Candy Cane Murder

by Joanne Fluke

  “Hold on and I’ll get a plate of cookies,” she said, setting the coffee down on the work island and never quite meeting his eyes.

  It didn’t take long to fill a plate with cookies and put them down in front of Mike. Hannah waited until he’d eaten two and washed them down with a whole mug of coffee. Then she got up to pour them more. “So how did you like them?” she asked, sitting down across from him once more.

  “Great! Cover them with a napkin or something, will you, Hannah? Otherwise I’m going to eat them all.”

  “You’re going back out to the sheriff’s department, aren’t you?”

  “Right after I leave here.”

  “Mother picked up something for Bill and she doesn’t want him to hang it in his closet at home. She’s afraid Tracey will see it and stop believing in Santa Claus.”

  “I take it it’s a Santa costume?”

  “Bingo. She bought it this morning at Bergstrom’s.”

  “No problem. I’ll take it out there and hang it in Bill’s closet.”

  Hannah waited, but Mike didn’t say anything else. The man was a genius when it came to holding his tongue. They sat there in silence for the space of a half-cup of coffee and then Hannah caved in.

  “How’s the investigation going?” she asked.

  “It’s going. How about you?”

  “What do you mean?” Hannah assumed the most innocent expression she could muster.

  “I know you’re asking questions. And I know people talk to you. Do you have anything I should know about?”

  Hannah took a brief second to consider what she should give Mike so that he could give her something in return. “One thing,” she said.

  “What’s that?”

  “I know the name of Wayne’s lawyer if you want to ask about his will.”

  “That was next on my list, but you can save me some time. Who is it?”

  “Larry Helms. He’s with Helms, Jackson, and Connors out at the mall.”

  Mike reached in his pocket for his notebook and pen, and wrote it down. “Thanks, Hannah.”

  “You’re welcome. Did you happen to examine the Santa suit that Wayne was wearing?”

  “Not personally. The crime lab has it. What did you want to know about it?”

  “I was just wondering if there were any candy canes left in Wayne’s pocket.”

  “Why do you want to know that?”

  “Just curious. Wayne was such a tightwad about those candy canes. I asked him if I could have the ones that were left, and he told me he needed them for the next time he played Santa, and he told me to pour them in his pocket. I guess they all fell out the hole.”

  “What hole?”

  “The one in Wayne’s pocket. There must have been a hole. And the candy canes dropped out of the hole and onto the path. That’s how we found him. We followed the trail of candy canes.”

  “Right. Do you want me to find out about the hole and the candy canes?”

  “Sure, if you’ve got a spare minute. But I’m just satisfying my curiosity. I figured Wayne was being cheap when he said he needed to use the rest of the candy canes.”

  “I’ve heard that before!”

  “Heard what?” Hannah asked, wondering how many other people had asked about Wayne’s candy canes.

  “What a cheapskate Wayne was. Even his ex-wife implied that. She thought it might relate to his murder. But I came away with the impression she still had a lot of affection for him.”

  “You talked to Jenny?”

  Mike flipped open his notebook. “Jennifer Perkins Bergstrom. That’s right.”

  “What did you think of her?”

  “I told you already. She’s the only one I’ve talked to so far who seemed really sorry her ex-husband was dead.”

  “I hope she’s okay. I have to go out to the inn to see her tonight.”

  “To ask her questions?”

  “No, to deliver cookies. Mother wants me to take a dozen of something chocolate to Jenny. She thought it might help.”

  “Good idea. It doesn’t happen often, especially when I’m working a murder investigation, but I couldn’t help feeling sorry for her. She was the grieving widow. The current wife didn’t seem all that upset.”

  “I agree,” Hannah said, before she could think better of it.

  “You saw Melinda Bergstrom today?”

  “Actually…I brought her some cookies. Chocolate.”

  “Your mother’s idea again?”

  “No, it was Cory’s. Norman and I drove out to the mall to get a Christmas gift for his mother. We ran into Cory and he mentioned that Melinda had been crying all night. I had some cookies with me, and we took her some.”

