Mission Inn-possible 01 - Vanilla Vendetta

by Rosie A. Point

  “Yeah?”

  “Try not to snack on any of the mushrooms down there. I’m growing some shitakes and if they’re disturbed I’m liable to get upset.”

  And from the show of anger over the recipe book, I doubted I’d want to see that. Poor Lauren had let Tombs walk all over her, but touch her mushrooms and she’d flip out.

  “Roger that,” I said, and folded my hand around the heavy Shroom Shed key. Or the key to the external basement entrance. Whichever one it was.

  The mystery of going shroom hunting excited me. Was I crazy? Or had Gossip slowly started seeping into my skin? Either way. The button mushrooms weren’t going to pick themselves.

  I stopped off at the greenhouse first and collected five ripe tomatoes from the vine and a few sprigs of rosemary. Gamma and Lauren kept a cutesy basket next to the front door, and I collected the veg and herbs in there, tripped over a loose brick, muttered, then headed out of the greenhouse. I went in search of the Shroom Shred around the side of the inn.

  Lauren had been right—the entrance to the basement stood out like a sore… mushroom? The wooden doors, angled so that they could be opened outward, had been painted with red and white toadstools, and a central padlock shaped like a heart sat on a thick chain around the handles.

  I unlocked it with the key then opened the doors to reveal the basement stairs. A waft of moist soil drifted up from below.

  The inn was full of secrets. Or so it seemed. An ancient museum section, and underground and hidden Shroom Shed, and what else was in the basement? For a second, I was transported back to my childhood when I’d run around my Gamma’s old house, pretending that I was a spy, sneaking into nooks and crannies and defeating bad guys.

  I hurried down the steps and found the light switch along the wall. I clicked it on.

  A single bulb illuminated the basement room—it seemed that the area I was in was portioned off from the rest the space. How many sections were they? Did it span the entirety of the underside of the inn?

  The hair on the back of my neck rose, and Lauren’s chatter about ghosts came back to me.

  I laughed at myself and sought out the Shroom Shed.

  It was a tiny wooden construction off to one side. No padlock on the wooden door here, but also painted with merry toadstools and a few fairies to boot. I opened it and crouched down to get inside. Rows of trays had been set out within, and the mushrooms grew from damp compost and soil, their pale heads peering out at me inquisitively.

  I located the button mushrooms, avoiding the shitake like they were vipers, and picked a few, placing them in my basket next to the tomatoes, then covering them up with a checked cloth to keep the bugs off once I got back outside.

  How strange.

  The mushroom picking had been fulfilling. The smell down here was mysterious and reminded me of dark places, of a cave, even.

  I closed up the Shroom Shed, frowned at my Gamma’s boxes—teetering near a heavy door that led into another section of the basement, then hurried to the rickety wooden steps that led up to the garden.

  Outside, I took a breath of fresh air and locked the basement doors.

  “What on earth are you doing?” A woman spoke behind me.

  I tightened my grip on the basket of produce, my heart skipping a beat. You got a fright. You actually got a fright. Usually, I was hyper-aware, and I should’ve been more so now, especially with Kyle on my tail. But the intrigue of the Shroom Shed and the inn’s basement had distracted me.

  I turned toward the woman.

  She was short and stumpy, wearing a flowing lavender pashmina. Her hair was cut into a bob and raven-dark, and her blue eyes sparkled with an energy I wasn’t sure I liked. Her lips were thin and slathered in thick crimson gloss.

  “Who are you?” I asked.

  “I could ask you the same thing, dear,” she said, shrewdly. “You don’t live here, do you? New to the inn? New to Gossip?”

  “I work here.” Wait, why was I answering this woman’s questions? “You’re not a guest.”

  “I wouldn’t be if I was paid,” the woman replied, removing a pack of cigarettes from the pocket of her pants and tapping out one. It was thin and white, possibly a match to the butt I had upstairs.

  “What did you say your name was?” I asked.

  “I didn’t. And you can tell me yours before I tell you mine.”

  “Excuse me,” I said, growing heated again, “but you’re not a guest here and that means you’re trespassing. I should call the cops.”

