Leighann Dobbs - Lexy Baker 09 - Ice Cream Murder

by Leighann Dobbs

  Lexy backed toward the edge of the building, pulling Sprinkles along with her.

  What could possibly be going on with the dog food that would be worth killing over?

  Lexy rounded the corner of the building and headed back out into the commotion of the crowd. She’d missed supper, so she gave in and bought a sausage, pepper and onion sub, then brought it to her car where she sat on the hood to eat it.

  She savored the juicy sandwich, swiping at the grease on her lips with the tiny inadequate napkin the vendor had provided. Sprinkles danced around the front of the car, her eyes brimming with hope that a morsel of food would fall from the sub.

  Lexy tossed her a piece of sausage, careful not to include any onions. She knew they weren’t good for dogs.

  Her mind went back to what she’d heard by the dumpster. The man had said something about special packages that he didn’t want mixed in with the regular dog food. That implied the packages looked like dog food, but had something ‘special’ in them.

  Something that someone named Michael would pay money for.

  Were Olivia and Steve mixed up in smuggling drugs disguised as packages of dog food?

  Chapter Fifteen

  The next morning, Lexy got to the bakery early and finished most of the day’s baking by the time Cassie came in. She left Cassie in charge and brought scones to Nans, arriving at nine a.m. sharp as instructed.

  Lexy hummed with excitement over her discovery by the dumpster the night before as she knocked on Nans’ door.

  Nans whipped the door open, her bright eyes dancing. Lexy knew that look—apparently, Nans had a discovery of her own.

  “Come in, dear. We have something very interesting to show you.”

  Inside, Ruth, Helen and Norman were hunched over a series of photographs that were laid out on top of the dining room table.

  “Hi, Lexy,” the three of them muttered without even looking up at her.

  Ida came over and relieved her of the pastry box, then got to work setting the scones on a platter. Over in the kitchen, the percolator bubbled. Lexy followed the smell of fresh brewed coffee, grabbed a mug from Nans’ cabinet and stood in front of the machine.

  Nans dragged Lexy from the kitchen before she could fill her mug. “Look what we discovered on our stakeout!”

  Nans gestured toward the pictures. Lexy squinted at them, leaning closer to the table. The pictures were blurry, like they were taken with the shaky hand of an eighty year-old. Which, Lexy figured, they had been.

  In the first two pictures, she could make out a couple in a romantic embrace. In the third, they step away from each other. The fourth was a close-up of their heads.

  Lexy sucked in a breath. “Is that Larry and Evelyn?”

  “You bet your sweet bippie,” Ida said around a mouthful of scone.

  Lexy stared at the ladies with wide eyes. “You mean they were having an affair?”

  “Looks like it.” Helen headed toward the coffee urn, taking Lexy’s mug on the way over.

  “Isn’t that wonderful?” Ruth asked. “That gives them three reasons to kill Winston!”

  “Three?” Lexy’s brows dipped at Ruth.

  “Yep.” Nans walked to the whiteboard, then pointed at a list under the heading ‘Motive’. “To get the money, to stop the development, and to be together.”

  “And don’t forget.” Helen came back to the table from the kitchen, handing Lexy a mug full of steaming black coffee. “Cora said she thought Regis was going to cut Winston out of the will, so that would create an immediate need for them to get rid of Regis before he cut Winston out. Otherwise, they wouldn’t benefit from the money Winston inherited.”

  Lexy looked back at the pictures. “These don’t prove they were having an affair … just that they were embracing.”

  “True, but it shows they are very fond of each other,” Nans said.

  “More than a brother-in-law and sister-in-law should be.” Ida wiggled her eyebrows.

  “Well, I can’t say I’d blame Evelyn. Olivia said she suffered the brunt of Winston’s temper and I thought I saw a bruise on her arm when we saw her at the Farmer’s Market. Winston might have been hitting her,” Lexy said.

  “Yet another motive for her to kill him,” Helen added.

  Lexy’s shoulders slumped. “Well, that trumps my discovery.”

  “What did you discover?” Nans asked.

  Lexy told them about the conversation she’d heard by the dumpster and the stems she’d seen inside it.