  “Hmm.” Mike gave her a long, level glance. “What did you think of Melinda?”

  To give, or not to give. That was the question. Hannah decided that it couldn’t hurt to have the law on her side. “Melinda didn’t seem to be mourning Wayne’s death very much, but you already know that. I found it particularly interesting that she didn’t share the master suite with her husband. Her bedroom’s down the hall right next to her brother’s.”

  “She told you that?”

  “No. I just…” Hannah searched for a phrase to explain that she’d fibbed and snooped, but she couldn’t come up with one that was socially acceptable. “I just found out, that’s all.”

  Mike gave her another long, level glance, and Hannah was sure it was the same glance he used in the interrogation room. “What else did you just find out?” he asked.

  “Well…nothing really. Except that she knows a lot about plants. Her maid is named Emily, if that helps.”

  “Right.” Mike stood up to go. “Let me know if you hear anything you think I should know. And remember to leave the investigating…”

  “…up to the professionals,” Hannah finished the sentence in tandem with him. “Hold on a second and I’ll wrap up these cookies. You can take them out to the station with you.”

  LINDA’S PECAN SHORTBREAD COOKIES

  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F., rack in the middle position.

  1 cup white (granulated) sugar

  1 cup brown sugar***

  1 cup (2 sticks, ½ pound) salted butter

  1 cup vegetable oil (Canola is NOT a vegetable—the oil’s from a weed!)

  1 beaten egg

  2 teaspoons vanilla

  1 teaspoon baking soda

  1 teaspoon salt

  1 teaspoon cream of tartar (critical!)

  1 cup uncooked oatmeal (I used Quaker’s Quick)

  1 cup Rice Krispies

  4 cups flour

  2 cups chopped pecans (measure after chopping)

  Put one cup of white sugar and one cup of brown sugar in the bowl of your mixer. Zoop them up together to make really light brown sugar.

  You have two choices with the butter. You can let it come up to room temperature on its own, or you can soften it in the microwave. If you’re in a hurry and you don’t want to wait for nature to take its course, do this:

  Unwrap a stick of refrigerated butter. Put it on a paper plate. Nuke it for 5 seconds on HIGH in your microwave. Roll it forward so the topside is now on the side. Nuke it for another 5 seconds on HIGH. Roll it forward again and nuke it for another 5 seconds on HIGH. Repeat rolling forward again and nuking for 5 seconds once again. You’re done. Take the plate out of the microwave and dump the butter into your mixing bowl.

  Repeat the whole thing for the second stick of butter.

  Once you’ve added the butter to your mixing bowl, mix it until it’s smooth.

  Pour in one cup of vegetable oil and add one egg. Mix it all up together at slow speed.

  Add the vanilla, baking soda, salt, and cream of tartar. Mix it all up together.

  Add the cup of oatmeal and the Rice Krispies. Mix thoroughly.

  Add 4 cups of flour to your bowl in half-cup increments, mixing after each addition.

  Take the bowl from the mixer, give it another stir with a spoon, and mix in
2 cups of chopped pecans by hand.

  With your hands, roll dough balls approximately 1-inch in diameter and place them on the cookie sheet, 12 to a standard-sized sheet.

  Bake at 350 degrees F. for 12 to 15 minutes or until golden brown around the edges. (Mine took exactly 12 minutes.)

  Let cool on the cookie sheet for 2 minutes and then transfer to a wire rack to complete cooling.

  Yield: 9 to 11 dozen yummy shortbread-type cookies

  Chapter Ten

  Hannah removed another leftover quiche from Andrea’s seldom-used oven and set it out to cool on a rack. Their dinner plans had gone awry. Michelle had begged off. She was having dinner with Delores and Carrie, and then the three of them were going to call everybody who’d been at Sally’s Christmas party. Even though the deputies had already interviewed everyone who’d been there, Delores had decided it was worth a try. They’d already divided the guest list into three parts. There were the people Carrie knew best, the people Delores knew best, and the younger crowd that Michelle knew best. When Hannah had talked to her sister earlier, Michelle had been certain that the three of them could get more candid information from a friendly phone call than the sheriff’s deputies had gotten at the party last night.

