Book Retreat Mystery 07 - Murder in the Cookbook Nook

by Ellery Adams

  After several lengthy email exchanges with Mia’s assistant, a young woman named Bentley, Jane came to understand that Mia Mallett’s public image was meticulously curated and zealously guarded. Known as The Girl with the Midas Touch, Mia was a twenty-seven-year-old billionaire and social media darling. If she endorsed a product, her millions of fans would immediately buy it.

  As the manager of a five-star resort, Jane had met her fair share of actors, politicians, writers, musicians, and media sensations, but none had made requests quite like Mia Mallett’s. To guarantee her boss’s privacy, Bentley had booked the entire third floor of the East Wing. Only Jane, select Storyton Hall staff members, and Mia’s entourage were allowed to step foot on the floor while Ms. Mallett was in residence.

  How will I fill those empty rooms if Mia checks out after a single night?

  Jane pushed the thought aside. There was no sense in catastrophizing. All she could do was find out what was burning, and if the fire would affect tomorrow’s filming.

  “Don’t be the tent,” Jane chanted as she rode on.

  Her phone was mounted to her handlebars. When it rang, she pressed the speaker button and kept pedaling.

  “The fire’s in the archery field,” Butterworth said. “Chief Aroneo has the situation well in hand, and the flames should be extinguished shortly. A gentleman from the temporary power supply company is talking to the chief. From what I understand, this is an electrical fire.”

  Butterworth sounded so calm that Jane’s panic instantly subsided. “What kind of damage are we looking at?”

  “The fire was restricted to the grass. It didn’t have the chance to reach the tent, but the smoke and ash have severely discolored one side.”

  “Is the director there?”

  Butterworth grunted in disapproval. “Mr. Scott is using his bullhorn to shout orders contradictory to those the chief is issuing. If I don’t intervene, the firefighters may turn their hoses on him. If they do, I won’t lift a finger to intervene.”

  “We knew this reality show would be a challenge, but I expected to only see flames when the chefs flambéed food,” Jane said. “Please take charge until I get there.”

  After five more minutes of exertion, Jane emerged from the shady forest into a clearing filled with smoke, noise, and sunbaked spectators.

  Jane leaned her bike against a pine tree and jogged over to where Butterworth stood. Though the butler was in his mid-fifties, he was tall and powerfully built. Most people found his physical presence and gargoyle stare intimidating, but Mr. Scott was clearly the exception.

  Even though Butterworth’s muscular chest was firmly pressed over the bell of Mr. Scott’s bullhorn, the director didn’t seem to realize that he was seconds away from having his legs swept out from under him.

  “How am I supposed to tell people what to do?” he whined. “I’m in charge, man!”

  Butterworth was as unmovable as a boulder. “As I said, sir, Chief Aroneo is in charge. You will surrender your bullhorn until he and his firefighters have given the all-clear.”

  Jane pasted on her most winsome smile and approached the two men. “Thank you, Butterworth. I’ve got it from here.” Turning to the director, she said, “I almost missed all the drama, and you haven’t even started filming yet.”

  Butterworth retreated to a polite distance, bullhorn in hand, while Mr. Scott took in Jane’s sweaty face and dirty clothes. “Ms. Steward? Whoa. I didn’t recognize you, well, looking like that.” After raking his eyes over her once more, he pointed at the tent. “It’s been a helluva day.”

  “How is it inside?”

  The director chewed his lip. “Fine. But my opening shot is ruined. I wanted that Little House on the Prairie vibe. A picnic blanket here. A horse grazing there. A kid flying a kite. But I can’t work with burned grass. I’m filming a cooking competition, not Apocalypse Now.”

  Since Jane had never seen the famous war film, she focused on the television show that would introduce Storyton Hall to hundreds of thousands of potential guests. “Maybe the burned grass could be a metaphor for cooking. Fire can transform food into something magical, right? When we were kids, putting a marshmallow on a stick and holding it over an open flame was one of the best things about summer. And adults love watching a chef prepare crêpes suzette. But too much fire, and that nice cut of Wagyu beef will taste like an old boot.”

  Scott touched his hair, which rose high over his forehead like a cresting wave. “That won’t work for the opener, but I could use it when one of the chefs has a kitchen disaster.”

