Granny examined the spread. “Music?”
“Yes!” I brought up a holiday station on her radio and set it to play softly. “Perfect. What else?”
“I think that’s it,” she said. Her gaze flipped to the black cat clock above her sink, its eyes and tail swinging in time. “Five-thirty-five. He should be here any minute.”
I blew out a long thin breath. She was right. The bank closed at five, and the commute was less than ten minutes. “He’s probably finishing paperwork or reviewing applications.” I doubted the bank staff stood at the time clock like diner employees, waiting to punch out. “He might even be approving my loan request.” Probably not, but a lady could hope.
Granny lit a pair of candles on her baker’s rack, adding cinnamon and vanilla scents to the already mouthwatering aromas filling her home. “There,” she said. “I think that’s it.”
I agreed. The room was perfect. Inviting. Enticing. Everything I could want for atmosphere on such an important night. Even the aged stone fireplace along the back wall had a little fire going and two orange kittens dreaming happily on the hearth. If they woke and climbed Mr. Sherman’s legs, I would die on the spot. “Maybe I should move the kittens into one of the bedrooms while he’s here.”
A sharp rap on the door canceled my thought.
“He’s here!” Granny stage-whispered loudly enough to be heard outside.
She took a long audible breath, then went to answer the door.
I shoved a bite of apple torte into my mouth to stabilize my nerves.
“Mr. Sherman,” Granny said, “Welcome. Come in. We’re so glad you were able to make the time for a second visit. How are the roads?”
“Slick,” he said, shaking rain from his hat. “It took a little longer than I expected. I didn’t mean to keep you waiting. Hello, Miss Montgomery.”
“Hello.” I swallowed hard, feeling the pressure of the moment in full force. This was it. This was my chance. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
Granny stepped closer to the overflowing kitchen table and made a face at me.
“Oh.” I rubbed sweat-slicked palms against the thighs of my pants. “Well, you’ve been at work all day, and you probably want to get home, so I won’t keep you long. We’ve set a display of samples here for you to taste test. It’s a small selection of the gourmet items I plan to sell in the cider shop.”
Granny splashed a few ounces of the first cold cider sample into a glass and passed it his way. “These are all Winnie’s recipes,” she said. “I think you’ll find it hard to choose a favorite.”
He accepted the drink with a small smile. “Thank you.”
I filled a plate with bite-sized bread and pastry samples, then passed that to him as well. “I make the ciders, Granny bakes the treats,” I said. “Everything you’ll sample tonight is proprietary.” Meaning the recipes belonged only to us. They could be used by us, sold by us, put into cookbooks by us, anything we wanted.
“Good.” He nodded as he chewed.
I wasn’t sure if the word was meant to be a comment on what I’d just told him or a compliment on the fritter he’d pushed between his lips. I didn’t care.
“Would you like to sit?” I asked, offering him a seat at the end of the table where a bit of room remained.
“No, thank you.” Instead he circled the table, working his way through the cider selections and sugary offerings. Each time his cup neared empty, Granny traded him for a new one and told him about the recipe. I did the same for his plate.
Twenty minutes later, based on Mr. Sherman’s satisfied expression and the fact our buffet had been nearly wiped out, I guessed things were going well. “Can I answer any questions for you about our products or processes?” I asked.
He looked up from his mug of hot cider as if he’d forgotten we were there. “What are the production costs for these items?”
“Production costs?” I looked at Granny.
“I have all the ingredients on hand,” she answered promptly. “They don’t cost me a thing.”
Mr. Sherman’s expression soured. Wrong answer. Everything cost something and he wanted to know the total when every spoonful of sugar and pinch of salt had been figured in.
“I can get those numbers to you,” I said, “for the breads and pastries as well as the ciders.”
He nodded. “What will you sell them for?”
I hadn’t decided.
“What will your margins be?” He asked before I could think of an answer to his first question. He wiped the corner of his mouth with a napkin and turned his full attention on me.