  Another few minutes and the quiche would be cool enough to cut and then it would be time for the second shift to eat. She’d fed Tracey and Grandma McCann while Andrea had spoon-fed baby Bethany, who had recently graduated from purees to small chunks. Then the kids and “Grandma” had gone off to the den to watch a new Christmas movie with animated penguins who’d lost their Christmas presents and had to find them before Christmas Eve. Andrea had gone upstairs to change. They were going to go out to the inn to talk to Wayne’s ex-wife right after they’d eaten their dinner.

  “Is it cool enough to eat?” Andrea asked when she came into the kitchen again.

  “I hope so. I’m hungry.” Hannah sliced the quiche while Andrea dished up salads. They sat down across from each other, picked up their forks, and for long moments there was silence broken only by the sounds of chewing.

  “This quiche is absolutely delicious,” Andrea finally said, finishing the last of her slice and looking longingly at the three slices still left on the serving plate.

  Hannah smiled her thanks. “I’m glad you liked it. Have another piece.”

  “I’m thinking about it. It’s made with cream, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Uh-oh. And there’s butter in the crust?” Andrea waited until Hannah nodded and then she asked her next question. “How about cheese?”

  “There are a couple of kinds of cheese.”

  “A couple? Uh-oh. How much cheese?”

  Hannah thought about dissembling, but it wasn’t nice to mess with somebody else’s diet. “Quite a bit of cheese,” she admitted, “probably the equivalent of two ounces per slice.”

  Andrea gave a little whimper. “I don’t suppose you used low-fat cheese.”

  “Nope.”

  “Uh-oh. Tell me about the bacon pieces.”

  Hannah thought about that for a moment. “They’re well drained,” she said.

  “Oh good!” Andrea gave a relieved smile. “Then I guess I’ll have another piece!”

  The parking lot at the Lake Eden Inn was full, but Hannah “found” a space by parking at an angle with the rear end of her cookie truck partially elevated on the rim of hard-packed ice that had been left by the snowplow around the perimeter.

  “Okay,” she said, opening her door. “You’re wearing boots, aren’t you?”

  “Of course. They’re the ugly silver moon boots Bill gave me when I got pregnant with Tracey and he was afraid I’d slip on the ice.”

  “I thought you hated those.”

  “I do, but they keep me from slipping on the ice. And besides, nobody’s going to see me until I get inside and then I’ll change to my shoes.”

  Hannah glanced down at her old moose-hide boots. She’d left her shoes at The Cookie Jar. Unless she wanted to leave her boots in the cloakroom and pad up to see Jenny in her stocking feet, she’d better look for the pair of ballet-type pull-on slippers she usually carried in the back of her truck.

  “You do have shoes, don’t you?” Andrea asked, glancing down at Hannah’s boots.

  “I do.” Hannah did her best to exude confidence as she opened the back of her truck and rummaged around for her slippers. Luck was with her and she found them. “Here they are,” she announced, holding them up for Andrea to see.

  “Great. Let’s go then. It’s freezing out here.”

  The air was crisp, the night inky black with the moon shining blue and cold against the snow. When Hannah looked up at the night sky, the stars appeared jagged, as if they were made of shattered ice crystals. There was a beauty in the frosty night that made her wonder what it would have been like to live in an ice cave. If anyone could live in an ice cave. She really wasn’t sure.

  “Brrrr! It’s must be close to zero!” Andrea moved a little closer to Hannah. “I’m worried about the crab apple tree Bill and Tracey planted in the backyard. I hear it’s supposed to drop down to minus fifteen tonight.”

  Her sister’s comment brought Hannah back from thoughts of wooly mammoths and glaciers. “Where did you hear that?”

