by Eve Calder
“A private airport?”
Maxi nodded.
“That’s a lot of trouble and planning if you’ve only made a few halfhearted, lowball offers on a couple of pieces of property.”
“So what do you think?”
“Lord’s specialty was getting land for next to nothing. After the hurricanes. And remember what Amos Tully said at the book club meeting? When that wasn’t enough, rumor has it he cut a deal with some of the insurance companies to delay payouts? If that’s true, it means Lord stepped up his game and learned how to get even more land for next to nothing.”
“You think he learned a new trick?” Maxi asked.
“I do,” Kate replied. “I suspect Stewart Lord had a plan. Something big. Something that would have let him scoop up Coral Cay for a song.”
Chapter 34
That afternoon, as Maxi carried a late lunch—and the good news about the reopening plans—over to Sam at the jail, Kate kept an eye on Flowers Maximus and the Cookie House.
Pressed for time, they’d opted for one of Bridget’s chicken pot pies with strawberry shortcake for dessert.
Before Maxi left, Kate handed her two cookie boxes, both without the new Cookie House labels. “This one’s for Sam. So he can enjoy a snack later. And this one’s for Ben, if you see him. Apparently, Ball Cap Man and I cost him dessert.”
“Ay, you definitely don’t want to do that. You know that phrase ‘the long arm of the law’? When I hear that, I always see Ben at Thanksgiving dinner, reaching across our table for the cherry pie. That man loves his sweets.”
An hour later, Kate didn’t see how Maxi managed it. Even without the health department crisis, the florist’s phone rang almost nonstop. While most of the calls were fairly simple—people who wanted to see if she had a favorite flower in stock or to get prices for plants or landscaping—many were big last-minute floral orders. Or changes to big last-minute floral orders.
One bride-to-be needed an estimate on flowers for her wedding. But she wanted native seasonal plants only. The date of the wedding? Either next weekend or Halloween. They were still working on that. (Kate promised Maxi would call as soon as she returned from “another event.”)
A second bride confessed her father had pronounced the florist’s estimate for pink and white roses “too bloody high.” What else could Ms. Más-Buchanan recommend that would be stylish and still fit their budget? (“Not to worry, Ms. Más-Buchanan can suggest some lovely alternatives, and she’ll be in touch this afternoon.”)
And two of the resort hotels phoned. One had a guest planning a last-minute wedding, another needed flowers for an impromptu baby shower this weekend: Could she accommodate them? (Definitely, Kate informed both. And her “boss, Ms. Más-Buchanan, would call for the details and handle the arrangements personally.”)
All between taking deliveries for the bakery and the flower shop. And shuttling cookies, cold water, and lemonade to the painting crew.
When she spotted the UPS truck pulling up in front of the Cookie House, Kate opened the door and flew across the lawn to the bakery.
She met the deliveryman just as he was hiking up the walkway carrying a white box with “Marco’s” printed on the sides in heavy black letters.
“Hi, I’m Kate McGuire,” she said, slightly out of breath. “I think that one’s for me.”
“Kate McGuire, care of the Cookie House,” the young guy said, smiling. “Just take this and sign there,” he said, handing her the box with an electronic tablet stacked on top. “Hey, do you guys really make cookies?”
“All kinds. Come back on Saturday. We’re having a grand reopening. To celebrate, we’re giving away everything we bake. To the community.”
She paused for a beat. And focused. “And the peanut butter cookies are outstanding. Salty and sweet.”
“With those fork hashtags in the top? Oh man, those are my favorite. My mom hasn’t made those in years. OK, you’re on. I’ll be back here Saturday. Might bring a few friends, too.”
“The more the merrier,” Kate said, wondering if they might need more supplies.
With ladders forming a virtual cage across the front of the bakery, she headed to the back door. As she rounded the corner of the house, she spied Carl Ivers sitting on the back stoop. Smoking a cigarette.
“Don’t tell Minette,” he said, inhaling deeply and casting a long glance across the backyard.
