His fists now up near his waist, Derek took a step closer to Rich.
Customers were staring at the three enraged people. This was not the atmosphere we liked in Deputy Donut. Besides, someone might get hurt.
The carafe in my hand was becoming heavy. I held it in front of me like a shield. “Sir,” I said to Derek, “if you’re not going to sit down and stop harassing other customers, I’ll have to ask you to leave.”
Derek turned one hand into a fake revolver, pointed it at Rich, and stated, “You’re going to be sorry for stealing Terri. And she’s going to be sorry she ever snuck around behind my back and made a fool of me.” He marched to the door. Chains on the backs of his scuffed black boots clanked. He slapped the door open with one hand against the glass and stomped outside.
Shoulders shaking, Terri ran toward the ladies’ room.
The other customers in Deputy Donut had been quietly observing the drama. Now they chattered, leaning toward other tables to talk to people whether they knew them or not. Wherever Derek had gone, his ears must have been burning. Cheryl caught my eye, gave her head a quick shake, and mouthed, “Wow.”
I retrieved the two mugs, went to Rich’s table, and poured coffee for him and his date.
Rich’s face was almost purple, and a pulse beat in his neck. He handed me an envelope and spoke quietly but jerkily, as if his anger was affecting his breathing. “The directions to my cottage and the key to the back door are in the envelope. The renovations are a surprise for Terri. I have a date with her tonight, so I can’t meet you at my cottage. Is your talented assistant coming with you, Nina Lapeer?”
“Yes.”
“Excellent! I called one of my former banking clients and told him about her. He has important contacts in the art world, and he trusts my good taste. He’s interested in seeing Nina Lapeer’s work. What do you think of that?”
I gave him a genuine smile. “I like it. Thank you.”
“Hey, I do what I can to help others, especially up-and-comers. That painting of hers that you’re displaying—is it for sale?”
“It is.”
“I’m going to think about where I could put it. It’s too big for any wall in my cottage, but maybe it would fit in my house. What do you think about that idea?”
“It’s great. You can contact The Craft Croft to make the arrangements.”
“Will do. It should be a good investment. That’s the name of my game—quality investments. I’ve done very well with them, so when it comes to renovating my cottage, money’s no object. You and Nina can suggest whatever luxuries you think renters and Terri and I might like, especially in the kitchen. And Nina should keep in mind that I could be in the market for a smaller painting, maybe to go on the wall above the fireplace.”
“I’ll tell her.” I would have to thank Cheryl for causing Rich to visit Deputy Donut.
“I’ll have a look at The Craft Croft to see if I want to buy any of her other work. Meanwhile, you’re bringing donuts to my party tomorrow at eleven fifty-five, aren’t you?”
I tucked the envelope into one of my apron’s wide front pockets. “Yes.”
“You can return the key to me at the party. Tonight, while you’re figuring out what I should have my contractors do, take a platter out of one of the upper kitchen cupboards near the sink. It’s a big platter, so it’s probably near the bottom of the stack. Be careful. It’s fragile, but it’s decorated with sailboats and will be perfect for you to arrange your donuts on. Now, what do you think of that? Perfection!”
I wasn’t sure what I thought of a version of perfection that involved platters at the bottom of undoubtedly teetery stacks of breakable dishes, but I answered, “It sounds good.”
“After the party, you and Nina and I can meet at the cottage and discuss your ideas, and if she has any suitable paintings, she should bring them. Tomorrow night at seven? My party will be over by then.” He quoted what he would pay us. “Plus, I might buy a painting. Or several.”
I decided that I didn’t mind spending the next two evenings playing with decorating and renovating ideas. It should be fun, and Nina could use the publicity. If what Rich had said about telling a former client about her work was true, he’d already been promoting her. I gave him a big smile.
Terri came toward us. She frowned. Her redone makeup did not conceal her red eyes and puffy eyelids.
Rich patted my arm. “Mum’s the word,” he whispered.
I started toward Cheryl and Steve’s table.
Rich pulled out Terri’s chair. She didn’t sit down. “What were you two talking about?” Her voice was shrill.