  Jane cupped his elbow and gently steered him toward the tent. “Does that happen often?”

  “We hope so. With every episode.” Scott grinned. “Drama makes for good television. If drama doesn’t happen naturally, we create it. Things like this fire rarely happen on set. Too bad I wasn’t filming. But I could always start another fire.”

  As they rounded the corner of the huge tent to face a patch of black and sizzling ground, Jane said, “Don’t do that, Mr. Scott.”

  “I’m just kidding. And call me Ty. By the time this show wraps, we’ll be good friends.” He flashed her a bright Hollywood smile that Jane didn’t find the least bit charming. Though she and the director were both in their late thirties, Ty looked younger than Jane. The skin on his face was smooth, his body was trim, and his hair—the color of a new penny—gleamed in the sun. The sleeves of his oxford shirt were rolled up to the elbow, exposing tan forearms and a gold Rolex. Designer sunglasses dangled from his breast pocket. He moved and spoke with the ease of a person who’s never known true hardship.

  We’re not going to be friends, Jane thought. Aloud, she said, “Protocol requires that I stick with Mr. Scott. If I can help, let me know. I’m going to speak to Chief Aroneo.”

  Putting his hands on his hips, Scott frowned at the stained tent and the smoking field. “Wait! You can help. Find me a company that can lay sod. Today. I want green grass for my opening shot. Cool?”

  Jane bristled. She wasn’t this man’s lackey. “My first priority is to speak with the chief. After that, I need to clear my guests from the area. Don’t you have an assistant to handle phone calls?”

  Ty Scott waved in the direction of the manor house. “Everyone’s busy. We start shooting tomorrow, remember? What about that grumpy butler? Can he help?”

  Feeling wicked, Jane smiled and said, “You’re free to ask him.”

  Leaving Tyler Scott to Butterworth’s mercy, Jane looked for Chief Aroneo and spotted him talking to a man in coveralls. The man was red-faced with fury. He pointed from the burned grass to the tent and then jabbed himself in the chest. The chief held out his hands to show that he was listening before accompanying the man inside the tent.

  Jane glanced around, expecting her sons to be among the spectators. When she didn’t see two boys or two bikes, she assumed they’d gone home. She slipped into the tent.

  Though she’d been inside before, Jane was still amazed by how much work had gone into creating this set. Storyton Hall used upscale tents for outdoor weddings all the time, but they didn’t have kitchen appliances, sinks with running water, granite countertops, or butcher block chopping stations. And that was just the cooking stations. The perimeter was lined with antique country furniture. Dry sinks, cupboards, pie safes, and hutches filled with stoneware, copper pans, milk glass vases, mason jars, and vintage kitchen scales. Other cabinets featured sets of jadeite, Lenox, Blue Willow, and Royal Albert dishes.

  The ground had been leveled before the tent was erected so that a temporary floor could be installed. Between the floor, lighting, appliances, and décor, the tent was an interesting blend of an upscale restaurant kitchen and the kitchen in a country home.

  Tomorrow, bucketloads of fresh flowers would augment that home kitchen feel.

  “They’ll be everywhere,” the set designer had told Jane. “In vases. On top of cupboards. In baskets. It’s how we’ll get that outdoorsy summer vibe inside the tent.”

&nbs
p; “Are the flowers coming from the Potter’s Shed?” Jane had asked. She wanted the local businesses to profit from the show along with Storyton Hall.

  The set designer had consulted her clipboard. “Yes. Sunflowers, bachelor’s buttons, coneflowers, and Queen Anne’s Lace. But if Mia wanted Venus flytraps, she’d find a way to get them. Things tend to appear at the snap of her fingers.”

  “I wish she could snap her fingers and erase this fire,” Jane muttered as she approached Chief Aroneo and the angry man in the coveralls.

  The men were standing at one of the cooking stations, their backs to Jane. A large sheet of paper was spread across the counter and the man in the coveralls was tracing something with his finger.

  “I’ve been doing this job for twenty years, Chief. I know how to avoid an overload. There’s no way I plugged all that juice into one generator. None of my guys did either.”

