by Libby Klein
He wasn’t budging and I didn’t have time to press him further. My five-minute parking at the Heritage Inn was over a half an hour ago.
I collected my car, which had an angry note on the windshield, and drove to the specialty cheese store, then headed home to make the cherry mascarpone filling.
I was getting the bags out of my car when a blue Jeep drove past the house. That’s when I heard the popffftppp! I dropped to the ground on my belly. Am I being shot at? I held my breath and waited. All I heard was shhhhhhhh. I peeked through my hair and saw Rabbitzilla bowing down to sniff the daffodils. Are we on some website of obnoxious Easter decorations to fire at? I crawled to my knees and pushed the Speed Dial for Smitty.
He answered on the first ring. “I’ll get the duct tape.”
* * *
I didn’t appreciate Joanne bullying me—not in high school, not at the reunion, and not while she was wearing my pink cupcake apron. But her custard tarts and chocolate passion fruit petits fours were so delicious that I just wanted to forgive and forget. Then she started making fun of me.
“So, are you trying to get the fat sucked out of your giant butt or your thighs?”
“What are you talking about?” I hid that brochure in my underwear drawer. She couldn’t possibly know about that.
“I’m talking about you looking for a face-lifter to tackle those crow’s feet. I saw the ad on your computer.”
“You saw the ad for what?”
“Fraudster. Don’t act dumb about it. If my boyfriend was that gorgeous stallion who picks you up, I’d get some work done too.”
How did she get on my Facebook account? I stopped filling the chocolate bread with cherry mascarpone and put my knife down. “Where did you see the Fraudster ad?”
“On the tablet when I went to check my . . . stuff. Duh.”
“And that has to do with getting liposuction how?”
Joanne’s lip curled in distaste. “Gol—I wasn’t expecting a tribunal. I just logged in to check my connections and it popped up.”
I went out to the front desk and grabbed the iPad. “Here. Can you show me?”
Joanne huffed and snatched the device from me. She clicked the keys and flipped the iPad over. “See?”
“Whose Tinder account is this?”
“It’s mine—shut up! Just look at the ad in the corner.”
“ ‘Fraudster. Saving your skin from cosmetic surgery blunders.’ ” I clicked the link. It was a website dedicated to complaints about plastic surgeons. Most of them were about Dr. Lance Rubin.
Joanne flipped the iPad back over. “You can do research on your own time. We have three hundred sandwiches to fill.”
She stowed the tablet behind the cookie jar and I picked up my knife. “So . . . you’re on Tinder. . . .”
She cut me off immediately. “We’re not talking about it.”
We worked in relative silence. Making sandwiches, filling bowls of Devonshire cream, lemon curd, and Aunt Ginny’s homemade strawberry champagne preserves. We plated everything with the cakes and tarts on three-tiered stands that we’d bought or borrowed from the biddies and their Bingo besties.
Everyone had abandoned us after we’d set the tables up for the one o’clock seating. I was a little worried about Aunt Ginny, who would usually be underfoot right about now, but she had disappeared over an hour ago. That was a long time for her to plot something sneaky.
The kitchen eventually got so steamy from simmering water that Joanne had to open the windows. “Uh-oh. You’d better come see this.”
It was still a quarter to one and a dozen ladies were milling about the wraparound porch, stalking the tables. “Where is Aunt Ginny? She’s supposed to be checking people in and seating them.”
“You better go rein them in or you’ll have a riot on your hands.”
I pushed through the dining room and found Aunt Ginny dressed like Queen Elizabeth on coronation day, and she was directing ladies to their tables by way of pointing a fancy wand. I sidled up to her and dropped my voice to a whisper. “What are you doing?”
She arched her eyebrows and stuck out her good hip. “What do you think I’m doing? I’m seating everyone.”
“What is that in your hand?”
“My jeweled scepter.”
I took a long look at the crown jewels and sighed. “That’s the doorknob from my bathroom and a curtain pole, isn’t it?”
