Criminal Confections

by Colette London

  The former made it look as though Danny was right about me and all that sappy picket-fence stuff. The latter only made me remember that Nina (wrongly) thought Danny had concussed me.

  I wasn’t sure how to finesse that misguided tidbit.

  “Okay. We’ve got a few suspects lined up.” No longer fiddling with his whiskey, Danny gave me a serious look. “What we need here are motives. That should clarify things for us.”

  “Motives are easy,” I told him. “This one’s love. People kill for love—or love gone wrong, I guess—all the time. Right?”

  Danny didn’t disagree. But he made a hilarious face. “If I’m ever that far gone over someone, you should kill me.”

  As if I could. “It’s a deal.”

  “Not that you’ll have to.” Then, “As a motive, love is . . .” Danny’s gesture dismissed it. “It’s got to be money.”

  “Money is the motive for someone to kill Adrienne? And Rex?” And maybe Isabel? I added silently. “Love is stronger.”

  “I think Travis would side with me on this one.”

  “Oh. Then I give up. You know what a pushover I am.”

  He wasn’t intoxicated enough to forget how well he knew me. His head shake belied all the whiskey he’d drunk. “Obviously.”

  “I hate to say it,” I told him, ignoring his teasing, “but I think Isabel did it. She wanted Adrienne out of the way so she could have Bernie all to herself to travel the world with her the way she’d dreamed of—especially now that Bernard is retired. She wanted Rex out of the way because he threatened to tell Bernard . . . something.” I didn’t know what yet. “Maybe Rex was going to tell Bernard about their fling? And Isabel wanted me out of the way because I was on the verge of catching her.”

  “Whoa. Good going, Sherlock,” Danny cracked. He arched his brow at me, then swirled his finger absently around the rim of his half-full shot glass. He shook his head. “It wasn’t Isabel.”

  It could have been. “Why not?”

  “You’re only pointing the finger at her because she’s not here.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Danny gave me a long look. “Isabel is your safest suspect. She demands the least from you. That’s what it means.”

  What? I took his whiskey. “You’re cut off.”

  He relented. I hoped he was about to make sense.

  “You hate thinking the worst of people, Hayden,” Danny finally said. He looked at me. “It’s one of your biggest flaws.”

  I frowned. “In what universe is being nice a flaw?”

  “Mine.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  “Mine, where people are trying to kill you,” he persisted. “I’d be willing to bet that you’ve considered—and dismissed—Adrienne’s real killer a dozen times already. You’re too nice.”

  “I don’t even know what you’re talking about.” Guiltily, I remembered thinking the worst of him. He was wrong about me.

  Obviously, I could be doubtful with the best of them.

  “But if it’s Isabel,” Danny told me, hooking his whiskey and taking another drink, “you can doubt her all you want. Risk free. Because she’s already gone. If it’s someone else—”

  “Fine. Let’s say Rex is the one who overdosed Adrienne.”

  “Also conveniently gone,” Danny reminded me.

  I was proving his point. Annoyingly. “I wouldn’t call being dead ‘convenient.’ Rex could have killed Adrienne. For money,” I argued, pushing to sell my theory. “Maybe he wanted to get her notebook—and her chocolate expertise—at a heavy discount.”

  “Maybe,” Danny agreed. We discussed Adrienne’s supposed corporate espionage, Rex’s financial woes at Melt, and his difficulties partnering with Bernard. “Then who killed Rex?”

  We were back at square one. “Bernard?” I guessed. “He was there in the shadows, just like us, and saw Isabel and Rex together last night. He lost his mind, followed Rex, and pushed him off the ridge. I know Bernard is strong enough to do that.”

  I reminded Danny of the way the Lemaître founder had grabbed me when I’d almost fallen from the ridge trail at the scavenger hunt—and of Bernard’s eerie on-again, off-again warnings. He’d frightened me today. Then again, that was getting easier to do as the secrets, lies, and concussions mounted.

  “Bernard could have killed Isabel, too,” I went on, recounting some of my earlier theories, “then made it look as though she’d left the resort on her own.” I remembered the Maison Lemaître security cameras I’d seen in the parking lot. “What we need is security footage of the nights in question.”