  “How can you be so sure?” the chief asked. “Things seem pretty chaotic around here.”

  The man shrugged. “It’s always this way around TV and movie people. Lots of yelling. Lots of freaking out over nothing. We ignore most of what they ask for because it goes against every safety protocol in the book. Scott wanted so many lights in this tent that the butter would have melted as soon as it came out of the fridge. I tell him what he wants to hear, but I stick to the contract.” He tapped the paper. “The contract called for these lines. That’s max capacity for the transformer.”

  “So who added an extra line?”

  The man rolled up the paper. “Not me or my guys. Twenty years and not one fire, Chief. Maybe somebody wanted a fire, but it wasn’t us.”

  “What’s going on?”

  Startled, the men spun around to face Jane.

  “Please,” she added. “I need to know if the fire was deliberate.”

  Jane saw the answer in the chief’s face before he said a word. After glancing at the other man, he said, “I’ll open an investigation, but considering all the people who’ve traipsed over this field lately, I don’t expect to find much.”

  Someone called for the chief on his radio, and he excused himself and exited the tent. The man in the coveralls was staring intently at his cell phone when he suddenly went rigid.

  “Just like I said,” he mumbled. “It wasn’t me or my guys.”

  Moving closer to the man, Jane introduced herself. “This is my resort, and I’m responsible for everyone here, so I’d like to know what caused that fire.”

  The man nodded. “I’m Jeff with Ashley Power Solutions. Our company provides temporary power for movies and TV shows. I’m in charge of this job. How much do you know about electrical systems?”

  “Nothing.”

  Jeff showed her the image on his phone screen. “Pretend this box with all the wires and circuits is the brain of our system. These bigger cables have to plug in here. These skinny wires plug in here. And so on. All the wires have to be coated. Everything has to be clean and kept out of the weather. No water can get inside. Okay. See this red wire?” He tapped a red wire in a nest of black wires. “It shouldn’t be there. Way too much juice went into the brain at this spot. That’s where the fire started. See how black the board is around that wire? But there’s more.”

  Though Jane didn’t like where this was headed, she had to hear the man out. “Go on.”

  “Somebody helped create the overload by making sure the brain got wet. We haven’t had a drop of rain since we’ve been here, but when the chief takes a closer look at this box, he’ll see what I’m seeing. Wrong wire in the wrong place plus liquid. That’s a recipe for an electrical fire.”

  “But aren’t these boxes locked? To avoid tampering?”

  Jeff looked aggrieved. “Once everything’s up and running, yeah. But we were still tweaking things to make Mr. Scott happy. Anyone could have walked by, swapped a wire, and left a chunk of ice on top to melt into the box. I’m sorry to say this, but somebody has it out for this show.”

  After Jeff left the tent, Jane sent a text to Butterworth.

  Fire wasn’t an accident. Someone wants to sabotage filming. Since attempted arson failed, what’s next?

  Staring at her screen, Jane cursed her own stupidity. She knew better than to tempt the fates by wondering what else could go wrong.

  Besides, she already knew the answer.

  It was everything. Everything could go wrong. And that’s when people got hurt.

  Pushing her damp hair off her forehead, Jane glanced around the empty tent. “I’d like a summer without violence. A nice, easy summer filled with weddings, barbecues, and beach reads. Can I have one of those?”

  The stain on the tent wall, which crawled from floor to ceiling like some multi-limbed shadow creature from a child’s nightmare, felt like a sign that her wish had little chance of coming true.

  Chapter 2

  After freshening up at home, Jane called a meeting with Butterworth, Sterling, Sinclair, and Lachlan. These men were all department heads. More importantly, they were Fins.

  The Fins were established a century ago in England by Walter Egerton Steward, Storyton Hall’s original owner. Walter required protection for both his family and the secret library hidden inside his manor house, so he hired a small group of men with specialized combat training to serve as his personal guard. Because the Fins were named after the stabilizing device used on arrows, every Fin had an arrow tattooed over his heart.

  Despite the presence of these skilled fighters, threats against Walter Steward persisted. Thieves came from every direction, hoping to steal Steward’s treasure, and Walter was forced to make a drastic decision. He dismantled his estate and shipped it overseas. Brick by brick, a slightly modified version of Storyton Hall was built in a picturesque, isolated valley in Western Virginia. The location was ideal because very few people could approach the manor house undetected.

