Death Before Decaf

by Caroline Fardig

  While the bacon for the scones was cooling, I started on the muffin recipe without him. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but Cecilia was laughing, and Pete’s voice sounded happy. Blech. I wasn’t jealous, but the thought of them together made me sick. I’d almost rather he go out with Charlene than Cecilia.

  Realizing that I was mindlessly beating the living hell out of my muffin batter, I stopped and took a breath. I also stuffed an entire cookie into my mouth. And then another. If he didn’t get rid of her soon, I’d go into a sugar coma. Just as I was reaching for cookie number three, Pete came back into the kitchen. He looked apologetic, and a little wary. What was he up to?

  “Jules,” he said tentatively, “I’m afraid I’m going to have to take a rain check on the baking. Cecilia wants to talk, so we’re going to dinner.”

  I nodded, afraid that if I said anything, it would be something rude.

  He sighed. “I know that look. We’re just talking, that’s all.”

  “We’ve already fought once this week over poking our noses into each other’s love lives. If you’re going to let me make my own mistakes, then I have to do the same for you.”

  Squinting at me, he said, “That was a sly way of telling me I’m making a mistake, wasn’t it?”

  “You caught that, did you?”

  He smiled. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Cursing and grumbling, I slammed the muffin tins down and began slopping the batter into the cups. Pete could do so much better than Cecilia, the bitch. There were plenty of nice women in Nashville for him to date, but she wasn’t one of them. I threw the muffin tins into the oven, splashing batter all over the place.

  It was awfully quiet in here with Pete gone. And kind of creepy. I went around to all of the doors and made sure they were locked. I knew no one was in here with me, but I kept hearing noises. Being alone was driving me nuts, and the pastries were piling up. I was in serious danger of eating them all myself. I had to get someone over here to keep me company and get rid of some of these cookies.

  I texted Trevor, asking if he and Ryan would be interested in eating several dozen baked items, and he responded immediately with a “YES!” They must have dropped what they were doing and rushed over, because they arrived in only a few minutes.

  “Hey, guys,” I said, letting them in.

  “All the free pastries we can eat? What’s the catch? Your boyfriend get shanked again?” asked Ryan, smiling at his own joke.

  “Nope. I’m testing recipes, and I need guinea pigs.” I led them back to the kitchen. “Now, I also want honest answers, so if something tastes like puke, I want you to tell me.”

  Trevor took a deep breath. “It smells awesome in here. I can’t imagine anything that smells this good could taste like puke.”

  When they saw the mountain of cookies, scones, and muffins on the prep table, their eyes bulged out. They immediately went to work on them, stopping only to say, “Mmm” and “Oh, man, these are good.”

  After eating a dozen or so items each, they began to slow down. Trevor asked, “Hey, does Logan still work here?”

  “Yes. Do you know him?” I replied.

  “He used to be a computer science major, so I knew him from school. I heard he started working here after…uh…” Trevor shot a glance at Ryan, who raised his eyebrows.

  “He’s taking some time off from school to save up for next year, right?” I asked, hating to air my employee’s dirty laundry too much.

  Trevor wrinkled his forehead. “Maybe, but the real reason he’s not there is that he got kicked out.”

  “Oh, I didn’t know.” It was amazing what I didn’t know about my employees.

  “Yeah,” Ryan said. “Turns out Vandy frowns on stealing your roommate’s identity, for some reason.”

  “Wow. I didn’t know Logan had it in him.” I didn’t peg Logan for a cybercrime guy. Pete had said that Logan was bright, but he never showed it much at work.

  “The kid’s freakin’ brilliant,” Trevor said. “And, honestly, his roommate was a stuck-up, rich prick who was a total asshole to him. Nobody really blamed Logan for getting back at him.”

  “Except the police,” Ryan interjected. “And the school.”

  “Right. Just them,” Trevor said, chuckling. “It was lucky that he skipped a grade as a kid, so he was still seventeen his freshman year. He was tried as a minor, so his record was sealed and he didn’t have to do time or anything.”

