Traveling Town Cozy Mystery Box Set

by Ami Diane

  With the weather a great deal improved, exercise proved to be a slog due to weeks of inactivity, despite the pushups she’d done in her bedroom while housebound. Well, not pushups in the plural sense, so much as a single one here and there. And not pushups so much as dropping her phone or jewelry on the floor and having to fish it out from under her bed.

  Fresh air smelling of salt and sea blew across the lake and hit her with its fresh scent. It tasted good as she gulped it in lungfuls and pushed herself. About halfway around the trail, she slowed to a power walk. Cottages dotted Lake Drive, their rooftops nestled at the base of Twin Hills and the forest.

  With the mishmash of weather, it struck her that the town was already entering an early summer. The foliage had rushed through spring or had never truly experienced fall. Jumping through time was just as hard on them as it was for her.

  Her thoughts turned toward Twin Hills and their mysterious connection to the town’s jumping. She wasn’t sure what poking around Wink’s property would accomplish, but it was as good a place to start as any. But how much to tell Wink?

  She sprinted the last leg of the trail, past the park, the placid water of the lake a mirror of the blue sky above. Panting and dripping enough sweat to fill a pool, she burst into the kitchen. Water sloshed into her cup as she filled it from the tap then gulped it down.

  As she was filling a second glass, the hallway door swung in. Rose glowed like a sunflower, wearing a yellow dress that shone more radiant than the kitchen walls. Ella’s hand went up to shield herself from the sunshine and the exuberant personality to match.

  “You could take down a plane.” She lowered her hand. “I mean, you look gorgeous. But also, you’re camouflaged with the walls.” It was a yellow-shirt dress, complete with a white collar and a pleated skirt that flared out. The innkeeper sported extra tight pin curls today.

  Rose let out a demure laugh. “You’re such a hoot.” She pushed her cat-eye glasses up her nose. “I’m glad I caught you. I’m making meatloaf for dinner tonight, so don’t go stuffing yourself with donuts from the diner again like last time.”

  “Oh, Rose. You know I’ll always find room for more food.” It was largely due to this fact that had inspired her to take up running in the first place. She snapped her fingers. “Blast, I’m actually eating at Wink’s tonight. So sorry.”

  “Not a problem. I’ll save you some leftovers. Do me a favor will you, dear? If you see Jimmy, can you really talk up the dish? He always puts up such a fuss when I make it.”

  Ella nodded, sure there was a joke in there somewhere about Meat Loaf the singer and actor, but she was too late on the uptake because Rose was already gliding out of the kitchen.

  As Ella slurped more water, the back door opened. Jimmy stuck his head in. “Ella, perfect. I was hoping you’d be in here. I think Rose is planning on making her meatloaf tonight. If she brings it up, try to talk her out of it, will you?”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  “Thanks. You’re a peach.” He shut the door.

  With a whoosh, the kitchen door swung in.

  “Good, you’re still here,” Rose said. “I was just thinking about it, and I’m worried it may have sounded as if I was telling you and not asking. My apologies.”

  Ella waved the comment aside. “Not to worry. I’ll talk it up.”

  Smiling with relief, Rose swept out of the room once again. Just as the door was settling into place, the back door opened with a creak, and Jimmy’s head—receding hairline and all—popped back in. “Sorry, I probably should’ve asked first if you were okay with this mission. It’s just, her meatloaf makes me burp and have wind for days.”

  “Ew, thanks for that visual.”

  Her comment didn’t seem to register. “I’m sure the last thing you want to do is get caught in the middle of this—”

  “Say no more, Jimmy. Nobody wants this place smelling of sulfur.”

  The lines in his face smoothed with relief. “I knew I could count on you.”

  She shot him a finger gun, resulting in a puzzled expression. Shrugging, he ducked back out into the sunshine.

  Suddenly, Ella snapped her fingers as it hit her. “I’d Do Anything for Meatloaf. That’s what I should’ve said.”

  She shook her head in disgust at herself for having missed the opportunity to bring up a Meat Loaf reference—how often did they come around? Setting the cup in the sink, she hurried out of the kitchen before the innkeeper-dinner routine came back for an encore.

