Flourless to Stop Him

by Nancy J. Parra

  Meghan made coffee and worked the counter while I made up extra batches of donuts, muffins, Danish, and tarts. The pie and cake orders rose to a record level. It gave me hope, and I tried not to think about how I would get it all done by the requested pickup time. I’d worked twenty-four hours straight before and I could do it now.

  Sam came in during a lull just after lunchtime. He teased Meghan about her vintage day dress and combat boots. Then he walked into the kitchen and all the air went out of the room. I smiled like a fool.

  “Meghan said I was family and could hang out in the kitchen with the cool kids,” he teased. Then he helped himself to a coffee mug and poured thick black brew into his cup.

  “You are her uncle,” I said casually. “I suppose that makes you family.”

  He reached over and snagged two chocolate cookies off the day-old trays. His presence made the kitchen feel small and had my entire body tingling in anticipation. Which was silly, I told myself. It was all because I hadn’t slept. Then I turned to find him standing right behind me. “Oh!”

  “Sorry,” he said, giving me that practiced smile.

  “No, you aren’t,” I accused him. The heat from his body teased my senses. It really had been a long time since I had been so close to a man. There was something tempting about it. I wanted to lean into him and rest my head against his broad shoulder and take comfort in the touch of another human being.

  “You’re exhausted,” he said, his sexy gaze taking in every inch of my face.

  “It’s the busy time for the bakery.”

  He reached up and tucked a wayward lock of hair behind my ear. I stood very still. It took a lot of effort not to curl into his touch like a cat. “Hire more help,” he said firmly. “It does no one any good if you exhaust yourself.”

  “I know, but honestly . . . I can’t afford to hire anyone. I’m barely making the bills.”

  He frowned. “Ask your family to help. It’s why you have a large family.”

  “I suppose you’re right.”

  “You know I’m right. What’s kept you from asking for help? Hmm? Pride? Are you too proud to ask for help?”

  I winced and this time pressed my forehead into his shoulder so he couldn’t see the tears that welled up in my eyes. He put down his cup and the purloined cookies and held me against him. Running his hands up and down my back, he worked magic, and the stiffness and worry melted off me. I sighed. “Eleanor has been waiting for me to fail. Joan thinks gluten-free is a fad that will fade. Richard advised me to not invest in a storefront in a small town.”

  “And you’re worried they were all right,” he finished as he rubbed my back.

  “Any start-up has its up and down moments,” I said as I eased farther into his sturdy warm body. “You have to expect to not make a profit for at least three years.”

  “You won’t make three years if you exhaust yourself in the first six months.” He walked me over to the kitchen table and pulled a chair out for me. “Sit.”

  I opened my mouth to protest.

  He placed his index finger on my lips. “The world won’t end if you take a fifteen-minute break.”

  I sat down and he poured me coffee, put in a splash of cream, and brought over a small plate with my fiber-rich apple cinnamon muffins.

  “Here, drink this and eat these. I happen to know from a very reliable person that these particular gluten-free muffins are a good source of protein, fiber, and carbohydrates.”

  I couldn’t help the smile that crossed my face. “You are a good man, Sam Greenbaum.”

  “I’m a handyman; it means I’m handy to have around.” He winked and sat down beside me.

  I laughed and teased back. “I’ve yet to see how good your hands are.”

  He threw his head back and laughed. It was a full, deep, wonderful sound that warmed me to my toes. “Well, now we’re going to have to fix that.” He reached over, took my hand, kissed my fingertips, then waggled his eyebrows. “Ready to date yet?”

  “Oh, I’m ready,” I said with a long sigh. “But the year isn’t up yet.”

  “Why a year?” he asked.

  “Because I wanted to take the time to get to know myself again. I think maybe you need time to undo all those bad habits that got you into trouble the first time.”

  “So it wasn’t all Eric’s fault?”

  “Oh, Eric was a cheating, lying, bad guy,” I said with no bitterness in my voice. “But I refused to see it. I believe in seeing the best in people. That gets me into trouble—especially when I shrug off the truth.”

