The Truffle with Weddings

by Laura Durham

  "Okay," I said. "That doesn't sound so bad. Doves are doves, right?"

  He recoiled from me and sucked in air. "Wrong. My prima doves can fly in a heart-shaped pattern like we'd planned. I don't know what these birds can do. Flap their wings? Caw? Who knows? I hate working with second-tier performers. I just pray they don't poop on everyone's head."

  That made two of us.

  "Calm down." I took him by the shoulder. "No one but us and the bride know about the heart-shaped flight pattern. If it doesn't happen, it doesn't happen. It's not worth having a coronary over." I immediately regretted my choice of words.

  Sidney Allen looked stricken. "You know I had to leave my Leatrice for this, and now it's a disaster. It serves me right for abandoning my lady love in her time of need."

  "Leatrice is fine," I said. "Prue is over there right now with the baby and Hermes. Nothing bad is going to happen to her. I promise."

  Sidney Allen blinked up at me. "She is? They are?" His shoulders relaxed. "Thank you, Annabelle. That makes me feel better." He took a shaky breath. "I'd better go sort out these ragtag birds."

  I watched him hurry off and crossed my fingers that the doves weren't as dodgy as he claimed. I didn't relish the idea of cleaning bird poo out of guests' hair all night. I felt a buzzing in my pocket and retrieved my phone, smiling when I saw Reese's name on the screen.

  "Richard told me about Cassandra," I said when I answered. "Do you have any idea where she could have--"

  "Babe," my boyfriend interrupted. "I'm not calling about her. I discovered something about Marcus."

  31

  "What about Marcus?" I held the phone to my ear as the doors to the ceremony room opened and the sound of the strings playing "Love Me Tender" drifted out.

  "Remember how he was arrested and kicked out of college before graduation?"

  "Yes," I said. "What does that have to do with the murder case?"

  "Maybe nothing," Reese said, the sounds of car horns in the background telling me he was driving. "I like to know as much as I can about the victims, even the ones we think may not have been the intended victim, so after Richard told us what he’d found, I thought it might not hurt to do a bit more digging. Turns out there was a witness in the case that placed another person in the stolen cop car with him."

  "Okay." I wasn't sure where he was going with this.

  "That other person disappeared or ran away," Reese said. "Long story short, they didn't get caught or charged with a felony like Marcus did."

  "And Marcus never mentioned the other person?"

  "I read the transcript from his questioning, and he claims he acted alone."

  I turned and walked toward the other end of the foyer away from the snippets of music. "So if there was a second person, Marcus covered for them and took the fall for everything himself."

  "One more thing," Reese said. "The witness who saw the other person claims it was a woman."

  My mind raced. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

  "If you're thinking that the other woman could have been his best friend from college and the woman who gave him a job when no one else would, then yes, I'm thinking what you're thinking."

  "This means that Marcie had a significant motive to get her old pal out of the way," I said. "Especially if he was as loose-lipped as everyone claimed. She couldn't risk him revealing her part in a crime when she was in a position of importance."

  "I'm guessing she's been steering us in the wrong direction from the beginning so that we'd think she was the intended victim," Reese said. "It was pretty clever."

  "But what about Cassandra?" I said more to myself than to him. "She made a run for it. Doesn't that mean she's guilty?"

  "Maybe it means she figured out who killed Marcus or figured whoever killed Marcus might come after her. I'm guessing she ran because she was afraid. Not because she was guilty."

  "Did Richard tell you about the decoy box of chocolates?" I asked, watching a few guests hurry into the ceremony room.

  "Decoy box?" Reese sighed. "He didn't put it that way, but yes."

  Kate waved at me from the ceremony room door and tapped her wrist. It was go time. "I have to get a bride down the aisle, so I'd better run." I spotted a guest loitering next to one of the tall planters outside the doors to the reception ballroom. "As soon as I scold this guest for trying to get a peek at the reception room."

  "I love it when you get tough," Reese said with a chuckle.

  "Then you're going to love this," I said, shaking my head as I watched the person stick their hands into the dried moss around the base of the tree. "I'm going to have to ask someone to stop rummaging around in the foliage."