“Individually?” My voice cracked. I’d only considered the big picture costs like renovations and monthly/annual overhead associated with daily operation of the cider shop. I’d based my projected sales on current cider and product numbers. I hadn’t broken it all down per product. “I’ll get those figures to you first thing tomorrow.”
Obviously unimpressed, he looked at the clock.
I was losing him.
“How about a walk?” I suggested. “Some mountain air to go with the sweets.” I smiled.
He didn’t.
Granny passed me my coat, then threaded her arms into a wool number of her own. “I’ll come along so you won’t have to walk back alone.”
My heart swelled. “Thanks.”
Outside, the wind whirled fallen leaves into soggy cyclones at our feet.
I hurried along beside Mr. Sherman and Granny, struggling for the right thing to say. “I’m confident our Mail Pouch barn is the perfect location for this kind of shop,” I said. “There’s nothing more perfectly West Virginian than sipping cider on an orchard nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains, except doing it inside an iconic location like this one.”
Mr. Sherman slowed slightly. “I don’t disagree, Miss Montgomery, but it’s my job to be thorough and prudent. I know we’ve said that the cider shop is separate from the orchard, and that investing in your new business is different than investing in Mrs. Smythe’s older one, but how can that ever be one hundred percent true? Your proposed location is on her property, a location that’s receiving a lot of bad press right now.” He stopped to face me under the moon and stars, cold wind battering our hands and cheeks. “I’m not saying it’s fair. I’m just voicing facts that I believe will inevitably impact your new business. Folks are already cautious where the orchard is concerned. How can I know that the pattern won’t continue or even worsen after I’ve approved your loan? In that scenario, granting the money doesn’t help you at all, instead I will have done you a great disservice by putting you in a position of debt you can’t repay.”
I pulled my hands inside my coat sleeves to curl my fingers against the cold and frustration. “It’s true that the orchard isn’t getting as much business as it did before, but how do we know that folks are pulling away from the farm intentionally and not merely acting out of routine? Granny’s never had the farm open this late into the season before. Maybe people aren’t coming because they normally don’t. Maybe they still think of the orchard as closed after Thanksgiving. Most of the guests we met today told us they’d stopped in after receiving my flier or driving past and seeing the signs up.”
“And what about your wildly successful Christmas at the Orchard campaign?” he asked.
I pursed my lips. I’d definitely oversold that the last time I talked to him. “It’s bringing in new customers as well,” I hedged, “and people will continue to come as they realize we’re open. The winter festival I have planned will go a long way toward that end. I’m in the process of contacting all the tour companies we’ve worked with in the past, and I’ve taken out an ad in the county’s Gazette. Right now, the change is new, and change takes time.”
Mr. Sherman offered a pitying smile.
I could practically hear his inner voice asking, How much time do you think the orchard still has, Miss Montgomery? And, How long do you believe your new cider shop can succeed with dismal sales and a lack of customers?
/> Sadly, I didn’t know.
“Mr. Sherman,” Granny said, “I can understand your concerns about my business impacting Winnie’s. I’ve thought about that, too, and I’m willing to get a surveyor out here who can divide the property. I can make the acre or two around the barn and down to the road separate from the rest, then put that in Winnie’s name.”
“Granny!” I gasped. The cold knife of separation sliced through my core. “I don’t want that,” I whispered, working to control my tone through the shock. “We’re a team. The orchard and cider shop need to support one another, not pull apart.” My insides twisted at the thought of being cut off from her. “No.”
She stepped closer and gave me her usual loving smile. “It’s only a formality. Divided on paper alone. In case you haven’t thought about it, or guessed, the whole shebang is yours when I go anyway.”
I felt the squeeze inside me tighten. “No.”
She sighed, then turned her smile on Mr. Sherman. “It’s an option we can pursue if it comes to that. Meanwhile, there’s an access road behind the barn that could be properly graveled and used as an access point for cider shop patrons if we need to disassociate this place from mine.”
Mr. Sherman peered into the night beyond the barn, probably trying to discern the overgrown path the cable and electric companies had used to run services to the property. “I’m not sure this barn can ever be disassociated from your family’s legacy, Mrs. Smythe, but I certainly appreciate the thought you’ve given this.”