  Maybe that was why Dave was so interested in keeping an eye on Logan—he had already gotten himself into trouble once, and his brother wasn’t the best role model. It stood to reason that Logan was surly, given the shame of being kicked out of school and having to work in food service instead of technology. Not that this information would help me in getting along with him, but at least I understood why he was the way he was.

  “The whole thing freaked out lots of people at school, though,” said Ryan. “Everyone who wasn’t getting along with their roommate was scrambling to lock down all of their personal information and shred their mail. I heard Logan started with the information from just a couple of pieces of his roommate’s mail and went nuts from there.”

  Mail. I asked slowly, “What kind of mail, exactly?”

  Ryan shrugged. “Beats me. Trevor’s the cybercrime expert.”

  Trevor blushed. “Knock it off, bro! It’s not like I use my hacking skills for evil.”

  “I want to show you something,” I said, running to the office. I grabbed the three pieces of mail that Dave had stashed, brought them back to the kitchen, and handed them to Trevor. “What could you do with this mail?”

  Trevor thumbed through the stack. “A lot. These are the names you had me look up a few days ago, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Well, the pre-approved credit card offer is easy,” he replied, waggling the envelope. “Steal one of these babies, send it in with a change of address, and you’ve got yourself a free credit card. That’s basic credit card fraud.”

  “Wait, so…” All this talk about credit cards and fraud started pulling thoughts together inside my head. “Okay, let me see if I have this straight. Let’s say you steal a credit card offer out of my mailbox and get yourself a ‘free’ credit card. It would have my name on it…but I would have no idea that it had happened. Am I right?”

  “Yep.”

  Could that have been what happened to Paolina, the Vandy student whose credit card I found in the pastry case? If so, poor Paolina was getting scammed, and she didn’t even know it.

  Trevor continued before I had time to piece anything else together. “As for the auto insurance quote, that’s a little more complicated, but an identity thief can take out an insurance policy in your name, make a bogus claim, and pocket the money.”

  “I see. And the phone bill?” I asked.

  “That’s probably the most useful one. Any account number is an open gateway for identity theft. With even a few computer skills, someone could obtain enough personal information to do as much damage as they wanted. We’re talking fake loans, wire transfers, phony accounts…you name it.”

  I blew out a big breath. “So with these three little envelopes, someone could be running a sizeable scam. Is that what you’re telling me?”

  Trevor nodded uneasily. “Yes.”

  Hmm. Was it possible that Dave wasn’t as clean as I’d thought? Maybe identity theft was the big scam that Rob Carmichael had going on, and instead of trying to stop it, Dave was a part of it. And what if narcing to the cops was his way of not getting caught himself? Dave could have flat-out lied to Ron Hatcher about any part of that deal. Even worse, instead of supposedly watching out for Logan, Dave could have been using him for his cybercrime skills. Wait. Why did I care? I wasn’t a murder suspect anymore, so from my perspective, this little nugget of information didn’t really matter that much. I supposed I could do my civic duty and turn my information over to Cromwell, or I could just let him figure it out on his own. He’d be pissed if
I told him I’d hidden evidence from him for days.

  “Juliet?” Trevor asked, snapping me out of my thoughts. “You said a friend of yours stole these. That friend wasn’t Logan, was it?”

  “No, actually. It was someone else. I probably need to call to the cops.” They both nodded, so I asked, “Would you like me to box these pastries up so you can take some home?”

  Both of their faces lit up. “That would be awesome!” Ryan exclaimed. “My sister is usually the one who keeps me in cookies, but she’s been busy lately and hasn’t been baking as much. I’ve been in major withdrawal.”

  “I’ll remember that next time I’m testing recipes.” I handed them each an overflowing box of pastries.

  Trevor eyed me. “You never got around to telling me why the guy Ryan stitched up is going around saying he’s Seth Davis.”

  “Right. I didn’t. Um…I guess since you already know he’s not the Seth Davis, I can tell you that he’s working undercover. That’s about all I can say, though. Sorry.”