  “Stems?” Ruth scrunched her face up. “The only drug I know in which stems are used is marijuana and I doubt they’d be smuggling that … it’s too readily available.”

  “It is?” Lexy narrowed her eyes at Ruth, wondering exactly how she knew that.

  “Of course. Why, you can even get it here at the retirement center.”

  “For medicinal use only,” Nans said sharply.

  “Anyway, I’m not sure what the stems would be for,” Ruth continued. “Maybe they’re doing something with vegetables or herbs.”

  Lexy remembered Olivia had that book on herbs the last time she saw her. “Hmmm … maybe. But there is something suspicious going on, for sure. I mean, why would this mysterious Michael person be coming to hand over money?”

  “That is a good question. But my money is on Larry and Evelyn.” Ida tapped the picture of the kissing couple with her index finger.

  “If Olivia and Steve are smuggling drugs in dog food, why would they have to kill Regis and Winston?” Helen asked.

  Lexy pressed her lips together. “I’m not sure. They might feel that developing that land right next to the Fur Fun K9 Center would turn a lot of eyes on the operation and they’d be discovered.”

  “Or maybe Winston or Regis discovered their operation already,” Ruth added.

  “I’m not so sure about Olivia. Evelyn and Larry both had plenty of access to poison Winston and Regis,” Norman, who had been watching the old ladies like a groupie at a rock concert, piped up.

  “I can’t believe it could be them, though … they seem so nice!” Lexy said.

  Lexy’s phone chirped. She dug it out and looked at the display. Hope bloomed in her chest when she saw who it was.

  “It’s Susan from the fudge shop. Maybe she saw Larry or Evelyn there the morning the birthday party photos were stolen,” Lexy said. “That will give us another piece of evidence.”

  “Hi, Susan.”

  “Hi, Lexy. How are you? You still trying to get that penuche recipe out of me?”

  Lexy laughed. She loved Susan’s penuche fudge and had been trying to coerce the recipe out of her for years, but the other woman wouldn’t give it up. Said it was an old family secret. “Yes, but that’s not why I called.”

  “Okay, what’s up?”

  You probably heard about the break-in at Wolf’s photography the other day.”

  “Yes, of course. That’s very disturbing. I’m having extra locks installed on the fudge shop.”

  “I was wondering if you saw anything suspicious that morning.”

  “The police asked me that. I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. I certainly didn’t notice anyone breaking in. But they probably came in through the back where no one could see, and I don’t go out back too often.”

  Lexy’s heart sank. “Oh. Okay.”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “I catered the desserts at Regis Banks’ birthday party and the pictures from that were stolen from Wolf’s, so I kind of have a vested interest. I was hoping you might have seen something.”

  “Sorry. I didn’t see a thing. The only thing out of the ordinary that day was the little ball of fluff that came to the shop door.”

  “Ball of fluff?”

  “Yes. I found a tiny orange dog yipping at the shop door. I heard the noise, opened the door and barely noticed it, the thing was so small. And all fur. Anyway, I was about to scoop it up when some lady came running down the street in stilettos, yelling about falafels. I tried to
tell her we didn’t sell those, just fudge and candy. Then she grabbed the dog and ran off.”

  Lexy’s heart turned over in her chest. “Falafels? Wait a minute, are you sure she wasn’t calling the dog Farfel?”

  “Oh, maybe that’s what it was!” Susan’s laugh rang through the line. “That’s me—always thinking about food. I got a customer here. Was there anything else?

  “No, you’ve been very helpful. Thanks for calling.”

  “Okay, don’t forget to stop by. I’m having a sale next week!”

  Lexy hung up and noticed all eyes were on her.

  “Well?” Nans stood by the whiteboard, her hands on her hips.

  “Susan didn’t see Larry or Evelyn there that morning, but she did see someone else,” Lexy said.

  “Who?” Ruth, Ida, Helen and Norman chorused.

  “Olivia Banks.”

  ***

  “Well, that’s just dandy,” Nans said. “Now we have too many killers!

  “Are you sure it was Olivia who Susan saw?” Ruth frowned at Lexy. “Does she know her enough to recognize her?”

