A Food and Wine Club Mystery Boxset Books 1 through 5

by Cat Chandler

  He pulled out a few coins which he dropped into a second bag. “Two pennies, one dime and three quarters, in case you can’t see this far, Ms. Connors.”

  Nicki wrinkled her nose. “Thank you, Chief.”

  “And here’s a receipt from Starbucks, dated yesterday and stamped at twelve minutes past ten in the morning.”

  The Starbucks was located on the town square about a mile away.

  Chief Turnlow carefully turned the body over to one side and patted down the rear pockets of the pants before he leaned back on his heels, holding a battered wallet in his hand. “Not much here,” he said. “One five-dollar bill and two ones, a couple of credit cards, his license and some business cards.” The chief took out several and thumbed through them. “Looks like vendors. One’s for a meat delivery service, the other is for a bakery, and here’s one for Green ‘N Go.” He looked over at Nicki. “Do you know what that is?”

  “A pretty new chain of takeout food, kind of like Eddie’s, except they only have salads,” Nicki said. “Is there a cell phone?”

  “Not on the victim.”

  Then no cell phone or apartment key. Nicki bit her lower lip. She hadn’t seen them on top of the desk either and wondered if maybe Eddie had left them in one of the desk drawers and that’s what the killer had been looking for.

  The chief stood and held out a hand to help the doctor get to her feet as well. He shooed her out of the freezer. “That’s about all the cold I can take for the moment.” After the two of them had walked out, he herded both Alex and Nicki in front of him until they were all the way out of the diner and standing on the walkway in front of it.

  He looked at Nicki as he put on the jacket that Alex had handed back to him. “The Doc and I will get the body ready for transport. You’ve seen and heard enough to answer any questions Jenna might have. Why don’t you go on home now and take care of that?”

  Realizing that was all she was going to get from the chief, Nicki reluctantly nodded her agreement. She turned and gave Alex a hug. “Give me a call later? Jenna’s pretty shaken up.”

  “I’d have to agree with that,” the chief said. “So she doesn’t need any more shocks that come with a murder investigation.” He gave Nicki a hard stare. “What that means, Ms. Connors, is that you need to stay away from this one.”

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Nicki stopped Jenna’s little Honda next to the curb bordering her friend’s townhouse, and right in front of Maxie’s Mercedes and Suzanne’s red Buick. Since her own townhouse was right next door, Nicki didn’t have far to walk as she did a quick-step to her front stoop. She was guessing that both her landlady and Jenna were inside with Suzanne, and hopefully relaxing over a warm cup of coffee. Still worried about how quiet Jenna had been when she’d left the diner, Nicki quietly opened the front door and stepped into the tiny foyer. She’d barely closed the door behind her when Suzanne came rushing down the hallway. She skidded to a stop, blocking Nicki’s path to the kitchen.

  “We have a problem,” Suzanne said in a low whisper. She cast a quick glance back over her shoulder before returning her gaze to Nicki. “Maxie got a call from Chief Turnlow. He wants her to come to the station at what he called ‘her earliest convenience’.”

  Nicki frowned. “Why? Did he tell her why he wanted her to come to the station?”

  Suzanne shook her head. “No. And that upset her even more. And he said you were on your way home, and Maxie should wait and bring you along.”

  “He did?” Nicki bit her lip as she absorbed that news. Wondering what the chief was up to, she waited for Suzanne to move so she could get to the kitchen. She needed to check on Jenna and then collect Maxie for the ride back into town.

  But Suzanne didn’t budge. “So I called Fran back.”

  “You did?” Nicki sighed. She was sounding like a parrot.

  The middle-aged woman bobbed her head up and down. “I did. And she said it had to do with myMason, but she wasn’t sure why. And then Fran said that she was glad you’d be coming along, because she had something to tell you.”

  “Okay.” Nicki pointed toward the kitchen. “I just need to check on Jenna and then we’ll be on our way.”

  “That’s our other problem. I’m worried about Jenna. I think you should call your doctor friend.”

  Suzanne’s voice was so matter-of-fact that Nicki stared at her for a moment. “Alex?”

