Bittersweet Betrayal

by Stephanie Damore

  "You know I can't tell you that," Autumn snapped at me.

  "I'm going to take that as a no."

  Autumn glared in response.

  "What about the antifreeze? Have a lead on that?" Now I was just being a show-off.

  "So much for patient confidentiality," Autumn grumbled.

  "People talk. Especially in a small place like this, you know that."

  "Don't I ever, which is why I stopped in. What else have you heard?"

  "That's it."

  "Any idea where Adele got the desserts from?"

  "Not a clue. I only know they weren't from here, which I already told you."

  "Yeah, you did. We have to track Margaret down."

  "You can't find her daughter?" I asked.

  "Not a current address. She didn't say what city she was headed to, did she?"

  I thought back. Nothing specific came to mind. "No, I'm pretty sure she just said down state."

  "If that was the truth ..." Autumn replied.

  "Yeah, I thought of that."

  "Is that her cat?" Autumn looked over my shoulder at the staircase. Milo was sitting on the last step, licking his paws. It was a redundant question of course; she knew I had taken Milo yesterday. "You're not allowed to have a cat in the kitchen. It's against code."

  "He's not technically in the kitchen."

  "Don't make me report you," Autumn said.

  Even though the threat was directed to me, Milo took it seriously and retreated up the stairs.

  "Aren't you busy enough?" I asked.

  "I'm never too busy to uphold the law."

  "He'll stay out. I promise." Make that, I hoped.

  Autumn took her leave shortly after that, but not before dodging a handful of questions from the women's guild. What could I say? Those ladies could be relentless.

  Come noon we were fresh out of baked goods. I wanted to disappear in the back and bake some more inventory, but Ellen wouldn't have been able to hold down the fort. As it was, we had to empty cash out of the till twice. The banker’s bag was full, and I was beyond appreciative. I tried to give Ellen a few twenties for her extra hard work, but she wouldn't have it.

  "You better save that, honey." She patted my hand on the way out. She was right, but I still wanted to give her something a little extra. Again, I thought of her Christmas bonus. "I'll see you tomorrow," Ellen said over her shoulder. "You too, Milo." He was back to his official post on the steps.

  "Sure thing," I replied for the two of us.

  I heard Adele and Nick upstairs before I even made it all the way to the top of the staircase. That was a darn shame because I was ready for a nap. Getting up extra early and working my tail off had caught up with me.

  The nap was going to have to wait. For as much as my bed was calling me, I still had questions that I wanted to ask Adele. Especially since confirming Andrew had been poisoned. Milo pawed up the stairs after me.

  "She's coming up the stairs right now. I can hear her. Just give her a minute." Nick's voice floated down the stairway.

  "Yeah, I'm here. What's up?" I said.

  "Grandma wanted to come down and talk to you, but I saw how crazy busy you were. Congratulations by the way."

  "Yeah, thank you. It feels good to be back. I hope it doesn't last just for today. I wanted to talk to you guys, too. Turns out Andrew was poisoned. Antifreeze." I took my smart phone from my back pocket and googled the symptoms of antifreeze poisoning. "Nausea, dizziness, stomach pain, fatigue," I read the symptoms off. "Does any of that sound familiar?" I asked Adele.

  "Well, you know, I didn't feel right the other day."

  "What day would that have been?" Nick asked.

  "Well, let's see, it was a couple of days ago. After I had tea with Becky. Later that night, my stomach hurt a bit, as it did the next day too."

  Nick and I looked at one another. He was thinking the same thing I was.

  "You had tea with Becky the day before you died?" Nick asked.

  "You remember what you guys ate?" I added.

  Adele's eyes went wide. "She brought the desserts, I remember now. She had a white box with her. A square white box with a thin gold elastic band around it. I thought it was a gift for me until she handed it off to Margaret. I didn't give it a second thought after that, but that must be it."

  Could Becky be the one to blame? She could have poisoned Adele during their afternoon tea time. I said as much to Adele. "Plus she has motive, wanting to sell your house and get Charles out of Michigan, and she had the means."

