Five-Alarm Fudge

by Christine DeSmet

“Never mind me. What about him? He was snooping for the recipe. Why else would he be looking inside that pipe? He and John have gold fever.”

  “Don’t go blaming John for the mess upstairs in the kitchen.”

  I headed for the basement wall and the blood smear that was still evident on the concrete. With care, I braced myself with my hands on either side of it for a close look. The smear wasn’t much, it seemed to me. Cherry could have been pushed back against the wall and hit his head, but I wondered if he’d come off the wall and fought back. If he had, I didn’t see how Fontana on her own could have gotten Cherry to turn around again so that he could be whacked on the back of the head before falling facedown on the floor. But it could happen if somebody had been helping her.

  I told Pauline my thoughts, then added, “I don’t think Cherry was killed here at all. I think he was placed here and this smudge is from somebody’s hand.”

  “Whose hand? Not John’s.”

  “Of course not John’s. But whose?” I splayed a hand and fingers out in the air above the stain to size it up.

  Pauline ventured near me to peer at the bloodstain on the gray concrete. “It’s awful to think that somebody was wrestling down here with Cherry when John and Marc came into the church Saturday night.”

  As we ventured from the old furnace room, we noticed the electric breaker panels on the south wall. I hadn’t noticed them before because we’d been intent on stepping around overhanging cobwebs.

  I opened one of the two-hundred-amp panels. “Go upstairs, Pauline.”

  “Why?”

  “Do you have to question everything?”

  “Yes. Sometimes you do stupid stuff. Like wreck my car.”

  “Just go upstairs. And give me a tissue. I want to see which breakers take out all the lights in the nave and choir loft.”

  Pauline handed me a tissue, then trundled up the basement steps. Soon, she hollered, “I’m in the nave!”

  I yelled, “Turn on all the lights!”

  “They’re on!”

  With her tissue over my fingers, I nudged one circuit breaker switch after another. Between each flip, I waited for her to respond. On the fifth try, we knew which ones had been flipped to cut any lights. We knew which one cut all the lights at once.

  When I rejoined Pauline in the kitchen disaster, I called the sheriff. “Hey, Jordy. Did your team look at the circuit breakers for fingerprints?”

  I had to hold my phone away from my ear. He was yelling at me. I put my cell phone on speaker mode.

  Jordy yapped, “What the hell are you doing in that church? I’m going to arrest you. You’re tampering with evidence, which suspects often try to do. Don’t you move. You Oosterlings are a big bunch of bothersome Belgians!”

  I grinned at my BFF, then said to him, “Pauline just gave you an A for that.”

  Jordy barked, “You got that right because it’s A for aggravation.”

  “Listen, Jordy, I think the person who killed Cherry had to know how to work the church’s breaker box in a pinch. They didn’t have time to think. I don’t think Kjersta was in this church much at all, and Daniel’s pretty tall, so I don’t see how his hand could cause that smudge on the basement wall. He and I reach up higher than that when we brace ourselves against the wall. Have you thought this through?”

  Click.

  Pauline had gone white. “You shouldn’t badger the sheriff when you’re a suspect.”

  “He knows very well I didn’t knock off Cherry.”

  “It doesn’t matter. Jordy has to go by the book. I think he really meant it when he said he’s going to arrest you.”

  We gave the flour-strewn kitchen a final glance, then left the church.

  Pauline wanted to go straight to the historic school to see John.

  But when we got there, it was locked. We turned in time to see a long black limousine leave Namur. Obviously, it had been hidden on the west side of the church, maybe even on the other side of Chris and Jack’s Belgian Bar and that was why we hadn’t noticed it. Such a thing was so rare and out of place in Door County that Pauline and I stood there, mesmerized. The big tree overhanging the fake cemetery rippled in the reflections as the glamorous vehicle glided by.

  Pauline muttered, “Wow.”

  “You do realize that John is being seduced by my manager and that you likely won’t see him until we figure out a way to get rid of Marc. He’s convinced that something about Door County, Wisconsin, is unique enough to draw a big audience on television.”

  “But you’re not so sure.”

