“I think she looks great.”

“Thanks, but it’s hard to be a business owner in a bikini.” I smiled at them both. “Not that I don’t appreciate the compliments.”

“I’m just saying.” Uncle Saul maneuvered his gumbo pot into the tiny sink.

He winked at me when Miguel couldn’t see. I knew he was trying to help me. I thought I was doing okay, finally. Miguel and I seemed to be on the right wavelength.

Ollie and Delia came back to the Biscuit Bowl, and we applauded their efforts.

“I think everyone’s done,” Delia said. “It looks like they’re all headed for the cool-down tent.”

“I’m glad we’re headed home today,” Ollie said, pulling his shirt over the bikini.

I checked on Crème Brûlée, and then we started across the street to the stage and the cool-down tent after everything was clean and put away. I saw Patrick Ferris helping the two bikini girls with the electronic board. Delia was right. It was time to wind up the Birmingham challenge.

Ollie was right, too. I couldn’t help that jump of joy in my heart knowing we would soon be going home. My bed at the old diner wasn’t much, but it was going to be good to sleep in it that night.

I heard someone calling Miguel’s name coming closer from a distance. We all looked back as Tina Gerard ran up, tears and black dirt on her face and arms. The dirt seemed to be mingled with blood.

TWENTY-SIX

“Miguel! Miguel!” She was screaming his name over and over until she threw herself into his arms. “Someone tried to kill me. They tried to run me down in the hotel parking lot. I managed to get away and I called a taxi. I rode all around the city, hoping he wasn’t following me. I tried to call you. Why didn’t you answer?”

“My phone didn’t ring,” he said. “Are you okay?”

“I just got a few scratches when I fell on the concrete in the parking lot. I thought this was over. Why would someone come after me? I’m not part of the race.”

“It may not have anything to do with the race,” he said.

“Surely this proves that I wasn’t part of what caused Alex’s death. People are trying to kill me, too. I don’t understand.”

“Did you call the police?” Miguel asked.

“No. I came straight here. I didn’t want to talk to them by myself. I was afraid I might say the wrong thing.” She buried her head in his shirt and stood there, shaking.

Patrick was waiting for the remaining food truck teams to reach the stage. I hated to leave the dramatic scene, but we’d come this far. Miguel was going to have to call the police anyway. There wasn’t much any of the rest of us could do. “Go ahead,” he said over Tina’s head. “I’ll catch up with you.”

Chef Art got out of his golf cart. “What’s going on? Why aren’t you all down there already?”

I told him about Tina’s brush with death.

“Hog feathers! Get over there and win this challenge, Zoe Chase, or you’re not the entrepreneur I thought you were.”

He was right. All the remaining teams were there. The producers’ assistants were counting the earnings again as the four food truck owners stood by watching.

Grinch’s Ganache had demanded a recount. When all the earnings for the morning were counted, the assistants returned our money. All eyes, and TV cameras, were on Patrick as he picked up the microphone.

“Everyone did an exceptional job out there this morning. Congratulations! It looks like our winner for the Birmingham challenge is the Biscuit Bowl. Not only did they sell two hundred dollars in delicious biscuit bowls, they also knew what to do with their red tag—which meant all team members wearing red bikinis.”

Ollie, Delia, Uncle Saul, Chef Art, and I were too busy squealing and hugging to even hear what Patrick said next. We finally quieted down and listened again.

“We have a tie between Shut Up and Eat and Stick It Here. The producers have decided on a tiebreaker to determine who the second food truck winner will be.”

“What happened to Our Daily Bread?” Ollie asked.

“I think we missed that,” I whispered.

Bobbie Shields was standing beside me. “They were disqualified for cheating and removed from the race.”

“Why? What happened?” I couldn’t believe it.

“They weren’t ministers after all.” She shrugged. “Someone reported seeing Reverend Jablonski on TV doing a promo for the race. He’s an escaped felon from Florida.”

“Don’t that beat all.” Uncle Saul shook his head. “And here they’ve been trouncing us right along.”

“Darn good bread makers,” Bobbie remarked.

“We’ve come up with a tiebreaker,” Patrick announced. “We’ll need the owners of Stick It Here and Shut Up and Eat to come forward. Everyone else is free to do what they want for about thirty minutes. We’ll have the beauty pageant, and the official announcement of who is going on with the race, at the stage then.”

“I forgot about the beauty pageant.” Ollie’s expression was fierce. “I don’t know, Zoe. I think I might just go on home now.”

“We’re going home in a little while,” I said. “If you back out, we’ll be disqualified, too. Please, Ollie. One last thing.”

“You know I might fall for that if I didn’t know we still had to do goofy stuff tomorrow in Mobile.” He was frowning but finally relented. “Oh, all right. As long as no one else pinches me.”

“I won’t let it happen again,” I promised, hugging him.

We went back out in the street and saw two police cars there with Miguel and Tina. An ambulance was pulling in, sirens blaring, as we reached them.

“Is Tina okay?” I asked Miguel.

“She’s probably fine. I think she should be checked out.”

“Who are you people?” an officer asked when he saw our group.

I explained about the food truck race.

He laughed. “I’ve heard about that on TV. Sounds funny!”

Ollie muttered to himself and shuffled toward the Biscuit Bowl to wait for the final announcement.

“Come with me, Miguel,” Tina asked. “I don’t want to go to the hospital alone.”

“You’ll be fine,” he said. “I’ll come and get you. Just take it easy, okay?”

She threw herself against him again. I was starting to feel a little doubtful that she was thinking of him only as a friend and attorney. Maybe I was being touchy because my relationship with Miguel was very new and she’d known him forever.

“You might have to kick that girl’s scrawny behind,” Delia whispered.

“Thanks.” I grinned at her. “At least I’m not the only one seeing this.”

Miguel politely saw Tina into the ambulance. The paramedics got in back with her and the vehicle left.

“Why would anyone want to hurt her anyway?” Delia asked. “I thought the police accused her and Miguel of killing Alex.”

“No one said it had to make sense,” Uncle Saul said. “Maybe someone wanted to kill both of them—someone besides you, Zoe.”

I answered my phone. It was Marsh calling from the hospital. Helms still hadn’t regained consciousness. Her family from Charlotte was flying in later that day to be with her.

His update was brief and to the point. I explained what he’d said to everyone.

“I don’t know what to think about all of this.” I put my phone back in the pocket of my robe. “Marsh and Helms are the only ones who have followed this from the beginning. The Birmingham police are baffled. If we drag it to Mobile, they won’t have any answers, either.”

We kind of looked at one another and shrugged. We stood around in the street as the sun rose in the blue sky. Uncle Saul said he was hungry and went to get a biscuit bowl.

The thirty-minute wait to find out what was going on in the race went by slowly, until we were finally called back to the stage. With only two food trucks going to Mobile, the group was dwindling fast.