Tragic Toppings

by Jessica Beck

  At least on the outside.

  I brought them both up to date, then replayed the confession from the card for them.

  The chief took it from me, and then said, “That was smart thinking, Suzanne. I’m glad you weren’t hurt worse than you were.”

  “So am I,” I said with a grin. “Jake’s going to kill me, though. He left a really special message in that card, and I erased it.”

  “I think he’ll find it in his heart to forgive you,” the chief said.

  As he started to go, he turned to my mother and said, “Dorothy, this evening was delightful, even if it was cut short.”

  To my surprise, Momma laughed and gave him a quick kiss. After that, she said, “Don’t worry, we’ll get better at it. Just give us a little time.”

  I don’t know who was more surprised to hear that, the chief or me.

  * * *

  I finally managed to get Jake on the phone after a long soak and a quick change into some clean clothes. It still hurt my voice to talk, but it was something I was just going to have to deal with. Jake deserved to hear everything that had happened. As I brought him up to speed, my voice choked up a little when I explained how I had recorded over his message to me.

  “It was the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard,” I said, for some reason starting to cry. “And now it’s gone.”

  “It’s okay, Suzanne,” he said soothingly. “I’ll make you another one tomorrow. I’m sorry I’m not there to hold your hand. You were really brave tonight.”

  “Just hearing your voice is all I need,” I said.

  “Are you going to close the donut shop tomorrow?” he asked.

  “No, we’re going to be open as usual.”

  I loved the sound of Jake’s chuckle on the other end. “Why am I not surprised? I’d better let you go, then. I’m glad you’re okay, Suzanne. Good night.”

  “Good night,” I replied as I hung up.

  I knew I needed sleep, but too much had happened to allow it. I went downstairs, and to my surprise, Emma and her mother were sitting on the couch with Momma.

  “Hey, I didn’t know we had visitors,” I said.

  “You were on the telephone, and we didn’t want to disturb you,” my mother said with a smile.

  Emma’s mom stood, and I noticed there was a plain white box in her hands. “Suzanne, I hope you can forgive me, but I did something without your permission.”

  “I can’t imagine it being that bad,” I said. “Besides, I’m in a very forgiving mood tonight.”

  “Give her the box,” Emma said, grinning at us both.

  “By all means,” I said. “I’d love to have whatever it is you’re offering, though I can’t imagine what it could be.”

  Her mother smiled and handed me the box in her hands, and as I opened it, my heart started to flutter.

  There, in my own handwriting, was a photocopy of the front of my recipe book. As I quickly flipped through the pages, I saw that she’d managed to get everything but my very last musings.

  As I raced through it, she explained, “I’ve had a hard time with the recipes when I’ve helped out in the past, so I made a copy of it without telling you about it. My notes are in the margins, but everything you wrote down is still there. I hope you can forgive me.”

  “I thought I’d lost this forever,” I said as I dropped the box to the floor and hugged her. I was openly crying now, maybe from the stress of the last few days, or it could have simply been because something I cherished had been returned to me.

  Emma rubbed my shoulder and said, “Suzanne, you don’t ever have to worry about losing it again. I scanned it all into my computer and I’ve backed it up in a dozen different places. Cool, isn’t it?”

  “About the coolest thing I’ve ever seen,” I said as I wiped away my tears. I turned back to Emma’s mother and said, “I don’t know how to thank you.”

  “Not being angry with me is all the thanks I need,” she said.

  “Trust me; I couldn’t be happier.” I turned to Momma and asked, “Do we have any pie left? I feel like a snack. Come on, let’s have a party.”

  Emma looked at her watch. “You’re kidding, right? We have to be up in seven hours if we’re going to open on time.” She turned to my mother and added, “Not that we don’t love your pie.”

  Momma said, “Why don’t you children run off to bed and let the grown-ups have a little time together? Good night, ladies.”