Rich answered quickly and loudly, “Tomorrow’s party. But don’t you worry your pretty little head about it.”
“Let’s leave, Richie. I don’t feel safe here. He might come back.”
“Rich,” he corrected her.
“Rich.”
I asked Cheryl and Steve if I could bring them anything else. They didn’t have time to answer. Instead of escorting Terri outside, Rich brought her to Cheryl and Steve’s table. “Cheryl, meet Terri. Terri, meet Cheryl.” He looked pointedly at Steve. “And you are?”
“Steve Quail.”
“Well, Steve Quail, congratulations on dating such a sweet little lady. And Cheryl, I hope there are no hard feelings. Since the time two weeks ago that you and I arranged our date for this morning, I reconnected with Terri. I thought I’d lost her years ago. I didn’t want to disappoint you, Cheryl, by breaking my date with you, so I came here to meet you this morning, anyway. Isn’t it great how things turn out?” Cheryl opened her mouth, but before she said anything, Rich announced in hearty and patronizing tones, “You’ve already found someone else.”
Both Cheryl and Steve blushed. Cheryl regained her composure first. “It’s okay, Rich.”
Rich squinted at Steve. “Have we met before? I was a bank manager, with dozens of people coming into my corner office every day.”
Steve looked as uncomfortable as I might be if someone as boomingly annoying as Rich publicly claimed to have a connection with me. But then, Steve’s blush at Rich’s assumption that he and Cheryl were already a couple hadn’t yet subsided. “I don’t think so,” Steve said.
“Tell you what,” Rich burst out. “We can all be friends. I’m having a birthday party tomorrow out at Lake Fleekom. First house you come to at the lake. Noon, for lunch and the afternoon. Why don’t you two join us? No presents, only good wishes.”
Terri nodded. “Yes.” She didn’t exactly sound sincere.
Cheryl glanced at Steve as if for confirmation, then said quietly, “Thank you, Rich. That would be nice.”
Terri reminded Rich, “We were leaving.”
He escorted her out. She had not touched her coffee or her lavishly frosted Boston cream donut.
Chapter 4
Terri wasn’t the only one who didn’t finish a donut. Steve ate his jack-o’-lantern donut, but after he and Cheryl left, I discovered that the two pieces of candy corn that Nina had used as eyes on his jack-o’-lantern donut were underneath his plate’s rim.
We closed for the afternoon at four thirty as usual and made the yeast dough we would need the next morning, including enough for Rich’s Boston cream donuts. I told Nina and Tom that Rich had said he’d talked to a former client who had contacts in the art world.
Nina glanced at me and away again. “Sweet,” she said softly.
Tom asked, “Did Royalson give you a name?”
“No, why? Did you ever arrest any Fallingbrook art connoisseurs?”
Tom studied the ceiling as if Fallingbrook had large numbers of criminal art connoisseurs and their names were written up there. “I can’t think of any at the moment.”
Nina wasn’t afraid to tease him back. “Don’t worry. I won’t spend the millions I expect from my paintings like, oh, about next week.”
“You’re irreplaceable here,” Tom told her. “But by about your second million, we’ll understand if you want to devote all of
your time to painting.”
Nina smiled. “As if. But thanks.”
We placed the yeast dough we’d made into our proofing cabinet and set the temperature and humidity to allow the dough to rise perfectly overnight.
Nina walked home with Dep and me. Dep wore a halter and leash and was good at keeping the pace—her pace. Falling leaves tempted her to practice her hunting skills, which weren’t very good at the best of times. She did catch one leaf. After it landed.
We all trotted up the stairs to the porch of Dep’s and my sweet yellow brick Victorian cottage. Just inside the front door, I took off the wiggly cat’s halter and leash, gave her a quick hug, and set her down on the pine planks of the living room floor. She scampered toward the back of the house where she could, if she wanted, find her food, water, toys, and litter tray. Or she could relax on a wide, cushioned windowsill above a radiator cover in the sunroom and watch squirrels bury acorns.
I locked the house, and Nina and I headed to the driveway. Pointing at the kayak on top of my car, she teased, “You know that the reds of your kayak and your car clash?”