  “That’s cool. As long as he’s not skeeving on college chicks like the actual Seth Davis, I’m fine with it.”

  “Oh, he’s definitely not doing that.” At least I hoped not, since he was sleeping with me. “Oh, Ryan, fake Seth Davis’s stitches are doing great, by the way. Thanks again for that.”

  “Hey, it was my pleasure. Live human skin stitches up differently than dead pig skin, so it was a great learning experience,” he replied.

  “Sick, dude,” Trevor complained. “Later, Juliet.”

  “Bye, guys.”

  After they left, I reluctantly got out my phone and called Detective Cromwell. When he answered his phone, I said, “Hi, Detective Cromwell. It’s Juliet Langley.”

  “Keeping your nose clean this weekend?”

  Good thing he couldn’t see the face I was making. “Yes, sir. I have something for you.”

  “What is it?”

  “I found three pieces of mail in with some of Dave’s belongings he had at Java Jive. They’re all from different companies and are addressed to different Vanderbilt students. I don’t know if they’re pertinent to his case in any way, but it doesn’t seem particularly aboveboard to be in possession of someone else’s mail, so I want to make sure that they get into the right hands.”

  “And?”

  “And what?”

  “You and I both know you tried to figure out what they had to do with David Hill’s murder. What did you come up with?”

  Detective Cromwell was no dummy. I sighed. “Fine. I tried, but I still don’t really know anything. The only connection these kids have is that their mailboxes are near one another. As for the mail, I’ve been told that credit card offers, phone bills, and auto insurance quotes can all be used in identity theft. So there you go.” He could figure the rest out for himself. I did my duty.

  He actually sounded impressed. “Not bad for an amateur. I’ll have a uni come over and collect them. Where are you?”

  “Java Jive.”

  “You’re there a lot.”

  “You have no idea.”

  He chuckled. “I know a thing or two about being married to your job. Thank you, Ms. Langley.”

  We hung up, and I cleaned up my mess while I waited for the cop to show up. He was there in a few minutes, and barely said two words to me when I handed over the mail. That was fine. I was so done with this stupid case.

  An hour later, Ryder finally came to pick me up. I grabbed the box of pastries I had set aside for him and went out to meet him.

  “Hey,” he said, grabbing me and planting a big kiss on my lips. “I missed you.”

  I smiled. “I missed you, too.”

  “Don’t freak out,” he warned, reaching into the backseat.

  “Why?” I asked warily.

  He produced a copy of the Nashville Gazette. There I was—in color, blood all over me, right on the front page, above the fold. The headline read, LOCAL COFFEEHOUSE MANAGER INVOLVED IN TWO VIOLENT CRIMES IN ONE WEEK. I cursed and tossed the paper out the car window as Ryder pulled away from the curb.

  “You just littered,” he pointed out.

  “I don’t care!” I exclaimed, crossing my arms angrily.

  Reaching over to squeeze my knee, he said, “Don’t get upset. There were no facts in the article whatsoever. Wolfe tries to make you sound guilty, but he has no proof to back it up. It’s very obviously a witch hunt, something he’s known for.”

  “I wish he’d find a new witch,” I grumbled.

  “What did you do to piss him off so bad?”

  “Well, you remember what I did to him when he accosted me in the ladies’ room?”

  Ryder grinned proudly. “Did you junk-punch him again?”

  “I did.”

  “I think I’m in love.”

  After a few days? No freaking way. “You take that back.”

  —

  Ryder took me to his house again. “What’s in the box?” he asked, tossing his keys next to the bakery box I had placed on his kitchen counter.

  “I was baking this afternoon.” I opened the lid and showed him my creations. “Want one?” I wasn’t convinced that Ryder, with his perfect bod, would even consider eating anything sweet. I had never seen him eat anything out of the pastry case at Java Jive, but then again, those weren’t worth the calories.

  “I didn’t know you could bake,” he said, grabbing a cookie.

  “Duh, I told you I had my own café. I made most of the food, and we had a bitchin’ pastry selection.”

