by Fiona Grace
“Yeah, Ali,” Piper added, leaping to Branon’s defense. “Don’t be mean.”
Ali was even more astonished. “Sorry, what is going on here?” she asked, folding her arms. “One minute you’re all bro dude, and now you’re… what? What is this act?”
Brandon rubbed his forehead and sighed. He seemed tired. “No act. This is the real me. Not all my work is prank videos, you know? I actually do reviews, too. I’m a serious businessman at the end of the day. People want silly content, so I make silly content. I’ve got to go where the money is.”
“We’re all just trying to make ends meet, aren’t we?” Piper added.
Ali couldn’t argue with that. She’d wanted to be a French pastry chef, but no one bought her fancy desserts. They wanted cupcakes. Brandon was just doing the same thing she was by catering to the crowd.
“I appreciate the explanation,” Ali said, though she was still suspicious. “Can you tell me what you’re planning on doing with my macarons?”
“Just a taste test,” Brandon said. “A review.”
Ali’s defensiveness began to diminish. “Really?”
“Yes, really,” he said, holding his hands into truce.
Ali dropped her folded arms at her sides. “Well, okay then. I appreciate it. My bakery is new, so positive reviews go a really long way, especially from people with a big platform.”
Piper flashed him an adoring look.
“No problem,” Brandon said. He looked back over at his cameraman. “Ready to roll?”
The man raised the camera again. “Rolling.”
The switch in Brandon was truly something to behold. His expression went from normal to suddenly goofy. He was quite the actor, turning on his persona for the camera.
Ali watched him with renewed interest and excitement. If he liked the macarons and gave her a glowing on-camera review, millions of viewers would suddenly know Seaside Sweets existed. It would be an amazing endorsement!
She watched with bated breath as he selected the raspberry-flavored macaron and took a bite. He chewed it, once, twice, then spit the half-chewed mush back onto his plate.
“Hey!” Ali cried with indignant anger, but her yell was drowned out by Brandon’s own exclamation of, “Gross!” before he picked up the rose-pink macaron, took a bite, and spit it out everywhere.
Indignant with anger, Ali grabbed the plate. “You said you were doing a review!” she exclaimed, tugging it toward her.
Brandon held on tightly. “I am,” he said in his weird, goofy persona, grabbing a rhubarb-flavored macaron and shoving it in his mouth. “And they taste gross!” he shouted with his mouth completely full and bits of macaron dropping out of it onto the plate.
Ali tugged the plate again. “STOP!” she cried.
But Brandon was clutching on too tightly, and quickly shoveling macaron after macaron into his mouth, letting them smoosh together into a horrible multicolored mush and fall onto the plate as he made disgusted noises.
Ali had never felt more insulted in her life, not to mention disappointed, and foolish for having believed Brandon would do an honest review.
With all the macarons now sampled, Brandon’s plate was now a rainbow pile of disgusting half-chewed food. Brandon dabbed at the corners of his mouth with a napkin, as if he was a very genteel man who’d just eaten a meal. “Now my suggestion,” he said in a fake posh English accent, “is that you use better ingredients.”
Ali was furious. Her eyebrows rose to her hairline. She put her hands angrily on her hips. “Who the hell are you to tell me how to cook my macarons?” she exclaimed. “I’m a French-trained pastry chef! I learned this recipe from Milo Baptiste!”
It was totally the wrong thing to say. Brandon and his cameraman fell about laughing, sounding like two nasty cackling hyenas. All Ali had done by sticking up for herself was pour fuel on the fire.
“Milo Baptiste!” Brandon mimicked, using a shrill, girly voice. “Milo Baptiste!”
Ali’s cheeks turned as red as the chewed up strawberry macaron on Brandon’s plate. She tried to tell herself his merciless teasing was just an act, but it still made her feel about two feet tall. The fact he was supposedly playing it up for the camera didn’t matter. Enough was enough.
“Right. That’s it,” she said. “I want you out of my store! Come on. Get out of here!”