  “I’m never sure about Marc Hayward. He has this earnest edge about him, and he does know a lot of Hollywood people. He gets too caught up, though, in the game of pitching scripts and selling new product. Being near him feels like I’m a footstep away from landing in the jaws of a bear trap. I’d be happier if he weren’t around.

  “Yes. But I’d love to get a ride in that limo with them before he leaves. And maybe this will give John ideas about hiring a limo the night he proposes to me.”

  “When is this night going to be?”

  “It could come at any time.”

  “He needs to get his full memory back first. You’re lucky he remembers you.”

  Pauline laughed. “No man forgets what I offer him.”

  “Pauline!”

  I walked around the pale yellow historic school and sister house until I found the window that I knew was loose. Mom and I had been cleaning the building one day when we learned which old screens and sashes had faulty latches.

  Pauline gave me a boost up and over the windowsill. “I’ll wait by the car and whistle a warning if somebody comes,” she said.

  “Nothing doing. Grab my hand and get in here to help me look around.”

  “What are we looking for now?”

  “The murderer could have hid in here before or after they killed Cherry. They could have left a clue behind.”

  Pauline leaped up and got over the sill far faster than I had.

  The inside of the main room had rows of chairs for the Belgian Foundation meetings on Thursday nights. Most of the dark, scarred wooden floors were the original planks from when the school had been built in 1860. An old-fashioned chalk blackboard dressed one wall. At the front of the room were two wide, ceiling-high doors on wheels. Pauline and I pushed them aside, the doors rattling, to reveal the altar where Mass or worship had been held for the sisters and the schoolchildren long ago.

  Pauline said, “This simple school with this ingenious door always makes me stop to think about the life of the sisters. It had to have been very harsh, yet they kept their faith going no matter what. Their first winter here they had nothing but sabots.”

  “Wooden shoes.”

  “And people would walk ten miles or more in them to come here for Mass.” Pauline stepped closer to the altar. “Didn’t your grandpa wonder if this building had the recipe, instead of the church? After all, didn’t the sisters stay here for weeks at a time to teach?”

  “But this is made of wood. He’s sure they would have stored precious things in the brick church so that fire couldn’t take them.”

  After the famous fire of October 8 and 9, 1871, that killed so many in our county, practices changed. It was considered a miracle that the church made of wood in the neighboring Robinsonville community withstood the fire. That church was where Sister Adele Brise took refuge. The church—in the community now renamed Champion—marked the spot where she saw what she called the “Queen of Heaven,” a woman with a long white dress and a yellow sash, and a crown of stars around her forehead holding back long golden hair that hung past her shoulders. Despite Sister Adele’s blessed luck with wooden structures, brick and stone became the norm for new structures. I was certain my grandfather was right about where the recipe had to be stored, if it existed.

  As we wandered about the school, I recognized plenty of places for hiding sacred recipe cards, though. Maybe there was a clue here, a journal hidden behind a panel of the wall, fo
r example. There were bookshelves, a pantry on the first floor, cupboards, and a dining room where an antique clock that looked like a castle sat on a table by a window. I gave the clock close scrutiny, but it didn’t appear to have secret compartments.

  We went upstairs, the warm air growing stuffier as we ascended the narrow staircase.

  A room that must have served as a parlor and library was filled with shelves on the walls and a shelving unit in the middle. The stand-alone unit held antique tools, cooking utensils, and more. The foundation was gathering and preserving historical items.

  The first small bedroom on the south end didn’t hold much. A door in the middle of the two bedrooms went to the attic. It held the usual assortment of forlorn furnishings and lamps, and appeared to be a dead end when it came to clues. Nobody had been living in it, for sure, and nothing seemed odd or out of place.

  The last bedroom gave us a surprise. The dust on the floor had been disturbed, brushed clean mostly. The vestiges of footprints remained.

  Pauline said, “Who’s been sleeping in my bed?”

  “Exactly. It looks like somebody camped out in here.”

  “Not the three bears, I bet.”

  “But maybe the killer.”

  Pauline hugged her bag to her chest. “I’m getting out of here.”

  She took off, tromping down the narrow staircase. I followed. We went through the kitchen and through the door leading to the church lawn.