Aunt Ginny looked at me like she was suffering through a conversation we’d had many times. “It had to be done.”
“Why couldn’t it be done with your doorknob?”
“Mine doesn’t look like a giant sapphire.”
This was an argument I would never win. “Are you checking people in against the list?”
“Of course I am.”
I took one of the laminated guest lists off the sideboard and read the names. “Rita and Faelynn?”
“On the front porch.”
I looked through the bay window in the sitting room and, sure enough, the ladies were seated at table one, right out front. “The Hortons?”
“Table five around the corner.”
“The Shuttleworths?”
“Table eighteen around the back.”
“The Lotts?”
“Right there in the tower.”
Two ladies waved to me from the table in the circular tower section of the sitting room.
I handed Aunt Ginny the guest list. “Okay. I thought you were up to something.”
Aunt Ginny’s eyes drooped and her lower lip jutted out. “Would I be up to something? I know this is a big deal for us.”
“I’m sorry. Joanne and I will start bringing around the pots of tea to those who are seated. Okay?”
Aunt Ginny gave me a prim nod. “Okay.”
“And please put my doorknob back when we’re done here.”
“Fine.”
“Fine.” I went back to the kitchen and filled pots of tea. Joanne and I had made three kinds: English breakfast, Ipsahan—a black tea flavored with violet and rose—and an herbal infusion of oranges and berries that I thought tasted like sangria. I gave Joanne a nod. “Okay, let’s do this.”
We made our way from opposite ends of the porch, delivering tea and welcoming guests. Joanne started delivering the towers of sandwiches, scones, and sweets while I finished the tea service inside the house. I was delivering a pot of English breakfast to the Lotts at the tower table when I heard the tinkle of a little bell. I only had one room left to serve and I definitely hadn’t put a bell in there. I slowly turned around to face the library across the hall.
There they were. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Dressed in Victorian splendor from their flowered hats and pearls to their lace hankies and feathered necklines. The biddies held their teacups in salute and Aunt Ginny snapped her fingers.
I smiled at the Lott party, tried to control the twitch in my eyebrow, and took a pot of violet rose across the hall. “Ladies. You know I’m fully booked for today.”
Mrs. Dodson tapped her cane on the floor. “Of course we know. We’d never think of showing up without a reservation. What do you think we are? Barbarians?”
I picked up the laminated guest list in the library and checked it. “I don’t see your names on here anywhere.”
“Look under Lady Ashcroft.” She held her nose high in the air and blinked twice.
“I see. And who is the Viscountess Lady Westbrooke?”
Mrs. Davis tittered and blew her feathers, the exact same shade of pink as her hair, away from her mouth.
I took the bell away from Aunt Ginny. “Uh-huh. I’ve met the queen here; Elizabeth Windsor, I presume.” I turned to Mother Gibson. “And just who might you be?”
The grin she gave me was too devious for a Sunday school superintendent, so I knew they’d been planning this for weeks. “I’m Her Royal Majesty, Queen Sophia Charlotte, the first black queen of England.”
“Of course you are.”
The ladies leveled even s
tares at me. I could tell they’d fired their first round and had a rebuttal ready in the chamber. Joanne carried one of the towers laden with savories and sweets for four into the room. “Are you going to help me or what?”
“I’m sorry, I was just trying to make sense of the reservation list, here.”
Joanne put the tower in the middle of the table. “Don’t look at me. Ginny handled most of the reservations.”
Aunt Ginny grinned and motioned to the empty seat next to her. “We’ll need another tower. As you can see, we have a fifth who’s running late.”
Mrs. Davis shook a lace hanky at me. “Oh, Poppy honey, before I forget, I heard about you finding that doctor who’d been killed at Convention Hall. That’s a shame.”
Mother Gibson’s lips flattened and she shook her head. “Child . . . they say crazy Agnes killed him.”
Aunt Ginny snorted. “Agnes Pfeister-Pinze is still waiting on that appeal that’s never going to happen. She should have taken the deal.”
I tapped the guest list against the table. “You all know about the lawsuit?”
