A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery Box Set

by Kate Bell

  I nodded, but pain shot through my head. “The little orange toy that was in Iris’s hands. In the show, he’s full of doubts. But one of the other characters, Jackie, always encouraged him. She kept saying, ‘you can do it’. I had a dream and Iris kept saying, ‘you can do it’,” I said and swallowed. My mouth was dry and my lips were chapped.

  “Here,” he said and brought a straw to my lips for me to take a sip. The water was room temperature, but it felt like heaven in my hot, dry mouth. I swallowed.

  “He said Iris was the only person that believed in him and encouraged him. Remember? When we ran into him at Kohl’s. He said it again today at the school.”

  Alec sighed. “Too bad he killed the only person that believed in him.”

  “Yeah. That’s pretty sad.”

  “But, at least we got a confession,” he said.

  “Do you think it’s true? That he didn’t mean to do it?” I asked him.

  “It could be. But he better get a good lawyer. I don’t think a jury’s going to be willing to believe it was an accident when he tried to do it a second time with you,” he said. He leaned over and kissed my forehead.

  I teared up. “That was so close,” I said.

  “I know, baby. It’s okay. Everything’s okay,” he murmured.

  I was beginning to think being an assistant PI might be bad for my health. I enjoyed spending time with Alec. Except for the near death experiences I was having, anyway. I was going to have to think about this assistant PI thing carefully.

  Author’s Notes

  I love the way Allie and Alec’s relationship is progressing. They’re a match made in heaven. Alec and Allie are embarking on a new adventure in this book and it will be fun to see how it progresses.

  I always wanted to live where it snowed when I was younger and now I get to live that through Allie’s story. I remember reading Laura Ingall’s books when I was eight and reading about them making snow cream and I always wanted to try to make it. I’ve never gotten the chance to do that, but maybe someday.

  https://www.facebook.com/Kathleen-Suzette-Kate-Bell-authors-759206390932120/

  Snow Cream

  4 quarts clean snow or shaved ice

  1 cup white sugar

  2 cups half and half

  4 teaspoons vanilla extract

  pinch of salt

  Heat half and half almost to the point of simmering. Remove from heat. Stir salt and sugar into half and half until sugar is dissolved. Refrigerate half and half until cold. Stir vanilla extract into half and half and pour over snow or shaved ice. Stir gently to combine. Do not over mix to keep from breaking down the snow or shaved ice. Serve with chocolate sauce or sprinkles.

  Blueberry Sour Cream Pie

  1 9” deep dish piecrust, unbaked

  3 cups fresh or frozen blueberries

  3/4 cup white sugar

  1/3 cup all purpose flour

  1/8 teaspoon salt

  2 eggs, beaten

  1/2 cup sour cream

  2 teaspoons vanilla extract

  For the streusel topping

  1/2 cup brown sugar

  1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

  1/2 cup all purpose flour

  1/4 cup butter, softened

  Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Rinse blueberries and pat dry. Place in unbaked pie crust and set aside.

  Combine 3/4 Cup sugar, 1/3 cup flour and salt. Beat eggs with sour cream, and then mix in sugar/flour mixture. Pour over blueberries in pie crust.

  In another bowl, combine brown sugar, cinnamon, and 1/2 cup flour. Cut in butter with a pastry blender of using a fork until mixture resembles coarse meal. Sprinkle over blueberries and sour cream mixture in the pie shell.

  Bake on center rack of oven 50-55 minutes, until top is lightly browned.

  Remove from oven and allow to cool.

  Chocolate Orange Cheesecake

  Crust:

  9 ounces chocolate wafer cookies, crushed (chocolate sandwich cookies can be substituted)

  6 tablespoons butter, melted

  Filling:

  4, 8 ounce packages cream cheese, softened

  1 1/3 cups granulated sugar

  2 tablespoons orange flavored liqueur, or orange juice concentrate

  2 teaspoons orange zest

  1 teaspoon vanilla

  4 eggs, beaten

  dash salt

  Topping

  6 ounces semi-sweet chocolate, coarsely chopped

  6 ounces heavy cream

  1 tablespoon butter

  Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

  In a medium sized bowl, mix crushed chocolate wafers and melted butter. Press into the bottom of a 9” spring form pan, bringing the mixture 2” up the sides of pan. Set aside.

  In a large mixing bowl, mix softened cream cheese with sugar until combined. Add in orange liqueur, orange zest, salt, and vanilla. Mix until well combined. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Pour filling into crust.

  Bake 55-65 minutes or until filling is almost set. Open oven door and allow to cool on oven rack, 2 ½ hours.

  Place topping ingredients into a double boiler and heat over medium low, stirring constantly. When chocolate is melted and well incorporated, remove from heat. Allow topping to cool slightly, you want it to still be pourable. Pour the topping over the cooled cheesecake and refrigerate at least four hours before serving.

  Love

  is

  Murder

  A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery

  by

  Kate Bell

  Kathleen Suzette

  Copyright © 2017 by Kate Bell. All rights reserved. This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination, or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronically or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author or publisher.