  “Good night,” we said in unison, and Emma headed back home while I went upstairs to my room. I knew I should go straight to sleep, but I couldn’t help leafing through the pages of my life in that copy of my recipe book.

  The last, and most important part of it, was all there in black-and-white.

  It was a special donut I’d been planning to make for Jake, but hadn’t had a chance to do yet.

  There was just one more thing I had to do.

  As I punched in Jake’s telephone number, I thought about how delicious it would be to share my news with him.

  And that was why it was really so special having someone in my life again.

  And now a look at the next Donut Mystery,

  KILLER CRULLERS

  —available soon from

  Jessica Beck and St. Martin’s/Minotaur Paperbacks!

  “Give me a dozen of whatever you still have on hand,” a tall, dark-haired man in his thirties asked me curtly at my donut and coffee shop in April Springs, North Carolina. I’d aptly named the place Donut Hearts, since my name is Suzanne Hart, and I couldn’t imagine being anywhere else than in my shop, a reclaimed train depot on the edge of our small downtown business district. He added with a frown, “I don’t care what they are. Just make sure they’re loaded with icing.”

  It was near closing time, and I wasn’t sure what I could give him, since even my glazed donut stock had been depleted at that time of day, but as I studied the case, I realized that Simon Henson had neglected to pick up his special order for the second time in a month. Simon always made a big fuss over my crullers, and the first time he’d ordered a dozen nearly drowning in icing, he’d paid for them in advance. The next time, he “forgot”—both to pay and collect his order—and when he didn’t pick them up, and I was stuck with his crullers and had to give them away, I told Simon if it happened again, he was going to lose his ordering privileges, and he’d sworn that he’d remember the next time.

  Only he hadn’t.

  “Are crullers okay?” I asked.

  “Let me see one.”

  I held up an iced monstrosity and was afraid he’d back out of his offer, but instead, the man surprised me by saying, “Those are perfect.” I boxed a dozen crullers and put them on the counter, and he shoved a twenty across the counter toward me.

  As I handed him his change, I said, “I hope you enjoy them. The icing might be a little much for most folks, but the crullers themselves are really good.”

  “That doesn’t really matter. I’m not going to eat them,” he answered as he took the box and jammed his money into his front pocket.

  That was certainly an odd response. “Do you mind if I ask you what you’re going to do with them, then?”

  “Sure, why not? I’m going to throw them at the woman next door,” he said with a grim nod as he walked away.

  That could only mean that he had a problem with Gabby Williams, and now I was going to be drawn into the middle of it, whether I liked it or not.

  “Emma, cover the front,” I yelled out to my assistant in back as I raced outside after him.

  I didn’t even wait to see if she’d heard me.

  I hurried to Gabby’s shop and found my customer doing exactly what he’d threatened, throwing those heavily iced crullers at the door, window, and brick façade.

  “Stop that,” I screamed as Gabby herself came barreling out of ReNEWed, her gently used clothing store that was beside Donut Hearts, barely missing getting pelted as well.

  “Not a chance until you admit what you did,” the man said as he h
urled another cruller.

  Gabby snapped, “Knock it off, Desmond Ray, or I’ll call the police.”

  “Go ahead. Call them,” he said as he hit the door again. With the heavy icing, some of them hit, stuck for a moment, and then slid down the side of the building, while others seemed to explode on impact.

  “Gabby, I had no idea what he was going to do with those,” I explained.

  “I’ll deal with you later,” Gabby said as she glanced over at me for a bare second. When she turned back to the man, she said, “That’s it; I’ve had enough. I’m calling the cops.”

  The threat didn’t even faze him. “Fine, go ahead. Then you can tell them how you stole from my aunt.”

  That certainly got my attention. As a fellow shop owner, I was acutely aware of how important our reputations were to us, and if this man was slandering Gabby, whether if there was merit to his complaint or not, it could end up doing some real damage to her business.

  Gabby put her cell phone back into her pocket and stepped between Desmond Ray and her shop. “I told you before; there wasn’t any cash or jewelry in your aunt’s coat when it arrived. I checked it thoroughly before I put it on sale.”

