Shivers of Murder

by Gretchen Allen

  “Yeah, I’ve been thinking about it a lot actually. I have quite a bit of time on my hands, believe it or not,” Cyndee chuckled softly.

  “Wow. I wouldn’t have guessed. You seem like you’ve got a lot on your plate,” Yvette told the other woman, imagining just how busy April kept her on a daily basis.

  “I am busy, but I also put this business ahead of everything else in my life. I don’t really have any family to speak of, and I’m basically April’s indentured servant. I feel that it’s best if I just keep myself busy by getting lost in the job.” Cyndee swirled the liquid in her cup before taking another sip. “I just happen to complete the tasks I have very quickly so I have time to add even more to my plate.”

  “As long as you’re enjoying yourself.” Yvette knew what being a workaholic was like, but the thought of doing a job that she hated was something she couldn’t understand.

  “I get by.” Cyndee smiled. “Anyway, it was good to talk with you. I’d say maybe we could do it again sometime, but I’m not sure how much longer we’ll be in town.

  “Hopefully you get to go home soon, and everything gets figured out. Again, I’m so sorry for your loss.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Yvette hadn’t been awake for more than five minutes when she heard her cellphone ringing. With one eye open, she batted her nightstand looking for it. Having no luck, she was forced to get out of bed. Digging to the bottom of the sheets, she finally found her phone. When she’d fallen asleep the night before, she had been scrolling a variety of social media sites, looking for anything she could find about April and Cyndee.

  “Hello,” she mumbled. “Hello?” she said again when no one responded.

  Pulling the phone from her ear, Yvette looked at the screen. Just as she was about to go back to the caller ID to see who had called, the phone let out a little ding. A text from Heath.

  “How many times do I have to tell you something before you take me seriously?”

  Yvette wasn’t sure what he meant. Had Nate told him what she said? Certainly that didn’t require a text before 8 A.M. Deciding to put the thought aside while she showered and had some coffee, Yvette set her phone down and began her day, hoping to get it started off on the right foot.

  About thirty minutes later, Yvette was feeling refreshed and ready for her coffee. Planning on having her first cup out on the porch, she set her coffee maker to brew while she ran back upstairs to grab her phone. Three more missed called from Heath had come in while she was in the shower. Sighing, she took her coffee to the porch to call him back. Something was obviously wrong.

  “Why are you so hard to get a hold of?” Heath bellowed from the stairs.

  “I was just about to call you back. Is something wrong?” Yvette stopped in her tracks standing in the doorway.

  “No one is hurt. Yet. But at the rate you’re going, I might not be able to say that next time.” Health shook his head, coming the rest of the way up the steps.

  “What are you talking about? Did you just threaten me?” Yvette joked.

  “This isn’t funny. I’ve told you time and time again to let me do my job in peace. I’m grateful that we’ve had several cases solved and just because you had a hand in that, doesn’t mean I’m eager for it to continue happening. Believe it or not, I am a trained professional and can do this on my own.” Heath’s voice was stern.

  “Okayyyy…” Yvette gestured for Heath to take a seat with her on the porch.

  “You have to stop getting involved, or I’m going to have to arrest you for impeding an investigation.”

  “Is this about Nate?”

  “No. This is about you. You getting yourself involved in places you don’t belong. You asking my son for help. You going to your moms to look for information… you creeping around and talking to the people from the tour company. The list goes on and on, yet, none of these things should be happening.”

  “Nate told me what you said, and I agreed I’d keep him out of it. I have been to my mother’s home because she’s my mother. And, I was not creeping around. I was out for a walk which, the last time I checked, wasn’t illegal. I ran into Cyndee, and we had a cup of coffee in public,” Yvette defended herself.

  “So, you agreed to keep him out of it, but that doesn’t mean you agreed to that for yourself.” Heath took a deep breath, clearly losing patience. “Yvette, I care about you. You’ve been like family to me for more than thirty years. I was at the hospital the day you were born…”

  “I get it. But I stand by the fact that I didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “These folks are leaving your mother’s this afternoon. I think it’s in your best interest to stay away from there until they’re gone. I’ve got an officer there right now overseeing everything with instructions to call me if you show up.”

  “I don’t even know what to say to you right now. You’re treating me like I’m a criminal,” Yvette muttered.

  “I’m not. I’m trying to keep you, and everyone else in this town, safe.”

  “Fine. For what it’s worth, I think you should check out April a little further. Everything points to her, and she has a weird vibe, even if that’s not what solves a murder,” Yvette offered her thoughts to Heath, certain he didn’t want them.

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” Heath said. “I’m serious though, Yvette. Please don’t forget that.”

