The Alpha Billionaire's Unexpected Baby: A Billionaire BWWM Pregnancy Romance

by Joanna Jacobs

  ***

  Buying a trolley was a good choice. Mary Ann wheeled out the twenty-five plates of lemon meringue pie, all dusted with icing sugar, a slice of lemon on the side, and ready for whatever accompaniment was chosen. “Okay, everyone, here’s the pie you’ve all been waiting for. There is one plate each. Do not take more than one plate, or I will be forced to chop your fingers off, Darren.”

  “Why are you assuming I’m going to try to take more than one plate?” He eyed the trolley. “I understand I’m not allowed more than one slice tonight.”

  “Yeah, that’s what you say, but I don’t trust you.” She pushed the trolley to the other side of the table. “Take a plate as I pass you. Add anything you want to it.”

  “Don’t put custard on it. Custard is not for lemon meringue.”

  “Ignore him. Sometimes he’s very opinionated about what should be with a pie.”

  “I’m always very opinionated.”

  Someone female on his side of the table laughed and Mary Ann was certain it would be Jessica. “That’s true. Just ignore him all the time, then.”

  Eventually, Mary Ann reached the top of the table again. No one had touched their pie, not even Darren, and she smiled. “Get started everyone.”

  Everyone seemed to be enjoying the lemon meringue. From the looks of things, Darren had already finished his and was attempting to steal so more off his sister. That was why Mary Ann wasn’t paying attention to what was happening on the other side of the table. When she turned to find out what it was, she saw the people gathering around and she knew what she needed to do. In seconds an ambulance was on the way, but, from the look on Darren’s face, it was already too late.

  The man on the floor, Cassie’s friend Paul, was dead, which meant the police would be turning up soon enough. Sighing, she brushed a hand through her hair. Without stopping to think about what she was doing she started to gather the remains of the pie, to put them in the fridge, knowing they’d need testing for something that might have led to Paul’s death.

  Mary Ann couldn’t think of what it might be, and it could easily be natural causes, but she knew the police would want to check everything out–including all of her pies. Having something to do would stop her from thinking too much about what she could have done differently if one of her friends might be the next victim… or her sister. Blinking away unwanted tears she focused. Gathering some of the pie Paul dropped was important.

  As she gathered it up, being careful not to mix it with anything else she had, she sniffed it. There was nothing different about the scent and she knew that could easily be due to how strong her lemon meringue pies were. By the time she was done the paramedics and the police were there.

  Chapter 2

  “You are Mary Ann Lennon, the owner of Infinity Pies?” Detective Inspector O’Connor studied her. “The baker of all the pies eaten tonight.”

  “I am.”

  “How did you know Paul Foster?”

  “Cassie Jenkins brought him as her plus one. Tonight was the first time I’d met him.”

  Nodding, he scribbled down a note in his notebook. “Why did you gather up all the pies?”

  “Evidence.” She laughed. “I watch a lot of police procedurals and I knew the first thing you’d want to do was test them all. The only pie I think could be the culprit is the lemon meringue, but I don’t know how anyone would have tampered with it.” Which made her a suspect. “My friends have always loved my lemon meringue pie and I wanted it to be the last pie of the night, which meant I had to hide it, so I hid it behind a false back in my fridge. I was the only person who knew it was there. Someone might have been able to find it. However, I cut it when I was in the kitchen and it doesn’t seem like anyone else is ill.”

  “Did everyone in the room have a bit of the pie?”

  “As far as I know. I wasn’t watching everything.”

  “That is impossible to do, even if you’re trying.” Their eyes met. “You seem very calm.”

  Mary Ann smiled. “I won’t be later. This is me doing what has to be done. A man has died in my pie shop and I want you to find out who killed him.”

  “It could have been you.”

  “Yes, it could, but I don’t have a motive to kill him. I barely knew him.”

  “True, but not all killings have motives. Maybe it was an accident.

  Maybe you meant to kill someone else in the room.”

  “Do you believe that?”

  “Right now I don’t know what to believe. I have a dead body and it’s suspicious circumstances. I don’t know you, or your friends. For the moment, until I have reason to think otherwise, you’re all suspects, but you are on the top of my list.”

  Nodding, she glanced over at where Hannah was talking to one of the other detectives. “I can understand that.” Mary Ann knew it was going to have an effect on her new business. “Will I be able to open the shop tomorrow?”

  “I’ll let you know for certain, but I don’t think it should be too much of a problem. The CSIs should have done everything they needed to by then.”

  “Ring me as early as you can. I need to be up to make some new pies.” She brushed a hand through her hair. “How quickly will this be in the papers?”

  “Far sooner than you want it to be. We try to keep these sorts of things quiet for as long as possible, but the journalists have a way of finding out anything they want to know, especially when it comes to murder investigations.”

