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  MOSQUITO BITE MURDER

  a Merry Wrath Mystery

  by

  LESLIE LANGTRY

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  Smashwords Edition

  Copyright © 2021 by Leslie Langtry

  Cover design by Janet Holmes

  Gemma Halliday Publishing

  http://www.gemmahallidaypublishing.com

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  Smashwords Edition License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

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  CHAPTER ONE

  Riley fought his way through a giant spiderweb, looking like a deranged lemur standing on two legs and practicing some sort of disco-karate moves. I supposed I could've told him to watch out before he stepped into the sticky mess, but you have to take your fun where you can get it.

  "Why are we out here in the middle of nowhere again?" he asked.

  "We're not in the middle of nowhere," I disagreed. "We're about to enter a vast forest preserve. Which is definitely somewhere, because it's on a map and everything."

  This was true. We were about to enter an enormous forest for some hardcore camping. Well, that's what I'd told the girls anyway. They were actually my cover for something entirely different, which, now that I thought about it, might not have been the best idea.

  "And," I added, "the girls are working toward their Bronze Award by finding and mapping an old Girl Scout camp."

  Which was a pretty cool cover, even though it was true. Camp Deer Path had been defunct since the 60s. The Council had wanted to locate its remains for a long time. We'd offered to do it for them—which gave us the perfect excuse to go camping.

  "And why isn't Kelly here?" He eyed the girls nervously.

  "Because she's taking that training…" I slapped my hand over my mouth, wishing I could take the words back.

  Riley's eyes narrowed. Kelly worked for him as a researcher for his private investigation agency.

  He brushed the remains of the web off of his tanned, muscled arms. "What training?"

  Oh well. He was going to find out in a week anyway. Maybe he'd get eaten by a bear and Kelly would never know I'd inadvertently ratted her out.

  "The field training certification that you were too cheap to send her to," I explained.

  My former CIA handler sighed. "Tell me she didn't use her agency credit card to sign up for that."

  "For your information, she got a full scholarship." From the Merry Wrath Foundation, but that was just splitting hairs. Kelly didn't know it either, to be honest. But she deserved this training, and Riley was too cheap to send her.

  "All set, Mrs. Wrath." Betty and the other five girls saluted me.

  They were wearing little military uniforms and camo face paint. They looked like a fifth-grade terrorist militia.

  Riley's eyebrows went up. "I have a couple of questions. Firstly, are we training these kids to be commandos? And second, is that really a good idea?"

  "Do you want me to frag him, Mrs. Wrath?" Betty asked as she began whittling a punji stick.

  I waved her off. "Maybe later."

  My name is Merry Wrath, and I used to be a field agent in the CIA. I say used to be because I was "accidentally" outed by the vice president, who had it in for my senator father. My name is really Fionnaghuala Merrygold Czrygy, but with all the publicity that accompanied my flight from Chechnya, I changed it to my mother's maiden name of Wrath and moved home to Who's There, Iowa.

  Once back home, my best friend, the aforementioned Kelly, decided we should be Girl Scout leaders. I have to admit, it was more fun than the CIA. My troop was precocious and obnoxious, which equaled awesome in my book. I couldn't say the same for the people I'd worked with, like Carlos the Armadillo and Wally the Chechen strongman—who'd been too serious for their own good. They weren't as dangerous as my troop either—something I took immense pride in and a smidge of credit for.

  If Riley was apprehensive about Betty's suggestion, he didn't show it. Instead, he double-checked his designer backpack and adjusted his tailored cargo pants.

  "Have you ever been camping before?" I asked him as he pulled a Hermes silk scarf out of the backpack and tied it around his neck like a bandana.

  He rolled his eyes. "Of course I have. Remember Mongolia?"

  I did remember Mongolia. "That was more like glamping! We had an air-conditioned yurt with Wi-Fi and a pizza oven!"

  Riley frowned. "What's glamping?"

  "It's glamour camping." I pointed at his designer duds. "What you're doing."

  "Oooh, I like that idea." He pulled out a can and sprayed his hair.

  "Is that hairspray?"

  He nodded. "It's a combination hairspray and bug spray. Gucci makes it." Riley sprayed the air, and I sniffed.

  "That smells like cologne." I shook my head.

  "I had to pack light." This"—he indicated the can—"is three things in one. I thought you'd approve."

  Betty had been watching. She stepped forward and asked Riley for the spray can.

  "Betty thinks it's legit." Riley pointed at the girl, who was now surrounded by her troop mates.

  Betty was my challenging one. She was also my fun one. It depended on the situation and whether or not there was opportunity for something dangerous, scandalous, or both. She held up a lit match and then sprayed it with the canister. It turned into a massive fireball.