  “Hmm, I hear they practically live here now, what with all the murder going on.”

  “There was one murder,” I replied. “And I don’t see how that’s any of your business.” Calm down, Charlie. Play the innocent and hapless waiter. “Look, I don’t mean to be rude but—”

  “That’s a pity because that’s exactly what you were.” She lit her cigarette with a gilded lighter then took a puff.

  My nose wrinkled up. I wasn’t a fan of smoking, and if it had to be done, I didn’t see why it couldn’t be done away from my face. I waved a hand, dismissing the cloud.

  “It’s considered polite not to blow smoke at someone.”

  “It’s considered polite not to speak to an older woman in such a condescending tone,” she countered.

  Good heavens. I’d met a few annoying people in my lifetime, a few war criminals too, and this woman irritated me more than either of them. What she lacked in originality, she made up for it lip-pursing and cigarette smoke.

  I can get her cigarette. Send her DNA to a lab and… yeah, that wasn’t happening. Smulder would eat the Special Agent in Charge’s mustache before helping me with a sample.

  “Who are you?” I asked, again.

  Footsteps crunched on the grass nearby, and Gamma came into view. “Charlie, Lauren wants to know where—oh.” She stopped mid-stride, her fists moving to her hips.

  The smoking woman grinned at my grandmother. “Hello there, Georgina. I was just checking in.”

  “Jessie Belle-Blue,” Gamma said, enunciating the name like she would have cuss words. “I told you not to come back here.”

  “Mm-hmm, well, I chose to ignore that and here I am,” Jessie said, flicking ash onto the grass.

  Another wave of anger rose in me, but I forced it down. Play the part. You don’t know who this Jessie woman is yet, or what she’s capable of. Apart from annoying me so much, I’d forgotten my irritation at having to wear a dress covered in the images of frolicking puppy dogs.

  “Why are you here?” Gamma asked, coming off posh.

  “Oh, a little birdie told me that you might be starting something you can’t handle.”

  “And what might that be?” Gamma asked, stepping closer, her silvery eyebrows flying upward.

  Jessie Belle-Blue matched her expression, dropped her cigarette and ground it underneath the heel of her ankle-boot. “I hear you’re thinking about setting up a kitten fostering outpost.”

  “Is that what it’s called?” I asked. “An outpost? Wouldn’t it be a center?”

  “The nomenclature is irrelevant,” Jessie said, sniffing. “I wanted you to know, Georgina, dear, that I have my eye on you. Both eyes, actually. If you think you’re going to get away with this, you’re mad. I’ll go to the Cat Rescue Center and I’ll—”

  “I’ve already been approved,” Gamma said. “So you can save your breath.”

  “I won’t compete with the likes of you.”

  “Compete?” I shot a questioning look at Gamma.

  “Belle-Blue owns a cattery.”

  “A cattery?” I asked.

  “Yes, a cattery,” Jessie snapped. “Where one raises and cares for cats. Cats that people want to look after and buy. You know, like normal cats? Not the runts who are found in gutters and on sidewalks and wandering around old, crusty museums.”

  Oh wow. She’s a terrible, terrible person.

  Gamma glared at Jessie as if she’d sprouted an extra head. I sensed a catfight incoming. Literally. �
��It’s time for you to leave, Belle-Blue.”

  “It’s time for you to grow some common sense, Franklin,” Jessie replied. “You’re going to regret getting on my bad side.”

  Gamma sauntered forward, narrowing her eyes at the other woman. “I’ve been getting on your bad side for years, Belle-Blue, and I haven’t regretted it yet. I hope you’ll take my invitation to get the devil off my property before I have the police remove you.”

  Jessie raised her sharp nose and glared down it.

  Birds chirped in the trees, something rustled in the grass nearby, and the distant scent of Lauren’s baking drifted from the Gossip inn. Not exactly the back-drop for a granny showdown, but whatever.

  I cleared my throat.

  The tension snapped like a worn rubber band, and Jessie took a step back. “This isn’t the last you’ll hear from me, Franklin. Mark my words.” And then she swept off back around the corner and away.

