by Poppy Blake
‘Are you sure we’re going to be safe?’ asked Jess, jumping up to grab her sister’s arm. ‘What if there’s a murderer around? What if they try again? What if I’m next on their list. You can’t leave me here!’
Rosie saw that Jess’s face was suffused with genuine panic. All evening she’d had the appearance of a forlorn toddler who had just been informed she had been left off the birthday party guest list and Rosie wouldn’t have been surprised if she had stuck her thumb in her mouth and indulged in a sulk.
‘You’ll be fine, Jess darling. There’s no reason to suspect this was anything other than an unfortunate accident. And, anyway, you have Lucas to take care of you.’
‘Oh my God! I’m definitely going to die!’
Chapter 11
The next morning dawned overcast and it seemed the summer heatwave had broken. Heavy, bulbous clouds sporting bruised underbellies drifted in from the sea and grazed the canopy of trees in whose depths Ultimate Adventures was located, yet the weather reflected Rosie’s mood.
When she’d got back to her flat the previous night it had been after midnight and, for the first time since arriving at the Windmill Café, she hadn’t felt the insistent pull to give the surfaces one last wipe down with the anti-bacterial spray before she retired to bed – she had just been too exhausted. However, her tiredness was nothing compared to her relief that the café had been exonerated and would live to serve its customers freshly buttered scones for another day. She had drifted off to sleep as soon as her head had hit the pillow.
Nevertheless, she had woken up at three in the morning with a jolt of alarm. Within minutes her body was covered in a hot sweat of panic as a kaleidoscope of new worries rampaged through her head.
How could she have forgotten? Hadn’t Suki sourced the contents of her throat spray, well, the Jarrah honey at least, from her own store cupboard in the Windmill Café? Should she tell Matt? Maybe he would be delighted to resume his amateur sleuthing when she confessed that Suki had not acquired a contaminated batch of her spray from the internet.
Rosie had tossed and turned until her alarm clock told her it was 7 a.m., then padded down the staircase to survey the café kitchen, fingering her mobile phone as she considered whether to call Matt and confess to a new twist in the ongoing saga. She rummaged in the cupboard and found a second jar of the Jarrah honey that her sister had bought her for her birthday. She scrutinized the label and, whilst she was certain that Harrods would never sell contaminated honey, there was only one way to find out. She unscrewed the lid and before she could think too much about what she was doing, she tasted the honey and waited.
Nothing happened.
After thirty minutes, she hadn’t rushed to the bathroom or felt any ill-effects whatsoever and she concluded that it must have been one of the other ingredients in Suki’s throat spray that was the culprit. She let out a long, ragged sigh, before being jerked out of her trace by a rap on the door.
‘Hello? Is it okay to come in? I know the café doesn’t open until eleven. If I’m disturbing you I can come back later?’
‘Oh, hi, Suki. No, no, of course you’re not disturbing me. How are you feeling today?’
‘A little woozy still, but otherwise I’m fine. I just need to get away from Felix for a few hours. He’s driving me crazy. I’m afraid he’s still fixated with involving the authorities, and all William wants us to do is leave. I want to stay until Dr Bairstow gets back to me about what kind of “foreign substance” was in my spray, so I’ve told Felix and William that they can do whatever they like but I’m not going anywhere. I know my illness has nothing to do with the Windmill Café. I love it here, it’s so restful. Actually, Rosie, I wanted to ask you and Mia a favour.’
‘Of course, ask away.’
‘Would you be up for giving me, Jess and Nadia a lesson in how to make a batch of those delicious Stilton and grape scones we had at the garden party? And, if we have time, maybe we could also bake some of your pineapple and coconut cookies?’
Rosie stared at Suki, totally surprised at her request. Surely the last thing she would want to do after what had happened to her was indulge in a full-blown bake-a-thon.
‘Are you sure?’
‘What Rosie actually means is that she and Mia would be delighted to showcase a few of the Windmill Café’s signature bakes,’ laughed Matt appearing on the doorstep of the café, waving a handful of white confectionery bags in the air. ‘I thought you’d appreciate breakfast, why don’t you stick the kettle on while I give Mia a call to see if she can start her shift a little earlier?’