  “Jenna hasn’t said a word since she got here with Maxie,” Suzanne went on in the same practical tone. “She needs to talk to someone. A professional someone. I volunteer at the battered women’s shelter in Santa Rosa, and I’ve often seen this sort of emotional shut-down.”

  Nicki immediately nodded. She’d had her own experience with an emotional shock and the trauma that followed it. And if Jenna was going through that, Nicki was absolutely going to call Alex.

  “This morning was hard on everyone, especially Jenna. Calling Alex is an excellent idea. But I need to talk to Jenna first.” She sighed. “We have a pact to not go behind each other's backs and do something.”

  “Good friends make promises like that.” A sadness crept into Suzanne’s eyes.

  Guessing she was thinking about her best friend, Catherine, whose murder had left a huge hole in Suzanne’s life, Nicki gave her a sympathetic look. She couldn’t imagine losing either of her best friends. But right now, she’d better get into the kitchen and see what was going on with one of them. Nicki sidled past Suzanne and continued along the hallway, not stopping until she was standing next to the tall stool where Jenna was perched.

  The computer geek was hunched over, continually stirring a cup of coffee. She didn’t even look around when Nicki walked up and leaned on the counter next to her.

  “Jenna? What’s going on?”

  Her friend looked at her with a guarded expression. “Nothing. We’re just waiting for you.” She glanced over at Maxie. “Our landlady has to go downtown and pay the chief another visit.”

  Nicki shot Suzanne a telling look, and was surprised when her fellow society member got the message and briskly nodded. She wrapped a hand around Maxie’s arm.

  “C’mon, Maxie. Let’s get your purse and sweater together while Nicki grabs a quick to-go cup of coffee.”

  Maxie looked between Nicki and Jenna before smiling. “Of course. Then we’ll be all set to be on our way.”

  Suzanne winked at Nicki as she raised her voice. “You and Nicki will. I’m going to stay here to finish planning the first cooking class, and hope Jenna will be able to keep me company.”

  As the two made their exit, Nicki walked around the kitchen counter and headed for the cupboard where she kept a supply of to-go cups. “What’s going on, Jenna?” Nicki repeated, frowning when her friend lifted her shoulders into a shrug. “You need to talk to me. I know this is a shock, but you weren’t this quiet when mom was killed. So something is going on.”

  “I wasn’t a suspect when your mom was killed.” Jenna gave her coffee another hard stir.

  “You aren’t a suspect in Eddie Parker’s murder either,” Nicki pointed out, then hung onto her patience when her friend shrugged again.

  Jenna looked over at the kitchen door that led into the hallway before lowering her voice to a whisper. “Then why did the chief want to see Maxie and not me? I think he wants to question her about anything I said when the two of us were sitting alone in the front of the diner.”

  “Oh.” Nicki dropped her voice into the same whisper. “I think he wants to talk to her about her husband.”

  “What?” Jenna forgot she meant to whisper and gaped at Nicki. “That’s completely random, Connors. Where do you come up with that stuff?”

  Nicki grinned. “I didn’t. Suzanne did. She called Fran to find out what the chief wanted. Fran didn’t know exactly, but she said it had something to do with myMason.”

  “Why doesn’t he just call myMason himself?” Jenna frowned.

  “I don’t know. Fran also said that she wants to talk to me.”
/>   Jenna’s frown deepened. “Why does Fran want to talk to you?”

  “I don’t know.” Nicki laughed and held up her hands when Jenna sent her an exasperated look.

  “Well, I wish we knew something,” Jenna declared. “This ‘in-limbo’ thing isn’t working for me at all.” She sighed and went back to stirring her coffee. “I can’t get my mind off it. The diner, finding Eddie, thinking that I should have insisted we meet last night instead of this morning.”

  “Whoa! Wait just a minute.” Nicki leaned across the counter and jabbed one finger into the white quartz top. “None of this is your fault, Jenna Lindstrom.”

  “I know. At least I keep telling myself that.” She looked over at Nicki with troubled eyes. “I wish there was something I could do. I’d feel better if there was something I could do.”