  “Isn’t she lovely?”

  “About as lovely as a heart attack.”

  I bent and lifted the cigarette butt from the path then pocketed it. It seemed Jessie Belle-Blue was determined to get what she wanted—did that include sabotaging the inn? And if it did, was she determined enough to murder a man to do it?

  12

  Whether I liked it or not, I would have to go out and dye my hair to match my fake identity. It wasn’t the biggest deal, but it still irritated me. I liked having short, blonde hair. It was manageable. Easy to tie back during a high-speed chase.

  The thought of getting extensions and changing my hair color made my neck itch. Most of the folks at the inn would probably comment on it, but in the long run, it would be better.

  In the long run.

  That thought made me even itchier.

  I was stuck in Gossip for the long run.

  It was late, dinner had already been served—shrimp tacos, virgin margaritas, and a homemade pecan pie for dessert— and the inn itself had grown quiet and almost contemplative. Or maybe it was a blanket of fear that hung over the place.

  Most of the guests kept to their rooms, apart from breakfast, lunch, and dinner, when they’d all gather in the dining area and sit awkwardly, chatting and glancing left and right. Perhaps, they expected the ghost of Pete to materialize out of the floor.

  I grasped my feather duster and worked it over the spines of the books in the library, reading the titles as I went. There was a lot of great literature here, from Dickens to Shakespeare to Agatha Christie, and I enjoyed the gentle weight of knowledge.

  Unfortunately, it didn’t distract from what I wanted to know. Who had killed Pete? Oh, and why couldn’t they find my murderous, rogue agent ex-husband? And would I be trapped in Gossip forever, relegated to cleaning? Not that there was anything wrong with it, just that it wasn’t running after bad guys, or rolling into a room and simultaneously drawing a weapon in a show of ‘coolness.’

  “You’re losing it,” I muttered, shaking my head at myself.

  I left the library and dusted the assortment of polished tables and their ornaments in the entryway of the inn—Gamma had kept a lot of the old museum’s abandoned artifacts and put them on display.

  One of them, a shimmering orb that sat on a wooden, circular stand, seemed to gather more dust than the others. Intrigued, I leaned in to read the plaque.

  “—can’t believe it’s happening.”

  Whoa, had the orb just spoken to me?

  A door slammed upstairs, and I straightened. Of course, the orb hadn’t spoken to me, for heaven’s sake. It was some of the guests. Coming down. At night.

  Let’s see what this is about.

  Hopefully, they’d dismiss me as the hapless inn assistant and let something juicy slip.

  I set to work dusting the glimmering purple orb, watching the stairs out of the corner of my eye.

  Harley and Bella descended together, arm-in-arm. “I just can’t fathom who would do something like this,” Harley said. “I mean, to break into someone’s room and take their possessions? That’s so low.”

  “Mmm, you said it,” Bella put in. “It’s like, you can’t trust anyone nowadays. First the murder and now this.”

  Harley and Bella reached the entry hall and stopped nearby. The blonde cast an obvious look in my direction. “If you ask me,” she said, “all the trouble started a few days ago if you catch my drift. It seems to me like this might be an inside job.”

  Oh great. So much for the hiding. I caught Harley’s eye. “Good evening, ladies,” I said. “Heading out?”

  “Wouldn’t you like to know?” Harley snapped.

  The women hurried out of the inn and away.

  Trust was at an all-time low. It would’ve bothered me if not for the tidbit of information I’d picked up. Someone at the inn was stealing. For sure. First Peggy had complained about her jewelry box going missing—with something important in it—and now items had been stolen from Harley’s room.

  “But why?” I murmured.

  Cocoa Puff meowed at my ankles and wound around them, purring.

  “Do you have any ideas?” I asked, bending to scratch between his ears. “Of course, you don’t. Your big idea is getting me to give you some of the shrimp from dinner, isn’t it?”

  The purring grew a few decibel levels.

  “All right,” I whispered. “But only if you promise not to tell anyone.”

  That seemed to be the rule in Gossip. Secrets hidden in plain sight.

  It was past time I uncovered them.

