“Ty’s doing good. He’s a little angel now that he’s gotten into a sleeping rhythm.” Lauren tapped a page in her recipe book. “I think we’ll do chocolate cupcakes this week. With a raspberry coulis. Oh, and we’ll do eggs over easy, omelets, fresh-baked bread, bacon, and sausages for breakfast. What do you think?”
I rolled up my sleeves and slipped an apron from the peg on the wall. “Just tell me what you need me to do.”
“Right. Let’s get working on the cupcakes batter and the bread dough.” Lauren checked her watch. “We’ll have to make it quick. We only have a couple hours to proof it.”
Breakfast was at 9am this morning, and I was already starving. I distracted myself by following Lauren’s instructions exactly. We’d fallen into an easy pattern in the kitchen—Lauren enjoyed controlling how things were made, and I was useless at reading and following recipes. So, she told me exactly what she wanted, and I followed her words exactly.
As a result, I’d made some pretty great dishes with only minor defects. Still, cooking and cleaning beat dealing with moody guests. It was easier to maintain my cover in here.
The fact that I found it difficult to maintain my cover reminded me of Smulder’s words—that maybe I wasn’t cut out to be an agent. Ever since we’d received news of Kyle’s knowledge of my whereabouts, I’d been obsessing over what I’d do once he was caught. Stay in Gossip? Leave for good? Could I do that?
This was the first time I’d found a home in my adult life.
I cleared my throat, distracting myself from the existential crisis. “How are things going with Jason?” I asked.
Lauren’s cheeks flushed, but she didn’t shift her focus from the bread dough she kneaded on the counter. “Fine. I guess. We’ve been in couples counseling for over a month now, and he still doesn’t get it.”
“What?”
“That what he did was out of order.”
“Hiding in the cabin in the woods?”
“Exactly.” Lauren pounded the dough with her fists. “He doesn’t see it as a selfish. He thinks I wanted to be on my own with Ty.”
A month ago, Lauren’s husband, Jason, had lied to her about his business trips, and hidden out in a cabin on the edge of the inn’s grounds because he couldn’t ‘handle’ the responsibility and exhaustion that had come with having baby Ty.
It was abhorrent.
“You deserve better.” I struggled to keep my mouth shut about this. “I know it’s none of my business, Lauren, but I can’t believe Jason did that to you.” Lauren had no idea that I was a spy or that my grandmother had been, but I was close to her, and it was… different.
I hadn’t let anyone close in my previous life. Shoot, the only person I’d let anywhere near me was my ex-husband and look how that had turned out.
“I can’t believe it either,” Lauren said after a beat.
We fell into silence again, apart from when she told me what to do, and at around 9:00 a.m., I started taking platters of food out to the long table set up at the front of the dining area. Guests had already taken their seats at glossy wooden tables, many of them having helped themselves to coffee from the station at the front of the room.
The floorboards creaked underfoot as I collected a coffee pot and did my rounds, offering to refill cups here or there. I knew most of the guests currently staying at the inn—hazard of not being allowed to leave and my grandmother’s insistence that I play nice.
A pair of identical ladies—twins, obviously—sat at the table in front of the grand windows looking out on the inn’s front lawn. They were both blonde. One had cut her hair into a severe bob, while the other wore it long and twirled into a fancy creation on top of her head. Their blue eyes looked everywhere but at each other.
“Good morning,” I said. “My name is Charlotte, and I’m here to help you if you need anything.” The line had become practiced after this much time in the inn.
“Oh, hello,” the twin with the bob said.
They were in their early thirties? Late twenties? I assessed them, but they didn’t seem threatening, and I highly doubted my ex-husband could pull off a disguise this well. Unless his contacts had started manufacturing human skin suits.
Gross.
“Forgive my sister,” the twin with the elaborate hairstyle said. “I’m Kayla and that’s Josephine. We’re Warts.”
“I… beg pardon?”
“It’s our last name,” Josephine snapped, scratching her neck furiously. She’d left several raw red scrape marks behind. What was that about? Stress reaction? “It’s not uncommon.”
