A Berry Horrible Holiday

by A. R. Winters

  "Ha!" Zoey barked.

  "What?" I challenged. She was clearly unimpressed with my declaration of neutrality dealing with all things dead. Call me Switzerland. Not even the zombie apocalypse could sway me this time.

  "It's not a curse," Zoey said.

  "Pfffft." In that moment, I was as confident in her statement as she’d been in my declaration to stay out of this murder.

  Zoey pointed down the hill. "That guy was gonna die. You're here. You're not here. He was gonna die either way."

  "Okay..." I gave her lots of side-eye, unsure where she was going with this. If this was her idea of a pep talk, her delivery needed a lot of work.

  "You being here when he died, that's a blessing, not a curse."

  "How so?"

  "'Cause you're gonna find that guy's killer. You'll get justice for him." She looked past me to all the uniformed people milling around. A new team had arrived carrying equipment. Their loose-fitting plastic coverings reminded me of hazmat suits. "It won't be these people who figure it out. It'll be you."

  I looked at Zoey. I looked at everyone else. "Nope. No, I'm done. Joel can stay. Brad can stay." I paused. "I'd rather you not stay, but I'm leaving."

  And with that, I turned and stalked away. It was time to pack my bags and go.

  Chapter 6

  I hadn't exactly thought through my whole storming off outburst. I didn't have car keys. We were in the middle of nowhere. Even the cell reception on my phone flickered in and out.

  I reached the B&B and stared up at the huge monstrosity that I'd found so idyllically beautiful yesterday. I considered going back to my room, but that thought left me feeling empty.

  I wandered over to the Civilian Justice League's tent. It was empty save for the enormous monitors and what had to be thousands of dollars’ worth of equipment scattered throughout. While it was interesting to look at, without anyone else there, the place wasn't much of a distraction against my racing mind. The latest addition to my body count via proximity had thrown me for a loop.

  What a girl in my death-becomes-me predicament needed was chocolate—and lots of it. It would help me think. It had all those polyphenol-shabobs in it. Surely those would do something nice for my brain.

  I felt better already. I had a plan. I'd go to the kitchen, find something yummy, and sit and eat while I strategized my escape. If I couldn't get Joel to give me the car keys, I could hotwire the car.

  Scratch that. I could get Zoey to hotwire the car.

  I set off across the yard with long, sure strides. I stomped my way up the wide steps onto the deep covered porch and walked right in the kitchen door like I owned the place. But I didn't, and I was reminded of that fact when I found somebody there. It was Mama Hendrix's kitchen helper. She was dancing, swinging her hips in front of the kitchen sink as she scrubbed an oversized pan.

  She hadn't spotted me. I didn't mind. The kitchen was perfumed with baking apple pie. I could make out cinnamon and nutmeg, the slightly sweet smell of pastry turning golden brown, and... cardamom?

  "Hi," I said.

  No response.

  "Hi!" I said with a bit more punch behind the word.

  This time, the girl looked this way and that as if searching for the birthplace of the word's sound. It wasn't until she turned all the way around that she spotted me, and I realized why she hadn't heard me in the first place. She pulled cordless earbuds out of her ears.

  "Sorry," she said, giving me a girlish smile that almost had me smiling back. Her thick hair was chopped short in a bob cut that suited her wide cheekbones and slender chin. "Mama's not here right now, but she usually keeps cold cuts in the fridge. You want me to make you a sandwich? Or you want something to drink? There's hand-squeezed lemonade."

  "You got any chocolate?" I asked. "Oh, and coffee? Maybe some brown sugar. Whole milk?" For the first time since Joel and I left Kentucky, I missed my café, The Berry Home. I missed my cat, Sage. I missed Jack and Agatha. I couldn't figure out which I missed more between Jonathan and his pancakes. But what I really ached for in this moment was my endless supply of coffee. I wanted to sit in front of the corner fireplace and sip coffee under the afghan Agatha had knitted me.

  I wanted to go home.

  And I didn't want anybody else to die—ever again.