Kate’s mind worked double-time. A locksmith (and ex-cop) would know how to pick a lock. She remembered Carl installing a dead bolt the morning after the break-in—how safe that had made her feel. Now she suddenly realized it also meant he could have a key to the bakery. And with the painting project, who’d think twice if they saw him going into the place at any hour? He was going to be here tonight. Late. Painting the storerooms. How hard would it be for him to take a “smoke break” to finish searching the place for whatever it was the burglar wanted?
She snuck a glance at his shoes. Work boots. With hard soles.
“I don’t really smoke anymore,” he explained. “Quite a long time ago. I just bum one now and then. To relax.”
Carl finally looked up and met her eyes. “So what’s in the box?”
“New shoes,” Kate said quickly. “Ordered them online.”
Chapter 35
That evening, as Maxi worked the phones for the flower shop, typing away at her home computer, Kate staked out the Más-Buchanan kitchen, baking batch after batch of cookies. While simultaneously researching tricks and techniques for making the perfect sourdough.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t put her hands on the real thing for another twenty-four hours. Until Francine Junior Junior had time to adjust to her new home in Maxi’s kitchen cupboard—and leaven a bit of flour.
In the meantime, Kate made do by reading every sourdough how-to she could lay her hands on—from professional strategies to hacks from home chefs. She had a library’s worth of cookbooks piled on the counter. She’d even bribed Michael into parting with the family iPad so she could access a few online resources.
His price: a post-dinner batch of cookies in the flavor of his choice.
As a result, Michael, Javie, and Elena were conducting high-volume, high-stakes negotiations in the den, while Oliver supervised from the sofa.
The sound of the doorbell sent them into overdrive.
“Pizza guy!” Michael hollered.
“Pizza man, pizza man!” Javie sang, jumping up and down.
“Piz-za!” Elena exclaimed.
“Got it!” Peter called, heading for the front door, still in his dress shirt and suit pants.
He’d barely made it through the door that evening when Maxi informed him he was on dinner duty. So he’d shed his jacket, pulled off his tie, and ordered pizza.
“Gordian knot solution,” he happily informed his wife. “And the kids can help me set up out back.”
As they all sat around the outdoor table, Maxi glanced over at him and grinned. “You, mi amor, are a wonderful Italian chef. I love it when you cook.”
Esperanza, a small smile on her face, delicately cut her slice with a knife and fork.
“Hey, I’m a regular Renaissance man. I cook, I deliver baked goods, I put away the bad guys.…”
Maxi looked at him meaningfully. “How did I get so lucky?”
“Well, if that impressed you, I’m going for broke now. Remember how we were having so much trouble finding any information on His Majesty Stewart Lord back in the U.K.?”
Maxi and Kate nodded as Javie reached over and snagged another piece of bacon and sausage pizza.
“Turns out Lord’s not his real name. His birth name is ‘Larde’ with an e. Paul Larde. Known around the old neighborhood as Roly Paulie.”
“Did he have a record?” Kate asked.
“Some small-fry stuff when he was a teenager. Petty theft. Loitering. Joyriding. Sounds like he was more of a wannabe than anything else. And he already had quite the gift of gab. Always managed to talk his way out of an
y serious charges. Then, when he was nineteen, his mother passed. Didn’t have much of an estate, but the old lady had a nice burial policy. Some kind of holdover from the father’s pension plan. Anyway, it was supposed to cover her expenses, with any remainder split between Paul and his sister, Mary.”
“I think I know where this is going,” Maxi said, taking another piece of veggie pizza and carefully placing it on the paper plate in front of Elena.
Oliver, stationed on the grass near the girl’s chair, didn’t beg. But he happily accepted any morsels surreptitiously slipped to him. And claimed anything that fell on the ground.
Peter smiled. “Yup. Somehow, Paulie-boy got his hands on that check and both he and it vanished. Sister never saw either one again.”
“Did she file charges?” Kate asked.
“Didn’t see the point, apparently. She knew Paul well enough to know that money was long gone. Rest of the relatives had to pass the hat to bury the mother.”