‘Oh, erm, yes, thank you, Matt. Sorry, Suki, I’d love to do that for you, but we’d better get started right away because there’s only two hours until the café opens to the public.’
‘Great! I’ll pay you for your time and all the extra ingredients.’
‘Oh, no, that won’t be…’
‘I want to. I’m thinking, with your permission of course, of having a cake sale in the car park for the local children’s music and drama school that Carole told me about at the garden party on Sunday. What do you think?’
‘I think it’s a lovely idea,’ smiled Rosie, leading Suki into the kitchen, her spirits soaring as they invariably did whenever she was about to treat herself to a morning of unbridled culinary fun. Scones and cookies were amongst the simplest of recipes to create and she knew the kitchen was cleaner than it had ever been. What could go wrong?
‘I’ll leave these croissants here and catch up with you later, Rosie. Have fun!’
Matt leaned forward to deposit a farewell kiss on Rosie’s cheek. His gesture was so unexpected she drew back in surprise and stumbled into the work bench. He laughed, shook his head, and strode from the terrace as her face flooded with heat once again.
‘He’s gorgeous. You are a very lucky girl!’ smiled Suki, standing next to Rosie with her hands on her slender hips as she surveyed Matt’s retreating figure.
‘Oh, no, we’re not… I mean, Matt and I are just friends.’
‘Didn’t look like it from where I was standing!’ giggled Jess who had joined them with Lucas in tow. ‘If I didn’t have my incredibly handsome Lucas to keep me warm at night, you’d have to fight me off with your spatula, Rosie!’
Rosie was shocked to discover how flustered she was at their teasing. She was surprised that others had noticed the chemistry between her and Matt. Although she had denied it, she had to admit they were right – there was a definite buzz of electricity in the air whenever Matt Wilson was in the vicinity. She had no idea what it meant, nor did she understand it.
Hadn’t she declared herself finished with all romantic relationships? Didn’t they all end in disaster one way or another? Even though she had moved on, she could still recall the sharpness of the pain she had endured when she had broken up with Harry, especially after the way she’d discovered his infidelity, and there was no way she was going there again.
‘Okay. Everyone help themselves to one of our Windmill Café aprons and we’ll get started on the scones.’
‘At last, Nadia! Where have you been?’
‘Don’t nag. Anyway, aren’t we supposed to be on holiday? Why should we be forced to get up at the crack of dawn?’
‘Oooh, someone didn’t get any act…shun in the bedroom department last night!’
Lucas grinned with mischief at Nadia’s reaction as he sprinkled flour through a sieve into a silver bowl from a great height. A good handful fell onto the floor and Rosie almost had a coronary. It took all her willpower not to crouch down and wipe it up straight away. She wasn’t sure she was cut out to be a cookery teacher and she kept checking her watch, hoping that Mia would arrive before she attacked Lucas with the meat cleaver for leaving snail-trails of desiccated coconut on her precious units. Never mind a poisoning for Matt to solve, there would be a murder!
‘When you make scones, it’s essential to make sure all the ingredients are cold and that you don’t overwork the mixture,’ said Rosie, tossi
ng in a generous portion of crumbled Stilton.
‘Hey, Jess, do you think I could persuade my boss Marcus to offer a selection of fruit and savoury scones to his customers?’
‘I don’t think San Antonio is ready for scones, Lucas darling, but maybe these cookies could work,’ Suki laughed.
‘I don’t know why you still work in that flea-pit of a place,’ said Nadia.
‘Needs must, Nad. We haven’t all got a private income to rely on,’ Lucas said, glancing across at Suki from beneath his eyelashes.
Even in the humidity of the café kitchen, with the oven on full-blast as their scones produced the most delicious smell of melting cheese, Lucas’s blond quiff stayed rigidly in place. He had pushed the sleeves of his shirt up to his elbows to reveal a scattering of fair hairs across his forearms. Rosie couldn’t help but smile when she realized that, in the right light, Lucas really could be mistaken for his hero, Jamie Oliver.
‘Hi everyone. I hope I haven’t missed out on all the fun?’