  ***

  Hannah and Mary Ann walked back to their shared apartment together. “Did you know Paul?”

  “Cassie had never introduced us before, so I didn’t know the two of them were friends, but I did know Paul.” Hannah sighed. “The two of us shared a couple of classes back in high school. We weren’t exactly friends, but I spoke to him a few times. He seemed like a nice enough guy, so I can’t understand what could have happened to him.”

  “I’m the main suspect, at the moment.”

  “They don’t think it was natural causes?”

  “Why would they? A young man dies randomly on an evening out. It doesn’t make sense for it to be natural causes. The most logical explanation, unfortunately, is for this to be foul play of some kind–using my lemon meringue.”

  “You were the only person to touch it before it came out.”

  “And that’s why I’m the main suspect, but I have no motive unless the piece of pie Paul had was meant to go to someone else.”

  “Even if that was the case you still have no motive. Everyone you invited to the shop was a friend or a friend of a friend. There was no reason for you to hurt anyone tonight.”

  “Thank you for believing in me.”

  “What are you going to do next?”

  “I’ve been thinking about that a lot. The only thing I can do, really, is find out who killed Paul.”

  “Maybe you’ve been watching too many detective shows.”

  “Possibly.” Mary Ann smiled. “I can understand why you’d be worried, Han, but this is something I want to do. He was killed in my pie shop and it seems likely the killer used my lemon meringue to do it. That’s something they’re not going to get away with.”

  “Just be careful. You don’t know why Paul was killed. The moment you start asking the wrong questions it’s likely you’re the one who’s going to end up dead next.”

  “I promise you I’ll be careful.” Mary Ann reached out to take Hannah’s hand. “I’m certain I can do this. I can find the person who killed Paul. There are only twenty-two suspects.”

  “You aren’t including me, or Darren.”

  “Of course I’m not. You’re my sister and Darren is one of my closest friends. Neither of you could do something like this.” Mary Ann thought about who was where at the table. “I think it’s probably possible for me to cut that down to eleven because I don’t see how anyone on your side of the table could have reached across to poison the lemon meringue.”

  Nodding, Hannah squeezed Mary Ann’s hand. “If w
e’re lucky, this is going to be natural causes, and then none of this is going to matter.”

  “We both know that’s wishful thinking.”

  “Yeah, but right now it’s what I want more than anything. How could something like that have happened so soon after you opened the shop?”

  “Pure bad luck. Someone happened to be there who wanted Paul dead and they saw an opportunity.”

  ***

  Waiting for a phone call from the detectives wasn’t an easy thing for Mary Ann to do, because all she wanted was to be back in her shop. Being there would give her a chance to deal with the memories of Paul’s death, which was probably, as much as she hated the thought, a murder. As she made her way out into the kitchen to make a coffee, she tried not to think about what it would be like to be alone in the shop. It was the place where she was happiest, and that wasn’t going to come to an end because of one thing. Listening to the kettle boil was another reminder that life went on.

  Paul was dead, but they were all still alive. Being alive meant she had to earn a living. She couldn’t earn a living if she couldn’t go back to the ship.

  Breathing deeply she poured the water into her mug, which was the moment Mary Ann realised she hadn’t actually put any coffee in. Sighing, doing her best not to think about Paul or the shop, she took the jar of coffee out of the cupboard and put a spoonful in. Watching as the granules became one with the water slowly took her mind off everything else for a few seconds. She knew then it was going to be a strange day, no matter what happened. Someone at least one person in her life cared about was dead. That wasn’t something someone could just move on from. Death was permanent.

  When her phone rang, Mary Ann couldn’t help breathing a sigh of relief. It didn’t matter what the detectives said–at least it was something that would take her mind off things she didn’t want to be thinking about. “Hello?”

  “Good morning, Miss Lennon.”

  “Detective Inspector O’Connor.”

  “The CSIs, as expected, have finished in the shop, so you can go back whenever you want.”

  “Will you be letting me know what the autopsy shows?”

  “I will.” He sounded grim. “We both know how bad this looks. I suggest you don’t leave town, for any reason, because the likelihood is you will be arrested for the murder of Paul Masters.”

  “Even though I don’t have a motive.”

  “You had opportunity.”

  “No means, either. I know your CSIs wouldn’t have found anything in my kitchen that wasn’t supposed to be there. I didn’t kill Paul. I barely knew him.”

  “Maybe.” Of course, he didn’t sound convinced. He’d already decided she was the one to kill Paul and nothing she said was going to change that. “I’ll be in touch, Miss Lennon, sooner rather than later.”

  Growling, Mary Ann poured some milk into her coffee. The last thing she needed was some D.I. making the decision she’d killed Paul when there was no reason for her to. She shook her head. Obviously she didn’t have any other choice. Finding out who really killed Paul was something she had to do.

