Murder at the Christmas Cookie Bake-Off

by Darci Hannah

  We marched down a long hallway behind the girl, around a corner, past a wall of windows, to a large area that was reminiscent of a trendy loft apartment. Along the far wall was a modern kitchen sporting a large refrigerator, cement counters, sink, microwave, and what looked to be a specialty beer on tap. A long island counter separated the kitchen from the rest of the room. There were leather chairs and couches, tables, and two arcade video games. On the other side of this impressive room sat a very messy desk with two large monitors.

  “Your desk?” I asked our moody guide.

  She glared at me. “Not fer yer eyes, lady!” she snapped, and turned one of the monitors just enough so I couldn’t see it. I took that to be a yes. Apparently, Alyssa, although privy to one hell of a private kitchen-lounge area, preferred Red Bull, black coffee, and Sour Patch Kids candy to real food.

  “I wasn’t . . .” I was about to say “looking,” but it didn’t matter. She walked past the desk to another door. She gave a knock before opening it.

  “Hey, that baker’s here,” she announced with a lack of enthusiasm, then stood aside to let us in.

  “Impressive setup you have here,” Rory said, extending his hand to Stanley. “We haven’t met. I’m Rory Campbell, the baker’s friend. This is Kennedy Kapoor, her other friend.”

  Stanley stood and took Rory’s hand. “Sorry about that. Alyssa can be a little curt, but she’s a whiz at computers.”

  “I picked up on that,” Kennedy remarked with a hint of sarcasm. “It was the whole Girl with the Dragon Tattoo vibe she puts off. Edgy, smart, and with a truckload of daddy issues.”

  “She’s joking, of course,” I told Stanley, noting that he couldn’t puzzle out if she was or not. “Thanks for seeing us on such short notice. Nice place you have here.”

  The perplexed look on his face melted away. “Lindsey, nice to see you again. Please, all of you, take a seat.”

  We removed our coats and sat in the proffered chairs. I silently marveled how our host, well into his late forties, had the perpetually youthful appearance of a gangly teenage boy who’d recently filled out. He was tall, slender, with light brown hair gelled to perfection and hazel eyes that sparkled with intelligence behind wire-framed glasses. To break the ice, I asked the question, “What exactly does Tartan Solutions do?”

  “Mostly software,” he replied.

  Rory, no stranger to technology, sat back in his chair and crossed his legs. “What’s your niche?”

  Stanley, momentarily taken aback by the question, raised an eyebrow. “Agriculture in general, but our niche, as you put it, is small batch, locally sourced alcoholic beverage production. Microbreweries, wineries, and producers of popular spirits, like whiskey, vodka, and gin, have become a booming business, not only in Michigan but elsewhere. Our name Tartan, like the woven fabric of intertwining colors, represents the many intertwining stages of beverage production, from the farms that grow the hops, grains, and malted barley, all the way to bottling and distribution, be it beer, whiskey, or wine. Beverage makers are artisans, but most are at a loss when trying to manage a business. Our software is designed to harvest data and streamline payroll and expenditures while optimizing profits. We also provide web services and web hosting in house. Then there’s—”

  “Whoa, fella!” Kennedy, smiling coyly, held up her hand. “You had me at ‘wine’.” She honed her smile in like a laser. “I don’t suppose you have any on hand for sampling, do you, Stanley? A nice full-bodied spicy red with notes of Christmas?”

  To our amazement, Stanley leaned forward. His lips twitched into a grin as he said, “But, of course. Alyssa would be happy to pull such a bottle from our collection.”

  I didn’t know how she did it, but Kennedy had him in the palm of her hand. As Stanley made the call, I cast my friend a look that screamed, Really? Her reply was a look that suggested, Why not? The conversation had gone off the rails. I cleared my throat and addressed Felicity’s husband.

  “None for me, thanks.” Rory refused the wine as well, stating that he was driving. “While you and Kennedy wait for your wine, I’d like to ask you a question about your wife.” Stanley raised a brow in question. “I don’t know how to put this, so I’ll be blunt. Was Felicity having an affair with Chevy Chambers?”