  "Cool! We have a flamethrower!" Lauren and the others applauded.

  Only six members of my ten member troop had been able to join us. Two of the Kaitlyns (of four Kaitlyns who looked exactly alike), Ava, Inez, Lauren, and Betty. The other girls couldn't come due to conflicting plans—which was starting to happen a lot. My troop was very active, in everything from church to sports. There were times when I worried that scouting would lose priority with them. But then Betty would turn a can of hairspray into a flamethrower or we'd do something with cute animals and the overwhelming enthusiasm would make me feel better.

  Most of the girls were involved in specific activities, like Lauren, who was a junior zookeeper at Obladi Zoo…Ava, who had started (and as far as I knew was the only member of) FIUA or Future Insurance Underwriters of America…or Betty's after school Fight Club (which I pretended not to know about). It was great that they were so busy but sad because they all couldn't participate in everything
we did.

  "I thought we only had five girls coming?" Riley asked.

  I nodded. "Ava was able to take a break from her mayoral campaign. Her parents said it would be good for her. I think they were just afraid of her. From what I hear, she's become a little power-mad. In hindsight, it was probably a bad idea to suggest that Betty be her security director. She's once again planning to kidnap the current mayor. I'm not sure that's a solid move, politically, but the girls need to learn how to do these things for themselves."

  "She's still in the running, then?" Riley's right eyebrow went up.

  "Yup. Got her petition through, and I think her chances are good. I'm going to vote for her."

  For reasons no one understood, there was no age requirement to run for mayor of our small town of Who's There, Iowa. There's a requirement to be human, after a few terms where a donkey ran things. But nothing that says you had to be of a certain age.

  Eleven-year-old Ava was my go-getter, with the dream of becoming CEO of a large insurance company. Why? Who knows? The kid was obsessed with insurance. When she discovered the loophole at City Hall, she thought she'd start her leadership trajectory by running for mayor.

  "That's cool," Riley said. "I'll have an in for city contracts."

  I called for the girls' attention. We hadn't yet entered the forest preserve, and I wanted to make sure we were all set before going one step farther. "Is everyone ready?"

  We ran through the checklist of the usual stuff. Since we were backpacking for three days, we had to carry everything we needed on our backs. I took on the heaviest equipment, and the girls and Riley divided the rest. We had tents, canteens, matches, dried food, trail mix, and such. Everything you needed to commune with nature.

  I was especially excited because I'd figured out how to freeze-dry Pizza Rolls. The girls were going to be happily surprised. And of course, we had the makings for s'mores. I was pretty sure that legally, you couldn't have a Girl Scout camping trip without them.

  It might seem odd that Riley was joining me. But I needed his help. We weren't just here to take my troop hiking. We were here on a mission. An old colleague from my spy days, Maria, had looked me up recently. It turned out she needed help for some unknown reason.

  I could've brought my husband Rex—detective for our town. But he followed the rule of law, and to be perfectly honest, sometimes the CIA did not. Which meant that I needed someone who wasn't afraid to make the rules all bendy-like.

  Maria had gone rogue a while back, when she discovered that the agency was on the brink of acquiring technology that quite frankly, no country should have. I hadn't seen her in forever. Then, out of the blue, I got a message from her asking for my assistance. At the same time, I discovered that a CIA agent had been watching me, in hopes of catching Maria. This made her request more urgent.

  I mentioned that the girls were looking for a camping project, and she thought it would be fun to tag along. The Vallee des Cranes, or Valley of the Skulls, Forest was a massive preserve, discovered by a French explorer, who, according to legend, was out looking for mushrooms, but instead found three dozen skulls lying around. He quickly named the place, even though it was a forest, not a valley, and fled back to Paris where he spent years in hiding, believing he was being stalked by Ioway Indians—who never even knew he'd been there and, in fact, didn't care.

  It was an enormously vast forest, and from what I've heard there are no cell towers, restrooms, or any conveniences. Well, except now, with amenities like freeze-dried Pizza Rolls and Riley's French and Italian designer gear. That's the Girl Scout motto—"Be prepared."

  Since Riley knew Maria and was obviously familiar with the doings of the CIA, I asked him to come along. To be honest, I didn't think he'd want to come. But the lure of clandestine ops with Maria proved to be too tempting, and after what I can only assume was a shopping trip to Saks Fifth Avenue in Omaha, Riley agreed to go.

  Ava stepped forward and read the checklist aloud as the girls confirmed this thing or that. I thought I heard zip gun on the list but decided to ignore it until I could see and confiscate it. Riley looked amused but said nothing.

  I clapped my hands together. "Okay, then! Buddy up and let's go!"

