Plotting for Murder (Cozy Mystery Bookshop Series Book 1)

by Tamra Baumann

  “Who could ask a child to live like a monk in a monastery? Or your mom, for that matter.”

  He shrugs. “My mom spends a lot of time in her garden. When school was out, she and I would take trips up the coast to visit Aunt Betty.”

  I’d always chalked up his quiet nature to basic politeness. Something I find attractive in people. “I wonder why we never ran into each other?”

  “Oh, we did.” Gage finishes off his wine and then pours us both another glass. “You just never noticed. Probably because you assumed I was just another tourist. The locals here do that. They look at you but don’t really see you.”

  Gage is right. When you live in a town full of tourists, you don’t pay them much attention. They’re all temporary people who you’ll most likely never see again. “I apologize for treating you like a tourist, Gage.”

  He smiles. “You were always nice to me when I came into Renee’s parents’ shop for ice cream. I was painfully shy back then. I’d sit in the corner and eat my treat, watching all the cool kids who hung out there. They weren’t very nice to you.”

  “No. They weren’t.” Memories of that time of my life aren’t pleasant. “Renee was my only real friend back then, besides Dylan. Her mom was nice enough to give me a job, but I hated it. It was embarrassing serving ice cream to the mean rich kids.”

  “I didn’t fit in either at school. It wasn’t until college that I finally grew into my gangly body and came out of my shell. And I got Lasik and dumped my glasses.” He takes another long drink. “It used to pain me to see how those kids treated you back then.”

  “Now I’m embarrassed that you felt sorry for me.”

  “I didn’t feel sorry for you as much as I understood how not belonging felt. But you never let them see you sweat. You held your chin high and gave it right back to them. I admired that about you.”

  I wave a hand because I hate talking about that part of my life. “One does what one has to do to survive in a small town. So back to you. Did your dad ever come back?”

  “No. Never. He wrote and occasionally called. Eight years ago, he died and left me his trust fund, thereby allowing me to move here and practice the kind of law I enjoy.”

  That explains the fancy suits and slick sports car Gage drives. “And make all the noise you’d like to make?”

  “Exactly.” He lifts his glass in a mock toast. “I’ve never told anyone in town about my trust fund. I only told you because I want you to know I’m not after the millions in yours. I have plenty of my own.”

  “And you of all people know I don’t really have access to those millions in my account.” I take a drink too. “I’ve wondered why you’ve never asked out Julie? She’s the prettiest girl in town.”

  “She’s not my type. And because I’ve had a crush on you since I was fourteen, Sawyer.”

  That totally catches me off guard. What am I supposed to say to that? “I still can’t believe I didn’t notice you back then.” He’s so darn good-looking, how could I have been so blind?

  I stare deeper into his greenish-turquoise eyes, searching for something familiar. It’s hard not to get lost in his entrancing gaze. There is something about Gage’s eyes. “Wait a minute. I do remember you. Tall, skinny, black glasses, and two scoops of rocky road in a cup with caramel, nuts, and whipped cream. No cherry. Right? You came in often. So much, I remember asking you if you lived in the area. You just shook your head and walked away.”

  Gage slowly nods. “Told you. Painfully shy. And I still hate cherries.”

  “Well, you’d think I’d hate ice cream after working there for so many years, but unfortunately, that’s not true. It’s still my guilty pleasure. And speaking of frozen dessert, are you ready to bust into it?”

  “Absolutely.” Gage stands and clears our dishes to the sink.

  I slip off the stool to grab the semifreddo. When I close the freezer door, I wake my snoozing dog. Cooper grumbles a bit and then goes right back to his nap. “Excuse me, your highness, but I believe it’s time for you to do some business outside.” I open the kitchen door and wait. Cooper slowly stands and stretches like a cat before he heads outside. Just past the doorway, he freezes, yelps, and runs back inside and behind my legs.

  My heart starts pounding. “Is someone in the backyard, buddy?” I toss the dessert onto the counter and stick my head out the door. “Gage, there is!” Someone dressed all in black with a white football team logo on the back and hood pulled over his or her head is running away.