  Desmond’s face reddened, and for the moment, the cruller missile pastry in his hand lowered slightly. “She told me she had ten thousand dollars stashed there, and don’t forget the diamond brooch.”

  “Did she have the queen’s tiara tucked somewhere in there as well?” Gabby asked. “The woman’s delusional, and we both know it.”

  “Aunt Jean was positive about where she left the cash and the brooch,” Desmond replied.

  “She might be, but she’s still wrong,” Gabby said.

  “Are you calling her a liar?” The cruller rose again, and then left Desmond’s hand a moment later, shattering against the glass door, chunks of it flying through the air after the ricochet.

  I was amazed by how calm Gabby seemed to be, though I had to believe she was seething inside. “I’m telling you, there was no cash in that coat, and certainly no brooch. I let you check the coat yourself fifteen minutes ago. You saw that the pockets were empty.”

  “After you cleaned them out,” Desmond said angrily.

  There were still three or four crullers in the box, and while the man was distracted with Gabby’s replies, I grabbed it from him.

  “Hey, those are mine,” he shouted as he tried to get them back.

  I pulled a ten out of my pocket and threw it at him. “I’ve changed my mind. They aren’t for sale now. That should more than cover what’s left.”

  Desmond gave me a look of icy evil, and then turned it toward Gabby. “I’m not going to forget this. You should know that I’m coming back. Both of you,” he said, and then stormed off.

  I hated confrontations, and I could feel my knees go a little weak after Desmond was gone. “Wow, that was bad,” I said.

  “It’s not the first time someone has accused me of acting unjustly.” She bent and began retrieving bits of crullers as she spoke. “Suzanne, don’t just stand there; help me clean this mess up. After all, it’s as bad a reflection on you as it is on me.”

  Not quite, I almost replied, and then decided to keep that particular thought to myself. While it was true that shattered crullers on the sidewalk and even sticking to the door and window weren’t the best advertisement for my business, having someone shout that Gabby was a thief was a thousand times worse for her.

  As we worked at cleaning up the destroyed crullers, I said, “I didn’t know Jean Pender had a nephew. That is the ‘Jean’ he meant, right?”

  “None other,” Gabby said. She made a face as she picked up a particularly mangled piece of cruller and dropped it into the box as though it were radioactive. “I knew she’d been slipping a little lately, but if you ask me, the old woman’s gone completely off the bend.”

  That was odd. Jean came by my shop occasionally, and I’d never found her to be anything short of sharp and lucid, though she had to be approaching her eightieth birthday, if indeed it hadn’t already come and gone. “She seemed fine to me the last time I saw her,” I replied before my internal filter could stop me.

  Gabby stopped what she was doing and looked hard at me. “Are you telling me that you actually believe that donut-throwing maniac?”

  “No, ma’am,” I answered quickly. “I know what it’s like to be falsely accused. I’m on your side in all of this.”

  Gabby seemed to consider that a moment, and then, to my relief, she nodded her acceptance of my explanation. Gabby Williams was not a woman I wanted to feud with, especially since my innocent crullers had been dragged into the fray purely by the sin of proximity.

  We had nearly finished our cleanup when a squad car pulled up in front of Gabby’s shop, and our chief of police—and my mother’s current beau—Philip Martin got out.

  “What seems to be the problem, ladies?” he asked.

  I wasn’t going to speak first, but I was beginning to wonder if Gabby intended to respond at all when she finally said, “Everything’s fine here, Chief. There’s no need for you to get involved.”

  I wasn’t sure the threats we’d both received qualified as everything being okay, but this was Gabby’s mess, and for once, I was thrilled that I wasn’t in the middle of a public confrontation.