He dipped his chin and began to move again. “To be honest, I’m still bothered by the condition of your trees. I’m no farmer, but I do enough gardening and have spent enough time in nature to know what I saw the other day wasn’t a sign of good health. Something was clearly wrong with them.”
Granny shot me a look.
I shook my head infinitesimally. I’d have to bring her up to speed on that later.
“Maybe if you had something for collateral,” he suggested.
Granny’s gasp cut through his words, and I turned, half-sick with the knowledge Granny and I had nothing aside from the farm, which was more baggage at the moment than buoy.
Her eyes were wide. Her stare fixed to the Mail Pouch barn. Still several yards away, doors parted. The distinct flicker of flames glowed against the walls inside.
“No!” I burst into a sprint, terror clawing at my chest.
This couldn’t be happening. I couldn’t lose the barn. Grampy loved the barn. I loved the barn. I’d pinned all my hopes to it, and I couldn’t watch it go up in flames.
I swung the doors wide, and a cloud of acrid smoke rushed out. The space was trashed, crates broken, signs ripped down, but the fire was contained inside an old metal barrel I’d posed as a hostess stand. Someone had stuffed the barrel with chunks of broken crates and my holiday décor, then used it all as kindling.
“Oh, Winnie!” Granny wailed, her voice and footfalls arriving several moments behind me. Her hands cupped my shoulders, and she turned me to her for a hug. “I’m so sorry.”
I pulled away, determined to look as grown-up as possible while on the verge of tears. Mr. Sherman had just said there could be a problem with opening my shop here, and now he was present for the proof. He was witness to the second crime on Granny’s property this week. “Mr. Sherman,” I began softly, turning to see if he’d left again, the way he had before.
This time his gaze clung to the floorboards beyond the fire. His long shadow stretched and wobbled over a line of letters carved into the historic wooden floorboards.
STRIKE TWO.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The sheriff interviewed Granny, Mr. Sherman, and me while one of his deputies examined the grounds outside the barn and another picked through the mess around us. Floodlights had been erected to assist in the efforts when my light bulb on a chain had left too much to be desired. The process was still slow going. Darkness and intermittent rain made outside searches doubly awful, but the deputies worked diligently and without complaint. Hopefully this time one of them would find a clue about who’d trashed the place and started the fire. I knew in my bones that person was also Mrs. Cooper’s killer and needed to be stopped.
I waited as patiently as possible through the search process happening inside the barn. My hands itched to clean up the mess and erase the crazed lunatic’s mark from my future cider shop, but I couldn’t risk damaging potential evidence. Instead, I wound and unwound a loose thread from the hem of my sweater around one fingertip and listened to the sheriff’s interviews. Granny and Mr. Sherman gave identical statements to mine. We’d found the mess together. There were no signs of the vandal. No one fled the scene this time or escaped on a hidden four-wheeler. The night had been perfectly still as we’d made our way from Granny’s house.
When the inspecting deputy finally took his leave of the space, I got busy righting toppled crates and tossing splintered ones into the burn barrel. Who would do something like this? My furious mind played the question on repeat, but that was exactly the problem. Wasn’t it? No one knew who would do this. In a town so small I’d probably served eight-five percent of them coffee or a burger at one time, no one seemed to have a clue who’d killed my neighbor, broke into our press house, left a note on my car, tried to run me off the road, or vandalized my future cider shop.
“Winnie?” Sheriff Wise approached me, his hat clutched to his chest. “How are you holding up?”
I nodded, not trusting my tongue to hold its angry thoughts.
“My men are walking Mr. Sherman to his car and your granny back to her house. I told her I’d see you home. When you’re ready,” he added
I scanned the room for Granny. She stood between the open barn doors with a deputy, her gaze on me, brows raised in question.
“I’m okay,” I told her with surprising calm. “I’ll call you when I get to my place.”
“All right.” She returned a small smile, then took the elbow offered by the deputy, and began the cold, dark walk home.
