by Sofie Kelly
“Good choice,” Claire said as she passed behind Eric with her half-empty coffeepot.
He smiled and headed back to the kitchen. “It’ll just be a couple of minutes.”
I was wondering how to bring up the subject of Mike Glazer’s death as Claire set a napkin-wrapped bundle of utensils by my right elbow. She gave me a thoughtful look and then said, “Kathleen, is it true that you found Mr. Glazer’s body?” Her face flushed. “That was a tacky question, wasn’t it?”
“It’s okay,” I said. “And yes, I did find his body.” I didn’t bother adding the part about my cat finding it first.
“The guy was obnoxious, but”—she gave a little shudder—“no one deserves to die all alone like that.”
I nodded, remembering how the body was slumped in the plastic chair in the dim light of the tent. “It seems like he rubbed some people the wrong way,” I said, reaching for my coffee.
“More like everybody.” She shot a quick glance past me to make sure the other customers weren’t trying to get her attention. “He wasn’t in here five minutes and he was telling Eric how he needed to change the menu and update the decor.”
I looked around. “What’s wrong with the decor?”
Claire gave a snort of laughter. “He thought we should go for a Parisian bistro look.”
“In Minnesota?”
She reached for the coffeepot and topped up my cup. “If people want a Parisian café, they’ll go to Paris. Tourists who come here are looking for a small-town restaurant with comfort food they recognize.”
Eric came out of the kitchen then. “You must be talking about Mike Glazer,” he said, as he slid a heavy plate in front of me. I could smell bacon, tomatoes and maybe a little thyme. The thick-cut sourdough bread had been pan-toasted—crisp and golden on the outside and soaked with tomatoes and spices on the inside.
I took a large bite and sighed with happiness. How could Mike have found fault with this?
Claire grinned at me and headed for the table by the window with the pot.
“I take it Claire was telling you about Glazer’s suggestions,” Eric said.
“Parisian bistro?” I said, raising my eyebrows.
He crossed his arms over his chest. “He also thought we should get rid of all the ‘old-fashioned’ stuff on the menu, like the chocolate pudding cake.”
“Did he have any idea how popular that is?”
Eric shrugged. “Wasn’t interested. I made that recipe three times a day during the music festival last month. It was almost eighty degrees outside and the tourists were still ordering it.” He gave me a sideways smile. “By the way, how was last night’s batch?”
“Good,” I said.
His smile widened, and I knew I’d just been hooked in a fishing expedition. “Susan was positive it was you Marcus Gordon was trying to impress. As my grandmother used to say, are you and the detective keeping company?”
“No comment,” I said, bending my head over my plate. “And tell your wife she’s going to be dusting every single shelf in the library today.”
Eric laughed and gestured to my half-empty plate. “Would you like anything else?”
I shook my head. “No, thank you.” I took another bite of the sandwich while Eric started a new pot of coffee.
“Are you still going to do the food tasting?” I asked.
“We are,” he said. He turned to look at me over one shoulder. “If Liam and his group can pull this together, it could be good for the town. And I know it sounds awful, but it’ll be a lot less of a hassle without Glazer.”
I reached for my cup. “Do you think it was just the small-town boy trying to show off his big-city polish?”
“It’s possible. Not such a good idea, if you ask me, considering he might have been leaving the big city.”
“What do you mean?”
Eric stopped to wash his hands and then came back over to the counter. “Friend of mine has a restaurant in Chicago. I called him when we knew this pitch to Legacy was a go. He said there was some talk going around that Glazer’s partners wanted him out of the company. Nothing specific, mostly just talk.”
Before I could ask if he knew why, Claire came back with an order for the three men—town workers—who had just come in.
Eric headed for the kitchen. “Have a good day, Kathleen,” he said. “And remember, Susan’s bringing lunch. Let me know what you think of the soup.”
Claire took my empty plate and I pulled out my wallet to pay for breakfast.
“Kathleen, are you going to be seeing Maggie anytime soon?” she asked.
“Tomorrow night at tai chi class,” I said. “Why?”
