Nadine blinked, a corner of her paperback folding itself under her thumb. “This shop? Really, Brenda? Vance can barely keep his tools organized, let alone a sophisticated financial fraud.” Before Brenda could retort, a heavy scuff of boots echoed past the oil drums outside. Barnaby Grimsley, whose khaki uniform strained against his massive gut, stood framed in the threshold, two deputies flanking him like jittery bookends. The lawman swept a sluggish squint over the scene, pausing on Vance, then on the offending bound account book clutched by a panting Brenda. “Barnaby!” Brenda gasped, thrusting the folio forward. “Thank goodness you’re here! I found it! All the evidence you need! Grain futures for the Durranberry Cooperative, the Rillbrook Wheat Exchange, even the Spindlewood Sap refinery—all shorted! And every last Solon traces right to invoices filed here at Hollister’s Auto!” Grimsley took the calfskin binder, thick fingers leafing through the tabbed leaves Brenda had marked. Vance slowly set Nadine’s bare foot down onto an oily rag, his jaw stiffening. “Vance Hollister,” the officer rumbled across the high-raftered shop. “I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to come down to the station. This looks… rather damning.” Nadine didn’t move, her gaze flicking over the rim of her trashy romance to Vance’s profile. He stood motionless. “Damning? Chief, this bay stays unlocked half the night. A stray dog could wander in and leave paperwork.” “The invoices bear your name, Mr. Hollister,” Brenda interjected, chin tilted up. “Copied, perhaps, but quite convincing to anyone who doesn’t know you.” “Nonsense!” Vance barked, pushing himself up from the floor. He advanced on Brenda, his tall frame looming over her. “I run an honest business! I fix engines, I don’t steal from farmers!” Grimsley shuffled between them, resting a beefy palm against his leather holster. “Easy now, Mr. Hollister. We’ll sort this out at the station. Shorting farm syndicates could bankrupt half the county.” Nadine heard the words, but they seemed distant, like background noise to the sudden, sharp alarm bell ringing in her mind. If Vance went to jail… if Vance went to jail, who would bring her malt balls? Who would massage her feet? Who would build her custom couches and tolerate her extreme aversion to all forms of exertion? The horror of having to clock into a canning line, of scrubbing pans and wearing an itchy uniform, knotted in her gut. No. Absolutely not. This was unacceptable. With a slow, agonizing groan that drew every eye in the bay, Nadine Finch dragged herself upright. Then, to a collective murmur from the rubberneckers gathering by the doorway, she planted her bare soles against the cold cement and hauled her frame completely vertical. Her calves wobbled under her, soft and unaccustomed to bearing eighty kilograms of idle bulk. Brenda stood frozen, mouth hanging open. The deputies exchanged alarmed glances, as if watching a parlor fern pull up its roots and march. “Barnaby,” Nadine said, clearing the gravel from her throat. “Hand over that folio.” The officer, momentarily stunned by Nadine’s unprecedented display of self-locomotion, surrendered the volume. Nadine took it, the calfskin cover heavy and cold against palms more accustomed to cheap pulp paper. She thumbed through the tabbed leaves, tracing the inked columns. Her former life sorting corporate expense sheets cut right through the hand-scrawled arithmetic. “Hmm,” she hummed, running a perfectly manicured nail down a column. “Durranberry Cooperative, shorted by 500 bushels. Rillbrook Wheat, 800 sacks. Spindlewood Sap, 1500 barrels. All substantial sums, indeed. And all leading to ‘Hollister’s Auto Repairs’ as the recipient of the embezzled funds, apparently for ‘parts and specialized equipment’.” She looked up, her gaze landing on Vance. “Vance, darling, when was the last time you bought 1500 barrels of sap, exactly?” Vance blinked, a flicker of amusement replacing his anger. “Nadine, I wouldn’t know what to do with a single barrel of sap. Unless it was for a sticky engine block, and even then, I’d prefer high-grade lubricant.” Nadine nodded sagely. “Precisely. And yet, this record claims you received three separate payments for ‘sap-related industrial repairs’ totaling 27,000 Solons. Tell me, Barnaby, have you ever seen a sedan running on boiled syrup?” The officer scratched his fleshy jowl, suddenly uncertain. “Well, no, but…” “Furthermore,” Nadine pressed on, fingernail tapping a smudge of black ink. “These dates. All these transactions happened in the last two weeks. In that time, Vance spent his days bolting down my teal sofa, bolting replacement springs, and jogging down to the corner store to restock my chocolates.” A murmur rippled through the spectators idling by the roll-up door. A few snickers erupted, choked off when Brenda glared over her shoulder. “Now, Vance is wonderfully attentive,” Nadine continued in a dry, flat monotone. “But he keeps receipts in an empty lard pail. Do you honestly believe a mechanic who filed his quarterly returns with a sketch of a socket wrench is capable of manipulating regional commodity shares? The man gives away spare spark plugs because he forgets to punch the register.” Brenda hissed through her teeth. “His endorsements are right at the bottom!” Nadine tilted the binding. “Ah, yes, the handwriting. Look closely, Barnaby. This cursive is prim and upright. But Vance’s actual scribble,” she pointed to a grease-stained carbon slip tacked by the hydraulic lift, “looks like a startled spider fell into an inkpot. He never writes his initials the same way twice. Whoever traced these had neat, delicate schoolmarm penmanship.” She tilted the page toward the light. “And what’s this? ‘Payment for 100 gallons of high-octane fuel for crop machines, delivery to the reservoir tower, midnight.’ Vance, you aren’t running clandestine fuel runs in the dark, are you? I spent Thursday afternoon sleeping beneath that tank, and nobody dropped off drums.” Vance let out a dry, rumbling huff. The tension drained out of the workspace, replaced by muffled chuckles from the doorway. The lawman shifted his boots, his thick neck flushing mottled pink, while Brenda’s nostrils flared in fury. “This folio,” Nadine concluded, returning it with the tips of two greasy fingers as though handling spoiled ham, “is amateur pulp fiction. It wouldn’t fool a clerk at the feed store. Now, if you’ll excuse me, this vertical posturing is horrifyingly tiring, and my paperback is waiting.” She pivoted on her heels and shuffled toward the cushions, every stride a calculated slog. Brenda stood shaking with rage. Grimsley cleared his throat, tucking the pages under his arm. “My apologies, Mr. Hollister. We’ll… review the paperwork.” Just as Nadine was about to collapse back into the plush depths of her teal sanctuary, a new voice, laced with saccharine sympathy, cut through the air. “Oh, Vance! This is simply dreadful!” Jolene Mercer emerged from the cluster of onlookers, blue eyes glistening with quick, tidy tears. She swept inside and laid a manicured palm on Vance’s sleeve. “To think anyone would frame you! Barnaby, surely there’s bail? I insist on paying whatever deposit is needed! Vance is an honest pillar of Mudlark!” Vance glanced down at Jolene’s hand, his mouth drawing flat. Nadine reached the teal sofa and collapsed into the velvet cushions with an audible sigh of relief. As Jolene leaned close to Vance under the pretense of offering support, her eyes darted past his shoulder straight to the sofa. The manufactured grief vanished behind an icy stare. She leaned just far enough into the open air that Nadine caught the faint, venomous murmur carry over the hum of the ceiling fan. “Let him take the fall, or I blow up the town’s entire crop reserve tonight.”

The Mid-Point Hustle