  "Grandma said you ran into her outside of the market."

  "Yeah, she was coming out of that yoga studio that shares the same parking lot. Although, I do have to give her credit; she did seem surprised to hear that Adele had passed."

  "Or she was just acting," Nick pointed out.

  "Heaven knows, she was acting every time she came over to visit me. I can't believe that woman. If she was the one who killed me, well then you can bet your bakery that I will haunt her until the day she dies and then some." That was exactly what I was afraid of.

  "How are we going to prove it though? Did Andrew know you weren't feeling well?" Nick asked.

  "I told him that I was feeling a little under the weather, but he couldn’t have cared less. He was too busy studying upstairs."

  "True, he is a bit self-absorbed, but think about it. He's also smart. He knows you weren't feeling well after his mom came and visited you. The next day, what, you have your regular afternoon tea, I'm assuming eating the same desserts?"

  Adele nodded. "With Margaret gone, I was forced to eat the leftovers. Hiring a new housekeeper was at the top of my list."

  "Right, so you get sick and die and then Andrew eats the desserts that his mom brought over, and he also gets poisoned," I said.

  "So he knows, or he'll put it together soon enough," Nick added.

  "The question is will he do the right thing?" I asked. We all looked at one another and the answer was plain as day. No, he wouldn't. There was no way that Andrew would turn on his mom. Even if he had been poisoned by her.

  "You have to find a way to prove it ourselves," Nick said.

  "I was thinking the exact same thing. Just give me a second to change and then we can head back to the house. Can you two pop over there and let me know if the coast is clear?" I asked.

  "On it." Nick said. I left the two of them to their task while I changed, then gave Milo some fresh water and kibble.

  "Meow?" Milo asked inquisitively. I knew he was wondering where his fish was. I pulled out the smoke fish from the fridge and gave him a small piece out of the tinfoil that I had stored it in.

  "Don't tell Adele," I added. He readily ate his treat and started licking his paws, leaving the kibble untouched. I was creating a monster. Autumn's warnings about keeping Milo out of the kitchen then rang in my head, and before I left, I made sure to kick the apartment's extra door free and shut it behind me. I wouldn't put it past Autumn to look in the bakery's back windows to see if Milo was in the kitchen. She could be persistent like that, which I suppose is what made her a good deputy, if not extremely annoying.

  7

  Nick and Adele didn't come back before I was ready to go, but I headed there anyway. Hopefully they would check in with me before I reached the house's front gates, but if not and someone was there, I could pretend I was stopping for the rest of Milo's belongings. I was quickly learning that it was always good to have a cover story—just in case.

  When I reached the house, all was quiet. Eerily quiet. Make that haunted house quiet, which was no lie given that I could see Nick’s and Adele's orbs floating around through the front dining room window. They hadn't come out to warn me, and I took that as a good sign. I skipped going to the front porch and walked around to the side garage entrance. A small rectangular keypad was on the doorframe, the display indicating that it was indeed armed.

  Adele popped up beside me. "Coming in?"

  I smacked my hand over my mouth to keep myself f
rom screaming. "Geez Louise, will you stop doing that!"

  "Why are you so jumpy?" Adele snapped at me. "Your husband's a ghost. You'd think you'd be used to it by now."

  "I expected you would have unlocked the door from the other side, that's all."

  "Now how in the world am I supposed to do that? I don't have any hands!"

  As far as I knew, Nick didn't actually use his hands to unlock doors. It had something to do with manipulating energy and objects, although I didn't know the specifics. Apparently, Adele hadn't learned them either.

  "1024" Adele said to me, meaning the passcode to unlock the door and disarm the alarm.

  "Nick's birthday." It wasn't a question but rather a statement. "Well, yours too," I added.

  I punched in the code, and the light on the keypad turned green, indicating that I was free to enter.

  "Where's Nick?" I asked.

  "He’s doing a thorough search upstairs, trying to see if there is any evidence the police hadn't discovered."