  "Go ahead and sit down. I'll get you something good," she said with a wink. She motioned to the long, narrow table that stood flush against the wall, turning back to the sink to rinse her hands. I sat down, and she asked, "What's all the hubbub about? I keep seeing people coming and going up the mulch trails."

  I realized then that she had a perfect view of it from the kitchen window.

  "Doug, the orchard manager—they think it's Doug—is dead. I found him... Well, I found his legs this morning."

  "What?" she said with a laugh, turning her back on the sink to face me. It was clear she thought I was kidding, until she saw my face, which lacked any of the telltale signs of mirth. It was enough to make her believe the words I’d spoken. As the truth sank in, her eyes grew startlingly wide and her hands flew to her mouth.

  "I'm sorry."

  She whimpered with a jerk of her upper body, still standing with her eyes wide and her hands covering her lips. She spun around and leaned over the sink as if that would make a difference in how far she could see.

  From where I sat, I could see Sheriff Palke and Brad on the mulch trail heading in the B&B's general direction.

  Seeing the sheriff must have been all the confirmation the girl needed. She released a strangled cry through her pressed fingertips and ran out of the kitchen. Through the kitchen window, I could see her run toward the sheriff and Brad, but she stopped halfway. Her head was bowed, and her shoulders shook. Her crying was silent to me from where I sat in the kitchen, but it broke my heart all the same.

  Rather than continue on to intercept the sheriff—or possibly to see Doug's dead body for herself—she turned ninety degrees and took off running. A car engine sounded a moment later, followed by a spray of gravel.

  I was alone. Again.

  I felt terrible about the pain my careless words had caused the girl.

  "I really gotta find out who I'm talking to before I start running my mouth next time." What was I saying? There’d be no next time! I was done with finding dead bodies, even if it meant moving to some remote village in Alaska with a population of one. Me.

  I wondered why the girl had run off crying. Maybe she was sensitive that way. Maybe she would’ve had the same reaction regardless of who was killed. Or maybe she and Doug had been friends. Maybe they'd even been lovers.

  The bell of a timer chimed. I looked around and spotted one on the counter.

  I glanced around the kitchen. It was empty, of course.

  I then looked expectantly at the kitchen’s winterized screen door. It stayed closed.

  Finally, I got up. I was nervous to touch someone else's baking efforts. To say that food rarely had a good outcome under my care was an understatement. On top of that, I was pretty sure I was looking at an oven, but that was as much as I could say about the thing—other than it was gorgeous. The whole front was covered in a glossy navy-blue enamel.

  I took my time, staring at it, trying to figure out what to do. It didn't look like any oven I'd ever seen. For one thing, it was the size of a small Cadillac. Seriously. The thing was huge! And instead of one giant door that took up its whole face, it had six smaller doors. Two rows, three doors on the bottom and three on top. The middle door of the top row had the letters “AGA.”

  That wasn't even the weirdest thing about it. Instead of having a myriad of different-sized burners on top, it instead had two large domes: one was over a foot wide, the other a little smaller. The right dome was tilted open on a hinge to expose a flat surface beneath. On that flat surface stood a tall soup pot. Even though I couldn't pinpoint a specific heat source, the pot had gotten hot and was somehow staying hot. But I still needed to find whatever was in the oven, the thing that the tim
er had been set for. I didn't want it to burn.

  I opened one of the doors. They were all hinged on the side rather than the bottom. I could tell the door was solid. It moved easily enough, but there was something substantial about it. It had some serious heft to it. I gave it a tap, and the resulting sound was a thud instead of being tinny or hollow.

  "Cast iron!" I realized. The whole thing, the entire oven, was made from cast iron.

  I straightened up and gave the oven a bump with my hip. It didn't budge. At all. Not a tilt. Not a jiggle. I might as well be pushing against a brick wall.

  "This thing must weigh a thousand pounds," I said in awe.

  It took opening three doors before I found the pie. I frowned when I saw it. It wasn't done. Its edges had turned a pale gold, but the pie's center still looked doughy. Maybe the timer hadn’t been for the pie after all.

  I shut the oven door and turned my attention to the tall pot on top of the stove. I took off its lid and stood on my tiptoes to see inside. Then I moaned as the steam from mulled apple cider wafted over me. I had no idea if the amber liquid had reached its aromatic peak, but it smelled heavenly to me.