Brandon laughed as she attempted to tug him up by the arm. “I’m just giving constructive criticism,” he said.
“Constructive criticism? I’ll give you constructive criticism in a minute!”
The whole time Ali was blowing up, she couldn’t help but picture all the stupid emojis that would be appearing on the screen beside her face, the cartoon steam they’d add coming from her ears, and all the disrespectful noises they’d edit in. Not to mention the less than complimentary text. It would be humiliating. This whole thing was a disaster.
Brandon stood. “Ah, you’re gonna regret chucking me out of your store,” he said. “Just you wait.”
Ali had heard enough. “Go. I don’t care. Get out.”
Brandon gave his camera guy a high five, then took three steps toward the door… before suddenly falling flat on his face on the floor of her bakery.
Ali folded her arms. Another stunt. Great. She was not impressed by this one bit.
But as the seconds passed without Brandon so much as twitching a muscle, she became increasingly uneasy.
The cameraman lowered his camera. “Brandon? Buddy? You okay?”
With the camera no longer capturing the moment, Ali realized this was no stunt. Her heart leapt into her throat.
“Is he okay?” Piper cried, leaping up from her seat and running to where the cameraman was crouched beside Brandon.
“He said he was feeling sick earlier,” the terrified-looking cameraman told her.
Piper looked over her shoulder. “Ali! Don’t just stand there! Call an ambulance!”
Ali snapped out of her trance. “Ambulance. Right.”
She rushed around the counter and grabbed the phone, punching in 9-1-1. She kept expecting Brandon to sit up at any second, shout “psyche!” and start laughing, but instead, the horrible scene stayed exactly as it was, with Brandon motionless, and Piper desperately searching for a pulse.
“He’s not breathing!” the panicked girl cried.
Just then, the call connected. “Nine-one-one, what is your emergency?” came a voice in her ear.
But before Ali had a chance to reply, Piper turned and shouted words she’d never expected to hear. “He’s dead!”
CHAPTER TEN
Ali couldn’t believe what was happening. She clutched the bakery’s phone in her shaking hands, answering the emergency responder’s questions like a brainless zombie, as she watched Piper’s futile attempts to resuscitate Brandon Lennox.
“The paramedics are on their way, ma’am,” the voice in her ear said.
“That’s nice…” Ali murmured, in a hypnotic voice.
“Stay on the line with me until they get there, okay?”
“Okay.”
She looked at the audience of aghast onlookers, pressed up to the bakery’s windows, all staring in horror at the sight of Brandon Lennox’s lifeless body lying supine on the peppermint tiled floor. She was supposed to be selling them macarons, not sharing this surreal, unpleasant moment with them.
Just then, Ali noticed a paramedic—a bald black man in dark green scrubs—come wending his way through the crowds, carrying a bulky green bag. The audience parted for him. He reached the door and knocked on the glass.
“He’s here,” Ali said into the telephone.
“Okay, ma’am. You can go ahead and hang up now,” the emergency responder replied.
“Have a nice day,” Ali murmured, dully noting how polite her zombie-self was.
She returned the telephone to the receiver and hurried for the door, unlocking it to let the paramedic in.
“Paramedic,” he announced, as he stepped over the threshold.
> The vibe in the bakery changed instantly as the tall man took charge. Piper and the cameraman staggered back away from Brandon, and the paramedic went down to his knees, removing equipment from his bag with rehearsed efficiency.
Ali went to Piper and clutched the girl in her arms, unsure whether she was providing comfort or seeking it. Piper shook with sobs.
The paramedic listened to Brandon’s chest with a stethoscope, then placed two fingers to his neck, searching for a pulse.
“Tell me what happened,” he demanded as he worked.
“He just collapsed,” Piper stammered.
“No choking? Coughing? Wheezing?”
“Nothing.”
The paramedic began charging up the defib machine. Piper buried her face in her hands and turned into Ali’s chest. Ali, meanwhile, found it impossible to look away.
