"Oh, is he really? Right before Valentine's?" Kenneth's eyes widened a bit and I could tell that there was an idea brewing away there inside his head.
"Why don't the four of us celebrate Valentine's day together then?" Kenneth suggested. "A double date?"
My eardrums were almost pierced by Pippa's shrill screaming. I supposed that was a 'yes' then, on her part.
"Rach?" Kenneth asked, looking at me. "What do you say?"
Did I have a choice?
"Sounds great."
Three Days Later.
"Happy Valentine's Day!" Pippa cried out, clinking her wine glass first against Marcello's, then mine, and Kenneth's followed last.
"Well, technically, this isn't Valentine's Day," I couldn't resist pointing out. We'd left it way too late to book a table—especially with a party of four—and we'd had to settle for Valentine's Day eve. But that was what we got for choosing the most expensive restaurant in Belldale. It was simply called Scott's, though I had no idea what that was supposed to reference. The food seemed more French than Scottish to me. The prices were more French as well. Marcello had graciously offered to pay, but I had this sinking feeling that meant that at the end of the night we'd all be in the kitchen washing dishes.
I flipped the menu straight to the dessert section—wanted to check out my competition. "Ooh, they've got chocolate soufflé on the menu," I said, impressed. It was a dish that was a little complicated to prepare in a bakery but something that impressed me nonetheless. "I wish I could make desserts like this to serve at the bakery,” I murmured. "But they need to be served hot and we can't exactly make them to order.”
Kenneth couldn't help himself from butting in. "Actually," he said, "soufflés can be served cold, and if you've cooked it to just the right temperature, it shouldn’t have any trouble keeping its shape and texture for a while till someone orders it. All you need to do is heat up the hot sauce to go over the top whenever someone orders one. I know exactly how to do it."
I tried not to roll my eyes. He had a slight habit of needing to one-up me when it came to baking things. Pippa had already told me her point of view on the subject. "You should never date someone in the same industry as you are. You might think you have a lot in common, but it will only end in tears."
I had ignored her. So what if Kenneth and I occasionally butted heads over work-stuff? He was great in practically every other way. He was cute, and funny, and he owned his own apartment in a super cool hipster part of Belldale. He knew all the best places to eat and where to get the best coffee. And he treated me really well. I couldn't say the same for every other guy I had dated.
I smiled at Kenneth and changed the subject. "This restaurant is very impressive. Marcello made a good choice."
Marcello grinned at me from across the table. His dark unruly curls were only slightly tamed for the evening, and he looked a little ill-suited in such a fancy suit. "Only the best for you guys! My Belldale family!" With that, he reached forward for the wine bucket and in one fell swoop managed to knock over both Pippa's and Kenneth's glasses of red, staining the white table cloth…and Pippa's white dress.
She squealed a little and jumped up, splashing even more wine out in little red drops.
"Hey!" a man with gray hair, wearing thick black glasses, called out from the next table. "Watch out! You're getting wine on me!"
"Sorry, so sorry," Pippa said hurriedly.
I buried my face in my palms. So it was back to business as usual with Marcello around, then. I could hear Kenneth laughing. At least he found it amusing, not humiliating.
When I opened my eyes there was a young waiter with blonde spiky hair trying his best to mop up the mess. "I'm terribly sorry about this," he said, making even more of a mess. Was he related to Marcello?
"You don't need to apologize," I said, trying to reassure him. "It wasn't your fault."
"I will fetch you another bottle," he said. "On the house."
But that offer clearly didn't go well back behind the bar because seconds later, we could see and hear the poor young man getting berated by a man in a large white chef's hat. It was just the two of them there, but the scene was loud enough to cause the patrons to look up in shock at the disturbance. "You can't just go giving away expensive wine, you idiot! You'll have to pay for this! Out of your own tips! And you will pay, Paul, one way or the other!"
