As Gouda as Dead

by Avery Aames

  While I devoured the quiche at the granite counter and drank a glass of milk, Rebecca joined me. “Guess who stopped in while you were in the back?” she said.

  “Meredith?” Soon, all my girlfriends would come in to commiserate if Rebecca had anything to do with it, the frivolity of last night’s bachelorette party a mere mist of a memory.

  “No, silly. Jordan.”

  I gaped. “Why didn’t you show him to the office?”

  “Because he seemed in a hurry to find Tyanne.”

  “Didn’t you tell him I’d informed her about the postponement?”

  “I did, but that didn’t deter him. He said he wanted to settle accounts.”

  A pang of regret gripped me. I thought of all the flowers that would have to be canceled and the food and the cake that we’d commissioned from Providence Pâtisserie. Not to mention all the guests that would have to be alerted. I’d given that task to Tyanne. I thought it might ground her. I told her I’d contact my grandparents and bring them into the loop. I hadn’t yet. I knew Grandmère would tend to me like a mother hen.

  “Call him,” Rebecca suggested.

  “I will when I take my next break.” I slung on my apron and trudged through the shop to make note of what needed reordering. As I slipped my hand into the pocket of my apron for the pad and pen that I usually kept there, I felt something else—a folded square of paper. I opened it and realized it was a note. Not simply a note; a love letter. From Jordan. Blinking away the instant tears that sprang to my eyes, I read how much he loved and adored me. In closing, he asked if I would like to go on a date soon.

  “What’s wrong?” Rebecca asked, trying to take a peek.

  “Nothing. Nothing at all.” I showed her the note.

  She applauded. “Oh, yay! What a romantic. He’s wooing you all over again. By the way, he has nice handwriting.”

  “Yes, he does.” I chalked that up to the fact that he was a magnificent chef who liked everything to be just so. I eyed the note again and reflected on what Tyanne had said about Tim not writing text messages. If he’d wanted to reach Urso so badly and couldn’t get hold of him by phone, why hadn’t he at least attempted texting? Had he been worried that whomever he saw doing whatever it was the person was doing might see the text and hurt him? Well, too late for that. The person did hurt Tim; he killed him—text or no text.

  The front door to the shop flew open. In bustled my grandmother. “Chérie!” Had she sensed that I’d been thinking about her? “There you are. I am so sad for Tim and his family. And for you.” She brushed a fresh dusting of snow off the shoulders of her winter coat and gathered me into her arms. We kissed la bise, first one cheek and then the other, and then she held me at arm’s length. “You look pasty.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “I heard you have postponed your wedding.”

  I skewered Rebecca with a glance. Had she sneaked into the office and called Grandmère? Defiantly, Rebecca shrugged a shoulder.

  “You and Jordan,” Grandmère went on. “You are as sad as the pair in Love Letters.”

  “We are nothing like them, Grandmère. Jordan and I will be together.” Spoiler alert. At the end of Love Letters, the lifelong friends do not wind up together. The bad decisions they make throughout their lives destroy all possibility of a future for them together.

  “You must come to auditions tonight,” Grandmère said. “It will boost your spirit.”

  “The auditions are tonight?” Rebecca sounded gleeful.

  “Oui. We moved them up a week. Why?”

  “Because I want to audition.”

  “Mais bien sûr. We would love to have you.” Grandmère winked at me. “We have a budding actress in our midst.”

  “More like a budding ham,” I teased.

  Urso entered the shop, removing his hat as he did. “Ladies.”

  Deputy O’Shea trailed him. He looked glum; there was no spark in his gait. Why would there be? I ached at the sight of him. I could tell by the way Rebecca was clutching her arms that she felt the same. I was sure she wanted to comfort him, but now was not the time, not when he was so brittle that he might crack, and certainly not in front of his boss.

  “Hello, chief. Hello, deputy,” Grandmère said, eyeing them as if they were prey. “You could not have arrived at a more opportune moment. I was telling Rebecca and my granddaughter that we are holding auditions at the playhouse tonight. Both of you should audition.”