  ***

  Cassie was waiting by the door. “I was hoping they’d let you in today.”

  “Finding everything they needed wasn’t going to take long.”

  “Are you okay, Mare?”

  “Not really, but it’s something I can live with.” Mary Ann managed to smile at Cassie as she unlocked the door to her shop. Fortunately, the CSIs had left it nice and tidy for her. “What did you want?”

  “Do you know what happened to Paul?”

  “Unfortunately, no, but D.I. O’Connor will be in contact as soon as he knows because he believes I was the person who killed Paul.”

  “You didn’t know Paul.”

  “Logic doesn’t seem to be getting me anywhere. I keep telling him I had no motive.” They made their way into the kitchen. “Do you know anyone who might have had a motive?”

  “Out of the group of people at the party I can’t think of anyone who might who wanted to hurt him. I know you didn’t. I don’t care if your pie was used–I know, without any doubt, it wasn’t you. You aren’t stupid. There is no chance you would have poisoned your own pie, at a party with a limited number of people, even if you had wanted him dead. You would have been smarter. You would have done something clever, like used a slow acting poison that wouldn’t have killed him until he got home.”

  “Have you been thinking about this a lot, Cassie?”

  “How can I not? Paul was one of my best friends and I wanted him to meet you more than anything. I thought the two of you would get on really well. His sudden death was the last thing I expected to happen last night. It was the last thing all but one of us expected to happen last night.” Cassie shook her head. “What are you going to do?”

  “Someone used my pie.” Mary Ann shrugged, trying to work out how to put what she was feeling into words, knowing that no way of putting it would be the right way. “That annoys me more than anything because it makes me the main suspect.” She pulled her apron on. “I will find out who killed Paul and then D.I. O’Connor can have them arrested.”

  “You want some help?”

  “I think one of us doing stupid things is enough. You need to come to terms with the death of Paul and I think going around asking questions of people we thought we trusted will make that a very hard thing to do.”

  For a long time, Cassie was silent. Mary Ann focused on what she needed to be doing but kept an eye on Cassie. “You’re right.” Cassie sighed. “I know, if I was to go digging for the truth, it would hurt much more. I want to know who killed him, though. I want to know which one of the people I thought were my friends was willing to do something so heinous.”

  “I do too.” Mary Ann glanced at Cassie. “I want to know who it was who wanted me to get the blame for this murder.”

  Chapter 3

  Having some time alone, to work on the pies she would be selling for the rest of the day and think, was exactly what Mary Ann needed. Creating a plan for how to deal with the search for Paul’s murderer was the first thing she needed to do, because finding them was the most important thing.

  When she’d done that she’d be able to get back to her life, rather than being afraid the whole time it was all going to be taken away from her by someone she’d trusted enough to join her at her party–and that hurt. The more she thought about it, the more it hurt. Someone she cared about could have used her pie to hurt someone without seeming to care about how it was affecting her. A couple of times tears had threatened, but she managed to stop them from falling by telling herself she didn’t want her pies to be salty. Soon enough there would be customers.

  Customers who, hopefully, wouldn’t know about the murder. Mary Ann didn’t think it would be possible for them to find out what had happened that quickly. As soon as they did she knew she would be blamed by them, in the same way she’d been blamed by D.I. O’Connor, because she had the best opportunity to poison the lemon meringue pie she’d served. Breathing deeply, she pushed the thought away. Having the best opportunity didn’t mean it was the only one. There were other people at the party, people who could easily have done the deed, and she was going to find them–that much she was certain of. Finding them was the most important thing. Getting them arrested was the second one, because she wasn’t willing to let anyone get away with murder.

  At 9am, later than she would have normally opened, Mary Ann went to turn the sign on the door. People were waiting outside for her, and for one terrible moment she thought they might be journalists. Then she overheard them talking about what pies they were going to buy as they stepped inside. It was a relief to know she was still in business. Not knowing how long it would be for she even took some orders for pies people wanted to pick up on their way home from work, so they could have them for dinner, which was something she hadn’t done before. Finally, just after 8pm, she closed the door, turned the sign, and started walking in the direction of the kitchen.

&
nbsp; Someone knocked on the door when Mary Ann was halfway there. Her first thought was that she’d have to tell whoever it was they were closed, but when she turned back to the door, she saw it was D.I. O’Connor, the very last person she wanted to see. Slowly she made her way back to the door and let him in. “I wasn’t expecting you to turn up here.” As it was only him she didn’t think he was there to arrest her. “Was there something you wanted?”

  “The CSIs told me there was nothing here that could have been used to poison the pie, which means they think I should be looking for someone else. I think it means you were quick enough to hide whatever it was you used.”