A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery Box Set

by Kate Bell

  “That’s a lot of money for one measly piece of pie,” he said, not taking his eyes off the cherry pie.

  “Charles, you can take it or leave it. It all goes to charity, you know,” I said. I wasn’t giving him anything for free. The squealer.

  “How much for the candy apple?”

  “Five dollars.”

  His eyes just about popped out of his head.

  “What? No way! I can get one for a dollar at Shaw’s Market!” he exclaimed.

  “Yeah, and it will taste like one dollar, too!” I said. “Come on, Charles, you know anything I make will be a hundred times better than what you can get at any grocery store, and you’ll get a warm fuzzy feeling when you help those who are less fortunate.”

  He sighed. “I’ll have a piece of cherry pie,” he said and dug into his pocket.

  I cut a piece of cherry pie for him and put it on a cute little Halloween paper plate. I gave him an orange napkin and a black plastic fork to eat it with. It was a darling little place setting if you ask me.

  He pulled out four crumpled dollar bills from his pocket and laid them beside the pie.

  “Hold on,” I said when he reached for the plate. I picked up each dollar bill and un-crumpled them and straightened them out. When I had them all straight, I said, “Okay, go ahead.”

  He grunted at me, took the pie, and left. I looked over to see Lucy with a big grin on her face and I winked at her.

  Business was booming by 7:45 and I was certain we would earn a big donation for the community dinner and coats for the kids. Now and then someone would ask about the police and ambulance being here earlier, but for the most part, people were distracted by the bazaar and forgot to ask.

  Chapter Five

  I went home that night and picked up the house telephone receiver. I was pretty sure the phone had been attached to the wall since 1989. It had been top of the line in its day but was now an ugly old dinosaur. I dialed voicemail and then saved messages.

  “Allie, this is Diana.”

  “Listen, I need to talk to you. I would talk to Lucy, but I don’t want to upset her, you know how she can be. God love her, she’s high strung,” she said and chuckled. “Anyway, if you can get to the bazaar a little early, that would be great.”

  I played it again.

  What was it that she thought would upset Lucy?

  Her voice didn’t sound upset or scared. If she wanted to confess something why would she call me? Maybe she wanted to talk about something having to do with the bazaar? If so, why would she bring up Lucy?

  I played it again.

  I ran and got a pad of paper and a pen, and I played it again, writing down as much of what I could remember as I could. Then I played it again and wrote some more. It took playing it five more times before I got it all.

  I sat at the table and read it over and over. I couldn’t imagine what she wanted to talk to me about. We had had a very casual relationship, discussing the weather and shopping whenever I stopped into her flower shop to say hi to Lucy.

  I glanced at the clock. 12:47 AM. I yawned and headed to bed. There had to be something there, but for the life of me, I didn’t know what it was.

  ***

  “So, what do you think about Ellen?” Lucy asked, stirring the cup of coffee in front of her. She took a sip and made a face and added another teaspoon of sugar.

  “If it turns out she died of unnatural causes, then I think Ellen killed her. You saw how cold she was about the whole thing,” I said, topping my coffee off with cream. I inhaled the lovely aroma. I was a tiny bit of a coffee snob and always ground my own fresh beans. It made for a heady aroma and a richer flavor. We were sitting at my kitchen table, going over the events of the day before.

  “I know, right?” Lucy said, still stirring. “I mean, I get it, Diana fired her. But really, there was a death here! How can you not feel a little sorrow or at least empathy for the family? She just needs to get over being fired.”

  “I know exactly what you mean,” I agreed. Ellen was short on class.

  “Allie, did you see her?” Lucy asked hesitantly.

  Our eyes met. “Sort of. But not really. I mean, she was laying halfway under the table and she was facing away from me.”

  I suddenly felt guilty about not telling her about Diana’s phone call. But since I had no clue what Diana wanted, it wouldn’t help to tell Lucy about it. I certainly couldn’t tell her that Diana said she was high strung. That would only hurt her.