  Chapter 5

  GRAVEL CRUNCHED UNDER Ella’s sneakers as she got out of her jeep. She’d shot a withering look at her dwindling gas gauge before turning off her car. Wink’s place was too far to walk to, and the west Twin Hill much too steep to climb on foot—unless she wanted to end up in Pauline’s clinic with an IV sticking out of her. She’d have to consider investing in a bicycle soon if Will couldn’t get around to fixing her car.

  Before mounting the porch steps to Wink’s house, she surveyed the panorama of blue ocean stretching out where it met the horizon. In the distance, jewels cast by a fading sun danced on the surface. The vista was breathtaking, no doubt, but her mind was occupied with the greater mystery.

  She pulled out her phone and compared where she stood to the map on her screen. It was hard to pinpoint the exact center of the jagged circle they’d drawn without actually printing out the map and using a compass to pencil the circumference.

  Maybe she and Will could somehow discreetly use the original map that was in the library. Of course, it wouldn’t be easy. They’d have to figure out a way to transfer the data points, draw the circumference, and pinpoint the center without marking up the map.

  One problem at a time.

  Besides, this might all be for nothing. She was treating the hill like an epicenter of the flashes, but maybe there was no correlation whatsoever. Correlation didn’t always equal causation, or so her science and math teachers had always said.

  She scanned the more immediate vicinity, which included Wink’s one-story robin egg blue house, her Oldsmobile, and several trees. As she turned, Ella’s eyes fell on a roof, partially obscured by tall Douglas-firs and lodgepole pines.

  She’d forgotten that the professor lived up here. Come to think of it, she’d passed his driveway before climbing up Wink’s. She hadn’t seen the old man in a while, which wasn’t all too surprising since he was a veritable hermit.

  Although brusque and quite peculiar, she was fond of him. Well, not really fond, so much as, didn’t dislike him. Indifferent, really. He seemed like the crazy, cantankerous uncle that showed up at family gatherings. His appearance greatly resembled that of a character in one of her favorite movies: Dr. Emmett Brown, more affectionately known as Doc, from Back to the Future, played by the great Christopher Lloyd.

  She allowed herself a moment of nostalgia and mourning over the decline of Hollywood movies before sauntering up Wink’s steps. At the top, she paused, her hand gripping the white rail.

  What did she know about the professor? Other than the fact that he looked like a mad scientist with a shock of crazy white hair, glasses, and unkempt clothes, she knew his real name was Dr. Kaufman—first name, unknown.

  He also spoke with a German accent. He was as reclusive as a billionaire and as warm as a blizzard, but in a socially inept kind of way, rather than a crusty old-man routine. She’d been to his house once, along with Chapman and Will.

  Also, he used an absurd amount of electricity, about 1,500 kWh a month, if memory served correct. Will had mentioned the exorbitant power consumption might be related to the professor’s equipment.

  What equipment a theoretical physicist needed, she could only guess at. She’d always thought most of their work happened in their heads and on blackboards, but up until recently, she’d also thought socks with Birkenstocks was a bad idea. And she’d been wrong about that, so maybe she was wrong about his equipment needs.

  After knocking, Wink hollered for Ella to let herself in. Weavin
g around the couch, using her nose to guide her to the savory aroma of dinner, she stepped into the kitchen and surveyed the small dining table shoved against the wall.

  “I thought we’d agreed upon nothing fancy.” Her eyes went from lasagna Alfredo to buttery garlic green beans to blackberry upside-down cake.

  “No, you agreed upon that. And this wasn’t much trouble. I would’ve made it for myself anyway.”

  Ella pointed a finger at the dessert, her face pinching dubiously. “That. You would’ve made that for yourself?”

  The diner owner nodded, but her cheeks turned pink. Ella sighed, wistfully looking over the spread and wishing, not for the first time, that she could do more in a kitchen than set it on fire. Then again, if she were any kind of decent cook, she’d be at least a hundred pounds heavier since, when it came to food, she had no willpower to speak of.