  “And what truth is that?” His gaze was warm and interested.

  “The truth that while everyone has good parts, they also have bad. I have to face the good and the bad when I’m in a relationship. I need to figure out how those good and bad parts fit in with my good and bad parts.”

  “You have bad parts?” His mouth twitched and his eyes shone.

  “I do.” I smiled back, then got serious. “The trick is to find someone who helps you make the bad parts better. You know?”

  “You are an intelligent woman, Toni Holmes.” He took a big bite out of his chocolate cookie. “And an excellent baker.”

  I laughed. “It would be even better if I could be both things at the same time.”

  CHAPTER 26

  “Well, have you discovered who the real killer is yet?” Grandma Ruth rolled her scooter into the bakery’s back kitchen door in a whirlwind of cold and the beginning of another snowstorm.

  “Grandma, what are you doing out in this weather?”

  “Oh, please, I got tired of being stuck with the old people down at the center. There is nothing worse than old people . . . always complaining about this or that ache or pain. Always saying, Who knew you lived this long? Well, let me tell you, I knew. I’m here to tell you that old saying is true.”

  “What saying, Grandma?” Meghan closed and locked the door behind her, then got out the mop to wipe up the snow that had melted into puddles on the floor, leaving perfect scooter tracks.

  Grandma snagged an oatmeal cinnamon chip cookie off the fresh rack before I could say no. She put it in her mouth for safekeeping and scootered over to the table. Pulling the cookie out, she took a bite. “That saying that goes something like this: Who wants to go to the grave perfectly preserved? I plan on partying, eating, smoking, and drinking until the last moment. You only have one life, chickie. You should live every day to the fullest, which means I’m not going to let a little snow and ice keep me from all the fun.” She popped the rest of the cookie in her mouth. “Now tell me how the investigation is going.”

  “Are you kidding me?” Meghan said. “We’ve been baking twenty-four/seven to cover all the orders. We lost an entire day due to the power outage and the last storm.”

  “Well, see, there you go.” Grandma shook her head and waved her hand in Meghan’s direction. “Worrying about all the wrong things, while my grandbaby faces certain jail time.”

  “Tim won’t go to jail,” I said, then took the coffee out of her hand and replaced it with herbal tea. “Brad won’t let it happen.”

  Grandma gave me the stink eye, sniffed the orange zest calming herbal tea, and made a face. “I wasn’t asking what Brad was doing. I know that boy’s working hard on Tim’s case. What I wanted to know is what you’ve found out. Don’t tell me you haven’t been investigating. Not after I practically handed you the solution.”

  “Handed me?” I put my hands on my hips, my arms akimbo. “All you did was tell me to keep an eye on the police blotter.”

  “Which leads you to the security firms that patrol Oiltop’s best hotels and motels.” Grandma pushed the teacup away and folded her hands on the top of the table. “That should have led you to the fact that only one company runs security in Oiltop.”

  “So you knew about Blackmore Security?” I narrowed my eyes
and pursed my mouth.

  “Of course I knew. Everyone in town knew.” Grandma waved her hand as if it was a simple fact and I was missing the bigger point. “What else do you know about Blackmore?”

  “That his became the only security company by outbidding everyone else.”

  Grandma tilted her head and nodded. “And . . .”

  “And he only uses part-time subcontractors so they work on ten-ninety-nines and he doesn’t have to pay them full-time wages or cover their taxes and insurance. It was the only way to undercut the competition.”

  “Good, good, you’re on the right track.” Grandma slapped the table and grinned.

  I jumped back when her hand hit the table, the sound and motion startling me.

  “Then what’d you find out?” she pressed.

  I swallowed. “Then I learned that each employee has a code that the hotels use to clock their coming and going for the night. Blackmore coded all his workers so that no one would have a set routine. He keeps them all on their toes by using a computer random generator to determine who goes where every night.”