  “No, thank you, Bernadette,” Urso said. “I told you before that I’m not an actor. Besides, I have an investigation to conduct. Now, my deputy on the other hand—”

  “No, sir,” Deputy O’Shea said curtly.

  “I have removed you from the case, young man.”

  I bit back a smile. Young man. Urso barely had five years on his deputy.

  “You’ve got to do something to keep your mind in gear,” he continued.

  Deputy O’Shea looked as chastised as a wayward puppy. “But, sir—”

  “I will not change my mind. That’s the end of it. A family member does not work a case.”

  “And a best friend does?”

  Urso scowled.

  “Deputy Rodham’s wife is due,” O’Shea added.

  “And I’ll make do. Got me?”

  Rebecca said, “Actually, Mrs. Rodham is on her way to the delivery room right now.” She gestured toward the exit. “That last customer told me.”

  “Sir,” O’Shea said.

  “No. Rodham will be back on duty in less than twenty-four hours.” Urso ended the discussion by spinning around and peering at the selection of sandwiches in the case. On any given day, we put together a few dozen of them. “Charlotte, I’ll take the six-inch soppressata with Jarlsburg, spicy mustard, and pepperoncinis.”

  “Not the foot-long?”

  “I’m on a diet.” He patted his stomach. I could tell he was lying. He probably didn’t have any appetite but knew he had to force something down to keep up his strength.

  “Do you want anything, deputy?” I asked.

  “The same,” he said, sounding defeated.

  Grandmère tapped his elbow. “I look forward to having you audition.”

  The deputy shrugged.

  A grave silence fell upon all of us.

  I removed the sandwiches from the display case and sliced each in half on a diagonal, then I wrapped them in our specialty paper as I would a present, folding the ends and sealing them with our logo stickers.

  Grandmère broke the awkward moment. “Might I ask what is going on with the investigation, Chief Urso?”

  “We have no clue who killed Timothy O’Shea, ma’am,” Urso said in a no-nonsense manner, the chief of police politely responding to a question put to him by the mayor. “Or why. So far, I can’t find anyone that holds a grudge against him. I’ve questioned everyone who was at the pub. A few contend that Tim raced off in his truck.”

  “You have one suspect,” I said. “Jawbone Jones. Also, Dottie Pfeiffer suggested that Councilwoman Bell might have had reason to kill Tim.”

  Urso frowned. “Why?”

  I explained.

  Grandmère said, “No! It cannot be so. Belinda has her moments. She is contentious. But she is a good woman. She is not evil.”

  “Not everyone who kills is evil,” I reminded her. “Some are simply pushed too far.”

  Grandmère clucked her tongue, doing her best to dismiss me, but I could see she was concerned. Even if she didn’t like someone on the city council, she would support him or her as a fellow politician should.

  Urso said, “I’ve contacted every one of Tim’s family members.”

  “You mean I did,” Deputy O’Shea muttered. “Uncle Tim left the bar to all twelve of his nephews, me included.”

  Urso said, “That doesn’t imply that any of you had motive to
kill Tim.”

  “How could it? None of us wants the pub. Not that it isn’t a great place.” O’Shea waved his hand. “It is. It’s just . . . we’ve all got careers.”

  I placed the sandwiches along with napkins and packages of extra mustard into bags. “This is on the house, U-ey. I insist. No argument.” On occasion, I could be as tough as he could be. I addressed Deputy O’Shea. “The other eleven nephews don’t live anywhere near here, do they?”

  “No, we’re spread out in three states. Most of them are up north, near Cleveland. We’re close, but we don’t talk a lot. We communicate via a social networking site. We share pictures of kids and pets.”

  “You don’t have either of those,” Rebecca said.

  “Yeah, but you know the drill.” He flapped his hat against his thigh. “Two of my other uncles are coming to run the pub until we decide what to do, and my dad and mom are due in town. They’ll be handling the funeral arrangements.”

  My grandmother whispered, “Some people leave this world too soon.”

  Another poignant silence enveloped us.

  Rebecca drew in a deep breath. She looked from me to the deputy and back to me. A sneaky grin spread across her face. “You know, chief, if you need a hand with the investigation, you should deputize Charlotte.”