  I took a step back to look at the front of the oven again, this time in search of a dial that would turn off the stove top. I found nothing. There weren't any controls on top of the oven either. Not knowing what else to do, I simply slid the pot to the side. The heat seemed to be radiating out of the flat plate that would have fit beneath the hinged dome had the dome been closed.

  Concerned that I would forget the oven's surface was hot and lay my hand down on it, I went ahead and closed the dome. Like magic, the majority of the radiant heat disappeared.

  Glancing around, I spotted another timer listing ten more minutes in its countdown. That one had to be for the pie.

  The screen door leading outside from the kitchen opened. Rita walked in followed closely by her father, Michael.

  "You don't need to see him like that. Eat something," Michael chastised. "You look ready to fall over." He then looked at me. "Can you make her something?"

  "Er..." was my brilliant response.

  "You're a chef, right?"

  "Uh..." I glanced around me at the fridge. The now-absent kitchen helper had said there were cold cuts inside. "I can make her something," I said, avoiding answering Michael's direct question about whether or not I was a chef.

  "Good." He flipped his wrist up to look at his watch, then to Rita he said, "You sit. Don't leave this room until you've eaten."

  "Where are you going?" Rita asked, sounding pitiful. She was pale and shaky.

  "I have to make some calls. I'm going to drive toward town to get a better signal on my cell, but I'll be back soon." Then, turning his attention to me, he said, "You, don't let her leave without eating." His gaze returned to his daughter. "No repeats of three years ago, okay? You have to eat."

  "Okay, Daddy." She plopped herself down in a chair as her father headed out the door.

  "I can make you a sandwich," I offered. If there were cold cuts in the fridge, it stood to reason that there'd be bread—somewhere.

  Rita scrunched her face and slouched in her chair. One slender hand moved to rest on her non-existent belly. "I don't know," she said, her voice trembling with uncertainty. "Would you mind making me some eggs? They're light, easy on my stomach, you know? Maybe an omelet?"

  I glanced warily at the alien stovetop, but the answer that came out of my mouth was, "Sure!" There was nothing I wanted more in this moment than to feed her after hearing her father's little pep talk.

  I got to work. I searched high and low for a pan I thought I could work with and eventually pulled an enormous cast iron skillet off its post on the wall. I lifted both domes and held my hand over each. The flat plate on the left was much, much hotter than the one on the right. I closed the left dome and put the skillet on the right to let it get heated up.

  I got eggs, milk, and a few other ingredients from the fridge and stirred them up in a bowl. But once I poured the mixture into the skillet, what had once carried the promise of a delicious omelet turned into lumpy clumps of eggs.

  I scooped out the eggs onto a plate and slid them onto the table in front of Rita. "Here ya go!" I said, wearing a cheerful smile for her. I knew it didn't make sense, but a part of me believed that my food would magically be perfect and beloved by all if I was upbeat and positive about it.

  Still, there was uncertainty in Rita's returning smile. What I'd put in front of her was a far cry from the omelet she'd asked for.

  I sat down in a chair catty-corner to her.

  Rita picked up her fork and took a bite. Her jaw moved to chew once then stopped. Her eyes went to me, then she chewed some more and swallowed. "It's a little runny."

  "Oh..." I couldn't stop my frown.

  "No, it's okay," Rita quickly amended. "I like them that way."

  I didn't believe her, mostly because of the way her face scrunched up with mild disgust as she lifted the next fork of eggs to her mouth.

  "I guess we're all thrown by what happened," she said after forcing herself to swallow another bite.

  "Yes. Definitely." It wasn't why I'd botched the eggs, but I'd take the excuse if she was offering. I was happy to see that her pallor looked better and the slight unsteadiness in her hand as she ate was gone. A vitality was returning to her, and I'd done that with the eggs I'd fixed. Runny or not, that made me feel good. Maybe I was a terrible cook, but I was good at feeding people. It was a win I'd take.

