Riddles & Riches (Vegas Chantly Mysteries Book 2)

Book summary

Private investigator Vegas Chantly is hired to find a missing treasure from the popular game, Riddles & Riches, but soon discovers she's not the only one hunting for it. With her mother by her side, Vegas must outwit dangerous rivals in a high-stakes race for the fortune.

Excerpt from Riddles & Riches (Vegas Chantly Mysteries Book 2)

Chapter One

The morning sun slipped from behind the far hills that overlooked the Pine Sap Camper Park. At campsite twenty-one, a silver Airstream with Woody Woodpecker painted on the side sat quietly beneath a shadow of trees. A radio clicked on somewhere inside its thin walls.

“Good morning, Georgia. In the news today: gas prices and inflation fears are surging once again. New York Publishing giant Read a Book Publishers is about to be acquired by the even bigger World Media. A strand of Richard Nixon’s hair was sold at auction for two dollars and forty-nine cents. The anonymous buyer is reported to have a huge Richard Nixon memorabilia collection. If I had a Richard Nixon collection, I’d want to be anonymous, too. The weather forecast calls for partly cloudy skies with a fifty percent chance of pop-up thunderstorms this evening with a high of ninety-one. So be sure to crash any pool party in your neighborhood.”

Vegas Chantly stretched out her arm from under the sheet and reached out and turned off the radio. She laid there for a few seconds trying to wipe the sleep from her eyes before she pulled the sheet down slowly and stared up at the ceiling. Stuck to it was a bumper sticker that read, “I like soup beans so you better stay back,” which she had placed there on a family camping trip when she was seven years old. She sat up slowly and jumped back in surprise when she saw her mother standing over her. Eleanor Chantly wore a trench coat and had a large purse slung over her shoulder, and she looked upset.

“Well, I’m banned from the DMV,” Eleanor said.

Vegas groaned. “Mom, why do you keep breaking into my camper and scaring me to death?”

“First of all, I didn’t break into your camper. I used my key.”

“At least let me know you’re around by making a noise first. It’s scary waking up to somebody in your house that you weren’t expecting.”

“I’m not trying to scare you. I’m trying to tell you my problems.”

“That scares me, too.”

Eleanor sat down on the edge of Vegas’ bed with a worried look on her face. “How am I going to get around if I can’t drive? I guess I’ll have to buy a horse or a wheelbarrow or something.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I went to the division of motor vehicles yesterday to renew my driver’s license and they told me to leave.”

“That happens everywhere you go,” Vegas pointed out.

“They can’t ban me from getting a driver’s license, can they? I paid all of my taxes. At least, I think I did. I don’t have any tickets. I did back into the corner of the house yesterday. I was going to take the mattress out and put in a new one. So I backed up to the house to make it easier to get the new mattress in and the old one out, then I heard a loud bang. I can’t believe I did that.”

“Well, a two-story house is hard to see. Why didn’t you call me to help you?”

“I thought I could do it. I was right, by the way. The mattress is fantastic. The corner of the house isn’t. But my vehicle is fine. Do you think that’s why they wouldn’t let me get a driver’s license?”

“Let me see your driver’s license.”

Eleanor reached into her large purse and began flailing about. She rummaged around and pulled out a multi tool, several greeting cards, and a box of chocolate-covered cherries.

“How much stuff do you have in that purse?”

“Just the important stuff,” said Eleanor. “It’s like my Batcave in here. When the commissioner calls, I’m ready.” She finally found her license and handed it to Vegas. Her daughter stared at it and shook her head.

“Your license doesn’t expire for another four years.”

Eleanor took the license back and looked it over. “You’re kidding. I thought it was due this month.”

“The month is right, but the year is wrong. Now the DMV can be dreading you coming back every day for the next four years.”

Vegas crawled out of bed and sat on the edge of it beside her mother. She rubbed her eyes, then stared at her mother’s trench coat.

“Why are you wearing a trench coat on a day when it’s supposed to be in the nineties?”

Eleanor quickly stood and opened it up and showed it off to Vegas as if she was a Price is Right model. “Do you like it? I bought it at Willard’s. They had it on sale, and it comes with a hat.”

Eleanor dug into her right coat pocket and pulled out a hat, then yanked it on her head until it was low on her forehead, almost covering her eyes. “How do I look?”

“You look like Dick Tracy’s overdressed mother. Can you see out from under that hat?”

Eleanor took the hat off. “Not really. It is a couple sizes too big for me. But when I wore it out of the store, people were pointing at me, so it definitely had an impact on society.”

“Why did you buy that?”

“I’m a detective now. This is what all detectives wear, you know.”

“You’re not a detective. You’re a problem.”

“Here, try it on.”

“I don’t want to try it on.”

Before Vegas could move away, her mother grabbed her, and in a matter of seconds, had taken off her trench coat and put it on her daughter. She then slammed the hat on top of her head and stared at her.