“Her boyfriend left his travel mug here last week. I thought he’d be back in, but I haven’t seen him. Or Maggie.”
“You mean Liam?”
She nodded, reached under the counter and brought up a sleek, shiny stainless-steel mug with a comma-shaped handle and rubber grip strips. “He probably forgot where he left it. He was pretty angry after everything. He didn’t even finish his meal.”
I frowned. “What do you mean, ‘after everything’?”
“He was here, at that table.” She pointed to the front window. “Next thing I know, he’s outside on the sidewalk having some kind of heated conversation with Mike Glazer. He was right in the guy’s face. When he came back inside, he just tossed some money on the table, grabbed his jacket and left.” She shrugged. “I think he just forgot that he’d asked me to fill his mug, and I couldn’t catch him. We’re usually not that busy on a Wednesday, but we were that night.”
“You’re probably right,” I said. “I can give it to Maggie.”
Claire smiled. “Hang on a sec and I’ll get you a bag.” She moved over to the cash register, where the take-out bags were stacked on a shelf. “Do you want a take-out cup to go?” she asked, gesturing at the coffee with her elbow.
“Umm . . . yes, thank you.”
She put the travel mug in a bag, got me a large cup of coffee to go and brought both over to me. I paid for breakfast, wished Claire a good day and headed out.
I’d left the truck at the library, but I didn’t mind the walk. The sun was shining for now, although my wrist still insisted it was going to rain later.
I let myself into the building and relocked the door, leaving the alarm off. After flipping on the downstairs lights, I headed up to my office. It was still early. I put my things on the desk and hung up my jacket. Then I tucked Liam’s mug in my briefcase so I’d remember to give it to Maggie.
As I picked up my cup again, I thought about what Claire had said about Liam’s argument with Mike Glazer. Mike had clearly pushed Liam’s buttons somehow if Liam had left without finishing his meal or getting his coffee. He worked part-time tending bar at Harry’s Hat, so he was used to dealing with people who were behaving badly; he didn’t lose his cool that easily. I couldn’t catch him, Claire had said. Then I remembered the rest of the sentence: We’re usually not that busy on a Wednesday, but we were that night.
I leaned back against the edge of the desk. Wednesday night was the night Mike Glazer had been killed. And he’d had an argument with Liam.
No. That didn’t mean Liam had killed him. It wasn’t a cause-and-effect thing. Liam wasn’t the only person who’d had words with Mike. He wasn’t the only person who didn’t like the man. Mary had threatened to drop-kick Mike between a couple of lampposts and I didn’t think she’d killed him.
Plus Liam was the one who’d come up with the idea of pitching a tour built around Mayville Heights to Legacy Tours in the first place. Why would he kill Mike? It didn’t make any sense. For all Liam knew, if Mike was dead, that would be the end of any deal with Legacy.
I looked at my watch. Mary and Abigail would be arriving anytime now and so would our new co-op student and her teacher. I took one last long drink from my cup and headed downstairs.
Harry Taylor—Junior, not Senior—came into the library just after eleven o’clock with Elizabeth.
She smiled back and Harry nodded. “Mary called. That’s what we came to get.” He took a library card out of his shirt pocket and handed it over to Abigail, who was working checkout; then he turned back to me. “There’re a couple of things I wanted to ask you.”
“Go ahead,” I said.
“Do you mind if I start cleaning out those flower beds at the front tomorrow and getting them ready to get the bulbs in?”
“That’s fine with me,” I said. “Do what works best for you, but don’t forget it’s story time tomorrow. You might end up with some little helpers.”
Harry smiled. “I don’t mind.” He glanced at Elizabeth. “The other thing is, I was wondering if Elizabeth and one of her friends could come meet your cats sometime. They’re thinking about helping out at Wisteria Hill.”
I was guessing the “friend” was Wren Magnusson and this was Harry’s way of giving me a chance to talk to her.
“Absolutely.” I turned to Elizabeth. “Owen and Hercules came from Wisteria Hill. The only thing you have to remember is that they don’t like to be touched by pretty much anyone but me. But they do like company.”