Pippa made a face. "Whoops. Guess he was just interested in getting a big tip from us and forgot that chefs can have big tempers about this sort of thing."
The gray haired man with the thick-rimmed glasses threw down his napkin. "This restaurant is a disgrace!" he cried out before storming away from the table. I thought he was going to walk straight out but then I realized he was only headed toward the bathroom.
The rest of us just waited awkwardly, wondering if our wine was actually coming or not. Things in the kitchen had gone eerily silent.
After a few seconds, it was Pippa's turn to toss her napkin on the table. "I'm going to try and get some of this wine stain out," she said with a small smile as she headed the same direction the grey-haired man had gone.
Only thirty seconds passed before Pippa came dashing back into the room.
She headed straight for me and bent down. "Rachael," she whispered, frantic and white in the face. "You'd better come look at this."
I looked at a confused Kenneth and excused myself. "Girl stuff," I said hurriedly while Pippa pulled me away. We passed the door of the kitchen and headed down a corridor to a small stock room.
She was even whiter as she pushed the door open. "I thought this was the bathroom," she whispered, as I gasped at what I saw in there.
It was our hapless waiter, lying dead on the ground.
Chapter 2
The head chef, still in his white chef's hat, paced back and forth in the back parking lot of the now deserted restaurant. "Oh, this is not good," he muttered over and over again, like a record stuck on repeat.
It was only Pippa, Marcello, Kenneth, and myself left. An assistant manager had told all the patrons that they had to leave immediately due to the kitchen flooding.
"Umm, has someone called the cops?" Pippa asked.
The chef, whose name was Scott—so that was what the name was a reference to, then—spun around and glared at her. Semi-ignoring her question, he launched into a tirade. "Do you know what this is going to do to my business? On Valentine's eve?" He stomped over toward us and looked me straight in the eyes. "We are completely booked solid tomorrow—day and night! At four hundred a head for our Valentine's set menu! Do you have any idea how much money I am going to be out?"
"Well, how many people are booked?" I asked, willing to do the math.
He spun back around and started to pace again. The rest of us just stared at each other. "Well, I’m going to call the police," Pippa said, pulling her phone out of her pocket. She shot me a sneaky look. "If you're really lucky, Rach, Jackson might be the detective they send down."
I couldn't believe she had just said that with Kenneth standing right there. I mean, I really, really couldn't believe it. Was she actually on a mission to get the two of us to break up or what?
"Who's Jackson?" Kenneth asked.
"No one," I muttered, though I was suddenly on Chef Scott's side. Did we really have to get the police involved?
After all, I wasn't just a baker. I was also something of an amateur detective. I cast an eye toward Scott, still pacing in the back of the parking lot. Did he know about my reputation?
Leaving the other three, I strolled over to him and kept my voice low. Scott stopped pacing as began to speak.
"You know, I have a lot of experience solving murder mysteries," I said bluntly.
Scott's eyebrows shot up. "Murder?" There was a note of worry in his voice, along with total disbelief. "No one said this was murder," he said, putting his hands up. "Murder is only going to make my situation a hundred times worse."
I pursed my lips. "Are you saying that his death was an accident?"
Thrown into the deep end by you, I thought. Yelled at, and humiliated, by you.
But I tried to appear sympathetic. Or as sympathetic as I could in that moment. "Okay, Paul then," I said softly. "Do you really think that his death was an accident?"
Scott's eyes were wild as he stared at me. "It has to be, or this place is going to be shut for who knows how long!" he shouted, pointing at the restaurant.
His shouting had gotten the attention of the others and they were all staring at us. Pippa walked over, leaving the guys behind temporarily. "What is going on here?" she asked.
Scott crossed his arms and frowned at her. "Does your friend here really have experience solving mysteries?" he asked.
Pippa gave me a surprised look. "Yes..." she said slowly. "And so do I."
"Huh." He paused for a moment and gave me a long, slow look before doing the same to Pippa. He was inspecting us, sizing us up, seeing if we were up to scratch.
