.
“There’s a receiver in your bouquet. Test the signal for me. ”
“You’ve got to be kidding. You’ve wired my flowers?”
“I’ll be your eyes and ears on the ground,” he says, fiddling with his earpiece. “One. Two. Three. Do you copy?”
“We’re only rolling by at five miles per hour,” I remind him. “We can probably talk to each other if you follow the float.”
“Not with all this Christmas music,” he says. “Put it in your earpiece. Just to ease my mind. One. Two. Three. Do you copy?”
“Copy.”
Satisfied, Elliot tips his head up and frowns at the fake trees.
As far as floats go, the mayor’s float is a local high school effort.
Catching sight of the inflatable penguin, Elliot’s frown deepens.
“I don’t like the looks of that thing,” he says, recalling the penguin from his dream.
“Can we get someone to move it away from you?”
“It’s glued down.” I check over my shoulder to find Mayor Thornberry watching us with a sneer. “Got a problem?”
“Your thug boyfriend isn’t supposed to be here,” he says. “If he doesn’t leave, I’m calling Janet.”
“It’s just like you to tattle.”
“Janet!” He motions to the parade organizer. “We’ve got riffraff on the float.”
Petty jerk. To think I thought he was a good man. He’s a crap man. Crap!
“He called me a ‘twatwaffle’ earlier,” I tell Elliot, earning the first real smile out of him today. “Tried to play it off like he wanted a ‘hot waffle’, but I know what I heard. Nobody actually craves a hot waffle.”
Elliot glances at the food stalls. “I could go for a hot waffle.”
“Seriously?”
“No.” He glares at Mayor Thornberry. “So ‘twatwaffle,’ eh? That’s a new one. Remind me to beat him up later.”
“Then you’ll actually be my thug boyfriend.”
Janet marches up to us, clipboard clutched to her chest. “Hey! You! Get off the float.”
Pointing discreetly to his earpiece, Elliot squeezes my hand. “Be vigilant.”
His touch is a warm pulse of strength. “I will.”
“Anytime now!” Janet barks at him over the signal of trumpets.
Reluctantly, Elliot releases my hand and hops off the float.
He jogs back to the huddle of spectators on the street, never breaking eye contact with me.
“Cue the band,” Janet speaks into her walkie talkie. “Go! Go! Go!”
The Mapledale High School marching band kicks off the parade. The route takes us from the northern most part of Main Street, around the traffic circle, and stops just short of Hyacinth Way, the first borough of neighborhoods.
The mayor’s float is fifth in line behind the marching band, the sheriff’s three horse calvary, a squad of jazz dancers, and several club-sponsored inflatables passing off as floats.
I suspect the town got a steep discount on some ancient Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade balloons that didn’t pass muster.
The mayor’s float is one of the best floats in the event, but we’re still a long shot from Rose Parade quality.
For five suspenseful minutes, our float stalls until Janet wrangles a few high school volunteers to help her push. With a heave, we’re crawling down Main Street at five miles per hour.
Clutching my poinsettia bouquet and plastering on my brightest smile, I began waving like a beauty contestant while the marching band’s horn section blasts Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.
The shops along Main Street are decked out in Christmas lights and decorative garland.
A net of glimmering blue lights forms a canopy over the parade.
I spot my mom and Aunt Cherry camped in lawn chairs, sharing a giant flannel throw.
Uncle Tony is sprawled in his own lawn chair, headphones on, scrolling through his phone.
He could be at home for all the interest he shows in the festivities.
In front of the yellow facade of The Honey Latte Lounge, Paige and Manny are in mid-conversation. Manny is still in uniform (I guess the poor guy will be working double overtime this week) while Paige smiles over a cup of coffee. They both look up and wave at me as my float passes by.
As it’s not yet cold enough to snow, fake snow machines placed at strategic intervals on the parade route showers us in white. Polymer snow flakes douse us from above and blasts us from the side. Despite the amateurish floats, Mapledale spares no expense on snowfalls.
“The usual suspects are accounted for,” Elliot’s garbled voice says in my ear. “Victor and his family are camped on the park island in the middle of the traffic circle. Mullet man sighting at three o’clock by the food trucks.”
“What’s he buying?” I ask through my frozen smile.
“A hot waffle,” he says. “Doused in sliced strawberries and chocolate syrup.”
“Seriously?” I glance at Mayor Thornberry. So he was actually craving a hot waffle after all… “There’s a hot waffle food truck?”
My stomach growls. Damn it. I’m craving one too.
“Jen just appeared by my mom,” I say, attempting to distract myself from my hunger.