  Once we were outside, to my surprise Lucky Harbor bounded toward me.

  Dillon had parked his white truck next to Pauline’s car. As he loped behind his dog across the green grass lawn, my heartbeat quickened. The breeze tossed Dillon’s wavy chestnut hair, giving him a rakish, piratelike aura. He wore jeans and a black T-shirt, putting his muscular build in silhouette against the golden light of the sun.

  As he approached us, a scowl on his face put me off-kilter.

  I asked, “What’s wrong, Dillon?”

  “You’ve spent all day with Pauline and not me, that’s what’s wrong. Excuse me, Pauline, while I take her off your hands.”

  He scooped me up in his arms. I yelped in surprise. He strode fast back across the lawn to the parking lot.

  Lucky Harbor barked and ran in circles around us.

  I had to hang on with both hands looped behind Dillon’s neck, which wasn’t bad, since it allowed me to stare right into the deep wells of his eyes. He smelled of fresh soap.

  Pauline shouted after me, “Just in time!”

  The faint sound of a siren seared the air. Could that be Jordy coming to arrest me?

  Dillon plunked me in the front passenger seat of his white construction truck. The siren was growing louder. He let Lucky Harbor in the seat behind me. The dog’s tongue licked one of my ears in greeting.

  The siren was like an irritating cicada in the background. I said, “Let’s not sit here.”

  “That’s why I’m here. To rescue you. We need to talk about an issue.”

  Dillon burned rubber out of the church parking lot.

  Chapter 16

  Dillon had a serious edge about him as he barreled down the county road. Since our pact in July to try to be different people instead of our old reckless selves, he’d done a lot of serious things. He’d partnered in business with his mother, Cathy, after she’d moved to Fishers’ Harbor late in summer to work on real estate developments. He’d partnered with Al Kvalheim, our sewer-and-water guy in the village, to do plumbing jobs. He’d partnered with me to refurbish the Blue Heron Inn. He was taking firefighter and EMT classes with my employee Cody.

  But now he said there was an “issue.” It had to be about me. He seemed pretty darn perfect. Me? Not so perfect.

  This Monday evening he took me a scant five-minute drive straight west of Namur to Chaudoir’s Dock and County Park.

  After we parked in the blacktopped lot that sat near a trailer park, we raced down to the dock. On the outside pier, a sleek white yacht twice the length of my cabin waited.

  The sirens had deadened; I hoped that the sheriff had stopped at the church but hadn’t seen us leaving.

  I asked, “Is this the issue you want to talk to me about?”

  “I suppose you could say that.”

  Lucky Harbor raced happily down the pier toward the vessel.

  The sun had relaxed enough in the sky to paint the water with a shimmering pink that reminded me of my sparkly fudge.

  The sparkles reflected in Dillon’s eyes. The way his eyes devoured me shot a hot tingle through my body, awakening the hidden lowlands in my personal geography.

  Dillon bowed on the dock, holding one hand out toward the yacht. “Milady, this is practice for when your royal relatives descend upon us.”

  “Where did you get this boat? How much? I’ll pay you back.” He started chuckling, and so did I. “Okay. Someday. I’ll pay you back someday.” I was dirt poor at the moment.

  He grabbed my hand to tug me along the narrow pier. “Don’t be such a worrywart. My dear mother is renting this for a test run. I’m supposed to take it for a cruise with a lady.”

  “As soon as I find a lady I’ll let you know.”

  “You’re a lady,” he reassured me, kissing the top of my hand, which he held.

  As we were boarding, I asked, “Is Cathy thinking of getting into the touring business in Door County?”

  “Something like that.” Dillon smiled into the rose-tinted sunshine, then gave me a sideways glance. “She told me the other day she loved your Fairy Tale Fudge concept. And she’s wondering if she could create a fairy-tale fantasy concept for women who wanted to be pampered out on the water for weekends.”

  “So I’m a guinea pig?”

  Dillon laughed. “I told her you’d be the perfect one to test this on because you’re practical and know the people here.”

  “I’ve been away for eight years.”

  “If you don’t want to try it, we’ll turn around. . . .”