  “Do you think she suffered?” she asked, her voice cracking. “She was always so good to me. She gave me time off whenever I needed it. She never batted an eye when I was late to work.”

  “I know you were close to her,” I said, reaching my hand across the table and putting it on hers. “I don’t think she suffered. She probably had a heart attack and went really fast.” I had no idea if that was true, but I wanted to help ease Lucy’s pain. I stifled a yawn with my free hand. I had stayed up way too late the night before.

  “Well, I hope we at least made a lot of money last night,” she said, her voice cracking again. “It would have made Diana happy, and it will help a lot of people.”

  “I’m sure we did. I sold out of everything,” I said. The pies were gone so fast, I regretted not having made more.

  “I’m glad,” she said. “She was so good at organizing events.”

  I wasn’t sure how we would replace Diana. She had endless energy for community events and she was a real cheerleader for the town. Watching her work wore me out. I hoped she really did die of natural causes.

  Chapter Six

  I made a surprise lunch for Alec. We weren’t much more than acquaintances, but I wanted to find out if he had heard anything about Diana’s autopsy. I figured food was the best way to go about getting him to talk. It had only been six days since the bazaar, and I hadn’t heard anything from him. I texted him to make sure he was in his office and asked him if I could stop by. When he said yes, my stomach did a little dance. I told myself to chill out. This was strictly business. I wanted to make sure I wasn’t a suspect.

  I had packed two honey baked ham and Muenster cheese sandwiches on brioche bread, homemade potato salad, grapes and two generous slices of lemon chess pie. I also brought along chilled sparkling mineral water since I didn’t know him well enough to know what his favorite soft drink was.

  I knocked on his office door and waited. When he opened the door, he smiled real big. I hadn’t been sure if he was just being polite when he said it was okay that I stopped by, but he seemed happy to see me.

  “I brought a little something,” I said, holding up the basket I had packed our lunch in.

  “Wow, what is that?” he asked, showing me to the seat across from his desk.

  “Well, I hope it’s a tasty little lunch. Or rather, I know it’s lunch, but I hope you find it tasty,” I said, laughing nervously. I unpacked the food onto his desk, hoping I hadn’t forgotten anything.

  “Well, it certainly looks good,” he said, moving a book and a pair of gloves off the top of his desk.

  I laid out fall themed paper plates and orange plastic ware with napkins to match. “Wait until you see the sandwiches,” I said and opened up the individual plastic containers I had put them in. They were stacked thickly with ham and I had brought along all the fixin’s so he could add what he wanted. I secretly hoped he wasn’t one of those people that liked their food plain. What fun was that?

  “Oh my,” he said as I handed one to him. “Now that is a sandwich.”

  “The men in my family know how to eat. I hope you do, too,” I said and laid out the rest of the food. The men in my family could devour this whole picnic in one fell swoop. “Help yourself.”

  “Thank you so much. This is a nice surprise and I really appreciate it,” he said. “I was getting tired of fast food.”

  He began spreading mayonnaise on his bread and I opened mine. “So, have you heard anything about Diana Bowen’s death?” I asked. I thought I might as
well be direct.

  He glanced at me and then squirted Dijon mustard on his sandwich before saying anything. “Yes. We did hear something back from the medical examiner about her.”

  “And?” I asked when he didn’t continue. He had better not be coy about the details, I thought.

  He looked at me. “It seems she was poisoned.”

  “What?” I gasped. “What do you mean poisoned?”

  “They did an analysis of the contents of her stomach,” he said, laying a thick slice of tomato on his sandwich. “The only thing in there was some partially digested candy corn and part of a candy apple, and the poison. Ricin. It’s a flavorless and odorless poison. They couldn’t really tell if the poison had been in the apple or if the candy corn was coated with it, or if maybe she drank it somehow.”

  “Ricin? I think I’ve heard of it, but I’m not sure. Where would the murderer get it?”