  My question landed like a painful slap in the face. For one tentative moment, I thought he might throw us all out of his office. But then he did something even more surprising. He threw back his head and laughed. I assumed he thought the notion ridiculous, until he reined himself in and said, “Of course she was. She didn’t bother to hide it.”

  Shocked, I asked, “And you know this for a fact?”

  “Are you asking if I caught them doing the deed?”

  “It’s just that, well, Felicity has emphatically denied having an affair.”

  “Blagh!” he spat. “She was lying to you. She lied to me. But Chevy wasn’t lying when he bragged to me how he was banging my wife. The smug bastard. Can’t tell you how many times I paid for his dinner in Chicago, and this is how he repays me?” For the first time since we arrived, Stanley looked truly upset.

  Rory and I exchanged a look, prompting me to ask, “When did he tell you this?”

  “At the Christmas Festival.” Stanley grew quiet a moment, his brows furrowed in thought. “I’ve been so busy with work lately. Felicity runs the Christmas store. It’s her baby. She’s good at it. I honestly never thought there’d be a problem. But then Kara, our daughter, called at the beginning of December saying that she was spending Christmas in Arizona. Felicity pleaded with her, but Kara wouldn’t budge. Shortly after that, Kevin, our son, backed out of Christmas as well. He’s working in Hawaii. Told him I’d fly him home, but once he heard that Kara wasn’t coming, he didn’t want to either.”

  Kennedy crossed her long legs, stared at him, and tilted her head. “Any guesses as to why?”

  A bubble of derisive mirth escaped his lips. “Yeah. The drama. Christmas at our house isn’t”—he looked at us and drove his point home with—“normal. We have seven huge, fully decorated Christmas trees in our house, each one with a different theme. Seven! Who does that? When the kids were little, they honestly didn’t know which tree Santa would place the presents under. We have special holiday music for every day of the week leading up to Christmas—can’t play them out of order or you’ll get in trouble. Then there’s the fifty thousand Christmas lights, the Christmas cards, the barrage of specialty holiday foods, the weird cookies, and the matching Christmas sweaters that we’re required to wear. It’s always an over-the-top production put on by Felicity, for Felicity. The rest of us are miserable. But we grin and push through it.” He plastered on a grin for effect and swung a determined fist across his body. His grin faded to a grimace. “This year, however, the kids bailed on me.”

  Rory shook his head in silent solidarity. “Man, that’s rough.”

  Stanley appreciated the gesture. He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “True confession? I’ve been hiding out here. And Alyssa isn’t my assistant. Jane is, but she’s taken the week off because of Felicity. Knows how crazy the woman gets. Alyssa doesn’t know any better. She’s a new hire, a programmer who specializes in imported Scotch. That edgy child out there has imbibed more of the stuff in her twenty-five years in Scotland than most middle-aged men. I can’t tell if she’s sober or not, but I’ll tell you one thing. She isn’t intimidated by Felicity.”

  Kennedy nodded her approval. “Stanley Stewart, I underestimated you. You’ve put a whiskey-swilling hound at your door. But let us back up a moment. Are you saying that your wife had an affair with Chevy Chambers so that she could win the bake-off?”

  It was an uncomfortable conversation, but Stanley was willing to talk and we were willing to listen. He looked at Kennedy and nodded. “It sounds crazy, but I believe the thought of spending the holidays without the kids really got to her. I didn’t know how much until I observed my wife shamelessly flirting with that little scumbag in front of everybody at
the bake-off. But I never guessed that she was actually sleeping with him. That’s not like Felicity. She can be a little crazy at the holidays, but I love her. She’s crushed me, you know?”

  “But I thought you said that she denied having an affair?” I reminded him.

  He shook his head. “Of course, for the sake of our marriage, she has to deny it. But Chevy wasn’t shy about admitting to the affair. Can’t tell you how angry I was when I confronted him.”

  I looked at him. “Was that before or after you pulled Felicity from the bake-off stage?” I thought this an important question to ask. Chevy had disappeared after inspecting everyone’s gingerbread showstopper and had never returned.

  “After,” he replied glumly. “Felicity and I have been married for thirty years, and to my knowledge she had always been faithful. But watching her up there making a fool of herself really made me wonder. Then, when she slapped Chevy, I knew that I had to do something. I pulled her off the stage to calm her down but realized how distraught she was. That’s when I went to find Chevy. I wanted a private word with him.”