  Adele and I headed into the kitchen. It seemed to me the smartest place to find any additional dessert evidence. Autumn had made sure they bagged the desserts from the table. In fact, when I looked into the parlor, I saw that the authorities had taken the entire spread, including Adele's fine porcelain teapot and silver spoons.

  "They better give all that back when they're done with it," Adele griped.

  I ignored her comment. "Okay, so we’re looking for this bakery box, right? How big was it?" If Adele still had hands, it would have been easier for her to just mimic the size of the box, but as it was, she had to think about it for a moment.

  "Oh, I don't know, about the size of a hatbox?"

  "Okay." I opened the fridge to make sure nothing had been stored in there, but I didn’t see anything that jumped out at me. I took a quick look on the countertops and under the kitchen sink, and even opened the trash cans, but I was surprised to find that the police had taken the trash with them as well. Nick joined us at that time.

  "Any luck?" I asked him.

  "No, how about you guys?"

  "She isn't finding squat," Adele said.

  "Gee, thanks." I thought of one last place to look. I poked my head out in the garage and looked over at the recycling bins.

  "Bingo!" Sitting in the rectangular recycle bin was in fact a white pastry box. The elastic gold cord sat beside it. I didn't dare grab it with my bare hands for fear of what evidence I might destroy. But I did peer down and examine it. On the top of the box was a clear label with gold writing. It read Elegant Eats by Tara. I had never heard of the place. It couldn't be anywhere local.

  Adele and Nick came up beside me.

  "Do you guys know where this is located?"

  Nick had no clue, which wasn't surprising as food hadn't been a priority for him for some time now, and Adele swore that she hadn’t heard of the place either. I dug my phone back out to search for the place and found it immediately.

  "It's a mail order company. You know, like when you want to send someone flowers or chocolates? It's the same exact thing." I turned and showed them my phone. "Right here you can put in your order. It looks like you got the Admirer Box."

  "Well, that was smart of Becky, buying them online. It would make it harder to track the purchase to her."

  "Yeah, but then why deliver them in person?" That part didn't make sense. Adele was about to chime in when the garage door started to lift. Adele and Nick instantly transformed into orbs and left me standing there like a sitting duck.

  Adele's garage was practically empty given the fact that she didn't maintain her own grounds. The only thing of substance in the cavernous space was Adele's Lincoln Town Car, which I immediately ran over and hid behind. Luckily, Becky and Charles were too busy arguing to notice my run-and-hide maneuver.

  "I just don't understand why you don't wait until Mr. Frederick reads the will tomorrow," Charles said.

  "Because that jewelry is mine. I have had my eyes on it for the last twenty-five years. I'm not waiting another day!" If Becky was a toddler, she would've stomped her foot.

  "I appreciate your patience, but that's not the proper protocol."

  "Oh you and your protocol. I don't want to hear it." Becky seemed to think about something for a moment. "You don't think Claire is here trying to steal it, do you?" she asked.

  "No. Why in the world would she want to do that?" Charles sounded dumbfounded.

  "Because she's a London woman. That's the way we are."

  Crud, I completely forgot that my car was parked up front. I couldn't very well pop up now. I was going to have to wait until they went inside the house and then backtrack and sneak in after them undetected. I didn't want to have them start searching for me. I didn't want Becky to get suspicious.

  But before I could do that, I placed an emergency call to Autumn. Thank goodness she answered her phone right away.

  "You need to get to London Manor right away," I whispered into the phone.

  "Claire, what's going on? Are you okay?"

  "I've found some evidence and I think I know who killed Adele. They're here right now and they know I'm here too. Come in quietly and I'll try to explain it."

  "I'm just down the road," was all Autumn said before hanging up the line.

  I was hoping Becky would head directly for Adele's jewelry box in the master bedroom and Charles would follow suit. I waited a couple of beats and then stood up and carefully, while keeping an ear out, snuck back into the kitchen and started getting Milo's things together. Now that I was safely back in the house without being detected, I intentionally shut the pantry door harder than necessary while retrieving Milo's food. I then went about cleaning out his food and water bowl in the kitchen sink. As if ringing a dinner bell, Charles and Becky immediately came to the kitchen to see what I was doing.