  “Someone that’s motivated could find it,” he said, placing the top slice of brioche on his sandwich.

  I stared at him. Who on earth could have poisoned her? Then Ellen’s face flashed before my eyes. “It was Ellen Allen! I knew there was a reason she was so cold about Diana being dead!”

  “We don’t have proof of anything just yet, but I’ll certainly interview her again,” he said and took a bite of his sandwich. “Mmm, this is good.”

  “Thanks. Wait, Yancey put that candy apple in an evidence bag. Did they analyze it?”

  “Well, it seems that in all the excitement of the bazaar, the apple went missing,” he said and took another bite.

  “What? You police are supposed to be careful with evidence!” I said, looking up from my sandwich.

  He gave me a half smile. “It seems that police are human too and make mistakes. Yancey is searching for the apple.”

  “Okay, so she had a poison apple and candy corn in her stomach. That means, we’re looking for a wicked witch!” I was pretty proud of my deductive reasoning skills on that one. “It’s flavorless and odorless? I bet the killer put it in the candy apple coating. Diana never would have noticed.”

  He sighed. “Well, being that Halloween is only a few days away, I suppose it shouldn’t be too hard to find a wicked witch,” he said dryly. “The amount of ricin needed to kill a person would have to be more than what was in her stomach. It may have been administered over several days, but she would have been sick. It takes a while for it to work.”

  “It’s Ellen. I know it is.”

  “Like I said, I’ll have to work on it. Oh, and by the way, I noticed you had candy apples for sale at the bazaar.”

  “What?” I said. “No, you don’t suspect me. Right? I wouldn’t kill Diana or anyone else.”

  He chuckled. “Well, I did have a hard time explaining to Sam Bailey why you had found another body. I didn’t mention the candy apples though. Otherwise, you might be sitting on the wrong side of a set of bars right now and I wouldn’t be enjoying this delectable sandwich.”

  I gasped. “I swear to you, I had nothing to do with this. I did not poison her. I am a good person and I do not murder people. Not even people that annoy me.”

  Sam Bailey was the chief of police and I thought it might be a good idea to make him a nice lunch one day. Maybe I could persuade him to look at other suspects.

  “I know that, Allie. We’ll figure it out,” he said with a smirk. “You know, I should buy you dinner some time to repay you for this wonderful lunch.”

  I stared at him. Was he asking me out on a date? I hadn’t been on a date in years. “Sure,” was all I could manage in reply.

  Did I want to go on a date? Or was I reading too much into this?

  “Great,” he said. “We’ll have to plan something.”

  I spent the rest of our lunch trying to figure out how to prove that Ellen had committed the murder as well as whether Alec wanted to go on a real date or just repay my kindness for bringing lunch.

  ***

  Diana’s funeral was later that afternoon. Lucy and I sat in the back so we could see everyone that attended. I wondered who would show up, and whether I could mark other people down as possible suspects.

  “This is so sad,” Lucy said, dabbing at her eye with a tissue.

  “I know, honey,” I said and put my arm around her shoulders. “She’s in a better place now.” I kept looking around to see if anyone was acting suspiciously. The killer could be wracked with guilt and might show up to say their last goodbyes to Diana.

  I had told Lucy about the poisoning as soon as I left Alec’s office. I would like to have waited for another day to tell her, but I didn’t want someone else to bring it up. She was holding it together as best she could.

  “Look at her boys up there, trying to be brave,” Lucy said, nodding toward the front pew.

  The two boys sat shoulder to shoulder, bravely smiling as people stopped to pay their respects. It was heart breaking to watch. Diana’s husband sat beside them, now and then leaning over toward them, whispering encouragement. It broke my heart. I didn’t know Dick well, but I was sure he had to be struggling to find closure with Diana being murdered. He looked like he had lost weight and his hair was now blond instead of the medium brown I remembered when Diana had introduced us two summers earlier.