Mrs. Dodson tilted her head back to look down her nose. “Honey, everyone knows about Agnes Pfeister-Pinze and her lawsuit. She took out a full-page ad in the Herald complaining that the Expo should be canceled due to the condition of her nostrils.”
Aunt Ginny held up her scepter. “Protesting is not going to get her anywhere. Anyone with eyes can see she got a botched face-lift. But she signed a waiver absolving the doctor of blame if anything went wrong, then she refused to settle out of court like the attorneys wanted. Now he’s dead and she’s not getting anything.”
The front door swung open and Victory ran in, face flushed and dressed in a lace wedding gown shaped like a bell with a bulbous appendage sticking out of her middle. She flopped down in the seat next to Aunt Ginny. “I am soory to be late. I had to feind materneity wedding dress at threift shop. There were so manee to choose from.”
I scanned the guest list one last time. “And that would make you . . . ?”
Victory stuck her chin out and posed. “Princess Kate Middleton.”
“Uh-huh. Why are you pregnant?”
Victory put her hand over her belly. “In case fancee cat ladee see me. I commeet to role.”
God help me. “I don’t understand why you’re all in costume.”
Mother Gibson adjusted her fur cape. “We’ve been looking for an excuse to dress up.”
Mrs. Davis giggled. “Besides, a proper ladies’ tea demands formal attire.”
Aunt Ginny held her cup and saucer up to me. “Now, buxom housemaid, will you pour whilst we fill thee in about thy beau’s incommodious wife?”
CHAPTER 30
If anyone in Cape May County would know about shady dealings and connections, it was these racketeers. I filled their cups with steaming Ipsahan. “Lay it on me, ladies.”
Mrs. Dodson dabbed her mouth with a cloth napkin and cleared her throat. “I ran a background check on Alexandra Larusso.”
Mrs. Davis tittered. “You mean your daughter Charlotte ran a background check.”
Mrs. Dodson gave a reprimanding eye roll at her more lighthearted friend. “I told her what to type. Anyway. We discovered that Alexandra came to the country on a student visa. She didn’t graduate from any college or university, and her visa was about to expire when she was fortunate enough to marry a US citizen.”
Aunt Ginny held up a cucumber sandwich. “That would be our Gia, who had gotten his citizenship a few years earlier.”
Mrs. Davis giggled. “Lucky girl.”
Mrs. Dodson continued her report. “Gia filed for a separation two and a half years into the marriage, so they didn’t stay together long enough for Alexandra to get permanent resident status. While background information doesn’t tell us what Alex did for the next few years, we do know that she moved around a lot. Charlotte found addresses in six states, and all of them were connected with different men’s names on the utility bills.”
Aunt Ginny rolled her eyes. “I’m sure that’s just a friendly coincidence.”
Mrs. Dodson snickered. “In addition, she has some minor traffic violations in Connecticut and she passed a couple bad checks in New York.”
Mother Gibson added a few well-placed interjections: “Mmm-mm-mm.”
Aunt Ginny adjusted her tiara. “But wait for the big one.”
Mrs. Dodson paused for dramatic effect. “Two months ago she was picked up in Los Angeles and charged with indecent exposure and public intoxication on Rodeo Drive.”
Mother Gibson helped herself to an egg salad triangle. “That’s probably how the uncle found her.”
Mrs. Dodson folded her hands over the top of her cane and looked around the room triumphantly.
“Well,” I asked, “if she is in the US on a marriage green card, wouldn’t she be a citizen by now? It’s been six years or so.”
Mrs. Dodson shook her head. “She’s had her visa renewed, but no formal citizenship application is on record because she would need her husband’s signature.”
Mrs. Davis grinned. “Probably too busy running around. How did she get the money to afford trips to New York City and Los Angeles?”
Victory held up a chocolate cherry sandwich. “Theis is my favorite one.”
Aunt Ginny ignored Victory. “Someone must be bankrolling her.”
“Well, that’s something to think about, isn’t it?” I said. “What about the arrests? Doesn’t Immigration send you back when you break the law?”