  Lexy pressed her lips together. “Well, she didn’t actually say it was Olivia, but the dog she described, and the name the woman called it sounds like Olivia’s Pomeranian. Olivia doted on that dog, so I’m sure she wouldn’t let someone else take it downtown.”

  Helen sighed. “We’re going to have to come up with a way to weed the suspects out one by one.”

  “Sure,” Ida slurped some coffee. “But how?”

  Nans tapped her index finger against pursed lips. “We’ll have to go back to basics—means, motive and opportunity.”

  “We knew they all had motive,” Norman said.

  “And means?” Helen asked. “Once we find out what Winston was poisoned with it might help us rule out one of the three, but until then we’ll have to look at opportunity.”

  “They all had opportunity to switch the ice creams on Regis, but what about Winston?” Ruth added. “Evelyn would be the big favorite there since she’d have the most opportunity, being his wife and all.”

  “I guess we need to find out where all three of them were the morning Winston died,” Nans said.

  “How do you propose we do that?” Lexy asked.

  “Good old detective work … and lots of baked goods.”

  Lexy made a face. “Lots of baked goods? I’m going to go broke at the rate we’re giving away desserts.”

  “Now, Lexy,” Nans clucked. “You know that no one gets suspicious about us coming around and asking questions when we bring pastries. It’s one of our best tactics.”

  Lexy sighed. It was true, people seemed to be happy to spill their guts if you plied them with cookies and brownies.

  “Here’s what we’re going to do.” Nans raised her marker over the empty section at the end of the whiteboard. “We’ll make another trip to the Farmer’s Market … but not to see Larry. We’ll have to talk to someone else, an impartial witness that can verify if Larry and Evelyn were there yesterday morning. Does anyone here know someone who works there?”

  Norman raises his hand. “I do.”

  “Great, do you know them well enough to talk to about Larry and Evelyn?” Nans asked. “You can put your hand down, dear.”

  Norman looked at his hand and then lowered it. “Yes, Judy works at the paper part-time. I’m sure she’d tell us. I don’t even think we’d have to bribe her with cookies.”

  “Perfect,” Nans scribbled on the whiteboard. “Now what about Olivia? Who can we ask about her?”

  “I could ask around the Fur Fun K9 Center,” Lexy offered. “I don’t really know anyone there though, and it might be a bit awkward.”

  “Maybe we should go in and do our old lady act,” Ida suggested.

  “Old lady act?” Norman raised his brows.

  Nans shrugged. “Sometimes when we want to get information, we just act like doddering old ladies. You’d be surprised at how many people spill their guts to old ladies without thinking anything of it.”

  “Wow,” Norman looked at her in awe. “You really have this thing down pat. I could use you guys to help me with the research on some of my newspaper articles.”

  Nans tilted her head. “You know, maybe we could help each other out with research on future cases. We could do some field work and you could use your resources down at the paper.”

  Normans face lit up. “I’d like that! Maybe I’d even get to do something heroic for once—I always wanted to save someone or help someone, but it hasn’t happened yet.”

  Norman’s expression dimmed and Lexy’s heart tugged just a little for him.

  “That’s great for future cases,” Ruth’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “But can we get on with discussing this case?”

  “Right,” Nans turned to the whiteboard and wrote ‘old lady act at K9 Center’. “I think we should start with these two tasks and see if that eliminates any of the suspects, then figure out where to go from there.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  They split up into two teams. Lexy, Norman and Ida were tasked with talking to Judy at the Farmer’s Market and Nans, Ruth and Helen went to ask about Olivia at the Fur Fun K9 Center.

  Lexy’s team took Norman’s car. Lexy sat in the back so Norman could grill Ida about her investigative techniques on the way. Lexy ignored the conversation as she chewed on her thumbnail and wondered if her bakery would suffer because of all the time she was spending away from running it. She made a mental note to give Cassie and their part-time girl, Haley, a bonus for extra work they had to do in her absence.

  They pulled up in front of the Farmer’s Market and piled out of the car.