  I honestly thought Stanley was on the cusp of admitting to the murder of Chevy Chambers. I had it on good authority, namely Kennedy, that Murdock and McAllister hadn’t pulled him in for an interview yet. He had given his statement yesterday, like the rest of us, but he must have left his private conversation with Chevy out of it. Now he was with us, laying his soul bare. Rory held the man in his calm, collective gaze while Kennedy squeezed my hand.

  Stanley continued. “I found him at the end of a long hallway standing in a private sitting room . . . a library, I think it was.”

  I shot Rory a covert glance, knowing that he was thinking what I was thinking. Stanley was describing the room where we had found Chevy’s body.

  “He was shocked to see me.”

  “I’ll bet he was.” Kennedy, hanging on his every word, cast him a knowing look.

  “But he knew why I was there,” Stanley added. “Probably thought I wouldn’t have the nerve to confront him. I’m a techie, not a fighter.” He held up his hands as if to illustrate that fact. “However, it was my wife he was messing with. When I asked if he was sleeping with her, he didn’t deny it. In fact, he did the opposite. He grinned. I wanted to wipe that condescending look of pity right off his face. He then told me that my wife’s desire to win the bake-off was greater than her respect for our marriage.” He looked at us, mustering all the rage he had felt. “He then had the nerve to tell me—the nerve to admit—that he couldn’t pass up such an opportunity.”

  “What a class A creeper!” I exclaimed. “It might be hard to hear this, but we all had a feeling that Felicity was on the take.”

  Stanley, his face flooded with the memory of his anger, held up his hand. “No. I mean, she obviously thought that she was, she was that desperate. But Chevy did something far more despicable. He admitted to me that he was only using her, knowing that she would sell herself for the win. But he had no intention of picking an inferior baker over an expert just because she slept with him. If she earned it, so be it. But if not, he wouldn’t ruin his reputation because some hussy thought he could be bought.”

  Terrible as the revelation was, it was all beginning to make sense. “So, that was what the fight was about? Felicity hit Chevy with the frosting bag because she realized that he had no intention of letting her win?”

  Stanley, looking ill at the mere memory, nodded. Then his eyes flashed to the door. Alyssa had arrived with two glasses of wine.

  Stanley waved her over and took one. Without waiting for Kennedy to join him, he pressed the glass to his lips and drank it down in four large gulps. Kennedy, bug-eyed, gave him a wineglass salute.

  Rory and I were still trying to process what Stanley was telling us. Rory, with a distasteful grimace, needed to be sure of what he had just heard. He leaned in and asked, “Are you suggesting that Chevy coerced Felicity into sleeping with him to win the bake-off but never had any intention of letting her actually win it?”

  Stanley set down his glass. “That’s exactly what I’m telling you. That man deserved what he got.”

  In a calm, level voice, I offered, “So, you knocked him on the head with your wife’s rolling pin to teach him a lesson.” It all fit together so well—a slighted husband, a cheating wife, and a ruthless cookie judge . . .

  “What? No!” Behind the wire-rimmed glasses, his eyes looked like ginger cookies, they were so large. “Oh my God! You think I killed him? Is that why you’re here?” Unbelievably, it had just dawned on him. “I thought this was just small talk. You know, being relatable with a prospective client? I thought you were interested in our software for the bakery.”

  Kennedy, dumbfounded, lowered the wineglass from her lips and looked up at him with her large dark eyes. “Sorry, Stanley, boy, she’s not. Didn’t you kill him?”

  Stanley shoved his chair back from his desk with shocking abruptness and stood. We all watched in silence as he strode to the window, glanced out at the snowy landscape, then turned to us. “I think you all need to leave.”

  We got to our feet, but none of us was ready to leave. “Look, Stanley,” I began, “we’re not the police. We’re just trying to figure out what happened to Chevy Chambers.”

  “I didn’t kill him,” he stated again, his face flushing with anger. He took a deep breath and added, “I might have wanted to, but I didn’t.”

  Rory, holding him in a scrutinizing gaze, asked, “What stopped you?”

