Sinister Sprinkles

by Jessica Beck

  Grace smiled. “The truth. I said that I was too smart to let Wilma within half a mile of my hair.”

  “What did he say to that?”

  “I thought I saw a grin, but it was just there for a second, so I can’t be sure. Where do we go from here?”

  I glanced at the clock. “It’s almost eleven, so I have to stay around until closing.” I looked at the display case, which was still loaded down with donuts. When I ran the report, I’d know exactly how much we’d lost, but I had a pretty good idea just seeing the inventory we still had on hand.

  “I’ve got some calls to make, remember?” she asked.

  “You can use my phone in the office,” I said.

  “Thanks, but I’d rather do it somewhere else. I’ll be back around noon.”

  “Okay.”

  After she left, Emma and I tried to do anything we could think of to dispel the pallor in the air, but nothing seemed to work. Several customers drifted in, but none of the sales were all that large, and the till was practically bare when Grace came back ten minutes before noon. Emma had withdrawn into the back, and I had grown tired of trying to make her feel better, especially since I was the one who’d lost the money.

  Grace said, “You look like death.”

  “Thanks. You’re particularly lovely yourself. What did you find out?”

  She looked toward the back. “Is Emma still here?”

  “She is. Why?”

  “I’d rather not talk about this until she’s gone,” Grace admitted.

  I didn’t care one way or the other, but Grace had long had a mind of her own. “Help me box these up, and we can all get out of here,” I said.

  I called out to Emma, “We’re closing early. Can you come out here?”

  “Sure, what do you need?” she asked as she came out, wiping her hands on a clean towel.

  “Would you mind taking these by the church?” I asked as I pointed to the donuts we’d readied for transport.

  She patted her hands dry on her apron. “I’d be happy to do it. If there’s anything you need, all you have to do is ask.”

  She grabbed her jacket, then said, “Save the rest of the dishes. I’ll take care of them when I get back.”

  “I’ll do them,” I said. “You can go home after you drop these off.”

  “Suzanne, let me do them. That’s my job. Please.”

  I couldn’t bear the hurt look in her eyes. “Fine. I won’t touch a thing.”

  After we loaded up the car and my assistant drove off, I asked Grace back inside the donut shop.

  “Were you able to find anything out?” I asked as I started sweeping the floor. I’d leave the dishes for Emma, but that didn’t mean I had to put the entire burden of cleaning up on her shoulders. She’d made a mistake, a costly one, true, but I’d forgiven her, and it wasn’t in my nature to keep punishing her for it.

  Grace grinned at me. “You’re not going to believe this.”

  “Try me,” I said.

  Grace nodded. “Here’s what I was able to come up with so far. I started with Muriel, and I was frankly surprised by what I found. She looks like she’s been doing well to the outside world, doesn’t she? It’s all a lie. Her house is mortgaged to the hilt, she’s taken cash advances out on three credit cards, and her combined savings and checking accounts have less then forty dollars between them.”

  I had a hard time believing it. “Are you sure?”

  “My sources are pretty accurate,” Grace said. “I didn’t see the numbers myself, but I believe it’s true.”

  “So she’s in some kind of dire financial trouble,” I said.

  “That much is pretty clear,” Grace said. “What I don’t know yet is what happened to all of her money. At one time she was supposed to be loaded. I’ve got a few people looking into it, and I should know something more pretty soon.”

  “I’d say that’s a lot you found out,” I said. “What about Darlene?

  “Hey, I only had an hour. I’ve got some calls out, but I haven’t heard anything yet.”

  “You did great,” I said as I patted her shoulder.

  Grace asked, “So, where does that leave us?”

  “Before we do anything else, I’m going to run a report to see how much I lost today, and I want to finish it before Emma gets back. You can wait here with me if you want, or I can catch up with you later.”

  Grace grabbed the broom from my hands and started sweeping. “If you don’t mind, I’ll hang around.”

  I knew she’d have to go back to her home sometime, but it was clear she wasn’t ready to do it just yet.

