“I’ll take it under advisement.” He shoved a computer printout of a photo across the table to me. “Is this the woman you saw in the café this morning before you went up to Melanie’s room?”
The woman had dark hair like the one I’d seen, but it definitely wasn’t her. She did look somehow familiar, but I wasn’t sure why. I pushed the paper back. “No. Not her.”
“You’re sure?” he asked, sliding the paper a little bit toward me again.
“I’m sure. I may have seen this woman before, but it wasn’t the lady in the café. Who is she?”
“Just the only other dark-haired woman who was staying at the hotel besides Antoine’s crew. We tried her room. No answer.” Dan slid the paper over to the corner of the table. “Probably just someone passing through.”
“So whoever I saw came into the hotel just to go to the café?” I couldn’t imagine the desperation that would take.
“Possibly.” He stood up. “Thanks for the coffee, Rebecca. See you at home tonight?”
I nodded. “I’ll be there. Haley’s about two seconds from a full freak-out, you know.”
He grimaced. “I’m aware.”
He was almost out the door when one more thing occurred to me. “Hey, Dan. If it was suicide, why do you think she left the door to the hotel room unlocked?”
* * *
Shyly, I pushed the plate toward Garrett. “I made it just for you.”
He snorted. “I’m well aware that you were making this anyway and all I am is your guinea pig.”
“A super cute guinea pig. A guinea pig whose opinion I care about.” I pushed the plate a little closer to him. I wasn’t lying. He was totally supercute. Dark-haired, dark-eyed, broad-shouldered. It was a nice package. I’d liked him pretty well before he saved my life. Risking his own well-being to make sure of mine hadn’t exactly lowered him in my estimation. The fact that he was the one who rushed toward the gun while the man who’d sworn undying love and devotion to me had run the opposite way was not lost on me, either. I felt confident I wasn’t repeating the same mistakes. Garrett was like the anti-Antoine.
He picked up one cluster and took a healthy bite, then nearly choked. “Too sweet.”
I frowned. I’ll admit it. I have a sweet tooth. Sometimes it skews what I think tastes right. I took a bite. Ewww. No. I must have gotten the proportions wrong. It wasn’t a mistake I would usually make, but today hadn’t been a usual day. Apparently finding dead bodies threw me off my game. “Sorry. I don’t think I’m at my best today.”
He picked the bacon from it. “As peace offerings go, it leaves a little to be desired.”
“I’ll try again tomorrow.” I swept up the failed experiment and put it in the trash.
“Will you try not to stumble across any dead bodies tomorrow, too?” he asked.
I thought about it as I came back to the table and sat down. “I will certainly do my best.”
“And if you do, could you shoot me a text or something so I don’t hear about it from my secretary?” There was hurt in his voice. I’d put it there. That didn’t feel so fabulous.
“It’ll be on the top of my post-body-finding to-do list from now on,” I promised. I gave myself a little mental kick. Antoine had mainly cared about my activities as they related to him. Having someone around who just cared was taking some adjustment.
He reached out and took my hand. “Seriously, are you okay?”
I sighed. “It’s not like before. It’s not like seeing Coco. I didn’t know Melanie that well and what I did know of her I didn’t particularly like. It’s not like I wished her dead or anything, but it’s also not the punch in the gut that Coco’s death was.”
He nodded. “I can see that. But?”
“But what?”
He reached out and caressed my cheek. I found myself leaning into the touch. “I can see the caveat on your face, Rebecca. It’s not the same as Coco, but . . .”
I pulled away and covered my eyes. “But it’s still awful.” My voice cracked a bit. I doubted I’d ever be able to erase the vision of Melanie, naked and vulnerable in her bathtub, face turned to the ceiling, hair blossoming around her like that painting of Ophelia.