  13

  “What have you found out?” Gamma asked, from her spot at the worn kitchen table pressed against the wall.

  The guests were already eating their breakfasts, and Lauren had dipped out to use the ladies’ room. It gave us time to drop our pretense of innocent inn-keeper and maid for a few seconds. Gamma was no fool—she knew that I’d definitely been snooping around, listening in, and working my brain around the mystery of Pete’s untimely demise.

  “A few things,” I said. “Firstly, that one of your guests might be a thief.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Twice now, I’ve heard tell that rooms have been broken into. First Peggy’s, now Harley’s. Naturally, they both think I’m behind it, being the new maid and all.” I sighed. “Now, the trick is figuring out why someone would be stealing and who it is. And how they would have access to the rooms in the first place.”

  “And what about Pete?”

  I broke down the conversation I’d overheard from Bella out in the garden. “So, she’s suspicious, and she seems to be hanging around with Harley a lot.”

  “They went to school together.”

  “Right.” They were in town for a high school reunion. “But I have no physical evidence linking anyone here to the crime. Except for me, since I had access to the kitchen at the time the cupcake and frosting were poisoned.”

  “Apart from the break where you left.” Gamma pursed her lips at me. She hadn’t approved of that, but when a woman had to go, she had to go. Sheesh.

  “Of course. But that only brings me back to your dear friend, Jessie Belle-Blue.”

  Gamma’s lips grew even more puckered. “What about her?”

  “The stub of her cigarette matches the one I found in the old section of the museum where you plan on setting up your kitten fostering center,” I said. “And she’s clearly been snooping around, but that doesn’t mean she has a motive. Unless it’s just to take down the Gossip Inn.”

  “Highly likely,” Gamma replied, her blue eyes hard and glinting like sapphires. “That woman has been nothing but a bane since I first arrived in Gossip. She’s tried three times to close down the inn by reporting to me to the local building inspector. But there’s nothing wrong with the place. The Gossip Inn is up to code.”

  So, Jessie did have motivation.

  But I still couldn’t figure out why she’d hurt Pete of all people? And in such an obvious way? And why was Bella snooping around in the gardens late at night? And who had be
en stealing from the guests?

  The emulsion of questions turned my thoughts to goop.

  The theft was likely unrelated to the murder. I’d have to focus my investigative powers on one thing at a time. Gosh, if Smulder could see me now, he’d flip out. He’d warned me to cool my heels, but that only meant resigning myself to my fate, and I was far too active to do that.

  I had to keep my time in Gossip occupied with something. I’d already started talking to the cat for heaven’s sake. And not in that cutesy way either—in a serious, ‘you can understand what I’m saying’ way.

  “I’m wondering if—”

  A tinkling crash rang out from the hall, followed by several gasps and screams from the dining area. Gamma and I barely exchanged a glance before we were up and moving toward the kitchen’s side arch.

  I burst out ahead, my mind clear and focused. Kyle? Here? Now? Or another person dead?

  I skidded to a halt on the hall carpet, my eyes widening.

  Peggy Ball lay face down at the base of the stairs. One of the end tables had been knocked over and several of Gamma’s priceless trinkets lay shattered on the floor.

  The other guests rushed out of the dining room in various states of pale.

  “She’s dead!” a woman screamed.

  “Someone call the police.”

  “Oh my heavens, I knew I shouldn’t have come to stay here. I just knew it. This is a murder hotel. A murder—”

  “Quiet,” I said, putting out a hand. “She’s breathing. Nobody move her.”

  “I’ll call 911,” Gamma put in.

  I hastened to Peggy’s side and crouched down next to her. I wasn’t sure what had happened yet—had she fallen down the stairs? Been pushed? If so, she might have internal injuries and moving her would be dangerous.

  Peggy groaned.

  “She’s alive!” a guest squeaked.

  “I did just say that.” I couldn’t help grumbling it. “Peggy? Peggy, can you hear me?”

  The middle-aged woman lifted her head and looked over at me, her mousy brown hair plastered to her forehead. “Wh-wha—” She sucked in a breath, and her eyes cleared up. “Someone just broke into my room! Someone broke into my room.”