  “Now remember,” Ida leaned toward Norman, her voice barely above a whisper, “don’t make it too obvious how eager we are to find out where Evelyn was that morning. We don’t want to let on that we are investigating.”

  Norman’s eyes went wide and he nodded like a puppy eager to please its master.

  They went inside and Norman looked around for Judy while Ida and Lexy pretended to be interested in the watermelons.

  “There she is, over by the onions.” Norman nodded toward a petite brunette arranging signs on a display that was loaded with onions, garlic and potatoes.

  “Let’s go over slowly,” Ida advised and Norman started to walk at a snail’s pace.

  “Not that slow.” Ida rolled her eyes at Lexy.

  Norman increased to a normal pace. Judy looked up as they approached, recognized Norman and smiled.

  “Hi, Norman. What brings you here?”

  “Oh, we were just shopping for some …” Norman hesitated and shot Ida a look of panic.

  “Sweet potatoes,” Ida said, picking up one of the orange spuds in the bin in front of her and inspecting it. “Gonna make a sweet potato pie.”

  “That sound delicious,” Judy said. “Is this your grandma?”

  “Ummm … no …” Norman stuttered.

  “I’m a friend of Norman’s grandma and this here is Lexy.” Ida nodded toward Lexy.

  “I’m Judy,” the girl said pointing to her name tag.

  “We know some of the managers here … Larry and Evelyn,” Ida said before Judy could get away.

  “Oh, they’re real nice,” Judy said, favoring them with a perky dimpled smile.

  “I didn’t see them here yesterday morning.” Ida eyed Judy out of the corner of her eye.

  “I know Evelyn wasn’t here because she was already gone to the Organic Growers Convention in Houston.” Judy chewed her bottom lip for a few seconds. “Nope, Larry wasn’t here either. I remember because we had a problem with the spaghetti squash and he was the only one that could fix it, but no one could find him.”

  “Oh,” Ida feigned interest in a plump Vidalia onion. “When did Evelyn leave for the convention?”

  “Oh, she left two days ago. I remember because she was leaving on my day off … of course she had to cut her trip short and fly back when Winston … you know.” Judy looked down
at the floor.

  “Hello, ladies.” Larry had come up behind Lexy and was regarding them with narrowed eyes. “Nice to see you again.”

  “Hi, Larry,” Ida smiled and held up a sweet potato. “Just coming to get some of these wonderful potatoes for a pie.”

  “I thought I heard you asking about Evelyn,” he said sharply.

  Judy’s eyes darted from Larry to Ida to Lexy. “I was just telling—”

  Ida cut her off. “We were telling Judy how much we enjoyed talking to you and Evelyn the other day.”

  “And we wanted to tell you how sorry we were about Winston,” Lexy added.

  A shadow passed across Larry’s face. Sorrow? Guilt? Lexy couldn’t tell which.

  “Thanks.” His face turned hard. “We didn’t see eye to eye on a lot of things, but he was still my brother.”

  “Of course. You must be terribly upset,” Ida soothed.

  Larry nodded then looked pointedly at Judy. “The grapefruit display needs straightening.”

  “Yes, of course.” Judy nodded at Norman, Lexy and Ida before scurrying off.

  “I can help you take these potatoes up.” Larry put the potatoes Ida had been fondling into a bag. “Do you need anything else for your pie?”

  “No, that should do it.”

  Larry escorted them to the cashier, Ida paid for the potatoes and they piled back into Norman’s car.

  Ida half-turned in the seat so she could see both Lexy and Norman. “Was it just me, or did you guys get the impression Larry was trying to get rid of us?”

  “He was definitely trying to get rid of us … and he didn’t seem too happy we were talking about him and Evelyn to Judy.”

  Norman’s brows shot up to his hairline. “Almost as if he had something to hide.”

  Ida nodded. “At least we discovered one thing. Evelyn most likely didn’t do it because she’d been gone for a whole day before Winston died.”

  “But Larry could have,” Norman added. “According to Judy, he wasn’t at the Farmer’s Market that morning.”

  Lexy’s heart sank. Could Larry be the killer? She liked Larry and didn’t want it to be him. “That doesn’t prove he killed Winston.”