  “Thanks. I appreciate all the help I can get.”

  As Grace swept up, I ran the report. In the end, we lost a little over two hundred dollars. Not a fortune by anyone’s standards, but more than I’d hoped it would be. Still, things could have been a lot worse, and if it taught Emma to be on her guard when she was at the shop alone, it might have even been worth the price it was going to cost me.

  I finished the report, bagged the change and the checks left behind, then turned to Grace, who’d completed her task.

  “What now?” she asked.

  “We forget about the robbery and keep digging into the murder,” I said. “There’s somebody else I’d like to talk to, and I’m hoping we get more out of her than we did with Wilma.”

  “Who did you have in mind?”

  “Darlene’s roommate,” I said.

  “What do you think she can tell us?” Grace asked.

  “There’s only one way to find out, isn’t there? Let’s go.”

  “Aren’t we going to wait for Emma?” she asked.

  “No, I think this is something we need to take care of right now.” I left Emma a note telling her that we were gone for the day, and urging her to go home as well. There was no use crying over the money we’d lost. We’d just have to get over it, and make amends to try harder keeping our money safe in the future.

  Grace and I locked up the shop, and I looked over toward Gabby’s used clothing store. Oddly, it was dark inside, and I wondered if she’d closed for some reason. I’d been meaning to go talk to her just before I found out about the robbery, and it had completely slipped my mind in the turmoil.

  “My car’s this way,” Grace said as I started toward ReNewed Clothing.

  “I know, but I need to check on something first.”

  Grace touched my arm lightly. “Suzanne, if we go in there, we’re never going to get out, and you know it.”

  She followed me anyway, and we both stopped by the front door and read the sign posted there.

  To our loyal customers,

  We’re closed until further notice. If you have something on consignment with us, try back next month. We appreciate your business. If you want to buy something, I’m afraid you’ll just have to try again later as well.

  We appreciate your understanding.

  Sincerely,

  The management.

  “What’s going on?” Grace asked. “I didn’t think Gabby ever closed her shop.”

  “Not without telling me,” I said. “Something must have happened to her. Come on, let’s go back to the donut shop.”

  “What good is that going to do?”

  “I’ve got her home number written down someplace there, and there’s an emergency contact if something happens at her shop and she’s not there. We traded numbers the day I opened, but I’ve never had to use hers.”

  We walked back in, and Grace followed me to my office. I had to flip through my numbers notebook twice before I found Gabby’s entries. I tried her home number, but there was no answer, and strangely enough, she didn’t have her answering machine on, either.

  There was an emergency contact, but no name was listed. When I dialed it, it too rang for ten times without anyone picking up, but then the oddest thing happened. Suddenly Muriel Stevens’s voice greeted me. “I’m not able to come to the telephone right now, but if you leave your name and number, I’ll get back to you as s
oon as I can.”

  “That’s bizarre,” I said as I hung up without leaving a message.

  “What is?”

  “I dialed Gabby’s backup number, but I got Muriel’s phone instead.”

  “No way.”

  I nodded as I hit the “redial” button, then I handed her the telephone so she could hear the message for herself.

  Grace listened for a few seconds, and after the message ended, she said, “Muriel, I need you or Gabby to call me as soon as you get this. It’s important. Oh, this is Grace Gauge. I’m in the book.”

  “Why’d you do that?” I asked as she handed the phone back to me.

  “We want to know what’s going on, don’t we? I thought it made sense to leave a message. I didn’t realize Gabby and Muriel were that good friends.”

  “Neither did I,” I said. “What I don’t get is why Gabby didn’t mention they were close when we first saw Darlene’s body.”

  “I don’t know,” Grace said, “but we’re not going to figure anything out until we talk to her again. Now let’s go find Darlene’s roommate, Kimmi Erickson. That’s the one thing I was able to find out about Darlene when I started asking around.”

  “Let me guess,” I said. “I bet she spells her name with an ‘i’ on the end, doesn’t she?”