  Danny gave a shrewd smile. He knew what was coming next.

  I didn’t want to give it to him. But this was an emergency.

  Casually, I looked around the bar. “Do you think you could, I dunno, maybe find a way to get ahold of some of that footage?”

  Nothing but silence came from my buddy’s side of the table. I knew what Danny was thinking, though. I was always on his case about cleaning up his act, going legit, being on time . . . even the merest transgressions sometimes warranted a lecture from me, Ms. Goody Two-shoes. He couldn’t double-park without me hassling him about the risks he was taking. He wasn’t on parole anymore, but—

  “Are you asking me to break the rules?” Danny asked mildly.

  I closed my eyes amid the din of the band tuning up for another round. Guitars assaulted my senses. My conscience had a good poke at me, too. I knew it was wrong, but . . .

  “Only a little.”

  He laughed. “Already done.” His sparkling eyes irked me. Why did Danny only ever look truly happy when he was putting one over on me? “What do you think I was watching on my laptop?”

  “On your laptop?” I blinked, trying to remember. Maybe he’d had his computer with him on the bed. I couldn’t be sure now.

  I might have been too busy being badass to notice.

  The only thing left to do was go on the offensive. So I did. “You were watching Antiques Roadshow, and you know it.”

  “Keep your voice down.” He frowned, then looked around the packed-tight bar. “I don’t want to break any heads tonight.”

  I stared at him. “You already have the security footage?”

  “Did you forget who you’re dealing with?”

  I felt one step behind. It hadn’t even occurred to me that such footage might exist until today. Whereas Danny had obviously thought of it and gotten it. “How did you get it?”

  “The blond waitress. Her boyfriend works in security.”

  Aha. “But what about your pants?” I blurted.

  He gave me a puzzled look. “What about them?”

  I got busy chugging more beer. I shrugged. Extravagantly.

  Time to change the subject. “Did you see anything?”

  “On the footage?” At my nod, Danny elaborated. “It’s pretty limited. Grounds, lobby, ballroom, meeting rooms . . . plus kitchens and other staff areas. That’s it. The resort’s security system sucks.” He frowned, then had another drink of whiskey. “Whoever designed it had a clear focus on loss prevention, not safety.”

  Befuddled, I gave him a quizzical look. “‘Loss prevention’?”

  “Preventing employee theft,” Danny translated with a hard look at me. “That means service elevators, but no guest room hallways—”

  “So no evidence of who clobbered me,” I surmised.

  “—and no sign of Adrienne outside the kitchen or ballroom, where we saw her all night, until she stumbles into frame on the patio outside the welcome reception, with Nina helping her.”

  At that reminder of my friend’s tragic death, I shivered.

  “There’s footage of Christian in the ballroom kitchen, where Adrienne was working,” Danny told me, moving on quickly, “so he had access to the caffeine powder.” We’d both agreed that was what Adrienne had probably accidentally “overdosed” on, now that Travis’s analysis had ruled out the nutraceutical truffles. “He had access to Adrienne’s g
reen drink, too, while she was doling out chocolate to the big shots during the reception. But it’s not clear on the footage if Christian tampered with anything.” Danny leaned back, thinking about it. “Although since he’s in charge around here, he would have known how to avoid being caught on camera. All I can say for sure is that Christian nearly put back his own body weight in chocolate that night.”

  That fit with what I’d seen in his office today. “If he was bingeing on chocolate again,” I said, “that would explain why Christian looked so guilty when we ran into him that night.”

  “Yeah. He didn’t want to be caught breaking his diet,” Danny deadpanned. He rolled his eyes. “Or he murdered Adrienne.”

  We didn’t seem to be getting any closer to a resolution.

  “Bernard thinks Christian pushed Rex off the ridge,” I told Danny. “He also thinks Christian killed Adrienne in retaliation for her wanting to ‘defect’ to Melt when Rex offered her a job.”

  “‘Defect’ is a pretty strong word.”

  “It says a lot about Christian’s despotic mind-set, right?”