  “I saw the weather report on KCOW,” Andrea named the local television station.

  “Then don’t worry. They’re always wrong.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Positive. Remember last August when they said we were going to have a whole week of rain? They called it the storm of the century and said it would bring us at least six inches before it cleared up. And then it was sunny and warm every day?”

  “I remember. I stood in line to buy a new umbrella and I never used it.”

  “Hold on,” Hannah said, grabbing Andrea’s arm. “Stand right here and look over at the inn.”

  “But why should…” Andrea swallowed the rest of her own question as realization dawned. “Never mind. I get it. This is where you left the path last night. And you found Wayne’s body just a few feet from here.”

  “Exactly. That’s why I want you to look at the inn. How many windows can you see from here.”

  There was a moment of silence while Andrea peered into the night. “I can’t see the first floor at all,” she said. “The trees are too tall. But I can see the last four rooms on the second floor. And if I can see them, they can see us.”

  “Exactly. The moon was bright last night and if someone in one of those rooms happened to be looking out toward the parking lot…”

  “They could have seen Wayne’s killer!” Andrea interrupted her. “Do you want to check with Sally to see who had those rooms last night?”

  “Absolutely. Chances are, all Sally’s guests were at the party and those rooms were empty at the time Wayne was murdered. But it can’t hurt to ask.”

  The rest of the walk was accomplished in silence. Both sisters were chilled from the winter cold and didn’t feel like speaking until they were sitting on a bench in the cloakroom changing from boots to shoes.

  “Do you want to see Jenny first?” Andrea asked.

  “No. We’ll get the names from Sally and then we’ll go up to visit Jenny.”

  “Fine with me. Just let me comb my hair and fix my makeup.”

  Hannah thumped the side of her head with her hand. “Makeup. I knew I was forgetting something. If a woman cries all night and all morning, is there anything she can do with cosmetics in thirty minutes or so to make herself look as if she hasn’t been crying?”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “Not in thirty minutes or so. Cosmetics are really good, but they can’t perform miracles.”

  “So if somebody cried that long, it would show?” Andrea nodded and Hannah asked her next question. “How would it show?”

  “Well…there’s the obvious. Her eyes would be swollen and the skin on her face would be puffy. It would be blotchy too, but she might be able to cov
er that up with makeup. Are we talking about Melinda Bergstrom here?”

  “Yes. Norman and I saw her this afternoon and she looked just as beautiful as she did when she was modeling.”

  “Then she was lying if she said she’d been crying all night and most of the morning.”

  “She didn’t say it. Her brother Cory did.”

  “Then Cory was lying. There are things you can do to reduce the swelling, but they all take time. Melinda wouldn’t have looked beautiful unless…what was the lighting like?”

  “It was daylight. We met her in a solarium filled with plants and it had a glass ceiling. The sun was shining.”

  “That cinches it!”

  “What?”

  “Sunlight. Even if she used the best makeup and applied it like an artist, there’s no way she could hide it in strong sunlight.”

  “That’s what I thought, but I wanted to check to make sure.”

  Andrea slipped on a pair of forest green shoes that went perfectly with her stylish pantsuit. “It’s pretty clear Melinda didn’t love Wayne since she didn’t shed any tears for him. Do you think the maid was right and Wayne was planning to divorce her?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Maybe Wayne told her he wanted a divorce and she killed him.”

  “Impossible.”

  “Why not? It happens all the time on television. The rich older husband says he wants a divorce, the gorgeous trophy wife sees all that money flying out the window, and she kills him before he can file the papers.”

  “That makes perfect sense except for one thing.”

  “What thing is that?”

  “Melinda’s got an air-tight alibi. Pierre from Le Petit Salon was with her from seven-thirty on. I stopped there to check before Norman and I left the mall. He did Melinda’s hair at the penthouse and they were having a glass of wine in the solarium when Mike and Bill knocked on the door to notify her that Wayne was dead.”

  “Drats!”