“Why do you have such an attitude problem today?” Kayla asked, gesturing for me to fill up her empty cup.
I did as she’d asked, watching the interaction between the sisters. The mirrored anger was especially disconcerting.
“Can I help you ladies with anything else?” I asked.
“We’re good.” Josephine’s tone was a dismissal, and I backed away from the potential nuclear reaction about to take place at the table.
I turned and nearly walked into Brian, my handsome agent-posing-as-a-gardener boyfriend. I smiled up at him. “Hello,” I said. “How are you?”
Brian’s face usually lit up when he saw me, but his expression remained blank. Did he have news from the undercover agents around the inn? He usually served as the liaison between Special Agent in Charge Grant and me, and now was no different.
“We need to talk,” he said. “Soon.”
“I’m kind of in the middle of breakfast at the moment.” I forced a bright smile. Whatever Brian wanted to talk about, I wasn’t in the mood for it. I could tell from the way he kept his face completely still that he was not happy with me.
Funny how I’d grown so used to him that I could read his moods even without facial expressions.
“All right. We’ll talk later. You know where to find me.” And then he left me to complete the breakfast service.
A shout rang out from the Wart table—there was a strange turn of phrase—and I rolled my eyes.
More cats to herd.
3
I hadn’t caught up with Brian for the rest of the day. That was in part by design—I didn’t want to have an argument when my mood was already terrible. Evening had come, and I changed into my striped PJs and cotton robe after a welcome bubble bath.
Cocoa Puff lay purring on the end of my bed, and I ran a brush through my now short hair—I’d cut it a month ago because I’d hated the long, dark curls that had been a part of my cover. I stared at my reflection in the mirror of my dressing table, my fist tightening around my brush handle.
“Oh stop.” I slammed my brush onto the dressing table.
Cocoa flicked his tail at me but didn’t quit purring.
“There’s nothing you can do,” I said, pointing at my reflection. “You can’t go out there and hunt for him.” Not with the NSIB watching my every move.
But I couldn’t stand the waiting either.
Had I not been patient for months now? Waited while the NSIB tried hunting Kyle down and failed continuously. Now what? I had to trust them to handle the situation when they hadn’t even—
A knock came at my bedroom door, and I tensed.
I quietly slid open my dressing table drawer and removed the false bottom. My grandmother had given me a pistol, just in case. I strapped it to my waist, then pulled my robe close so it wouldn’t be noticeable.
Chances were, my ex-husband hadn’t managed to sneak past all the agents, infiltrate the inn, and get past my grandmother—she was the last layer of protection that he wouldn’t break. Still, better to be safe than sorry.
I approached the door, one hand on my gun, and opened it a crack.
Brian stared at me through the gap.
“Oh,” I said. “Sorry. I forgot about earlier.” A lie, but I’d grown used to telling white lies in the past while. Not a good thing to do when it was your boyfriend, though. I sniffed. “Actually, if I’m honest, I didn’t want to talk to you today. I
didn’t need the stress, and you looked angry.”
“That a gun under your robe?”
“I’ve the right to defend myself,” I said.
“No one said you don’t have that right, Charlie.” Smulder sighed and entered my bedroom, still dressed in his plaid work shoot and blue jeans. “We need to talk. Now.”
“OK, come in by all means.” I glared at the back of his head. Months had passed, yet he’d maintained that cookie cutter agent hairstyle. Brian rarely pushed his way into my room or got bossy with me. He knew better than that.
“Grandpa was going to give you a weapon,” Brian said.
“Oh really? Last I checked Grandpa thought it would be too dangerous for me to have a weapon.” Grant thought it would blow my cover. He didn’t trust that I wouldn’t do something irrational. Like solve another murder. Or save someone’s life. Both had happened in the past few months.
“We spoke yesterday morning,” Brian continued, stiffly, “and he mentioned wanting to give you a pistol. But when we spoke today, he’d changed his mind. Any idea why that is?”
