Apple Turnover Murder, Key Lime Pie Murder, Cherry Cheesecake Murder, Lemon Meringue Pie Murder

by Joanne Fluke

  “Parking meters?” Hannah was shocked. Parking had always been free in Lake Eden.

  “That’s right. He told Herb to find out how much it would cost to put them up on Main Street.”

  “On Main Street?”

  “Yes, but Herb thinks it’s a smokescreen.”

  “A smokescreen?” Hannah repeated, feeling more and more like an obedient mynah bird.

  “There’s a group that wants Lake Eden Liquor shut down. They say the city shouldn’t be making a profit on the sale of alcohol.”

  Hannah gave a little snort. Every few years someone organized a group to close down the municipal liquor store. “I wish people would learn that you can’t legislate morality. Closing the liquor store isn’t going to cut down on drinking.”

  “I know, but this time they’re really serious. They’re collecting signatures to get it on the next ballot. Herb’s sure that’s why Mayor Bascomb wants an estimate on those parking meters.”

  Hannah took another slug of coffee, but she still didn’t see the connection. “What do parking meters have to do with the liquor store?”

  “Herb thinks the mayor’s going to give them a choice. Close the liquor store and put parking meters on Main Street to make up for the lost revenue, or keep it open and forget about the tax increase they’ll have to pay to get the parking meters installed in the first place.”

  “That ought to work,” Hannah said with a smile. The mayor was almost as devious as her mother.

  “I think so, too. Everybody wants to park for free and nobody wants to pay more taxes. Anyway, I’m here and you don’t have to come in until you want to. You need some time to think.”

  “Think?”

  “About Mike and Norman. Mayor Bascomb asked Herb if you’d made up your mind yet.”

  “He did?” Hannah was surprised. “I didn’t know he cared one way or the other.”

  “Well, he does. He wants you to marry Norman. He says it’s your civic duty.”

  “What!”

  “That’s exactly what Herb said, but Mayor Bascomb explained it. He said that they can always hire a new detective, but finding a dentist to take over the clinic will be a lot harder.”

  “Wait a second…the mayor thinks the man I don’t marry will leave town?”

  “Yes, and he’s not the only one. Herb says Mike’s not going to stick around and feel like a loser if you end up marrying Norman. He’s too proud to eat crow in front of the whole town. And Norman’s not going to stay here and watch you live happily ever after with Mike. He really loves you and it would be too painful for him. Not only that, if Norman leaves, Carrie will probably go with him, because he’ll be all depressed and she’ll think he needs her. And then your mother will end up losing a partner.”

  “Oh, boy!” Hannah groaned under her breath. This was a whole new set of problems to consider. She’d been thinking about how her choice would affect her own happiness, but now it seemed it could have ramifications on the whole town of Lake Eden!

  “Anyway, take your time about coming in. I’ll see you when you get here.”

  Hannah said goodbye and turned to look at Moishe. “I wish I’d known sooner. Turns out we could have slept in.”

  “Rrrow!” Moishe replied, and Hannah thought he looked disappointed. Sleeping in while nestled at the foot of the bed, half buried in the fluffy comforter, was one of Moishe’s favorite activities.

  “Oh, well. I guess I might as well carry out the garbage and…”

  Before Hannah could finish telling an uninterested feline her plans, the phone rang again and she snatched it up. “Hello?”

  “Hi, Hannah. It’s Barbara Donnelly. I know it’s early, but I wanted to catch you before you left for work.”

  “Hi, Barbara.” Hannah grabbed the steno notebook she kept on the kitchen table. Barbara was the head secretary at the sheriff’s station and she always ordered cookies for the staff meetings she held on Monday afternoons. “Do you want cookies for this afternoon?”

  “Yes. Give me three dozen Black and Whites. I’ll send one of the girls in to pick them up. On second thought, better make it four dozen. They’re our favorites. But that’s not the reason I called. I need a favor.”

  “What’s that?” Hannah asked, wise enough not to agree before she heard what Barbara wanted.

  “I’m begging you to put an end to this whole thing today.”