“Yes, and that a kayak on the roof of a fast car makes it look like a slow car. And act more like one, too.”
“You’re never going to drive top speed, anyway.”
I backed carefully out of the driveway. “Don’t count on it.”
“Are you expecting a flood? Or were you planning to paddle to this guy’s cottage?”
I pulled out onto the street. “Good idea. I’ve never gone kayaking on Lake Fleekom. You can balance on the back of the boat with your feet in the water.” More seriously, I added, “I’ve been keeping my kayak on top of the car since midsummer, when I bought it. That way, I can race off for some last-minute kayaking whenever I want to.”
She eyed me slyly. “With your handsome detective.”
“Or by myself. And Brent is not mine. I’ll probably get him to help me put the kayak away for the winter, though. He said I could store it in his garage.” Someday, I hoped to have a garage built beside my own house. “That would be better than trying to heave it over the wall around my yard.”
“You could open a gate.”
“There aren’t any. I have to go through the house to get from the front yard to the back. It’s inconvenient, but nicely safe for both Dep and me.” I turned onto the main road and told Nina that Rich wanted her to pay attention to his cottage’s interior to figure out if any of her paintings would go with the new décor we would plan for his cottage.
“How high are the ceilings?”
“I don’t know, but he said that your painting in Deputy Donut is too big for his cottage but might fit in his house.”
“The one in Deputy Donut is one of my smaller ones. I don’t know if I could paint a canvas that didn’t require a ladder to reach the top. And I’m saving for an even taller ladder.”
She read Rich’s instructions aloud. I turned off the main road and drove down a hill. Lake Fleekom, shimmering in the early evening haze and mostly surrounded by trees, was below us. Even if Rich hadn’t said that his house was the first one we would come to on this road, I probably would have guessed that the imposing two-story stone mini-château with lots of roof angles and chimneys was his.
Nina leaned forward. “That house probably has a few rooms with nice, high ceilings. Look how tall the windows are.”
Sturdy stone posts supported a wrought-iron fence. Ornate gates at both ends of the circular driveway were closed. They were also almost useless—anyone could drive around the ends of the fence, which didn’t extend far beyond the gates. A white party tent was set up near the back of one side of the house, but the grounds sloped down toward the lake, and I could see only the two top peaks of the tent.
But I wasn’t going to Rich’s home until morning. Tonight, we were exploring his cottage.
Nina read aloud, “ ‘Turn right.’ ” She laughed. “Good call. That’s the only direction you can go.”
I had expected the road to divide into two branches in front of Rich’s place, with one branch going left around the lake, and the other going right, but there were only woods to the left. We passed another house, a timber frame one with no fencing in front, and then the road curved left. Not far beyond that, we entered thick woods with boulders approximately the size of commercial fridges and freezers.
Imitating Rich’s boisterous voice and attitude, Nina read, “ ‘At this point, you have to slow down. The pavement ends and the county doesn’t keep the road perfectly maintained.’ ”
We bumped along a gravel road for a half mile before we came to a clearing beside the lake. I read the sign aloud, LAKE FLEEKOM COUNTY PARK. About two dozen cars might fit in the small park’s gravel lot. In a grassy area, an open pavilion featured a stone fireplace and sheltered about ten picnic tables and benches. An old-fashioned water pump was nearby, and I caught a glimpse of outhouses tucked near trees surrounding the lawn. Pointing at the gently sloping sand beach, I said with satisfaction, “There’s a place to launch my kayak.”
Nina offered, “I’ll wait in the picnic shelter.”
With pretend reluctance, I agreed to drive the rest of the way to Rich’s cottage. It couldn’t have been far. From what I’d seen, Lake Fleekom was big enough for a kayaker to enjoy exploring, especially if the kayaker liked to nose around every cove, but it wasn’t huge. We passed what appeared to be someone’s driveway, two ruts with grass between them that disappeared into the woods between the road and the lake. More woods formed a canopy over the road. Rich’s cottage was nestled in the forest on the lake side of the road.