I locked the bedroom door and removed my pistol, placing it and its strap and holster on top of my dressing table for now. No need to show Smulder where I kept it.
That’s silly. He’s your boyfriend.
But I’d learned that Brian always did the right thing. Even if it meant hurting me, he would tell the NSIB about my hidden stash, and that would start a cascade of interactions that led to the discovery of my grandmother’s secret armory.
I’d kept Brian from telling them about the armory by pleading. It was only a matter of time before he broke.
“What’s up?” I asked. “You look as if someone squeezed lemon juice into your milk.”
“Yeah, I’m not in the best mood. And I waited to talk to you all day, Charlie. All day. But you didn’t show up.”
“Like I said, I wasn’t in the headspace to get into it with you today.” And I wasn’t in the headspace to fight now, either. Unless it was with my ex and with hand-to-hand combat. “Brian, I don’t want to cut you off, but I don’t have the capacity for—”
“What did you do last night that made Grant change his mind?” Brian asked. “Don’t lie to me Charlie, I know it was something serious or he wouldn’t have changed his mind about equipping you with a weapon.”
Grant had asked his agent lackeys to check our pockets last night, and he’d found my grandmother’s grapple gun and length of cord. Thankfully, they hadn’t detected her state-of-the-art microphones and earpieces, but trust was at an all-time low.
“Brian.”
“Cut it out,” he grunted. “Just tell me. I’m your boyfriend. You’re meant to trust me with these things.”
“And you’re meant to respect my privacy.”
He recoiled. “I do. I respect your privacy but not when it comes to life-or-death situations. You endangered yourself and—”
“And you think coming up here and yelling about it will make things better? That it will pull me into line? In your experience, when has that ever worked with me? I’ll do what I think is right, Brian, just like you do.”
“Charlie—”
“I need a breath of fresh air,” I said, tightening my robe around my middle and walking for the bedroom door. “We can talk when you’ve calmed down.”
I ignored his calls and exited into the upstairs hallway. I made my way down to the ground floor. It was late, and the kitchen was dark, the only light from the antique chandelier in the foyer. Whenever I needed space to think, I’d go to the most peaceful place in the Gossip Inn. The library.
I entered it. The tall bookcases stocked with literature of every type welcomed me, and I plopped down in one of the velvet green chairs, gaze on the empty fireplace. I was too lazy to start a fire, and it was too warm of an evening for it, anyway.
This is ridiculous.
How had every decision I’d made in my life led up to this moment? Where had I gone wrong? Was it when I’d joined the NSIB? Or when I’d met Kyle for the first time and accepted his offer of a date?
Hot tears threatened, and I gulped, forcing down the emotion clogging my throat.
You’re not going to feel sorry for yourself. You’ve been through worse than this.
A heavy thump sounded above my head, and dustings of plaster drifted from the ceiling and landed in my lap.
“What the—?” I dusted off the plaster and stood up, staring at the ceiling. Triangulating the position of the noise.
There was nothing above the library except… a secret attic, only accessible by a passage hidden behind a bookcase in here. The Gossip Inn, once a museum, contained secret passages, entrances and exits, many of them unmapped.
I moved to the bookcase in front of the secret passageway and touched it. It drifted open.
Someone must’ve come this way.
My hand darted to my waist, but I’d left my pistol on my dressing table.
I could go back and get it.
What are the chances Kyle would enter the secret attic? It’s not connected to anything other than the library. No, most likely it’s a guest who has found it. That wasn’t an uncommon occurrence. Not too long ago, a little girl had found the attic when she’d been staying here.
I steeled myself and started up the twisting staircase that led to the attic, keeping close to the wall to prevent creaking of the boards. I lowered myself into a crouch, adrenaline coursing through my veins. My muscles tensed.
I reached the top of the stairs, and the air whooshed from my lungs.
A length of rope had been tied to the rafters. Jordan Ames hung from the end of it.
4
I’d called 911 first, and then I’d put in an emergency call to Special Agent in Charge Grant. It was necessary to give him warning. When the ambulance and the local police turned up, they would need to withdraw or risk revealing themselves.