I peer to my left and spot Elliot, his green trench coat fluttering behind him as he dodges the crowd to keep pace with my float. He would jog alongside like a secret service member if the streets weren’t roped off.
I return my attention to Jen. She’s gesticulating wildly in front of our mom. Another heated argument, as per usual with my sister. Every conversation with Jen is a heated argument. I roll my eyes. What’s Jen whining about now?
“But I don’t see Brian with her,” I observe.
“Noted.” Elliot scans the crowd. “Brian is noticeably absent.”
“Maybe he’s at the bar playing with his nuts.” I cast a disdainful glance at Mayor Thornberry, preening like a peacock at the front of the float. “At least we know Mayor Dickhead’s accounted for.”
“I can hear you!” Mayor Thornberry calls over his shoulder.
“Good!”
“Is the float moving slower than usual?” Ivan asks. “Or is there a heavy load back there slowing us down?”
“You know what, Ivan…”
“What’s that?” comes Elliot’s garbled reply.
“Mayor Dickhead just called me fat,” I say, then raise my voice, “It’s a good thing that spare tire around your middle evens out the weight distribution, Ivan.”
Elliot halts in front of a mailbox. “Good thing this is a short parade,” he sounds amused, “because there’s about to be a cat fight on that float.”
I agree. This float is too small for the both of us.
“Any chance you can trade places with the mayor?” Elliot asks. “He’s in a covered spot. You’re in open range.”
Indeed, Ivan looks like he’s riding in his personal version of a Pope mobile.
He’s protected in a clear plastic dome along with two ice skating penguins in ear muffs and scarves.
By comparison, my designated spot at the back of the float has a few scant trees and plaster rocks.
The dome isn’t going to stop any bullets, but it may deter liquids (paint, water, bodily fluids, etc.) and rocks.
Not that I fear anyone will spray me with a super soaker or randomly jog up to the float and urinate on me, but you never know. I glance longingly at the dome.
“I don’t think he’ll give up his spot,” I whisper into my earpiece.
“Why not take it from him?”
“I can’t make a scene!”
“Be nice to him and join him under the snow globe?” Elliot suggests.
I snort. “Like that will ever happen.”
As we edge out of the historic part of Main Street and into the traffic circle, I shift my bouquet to my other hand, giving my waiving arm a much-needed break. Now that the parade is halfway over and most of the suspects are accounted for, I can relax a little.
I let out my breath and shake out the tension in my shoulders. “See? What did I tell you? There’s nothing to worry about.”
“The parade’s not done yet.”
“We’ve traded places. I’m the calm one. You’re the neurotic one. How did that happen?”
“Now you’re getting insulting,” he says.
I can hear the amusement in his voice as he follows the float. He’s a tense figure amongst the cheerful crowd and the only one wearing a frown. “The parade’s not over until it’s over. After that, I’ll buy you a beer. In the meantime, be ready.”
“Ready for what?” I laugh. “What’s the worst that can hap—”
Thwack.
Air whooshes against my cheek. There’s a jarring pop like the sound of a flat tire. The inflatable penguin deflates. I watch the penguin’s plump body shrink with an inelegant pfffffffffffftt when…
Thwack.
A branch snaps off from the fake evergreen above me, showering me with polymer snow. Some of the particles get in my eye, momentarily blinding me. What the hell is going on? It seems like every inflatable is losing air, every prop crumbling around me. The float is deteriorating as we speak.
A woman’s scream slices through the crowd, triggering another scream, and cascades into a din of hysteria. Rubbing my itchy eye, I scan the stampeding crowd for Elliot.
I see a hazy Elliot-shape blur racing toward me, frantically waving his arm, “Get down! Get down!” His garbled voice rings in my ear.
Thwack.
Something punches me in the back of the head, knocking me off balance…
Dizzied and disoriented, I probe the back of my throbbing skull. I glance down at my hand. My palms are slick with red…
Blood?
Stunned into stupidity, I blink at my hands like Carrie on prom night. I’m bleeding? I just got struck by a cardboard branch. How am I bleeding?
Then it clicks.
I’m bleeding!
Blood…
Blood!
I’ve been shot!
Shot in the head.
Why am I still alive?
Why am I still freaking out?
Shouldn’t you have a moment of peace before you die?
“Holly!” This sounds like Ivan. “My God, Holly… your head!”
“Protect the mayor!” Janet shouts, dashing toward us with her walkie talkie.
“Get off of me,” Ivan says. “Look to Holly. She’s hurt.”
“Holly!” Elliot leaps onto the float.
I reach out to him with my bloodied hand. “I’ve been hit…”
The last thing I’m consciously aware of is Elliot diving toward me, knocking us both into a pile of inflatable penguins before everything fades to black.