“That’s awful,” Maxi said.
“But true to form,” Kate added.
“So that real estate empire, he started it with stolen money?” Maxi breathed. “What happens to it now?”
“Barring a will, which we can’t find any trace of, his sister gets it all.”
Maxi giggled.
Kate grinned. “I know, right?” She raised her water glass. “Here’s to karma!”
Chapter 36
Friday morning, as Maxi fielded the phone and finished several orders next door at Flowers Maximus, Kate surveyed the bakery.
The outside was nearly complete. The painting crew was completing the back of the house. And Carl was confident they’d be done by sundown.
Inside, the upstairs was gorgeous. Thanks to whatever Carl had used, the new-paint smell wasn’t overpowering. And somehow the pale butter-yellow color intensified the sunshine. For Kate, who’d lived for years in an aging New York apartment where most of the illumination came from fluorescent bulbs and track lights, it was like a glass of cold water after coming in off the desert.
And Maxi had been right about el baño. The ice blue looked cool and relaxing. The perfect place to grab a refreshing shower after spending the day in a hot kitchen.
This is just temporary, Kate reminded herself. Next on the list after the bakery opens and tourist season winds down—get my own place. Still, she thought, looking around longingly. This is beautiful.
She walked to the open windows and looked out across the town, feeling the strong breeze on her face. It smelled like the ocean. She could see so much of Coral Cay. Even a bit of turquoise water off in the distance.
When Kate looked straight down, she was stunned. The dead bush was gone. Replaced by a healthy hibiscus dotted with deep pink blooms. And the second, freshly painted white window box held a twin of the first.
Maxi.
But when did she even have time? Maxi had spent most of the previous day putting in big beds of flowers along the porch and down the walkway of the Cookie House. She’d gotten a little help from Bridget O’Hanlon, who had come to bring lunch and ended up spending the afternoon. Maxi even managed to “borrow” a few of the kids from Carl’s crew.
The results were spectacular.
Nearest the house, the petunia beds were either entirely pink or white—“’Cause that will look good against the light pink house,” Maxi had confided.
She’d planted ground cover along the walkway. Something with dark green leaves and small, sweet-smelling white flowers. And at the intersection of the bakery walkway and the main sidewalk: two huge beds of petunias in a deep, rich indigo.
“That’ll grab their attention,” Maxi had explained. “The real estate ladies call it curb appeal. The customers’ eyes travel up the sidewalk. And their feet follow right through the front door. Science!”
Even the lawn looked good. Kate thought it was because of the soaking hoses Maxi had crisscrossing the lawn every night.
“Nope,” the florist had finally confessed. “That’s rye grass. Rye seed plus a little water and a lot of love equals really green grass. And it sprouts quick, quick, quick.”
While everyone had been planting and painting, Kate had given the kitchen and the shop area another thorough scrubbing yesterday. She’d even polished the floors. Everything gleamed.
Now the new supplies were stacked in the storeroom and the walk-in fridge, just waiting on the OK from the health inspector.
Her phone! She’d forgotten to pick it up at the police station. Oddly, after living on her cell for years—especially when she was scrambling for a job—living without it was strangely invigorating.
No jangling interruptions at the worst possible moments. No hectoring demands from Jeanine. No crisp, newsy updates from Amanda Thorpe. Or worse—a profound absence of voicemails from her son. Best of all, no cozy snaps of Evan and Jessica—from Jessica’s phone, of course.
It was like baking: She savored the luxury of focusing completely on what was real and solid in front of her. Friends, food, work. It was joyous.
Kate smiled. Maybe, subconsciously, that’s why she kept “forgetting” to retrieve that phone.
Next to her, Oliver leaned against her leg. Then he stepped on her foot. When she looked down, the puppy gazed directly up into her eyes and did it again.
“Trying to get my attention, little guy?” She kneeled down and stroked the soft oatmeal-colored coat on his back, finishing with a vigorous scratch behind one ear. His tail wagged faster.