  Stanley shrugged. “Cowardice. That and the fact that there was obviously another person he was waiting for.”

  Shocked, I asked, “Did you see this person?”

  Stanley nodded.

  Kennedy set down her wineglass. “Was it Felicity?” She was ready to be scandalized.

  But Stanley shook his head, knocking the hopeful look off my friend’s face. However, what he said next shocked us all.

  “It was an older woman who had come for him. I could tell the sight of her frightened him, and I didn’t know why. She looked harmless enough to me. What business did Chevy have to be afraid of a short, portly woman dressed like Mrs. Claus and carrying a cookie?”

  CHAPTER 27

  We couldn’t get out of Stanley Stewart’s office fast enough. The poor man might not have seen any harm in a short, portly woman dressed like Mrs. Claus visiting the cookie critic, but we sure could, especially since Stanley had described Mrs. Nichols to a tee.

  “Are we sure he didn’t mean Betty?” Rory voiced the question we were all mulling over in our heads. We were driving down Grandview Parkway in Traverse City, heading to Wags Dog Park, a place I had been wanting to take Wellington. It was thirty degrees with a light snowfall, the perfect weather for my dog to romp around in while we tried to clear our heads. “She was playing Mrs. Claus to Doc Riggles’s Santa,” Rory continued. “Betty’s old and portly.”

  “Stanley Stewart has lived in Beacon Harbor a long time,” I reminded him. “He’d know Betty Vanhoosen. She practically runs the town. And she’s not old and portly, Rory. Betty’s middle-aged and pleasantly plump.”

  Rory shrugged. “Same difference. But there have to be other older ladies who fit that description.”

  Kennedy, with a glass of red wine coursing through her veins, leaned her head over the front seat between us. “Doubtful Betty knows how to use a rolling pin. Mrs. N, on the other hand—”

  “Okay, let’s just stop thinking about this for a moment.” I couldn’t hide the anxiety in my voice. Truthfully, I didn’t even want to entertain the thought that Mrs. Nichols might be involved.

  Rory took his eyes off the road long enough to cast me a questioning glance. “Lindsey?”

  “I’ve had enough snooping for one day, and I think Mom was right. I don’t think we should pursue this. Chevy was murdered. This is a matter for the police.”

  “I know what this is all about.” Kennedy, still resting her crossed arms over the front seat, looked at me as only a friend could do
. “This sudden call-off-the-dogs about-face has nothing to do with murder. You’re Lindsey Bakewell. You like being snoopy. You like poking your nose into other people’s business. It’s essentially what an investment banker does,” she added breezily, as if she knew. Apparently, that’s all she had picked up from our many conversations on the subject. “This sudden change of heart is about losing the best assistant baker you’ve ever had.”

  Leave it to her to hit the nail on the head. I knew it wasn’t right to just drop the subject, but I suddenly lost my appetite for cookie bake-off justice.

  “It’s the holidays,” I protested, feeling a panic attack coming on. “I’m swamped at the bakery. Cut me a break! That woman—although mysteriously appearing on my doorstep—is a godsend.”

  “And possibly a sly murderer.” With another pointed look, Kennedy sat back, settling in her own seat next to Welly.

  “Look, it was all fun and games while we were investigating Felicity. Then Stanley had to ruin it by dropping that little brain bomb on us. If he is to be believed, Mrs. Nichols approached Chevy Chambers in the very sitting room he was murdered in—carrying a cookie, no less!”

  “He could be wrong,” Rory added, although his tone lacked conviction. “Look, Mrs. Nichols was standing at the foot of the stage the whole time.”

  “That’s mostly correct,” I told him, feeling a wave of dread wash over me. “When Chevy went missing, Mrs. Nichols did too. The whole day while I was baking, she was spotting cookie-nappers, sending you two all over the hotel to find them. I even went after one of them myself and got locked in a storage closet. But before that, there was a point during the bake-off when I noticed that she had disappeared for a while. I grew nervous thinking that one of the cookie-nappers had gotten to her.”

  “I remember,” Kennedy chimed in. “You sent me to look for her. I found her standing near the ladies’ room. Whatever else she had gotten up to before then is anyone’s guess.”