Aunt Ginny put her bejeweled hand over mine. “They were all misdemeanors, honey. And she’s still technically married to a US citizen.”
A very peeved “ahem” sounded behind me. Joanne looked like she’d just done a vinegar colonic and wanted to share her disappointment. “The next time you want to have twenty tables for tea, you can serve them yourself.”
“I’m so sorry. I’m coming right now.”
Victory called after me as I was leaving the room, “Bring more candee sayndweich.”
Joanne and I had served everyone and done a couple of hospitality laps. Now we were back in the kitchen refilling teapots. I was staring at a lone custard tart on the tray and I could feel myself weakening.
Joanne snickered. “Those aren’t gluten-free, you know.”
“So, the only things we have that are gluten-free are the things I made?”
She handed me a rice cake from her pocket. “Here you go. Pour a cup of tea and knock yourself out.”
Nope. I gave Joanne a dirty look and chucked the rice cake back at her. See, this is why we called you “buffalo gal” in high school.
Joanne was slapping herself on the back for that piece of witty repartee when the back door flew open and Sawyer rushed in. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I know I’m so late.”
“Late for what?”
Sawyer looked from me to Joanne. “The tea. I thought you asked me to help.”
“I did. You said you couldn’t leave the bookstore.”
We heard a tinkling bell coming from the library, then the intercom. “Serving wench, we require a fresh pot of Ipsahan and a few more scones posthaste.”
Joanne picked up a plate of scones. “I thought you took that bell away from them.”
“They had a backup.”
While Joanne was serving their ladyships, I sat Sawyer down with tea and a scone. “So, what happened?”
“I don’t know. I’m so confused lately. I can’t seem to remember what I’m supposed to be doing day to day.” She split her scone and slathered lemon curd on one half. “I forgot all about kids story time yesterday until they started showing up. I picked out A Bargain for Frances—one of my favorites—then realized halfway through I was reading about a badger’s tea party to a room full of five-year-old boys.”
I opened the secret Tupperware container I’d hidden behind the potatoes and took out a gluten-free scone. “How’d that go over?”
“Better than expected. The tea party h
ad cake, and cake is a universal language.”
I lifted my scone with clotted cream and strawberry jam. “Hear! Hear!”
She lifted her teacup to toast me, and my eyes caught something I hadn’t seen in many years.
“Why are you wearing Kurt’s ring?”
Sawyer’s hand flew under the table.
“It’s too late. I’ve already seen it.”
She sighed and took a cucumber sandwich from her plate. “It’s no big deal. I don’t care if you see it.”
Sure you don’t; that’s why you tried to hide it. “Then why are you wearing your ex-husband’s class ring six months after the divorce was finalized?”
“I’m getting it appraised.”
Joanne bustled back into the kitchen and frowned when she saw us sitting and eating scones.
Sawyer ignored Joanne’s passive-aggressive deep sigh and poured herself some more tea. “I do have some news, though.”
“What’s that?”
“The Twilight Egg Hunt is back on for tonight.”
Joanne snorted. “I thought all the glow sticks were stolen from Congress Hall.”
Sawyer shrugged. “I heard some muckety-muck from Philly donated a few cases so the event could go on. They just announced on the radio that the band starts at six.”
Joanne made herself a plate of tea sandwiches and stood alone at the counter to eat them. “That’s a stupid event anyway. Grown adults hunting glow-in-the-dark, painted eggs.”
I grinned at Sawyer. “What time do you want to walk over there?”
She grinned back. “I’ll be here at seven.”
Joanne grumbled in disgust and left the kitchen.
“I should probably go help her, although she gets to complain about me as part of her benefits package, so I may as well give her a good reason.” My phone chimed a text alert and I checked the screen. “Geez, Amber. You’d think she had me on retainer the way she wants me to jump every time she calls.”
“What does she want now?”
“She says she’s set up a meeting for tonight.”
“Meeting with who?”
“She didn’t say.”
