Read Online Killer Punch by Amy Korman - Free Book Online Page B

nothing else to do, and maybe if Joe misses me, he’ll start to appreciate me.”
    â€œOne thing’s for sure, Eula has to get her Early Girls to the club by 6 p.m. today to meet the contest deadline,” Bootsie said, getting up and grabbing her tote bag. “Even though her mom probably grew her tomatoes for her.”
    â€œThat’s exactly what you’re doing,” I told Bootsie, frustrated. “You’re taking credit for your mom’s Early Girls.”
    â€œWhatever.” She shrugged. “I already dropped them off this morning, and I don’t mean to brag, but I did a fantastic job for a first-­time exhibitor.”
    â€œYou didn’t grow them!”
    â€œDoesn’t Eula drive a Miata?” asked Sophie, squinting out the front window of my shop. “Because there’s a blue Miata pulling out of the ten-­minute parking spot in front of the diner right now, and I think she’s behind the wheel.”
    â€œEula’s on the move!” screamed Bootsie. “Let’s go!”
    F ORTY- ­ FIVE MINUTES LATER, the Miata exited the Atlantic City expressway at Farmville, N.J., and Eula turned right onto a two-­lane road that a rusty sign indicated was Route 192.
    All around us were neat fields of squash, lettuce, and—­what else?—­tomatoes. After following her for several miles at a discreet distance, and letting first a tractor and then a pickup truck turn onto Route 192 between us and Eula, the Miata took another right down a long dusty lane toward a large greenhouse.
    Bootsie parked behind a convenient grove of pine trees, concealing her Range Rover, which was no easy feat given that there was still a canoe strapped to the roof. She kept the engine running and the air conditioner at full blast, since the temperature outside was eighty-­one and humid.
    In the backseat next to me was Waffles, who I’d insisted we take with us. I’d told Bootsie it was because of the paint fumes at The Striped Awning weren’t healthy for the dog to breathe, but the truth is that once you get in the car with Bootsie at the wheel, you don’t know how long you’re going to be gone. Luckily, I’d stopped home at noon to let out John’s pack of dogs and had given them a lunchtime snack. I’d have to call Joe or Holly to take the next doggie shift if the Eula stalking took too long, and neither one of them are exactly dog ­people.
    â€œLuckily, I’ve got bird-­watching binoculars from L.L. Bean sale right here,” Bootsie said, ripping open a box she grabbed from the backseat and aiming the lenses at Eula. “I didn’t get around to unpacking the car yet.”
    â€œI’m real surprised this girl wears beige to schlep plants,” observed Sophie. “Her dry-­cleaning bill must be through the roof.”
    Eula took a key out of the pocket of her swoopy beige skirt, and the door swung open. A moment later, she reemerged from the greenhouse, carefully toting a tall, lush plant, staked in its terracotta pot. Even from our spot behind the trees, I could see that the leafy vine was fully loaded with robust red vegetables.
    â€œShe’s picking up tomato plants!” said Bootsie, outraged, staring through her binoculars, her mouth agape. She dropped the binoculars and grabbed her phone, snapping photos of Eula and her Jersey tomatoes as her nemesis toted the plants out of the greenhouse and into the Miata.
    â€œThose are Early Girls!” screamed Bootsie. “My category! I can’t believe she’s growing them in Jersey. That’s a flagrant violation of rule seven of the Tomato Show. Obviously, any vegetable grown east of the Delaware River is going to win. The soil over here is unbeatable!”
    â€œThey don’t call it the Garden State for nothin’!” Sophie observed, checking her own phone for about the millionth time since we’d gotten in Bootsie’s