‘Hi, Mia.’ Rosie gave her friend a hug of welcome before whispering in her ear. ‘Am I glad you’re here. I just need you to channel some of your mum’s fabulous cookery presentation skills and I think we’ll be fine.’
‘No problem, you can definitely count on me.’
Mia grabbed one of her signature aprons from a drawer, this one made from the same fabric as the green wide-legged culottes she was wearing, and fastened the strings around her waist. She looked like an advertisement for an over-decorated Christmas tree.
‘Okay, everyone, Mia is going to talk you through the recipe for the pineapple and coconut cookies whilst I make a start on the tidying up.’
Rosie surveyed the kitchen and cringed. Goose bumps rippled around her body as she struggled with an almost overwhelming urge to shove every one of the guests out of the room so she could get on with washing down all the surfaces with soapy water. She knew she was being unreasonable. She knew it was something she should consider getting professional help with – but what was the point when she also knew exactly where her problem stemmed from and why it had raised its ugly head recently?
‘Mmm, this chocolate is delicious!’ declared Jess, shoving a handful of white chocolate buttons into her cheeks and pulling a comical face at her sister like an over-stuffed hamster.
‘You’re not supposed to eat the ingredients before the cookies are even baked!’
‘You talking to me?’ Jess said in a gangster-type voice before bursting into hysterical laughter and sending splinters of chocolate everywhere.
Rosie turned her back and busied herself with filling a bucket with scalding hot water and adding her best friend – a generous slug of disinfectant. Her chest felt as though it was going to burst as she tried to keep a lid on her churning emotions. Why, oh why, had she agreed to give Suki and her messy friends a cookery lesson?
‘Wow, these scones look amazing! Is it okay if we sample our masterpieces, Rosie?’
‘Of course. There’s butter in the fridge for the scones.’
The kitchen filled with the most delicious fragrance of warm caramel as the cookies were removed from the oven and transferred to a wire rack to cool. Rosie made a cafetière of coffee and everyone moved to the terrace to indulge in the products of their labour, laughing and chatting about their life in Ibiza and how different things would be when Suki started touring to promote her album. Rosie relaxed, relieved that the tutorial was over and she had her precious kitchen back under her control.
‘Ah, so this is where you’ve all disappeared to?’ said Felix, snatching up a cookie and taking a bite.
‘I see you’re happy to eat at the Windmill Café, then?’ observed Suki, watching Felix’s expression closely.
Clearly Felix hadn’t thought his actions through properly because he stopped in his tracks, his mouth full of warm cookie, his eyes widened with surprise. Rosie suspected that he was in the process of considering the etiquette of spitting out the offending biscuit and reluctantly thinking better of it. He swallowed and paused as everyone waited for his verdict. It was apparent from the look on Felix’s face that he was expecting to keel over in agony.
‘Well?’ demanded Jess.
‘Before you answer my sister’s question, you might like to know that I made these cookies with my own fair hands!’ cried Suki.
‘They’re very… erm, well, nice.’
‘Nice? Is that the best you can do? I’ve spent the last two hours slaving in a hot kitchen and all you can say is “they’re nice”?’
‘Delicious, amazing, magnificent! What do you want me to say, Suke?’
‘As my boyfriend I expect you to show an interest in what I’m doing. It wouldn’t have killed you to have joined us this morning. I booked this break so we could spend time together but so far you’ve chosen to spend all your time either drinking with your friends or asleep.’
‘I wasn’t asleep. I was busy on the phone making enquiries!’
‘Enquiries? What sort of enquiries?’
‘I’ve managed to speak to the environmental health guys responsible for this area and they’ve promised to come over as soon as the lab tells us what kind of poison they found in your spray.’
‘You’ve done what?’ cried Suki, shooting an apologetic glance at Rosie and Mia. ‘Felix, you really are a complete moron. The reason we’ve just spent the whole morning baking is so that we have a selection of baked goods to sell to the café’s visitors. I was going to donate the profits to a local kid’s drama club. How can I do that when you’ve arranged for a bunch of inspectors to come swarming all over the place? I want you to cancel them right away.’