“You know, this is your home, too, if you want,” she said softly, settling on the floor. “I mean, I keep hearing that you’re not so hot on the idea of a permanent address. And I get that. But this place is pretty nice. And I am going to be baking ginger snaps just downstairs, so there’s that. I know I was plenty set in my ways, too. But in the past week, I’ve sort of gotten out of the habit of living alone. I don’t know how I’m going to bake anything without Michael and Javie fighting over LEGOs in the background. Or Elena singing and bouncing on the sofa. Weird, huh? So, for what it’s worth, I’d love to have you as a roommate. You know, if the place meets your standards, and all. But if you elect to stay, we’re not advertising that to the health inspector. Which is probably fair, because we’re not telling him I live here, either.”
Oliver cocked his head to one side and studied her. Then he turned around three times and curled up in a tight ball beside her.
A definite “maybe.”
Chapter 37
Three hard knocks on the door downstairs made Kate jump.
“Health department!”
Kate jumped up. “Not now!” she said to Oliver. “They’re early. They’re not supposed to be here until this afternoon. After three.”
The pup cocked his head.
Three more staccato raps sent her heart into high gear.
“Oh no, she’s at the back door! How am I supposed to sneak you out of here? If we go through the kitchen, she’ll see you!”
Kate grabbed the red landline off the shelf and dialed a familiar number.
“Flowers Maximus, this is Maxi.”
“Maxi, it’s Kate. The health inspector’s at the back door. And Oliver’s upstairs. In my room.”
“¡Vaya! When it rains, it pours!”
“Just a minute! Coming!” Kate hollered. Into the phone she whispered, “What are we going to do?”
“Leave Mr. Oliver upstairs,” Maxi said. “Close the door to your room, and leave the back door open. I’ll come get him. While you distract the inspector, we’ll make our escape.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“Ay, vaya con Dios!”
Kate looked at Oliver, who appeared totally sanguine.
“OK, just remember, be very, very quiet,” Kate said, ruffling the silky, soft hair on the top of his head. “Maxi will be here to take you out in just a minute.”
She sprinted down the stairs and threw open the back door. “Hi, I’m Kate McGuire,” she pronounced, slightly out of breath. “Welcome to the
Cookie House!”
“Yeah, I’m Stella Branch. County board of health. Let’s start in the kitchen.”
In a white short-sleeve blouse, shapeless black slacks, and a tight no-nonsense bun, Stella looked like the take-no-prisoners type. If she spotted Oliver, it was over. No bakery. No grand reopening. No business for Sam. He’d lose everything.
As Stella bent to examine the stove and oven, Maxi tiptoed through the back door. She waved at Kate and moved quietly up the stairs.
Kate heard a long creak. An upstairs door opening.
Stella straightened up. “What was that?”
“Old house,” Kate said quickly. “It settles. If you’re here alone at night, it’s really eerie.”
“Spooky. OK, let’s see the walk-in fridge.”
Kate opened the door and held it, letting the health inspector go in first. As she did, she saw Maxi, cradling Oliver, sneak down the stairs and out the back door. The last thing Kate glimpsed as they hustled off was the gangly puppy—front paws resting on Maxi’s shoulders—smiling back at her.
From her pocket, Stella produced a thermometer, held it aloft, and tapped it several times. Then she pushed a button on her watch. Half a minute later, it buzzed and she checked the reading. “Thirty-eight degrees. Solid. And very clean. But you really weren’t kidding about the noises in this old place.”
After a grueling ninety-minute examination that covered every inch of the kitchen, shop, upstairs storerooms, and bathrooms, Stella gave the Cookie House a 99 on its health inspection.
“I deducted a half a point for having to wait to get in, because we’re supposed to have immediate access at all times,” Stella explained. “And I subtracted another half point for the ladders lying in the grass in the backyard. That’s a safety hazard. I understand it’s not the regular customer entrance, but we have to examine all access points. Also, you’ll have a surprise follow-up inspection sometime in the next thirty days. Got to say though, all those creaks and groans in a big old house? Creepy.”