The mission was critical. If Kyle realized I was protected by the NSIB, he would never strike. And we couldn’t trust that he hadn’t infiltrated the local police or sheriff’s department.
“—Charlie?” Detective Crowley, the handsome detective who handled major crime investigations for Gossip and the rest of the small Texas county, peered up into my face. There was no suspicion in his expression. Only concern. “You drifted off.”
“Sorry,” I said, pinching the bridge of my nose. “It’s been a long night.”
We were seated at a table in the Gossip Inn’s dining room. Most of the guests had been awoken by the commotion downstairs. The Wart sisters had been particularly distressed by the news of Jordan’s passing. They hovered on the first-floor landing, occasionally wandering down a few stairs until they were ushered back up again by my grandmother.
“I can imagine it’s been a long night,” Detective Crowley said, tapping the end of his ballpoint pen against the side of his notepad. “Let’s talk about what happened.”
“Right,” I said, grimly.
I told the detective about the noise from upstairs and how I’d discovered the hinged bookcase, the staircase, and, ultimately, the body.
Detective Crowley took notes, his dark eyes squinched up. “Tell me, did you see anything that could’ve caused the noise?” he asked.
“Caused it?”
“Yeah,” Detective Crowley said. “If Mr. Ames had decided to… well, you know, hang himself, he would’ve needed to use a chair or object to reach the noose.”
I grimaced, mostly to maintain my cover of terrified maid. “Oh, I see. No, there was no sign of a chair or anything else that might’ve made that noise. Detective, do you think someone else did this?”
“I can’t comment on that, Miss Smith.” Stiff professionalism had finally arrived. Detective Crowley cleared his throat. “Did Mr. Ames seem unhappy to you at all?”
“Unhappy?” I cast my mind back. “No. Not really. He was content in the kitten foster center. He enjoyed his job, and he was well fed, and had a roof over his friend. He got on with prett
y much everyone, except…”
“Except?”
Shoot, I didn’t want to throw Hannah under the bus. “He’d been having arguments with Hannah Greerson lately. She’s the new assistant in the center.” I scratched the underside of my chin. “But she’s tiny. No way she’d be able to fight Jordan and string him up like that.”
Detective Crowley frowned at my nonchalance.
“I mean,” I cleared my throat. “She’s not strong enough to, uh, have done something as horrifying as what happened to Jordan.”
Detective Crowley’s frown remained, but he nodded. “Anything else you’ve noticed that might’ve been odd lately?”
You mean, apart from the secret agents watching my every move? “Nothing,” I said. “It’s been peaceful around here.”
Detective Crowley stared at me for a couple of seconds. “Are you OK, Charlie?”
“Me? Yeah, why?”
“I haven’t seen you around town lately.”
“Oh. Yeah, I’ve been busy with work, and the—uh, the kittens keep my pretty busy too. They’re needy little balls of fluff. Adorable, though.” I flashed him a smile, but it didn’t seem like he was buying it. “Do you need anything else, detective?”
“No, that’s it. For now.” He thanked me for my time, and I left him to his investigation.
I joined my grandmother at the base of the stairs. She drew me off to one side, her sharp gaze sweeping up the stairs to the Wart sisters, ensuring they didn’t break the rules. A police line had been placed over the doorway to the library.
“What did Crowley say?” I asked. “About the inn being a crime scene again.”
“He said they’ll cordon off the library again. Seal it up and go from there. It’s suspicious until they prove it was suicide.”
“But it wasn’t,” I said.
“Of course not.” Gamma’s reply was instant. “Jordan was happy as a clam. He had no reason to do this.”
“Do you think it’s connected to my friend?” I asked.
“Potentially.” Gamma knew by now that my ‘friend,’ was my ex-husband. “The circumstances are too suspicious to ignore. Jordan was familiar with the private entrances and exits of the inn. He might’ve gone up to the attic but…”
Chocolate Chills (A Mission Inn-possible Cozy Mystery Book 6) Page 2