Felix held Suki’s eyes for a moment, clearly wanting to argue back, but realizing he had an audience who were likely to maul him to pieces if he tried, he spun on his hand-made Italian leather loafers and left the café.
‘Felix really is an absolute… oh, God, who’s this ringing?’
Suki scrambled around in her Birkin for her phone, checking the caller ID before swiping her finger across the screen and walking out onto the terrace to take her call in private.
‘Hello, Dr Bairstow? Yes, thanks for calling. So, what did the lab say?’
Chapter 12
Rosie noticed that Suki’s face was devoid of its usual colour again, and that she was fiddling with her hair like her sister Jess did, wrapping a coil around her thumb and index finger in agitation. It was obvious that what Dr Bairstow was telling Suki wasn’t good news and her stomach lurched like a penny down a well as she wondered what new horror he had delivered. She didn’t have to wait too long for the hammer to fall.
‘Oh my God, Oh my God! Oh my God!’
Suki dropped down on one of the café’s overstuffed sofas and burst into tears.
‘What’s happened? Who was that on the phone?’ asked Jess as she rushed over to curl her arm around her sister’s shoulders.
‘It was Dr Bairstow. The lab has identified the “foreign substance” that was found in my throat spray. It was something called aconitine. Apparently, I’ve been lucky! In larger doses it can affect the cardiovascular system and cause multiple organ failure but because I only ingested a small amount and I was sick almost straight away, there were no long-lasting effects. Oh my God, what if…’
Rosie stared mutely at Suki, her jaw loose, her brain sending out synapses like fireworks as she tried to comprehend what Dr Bairstow’s findings meant. What on earth was aconitine and how had it got into Suki’s throat spray? Far from matters at the Windmill Café improving, they were getting worse, much worse, and Suki was clearly scared at hearing of this turn of events.
‘What the hell is aconitine?’ demanded Felix, reappearing at the French doors along with a cloud of cigarette smoke, and taking a seat on the other side of Suki. He reached into his pocket and handed her a bunch of tissues to dry her tears, the tremble in his hands belying his concern.
‘Dr Bairstow hadn’t heard of it either, so he did some digging on the internet. He
found this case a couple of years ago – a gardener found dead in his garden and doctors couldn’t find out why. It was eventually discovered to be aconitine poisoning from a plant called devil’s helmet or monkshood – apparently one of the deadliest flowers in the plant kingdom. He’s promised to email me the case and photographs of the plant, although I’m not sure I want him to.’
‘But, Suki, how could you have come into contact with monkshood?’ asked Rosie, her brain starting to clear as she wrestled with the implications of this new turn of events.
‘I have no idea, but Dr Bairstow’s had to inform the authorities and they’re sending over a team of inspectors to investigate sometime tomorrow. Rosie, I’m sorry, but you’ll have to close the café until they’ve given the place the all-clear and we’ve been asked to stay until it’s over in case they want to ask us any questions.’
‘Gosh, Suki, it should be me apologizing to you. This is the last thing you deserve when all you wanted was a relaxing break. I’ll do whatever the authorities want; close the café, the holiday site, anything. I want to get to the bottom of this as much as anyone.’
‘But if it was in Suki’s throat spray, it’s unlikely anyone else came into contact with that, don’t you think?’ said Mia, speaking for the first time since Suki’s phone call.
Suki’s eyes widened as if realizing something for the first time. Her tears returned with a vengeance and her voice rose up an octave to squeak level.
‘Oh my God, you’re right! How did the aconitine poison get in my throat spray bottle? Do you think someone put it there? Do you think someone wanted to hurt me… to kill me?’ Suki crumbled into huge wracking sobs and she rocked backwards and forwards in Jess and Felix’s arms as Nadia looked on in mute desperation and horror.
A roll of nausea swept through Rosie as she tried to comprehend what Suki had just said. If Suki’s suspicions turned out to be right, who could have done such a terrible thing? And more to the point, why? Had they wanted to damage Suki’s voice so she couldn’t sing for them that evening or was it something darker altogether? And why use such an unusual method? If Suki had been poisoned with bleach, then that would have been a different story, but whatever Felix thought of her café, she was one hundred percent certain that there was no monkshood stored in her kitchen cupboards!