  “I don’t have the faintest clue,” Grace said as I looked her name up in the thin April Springs telephone book.

  I found the listing, then said, “It just says K. Erickson here, but we can ask her how she spells her name when we see her. Come on, are you driving, or should I?”

  “Ordinarily I’d volunteer, but where exactly do they live? I’d hate for anything to happen to my company car, and if the two of them live out in the country, the roads might not be plowed yet.”

  “So if something happens to one of our cars, it should be to my Jeep and not your Mercedes, right?” I asked with a slight smile.

  “Suzanne, not to be mean about it, but what’s one more ding on your car going to matter?”

  “I’d love to argue with you, but I can’t,” I said as I laughed. “Let’s go.”

  “In your Jeep, right?”

  “Right,” I said. Apparently Kimmi and Darlene lived on the outskirts of April Springs, and from the address, I was guessing it was in a trailer somewhere out in the sticks. I was pleasantly surprised when I discovered a quaint old cabin at the address I’d found in the telephone book. It wasn’t run down at all. As snow layered on the roof, it made the place look like it belonged on a calendar page, and I wondered how these two women could afford the rent for a place as nice as this looked.

  We walked up the steps and rang the door bell twice, but no one answered.

  “Nobody’s home,” Grace said.

  “Give it a second,” I said. This time I used the brass knocker, giving it a hard set of raps.

  The door opened almost immediately, and inside, we found a girl in her mid-twenties dressed in a tight white t-shirt and a pair of red short shorts that looked like they’d been painted on. If I had a body like that, I’d probably go around wearing the same thing myself. She said a little breathlessly, “I’m Kimmi. Sorry, I was just doing my yoga. Come on in, I’m almost finished.”

  This girl had no idea who we were, or why we were visiting her, but she opened her home to us like we were long-lost friends.

  Kimmi got back on a bright blue mat in front of the wide-screen television, and hit a button on her remote control. As she dropped into a pose that would have sent me straight to a chiropractor, I looked around the room. It was wonderful and homey, with a fire burning in the stone fireplace. Darkened hardwood floors glistened with shellac, and heavy wooden furniture matched the structure of the house itself.

  As Kimmi contorted her body, she said, “We can talk right now. I know this part by heart.”

  “We were just driving by, and I have to tell you, I love this house,” Grace said. “Do you own it, or are you renting it?”

  “Neither,” she said. “My dad’s letting us stay here until he can sell it. Well, it’s just me now, and he’s not crazy about me living by myself.” She looked over at us, then asked, “Do either of you need a place to stay? I’m looking for a roommate so I don’t have to leave.”

  “I might be interested,” Grace said.

  I looked at her and tried to keep my mouth closed. Grace winked at me, and said to Kimmi, “Could I see your extra bedroom?”

  “Sure, but there’s still stuff in there, and it’s a real mess. My roommate … moved on,” she added lamely.

  I suppose you could call dying moving on, but Kimmi didn’t strike me as the metaphorical type.

  Grace nodded. “Where is it?”

  Kimmi pointed with a free foot. “Down the hallway and on the left. It’s the only door that’s closed. I’ll be with you in three minutes.”

  As we hurried down the hallway, I said, “You have a perfectly good house of your own. Why would you want to live here?”

  “To be honest with you, my place has lost some of its charm since somebody broke in and went through my stuff. Having a roommate might not be a bad thing.”

  “Are you telling me you’re actually considering living with Bambi?”

  “Her name’s Kimmi,” she said as she opened the door. “We came to snoop, so I got us through the door. What more can you ask for? Now let’s start digging before she finishes that howling dog pose she’s doing.”

  “I don’t think that’s what it’s called,” I said.

  “I don’t care if it’s called dog and hydrant,” she said. “Hurry up. We don’t have much time.”