  “This is amazing. Now I’m really in love.”

  I made a face. “Would you quit saying that?”

  He responded by slapping me on the ass.

  I changed the subject. “So what did you do today, besides witness the most awesome funeral ever?”

  He shook his head. “That was hysterical. Completely inappropriate, but hysterical. What is wrong with those people?”

  “I think everybody there had a screw loose.”

  “Yeah. Carmichael and Brewer didn’t show up to the funeral, so I went looking for them. It was extremely frustrating. I drove all over town, hitting every place I could think of where they might be and asking everyone I met if they’d seen them. I came up with nothing on Brewer, but one of Carmichael’s co-workers said he’s on the road. He’s a truck driver. I haven’t been able to confirm it with the company he works for yet.”

  “So the life of a P.I. isn’t as thrilling as it’s cracked up to be?”

  “Surveillance is generally a snoozefest. On a good day, you’re lucky to get one usable piece of information. Everything else is a waste, like today. However, I noticed that you and Pete kissed and made up.” He kept his tone light, but his eyes looked strained.

  “Yes, we did, and I’m much happier.”

  “I don’t get the semi-platonic thing you two have going on.”

  “He’s been my best friend since I was nineteen. What’s not to get?”

  “Have you ever slept with him?”

  I huffed, “Not that it’s any of your business, but no.”

  “But you want to.”

  “Let’s just leave it at I’m not going to.”

  Shaking his head, he said, “What I don’t get is that he never tried anything with you. You’re gorgeous. Is he gay?”

  “No! Why can’t you wrap your mind around the fact that a man and a woman can be friends with absolutely nothing sexual going on?” I wished it hadn’t made me giddy inside that Ryder said I was gorgeous.

  “Because it’s never happened to me.”

  “Why? Because you’re so incredibly hot that no woman can resist you?”

  He grinned slyly. “You couldn’t.”

  “I’ve been under duress.”

  He leaned his head back and laughed. “When are you going to admit that you like me?”

  “Not until I start liking you, which hasn’t happened yet.”

  Coming over to stand very close to me, he said softly, “You like it when I
do this,” and began kissing my neck. I couldn’t argue. He stopped abruptly and took a step away from me. “Wait, maybe I shouldn’t do that. One thing could lead to another…and I should probably save myself for someone who truly cares about me.”

  “Dick.”

  He snagged a scone. “So what else did you do this afternoon besides bake me a bunch of pastries?”

  “They weren’t just for you. I saved some cookie dough for tomorrow, and I gave the rest to Trevor and Ryan.”

  “You’re sharing your cookies with other guys? I’m hurt.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I made too many, and someone had to eat them besides me. Those two are human garbage disposals. They’re also gossips. Know what they told me about Rob Carmichael’s brother, Logan?”

  “If you tell me, won’t that make you a gossip, too?” He looked appreciatively at the scone he was eating. “Hey, is there bacon in this thing?”

  “Yes, and yes, but I’m not worried about you telling anyone. You can keep a secret like it’s your job. Logan didn’t quit school—he got kicked out of Vandy for stealing his roommate’s identity.”

  He choked on his scone. “What?”

  “Logan is some kind of computer genius. His rich asshole roommate was hateful to him, so he got back at him by—”

  “Identity theft,” he said to himself. He looked at me. “But Logan doesn’t have a record, right?”

  “No, the guys said he was tried as a minor, so his record was sealed.”

  Ryder started fidgeting. “Are they absolutely sure it was him?”

  “Yes. Trevor knew Logan from school. Oh, and I almost forgot, it would seem that our dearly departed Dave may have lied to Ron Hatcher about Rob’s scheme.”

  “What do you mean?” he asked sharply.

  “I found some of Dave’s…um…belongings at Java Jive. With them I found three pieces of mail addressed to Vandy students, obviously stolen. After talking to Trevor, I found out that this particular mail would be useful in a fraud and identity theft scam. I put two and two together and figured that this could be Rob’s big scam and that Dave was in on—”