  A village sprung up around the estate, and all its residents were fiercely loyal to the Stewards. For many years, Walter and his family lived in peace. After Walter’s death, his Fins stayed on and vowed to protect the next generation of Stewards.

  As the current Guardian of Storyton Hall, Jane had her own Fins. To her, they were much more than bodyguards and department heads. They were family. Butterworth, Sinclair, and Sterling had been surrogate fathers to Jane, and she loved them with her whole heart.

  Landon Lachlan was a relatively new addition. When he’d first come to Storyton, his rugged good looks and shy demeanor had caused a stir among the single women. But none of them had ever stood a chance of capturing his heart. Landon Lachlan had fallen for Jane’s best friend, Eloise Alcott, the moment he’d laid eyes on her.

  The couple was getting married in August, and Jane planned to host a bridal shower for Eloise soon after the cooking competition wrapped. And though she was the Guardian of Storyton Hall, Jane would much rather be at home, finalizing the party menu and reading Jasmine Guillory’s The Wedding Party than discussing arson.

  “I spoke with Chief Aroneo,” Lachlan said, interrupting Jane’s rosy visions of a novel in one hand and a glass of iced coffee in the other. “An arsonist caused that fire. Unfortunately, no one saw anything and there are no leads, which means our chances of catching this person are slim.”

  This was deflating news. With a hotel full of strangers, identifying the saboteur would be incredibly difficult.

  “We need to find out if Mr. Scott, Ms. Mallett, or any of the competing chefs have enemies,” Jane said. “Serious enemies. Let’s assume the arsonist meant to burn down the tent. That would have delayed filming and cost the studio lots of money. Was this the arsonist’s goal? Or do they have another objective?”

  “And will they strike again?” Lachlan added.

  “Monitoring activity around that tent will be a challenge,” said Sterling. The head chauffeur was also in charge of Storyton Hall’s surveillance system. “When my drivers aren’t working, I’ll ask them to change into plainclothes and mingle with the guests. They can keep their eyes a
nd ears open and report any suspicious behavior to me.”

  Sinclair, Storyton’s head librarian, smoothed a wrinkle on the lapel of his tailored seersucker suit, adjusted his pink bowtie, and said, “It wouldn’t hurt to let certain members of Mrs. Hubbard’s staff play a similar role. I imagine she’d be amenable to the idea.”

  Jane laughed. “Amenable? She’d be over the moon. I’ll talk to her as soon as we’re done rolling out the red carpet for Mia Mallett. Sterling? What’s her ETA?”

  “Her train arrived at four thirty. During the thirty minutes it took the porters to unload her luggage, Ms. Mallett posed for photographs around the station. Ms. Mallett and her staff were then loaded into cars around five. I’ve been informed that she plans to stop just outside our main gates to have more photos taken. After that, she’ll start a live feed, inviting her followers to share in her first glimpse of Storyton Hall.”

  “Just imagine.” Jane sighed dreamily. “Mia Mallett is going to introduce Storyton Hall to three million followers. All the people watching that video will pass through our massive iron gates, hear the gravel crunch under the tires of a Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith, and see the Blue Ridge Mountains rising over our tree-covered hills. They might even spot a red-tailed hawk circling in the sky. But when Mia’s driver eases around that final bend and Storyton Hall comes into view, they’ll forget about the mountains and the sky. They’ll be entranced by a man-made marvel.”

  Unable to resist, Sinclair picked up the narrative. “Ms. Mallett will let out a soft gasp. Though she’s seen architectural splendors like the Taj Mahal and Buckingham Palace, Storyton Hall is enchantingly unique. She is the jewel of this valley’s crown, a queen dressed in a gown of stone and brick. Ms. Mallett’s viewers will notice her clock tower first, soaring into the sky like an obelisk. Next, they’ll see how the mansion’s wings stretch out to the sides like two arms opening for an embrace. Golden light shines from every tall window. And on the other side of the carved entry doors, a bear of a man waits with champagne flutes balanced on a silver tray.”