“You look like a private investigator now. The world had better be prepared for wow now when you walk into the room. You look like a Dick Tracy.”

“And you’re one of my villains, Mama Big Coat.”

Vegas took the coat off and handed it back to her mother along with the hat. “I’ve got things to do today. So why don’t you go on back to your Batcave and help Robin get his cape out of the wheel spokes of the Batcycle.”

“What do you have to do today? I can help.”

“No, you’ll just get in the way.”

“Is it another case?” Eleanor asked with the enthusiasm of a child who wanted to see the shark tooth again.

“No, I don’t have another case, and even if I did I don’t want you to get involved in it with me.”

“But we’re a great team. We solved the last one together.”

“Not this time, Mom. It’s too dangerous. I keep telling you that,” Vegas said as she began making herself some coffee. “By the way, where’s Buttermilk?”

“I let my cousin Nadine have him. She has seven kids and she promised them a dog, so I let him go to her. Since he’s a basset hound, he’s long enough that all the kids can pet him at the same time.”

“Seven kids?” Vegas shuddered.

“Yeah, that’s a lot. You know, I don’t really remember ever seeing her husband. Of course, I guess she probably killed him by now. I mean seven kids and all is a lot.”

“Do you think you could have raised seven kids?”

Eleanor frowned. “No. No, I would not have been able to raise seven kids. I mean the money alone to pay for them all would be stressful enough. Your father came from a big family, though, so he probably would have liked to have had a big family. Your father was an animal in the bedroom.”

“Mom!” Vegas shouted as she put her hands over her ears. “I don’t want to hear things like that or I’ll be in therapy for a hundred years.”

“Well, it’s true,” said Eleanor with a wicked grin as she put the trench coat back on and placed the hat on her head. “By the way, where’s your red car?”

Vegas sat down with her cup of coffee. “I had to take it back.”

“But you and that car were perfect for each other. Like the best buddies in the world.”

“We were that, but the payments weren’t.”

“I would have helped you pay for it. Why didn’t you let me do that? That’s what moms are for. We don’t just drive our kids crazy, we also help them drive themselves.” Eleanor seemed to surprise herself with her words. “Hey, that’s pretty good, if I say so myself.”

“I’m a grown woman now. I have to pay my own bills.”

“Don’t you worry, I’ll drive you to all your cases. Being that my driver’s license is still good, I can drive you to all your cases for the next four years. You can thank your DMV for that.”

“No, Mom, Pepper is going to bring a car by today for me to try out. If I want it, he said I could pay it off a little at a time.”

The payphone outside rang and Vegas got up and hurried to it. Eleanor ran

outside with her, shouting, “Why don’t you get a cellphone instead of this payphone?”

“Because I don’t forget where this payphone is,” Vegas said as she stood at the payphone, took a deep breath then picked up the phone. “Vegas Chantly, P.I. How may I help you?”

On the other end of the line was a man’s voice. “Yes, this is Davis Harper, publisher of Read a Book Publishers. I was wondering if you were available for a case.”

“I can look at my schedule and possibly work you in.”

Eleanor took that as her cue. “Ms. Chantly, this is your secretary. You are swamped with very important clients. Are you sure you want to take on another case?”

Vegas looked at her mother horrified and placed her hand over the phone speaker and whispered, “What are you doing?”

“I’m making you sound important,” Eleanor whispered back. “Like a girl on the go.”

“I need you to go away,” Vegas whispered back.

“So you’re good here?”

“I talk better on the phone alone.”

“Gotcha. If you need me, I’ll be in the camper,” Eleanor whispered, then kissed her daughter on the cheek and walked away.

Vegas turned her attention back to the potential client. “What do you need?”

“My company is about to be acquired, and the company and I need to … well, maybe it would be best to talk to you in person. Could I come by your office today?”

Vegas glanced up at her mother, who had somehow shut the camper door on her trench coat and couldn’t get free.

“Uh, maybe it would be better if I just come by your office instead. Things are really kind of crazy around here.”

“Well, I’m from New York and I’m here on a business trip. Maybe we could meet at a mutual location.”

“That’ll be fine.”

“I’m just outside the Reno Café. Do you know where that is?”

“Oh, sure, I can meet you there. I eat there all the time. I should be there within thirty minutes.”

Vegas watched Eleanor pull her coat loose from the door and fall to the ground like a sack of potatoes thrown from a train. Vegas whispered at her, “Are you okay?”

“I was until I fell down,” Eleanor yelled back as she sat up and began dusting herself off.

“What was that?” asked Mr. Harper.

“It’s nothing. It was just the office janitor. He accidentally stepped into his mop bucket.”

“I see. Well, I’ll see you in thirty minutes then.”

“I’ll be there,” Vegas said and hung up the phone. Her mother walked to her trying to straighten out her coat and picking off dirt grains from the fabric.