  Nicki straightened up and studied her friend for a long moment. She’d felt exactly the same way once. Maybe she had jumped into the winemaker’s murder to help soothe an ache inside herself over feeling so helpless about her mom’s murder. And then into Catherine Dunton’s because Maxie was hurting, much in the same way Jenna was now. And there was no question that what she’d been willing to do for her landlady, she was certainly willing to do for Jenna. And so would Alex and her fiancé, Tyler. They could also count on Maxie, and Matt, the solid and very practical editor of the magazine she did her freelance articles for, and who was also friends with Jenna.

  Nicki shook her head at herself. It seemed their little impromptu club was going to be meeting again after all.

  “What was that head-shake thing for?” Jenna asked. “I really do wish I had done something for Eddie.”

  “Well, you couldn’t have done anything to stop what happened to him,” Nicki said decisively. She did not want Jenna to have any doubts about that. “But you can do something for him now.”

  “Such as?”

  Nicki filled her to-go cup and grabbed her purse while Jenna’s gaze followed her movements. “While Maxie and I are gone, you can set up the murder board.”

  “What?”

  Nicki adjusted the long strap of her purse on her shoulder. “Get Suzanne to help you. It will keep her out of my kitchen, and she has excellent handwriting.”

  Jenna drew in a long audible breath. “I won’t say that wouldn’t help, because it would. But I can’t ask you to get involved in another murder, Nicki.”

  “I’m going to whether you ask or not.”

  Her friend rubbed her hands together. “But what will Matt say? Forget that. What will the chief say?”

  “You’re the one who keeps calling us a club, and when Matt jumped in on Catherine’s murder, he became a member. So he isn’t going to object at all. He’s going to help.”

  Nicki mentally crossed her fingers on that one. She was sure that Matt would have plenty to say, but that wasn’t going to change a thing. They were going to help solve this murder to get that haunted look off of Jenna’s face, and that was that.

  Jenna crossed her arms and stared at Nicki. “And what about the chief?”

  “He’d be disappointed if I didn’t stick my nose into his investigation. I don’t want to be responsible for disappointing the local police chief. Call Alex and see if she can come up this weekend. And bring her future husband if he isn’t on duty at the firehouse. We may as well overwhelm the chief by the sheer number of us.”

  When Jenna burst out into laughter, Nicki knew butting into police business was the right thing to do. She smiled as she headed out the kitchen door.

  Fifteen minutes later, she pulled her robin’s-egg-blue, always-on-its-last-legs Toyota into one of the parking spaces next to the three reserved spots in front of the police station. No one in town parked in one of the bright orange reserved spots. Not unless they wanted their neighbors to think they were in hot water with the local law enforcement.

  The station sat on one corner of the town square, with its neatly manicured lawn and gardens, thanks to Maxie’s husband. At its center was a ten-foot-tall bronze statue of a bunch of grapes, because no one wanted a statue erected to the disgraced founding father.

  On a trip back East almost one-hundred years ago, Grady Mucher had sold fake deeds to many of the already owned and occupied lots in the town named after him. While the founder had made off with his spoils, his former neighbors had had to deal with the parade of deed holders who’d shown up to claim their land. It hadn’t taken long for the little town of Mucherville to become known as that “place that got sold off”, and over the years, the name had stuck.

  With the rising popularity of the wine industry, the whole area had prospered. While Soldoff hadn’t grown as much as its more well-known neighbor, Sonoma, it had come to enjoy its own small place in the wine, arts and food festival world.

  The town square was surrounded by eclectic and wildly different building styles, ranging from Southern colonial to a cement block, with a liberal sprinkling of the tiled and stucco Spanish adobes in between. Its overall look was so astonishing, that the square brought in a fair number of tourists each weekend who came to gape at it, and of course to spend time in the many tasting rooms tucked in all around the square.

  Nicki had grown to love Soldoff and its quirkiness, as well as the beauty of the wine country in general. But right now, all that was lost on her as she led a worried-looking Maxie up the short walkway to the very compact police station. When she opened the door, Fran jumped out of her seat and rushed to the front counter, raising a finger to her lips.

  The older woman turned a wrinkled cheek toward Nicki as she glanced at the opening to the back hallway.