  “But Adrienne didn’t take that job,” Danny argued—making me wonder, for the first time, why she hadn’t. I knew she hadn’t enjoyed working for Christian at the “new” Lemaître. “Is Christian that petty? He’d kill her for thinking of leaving?”

  We didn’t even need a nanosecond to nod in agreement.

  “If she’d think it the first time,” I speculated, trying to put myself in Christian’s domineering, mistrustful, alligator-skin designer shoes, “then maybe she’d do it the second time.”

  “Christian wanted to make an example of her.”

  I nodded. But where did that leave us?

  Still confused, actually.

  “That sounds plausible,” Danny mused. He gave a muttered expletive. “Bernard . . . wow. He really told you that? You’ve got to admire the old coot’s willingness to backstab his nephew, straight up. Back in the day, I hear Bernie was a real—”

  “Danny!”

  “What?”

  “Show a little respect, will you?” I shook my head, feeling my whole body start to vibrate in cadence with the band’s bass guitar player’s rhythms. It got louder. “Bernard Lemaître is the man who all but invented artisanal chocolate. Without him—”

  “You might not have been concussed and left for dead?”

  That shut me up. Temporarily.

  “Pussycat,” Danny yelled into the clamor of the band. “I hear Bernard was a real pussycat, back in the day. That’s all I was going to say.” His sarcastic grin was less than convincing.

  “Yeah. Right.” I shook my head, not persuaded. “I’m telling you, Christian is a lot meaner than Bernard is. He’s venal.”

  “And you know that . . . how?” Danny eyed my beer, probably wondering if I was going to finish it. He liked mixing it up sometimes. It was a good thing we were leaving via taxi.

  I pushed my leftover beer across the table. Danny lifted it in a mischievous toast, then took a swallow. When he finished, he put down his glass, straightened a make-believe deerstalker hat atop his head (à la Sherlock Holmes), then gave me a grin.

  “You know,” I mused, “I think you’re enjoying this.”

  “Nah.” He wiped his mouth, then nodded at a woman who passed by while giving him a flirtatious look. “I like being out, away from all the stuffed shirts. On our own again.”

  I liked that, too. “I’m glad you’re here with me.”

  “Hey. Settle down, sloppy. One of your other biggest flaws is getting mushy when you’re drinking. Try to rein it in, okay?”

  I saluted. “You know,” I said, getting more somber, “it’s possible that Bernard really is as nice as he seems to be—that he truly is grieving over Adrienne, sorry to have lost Isabel—”

  “What was I saying about you not wanting to think the worst of people?” Danny shook his head. “Come on.”

  “I mean it! I like Bernard. When he’s not scaring me.”

  “You need therapy.”

  Reminded of the info Travis was sending me about Nina’s husband, I considered checking my phone for his email. Travis had gone above and beyond on that request. He’d let me know that he hadn’t wanted to “skirt the law,” but he’d done it. For me.

  “Since you won’t leave to be safe,” Travis had told me on the phone, rumbly and hot, “you didn’t give me much choice.”

  “Remind me to steal all your pants sometime,” I’d joked, imagining him without “much choice” except to gallivant around in his tighty-whities, shirtless and—more importantly—available.

  But my superserious keeper hadn’t gotten in on the fun.

  “This information came from one of my friends in the Fed,” Travis had told me. “It’s for your eyes only. Not Danny’s.”

  Privately, I suspected Travis simply didn’t want his nemesis to know that he’d done something borderline sketchy by calling in a few favors with his highbrow government buddies.

  But I’d agreed to stay mum. Now I made keeping that vow to Travis even easier by not looking for his email.

  “If Bernard is innocent,” I told Danny, “then we have to consider what he said. He pointed the finger at Christian. Point-blank! No equivocating.” Not beyond window gazing, at least.

  “Maybe Bernard was redirecting you on purpose.” Danny’s keen gaze locked on mine. “There’s no better way to dodge trouble than by throwing suspicion on someone else.”

  I scoffed. He held firm. I reconsidered. “You think so?”

  He looked away. Tightly, Danny said, “I know so.”