  Chapter One

  It had been two weeks since I began blogging, baking, and selling my wares at Henry’s Home Cooking Restaurant. Henry Hoffer’s widow, Cynthia Hoffer and I had an arrangement. I would bake up a storm and sell my goodies on consignment at the restaurant. No risk to her. If my cakes and pies didn’t sell, I bore the expense. If they did sell, she got a commission. To say it had been a successful venture was an overstatement. Most days I baked too much and had a lot of leftovers. A couple of times, I had under-baked and left Cynthia’s customers wanting what they couldn’t have. Neither situation was good, and I needed to come up with a better plan.

  It was February and I was working on cooking up something for Valentine’s Day. I knew Henry’s would be packed on the big day and I didn’t want to disappoint anyone by coming up short. Everyone knows chocolate and Valentine’s Day go hand in hand like peanut butter and jelly, so I was working on something rich and chocolaty.

  So far I had narrowed it down to a dark chocolate cake with raspberry filling and a strawberry chocolate truffle cheesecake. I wondered if I should come up with an alternate dessert as well. I didn’t want to leave out people with chocolate allergies.

  “What are you doing?” Alec asked, looking up from his Kindle. Alec was an avid reader and I loved that about him. My boyfriend was as smart as he was handsome.

  “Trying to figure out what to bake for Valentine’s Day,” I said, flipping through my grandmama’s stained and worn recipe cards. Most of what she had baked came from her memory, but they usually began with a basic recipe of some sort. She made changes along the way, adding a little more of this and leaving a lot of that out. I cherished these age-yellowed cards. As a child I had spent many a rainy afternoon at her house helping her to bake a warm, cozy sweet to brighten the day.

  “Chocolate,” he said, turning back to his Kindle. He was stretched out on my sofa, shoes on the floor beside him. His dark hair needed a trim. It was falling over his impossibly
blue eyes.

  “Ya think?” I asked.

  “Ayup,” he answered without looking up.

  “I wonder if I could convert her decadent chocolate cake to a decadent white chocolate cake?” I mused. “That way people would have a choice. It could come in both flavors. Raspberry filling would be good in either of them.”

  “You could make one side of the cake white and one chocolate,” he suggested.

  “Oh, that would be beautiful!” I said, picturing it in my mind. I had some large, fourteen-inch round cake pans that would work. I could set up a divider of some sort when I baked the layers, and then remove the divider and put the layers together. But then I realized that the white chocolate would be touching the dark chocolate and that might be a problem for some with allergies.

  I sighed and continued flipping through the cards. Grandmama had kept the recipe cards in an old tin recipe box that had an orange floral design on the box. I picked up a card that had a chocolate chip cookie recipe on it and smiled. I was instantly transported back to my nine year-old self on a rainy day in March. I had wanted cookies. There was a dark smudge in the corner and I was the reason for that smudge. The chocolate chips were too tasty to resist and I had been shoving handfuls of them in my mouth when Grandmama wasn’t looking. They had melted in my hand and when I picked up the card, I left a chocolate smudge in the corner. A tear sprang to my eye and I brushed it away.

  Alec’s phone rang and he reached for it on the coffee table. He glanced at it, then sat up and put his Kindle down. “Alec Blanchard,” he said, answering the phone.

  “Yes?” he murmured. “I see.”

  I continued flipping through the recipes, and every now and then, glancing over at Alec. He was mostly silent, only making a few noncommittal sounds here and there. He had whipped out his notebook and started jotting something down.

  Finally, he said goodbye and hit end on the phone.

  I looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

  “I’ve got my first case,” he said and gave me a smile.

  Alec had retired from being a police detective at the end December and had taken and passed the Maine PI test a couple of weeks ago. I was proud of him for venturing out on his own. He hadn’t gotten along well with the local police chief and he had become restless.

  “Congratulations!” I said excitedly. “So, what’s the scoop?”

  He narrowed his eyes at me. “Allie, I’m working for myself now. I have to keep people’s business confidential or word will get around and there won’t be any repeat business.”

  “Alec, consider me an employee of yours. Or practically an employee anyway. I’m going to help you with investigations. I am completely trustworthy,” I said, giving him a military salute.

  “And you have a tendency to gossip and tell your gossipy friend everything,” he pointed out.

  I gasped. “I am not gossipy! And neither is Lucy!”

  “Oh?” he asked, cocking one eyebrow at me.

  “Alec Blanchard! Lucy and I have been a big help to you on past cases. Admit it. We’ve gotten you information that you never would have gotten on your own,” I reminded him.

  He looked up at the ceiling and sighed. “I guess that’s true. You both have come up with some important information from time to time,” he admitted. “But I don’t want to break anyone’s trust. This town is too small and once I get a reputation for not keeping things confidential, there’ll be no way to gain back the public’s trust.”

  Now it was my turn to sigh. “Listen Sherlock Holmes, I completely understand. You want professionalism. I promise, I will be completely professional. Scout’s honor,” I promised, now giving him the Girl Scout salute.

  He shook his head slowly. “You are something else. Do you know who Meg Cranston is?” he asked.