  Gage jumps in front of me and closes and locks the door. Then he grabs his cell. “I’ll call Dylan.”

  “Tell Dylan he’s running toward my neighbor Bill’s house. At least I think it’s a man. It’s hard to tell.”

  Gage nods as he reports to Dylan and then hangs up. “Dylan says to sit tight. Is the front door locked?”

  “Yes. I locked it behind you.” I peer out the kitchen window—all clear. Yet, Cooper can wait to go out until Dylan gets here. I place the dessert back in the freezer and then join Gage at the kitchen island.

  Gage lays his hand over mine. “So much for a nice dinner, huh? You okay?”

  “Fine.” I nod, but it’s hard to settle. “Things just got real. Dylan was never sure I was in danger, he was being cautious, but I think now we can establish I am. No one would have any reason to be lurking in my backyard other than for no good.”

  “I agree. Here.” Gage slides my wine in front of me. “Dylan will be here soon.”

  “Thanks.” A loud bang makes me jump.

  “Sawyer? Open up.” Dylan’s voice sounds at the back door.

  Relief fills me as I hop up and let Dylan in. He drops a duffel at his feet before Cooper runs and jumps into Dylan’s arms. I don’t call my dog Chicken Coop sometimes for nothing.

  Cradling my dog in one arm, Dylan locks the door behind him. “All clear outside. Any idea about height and build?”

  I answer, “Looked like a guy, but who knows? The person had on baggy black sweats. And the jacket had a pirate logo on the back, for the football team. Could be a tall woman, though.”

  Gage shakes his head. “I didn’t see anyone.”

  Dylan sets Cooper on the floor and then runs a hand down my arm. “In the morning, you and I need to go see the Admiral. Ask him to turn over what’s in his safety deposit box. Your mom’s scavenger hunt isn’t worth your life.”

  I turn to Gage. “You sure you don’t know what the Admiral left for me in his will?”

  “No. My instructions were to hand the envelope from his box to your mother’s heirs after the Admiral dies.”

  I turn back to Dylan. “Okay. You’re right. Let’s hope he’ll go against my mother’s wishes and tell us where the hidden items are.”

  Chapter 13

  Ed showed up bright and early to my house and is busy installing the new cameras. He promises to finish this afternoon. So book club should still be on for tonight.

  I slide a ham-and-cheese omelet in front of Dylan and then sit opposite him in my nook. I’m on my third cup of coffee, and it’s only eight thirty. “Did you get any sleep last night?” I ask Dylan.

  He shakes his head between bites.

  “Yeah. Me neither.” I play around with my veggie omelet, but I’m not hungry. “I say we go search Wade’s, Crystal’s, and Julie’s apartments. There has to be something they forgot while planning the crime. There’s no such thing as a perfect one, right?” After last night’s dark-clad visitor, I’m officially spooked.

  Dylan slips a bit of ham to Cooper, who’s under his feet in the nook. “Search warrants don’t work that way. We have to have a reason to look.”

  “The reason is that one of them either killed or help kill Chad!”

  Dylan sets his fork down. “Things have to be done in the proper order, and the suits are checking off all the boxes. Painfully slow. So, let’s talk about book club tonight. We need to tell everyone about the art you supposedly found and about the cameras Ed installed so people think the booksto
re is a dead end. And then tell everyone about the Twain book that must be hidden at your house.”

  “Okay, but can I have first dibs on your taser gun when we catch whoever did this? Chad made a mistake using the DDT, but he didn’t deserve to die like that.”

  “No, he didn’t. I’m just as eager as you are to see justice served on his behalf. Please let me do the serving, though. And it’s too soon to write off the mystery customer.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” I’m grumpy from being up all night. “What kind of evidence are we going to get from book club?”

  “Don’t know, but I’d like to see their demeanor when they’re not talking to a cop. For now, let’s go visit the Admiral so we can find whatever your mom hid.”

  “Fine.” I take a few more bites and then clear the dishes while Dylan puts Cooper into a harness I haven’t seen before. “What’s that?”

