Brownies, Bodies & Bad Guys

by Leighann Dobbs

  It was Jack … and he wasn’t alone.

  Lexy’s stomach sank when she saw who was with him.

  Simone.

  She saw Simone smile up at Jack. Lexy imagined her batting her eyelashes. Was he smiling back? Lexy’s heart twitched as she watched them walk out into the parking lot together, toward Jack’s truck.

  Then she started to feel something else.

  Anger.

  She had the sudden urge to grab the pie and smash it into Jack’s face. But she caught herself just in time. It wouldn’t do to get angry like that.

  The best way to deal with that sort of thing was to act like she didn’t care. For all she knew, it was totally innocent. Right? Maybe it had something to do with the Nunzio Bartolli case and Simone was some sort of witness. Yes, that must be it. Why else would Jack be with her?

  Jack’s just doing his job, she thought, as she watched them pull out of the parking lot through narrowed eyes.

  For a minute she pictured herself following them, just to make sure, then another movement inside the police station caught her eye.

  Through the large glass windows in the front, she could see Brax Daniels standing at the desk. The sleeves of his white collared shirt were rolled up to reveal tanned, muscular forearms. From where her car was she could just make out a shadow of stubble on his chin which give him an appealing “bad boy” look.

  Lexy looked down at her pie. She wondered if Brax liked coconut cream. I bet Brax is a lot more generous with sharing information.

  She opened her car door. The outside air seemed cool compared to the roasting stuffiness inside the car, even though it was seventy-eight degrees out. She slipped out of the car, put the pie on the roof, straightened her short denim skirt and fluffed her ponytail, then grabbed the pie and walked over to the police station door.

  Cool air rushed out as Lexy opened the door to the station. She stood nervously just inside, the pie balanced in her upturned palm.

  Brax turned to look at her, his eyebrows climbing toward his hairline.

  “Is that pie for me?”

  Lexy held the pie out in front of her and did her best impression of a southern coquette. “Why yes, I do believe it is.”

  Brax rewarded her with his million dollar smile and walked toward her, causing her heart to flutter annoyingly. He took the pie.

  “Coconut cream?”

  Lexy nodded.

  “I love coconut cream pie.” Brax put his hand on the small of her back and swept her out of the reception area and down the hall. He opened the door to one of the interrogation rooms which was now setup as a makeshift office.

  “Welcome to my home away from home,” he said putting the pie on the table and rummaging in a box on the floor. He pulled out some paper plates and plastic forks. “Aha! It pays to be prepared.”

  Lexy sat in one of the chairs and watched him cut the pie with the plastic fork and scoop a piece out onto one of the plates. Well, it wasn’t actually a piece. It was more like a messy glob. She put her palm up, waving him off when he offered the plate to her. Her stomach was too jittery for coconut cream pie.

  Brax shrugged then scooped a large pile onto his fork and sat in the chair on the opposite side of the table.

  “Yumm.” He closed his eyes and swirled the pie around in his mouth. “This is delicious! Is it from your bakery?”

  “Of course.” Lexy smiled.

  Brax demolished the piece of pie in two more bites then tossed his plate in the trash. Standing, he came around to her side and leaned against the table next to her.

  “Now, why don’t you tell me why you are really here?”

  Lexy felt her cheeks grow warm. It was hard to fool the F.B.I.

  He was standing very close to her and she had to lean back in her chair to look up at him which made her feel at a disadvantage. Probably some sort of interrogation technique, she thought as she scooted her chair back a few inches.

  “Honestly, I just wanted to drop off this pie.”

  “For Jack?”

  Lexy bit her bottom lip and nodded.

  “And …”

  “Nans had a few questions about the Nunzio case.”

  Brax laughed softly. “And what might those be?”

  “We … I mean she … was just wondering what type of gun he was killed with and the time of death.”

  “Oh, well that seems pretty straightforward. You need to bribe Perillo with a pie to get that kind of information?” Brax pushed himself away from the table and walked around to the other side. He grabbed a folder from a pile and rifled through it.