  Hannah was 95 percent certain she knew what Barbara meant, but she went for the remaining 5 percent. “What whole thing is that?”

  “The whole thing with Mike. He’s driving us all nuts. I had to assign three different secretaries to him in the past week.”

  “Why so many?”

  “Because after a day with him, they come to my office and ask for reassignment. It’s just too stressful working for a boss that’s walking around whistling one minute and chewing his fingernails the next. Of course I hope you choose Mike, but that’s up to you. I just want you to make a decision today and put my secretaries out of their misery.”

  “I’ll try,” Hannah promised and signed off. She’d no sooner hung up the phone than it rang again. “Okay, okay,” she plucked the receiver from its cradle. “Hello?”

  “It’s Doc Bennett, Hannah.”

  In one fluid motion, Hannah stretched out the phone cord, poured herself another mug of coffee, and sat back down in her chair. “What’s up, Doc?”

  “Wery funny,” Doc Bennett responded in his Elmer Fudd voice, the same voice that had taken the fear out of going to the dentist for so many Lake Eden children. “Seriously, Hannah, what’s up is Norman.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “That poor boy isn’t getting any sleep and he called to ask me to fill in for him again today. It’s a real pity, Hannah. I don’t know how much more of this Norman can take. So far, he hasn’t made any dental mistakes that I know of, but it’s only a matter of time before he fills the wrong tooth, or something even worse. What’s taking you so long, anyway? If you love Norman as much as I think you do, you should accept his proposal today and let him get some sleep!”

  Hannah was stymied. She didn’t know what to say. “I…I’m…”

  “I know it’s an important decision, but you’ve taken long enough. Will you try to decide today?”

  “I’ll try,” Hannah agreed, doubting that she’d be successful.

  “Good. I’ve got to go. Mrs. Wahlstrom is coming in early for a cleaning and I haven’t even had breakfast yet.”

  Doc Bennett hung up abruptly and Hannah was left holding a dead line. As she hung up on her end, she uttered a phrase she’d never use within Tracey or Bethany’s hearing, even though Bethany was too young to understand it and Tracey had probably heard it before, and then she turned to Moishe. “They’re ganging up on me. What am I going to do?”

  Moishe gave her a wide-eyed look that Hannah interpreted to mean he didn’t have the foggiest idea. She reached down to pet him, but before her hand connected with his orange-and-white fur, the phone rang again.

  “Uh-oh,” Hannah breathed as Moishe’s ears flattened against his head and he started to bristle. Her kitty caller I.D. wasn’t infallible, but nine times out of ten that bristle meant her mother was on the phone. When Moishe’s tail started to switch back and forth like a metronome, Hannah reached for the phone. Her mother was nothing if not persistent. If she didn’t reach Hannah at home, she’d wait and call her down at The Cookie Jar. “Hello, Mother.”

  “You really shouldn’t answer the phone that way,” Delores gave her standard greeting.

  “I know, but you’d be disappointed if I didn’t.”

  “Perhaps,” Delores conceded. “I need to talk to you about something important, Hannah. And I want you to know that normally I’d never interfere…”

  But, Hannah provided the next word. She knew it was coming, although she chose not to say it aloud.

  “But Carrie just called me and we have a situation on our hands. Do you know that Norman’s down at Hal & Rose’s
Cafe right now, slogging down coffee as fast as Rose can pour it?”

  “No,” Hannah answered truthfully.

  “Well, he is. Rose called Carrie to tell her. She said she tried to get Norman to go easy on the coffee, but he said this could be the most important day of his life and he wasn’t about to sleep through it.”

  Hannah groaned. “Norman thinks I’m going to give him an answer today?”

  “It’s not just today. Carrie says he’s been like this every day since he proposed. And to make matters even worse, Mike’s down there too. He’s sitting right across from Norman in the back booth, matching him cup for cup.”

  “At least it’s not beer for beer,” Hannah commented, grinning slightly.

  “Shame on you, Hannah Louise! That’s not one bit funny and you know it. I’ve done my very best to keep mum, but this time you’ve gone too far. I didn’t raise you to be cruel!”