  “Huh.” Grandma sat back. “He has to use a random number generator? That’s ridiculous. What a waste of a good generator. Why, I could set up a fairly random pattern in excel for a tenth the price.” Grandma rubbed her bristly chin. “So did you ask why he wants to use only random schedules?”

  “No.” I pouted. “I figured he didn’t want his guys to be predictable, that way they couldn’t be eluded by criminals.”

  “Maybe he does it for more nefarious reasons.”

  “And what would those be?” Meghan put the mop away and stood with a wide stance, her arms crossed in front of her vintage, cherry-patterned, 1950s dress.

  “Maybe he was doing something illegal and didn’t want anyone to know,” I filled in. “Is that right?”

  “Bingo.” Grandma tapped her index finger on the end of her nose.

  “That’s silly. Marcus Blackmore is a churchgoing man. I see him every Sunday right there in the front row with his wife and three kids,” Meghan said.

  “Some of the best criminals are churchgoers,” Grandma said.

  “You think it’s Blackmore who’s framing Tim? How would he even know who Tim was?” I asked and leaned in over my coffee cup. I pushed the tea back toward Grandma.

  “That’s the part I’ve been waiting for you to ask.” Grandma’s blue eyes glinted with secrets. “How does anyone know anyone in Oiltop?”

  “It’s a small town,” I replied. “Everyone you meet is somehow related to anyone else you might run into or accidentally cut off at a corner,” I said.

  “So Blackmore must have a thing against Tim,” Grandma said and pushed the tea away. She got up and grabbed a mug and poured herself some coffee.

  “Caffeine isn’t that good for you,” I said as I watched her add her packets of sweetener and creamer.

  “The latest studies beg to differ with you,” Grandma said and maneuvered her way back to the table, managing to snag two more cookies.

  “Don’t you think it’s rather random to assume that Mr. Blackmore is framing Tim?” Meghan asked. She had her right hand on her hip and the left hand held a wooden stirring spoon. She’d started to make brownies but had turned around when Grandma’s story got interesting. “There has to be some real hatred there to do this to someone. Tim seems like a nice guy. Who would hate him that much?”

  “Tim is a nice guy,” I said. “Whoever is doing this is crazy. That’s something we haven’t looked into. . . .”

  “What?” Grandma asked.

  “Whoever is doing this has to be a psychopath or something similar. That means they don’t have to have a reason to frame Tim. Maybe Tim is simply convenient.”

  “That’s a scary idea,” Meghan said. “To think that you might be going about living your life and some psycho decides to frame you and bam! You’re in jail for the rest of your life.”

  “Tim is not going to be in jail for the rest of his life,” I said, trying not to panic over the thought.

  “What about Harold?” Grandma Ruth asked. “What has Harold been doing? Has anyone looked into a motive to murder him?”

  “They say that Tim murdered Harold over a falling-out after a drug deal went bad,” Meghan said.

  Grandma and I looked at her.

  She shrugged. “I heard it from one of the girls at school.”

  “Well, they’re wrong,” I said as I poured dry ingredients for pie dough into a mixing bowl then added cut-up cubes of butter. “I talked to Tim about Harold. He said they had a fight about a year ago and haven’t spoken since.”

  “What was the fight about?” Grandma asked.

  “Tim said it was something stupid. Harold wanted Tim to invest in this scheme he said was a sure bet. Tim said no way and Harold never forgave him.”

  “Well, I’ve done some checking up on Harold,” Grandma said. “That boy has had a falling-out with more than Tim. He and Lance Webb started an investment business in Wichita last year. They talked some pretty wealthy people into investing and the business went bust. It seems Harold blamed Lance and Lance blamed Harold. Needless to say, the investors demanded their money back. When they didn’t have it, there was talk about fraud charges. But for some reason they got dropped. It’s why Harold was back in town.”

  “So that must be why Lance is working part-time for Blackmore,” I said. “I wonder if that was the scheme that Tim didn’t buy into?”