  “Says here the time of death was 1:30 a.m. And the bullets were .22 caliber. Probably a revolver.”

  “Okay. Thanks.” Lexy found herself wishing Braxton Daniels would be involved in every case she and Nans investigated. Getting information from him was a lot easier than getting it from Jack.

  “Your hair looks nice up like that,” Brax said.

  Lexy’s hands flew up to the hair piled in a mess on her head, her cheeks growing warm. Was it getting hotter in there? She had the urge to get out of there quick.

  Lexy pushed her chair back and stood, brushing a wisp of hair out of her face.

  “Well, I guess I’ll be going. Thanks for the info.” She turned abruptly tripping over the table leg on her way to the door.

  “Perillo isn’t here, you know,” Brax said, boxing up the rest of the pie.

  “I know.”

  “He’s an okay guy, Lexy. But if you ever get tired of him …” Brax wiggled his eyebrows up and down and flashed his smile again.

  Lexy laughed and fanned herself, reaching for the doorknob.

  “Seriously though, your grandmother and her friends might want to back off the Bartolli case for a while. Nunzio wasn’t just shot. He was executed. We’re dealing with a cold blooded killer here and I wouldn’t want any of you to get hurt.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Lexy shuffled around the pastries in the bakery case as she watched Nans, Ida and Helen sitting nervously at one of the cafe tables. Ruth was out in the back parking lot sitting in her antique Oldsmobile with the motor running. The plan was that as soon as the two suspects appeared in the shop, the rest of them would hop into Ruth’s car so they could be ready to follow them.

  Lexy brought a tray of cannoli to the table.

  “Take some of these and stop staring out the window. You guys look suspicious.”

  “Oh, sorry dear.” Nans turned away from the window and sipped her tea. “You’re right, we’ll just sit here and nibble just like any other day.”

  “They probably won’t even come in toda—”

  Lexy’s voice stuck in her throat. The two men were crossing the street, heading straight for the bakery.”

  “It’s them!”

  Four gray heads swiveled to stare out the window and Lexy bolted for the back room.

  “Cassie, those guys are here. I gotta go.”

  Cassie went out front while Lexy motioned for Nans and the others to follow her out the back. She’d told Cassie the whole story the night before and Cassie had agreed to stall the men to give Lexy and the ladies time to get in position.

  Lexy’s eyes narrowed when she saw Ruth behind the wheel of the big, blue car. Her head barely reached over the steering wheel.

  Lexy jerked open the driver’s side door. “Maybe I should drive. In case it gets hairy.”

  Ruth wrinkled her brow at Lexy. “I can handle this car, Lexy.”

  “No time to argue, just let her drive,” Nans said sliding into the back seat behind Ida and Helen.

  Ruth reluctantly pushed over and Lexy took the wheel, gliding the car out of the parking lot and onto the street where she slid it into a parking spot.

  “They’re still inside,” Nans said. “Helen, get some photos of them.”

  “Are those the men that knocked you out, Ruth?” Ida asked.

  Ruth squinted toward the bakery, her lips pursed in a thin line. “Yes, I think they are.”
<
br />   Lexy looked over her shoulder and noticed Helen was wearing the spy camera glasses the ladies had bought on the internet. They looked like regular eyeglasses but had a teeny camera in them which was perfect for taking pictures without anyone knowing. They’d come in handy on a couple of cases already.

  Inside the bakery, Cassie was ringing up the sale. Lexy saw her putting several brownies in a white bag which she handed to the suspects. She put the car in drive while she watched them come out of the store and cross the street, walking up a few cars to a black SUV with tinted windows.

  “Is that their car?” Nans asked. “How predictable—bad guys with a black car that has dark tinted windows. Helen, get a picture of the car and license plate.”

  They pulled out onto the street and Lexy maneuvered out behind them into the light midmorning traffic.

  “Stay several car lengths away,” Ida said.

  “We don’t want them to know they have a tail,” Nans added. “Once we get past the downtown area, try to stay at least two blocks away.”

  Lexy rolled her eyes. She knew how to follow someone—she’d seen it done on TV dozens of times.