  “That’s not the way I heard it,” Chief Martin said as he hitched up his pants. It appeared that the man’s diet was still going strong. If he lost much more weight, the chief was going to have to get new uniforms instead of having his old ones taken in to fit his new, sleeker figure. I didn’t know how he could do it with all of the home-cooked meals my mother had prepared for him over the past few months, but more power to him. I could probably stand to lose weight myself, if I could only figure out how to quit sampling the donuts I offered for sale.

  “Who exactly has been speaking with you about my business?” Gabby asked, and I knew that the chief was on thin ice. No one, not even the police department, wanted to go toe to toe with Gabby, and that included Chief Martin.

  He wasn’t thrilled by the conversation they were having, that much was clear, but the chief had a job to do, and I had to admire the way he took a deep breath, and then said, “Desmond Ray came by my office a few minutes ago. He claims you stole something from his aunt, so I need to hear all about it.”

  “I’ll tell you the same thing I told him,” Gabby said. “Those coat pockets were empty, and Jean Pender is either lying or mistaken. Either situation is not my problem. Then again, she could be insane, and if that’s the case, it clearly runs in the family. I explained all of that to Desmond when he came by, and I thought it was resolved until the maniac returned and began throwing donuts at my shop.”

  “Actually, they’re crullers,” I piped in.

  Both Gabby and Chief Martin looked at me at the same time as though I’d lost my mind by clarifying the distinction.

  “Well, they’re not the same thing,” I explained.

  The police chief shook his head, and then turned to Gabby. “Just to make Desmond happy, will you let me search your shop?”

  “I didn’t do anything wrong,” Gabby said. “Why should I allow you to paw through my things?”

  “I can’t make you, at least without a warrant,” the chief said with a sigh, “but don’t you think it might look better to everyone if you cooperated with the investigation?”

  Gabby frowned, and then looked at me. “Suzanne, what do you think I should do?”

  I didn’t even hesitate. “If you don’t have anything to hide, you should let him look around. That’s what I would do.”

  I saw the chief smile, but it started to fade when I added, “Don’t worry about your things getting mussed. We’re going to witness the search ourselves.”

  Gabby nodded and turned back to him. “That’s the deal, then, take it or leave it. You may search my business, but Suzanne and I get to watch you do it.”

  The police chief looked at me and frowned. “What’s the matter, Suzann
e, don’t you trust me?”

  “Chief, it’s not a matter of trust. I just want Gabby to be protected.”

  He shrugged. “Suit yourself. You’re both free to watch.”

  As Chief Martin reached for the radio on his belt, I asked, “Who are you calling?”

  “We need to get this over with quickly, so I’m calling in for backup.” He hit the transmit button, and then called out, “Grant, I need you at ReNEWed, right now.”

  I heard the officer reply in the affirmative, and I was glad the chief had called him. He was my favorite cop on the force, and often stopped in for donuts, both when on duty, and off.

  When Officer Grant arrived two minutes later, he flashed me a quick grin, and then turned to his boss. “What can I do, Chief?”

  “You can help me search this shop,” he said.

  Grant nodded, and then asked, “Anything in particular we’re looking for?”

  The chief nodded. “Ten grand in cash and a diamond brooch.”

  “A what?” Officer Grant asked.

  “It’s a pin,” Gabby explained curtly, “and don’t bother looking too hard; you’re not going to find it.”

  Officer Grant clearly didn’t know how to respond to that.

  After we all walked inside, the first thing the police chief asked to see was the safe.

  “What makes you think I have one?” Gabby asked.

  “I know you,” Chief Martin said. “You’re careful with your money, so you’re not about to leave it lying around. You’re too sensible for that.”

  Gabby nodded. “I like to think so.”

  As we all headed for the back, the police chief said, “Gabby, before we even open it, don’t try to tell me you’ve got ten thousand dollars on hand in your safe.”

  She shook her head. “I wouldn’t dream of it. You should know, though, that I keep five thousand dollars in small bills on the premises at all times, and any jewelry I might take in to resell.” Before the police could ask any questions, Gabby continued, “There are a few rings, a necklace, and a small emerald pin there at the moment, but no diamond brooches.”