  “Well, it smells amazing. Looks like I won’t be having a second dinner of meatloaf tonight. Sorry, Rose.”

  The chair scraped across the floor as Ella pulled it out and sat. Wink shot her a curious expression before she scooted to the refrigerator to retrieve a pitcher of iced tea.

  “I have a question for you,” Ella said, serving up her plate. “Do you own a Bedazzler or something?”

  “What’s that?”

  Ella picked up her fork and began to stab it into her food before noticing that her friend had yet to seat herself. Her stomach growled in protest, but, in the end, manners won out.

  She used her woefully barren fork to point at Wink’s outfit. “The rhinestones. The jewels. All of that bling happening right there.”

  After glancing down then back up, Wink beamed. “Isn’t it a dilly? I got it at a clothing swap.”

  “I didn’t know overalls could be dressed up. I was wrong.” That still didn’t answer the larger question of how Wink managed to own so many outfits with rhinestones.

  The older woman placed two glasses of iced tea on the table then dug through a drawer for some cloth napkins. The moment her boss’s bottom hit her chair, Ella plunged her fork into her food and stuffed a fat bite of steaming lasagna into her mouth, searing off several tastebuds. It was while she was fanning herself, resisting the urge to spit the food back out, that she realized Wink’s hands were folded in silent prayer.

  Ella froze.

  Finishing with an “Amen,” Wink unfolded her napkin and placed it on her lap. “Stew’s trying to get me to say grace more often. I think he figures it’ll counteract all the bad points I’ve accumulated from being around Flo.”

  Ella swallowed, her eyes watering from the pain. Her tongue had turned into sandpaper. “Cool beans.”

  “Oh dear. Are they cold?”

  “Huh?” Ella’s gaze fell to the beans. “Not those beans.”

  “Well, there aren’t any baked beans.”

  “No, it means—” she waved her hand in front of her face “—doesn’t matter.”

  She spent a quiet minute struggling to get a very long string of cheese onto her fork. A tossing motion failed, resulting in string flying onto the table cloth, so she resorted to using her fingers. With the majority of it finally in her mouth and a portion of it dangling from her lips, she searched for the best way to segue into her reason for being there.

  She swallowed and extracted a bit of cheese stuck to her shirt. “Wink? What do you know—chocolate donuts!”

  Chester had leaped up onto Ella’s lap from nowhere. The gray squirrel’s tail flipped angrily, and he chittered at her in his rapid rodent tongue that she was sure was a string of insults about her and her future progeny.

  “What did I do?” She held her hands up, leaning back to put distance between them in case he’d gone rabid. “And why is he wearing a nun habit?”

  Wink didn’t seem all that concerned about what was happening. Her gaze flicked up from her plate. “It’s a panda costume.”

  “Where? There?” Ella pointed at Chester’s outfit, earning a nod from the older woman. “A panda? Did you suddenly forget how to sew?”

  One of Wink’s penciled eyebrows rose, and she leaned in, narrowly avoiding the bib of her jewel-encrusted overalls taking a dip in her lasagna. “I’ll have you know, that was a gift.”

  “From a child?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” Wink leaned back and dabbed her mouth, averting her gaze. “Mrs. Fuller made it for him.”

  “The blind lady?” A tinge of guilt wiggled in Ella’s chest for ragging on the efforts of the older woman.

  “She’s not blind. She can see… shapes. Dessert?” Wink picked up her plate and reached for Ella’s before Ella snatched it away.

  “I’m not finished. And yes, of course, I want dessert.”

  She jiggled her legs, hoping that creating an earthquake under Chester would get him to go away. It wasn’t that she didn’t like the varmint—she begrudgingly found him cute—but the way he was staring at her right now was unnerving. Like she was the only cookie at a buffet of vegetables.

  “What’s his deal?”

  “He probably smells Fluffy. They got into it the other night at family dinner before you and Will arrived.”

  Ella scraped the remnants of her food off her plate then nudged the dishware towards the blackberry upside down cake. “Got into it, how?”