  “I’ve got to pay my respects,” Lucy said and got up to speak to Dick and the boys.

  I kept up my vigil, inspecting from a distance, everyone that walked through the door. If Ellen had the nerve to show up, I was going to ask her to leave. When I looked up Alec walked through the door. On second thought, I decided I would let Alec handle Ellen if she showed up. I gave him a little half-wave. He gave me a little smile in return, but then sat on the other side of the room. My heart sank a little. Maybe he was here on police business and didn’t want to put me at risk by sitting beside me. Yeah, that was probably it.

  Lucy was hugging the boys and crying. At least she was still in control. Somewhat. The boys were in their teens and looked like they were trying to hold themselves together. When Lucy came back and sat next to me, I handed her the box of tissues that was on the end of the pew.

  “If Ellen did this, I will kill her!” Lucy hissed, dabbing at her eyes again. “I cannot believe anyone would murder Diana. She was the sweetest person I knew. It’s just so unfair!” And with that, she began sobbing loudly.

  “Don’t say that. If someone hears you and she happens to end up dead, you’ll be the first suspect,” I said. The last thing we needed was the police’s attention. Threatening to kill someone was a one-way ticket to jail.

  “I know, you’re right. And I wouldn’t really do it. But I sure feel like doing it to avenge Diana’s death,” she said, and blew her nose.

  I patted her hand and kept my eyes on the people in the room. Mary Payne stopped by to speak to the boys. Mary had retired as high school principal at the end of the last school year, and Diana’s youngest boy, Seth, was a sophomore this year. Diana’s older son, Brad, had graduated the year before. It was nice of Mary to show up to support the boys. Small towns were like that. People really went out of their way to help. The funeral home sanctuary was filling up quickly, and I was glad Diana’s husband and boys were being shown so much support.

  I watched Diana’s husband, Dick Bowen. He was smiling and friendly, shaking hands or hugging people that paid their respects. He seemed strangely at ease, but then I realized he was probably in shock. The sudden death of a loved one would do that to a person. You put a smile on your face and force yourself to make small talk. You thanked people for coming and for bringing a dish to the reception and everything goes by in a blur.

  When Mary finished, she headed back in our direction. When she saw me, she smiled and walked over to me.

  “Hello Allie, it’s nice to see you, even though it’s under such difficult circumstances. It’s a shame about Diana, isn’t it?” She had a big smile on her face when she spoke and it felt a little like she was talking about something happy instead of a death.

  “It
really is,” I agreed. “It’s so sad and unexpected.”

  She nodded her head. “Those poor boys. And Diana was such a cheerleader for this community. I don’t know what we’ll do without her, although I’m sure we’ll manage just fine. Well, I’m going to take my seat,” she said and headed to the other side of the room.

  I looked at her as she left. “We’ll manage just fine?” I hoped she hadn’t said that to Diana’s family.

  There would be a reception to follow at the local Baptist church. I almost didn’t want to attend. I was too sad to eat. But I knew Lucy would want me there for support. She had lost a dear friend.

  I had baked six pies and dropped them off at the church earlier that morning. At least that had made me feel useful. Even though I had been through loss, it was hard to know what to do for people when they had lost a loved one. The truth was, there wasn’t anything that anyone could do to make someone grieving the loss of a loved one feel better.

  I peeked over at Alec and he seemed to be people watching as well. Good. He had a more experienced eye than I did. I would have to work at prying information out of him later. For Lucy’s and the boy’s sake, I was going to find out who Diana’s killer was.

  Chapter Seven

  It was Halloween morning, and Lucy and I were on a witch-hunt. I knew Ellen walked the running path most mornings because I had seen her there. I was glad I was a runner. It gave me an excuse not to stop and talk to her. She could be an unpleasant person to deal with. People around town thought it was impolite not to stop and visit when meeting up with people on the path, but I just kept running. I didn’t have time to stop and talk. I had a marathon to train for.