Ophelia. Ophelia committed suicide. Maybe Dan was right. Maybe Melanie did kill herself. Who was I to question the methods of someone so deeply in despair that she would choose to end her own life? Maybe I’d decide that throwing an electrical appliance into the tub with me would be the best way out. Maybe I would buy one just for that purpose. I could see maybe not wanting to mess up your real blow-dryer in case you changed your mind. Maybe that’s what had happened. Maybe something happened while she was getting ready for her date or whatever it was that pushed her over an edge on which she already tottered. I hadn’t walked in her shoes. Not the Louboutins and not the sorrowful ones, either.
“Hey,” he said, pulling my hand away from my face. “It’s okay. It’s normal. In fact, it would be kind of abnormal not to be upset. How about I take you to the movies tonight to take your mind off it?”
I shook my head. “Haley would kill me. I’m not allowed to be anywhere that requires me to turn off my cell phone until after she gives birth to the Peanut.”
He chuckled. “She is getting a little panicky about all the arrangements. Dan jumps about ten feet every time his cell phone buzzes.”
“You should see the house! I don’t think I’ve ever seen it gleam like that. There’s not a surface that hasn’t been scrubbed and polished. I’m afraid if I stand still in there she’ll go after me with lemon Pledge and a rag.”
“Fine. How about I pick up some takeout and a DVD?” he offered.
I loved that he understood my priorities. “That’ll be great, but no takeout. I’ll cook. It’ll be my makeup for that mess.” I pointed to the garbage can and the sad remains of the bacon popcorn.
“Let me know if you change your mind.” He stood up and kissed the top of my head then left.
I cleaned up the kitchen and started cutting up blocks of Coco Pop Fudge for the afternoon rush that usually started around two. I made more coffee as well. POPS was quickly turning into a place for people to chase away those mid-afternoon drowsies. That was fine with me. It was, however, getting to be a little relentless between the morning rush and the afternoon rush. Annie was right. If I really was going to start adding lunch, I needed more help than Susanna and Sam could give me with their school and sports schedules.
I needed to move forward, but suddenly a wave of exhaustion washed over me. I sat down at the table and ate a chunk of fudge. Sugar would probably help.
It did. A little. It also made me think. Coco Pop Fudge would never have existed if my life hadn’t fallen apart. If my marriage hadn’t fallen apart, I wouldn’t have moved back to Grand Lake and I wouldn’t have spent hours in the kitchen with Coco trying to find a way to collaborate. If Coco hadn’t died, I wouldn’t have ended up making Coco Pop Fudge my own. Some bad things happened to bring that fudge into existence. Yet, it still tasted sweet.
Sprocket whined. I washed my hands and got him one of his own treats. No chocolate for him.
I went back to boxing up the fudge and brewing fresh coffee for my afternoon crowd. So bad things had happened to create this fudge, but then it had saved my store. Things had been bleak, but never bleak enough to make me want to take my own life. I’d found Coco Pop Fudge before I sank that low. I boxed up another block of fudge and wished that Melanie could have found her Coco Pop Fudge. Then maybe I wouldn’t have found her in the bathtub of her hotel room.
Three
On the way home, Sprocket and I made our usual stop at the lighthouse on the edge of Lake Erie. Or we tried to. As we came up Marina Road, I saw a knot of people clustered around the edge of the pier. “Our spot’s getting popular,” I said to Sprocket.
He harrumphed in reply.
Then I saw why it wa
s so popular. Antoine and his crew were filming. Apparently the crew had decided they would rather stay busy than take the day off to mourn Melanie. I knew they wanted to shoot parts of the town. It was always part of Antoine’s shows. Wherever they went, they tried to give as much local color as possible. It was almost as much a travelogue as it was a cooking show. You couldn’t do much better than the lighthouse made out of melted-down cannons from the Civil War, with its original Fresnel light, for iconic images of Grand Lake. Given Antoine’s history with it, however, I was surprised. I slipped into the edge of the crowd to watch.
My presence didn’t go unnoticed. It started with a couple of elbow nudges and glances from Sophia Kelley and Katherine Newman, who then tapped Malcolm Taylor on the shoulder and whispered something in his ear. Malcolm chuckled and bumped Janis Carpenter with his shoulder. She turned, looked at me and giggled. I pretended not to see any of it.