  Wink scooped out a generous helping. “Chester jumped onto the table to get some pineapple, and Fluffy followed. Don’t know why Jimmy and Rose made such a big deal about it, though. If you ask me, they’re both wound a bit tight, but that’s between us.” She sat again, settling in with her cake. “Besides, it’s not like Jimmy’s got much hair up top to lose anyway.”

  “What’s his hair have to do with it?”

  Wink studied a blackberry rather closely. “Well, mind you, Chester was scared on account of that Maine coon. He jumped onto Jimmy’s head.”

  Ella winced before shooting the squirrel in her lap an accusatory look. Reaching over him, she picked up her fork.

  “Also,” Wink said, her voice dropping, “he may have relieved himself at the same time.”

  Ella snorted into her cake, the noise finally scaring off the rodent. The little nun scampered across the floor to the corner. At least that explained why Chester had been sleeping in Wink’s lap, probably exhausted from the ordeal.

  “Well, I’m sorry I missed that.” She took a moment to savor the treat, the tart burst of fruit pairing with the moist richness of the cake. “My gosh, Wink, this is amazing.”

  Once again, she tried to broach the topic of the time jumps. “Can I ask you something?” At Wink’s approval, she proceeded. “Up here, on the hill, during a flash, is it different?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Do you notice anything different than, say, down in town?”

  The older woman’s face scrunched up in consideration. “Nothing comes to mind.”

  Ella masked her disappointment by shoveling another bite of dessert into her mouth. Across from her, Wink’s fork stopped mid-way to her lips, the woman’s expression morphing.

  “Actually, that’s not entirely true. I know it sounds strange, but I feel different, sort of dragged down. It’s a silly thing to bring up.”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Then there’s the radio.”

  “What about it?”

  “Well, I don’t turn it on all that often. When there’s only one local station that plays the same ol’ worn out tunes, you tend not to listen anymore. But I had it on one day to hear the radio show the local drama club puts on.

  “While it was playing, the town jumped… to some frozen tundra location. This was about five years back, I think. Anyway, the radio goes all funny.” Her eyes slid shut a moment as if searching for the right adjectives. “Like the voices were being stretched. They went low and slow.”

  Her lids popped up like shutters, and she shrugged her bony shoulders. “Probably nothing but a glitch in the tower.”

  “Did you ever notice it again?”

  Wink was sl
ow to respond. “Yes. I had the radio on another time during a jump. I was in my kitchen here, warming milk before going to bed, and the radio did it again. The trumpet player’s notes elongated, sounded like a car horn dying.

  “Also,” she added, warming to the topic, “Chester gets more agitated as opposed to when we’re in town during a flash.”

  Ella’s partially-eaten dessert sat forgotten as she churned over this new information. The town’s jumping came to two possibilities: either a natural phenomenon or human orchestration.

  All this time, she’d been leaning on the former, but what if it was the latter? If the jumps were intentional, then it was a strong possibility that the epicenter had something to do with them. It was a big supposition, but it’s all she had to go on. Logical leaps.

  Sure the west hill had multiple houses on it, but only two were at the top and in the center of the circle. And only one resident had the know-how. She’d bet her cell phone that Wink didn’t know the first thing about time travel which left one person.

  But hadn’t he led the charge to try to figure out the jumps, to try to stop them? Why lie?

  One thing was clear, she needed to find out all she could about Dr. Kaufman.

  By the time she returned to the inn, it was nearing ten o’clock in the evening. She’d stayed at Wink’s for a while, playing cards and defending the merits of having a microwave.

  Before going upstairs, she stopped at the front desk, leaning on the mahogany top while picking up the antique phone. Using the rotary dial, she called up Will’s number, hoping to catch him before bed.

  While the other end of the line rang in her ear, whispering footsteps shuffled past her as Jimmy walked from the north hallway, across the cavernous entrance hall, to the south hallway. He clutched his stomach, burping, and smelling of something fierce. Clearly, he’d lost the meatloaf standoff.

  As he disappeared in the direction of his bedroom, Will’s rich voice came on the line. She quickly told him about her dinner with Wink and asked him what he knew about the professor.