“Did one of them really go and get Harry when someone broke into your house?” She shot her big brother a skeptical look.
I nodded, my hand automatically going to rub my left wrist. That encounter just over a year ago was when it had been broken. “Hercules,” I said. “Harry was mowing the lawn at my backyard neighbor’s house. Hercules got in front of the lawn mower and made so much noise, Harry came to see what was going on.”
“I figured either something had happened to Kathleen, or Timmy was stuck in the well and the cat fancied himself to be Lassie,” Harry said dryly. Abigail handed him the two books and he thanked her.
Elizabeth smiled and made a face at her brother before shifting her gaze back to me. “Is after supper tonight too soon?”
“No, it’s not,” I said. We settled on a time and I gave her directions. “Tell your dad the other book he wanted should be here next week,” I told Harry.
“I will,” he said. His eyes darted sideways to Elizabeth for a moment. “Thank you.”
I spent most of the morning teaching our new student intern—whose name was Mia—how the computerized card catalogue worked. Like most teenagers, she had good computer skills and she picked it up easily. She was well spoken and well read, conservatively dressed in a black skirt and long-sleeved white blouse. After working with her for a couple of hours, I felt Mia was going to fit in just fine, although her neon blue hair was probably going to get more than a second glance. I sent her to shelve books with Mary and walked over to the circulation desk.
“What time is Susan bringing lunch?” Abigail asked.
I glanced up at the clock. It was almost eleven thirty. “About an hour,” I said.
She swept her braided hair over one shoulder. “I don’t suppose there are any muffins in the lunchroom, are there? I’m hungry now.”
I shook my head. “Sorry. To paraphrase Dr. Seuss, the only crumbs in our lunchroom are crumbs that are even too small for a mouse.” Then I remembered that description pretty much described my kitchen and I’d invited Elizabeth and Wren over. I made a face. “Crap on toast!”
“It’s okay,” Abigail said. “I’m not going to pass out from hunger in the next hour.”
“I’m glad,” I said. “But I just realized that I invited Harry’s sister and her friend over tonight, and there isn’t so much as a brownie crumb in my kitchen.”
Abigail smiled. “I could call Georgia and see what she has for cupcakes. I don’t mind holding the fort here so you could run over there. She’s just over on Washington Street.”
That sounded a lot better than having to make coffee cake the moment I stepped through the door. “Please,” I said.
She reached for the phone. “And if you decided to reward my brilliance with a double-chocolate cupcake, I would be filled with gratitude.”
I smiled and shook my head. “You’re full of something.”
Good fortune was on my side. Georgia had just finished frosting a batch of cupcakes and I could have half a dozen. And Washington Street was close enough that I could walk. “I shouldn’t be much more than half an hour,” I told Abigail. “Mia is helping Mary.”
“Take your time,” she said. “I wouldn’t want you to smush the icing or anything. You know, for your guests.”
I waved at her and headed out the door.
Washington Street was a couple of streets above Main, two blocks east of the library. Georgia was working out of a blue-shingled two-story house that, like most of the other buildings on the street, had a business on the main level and apartments on the second floor. Abigail had told me to go to the back, and as I stepped onto the small verandah, I could see Georgia through the screen door, filling a pastry bag with what looked like chocolate frosting.
She looked up when I knocked on the doorframe and beckoned me inside. The kitchen smelled of a delicious mix of chocolate, vanilla and caramel.
“Mmm, it smells good in here,” I said.
Georgia made a swirl of dark chocolate on the top of a dark-chocolate cupcake and set the pastry bag on the counter. “That’s probably my cupcakes and Liv’s caramels,” she said with a smile.
“You share this space with Olivia Ramsey,” I said. “I thought the address sounded familiar.”
She nodded, icing sugar dusting her dark curls. “Actually, there are three of us: Decadence—that’s Olivia— me, and Earl of Sandwich. I’ve been here only a month.”