“Does he have any known medical conditions?” the paramedic asked, continuing to fire his questions into the ether.
Ali had no idea, so she looked appealingly to Brandon’s cameraman friend. The man’s skin had turned completely gray. He looked suddenly like a little boy, like he was half the age he’d been when he’d swaggered inside earlier with his camera and cocky attitude.
“No,” he said.
Ali was about to add that Brandon regularly stuffed his face with greasy food on camera, but decided that probably didn’t constitute a medical condition.
The paramedic sat back on his heels. He looked over at the three onlookers. “I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do for him. He’s dead.”
His words hit Ali like a slap. A wave of shock and sadness overcame her.
Piper let out a noise somewhere between a wail and a howl. The cameraman sank into the window seat, shaking his head, looking dazed.
“But he’s only twenty-five,” he said.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” the paramedic said gently.
He stood and draped a blanket over the man’s body, prompting an immediate reaction from the onlookers at the window, a collective gasp, almost as if they shared a hive mind. Then he removed the walkie-talkie from his hip, paced over to the corner of the room, and began speaking into it in a low voice.
Ali felt her stomach drop. Something about this just didn’t feel right, and when the paramedic’s eyes darted over to her suspiciously, she gulped.
“Yeah, looks like a code blue,” she overheard him say.
Code blue? she thought, as her pulse began pounding in her ears. What does that mean?
The paramedic paced back over to the group, eyeing each of them in turn with his dark brown eyes. “The operator said someone here attempted resuscitation?” he said.
Piper turned her face to him; she’d left the front of Ali’s shirt tear-stained.
“I did,” she said. “Why? Did I do it wrong?”
Ali immediately felt her begin to tremble all over again.
“I’m going to need to check you over,” the paramedic said in a grave and serious voice.
Piper flashed an alarmed expression at Ali. “What? Why? I don’t understand.”
“There was an unidentifiable residue on his lips,” the paramedic said.
“Residue?” Piper said, shooting another panicked look at Ali. “What do you mean by residue?”
The paramedic became suddenly tight-lipped. “Just let me check your vitals, please, miss.”
Ali didn’t like the sound of this one bit. She watched helplessly as the paramedic guided Piper to the side and began shining his little torch in her eyes.
Without the girl to comfort, Ali felt suddenly at a loss. She looked over at Brandon’s cameraman. The poor boy was staring unblinkingly into the middle distance. If Ali didn’t know he’d just watched his friend and business partner die before his very eyes, she’d think he was having some kind of fit.
She tiptoed over to him.
“Can I get you anything?” she asked.
He jumped, almost as if he’d thought he was alone and was surprised to see someone suddenly standing next to him. He turned his frightened gray eyes up to Ali. “Like what?”
Ali shrugged. “Water? Coffee? I don’t know. Do you want to borrow the phone to call anyone?”
“Can you get my camera?” he said, suddenly.
Ali followed his gaze across the room. The small vlogging camera he’d earlier been using to capture her distress had fallen right beside Brandon’s body and was now almost entirely concealed by the white blanket draped over him.
“I don’t want to…” he added in a small, boyish voice.
Ali felt a spike of nerves. She had no desire to approach the dead body either. But if retrieving the grieving man’s camera could provide him some comfort, then she would find her courage and do it.
“Of course,” she said, hesitantly.
She swallowed the lump in her throat and walked across the peppermint tiles to the lump lying in the middle of the bakery. Without letting herself think about what was beneath, she bent down and thrust her hand under the sheet. Her fingers collided with something soft and squishy, before they found the hard plastic of the camera. Knowing she’d just prodded a dead body, Ali was suddenly overcome with nausea. She quickly retrieved the camera and stood, her head swirling.
“What are you doing?” came a sudden booming voice.
Ali swirled on the spot. The paramedic had spotted her over by the body, and was now staring at her with an accusatory expression.
Ali quickly shoved the camera into the boy’s hands.
“Nothing,” she said.
The paramedic narrowed his eyes with suspicion.