  “Shh. I need to talk to you before the chief finds out that you’re here.”

  The low rasp in Fran’s voice was more pronounced than usual, and Nicki knew why when Fran turned her gaze back to the women standing on the other side of the counter. The police clerk was definitely angry. Her faded blue eyes snapped behind the lenses of her wire-rimmed glasses.

  “What?” Nicki mouthed, concerned about the older woman’s heightened color.

  “That Roberta Horton was in here not half an hour ago, waiting for the chief to come back from Eddie’s diner. I couldn’t believe the trash that woman was spouting.” Fran’s eyes narrowed even more. “She kept saying that Jenna was the one who found Eddie, and everyone knows what that means.”

  Maxie leaned forward. “Really?” She glanced over at Nicki. “Didn’t you just tell me that you’d warned Roberta about indulging in that kind of gossip?”

  Nicki nodded, her own temper spiking up to match Fran’s.

  “Apparently she didn’t comprehend what you were saying, dear,” Maxie said. “I might have to pay her a visit to explain it a bit more.”

  “You want to take my rifle?” Fran asked. “It makes a pretty good statement.”

  “No, she doesn’t want to take your rifle,” Nicki whispered. The last thing she needed in her life right now was to chase after a gun-waving Maxie. If her landlady didn’t accidentally shoot someone, myMason just might shoot Fran for letting his wife have a gun in the first place.

  The genealogist smiled and shook her head. “She’s joking, dear. I doubt if Fran even has a rifle.”

  “Well, I could get one,” Fran stated. “But I don’t think you need to worry about her, Maxie. The chief made it clear that he’d lock her up for slander if he heard one peep about Jenna being a suspect. Because she isn’t one.” Fran rubbed her chin. “I need to write myself a reminder to tell that chairman of the city council to pass an ordinance to allow someone to be arrested for slander.” She smiled at Nicki. “Wouldn’t want the chief to get into trouble.”

  “Of course not,” Nicki agreed. “Thanks for letting me know. I’ll keep an eye, and an ear, out for Roberta.”

  Fran shook her head, her frizzy gray hair bouncing with the movement. “That’s just part of it. The chief told her that she needed to meet him at Eddie’s apartment at three this afternoon. She squawked some about being busy, but he told h
er she had no choice. The chief thinks she might be able to tell him if anything is missing or out of place.”

  “So he’s going to meet Roberta at Eddie’s apartment at three?” Nicki repeated slowly, thinking it over. “Has he been inside yet?”

  “Nope. No key,” Fran said. “There wasn’t one on Eddie or in the diner that the chief could find. And the landlord lives in San Francisco. He can’t get out here until two thirty, so the chief is going to meet him at the apartment then.”

  “Two thirty.” Maxie nodded. “We’ve got it.”

  “If you’re through whispering over there, I’d like to talk to Mrs. Edwards.”

  Three heads snapped up to look over at the chief, and Nicki hoped the other two didn’t have as guilty an expression on their faces as she was sure she did. She felt the heat spreading in a rapid wave over her cheeks.

  “I was just going to announce them, Chief,” Fran said.

  “I can see that.” Chief Turnlow raised an eyebrow at his clerk. “Why don’t you skip the announcing and send them back, Fran.”

  “I guess you can go right in, ladies.” Smiling at the chief’s loud snort, Fran winked at Nicki. “Good hunting.”

  Nicki returned her smile. “Is that another gun reference, Fran?”

  The clerk’s laughter followed them through the small gate at the end of the counter and down the short hallway. Nicki pulled Maxie into the closet-sized room that served as the police chief’s office. There was barely enough space to scoot into the two visitor chairs placed in front of his desk. Once they were settled, the chief leaned back in his chair, ignoring its ominous creak of protest.

  “I didn’t suppose it would have done me any good to say I’d prefer to talk to Mrs. Edwards alone, so I thought I’d save us all an argument and just have you come in with her.

  Maxie sat up straight, her back stiff and her mouth set in a line. “And I’m glad she’s here for support if you’re going to insist on calling me ‘Mrs. Edwards’ in that official tone of voice of yours. I know what that means. I’m married to the former chief, if you’ll recall.”