  “Cruel?” Hannah was shocked.

  “What else would you call it? I’m serious, Hannah. Enough is enough and it’s time for you to stop dithering. You should choose which man you want to marry, tell him so, and let the other down gently. That’s what a lady would do under the same circumstances. Drawing it out the way you’ve done is unkind to everyone concerned.”

  Hannah was silent for a long moment, considering what her mother had said. Delores did have a point. “You’re right, Mother.”

  There was a crash as Delores dropped the phone. And then a scrabbling noise as she picked it up again. “I’m sorry. Did you say I was right?”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “Well…” Hannah’s mother sounded slightly breathless and extremely shocked. “Does that mean that you agree to settle this once and for all?”

  “Yes, I’ll settle it.”

  “And you’ll do it today?”

  “I’ll do it right now. Talk to you later, Mother.”

  Hannah hung up the phone to cut off any further questions, filled Moishe’s food bowl one last time, grabbed her coat and car keys, ignored the phone that was frantically ringing again, and headed out the door to keep her date with destiny at Hal & Rose’s Cafe.

  Chapter

  Two

  Twenty minutes later, Hannah skidded around the corner of Third and Main in the candy-apple red vehicle the Lake Eden kids called the “cookie truck,” and nosed up to the snowbank that Hal had left when he shoveled the sidewalk in front of the café. The plate glass window was steamed up and she couldn’t see inside, but Mike’s Hummer was parked on one side of her and Norman’s sedan was on the other. Since there was a layer of ice on both windshields, Hannah surmised that they must have arrived the moment Rose unlocked the door for the DelRay employees who stopped for breakfast before their early morning shift.

  Hannah got out of her truck and headed for the door. She pulled it open with a clean jerk and marched right in. The first thing she saw was a blackboard hanging on the back wall by the curtained poker room. It said, NORMAN vs. MIKE—BETS CLOSE AT NOON TODAY.

  Hannah hadn’t thought she could get any angrier, but she’d been wrong. One glance at that blackboard made her blood boil. She gave a most unladylike snort as she spotted Norman and Mike sitting in the back booth and she imagined she could hear the strains of theme music from Jaws as she headed across the floor.

  Mike nudged Norman as he spotted her. Norman looked up and began to frown. Hannah figured that was because of her thundercloud expression. It was too early in the morning to assume a poker face and she didn’t care if the whole town of Lake Eden knew that she was steaming mad. She didn’t appreciate receiving five phone calls before six in the morning from people who were dead set on giving her unwanted advice. This was her life, these were her proposals, and she was the one who’d have to live with her decision. There was no way she enjoyed being the subject of a very public betting pool at Hal & Rose’s Cafe, and it was long past time to put an end to the speculation.

  Hannah strode forward with purpose, her rubber-soled boots thudding against the floor. She was unaware that the other patrons in Hal & Rose’s had swiveled around on their stools to watch what they assumed would be a spectacle. She didn’t hear the whispered comments or see the money that quickly changed hands. She was concentrating on the two men in the booth and what she was going to tell them.

  “What’s wrong, Hannah?” Norman asked as she arrived at their booth and stood there in front of it, her hands on her hips.

  “Everything,” Hannah said, deciding not to mince words. “Why did you have to ask me to marry you anyway?”

  “Because I love you,” Norman was the first to respond.

  “And I love you, too,” Mike said.

  “Well, that’s just great, because I love you.”

  “Who?” Norman asked.

  “Yes, who?” Mike added.

  “Both of you. But that’s not the biggest problem. I’m sick and tired of people telling me that I have to choose between you! And I really resent the fact that everyone in this whole town is urging me to make a decision right now!”

  Mike held up his hand. “But, Hannah…”

  “Quiet!” Hannah interrupted. “Just this morning, I got calls from Bill, Lisa, Barbara Donnelly, Doc Bennett, and Mother. I even got an ultimatum from Mayor Bascomb! They all want me to make my decision right now, but they’ve got it all wrong. I should be the one to decide when to decide!”

  “Huh?” Norman asked, looking confused.