  The girls got into pairs, lined up, and with me in the lead and Riley in the rear, we headed into the great, green unknown. There, we'd rendezvous with Maria and find out what she needed from me.

  Whatever it was she wanted me to do—whether a secret mission or muscling in on some action, I just hoped we could keep it from Betty.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The sun was shining through the trees, and it was a gorgeous late summer day, made all the better by being with the girls. In the last five years we'd had many adventures, and I enjoyed every one of them. Oh wow. I'd been a leader for five years now! Where did the time go? It seemed like only yesterday that my troop was learning the basics of first aid, knot tying, and fire-building. Well, it didn't take them that long to master fire. My troop was made up of elementary school pyromaniacs who had no qualms about setting fire to any pile of wood. It was a good thing I'd hidden all the matches.

  After doing the math in my head, I realized we only had one more year of elementary school before middle school. What if my troop didn't want to continue at that point? The thought chilled me to the core. What would I do if we didn't have meetings every other week or swim parties and camping in the summer? Now that the troop was older and getting busier, what if they didn't want to do stuff with me anymore?

  The idea was devastating. This couldn't be! I'd have to work harder! Find more experiences for them so they wouldn't want to quit. I could promise them bigger and better things, like ziplining over Victoria Falls, bungee jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge, or a survivalist training camp in Iceland!

  "Are you alright?" Riley gave me the side-eye. "You've gone kind of pale and look like you might pass out."

  "I'm fine," I insisted. But I wasn't fine. I was having an existential crisis. My troop might leave me in a couple of years! What was I supposed to do then? I didn't have a job. There was no way I'd be able to just sit around the house and knit grenade cozies! I didn't even know how to knit!

  "Are you sure?" Riley repeated. "You look like you did in Minsk, when our housekeeper quit."

  I narrowed my eyes. "I liked her. We never had it so good after she left. The next housekeeper couldn't even vacuum. You should not have seduced and dumped her."

  In fact, most of our domestic issues while Riley and I worked together were due to Riley's irresistible charm. He could melt the panties off of any woman with just a smile—which was great if you wanted information from the German ambassador's secretary but not so great if you wanted someone loyal to clean your toilet.

  "Forget about it," I snapped. "Focus on the job."

  Riley thought for a moment. "You seem pretty worked up. Is it this thing with Maria? Do you know something I don't?" He looked around as if he were afraid the woman might jump out at him at any moment.

  "I don't know anything," I admitted. "She just said she needs help with something."

  "Does she know I'm coming along?" he asked.

  "No." And for a moment I wondered if I hadn't made a mistake. Maria never really had a problem with Riley, so it probably wouldn't be a big deal that he was here.

  "I guess we'll find out when we see her," he mused.

  I didn't reply. I was too busy making a list of exciting experiences I could do with the girls before middle school. I wondered how many of them had active passports. That was one thing we'd have to do when we got back. That and I'd have to explain to Kelly why the urgent need to take the girls to India to help with the monkey census or go dogsledding in Finland.

  We were about three hours into the hike when Riley asked for a break, and while the girls gathered to examine a nest of centipedes, he pulled out the map. By the way, you should know that the insect didn't frighten my troop. One of the first things I'd learned as a leader was to take the fear out of any living cr
eature by telling the girls it was a baby mouse/bat/snake or whatever. Worked like a charm, and even the grotesque became adorable.

  "Where are we meeting Maria, again?" He held out the map.

  I pointed at a clearing at the top of a hill. "There. She'll be waiting for us here."

  Riley frowned as he slapped at a mosquito. "Why not just meet in a coffee shop or your old house?"

  My jaw dropped. "It's like you were never in the CIA. We can't meet in public. Maria is considered a traitor."

  Riley held up his hands defensively. "I just wondered why we had to come all the way out here."

  "Because in addition to helping out an old friend, my troop is working on their Bronze Award," I explained for like the third time today.

  Riley attempted this time to pay attention. "And what's that exactly?"

  "A prelude to the Nobel Peace Prize." Betty appeared. "Which I'll get for helping the Basque people win their independence." She fell back to her buddy, and partner in crime, Lauren.

  "What's with her and the Basque region?" Riley asked.

  Obsession was more like it. "A couple of years ago she saw a documentary on the History Channel." And our troop had never been the same since.

  There were three awards in scouting—Bronze, Silver, and Gold. You started younger with the Bronze Award and worked your way up. I wasn't entirely sure what we'd do for the next two…especially since the Council frowned on things the girls had brainstormed, like establishing your own government on an island off of Ecuador where everyone had to wear mismatched socks or creating a sanctuary named Cookie's Unicorn Princess Sanctuary for retired Scout camp horses.