  Dylan snaps on the leash. “It’ll make him behave when you walk him.”

  I like this idea. “Great. Let’s go check it out.”

  After I tell Ed to let me know when he’s almost done so I can come home and lock up after him, we head down the steps and toward the cliffs to the Admiral’s house. And my little doodle boy is walking as well for me as he usually does for Dylan. “Thanks for this.”

  “Welcome.” Dylan gives me a shoulder bump. “How was the date last night?”

  “Dinner was enjoyable. Gage is a nice guy.”

  Dylan grins. “Yeah, but I win because I got to spend the night.”

  Brother. “On the couch with your gun. That hardly constitutes a win.”

  “Bet Gage would disagree.” His big shoulder bumps mine again.

  “I’m changing the subject. What was the Admiral’s reaction when you called him this morning and said we need to go against mom’s plans?”

  Dylan lets out a long breath. “He doesn’t take breaking the promise he made to your mom lightly, but after I explained things and told him what happened last night, he agreed to go to the bank with us. He knows your mother would never have knowingly put your life in danger.”

  “No. She couldn’t have planned for any of this.”

  We walk along in silence for a few moments until Dylan says, “Getting excited to find what your mom left for you?”

  “I might’ve been, except now I don’t even know if I can legally keep anything I find today.” I glance at Cooper who is happily trotting ahead of us with his tongue hanging out. I’m super thankful to my mom for my pooch, though. He sometimes reminds me of her with his sweet goofiness, and it makes my heart lighter.

  Dylan nods. “You’ll figure it all out.”

  “Hopefully.” We avoid the busy town square and head toward the sounds of the ocean pounding the cliffs. The steady rhythm of the waves, the cries of the seagull, and the tang of salty air bring back memories of Dylan and me walking this same path each morning to high school. No one dared to mess with me if he was around. He was protective of me back then too.

  I give him a shoulder bump for a change. “The big-city cops made a mistake taking you off the case. Still, we’ll get ’em anyway. Right?”

  “Absolutely. Because our team has a wild card the suits don’t have.” He slips an arm companionably around my shoulder. “You and the book club members.”

  I blink at him as I process, and then a lightbulb sparks in my head. “Oh, because we’ve already established our inclination to snoop? And could get ourselves into trouble. So now that you’re off the case, you’ve taken it upon yourself to keep us all safe while we continue to spy? That’s what you’ll tell the suits?”

  “Yep.” Dylan grins as we approach the Admiral’s house. “Let’s find out what your mom hid for you and worry about the rest later.” He holds out a hand for me to do the honors.

  The Admiral has a brass knocker shaped like an anchor on his front door. I lift it and then let it fall. We wait for a few minutes, and then I repeat the process all over again. “Maybe he can’t hear it. Is there a doorbell?”

  Dylan and I look around and finally find a doorbell. He pokes it, and the song Anchors Aweigh rings from inside the house.

  We wait some more until I ask, “You told him we were coming here, right? Not the bank?”

  “Yeah.” Dylan tries the doorknob, and it turns freely, so he pulls his gun from the holster on his belt. “You and Cooper should stay out here.”

  “Nope. We’re sticking with the guy with the gun.”

  He sends me a sideways look before he calls out, “Admiral? You home?” Dylan pushes the big wooden door with his shoulder, and it makes a noise like rusty hinges scraping a chalkboard. It sends shivers up my spine.

  Dylan whispers, “Stay behind me.”

  Once inside, Dylan doesn’t have to ask me twice to stay behind. The dark place smells like dusty library books and burnt grease. It’s spooky.

  I lay a hand on his shoulder blade and stick close as we creep inside with Chicken Coop bringing up the rear.

  There are brass ships’ bells on the wood-paneled walls, yellowed framed maps, ships in bottles on coffee tables along with lamps with nautical scenes. His home takes vintage nautical decorating schemes to whole new levels. As if a sailor and a hoarder combined forces and then gave up and just parked a shipwreck here instead. Not to mention the boxes and junk stacked everywhere that create eerie shadows.