Finally, he spoke again. "Then I want you to find out what happened to my waiter," he said. "To Paul. I want this matter cleared up as soon as possible."
I opened my mouth, in part to object, but Scott cut in. "This is worth a lot of money to me. So I am willing to pay you a lot to do a quick job of this."
Pippa and I stared at each other. I didn't think either of us were quite sure how to react. We weren't really 'detectives for hire' and never charged for our time, apart from one time when we were tracking down a client's daughter. Was it right to take this guy's money?
"I'll pay you ten thousand dollars," Scott said, cutting through the tension.
"We’ll take it!" Pippa said quickly.
But Scott wasn't done. "But you only get the money if you can solve this case by the lunch shift tomorrow. We open at eleven and I don't want to turn a single customer away on Valentine's Day."
My mouth dropped open. "I don't think that's possible," I stated in disbelief.
"Rachael!" Pippa hissed at me. "Of course we can do it. Think positive!"
I was thinking positive. I was positive that taking on this case was a huge mistake. I glanced at Scott out of the corner of my eye.
Especially considering that the person offering us the money was the person I most suspected of committing the crime.
Pippa pulled me aside so that Scott couldn't hear us. "Come on," she said, pleading with me. "Now that Marcello is back and we are building our new life again, we could really use the money. And ten grand for one night's work?" Her eyes were wide as saucers. "You can't tell me that's a bad deal."
I snuck a look over my shoulder at Scott. "Something tells me it's a very bad deal indeed. What if this is a deal with the devil?"
Pippa sighed and stood up straight, her arms across her chest. "What about that poor young guy? Paul? Don't you want to find out who did this to him?"
"What are you two talking about?" Scott shouted out, impatiently. "Do you want this job or don't you?"
I turned back to Pippa and nodded. "Yes. I want to find out who did that to Paul."
Pippa put her hand out for me to shake, which I reluctantly took. "Deal."
I pulled my hand away while Pippa went to tell Scott that the deal had been struck.
"But one night to solve a mystery?" I whispered to her when she got back, shaking my head. It seemed almost impossible.
"Can it really be done?"
"With us two working together," Pippa said firmly. "Of course it can be."
Chapter 3
I checked my watch. It was 9:00pm. We didn't even have a full twenty-four hours. We barely had twelve hours. Scott wanted the restaurant open again by the lunchtime Valentine's rush the next day, so we had to work fast.
Pippa was being very firm with her instructions to Marcello. "Are you listening, honey? You need to go home, greet the baby-sitter..." She paused to pull a wad of cash out of her purse. "And pay her for the last few hours. Then you've got to go check on Lolly."
I tuned out while she rattled off the list of baby-related tasks that I only hoped and prayed that Marcello was actually capable of. I kept having to remind myself that he was actually a grown man, an actual human, and that he had to be capable of looking after his own daughter. Right?
Back at my car, Kenneth was shuffling from foot to foot. "So, you know, it's a pretty busy day for me tomorrow too," he said, making an apologetic face. "There's about a million weddings happening in this town tomorrow and I’m in charge of the cake for half of them."
"Oh, right," I said, realizing what he was really hinting at. He wanted to go home. He did realize that someone had just died, didn't he? "I was kind of hoping you would help us out?" I asked hopefully, standing up on my tiptoes a little. "After all, you did help me find the Halloween Killer last year."
Very romantic story: I had actually met Kenneth because I suspected him of being a serial killer.
He wasn’t.
He made a face. "I'm sure you and Pippa have this under control, right? You don't really need my help."
I looked at the ground. "No. Sure. Of course we will be fine. We're old pros at this," I added, forcing a smile. "And I know it's a big night for you." I turned around and saw that Pippa and Marcello were arguing about something.
"I'm gonna take off. Get a cab." Kenneth leaned over and kissed me. "Don't stay out too late. I mean, it is Valentine's Day. I was kind of hoping we'd be waking up together."