The cottage was cute, if a little unexpected, with its white siding, blue shutters, and dormers in the pitched roof. Nina laughed. “We should have guessed it would be a Cape Cod. Unless there’s no second floor and those dormers are the fake kind perched on the roof above a cathedral ceiling, the walls can’t possibly be tall enough for my paintings.”
“Let’s go see. He told me the key is for the back door.” I pointed toward a charming flagstone path that wound between tall pines toward the right side of the cottage. Unlike the grounds of Rich’s house, which almost shouted “estate home,” this property was like other northern recreational properties with pines, poplars, and white-barked birches that would provide a shady haven on warm days. The air smelled fresh and crisp. Crows cawed and blue jays scolded. At the rear of the cottage and beyond a treed and rocky slope, the lake reflected the pale tangerine sky. I could barely make out the gleaming party tent on the far shore. Closer, a grayish aluminum canoe was upside down on a weathered wooden dock.
A large screened porch spanned half the back of the cottage. The door to the porch was unlocked. We stepped into a summer retreat where four dining chairs surrounded a table and comfy lawn chairs invited guests to relax.
Nina ran her hand down the side of a glass-fronted wooden cabinet next to the door leading into the cottage. “Look. A custom-made cabinet containing handcrafted canoe paddles.” The name ROYALSON had been wood-burned into the shaft of each paddle.
Agreeing that the cabinet and paddles were beautiful, I fit the key into the lock. After jiggling the key and shoving at the door’s upper corner, we managed to enter the kitchen. The cottage had that smoky, damp-linoleum smell of closed-up cottages with wood-burning fireplaces. Except for a couple of holes punched or kicked into walls—possibly the damage that Rich had accused Derek of doing—the interior appeared to be well maintained.
Nina burst out laughing. “If Richmond P. Royalson the Third wants Wisconsinites to feel at home renting here, he should consider decorating with the Packers’ green, gold, and white, not the red, white, and blue of the New England Patriots.”
She took a notebook out of her shoulder bag and started a list. The kitchen was serviceable, but we both would have preferred hardwood or tile to the worn Patriots-red linoleum on the floor. We agreed that new solid-surface counters would be prettier and easier to clean. Rich had said not to worry about cost. Nina a
dded sleek new cabinets to her list. The work triangle was fine, but new appliances and a shiny sink would make cooking more appealing.
In the hallway next to the kitchen, Nina put her hand on a doorknob. “What’s in here?” She opened the door. “Oh! A cute little powder room with a huge window. You can sit on the throne and look out at the lake.”
The powder room had obviously been redone recently, but the dark red ceiling and navy blue walls above white tiles were a little oppressive. We agreed that the powder room didn’t need anything besides paler hues on the walls and ceiling. And maybe white plantation shutters for at least the bottom half of the window.
At the top of the stairs, we found a full bathroom, complete with a tub fitted with a shower. Again, the fixtures and tile were new, but the colors of the walls and ceiling were suitable for a nine-year-old Pats fan.
Two bedrooms, one with a queen-size bed and the other with a pair of twin beds, flanked the bathroom. The ceilings at the front and back of the cottage sloped down to walls that were only about five feet high. Taller people would be able to walk in the centers of the rooms and into the dormers. The hardwood floors needed only refinishing. Bedside rugs would be comfy for toes on cool mornings, and curtains and bedlinens could be modernized.
Nina suggested, “We could recommend a nautical theme and colors.”
“Not Packers colors?” I asked.
“If he didn’t use anybody’s team colors, he could rent to people from all over the country or the world, no matter what team they rooted for or didn’t root for.” She bent to look at a photo on a dresser. “Who is this woman whose photos are all over the place?”
“She must be Rich’s late wife. He admitted that displaying lots of her pictures probably wasn’t a great idea for a rental cottage.”
“Or for bringing a new girlfriend to stay. This must be the wife that Tom said drowned in Lake Fleekom twenty years ago. None of the pictures look newer than that. They’ve kind of faded, and the fashions are that old and older.” Nina bent forward and studied an arrangement of photos on the bedroom wall. “She was pretty, wasn’t she?”
Boston Scream Murder Page 3