  “No.”

  “Temporarily. You can do that, right? She sees things others don’t.”

  “No,” Urso repeated, his tone brusque.

  My grandmother seconded his decision.

  “I assume you’ve questioned Jawbone Jones,” Rebecca continued. “He’s your main suspect, correct?” She snatched the bags holding the sandwiches off the counter and swung one like a carrot in front of Urso. Her pluck—okay, audacity—truly amazed me sometimes.

  Urso took the bags. “Mr. Jones swears he didn’t race after Tim.”

  “And you bought that?” Rebecca said. “Two witnesses saw him. Does he have an alibi?”

  “He was on his way to a jam session.”

  “A jam session?” Rebecca eyed me. “I told you he had musician’s hands. Strong fingers. I’ll bet he plays a mean guitar.” She turned back to Urso. “But he wasn’t at the jam session, was he? He said he was on his way, which means no one can verify as to his specific whereabouts.”

  “The other half of his duo said she talked to him on his cell phone,” Urso said. “He’d called to tell her he was running late.”

  Rebecca smirked. “That’s a pretty feeble alibi, if you ask me. We all know cell phone reception isn’t good around here.”

  Deputy O’Shea jumped in. “I agree. Uncle Tim’s message was jumbled. And Mr. Jones owns Lock Stock and Barrel, right?”

  “Your point?” Urso said.

  “Can you trust what a gun shop owner says?”

  “Are you saying what he does isn’t legitimate?”

  “I don’t know, is it?” A hank of Deputy O’Shea’s hair fell onto his face. He brushed it back with force. “Does he do anything off the books?”

  “Deputy, don’t infer a wrongdoing without substantiation.”

  “Fine. But what if Uncle Tim saw—”

  “Stay out of this,” Urso ordered.

  “My uncle saw something!” O’Shea shouted. “Why else would he go looking for you?”

  “Unless you heard wrong.”

  “You’ve listened to the voice mail. Did I hear wrong? Did I? Huh?” Deputy O’Shea leaned forward, the muscles in his neck pulsing with pent up anger.

  Urso bit his lower lip. I knew that look. He was doing his best not to level his deputy in front of Rebecca, my grandmother, and me. There was a time and a place.

  Rebecca jumped in to defray the tension. “Do you have any physical evidence to go on, chief? You know, like tire track prints?”

  Urso glowered at me.

  I held up a hand. “I didn’t tell her anything.”

  “No, we don’t,” Urso said to Rebecca, then added, “We’re through here. Deputy, let’s go.” He gestured toward the door.

  Deputy O’Shea mouthed I’ll call you to Rebecca and, chin lowered, trudged out of the shop.

  The door swung shut with a bang. I flinched. I knew I couldn’t sit still and do nothing. Urso had looked as defeated as his deputy. I flashed on what Dottie Pfeiffer had said to me about Violet Walden flirting with Tim and wondered again whether her behavior had spurred Frank Mueller to lash out. Should Urso be considering him as another suspect? Even though Urso had said he’d questioned everyone who had gone to the pub and even though he hadn’t officially deputized me, I could at least do one thing that might help him solve this case.

  CHAPTER

  A fine mist of snow splatted the windshield as I made my way to Violet’s Victoriana Inn, which was located northwest of the Village Green. Violet liked to call the inn a state-of-the-art B&B, but I thought the terms were contradictory. In my mind, a bed-and-breakfast should be like the one next to my house. Lavender and Lace was decked out with cushy chairs and beautiful antiques, and it was always flavorful with the aroma of tea and scones. Violet’s Victoriana Inn was sleek and modern. The furniture was steel gray and firm. Unlike other bed-and-breakfast inns that offered gardens to wander and trails to hike, Violet’s Victoriana Inn had a gym filled with stair-steppers, treadmills, and weight machines. And yet the place was popular and regularly sold out.

  Idyllic instrumental music was emanating from a variety of speakers as I entered. Violet, clad in a trim-fitting jogging outfit, her marshmallow-colored hair swept into a dramatic twist with chic wisps falling from the updo, stood behind the registration counter. Without all the makeup she’d worn the other night at the pub, she looked almost plain. She was polishing the chrome counter with a rag while talking angrily on the phone to what sounded like a supplier. I’d used the same kind of no-nonsense, mannish voice on occasion.