  “Rumor has it the initial investments were bold but made a lot of money,” Grandma said. “But like any gamble, things went south fast when they put all their money into a sure thing that turned out to be nothing more than sand dunes in Mexico. All my sources can tell me is that the business went bust and both men have been scraping by ever since.”

  “That’s sad for Harold and Lance,” I said as I slowly added cold water to the mixture. “But I don’t see what any of that has to do with Tim.”

  “You’re right. We need something definitive.” Grandma scowled and crossed her arms over her ample chest.

  I let the dough mix. The thing about gluten-free dough is, unlike regular flour, you couldn’t overknead it. “Whoever murdered Harold could have been an investor.”

  “Or even Lance Webb,” Meghan suggested as she poured the brownie batter into a pan and put it into the oven.

  “I’m sure the police must have thought of this and already looked into it.” I turned off the mixer. The dough was a nice rounded ball. I plopped it onto a cold marble slab and let it rest. “I mean, even knowing this, they must think Tim had the best motive and means or they would have charged someone else.”

  “There has to be more to the story,” Meghan said and stood with her hands on her hips.

  “I agree,” I said. “I find it odd that whoever it is seems to be one step ahead of us. I mean, they planted that cocaine in the garage, so they had to know a warrant was in the works.”

  “That brings us back to Marcus Blackmore,” Grandma said.

  “I don’t follow your line of thinking,” I said and drew my brows together. “How could Marcus know about the warrant and get to the house before the police could serve it?”

  “Easy,” Grandma said. “There are a lot of off-duty cops working for him. He could have a snitch inside the courtroom.”

  “But I never saw him around the house,” I pointed out. “In fact, I’d never met him until I went to the Chamber coffee yesterday.”

  “He could have sent one of his henchmen to do it,” Meghan said, her eyes sparkling. “Someone who lives in your neighborhood so you wouldn’t think twice about seeing them walk by your house.”

  “I still don’t understand why Marcus would kill Harold and frame Tim,” I said with a shake of my head.

  “Maybe Marcus is the one running the drug deals and Harold found out about it,” Grandma sa
id. “As you said, it would be easy for Marcus to do with his guys patrolling the hotels.”

  “Why frame Tim?”

  “Maybe Harold was working for Marcus all along,” Meghan said. “Grandma said he needed money. Maybe it was Harold using Tim’s name to sign into those rooms and sell drugs. After all, Harold was pissed at Tim. He might have blamed Tim for not helping him when his business went south.”

  “Well, now, that is the first thing that makes sense. Harold would use Tim’s name just to get back at my brother.”

  “Marcus would have to know,” Grandma said. “Say Harold tried to pull a fast one on Marcus. Marcus killed Harold and then pinned it on Tim because he was the only other person to know that Tim’s name was on all those hotel registrations.”

  “How can we prove any of this?” I asked.

  “You can talk to Lance Webb,” Grandma said. “It’s odd that he and Harold ended up working for Blackmore. Maybe Blackmore was an investor who demanded his pound of flesh when things went south.”

  “That’s something we could check,” I said, suddenly relieved to have something concrete to look in to. “I’ll do some research on Harold’s business. If they went bankrupt, then all their financials are public record.”

  “Cool,” Meghan said. “You should go do some sleuthing online.”

  “Well, my work here is done,” Grandma said and slurped up the last of her coffee before standing.

  “Oh, no, you’re not getting off that easy,” I said. “Your job is to see if you can find out who knew the judge was going to sign the warrant for the search of our house. I’m sure the senior network knows what’s going on with judges. They tend to be older, right?”

  “Right.” Grandma nodded

  “What about me?” Meghan asked.

  “You’re helping me keep up on my bakery orders,” I said and waved my hands toward the work on the table. “I really can’t investigate and bake at the same time.”

  “You know you can get your cousins to help,” Grandma said. “Lucy and her girls are great cooks.”

  “Lucy has her hands full with the diner,” I countered. “I feel guilty asking for help.”