  I looked around the room, and saw Darlene’s sad little attempt to decorate for the holidays. There was a small artificial tree on top of the dresser—complete with twinkling white fiber optic lights—and tiny little boxes were wrapped as presents and arranged under it. All of that sat on a blanket of cotton that had been spun to resemble fallen snow. On her nightstand, she had a familiar wooden tree six inches tall covered in gumdrops. For a second I thought I was seeing things. I had the exact same tree myself, and up until that moment, I thought I had the only one in town, but apparently I’d been mistaken. On the other nightstand, there was a folk art Santa, a thin woodcarving that was nearly two feet tall. Ragged and worn at the edges, this Santa didn’t look jolly at all. Instead, the woodcarver had chosen an intricate, sad face, with eyes that showed how tiring it must be to deliver presents all around the world in just one night.

  I was suddenly aware of Grace standing by my elbow. “Suzanne, we don’t have all day. I’ll go through her closet, and you check out her purse.”

  It made sense, so as she began rooting around inside Darlene’s closet, I emptied her purse on the bed. There was a collection of business cards there that I found odd, until I looked on the backs of them and saw several different telephone numbers scrawled on them. I shoved them all into my pocket so I could look at them later. There was nothing else inside that really helped—just a mishmash of car keys, makeup, lip balm, and other flotsam and jetsam a purse tends to accumulate over the years—so I shoved it all back into her bag and put it back on the bed. It felt like I was violating Darlene somehow as I went through her things, but in a way, I was trying to help her. I was sure she’d thank me if she could for trying to find out who had really killed her. I found a bookcase bulging with paperback novels, and I leaned over to read a few of the titles. They were all romances, and from the looks of the spines, they’d been read and reread many times. I felt a twinge of sadness for her when I realized that she had just been looking for someone to love, but when I remembered that the someone she’d set her sights on had still been my husband at the time, some of my sympathy started to wane. Still, I knew as well as anybody else that it wasn’t easy being alone. I just wished she’s stuck to men who were free to return her affection.

  “Look at these,” Grace said. I joined her at the closet and looked inside. It was evident that Darlene had an odd fondness for spiked pumps w
ith seven-inch heels, especially for a woman who stayed on her feet all day.

  “These are nice,” Grace said. “I’d borrow a pair, if I could. Have you found anything yet?”

  “Not really,” I said, and then I spotted it. Tucked inside on of the shoe boxes in back of Darlene’s closet was the edge of a hundred-dollar bill.

  “What’s that doing in there?” I asked as I retrieved the box.

  As I opened the lid, I’d expected to find more money—maybe even stacks of it—but what I found there rocked me back on my heels, and I nearly dropped the box as I looked inside.

  Before I could show Grace what I’d found, the door burst open, and I knew that we’d been caught.

  How on earth was I going to explain this?

  CHAPTER 8

  Kimmi asked heatedly, “What are you two doing in her closet? I didn’t mean you could snoop around.”

  “We didn’t know her things were still here,” I said as I covered up the box lid and hid it from her view. “Why did she leave everything behind?”

  Kimmi wasn’t budging, though. “You still haven’t told me why you were snooping around in there.”

  “We weren’t snooping,” Grace said indignantly. “I had to see how big the closets were, didn’t I? Wouldn’t that be the first thing you looked at if you were thinking about moving into a new place?”

  “I guess that makes sense,” she said as she rubbed her ear. “I just can’t get used to the fact that she’s gone.” Kimmi took a deep breath, then said, “I should probably tell you, my roommate didn’t move away. Somebody killed her.”

  I had to make sure she thought we didn’t already know that. “That’s terrible. Did it happen in here?” I pretended to look around for bloodstains, and Kimmi caught my implication.

  “No, it happened in town.” She frowned a second, then looked at me and said, “I know you. You run that place, Donut Darts.”

  “It’s called Donut Hearts,” I corrected her. “I heard someone died, but I never found out who everybody was talking about.”

  “You’re Max’s wife,” Kimmi said guardedly, and I was beginning to realize that I may have underestimated the girl’s intelligence, or at the very least, her knack for local lore.