Sheriff Wise leaned against one of the giant wooden spools I’d positioned as tables throughout the space. He braced his palms on either side of his hips. “Cool barn.”
Something had changed in his demeanor tonight. He wasn’t as brooding, taunting, or hostile as he’d been at the other unfortunate run-ins. I bristled, illogically irked that he had the nerve to change himself on me and without notice or apparent prompt.
“I know you and I got off on the wrong foot,” he began, “but I want you to know I’m sorry this is happening to you and your granny.”
Was this some kind of new tactic to gain my trust and lure a confession from me? Or had he possibly wised up and realized Granny and I were innocent?
“I’m also sorry I was harsh with you the other times we’ve spoken. I can be fast to assume the worst, I guess.” He lifted one shoulder with an impish grin. “Hazard of the job.”
The unexpected speech put a damper on my temper. I realized I was angry about the vandalism and had planned to point my wrath at him. A convenient target. Now, he’d ruined that.
He shook his head and released a low chuckle. “Apparently I’ve become so accustomed to criminals professing their innocence that I’ve picked up the bad habit of assuming the worst in everyone. It wasn’t fair of me to do that to you or your granny.”
“What brought on this confession?”
He shifted his gaze away. “A compilation of things, I suppose. For one, I’ve been asking around about you and your granny for days. No one’s had a bad word to say about either of you, and everyone I’ve met had some kind of beef with Mrs. Cooper. Furthermore, it seems less and less likely that these peripheral events are unrelated to the murder since I can’t find a soul who doesn’t think you’re a saint. Which leads me back to believing crimes like this,” he motioned to the barn, “are likely the work of the killer who is, in fact, trying to stop your ill-conceived investigation.”
I chewed my lip and considered him. “So you believe Gra
nny didn’t hurt Mrs. Cooper?” I asked for clarity. “And you know I’m not running around trying to cover anything up or redirect your suspicions, or whatever it is you’ve accused me of?”
“I think all those things are highly unlikely,” he said carefully, shifting his weight against the giant wooden spool. “Besides the fact it would be unthinkably dumb for your granny to have murdered her known nemesis and left the body to be found on her own property while scheduled tours were in progress, I also believe Mrs. Cooper’s death was an act of passion. I’ve spoken to your granny several times this week, and she’s no dummy. Also, I’ve seen her become passionate about many things. Farming. Her late husband. Her community. You. When we spoke about Mrs. Cooper, her mood consistently fell somewhere between nostalgic appreciation and exhaustion. I’m not sure the woman even has a temper.”
I smiled. “I’ve never seen it.”
The sheriff smiled back, and it reached his eyes for the first time in my presence.
I paused to enjoy the dimple that appeared on his left cheek and the kindness in his eyes. He really, finally, believed me.
“Well,” he said, breaking the sudden and inexplicably tense silence, “why don’t I help you finish up in here?”
He wanted to help me finish what? Cleaning?
Before I could ask for clarification again, Sheriff Wise grabbed the broom I’d leaned against a far wall and began to sweep the ash and splintered wood toward the open doors. “Got any music?”
“Sure.” I started a playlist on my phone, then busied myself in the work, unsure what to make of the strange new camaraderie brewing between us. I tossed crumpled signs and broken crates into the barrel of melted holiday décor and tried not to stare at the handsome sheriff sweeping my floor.
“You really should call me Colton,” he said, hoisting a toppled pallet off one of my printed café photos, “if we’re going to be friends.”
Is that what was happening? We were becoming friends?
“I’ll try.” My heart warmed senselessly at the thought. Though I couldn’t imagine why he’d want to be my friend, especially after the front row seat he’d had to my unforgivable behavior toward Hank this morning. I’d replayed the exchange a thousand times in my head after he left, and I died a little more each time. I must’ve looked impossibly moody and juvenile to Colton and anyone else who didn’t understand my history with Hank. Regardless, I’d been unfair. Hank hadn’t done anything to provoke me, and I owed him an apology.
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