  I brightened. “No, I don’t think I do. But what about her?”

  He leaned back against the back of the sofa. “She thinks her husband’s cheating. She wants me to get proof.”

  “A cheating husband? That’s it?” I asked, disappointed. I had helped Alec solve several murders over the past few months and I had rather enjoyed it. Except for the times I nearly became a murder victim myself. Hunting killers has its drawbacks.

  “Sorry, Watson,” he said with a smirk. “Being a PI will probably be pretty boring compared to being a police detective.”

  “All right. Fine. I’ll have to adjust my expectations.” I returned my attention to my recipe cards. “What are the husband’s and the probable girlfriend’s names?”

  “Spencer Cranston and Jenna Maples.”

  I thought for a minute. “Neither of those names sounds familiar. It seems like more and more people are moving to town these days though. Maybe they’re recent transplants.”

  “Could be,” Alec mused. “Oh, and by the way, I’ve rented an office. The place isn’t much to look at, and I’ll need to do some renovations. Since you’re my self-appointed assistant, I’ll expect you to do your share of the work.”

  “What?” I paused, slowly looking up from my recipe cards.

  He nodded. “Ayup,” he said laying his Maine accent on thick. “Needs new carpet and painting. I didn’t venture into the bathroom, but by the smell that was coming through the open door, I’m pretty sure it needs a good scrubbing. I’m assigning that job to you.”

  “No. I don’t think so,” I said, scrunching up my face. “I don’t do bathrooms. And where is it located?”

  “Aster Street.”

  I thought about it, trying to picture where it was. “Wait. There’s only one office building on Aster Street that I can think of. Isn’t that the same building the mayor’s office is in?”

  “The one and only. Just think of all the excitement that must go on down there. And we’ll get to be a part of it,” he said.

  I chuckled. “I bet Bob Payne will be thrilled to see us every day.”

  Bob Payne was a loan officer at the Bank of Maine by day and mayor of Sandy Harbor by night. Alec and I were not high on the mayor’s list of favorite people. It wasn’t our fault. Killers had to be caught and just because he was in denial about certain suspects didn’t mean we were going to let them go free.

  “He’ll adjust,” Alec asserted. “But I really need to get the repairs and painting done. I need an office where I can see clients. It isn’t an ideal location, being upstairs, but the rent was cheap and I didn’t have to sign a lease. It will work for now.”

  “What about if you have clients that can’t manage the stairs?” I asked.

  “I guess I’ll have to figure out another place to meet them,” he said. “I think we should start cleaning first thing in the morning.”

  “Oh, wait, I have cakes to bake,” I reminded him. The mayor’s office hadn’t been updated since 1976 and I was certain a lot of work would be involved with this little cleanup.

  “I’ll help you with your baking and you can help me with my cleaning. How does that sound?” he asked.

  I smiled at him. “That sounds like fun, Sherlock.”

  Getting to work with Alec would ease the pain of having to clean a nasty bathroom. It was a dream come true.

  Chapter Two

  Alec was true to his word and arrived at my house at 5:30 in the morning to help with my baking. I was surprised when he seemed to know his way around a kitchen. We’d been dating for five months and he had kept this talent a secret. In short order I had three lemon pound cakes, a double recipe of orange scones, and four cherry pies baked and ready to be dropped off at Henry’s.

  “You are a baking whiz,” I told him.

  He just laughed and pulled the pies out of the oven for me.

  Ever since I had decided to go into the baking business, I had had my eye on a new stove. The regular oven I owned just wasn’t big enough. I needed something else. I loved the restored vintage stoves with double ovens I had seen online and on the cooking channels, and I was seriously considering getting one. The problem was that my business couldn’t pay for a new
stove yet.

  We drove over to Henry’s and I let us in the back door. Cynthia had given me a key so I wouldn’t have to disturb anyone when I dropped the desserts off. Alec carried the four pies in individual carriers while I carried the cakes and scones. I had invested in some nice dessert carriers with carry straps and was glad I had. They made my life easier.

  As we walked through the back door, I avoided looking at the spot where I had found Henry Hoffer, dead with a knife sticking out of his chest. He had been killed one night and I still had flashbacks of seeing his body lying there. The shock of seeing a dead body for the first time never quite goes away.

  “Just keep going,” Alec said, knowing I still struggled with it.

  “Got it,” I agreed, pushing the image out of my mind.

  “Did you and Cynthia decide where to place the display case?” he asked, trying to keep my mind off of Henry.

  “Yes, it’s up front.” I led Alec to the dining room cash register. The cherrywood dessert cabinet I had bought to display my desserts in sat near the cash register so anyone who entered or left the restaurant would pass by them. I hadn’t sold many whole pies or cakes yet, but I hoped to. Most people just bought my desserts by the slice.

  I set the dessert carriers down and opened the glass door and pulled out the display stands. I had bought extras so they could be washed when I got time to and just replaced by clean ones. I put some fresh paper doilies on each one and removed the cakes from the carriers and put them on the displays. Someone from the restaurant would uncover them when they opened for business.