  The dust motes dancing in the rays of sunlight from the barely cracked-open curtains add to the ambiance, as if we’re entering a dark scene in a movie where everybody dies.

  A low moan sounds.

  I’m ready to bolt, but too frightened to leave Dylan’s protective bubble. “What was that?”

  He holds up a hand, shushing me. I don’t like to be shushed as a rule, but in this case, I’ll make an exception.

  With the leash on my wrist and both hands on Dylan’s back, my fists grabbing what little material I can gather on his tight uniform shirt, I match Dylan’s steps as we slowly make our way toward the direction of the noise. It sounds out again, and it’s definitely human. Someone’s hurt.

  Dylan picks up the pace, so I have no choice but to do the same, but then he stops suddenly. I smash against his back, and Cooper crumples against my legs. Dylan doesn’t flinch at the impact, and instead says, “Admiral? What happened?”

  Against my squeamish nature, I peek around Dylan to see for myself. The Admiral is on the dining room floor holding his head. Thankfully, there’s no blood.

  Cooper doesn’t hesitate. He runs to the Admiral’s side to comfort him.

  The Admiral pets Cooper and then faces us. “I was drinking my coffee at the table when someone snuck up behind me. A gloved hand slipped over my mouth, and then a note appeared on the table in front of me. I read the note but couldn’t answer the question. Next thing I know, something smashes me on the side of the head, and I fell to the floor.”

  Dylan scans the rooms and then says to me, “Call for help. I’ll have a look around.”

  “’Kay.” I pull out my cell and dial. When Madge answers, I say, “We need an ambulance at the Admiral’s house. He’s had a home intruder and has a nasty bump on his head.”

  Madge agrees to send help, so I hang up and jog to the nearby kitchen, keeping an eye on the Admiral. I step inside what I can only imagine a ship’s galley would look like. A kitchen on a wooden pirate ship, not a fancy cruise liner, though.

  Grabbing a towel hanging on a rack, I fill it with ice from the freezer and then hurry back to the dining room.

  I squat beside the Admiral, who is still prone on the wooden floor with Cooper snuggled against his side. “Hold this over the bump. Help is on the way.”

  Dylan joins us again and holsters his gun. “Do you recall anything else?”

  When the Admiral tries to sit up, Dylan lays a hand on the old man’s shoulder. “Stay down, please. You said there was a note?”

  “It’s right over …” The Admiral blinks and looks around. “It should be on the table right there. It was written on lined
yellow paper.”

  “There’s no note up here.” Dylan presses, “What did the note say?”

  The Admiral’s forehead scrunches as if he’s having trouble thinking. “It said to write down where the things are hidden for Sawyer, and nobody dies.”

  My stomach clenches. Now we know for sure someone is after what my mom hid. “Did you do it?”

  “I couldn’t.” He shakes his head. “Your mom sat right over there, wrote the note, then handed me the sealed envelope that I placed in my safety deposit box. It’s what I told the intruder too.”

  This makes me wonder, “Why did she type out the note she left for me, but write the one she gave you in longhand?”

  The Admiral closes his eyes. “The one she left for you was written just a few days before she died. She dictated, and I typed that note out on her computer because she’d become too weak to write. She wanted to be sure you could understand what she was trying to tell you, Sawyer.”

  That makes sense. And he called me by my real name for a change. Guess he does know what it is.

  Dylan asks, “Can you give us a description of the person who hit you?”

  “I only caught a glimpse after I fell to the floor. Black sweats that had a sports team logo on the back.” He opens his eyes. “A football team. Very familiar, but I can’t place it.”

  Could it be the same person who was in my backyard? “A pirate?”

  “Yes! That’s right, Sailor. A pirate with a dagger between his teeth.”

  Guess we’re back to Sailor.

  Dylan presses on, “Shoes? General build?”

  “White tennis shoes, I think. I’m not sure.” His eyes flutter like he’s going to pass out.

  Dylan squeezes the Admiral’s shoulder. “It’s okay. We can talk later. Where’s the key to the safety deposit box?”