Olivia Ramsey was a chocolatier who specialized in handmade truffles and caramels. Decadence’s reputation was beginning to spread outside the state. Earl of Sandwich ran two lunch wagons that serviced pretty much all the construction sites in the area. And yes, the owner’s name really was Earl.
I looked around the kitchen. The walls were painted a pale creamy yellow, like whipped butter. The appliances were all gleaming stainless steel. At the far end of the space, I could see two brick ovens built into the wall.
Georgia followed my gaze. “They still work,” she said. “This was a pizza place at one time, I guess.” She gestured at two wire racks to her left on the long butcher-block table. “What would you like? The ones with the green frosting are Chocolate Mint Madness and the others are Devilishly Decadent Chocolate.”
“Could I have half a dozen of each?” I asked.
“Absolutely,” Georgia said. She brushed off her hands and reached for a couple of flattened boxes from a nearby shelf.
“Are you ready for the food tasting?” I asked.
“I think so,” she said, glancing up from the box she was folding into shape. “I’m doing six different cupcakes. And Liam rearranged things so now I’m next to Molly’s Coffee, which should be good for both of us.”
“I hope everything works out,” I said.
Georgia set the finished carton aside and started bending the other one into shape. “I think it will . . . now.”
“Mike Glazer made things difficult.”
She nodded, keeping her head bent over the half-formed box. “Nothing seemed to satisfy him. He was on Liam about every little thing. Then he started in on Mr. Chapman about the style of the tents and if looks could kill—�� She realized then what she’d said. “I’m sorry. That was insensitive.” There were two blotches of red high on the cheekbones of her otherwise pale face. She wiped her hands on her long white apron.
I gave her a small smile. “It’s okay,” I said. “I think Mike had alienated pretty much everyone who was involved with the tour project.”
Georgia finished the box and reached for the cupcakes. “He stuck his nose into things that were none of his business, and now he’s dead.” She exhaled slowly and looked at me. “He just shouldn’t have done that.” I was a bit taken aback by the intensity in her v
oice.
Georgia finished boxing the cupcakes, and I paid her and put them in the canvas shopping bag I’d brought with me. She walked me to the door.
“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll look for you at the food tasting. I hope it goes well.”
She wiped her hands again on the front of her apron and gave me a small smile. “I think it will, now,” she said.
Walking back to the library, I thought again how sad it was that Wren Magnusson was the only person who seemed to feel any grief about Mike Glazer’s death. Georgia certainly didn’t seem sorry, although to be fair, she’d barely known the man. I thought about the tension in her voice when she’d commented that Mike had been sticking his nose into things that were none of his business and the way that she’d kept wiping her hands nervously on her apron. What had happened had clearly left her feeling unsettled.
Back at the library, I stashed the cupcakes in my office and took over from Abigail at the front desk. Susan came in at twelve thirty, carrying a large crock of soup—the lunch Eric had reminded me about. He was testing a new recipe and we were going to be his guinea pigs. She smiled sweetly as she passed me on her way to the stairs. A small feather duster with Kool-Aid-orange feathers was stuck through her topknot. Obviously Eric had repeated my threat about dusting all the shelves.
“So not funny,” I called after her. She didn’t even turn around, but I saw her shoulders shake with laughter.
The soup—chicken with spinach dumplings—was delicious, no surprise. So were Georgia’s cupcakes. I spent the afternoon doing paperwork and working on the list of new books I wanted to order.
It was raining when I left the library, fat drops that splattered on the windshield of the truck. As I hurried around the side of the house, I could see Hercules’s black-and-white face peering through the porch window. I shook my umbrella before I stepped inside the porch; then I picked him up off the bench under the window. He didn’t even object to the dampness of my jacket. Instead he peered at my face and then looked over at the door to the kitchen. Something was up.
“What did your brother do?” I asked. Herc looked back over my arm as though there were something incredibly fascinating all of a sudden on the floor behind us. “It can’t be that bad.” I stuck the key in the lock. He rested his chin on my shoulder and made a noise that sounded suspiciously like a sigh of resignation.