  Yet there was something that Rita's father had said to her when they'd walked in that was refusing to leave me alone. He'd told Rita that she didn't need to see "him" that way. Something about the way he'd said it suggested a familiarity, some kind of pre-death knowledge of Doug by Rita. I tried to push the idea away, but it pecked at the delicate tissue of my brain like a pesky woodpecker. I finally gave in to its pestering and asked, "Did you know Doug?"

  Zoey chose that moment to walk through the kitchen door. While she was dressed loud and fearless in clunky lace-up combat boots that stretched halfway up her shins, skin-tight cycling shorts that stretched halfway down her thighs, and a jewel green knit sweater that insisted on constantly falling off one shoulder, she somehow managed to move through the kitchen inconspicuously. Her hair was pulled back in a thick under-braid that started at the nape of her neck and traveled up to end in a messy bun at the crown of her head. The loose bun bobbed in all directions when Zoey hopped up to sit on the kitchen counter.

  She plucked an orange from a nearby bowl of fruit and started peeling.

  "I did know him—had known him... Had thought I'd known him, once," Rita said. She didn’t seem to have noticed Zoey's entrance.

  I remained silent after her declaration of familiarity with the dearly departed. My silence soon rewarded me with more words from her.

  "We were sweet on each other." She shrugged as she pushed her eggs around her plate with the tip of her fork. She'd stopped eating them. "At least, I'd been sweet on him."

  The kitchen door jerked open hard enough and fast enough to pull the attention of all of us.

  "I'm telling you, it's fake!" said a gaunt-faced thirty-something over his shoulder as he sauntered through the door. Two other guys trailed in after him. I guessed one to be in his fifties and the other in his early twenties. "It's all part of the weekend. All the workers are in on it." He stopped and turned his attention to me and Rita, then focused on Rita. He waved a hand in her direction. "Even some of the guests are in on it. They're plants to move the mystery forward."

  "But this isn't a mystery weekend," the fifty-ish guy countered. "This is the Civilian Justice League. We don't do mysteries. We do fact-finding and analysis."

  "Dude!" Gaunt-Face exclaimed as he backhand slapped fifty-ish in the chest. "What do you think a mystery is? It's fact-finding and analysis!" He looked in our direction again and rolled his eyes, his expression daring us to look at the idiots he had to contend with.

  I felt his pain, bu
t not for the reasons he would have assumed. I only saw one idiot in the room, and it wasn't anyone other than him.

  "We gotta get some food before we get cracking on this," he said. His gaze had taken a half second to shift between Zoey, Rita, and me before settling on me. Eeny meeny miny moe—I guessed I was it. "How ‘bout it, toots? Can you hook us up?"

  My mouth fell open just a little, and Zoey snickered.

  At the merest sound from Zoey, Gaunt-Face turned instantly bashful. He stuck his hands in the pockets of his dark trousers and intermittently stared at the ground and glanced up at her. "Hey, Z," he said with a silly grin.

  "Hey," Zoey said back.

  It seemed to be all the validation Gaunt-Face needed. His ego laden confidence returned, and he refocused on me. "So how 'bout that grub? We're burning precious time here."

  There was something else I'd like to burn, and it wasn't even his food. But instead of indulging my snarky inner monologue and letting it come out to play, I got up and limped to the fridge. Inside were all the fixings for a sandwich feast.

  I loaded up my arms with as much as I could carry, then turned toward the kitchen table to discover Rita's chair was now empty. The eggs I'd made her lay scattered around her plate, abandoned and barely eaten.

  It was possible she'd used the distraction of the newcomers to escape the awkward social obligation of finishing the slippery, undercooked eggs I'd made her. I hoped that was the case anyway. The alternative was that her father's fears were being realized and she was falling back into old self-destructive habits.

  As soon as I fully laid out the spread of food, the Civilian Criminal League guys descended like vultures. I hopped up on the kitchen counter next to Zoey and watched the feeding frenzy. Monica and John wandered in and fixed themselves plates. Even the deputies showed up, and a minute after that Brad and Sheriff I'm-too-gorgeous-for-my-badge arrived. They both went straight for the table of food. I didn't get so much as a hello from Brad.