  She kept her distance as they wound their way through town then out to the suburbs. As they got further away from downtown, the traffic got lighter and lighter and Lexy had to fall further behind so they wouldn’t be noticed.

  “This thing rides nice. You keep it in great condition,” Lexy said. Driving the car was like driving a yacht. It sailed down the road and gave a smooth ride. Even though the car was twenty-five years old, it looked brand new. It even had the new car smell to it.

  “Thanks,” Ruth said. “My Leo bought it brand new. He always kept it up nice. I don’t drive it very much anymore, since he passed.”

  Lexy nodded. Ruth’s husband had passed twenty years ago which explained the pristine condition and low mileage.

  “Where the heck are they going?” Helen asked.

  Lexy felt the uncomfortable flutter of butterflies in her stomach as she followed the black SUV into one of the remote areas of town. Where were they going?

  “I’m not sure. All that is out here is that old applesauce plant that’s been shut down for years.”

  And that’s exactly where they were going. Lexy felt a moment of panic when the SUV turned into the complex.

  “What should I do?”

  “Drive past. You don’t want them to see you follow them in. We’ll double back and sneak in later.”

  Lexy took Nans’s advice and drove past the entrance continuing on about a half mile before pulling into a dirt turnoff.

  She twisted in her seat to look at Nans. “Do you really think we should go in there? It looked dangerous. And scary.”

  “Of course. We want to find out what they are up to, right?”

  “I guess.” Lexy pointed the car back toward the applesauce factory, her heartbeat picking up speed, the closer she got.

  The factory was a massive hulk of rusting metal. The remains of two silos stood at one end with a low concrete block building at the other. In between were rows of round concrete structures that stood about seven feet tall interspersed with twisted metal pieces. Remains of the processing plant, Lexy guessed.

  Lexy’s stomach did a somersault when she saw the SUV on the other side of the concrete structures and she stopped the car. Brax’s warning about Nunzio’s murder being an execution echoed in her head.

  “There they are, over there.” She pointed to a space in between two of the concrete pieces where you could just make out the tail end of the car.

  Nans twisted around in her seat. “See those bushes over there?” She pointed to an overgrown area loaded with tall bushes at the far end of the lot.

  Lexy nodded.

  “Head over there and park behind them. I think that will hide us from view.”

  Lexy headed over taking a route out of the line of vision of the SUV. She pulled in behind the bushes and Nans jumped out, heading for a small space in between two shrubs. Helen produced a pair of binoculars from her purse and followed Nans with Ruth, Ida and Lexy close behind.

  “Yep, it’s them all right.” Helen pulled the binoculars away from her face and handed them to Nans.

  “Yep.” Nans passed them to Ruth.

  “He’s even eating one of the brownies.” Ruth passed them to Ida.

  “Chocolate frosted. He’s got some on his lip,” Ida said passing the binoculars to Lexy.

  Lexy could see the two men just fine without binoculars. They were standing beside the SUV as if they were waiting for someone. The tall skinny one held the bag of brownies in his hand. The large one was stuffing the second half of a brownie in his mouth, which was smudged with frosting.

  “What are they doing?” Ida asked holding her hand out for the binoculars.

  “Looks like they are waiting for someone.” Nans pushed her head further through the bushes and squinted.

  “I think you’re right.” Helen pointed toward the road where a black mid-sized car had turned into the entrance to the factory.

  “What is it with the black cars?” Ruth asked.

  “And the tinted windows,” Lexy said. The car had a dark tint on the windows making it impossible to see who was inside.

  The five of them watched in silence as the car pulled to a stop beside the two brownie eating thugs.

  Lexy held her breath as the driver’s side door opened. A long, bare leg appeared outside the door—a woman’s leg ending in an expensive pair of Jimmy Choo stiletto’s with a metal heel. The woman belonging to the leg slithered out of the car and Lexy felt her heart jerk in her chest.

  “Simone!”

  “Shhhh …” Nans waved her hand, but she needn’t have worried. They were too far away to be heard.