The cameraman—I thought his name was Jason—was checking the light on Antoine’s face as he stood far enough from the lighthouse so that it would show up in the shot. The fading light of the day played over the whitewashed walls. There was enough wind to whip the waves up a little but not so much as to muss Antoine’s hair. It was going to be a beautiful shot. I had a little twinge of pleasure from thinking that the segment that featured POPS would be gorgeous. That couldn’t hurt anything. Then Antoine opened his mouth.
“It was at this very spot that I found a crazed person threatening Rebecca Anderson, owner of POPS, with a gun. I was able to make my escape and summon the authorities before harm was done to her,” he said, looking earnestly into the camera. “I am grateful every day that I was able to stop that tragedy from unfolding.”
I gasped. Was he seriously going to rewrite history to that extent? He didn’t stop tragedy from unfolding. Garrett did. Plus, it was at least a little bit tragic. Sprocket had taken a bullet. He still limped a bit because of it. And the crazed person? That person was locked up. Kind of tragic, wasn’t it? Not to mention losing Coco.
“Good take, Antoine,” Jason said lowering his camera. “Where to now?”
I pushed my way through the crowd. “Antoine, what are you doing?”
He turned to me, a smile breaking out on his face. “Rebecca, we are getting some film of this beautiful Grand Lake landmark.”
“I can see that. I also heard what you said. You need to cut that part.” I stalked straight to him, Sprocket growling at my heels.
Antoine looked surprised. “Why?”
I threw my hands in the air. “Because it’s not true.”
“What part of it is not true? You were threatened by a crazy person with a gun. I summoned authorities. All true.” He took a step toward me. We were nearly nose to nose.
Sprocket growled a little louder. I wanted to growl, too. “You didn’t save my life,” I said. “You ran away.”
“Ran for help. Ran away. I think you are splitting the hairs.” Antoine set his hand on my shoulder.
I shrugged him off. “I think you are deliberately misleading people to make yourself the hero of the story. You were not the hero.” I turned to the crew and the crowd. “He was not the hero.”
Lucy marched over to where we were standing. “You need to go, Rebecca. You’re disrupting the shoot. We only have the light for a few more minutes.”
“The light? You’re worried about the light? How about worrying about the truth?” I whirled on her.
“I don’t have to worry about the truth, Rebecca. Antoine explained the whole story to us. Nothing he’s said is untrue. We double-checked the facts. He was the one who called the police.” Lucy stood with her feet braced and her hands on her hips.
“Yes, but he wasn’t the one who threw himself at an armed person who had already killed once.” I drew myself up.
Lucy pressed her lips together. “What the situation required was sound and rational thinking. I’d say summoning the authorities showed exactly the kind of quick mental work that really helps in an emergency situation.”
I opened my mouth and closed it again. It would be a waste of time arguing with Lucy. Her loyalty was absolute and it belonged to Antoine. I turned back to Antoine. “We’re not done discussing this, Antoine.”
“We can talk about it tonight,” he agreed.
“No. We can’t.” Sprocket and I pushed our way back through the crowd. For a second, I thought I saw the woman from the coffee shop that morning in the mob. I stopped and tried to push my way to her, but people shifted and I lost sight of her. Or maybe I’d never seen her at all. It was hard to tell with so many people milling around. I elbowed my way back to the edge of the group and went home feeling cranky and tired.
My ex certainly knew how to overachieve. Antoine had done what an unbalanced person with a gun hadn’t been able to do. He’d taken my happy spot and turned it sour.
* * *
I got back to my apartment and immediately started making risotto. Risotto required attention. You needed to stay with it, stirring, adding liquid a little at a time and helping the rice absorb it. It will reward you back with bursts of flavor on the midpoint of your tongue and a warm sensation in your tummy. In the meantime, it made me focus on watching the rice turn golden in the olive oil rather than strangling Antoine.
Garrett showed up and settled himself at the breakfast bar in my little kitchen. Sprocket got up from his bed in the corner and laid his chin on Garrett’s thigh. Garrett gave him an under-chin scratch and said, “You didn’t have to cook. I could have picked something up.”