  A stream of women, dressed to the nines, waltzed into the inn. All were chatting about the high tea they were going to enjoy in the lounge. Violet quieted until the women passed by her and then resumed her gruff timbre. Far be it from her to scare off the customers.

  She ended her call with a slam and grinned at me. “Hello, Charlotte.” She stuffed her dusting rag beneath the counter and checked the readout on the pedometer that was clipped to her waistband. “Got to keep moving to burn the calories.” She rocked from foot to foot. “What brings you here?”

  For someone who, according to Dottie, had been interested in Tim, she didn’t seem in the least depressed. Perhaps she hadn’t heard about the murder yet. On the other hand, gossip was rampant, and Urso said he had spoken to everyone who had been at the pub. Maybe he had skipped a few because he knew either Deputy O’Shea or I had questioned them.

  “I’m here to talk about Timothy O’Shea.”

  Violet’s cheeks tinged pink. “Of course. I heard he drowned. What a shame. Where? At Nature’s Reserve? Aren’t all the ponds frozen over?”

  “He died at Jordan’s farm.”

  “Jordan’s farm doesn’t have any ponds or lakes.”

  “No, it doesn’t.”

  Violet’s eyes widened. She wrinkled her nose. “Ick! Do you mean Tim accidentally drowned”—she twirled a hand and sputtered—“in a cheese vat?”

  “The police aren’t sure it was an accident or that he drowned.”

  “Are you saying he was murdered? How horrible. And to think it happened while the rest of us were out on the town having fun.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I’m assuming. I mean, it had to have happened last night, right? That’s why you and the deputy were asking questions at the pub, wasn’t it?” Violet pressed her hand to her chest. “What will happen to Jordan’s farm?” She often purchased Pace Hill Farm’s Double-cream Gouda to serve with the inn’s cheese plate dessert. “He’ll have to close it, won’t he? Such a shame. He emplo
ys so many people.”

  I ached to think what might happen to Jordan’s staff if he sold the farm. As it was, their livelihood might be affected simply because of the adverse public reaction to a murder occurring on the property.

  Violet retrieved her rag and clutched it like a security blanket. “What do you want to ask me?”

  “I saw Dottie Pfeiffer earlier today at the pâtisserie. She said you seemed interested in Tim.”

  “Dottie.” Violet made a pfft sound. “She doesn’t know her elbow from a pastry tube.”

  “She said you were flirting with Tim last night.”

  “Flirting? Me? No way. I barely spoke two words to him. How could I? He was hobnobbing with all the tourists, per usual. You know how he can be.” She halted. Her cheeks reddened again. “Could be . . . was.” She licked her lips. “Look, Tim and I were friends. Just friends.” Violet pulled a strand of hair out of her coif and twirled it at the nape of her neck. Was that the flirty move Dottie had seen her do? “There wasn’t anything between us, promise.” Violet released the hair. “Besides, Tim was involved with Tyanne. For months. I expected them to get married in the next year. She must be heartbroken.”

  “She is.”

  Violet resumed polishing the counter. “You know, Tim’s family stays here whenever they come to town. At a discount, because there are so darned many of them. A dozen nephews. Seven brothers.” She held up seven fingers. “Whew! How does a mom do that?”

  “With lots of love and patience.”

  “Some of the O’Sheas have already arrived. Others are holding rooms. I don’t think they know when they’ll be able to have the funeral. What do you hear on that end?”

  “I haven’t a clue.”

  Violet stopped buffing. “Want some herbal tea? It’s got lots of antioxidants.”

  “Thank you. That would be nice.”

  She led the way to an alcove where a glossy silver table was set with two china cups and elegant napkins. “I’ll be right back.” She returned with a glass teapot fitted with an infuser, two spoons, agave sugar, and a platter of thinly sliced Cobb Hill’s Ascutney Mountain cheese, an alpine-style cheese with white natural rind and a sweet, nutty flavor.