  “Nice to see you as always. Don’t forget to bring the sides to Thanksgiving dinner,” Yvette added, knowing full well she was acting like a child. Heath wasn’t there as her father’s best friend, he was there as an officer of the law. She knew he was capable, but she also knew that she’d been helpful in solving the last few cases as well. At the end of the day, though, Yvette had no desire to get arrested.

  Watching Heath walk down the pathway to his vehicle, Yvette sipped her coffee switching her brain from trying to solve a murder mystery to remembering that she was about to lose at least two employees very soon.

  She still hadn’t spoken to Joey about what Amelia had told her. Avoiding it wasn’t the best option, but hearsay, even if it came from her best friend, wasn’t something that Yvette wanted to rely on. She’d already put an ad in the paper, a note on Sundae Afternoon’s website, and had her parents on the lookout for her. She’d brought home the applications as well and had entirely forgotten about them. Taking a breath, she realized that she’d been more worried about who could have killed Jason than doing her job. That meant Heath was right. She had no business getting involved if it meant she’d be taking herself away from what was really important. Heading inside for a second cup of coffee and to get the applications from her bag, Yvette couldn’t pack away the stinging thought that both April and Cyndee had a pretty strong motive to kill Jason.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Are you glad they’re gone?” Yvette asked her mother when she’d stepped inside her childhood home.

  “Very. I’m just happy that they’ll be long gone by the time your father gets back. He’s due home in a few hours,” Abigail replied.

  “He may have known about it, but I don’t wanna be around when he gets here,” Yvette joked.

  “He knows how I am, and I made it out alive, so all is well,” Abigail grinned.

  “Mom! I know you’re trying to make light of the situation, but that’s horrible.”

  “It’s all over now. They are gone, and I’m perfectly safe. Now, we wait. I tried calling Heath this morning, but he said he had to call me back. I heard a voice shouting in the background that sounded an awful lot like Cyndee’s. So, I did a little investigating of my own.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I didn’t do anything but call April to see if there was anything I could do for her now that they were gone. I told her that I’d gotten close to them and wanted to make sure they were all set where they were staying.”

  “So, you lied?” Yvette chuckled.

  “Sure did. I just wanted to know if I was right and that it was Cyndee’s voice I heard and boy,
was I right. Heath brought her in for questioning,” Abigail said, looking satisfied. “April was annoyed that it interrupted her day having her assistant be taken away from her. I mean, how much work are they really doing while they’re here?”

  “No wonder Heath was mad at me!” Yvette nodded her head.

  “Mad at you? What did you do?” Abigail asked.

  “I had coffee with Cyndee, and somehow Heath found out. He was probably keeping an eye on her and saw us. If he has some sort of evidence it was her and saw me hanging out with her, it makes sense that he’d be upset.”

  “Hanging out with her? Really, Yvette?”

  “Oh, please. You let them live here. I didn’t ask her to meet me for crying out loud, I just ran into her and used it to my advantage. I learned quite a bit about her and everyone else in the short time that we were together.”

  “You think it was her then?” Abigail raised a brow.

  “Could be. She had some crazy plan for everyone, and with Jason gone, that plan certainly could have come to fruition. But, she’s just so nice.”

  “Nice? She’s nice, so she can’t be a killer?”

  Yvette laughed at her mother’s antics. “No, she’s nice but unlikely the killer because she’s like four feet tall and it seems like a reach to think she’d be able to do it physically.”

  “That makes sense, but Heath doesn’t seem to agree or he’d not have brought her in,” Abigail pointed out.

  “I think she has a motive, but I don’t think she did it. I think April makes the most sense.” Yvette opened the fridge, looking for a drink.

  “She’s not that much bigger than Cyndee, though.”

  “True, but she’s scrappy, and if you’ve been living your life in your less successful brother’s shadow, that might be a reason to be angry enough to do it anyway.”

  “Imagine.” Abigail shook her head. “Imagine being second to someone that achieved less than you? She took over the company, on top of the education she got and the awards she won, and Jason barely made it out of trade school on his own, but he was still their parent’s favorite.”

  “I’m just glad I’m an only child,” Yvette teased. “Really though, I can’t imagine. No matter how competitive you are, it’s just crazy to think what people are capable of. I also think it’s really interesting how much you know about these people.”

  “I feel terrible for their parents. Losing a child has to be so difficult,” Abigail said, frowning.

  “I feel bad for all of them. One is most likely a killer, and the rest just lost someone close to them. Any way you look at it, it kinda stinks,” Yvette stated.

  “Enough of that. What are you up to today?” Abigail asked her daughter.

  “I don’t know. I’m not working, but I may stop in for a bit to set up a few interviews for the end of the week.”

  “You know I’ll help out if I can. I’d like to think I can scoop some ice cream with the best of ‘em.” Abigail flexed her bicep.