  "Hey, guys. I was just grabbing some of Milo's belongings," I said.

  "Milo?" Becky asked.

  Charles pointed to the bag of kibble on the counter. "The cat, I'm assuming."

  I nodded.

  "But how did you get in?" Becky asked me incredulously.

  "Oh, Adele told me the passcode."

  Becky and Charles looked at one another, the shock evident on their faces. I didn't need to tell them that she revealed that information to me only after she died. Moot point.

  "How's Andrew doing?" I asked.

  Charles dismissed my concerns away. "He's fine, he'll be totally fine."

  Becky was a little bit more dramatic. "My poor baby," she patted her hand on her heart. "I can't believe someone tried to poison him. I don't know what I would do if I lost my son. He's just ... he's just my everything."

  Becky's quote had me baffled. Adele was right. She was one heck of an actress.

  Autumn's knock came at the front door. I offered to get it.

  Autumn had her hand on her weapon and she was ready to spring into action.

  "Who is it?" she whispered to me.

  "Becky. I found out she's the one who brought the desserts over to Adele the day before she died. The pastry box is in the garage recycling bin."

  "You didn't touch it, did you?"

  "No, I know better, but you might want to go get it. It'll make explaining this all easier."

  I led Autumn through the entryway into the back of the house toward the kitchen, but Becky and Charles were nowhere to be found.

  "Oh no." I looked to Autumn. Did Becky know that we were on to her? I did not want to play this game of hide and seek.

  "Do you have a pair of latex gloves?" I asked Autumn.

  "Yeah, I brought them in when you said you found evidence."

  "Okay, give them to me and I'll go get the box. You go look for Becky and Charles in Adele's bedroom." In my mind, I could see Becky trying to grab the jewelry and making a run for it.

  Autumn looked unsure of the plan. It was because I hadn’t asked her permission to handle the evidence. I knew it.

  "I promise I will wear the gloves, pick up the
box, and come in here and put it on the kitchen table."

  Autumn still hesitated.

  "Hurry up! You don't want to let Becky get away."

  "All right, but do not tell Sheriff Randall about this. You got that?"

  I highly doubted Sheriff Randall would care one lick if I was the one that retrieved the pastry box as long as Adele's murderer was safely in custody. However, I didn't push my luck. Instead, I hurriedly accepted the gloves from Autumn, slipped them on my hands, and made my way down the steps and back out to the garage. I had tunnel vision when I went for that box, grabbing it out of the recycling bin and making an about-face right back into the kitchen as promised. Of course, I should've been paying more attention to how I was holding the box, since at that moment the bottom slipped out and fell onto the floor. Inside was a little rectangular card, much like what you would send someone with a bouquet of flowers. The note read "To Becky with all my love, Charles."

  I froze. I had it wrong. It wasn't Becky who had killed Adele and accidentally poisoned Andrew. It was Charles who had been trying to kill Becky and accidentally killed his mother and poisoned his son. No wonder he had been so distraught and in shock. From my peripheral vision, I saw someone standing in the doorway that separated the kitchen from the garage. I looked up and saw that it was Charles. The look on my face and the card in my hand gave it all away. Now he knew that I knew the truth. He didn't speak but lunged down the steps after me.

  I quickly jogged backward alongside Adele's car. A garden tool sure would have come in handy at that moment, or something, anything that I could use to defend myself. Then, as if by divine intervention, I put my hand out and felt the back-driver side door of Adele's car. I pulled it open and braced myself behind it. Charles ran right into it, the force of it denting the door and sending us both sprawling backward, landing on the garage floor. Autumn was there not a second later and quickly assessed the scene, jumping down the steps and handcuffing Charles. Amazingly, I still had the card in my gloved left hand. I held it up for Autumn to see.

  "See, no fingerprints," I said as I tried to calm my breathing.

  "What, what's going on here?” Becky’s voice shrilled through the garage. “Why is my husband under arrest?"