  Lexy watched as Simone approached the two men. She pointed to her mouth and the big thug wiped the brownie smudge off his lips. Lexy couldn’t make out what she was saying, but judging from the way her hands were gesturing wildly in the air, she wasn’t happy.

  Finally, she stormed off in the direction of the concrete building, the two men following on her heels.

  “Did you get pictures of that?” Lexy asked Helen.

  “I sure did.”

  Lexy pulled out her cell phone.

  “What are you doing?” Nans grabbed her arm.

  “We need to call Jack and tell him about this,” Lexy said.

  “Tell him about what? That we saw three people go into a building?”

  Lexy bit her lip. Nans had a point. Jack would probably just yell at her for meddling. And since Simone was one of the three people, that made it even sticker. Lexy didn’t want it to appear as if she was trying to get Simone in trouble because she was jealous.

  “We need to get some hard evidence before we call in the police,” Helen said.

  “Right,” Nans said, heading back to the car. “Let’s go back to my place and run those pictures through the internet and see what comes up.”

  ###

  Ruth didn’t let Lexy drive on the way back which was just as well since Lexy’s head was reeling with questions about Simone meeting with the thugs. What was she up to? Did Jack know about it?

  Back at Nans’, they gathered around her dining room table while Nans hooked the camera glasses to her computer with a USB cable. Lexy watched as she uploaded the pictures to the internet, then used a sophisticated online picture search to try to match the men in the photos to any pictures currently online.

  “Bingo!” Nans turned to face them from her seat at the computer table. Her face was flushed with excitement as she pointed to an image on the screen.

  Ida walked over to the computer, bending down and squinting at the monitor.

  “These guys are definitely with organized crime,” She announced.

  “Looks like the fat one is called Louie The Finger. I wonder why that is?” Nans asked. “Here’s an article on a restaurant hit that he was suspected in.”

  Lexy shivered despite the warm temperatures
in Nans’s condo. These guys were killers.

  “And the skinny one is Sal Toreo. Skinny Sal,” Ida said.

  “Let’s run their names through the gun registry and see what they have for guns.”

  Nans worked the keyboard and a list came up on the screen.

  “Looks like Louie has a lot of guns. Including a Colt .22 caliber.” Nans snapped her fingers. “Yep, this is our guy!”

  “Okay, so we can be reasonably sure they killed Nunzio. But why did they search his condo and Ruth’s?” Ida asked.

  “And where do Barry and Simone fit into all this?” Helen added.

  Nans tapped her lips with her index finger. “That’s a good question. Barry and Simone have opposite goals when it comes to the will. She would want it to be found and he would want to destroy it.”

  “So they probably aren’t working together,” Lexy said.

  “Right, but Simone is working with Louie and Sal.” Nans tapped Sal’s face on the computer for emphasis.

  “Yeah, and I wonder what they are up to.” Lexy narrowed her eyes at the computer.

  “Well, they obviously have something inside that abandoned factory,” Nans said to Lexy. “I think you, me and Ruth need to head on over there tomorrow and take a look while Helen and Ida do more research.”

  “I don’t know. That sounds pretty dangerous.” Lexy’s stomach clenched at the thought of poking around inside the old factory.

  “There’s got to be a clue inside that we can give to the police. We’ll wait until they leave and then just take a peek. We won’t be but a few minutes. It will all be totally safe, I assure you. Can you pick us up at eight?”

  Lexy could see Nans was aiming her most honest, trustworthy look in her direction, but it did nothing to stop the butterflies from flapping around in her stomach. Everyone was looking at her expectantly, though, and she didn’t want to seem wimpier than a bunch of old ladies. Plus she knew Nans and Ruth would just go without her anyway, and she wanted to be there in case they got into trouble.

  Lexy let out a sigh. “Okay, eight o’clock it is, then.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Lexy squinted through the binoculars she had trained on the entrance to the applesauce factory. The squinting combined with the glare of the sun was giving her a headache, and she was beginning to wonder if Louie and Sal were ever going to leave. She felt a flurry of relief, chased by a pang of nervousness, when she saw their black SUV finally coming up the entrance driveway.