  “Oh, gosh, Mom,” Yvette laughed. “I may take you up on that if I can’t find anyone soon. Other than that, the only thing I wanted to get done today was a bit of grocery shopping.”

  “Me, too. Those people ate me out of house and home. I was planning on going out this morning to do it, but then I got the call that they were all leaving so I decided to stick around in case any of them got the bright idea to take along something that wasn’t theirs.”

  “You think they’d steal from you?” Yvette gasped.

  “Never know,” Abigail shrugged.

  “Interesting logic. Worried they’d steal but not that they’d kill you in your sleep…”

  “Funny. I’m glad I stayed though. Shannon and Patrick spent the whole morning arguing, and it was pretty entertaining to see. Patrick even told April off when she tried to get involved. I’m pretty sure that was a first for her. She doesn’t seem like the type that happens to very often.”

  “Jeez. I keep forgetting about Shannon. She was quite the character. Acted as though anything that wasn’t a basic need was out of the question. I understand being frugal, but it’s nice to work hard and be able to enjoy a treat every now and then.” Yvette got up and went to the notepad on the wall by the phone to pull a piece of paper off for her grocery list.

  “She kept to herself for the most part while she was here. She rarely even left her room. I had her and Patrick staying in your old room and Cyndee and April sharing the guest room.”

  “When she was at Sundae Afternoon she seemed pretty boisterous,” Yvette said, recalling how she’d told Patrick what he could and couldn’t order.

  “I need to stop. We both do. This is silly and not something I should be worrying about. This is the sort of thing my book club does on mystery week. It’s not meant to be a real-life situation.”

  Yvette knew that it was best to stop the conversation while she was ahead. Her mother enjoyed following along and picking out clues, but it was a real-life situation, and she knew how her mom could be. She’d get even more involved than Yvette had herself, and the thought of that was something Yvette couldn’t bear.

  “Agreed. I’m heading out to shop, want to come with me?”

  “I’m going to stay here and wait for your father. If I don’t see you before then, I’ll see ya Sunday for dinner.” Abigail gave her daughter a quick hug and retreated upstairs leaving her daughter alone in the kitchen.

  Too bad they are all gone because this would be the best time to poke around a little. Yvette thought to herself as she gathered her grocery list and her purse and left the house.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The next morning, Yvette decided to arrive at work a couple of hours early. She had several applications to go over and wanted to work on the next edition of the Inside Scoop. While she was working, she’d indulge in another one of the hot ice cream floats. She’d had her fair share of them during the tour, she enjoyed them so much that she was ready for another one before her actual shift started.

  Standing in front of the ice cream display case, after brewing a pot of coffee for her float, Yvette perused all of the flavors that were in stock that week. She wanted to try something different since they’d just received a delivery order the day before. Weighing her options, she narrowed it down to Crispy Caramel and Eggnog Cream. She’d never been a huge fan of eggnog as a beverage, but the ice cream flavor wasn’t so bad. Deciding to give it a whirl, she pulled out a single scoop of the Eggnog Cream ice cream and dropped it down inside a mug. She poured the freshly brewed coffee over the top and sprinkled a few bits of raw sugar over the top. Taking a small sip, she was ambivalent. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad. She’d probably never make it for herself again, but she was willing to bet that if eggnog was a flavor you enjoyed that it would be a perfect float.

  Yvette sat down at one of the ice cream cone shaped tables that her father had so lovingly made for her, and glanced up at the big white clock on the wall. Ten minutes until Joey arrived. That meant she was going to have to put her big girl britches on and confront him about what Amelia had told her. She prided herself in being a good boss, but she always appreciated loyalty and the thought that someone was considering leaving Sundae Afternoon and hiding it from her, made her anxious. Taking a few more sips of her concoction, Yvette heard the backdoor close, signaling that Joey had arrived.

  “Didn’t expect to see you here so early,” Joey said, greeting Yvette.

  “I’m early, but I had some things to take care of. Interviews and such, ya know?” Yvette said, awkwardly easing her way into the conversation.

  “I heard about Tonya. I’m really going to miss her.”

  “Me, too. It’s a shame she’s leaving but she needs to be happy. If that means it’s not here then so be it. Don’t you agree?” she asked.

  “I do. Actually, there was something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about, but I wasn’t sure when the right time was, so I’ve been holding off.” Joey took a few steps closer.

  “I already
know, save your breath. Are you leaving too?” Yvette asked, looking at her employee.

  “I applied for another job because I think it’s something that I would enjoy doing and that I’d be good at.”

  “I understand, but I just wish you would have told me. I need to be looking into hiring more people and I’d have preferred to find out from you about this, not someone else.”

  “I didn’t get the job so I’m not going anywhere,” Joey admitted, looking upset. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”