  Well. That was all I wanted to know about that. I tended to overlook the nitty-gritty details of Danny’s former life whenever I possibly could. It was better for us both that way.

  Perkily, I moved on. “So, what do we do next?” I looked around the busy bar, absorbing its energy and grittiness and music. “The retreat is winding down, which means I’m running out of time.” I reminded Danny that it was still possible I’d been the original target, not Adrienne . . . and Rex was just a wobbly, unlucky ridge-trail runner. “If someone is after me, I want to know whodunit before I leave San Francisco all unaware.”

  And vulnerable, I couldn’t help thinking. Yikes.

  Danny nodded. “We have to flush out the killer.”

  I swallowed hard. “Make them tip their hand?”

  “Otherwise, we won’t have any proof. I have an . . . acquaintance who works with the SFPD,” Danny told me, nodding at another frisky woman. She brightened. “I can bring help if we need it.”

  “But you don’t think we need it.”

  He shrugged. “I think we need to set your mind at ease.”

  “You think I’m making this up?” I was offended.

  “I think you weren’t the target. But that doesn’t mean there’s not a killer on the loose. Who else have you talked to?”

  We discussed all the other attendees I’d chatted with over the past few days. None of them had seemed even remotely suspicious to me—or had had any reason to want me (or Adrienne) dead. I sighed. “That leaves us with Isabel—”

  “No good unless we can give the police proof.”

  “Rex—”

  “If he killed Adrienne, he’s already got what’s coming to him.”

  “—Christian,” I went on. I made a face. “And Bernard.”

  “Christian is the one to start with,” Danny told me decisively. I was still hung up on Danny thinking I was being paranoid about this. I’d been clobbered and baked! “He’s a bully, but I don’t think he has the stones to kill anybody. We can eliminate him first, then cast a wider net if we need to.”

  “Okay,” I agreed, “but how do we flush him out?”

  Maybe it was the discount beer talking, but I liked the idea of settling this mess, once and for all. I wanted it done. I didn’t want to spend the next decade looking over my shoulder.

  “Greed,” Danny said. “That’s how. You’ll have to make the first move
. Christian would be suspicious if I approached him.” His gaze squared up with mine. “I’ll have your back, though.”

  With a shiver of trepidation, I nodded. We huddled up and made our plan together. We were drunk, we were amateurs at catching a killer, and we were probably out of our depth. But I didn’t want to wait for another near disaster to take action. It had to be now.

  Well, tomorrow. That’s when everything would go down, we decided. Just then, it was too late for anyone but bar crawlers, club kids, and two world-traveling miscreants like us.

  “This would be a very bad time,” I warned Danny as we raised a toast to our plan, “for you to be late again.”

  He scoffed, then drank. “You can trust me,” my pal said. He flashed me another grin. “Your first EFT hasn’t even cleared.”

  Then, with that unsettling jokey rejoinder, Danny hustled me out of the bar and into the clear, dark night. I only hoped it wouldn’t be my last lungful of Pacific breeze as I grabbed us a cab and sent us speeding across the bridge to Maison Lemaître.

  Chapter 15

  Predictably, by the time I woke up the next day, last night’s bravado felt a million miles (and several beers) away.

  What had seemed to be a stellar idea to me (trapping a killer) in the middle of a dive bar past midnight now seemed like a smoky dream. Or a movie. Who was I to augment my (already questionable) snooping activities with an honest-to-God trap?

  I didn’t have it in me, I decided as I showered and then got dressed. I wasn’t anything close to a formidable killer-catcher. But I opted to look the part, anyway. Because what else would a cool, save-the-day type wear except for all black? All I needed to pull it off were my close-fitting black pants, a chic black top, my fast-getaway flats, and (in deference to the changeable weather near the Marin Headlands) Danny’s jacket.

  I’d kept it last night, after we’d parted at the door.

  From the ankles to the waist, I was Audrey Hepburn. From the waist to the neck, I was James Dean. From there upward . . . I was stumped. My loose, shoulder-length hair and face (from the Slightly Hungover collection) stymied classification, until I remembered tomboyish ‘70s and ‘80s style icon Jane Birkin. That just about nailed it.