I didn't make any promises before he climbed into the cab.
Pippa marched back over to me. "I think I finally drilled the instructions into him," she said with a heavy sigh and a shake of her head.
"Are you sure you're really able to stay out all night with a new baby at home?" I asked her, concerned.
She nodded. "For ten thousand dollars? YES."
"It'll only be five when we split it two ways," I pointed out.
"Still," she said. "It'll go a long way."
Marcello had driven home in Pippa's car—I was shocked he actually managed to hold down a license—so the two of us gathered around mine.
"Where do we even start?" I asked, climbing into the car. As I turned the ignition, I felt my head spin and panic started to set in. Usually there wasn’t such a rush to solve a case. Not this kind of insane pressure where the clock was ticking and I didn't even have time to get my thoughts in order. I felt like I was back at college, taking an exam and the clock was counting down, seeming to get faster and faster, and I was still stuck hopelessly on question one with all my answer sheets blank.
Pippa told me to calm down. "Let's go back to the bakery," she said. "Get our thoughts in order there. That's the place we work best. We can decide where to begin. Take a deep breath. Or ten." She stopped talking and became very still. I turned to look at what had her so entranced.
Police car lights.
"They're here."
I shook my head. Somehow this only made the pressure worse. Scott was going to want us to find the killer before the cops did, and how were we supposed to work faster than the police?
"Let's get out of here," Pippa said quickly, tapping me on the arm and telling me to drive. "We don't want to get caught up in their questioning. We can't exactly afford to lose an hour or two getting questioned down at the station, can we?"
"Good point," I said, quickly fastening my seatbelt and pressing my foot to the accelerator. "Let's go!"
I groaned as we reached the street of the bakery and saw that there was nighttime road construction happening and the street was closed for traffic.
I checked the time. 9:30. How was time already speeding by so fast? My heart quickened as I physically felt the time running out.
"Quick," I said, slamming on the brakes and pulling over. "We're going to have to get out and run."
"We're both weari
ng heels. And dresses," she pointed out. "We were on dates, remember?"
"Well, then we're just going to have to walk really, really fast."
"I don't really need the money, you know, Pippa..." I said as we hurried along the dark pavement, passing the construction workers on the way. "Well, I do," I said, correcting myself. "I mean, of course I'm not going to turn it down. I just mean that's not my only motivation."
It was dark but I still caught Pippa raising her eyebrow in a show of disbelief.
"Really, it's not!" I practically shouted. "I'm finding it kind of thrilling that we only have less than a day to solve this mystery."
Pippa shook her head. "And you wanted to turn down the challenge," she said. "This is why you should always listen to me."
She was hinting at something. I just didn’t know exactly what.
"Speaking of," Pippa said, confirming it for me. "Where is Kenneth?"
"He had to head home for a bit," I mumbled, searching for my keys as we finally reached our destination.
Pippa leaned against the back door of the bakery. "He isn't going to help?"
"He has to be up super early for work."
"Hmm."
I stopped for a moment. We really didn't have time to waste, but I wanted to know what that 'hmm' meant. "Pippa, what is your problem with Kenneth?"
She shook her head and turned away. "Nothing."
Ugh, this really was not the time to have a fight. I pushed through the doors and stopped dead in my tracks to find the lights on and a bright faced Marcello standing there waiting for us in the middle of the kitchen.
"You haven't touched anything, have you?" That was my first reaction, to look around and make sure that nothing was smashed and there was no food lying on the ground.
Pippa's reaction was quite different. She was not shocked, or worried. She was furious. "Marcello, what on earth..." She must have stopped when she noticed that Lolly was behind him, sleeping on her car seat that was perched on top of one of the counters.
Marcello threw his hands up in a show of apology. "I didn't know what to do with her, Pippa!"
Bakery Detectives Cozy Mystery Boxed Set: Books 7 - 9 Page 19