Just then through the window, Ali noticed the crowds moving again. They appeared to be dispersing.
For the briefest of moments, Ali thought she was witnessing a display of humanity, that the crowds, on realizing the outcome of the drama had been the tragic demise of a young man, were respectfully leaving. But then she realized it was because a cop cruiser had pulled up, and was instructing them to move along.
As the crowd reluctantly dispersed, Ali spotted a black Merc pull up behind the police cruiser, its windshield and front windows tinted black. But she didn’t need to see inside to know who was there. She’d know that car anywhere. It was the car that belonged to the formidable Detective Elton and her partner, Detective Callihan.
Ali immediately tensed. Why were the murder detectives here? Surely Brandon had had a heart attack from all the artery-clogging food he forced himself to eat, or had induced some kind of other medical complication from throwing up so often.
But then Ali recalled the unidentified residue on his lips, the ominous “code blue” announcement, the check of Piper’s vitals, and suddenly realized that something far more sinister was afoot.
The paramedic had found signs of foul play and called in a “code blue,” prompting the murder detectives to attend. Brandon had been intentionally killed.
Just then, the sound of pounding on the window startled Ali from her anxious ruminations. Detective Elton was at the door. Dressed in black skinny jeans and a leather biker jacket, she was pounding with her fist against the door to be allowed inside.
Ali hurried over and unlocked it.
“Miss Sweet,” Detective Elton said in her smoky voice. She pushed her sunglasses up into her mass of dark hair. “We meet again.”
Ali couldn’t help but gulp. Detective Elton had a formidable presence. She could strike fear into anyone.
“Detective Elton,” Ali said, timidly, before looking over at her male partner, the preppy Sebastian Callihan. “Detective Callihan.”
The male detective flashed her a smile that was part greeting, part sympathy. Ali was actually relieved by his presence. If it had just been her and Detective Elton, she’d have turned to jelly by now.
Detective Elton’s eyes grazed the scene. Then she zeroed in on the white sheet. She took a couple of strides to close the gap, Detective Callihan dutifully following, then crouched and lifted the sheet. She peered beneath, then allowed
it to drop again.
“Tell me what happened,” she said, her hawk-like eyes trained on Ali.
“He just dropped down dead,” Ali replied, still not really believing what she was saying. “Fine one minute. Then…” She clicked her fingers. “Gone. Just like that.”
The two detectives leaned their heads together and conferred in hushed tones. Then Detective Callihan stood and approached the cameraman. Detective Elton, meanwhile, made a beeline straight for Ali.
Ali felt herself tremble with nerves. The detective halted in front of her, produced a notebook from her pocket, and clicked the top of a pen.
“Tell me what he was doing in here before he ‘dropped down dead,’” she said.
Ali could practically hear the air quotes in her tone. She was clearly suspicious about how a young, seemingly healthy twenty-something could simply cease to be alive. Well, that made two of them, Ali thought. None of this made sense to her either.
“He was sampling my new macarons,” Ali said, gesturing with her hand to the plate of Brandon’s spat out macaron mess, still on the table where he’d left them.
Detective Elton’s eyebrows drew slowly together. “It doesn’t look like he enjoyed them very much.”
Ali bit her lip with consternation. She could see how suspicious it looked. How could she explain that Brandon had spit out her macarons because he was doing a bit, rather than because she’d laced them with rat poison or something?
“He’s a vlogger,” Ali attempted.
“A what?” Detective Elton fired back.
“A video blogger. He records food reviews and puts them on YouTube.”
“Then why would he spit the food out?” Detective Elton said suspiciously.
“They’re prank videos. You know the ones. Hidden camera. You’ve been punk’d!”
With every word she said, Detective Elton’s brow became more furrowed. Ali, in turn, became more and more flustered.
“I don’t know how to explain it properly,” she said with a sigh of defeat. “You should ask his cameraman.”
“Oh, I will,” Detective Elton said, narrowing her eyes. “I’ll be getting everyone’s interpretation of the events. Starting with yours.”