  Mike wore the identical expression. “What was that, Hannah?”

  “Never mind. I know what I mean and that’s good enough for me. Do you still want to marry me?”

  If it had been raining, both men would have drowned as they looked up at her with their mouths open in surprise. Mike was the first to recover. “I do.”

  “So do I!” Norman added.

  “Good.” Hannah gave them both a tight smile. “That means I’m going to turn both of you down. You’re off the hook. You can stop moping around and waiting for the other shoe to drop. There’s no way I’m going to bow to peer pressure and choose between you.”

  “Hold on,” Norman said, looking dismayed. “Does that mean you’re not going to marry either one of us?”

  “That’s what I just said.”

  “But…is there someone else?” Mike asked.

  “No, there’s no one.”

  “Then why…”

  Norman started to frame a question, but Hannah interrupted. “It’s a matter of principle. Who decided that the man had to be the one to propose, anyway?”

  Both men shrugged and Norman finally answered, “I don’t know, but I think it’s always been that way.”

  “Well, I don’t like it and I’m changing the rules. I’m taking back my own life and following my own timetable. Nobody’s going to push me into anything I don’t want to do. I’ll decide when I want to get married. And when I do, I’ll ask the man of my choice if he wants to marry me. Is that clear?”

  Mike and Norman exchanged glances. Then they both turned to her and nodded.

  “Perfect. Now can we all stop acting like characters that escaped from a soap opera and get back to a seminormal life?”

  “Yeah,” Mike agreed, smiling for the first time since Hannah had come in the door.

  “You bet!” Norman said, but he didn’t smile. “I don’t want to open a can of worms here, but will you still go out with me, Hannah?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “And me?” Mike asked.

  “You, too. Let’s just forget about marriage and go back to the way we were.”

  “You’re on,” Mike said.

  “Deal,” Norman concurred, smiling at last.

  “I’m really glad we got that settled.” Hannah was smiling as she turned to Norman. “Would you please go get me a chair? If I’m not sitting next to either one of you, the customers that are staring at us from the counter can’t speculate on what that might mean.”

  “Sure thing,” Norman said, and slid out of the booth.r />
  “And would you go tell Rose I’m as hungry as a bear and I want two eggs over easy, bacon extra crispy, and toast?” Hannah asked Mike.

  “Of course.”

  Mike slid out of the booth, but Hannah grabbed his hand as he was about to walk away. “Just a second,” she said. “Do you think you can pretend you’re on duty for a minute?”

  “I guess. Why?”

  “I’d appreciate it if you’d remind those guys at the counter that gambling’s illegal in Minnesota. And then you can tell Hal that I’m not going to marry either one of you and that he should donate to charity every cent of the money he’s holding.”

  When Hannah came in the back door at The Cookie Jar, Lisa gave her a thumbs-up. “You were absolutely right to turn both of them down.”

  “Thanks, but how did you hear about it so soon?”

  Lisa pointed to the wall next to the sink and Hannah turned to look. The cord from the wall phone was stretched out to its limit and the phone attached to the end of the cord was out of sight, shut tightly in the drawer that held the dishtowels. “Too many calls?”

  “You said it!” Hannah’s petite partner gave a little laugh. “Everybody in town who doesn’t know wants to pump me for information. And everybody who does know wants to be the first to tell me about it. I couldn’t get the baking done and answer the phone at the same time, so I took it off the hook.”

  “And you hid it in the drawer so you wouldn’t see it on the counter and feel guilty?”

  “You know me too well.”

  “Well, I’m here now. I’ll take care of the calls.” Hannah opened the drawer, retrieved the phone, and hung it back on the hook. There was a moment of breathless anticipation and then it began to ring.

  “Your turn,” Lisa declared, slipping into her coat and heading for the door. “I’m running over to the school with the cookies for the faculty meeting.”

  “Put on your gloves. It’s cold out there,” Hannah called after her. Then she reached for the phone, hoping the person on the other end of the line was someone comfortable, someone friendly, someone from out of state. “The Cookie Jar. Hannah speaking.”