“From where?” The options for takeout in Grand Lake were exceedingly limited.
“The diner,” he answered without hesitation. Perhaps like a man who ate too much takeout from the diner. No wonder the promise of bacon made him forgive my transgressions.
I considered. The diner did make a fine grilled cheese and there’s no way to get fries the way I like them without an industrial fryer, but by the time Garrett got them here, they’d be soggy and cold. Blechh. Not interested. “I like cooking.” It soothed me. Some people drank. Some people exercised. Some people gambled or shopped. I cooked. “And this is simple stuff.”
“Yeah. It looks real simple.” Garrett shook his head.
I looked around at the chopped onions and garlic, the knobs of butter, and the mound of freshly grated Parmesan on the kitchen counter. “Looks can be deceiving.”
“Can I help?” he asked. Then, after I shook my head, he asked, “How about I open a bottle of wine?”
“That would be lovely.” There are all kinds of ways to help in a kitchen, after all. Plus, I’d need the wine for the risotto in a few minutes. I opened a cabinet to get a bowl.
“How long has that been creaking like that?” Garrett asked, pointing at the cabinet door.
“Long enough that I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I returned my attention to the risotto.
He retrieved my toolbox from the closet and started doing something to my cabinet door hinges. After a minute, he opened and closed it. The door was silent.
“How’d you learn to do that?” I asked.
“After my stint as a waiter while I was in college, I did some carpentry.” He poured two glasses of wine.
“There’s an awful lot I don’t know about you, Garrett Mills.” I pointed at him with my wooden spoon.
“I like to be a man of mystery.” He raised his glass to me and blew me a kiss. “Now keep cooking. That stuff smells good. Plus you owe me for feeding me whatever that stuff was this afternoon.”
I was enjoying that lovely floaty sensation I get after the second sip or so, when someone knocked at the door. “I swear, if that’s Haley checking on my Peanut Day readiness . . .” I said as I answered the door, not sure exactly what I’d do to my pregnant sister if it really was her. Make fat jokes? Pretend to forget Evan’s name? Pinch her really hard on the butt?
; It didn’t matter. It wasn’t Haley. It was Antoine. With a bottle of wine and a bouquet of flowers. As if he was showing up for a date.
I’m pretty sure both Garrett and Sprocket growled. “What are you doing here?” I asked.
“I told you I would stop by to check on you.” He held out the wine and flowers and sniffed the air. “You’re making risotto. I knew you were upset. You always make risotto when you’re upset.”
It made me want to growl that he knew me that well. “I told you it wasn’t necessary. I’m fine.”
He shrugged. “Just because something is not necessary does not mean it shouldn’t be done. Fresh Parmesan on top of your risotto is not necessary, but you were planning on putting it in, were you not?”
Garrett walked over to stand behind me. “Your presence is not only unnecessary, but unwelcome.”
Uh-oh. I shifted to stay between them. The last time the two of them tangled, Antoine ended up with two black eyes and I had to bail Garrett out of jail.
Antoine rolled his eyes. “The small-town lawyer? Still, chérie?” he asked me, ignoring Garrett.
“Still,” I said. “Good night. Go comfort your crew. They’re probably all still shaken up about Melanie.”
As if on cue, Antoine’s phone rang. “Yes, Brooke.” He shoved the flowers and wine at me as if I was a servant and turned away. “No. I don’t think that would work.” He stopped and listened again. “Please explain to Lucy that . . .” He broke off and listened again. “Yes. Fine. I am on my way.” He hung up the phone. “I am sorry, darling. I must go. You were correct. The staff, they do not know how to operate without Melanie. The smallest thing throws them into chaos. I must oversee them.” He turned to go.
“Wait,” I called after him, holding out the wine and the flowers.
He shook his head. “Keep them. Enjoy them. Maybe think a kind thought about me as you do.” Then he trudged back down the steps, looking more than a little dejected.
I shut the door and turned around, flowers and wine still in my hands.
Pop Goes the Murder Page 4