  That made me growl. “Show me what Cathy has in mind. But let me call my fudge shop to check in.”

  Cody said a crowd was enjoying the sunset on the Fishers’ Harbor docks and he was busy selling fudge. Bethany was helping and Dotty had dropped by. He said he heard on the police scanner that Jordy was heading to pick up somebody at the Namur church.

  I told him, “That’s not me, because I’m with Dillon on a boat.”

  But I had to smile. I asked Dillon, “You heard the scanner before, didn’t you?”

  He nodded. “Wasn’t sure I was going to make it in time.”

  I gave him a kiss. “You’re my kind of pirate. But still, what’s this about an issue?”

  “Go below first. We’ll talk after you come back.”

  To my shock, Cathy had loaded a closet in the stateroom with designer clothing in my size. After a quick and glorious shower, I had my pick of dresses and flowing tops in a rainbow of colors. There were shoes with heels so high Dillon would have to let me lean against him all night long—not a bad thing. There were skinny leggings with Swarovski crystals down the sides of the legs. I was partial to sparkly things because of my Cinderella Pink Fudge. I could almost hear Cody yelling across the fudge shop at me as he was wont to do, “You look all La-La Land, Miss Oosterling!”

  I donned an azure blue, flowing silk top that had three-quarter sleeves and a ribbon at the top that held together a boat neckline. I hungered to put on those wickedly tall heels, but I imagined myself accidentally falling overboard. A pair of simple silver sandals looked as sexy as the heels on my basketball-player feet.

  A blue ribbon secured my hair into a fresh ponytail. I let a few auburn tendrils frame my face.

  Cathy had scads of samples of designer makeup and perfumes on the dresser. This beat Fontana’s stuff all to heck. I applied a peachy lipstick that reminded me of the sunset. A spritz of something that smelled like a dewy morning in Grandma’s flower garden completed me.

  As I headed to the door, a candy dish next to the bed beckoned.
It was filled with Cinderella Pink Fairy Tale Fudge. Cathy had thought of everything. Or Dillon had. They cared that much about me. Or was this merely a business deal? What was the “issue” Dillon wanted to talk about?

  I was excited about Cathy’s business idea. People could stay at the Blue Heron Inn, then board this yacht for a weekend or an afternoon. I’d provide the fudge to complete the fairy tale. But was I prepared for such a partnership? This sounded more like something I’d do after . . . marrying Dillon.

  My stomach did a flip-flop. Was a marriage proposal the so-called issue?

  Panic peppered me with heat. But why? Wasn’t I ready for something permanent with Dillon and his family? Again? Come to think of it, I hadn’t really gotten to know his family or Dillon in that previous marriage. We’d been married only a month.

  Maybe I was ahead of myself. I sucked up a deep breath—filling my lungs with the expensive, floral air in the stateroom—and left.

  Up on deck, in the covered living quarters with its endless windows, the aroma of something cooking with onions, tomatoes, perhaps some asparagus, made my mouth water, but not nearly as much as the sight of Dillon.

  He’d changed into a crisp sky blue shirt with the sleeves rolled up enough to show off his tanned, strong arms. He wore tan pants and canvas deck shoes. The wind off the lake coming through the windows caught his hair, reminding me how rugged he looked these days compared to years ago. His large hands and muscular fingers had nicks and scratches on the knuckles from his carpentry work for me at the Blue Heron Inn.

  I suddenly realized that Dillon had grown handsomer with time.

  He was different. An edge about him threw my head and heart into a whirl of emotions not felt before.

  My heart was pumping so fast and hard and rocking me that I hadn’t felt the boat moving. We were easing into the giant bay.

  Dillon headed toward the double doors that opened onto the outdoor deck, beckoning me with an outstretched hand and a glint in his eyes.

  An exhilarating heat hopscotched up my spine. My legs grew wobbly. I was glad I’d chosen the sandals.

  The bay was relatively calm. The breeze buffeted me with the tang of freshwater perfume coming off the gentle froth stirred up by our yacht. With my anxiety fading somewhat, I inhaled the feeling of being Cinderella at her ball.