  "I don't even know what that means."

  "Excuse me," I said, holding the phone down so I didn't yell at Reese at the same time. "I'm going to have to ask you to leave the trees alone and go inside for the ceremony.”

  The person glanced up at me, and I nearly dropped the phone. "Marcie? What are you doing here?"

  Even though she wore a long wool coat and a scarf wrapped over her hair, the editor was easily recognizable. She pulled something out from the moss and tucked it inside her coat then took off running.

  "Get back here!" Even though she'd hidden it quickly, I recognized the item she'd dug out of the planter--a heart-shaped chocolate box.

  Kate and Richard stepped out of the ceremony ballroom as Marcie ran by them, Kate's eyes widening as she recognized the magazine editor.

  "Stop her," I yelled as I took off running, still holding my phone.

  Kate kicked off her shoes and joined me, running down the stairs to the lobby. I heard Richard in the background screaming about the ceremony, and I screamed back that he and Fern were in charge.

  Marcie was already out the glass doors when we reached the ground floor, and we flew past the doorman who looked startled to see three women running, two of them in black cocktail dresses. She made a left onto the boardwalk, dodging pedestrians and pushing people out of her way.

  Kate pulled ahead of me and was only a few feet behind her when Marcie hung a sharp right down the long dock extending into the river. My side ached but I didn't stop running. Not when the killer was getting away with the evidence. She looked over her shoulder at us and ran even faster. When we’d almost reached the end of the dock, I slowed. There was nowhere to go but out into the Potomac River or back toward me, so I braced myself to tackle her when she reversed course. To my surprise, she jumped up onto the railing and leapt into the water.

  Kate skidded to a stop and leaned over to peer into the river. "She jumped."

  I ran up and joined her at the railing, watching Marcie below us in the frigid water. "I can see that. Where does she think she's going?"

  "With that wool coat on?" Kate said. "No place but down."

  We watched as she struggled to stay afloat. People had begun to gather with us at the railing, murmuring as her head disappeared under the water, reappeared, and went under again.

  "Someone should go in after her," I said.

  "I hope you aren't looking at me," Kate said. "That water is freezing and this dress is silk."

  I saw a flash as another person jumped into the water and then saw Reese's head pop up with Marcie in tow.

  "Where did he come from?" Kate asked, looking over her shoulder.

  "I ran into him outside the hotel and pointed him in the right direction," Richard said, walking briskly up to us but not running.

  "I thought you were back handling the ceremony," I said, glancing at the towering hotel behind him.

  "And miss all the fun?" Richard asked. "Never. I left Fern to get the bridal party down the aisle."

  Kate gave a low whistle. "Thank goodness we hired a videographer for this wedding. I can't wait to see how that went down."

  "I'm sure he did a fine job," I said, trying to convince myself more than anything.

  A pair of burly firemen ran past us and proceeded to hoist Reese and Marcie out of the water.

&nbs
p; "I also may have called 9-1-1," Richard said with a shrug. "It seemed like an emergency."

  Kate tugged the neckline of her dress lower. "You know I'd never say no to the fire department."

  "Is there anything you would say no to, darling?" Richard asked, giving her his most saccharine smile.

  Kate ignored him and headed toward the flashing lights of the fire truck on the boardwalk.

  Once Reese was out of the water and had a blanket around his shoulders, I rushed up to him. "What were you thinking jumping into the Potomac like that?"

  "I thought you'd gone into the water," he said, his teeth chattering as he spoke. "Everyone on the dock was yelling about the women jumping in the river. I figured you'd gone in after Marcie."

  I wrapped an arm around him even though he was soaking wet. "Nope. Kate and I were arguing about who should save her when you jumped in."

  He managed a laugh. "That makes more sense." He held up the soggy heart-shaped box. "And, of course, I did save the evidence."

  "That must be the decoy box of chocolates," I said.

  "And if my guess is right, this is the one Marcus ate from and all the chocolates are poisoned," Reese said, turning the wet box in his hands.

  I squeezed him. "Thanks for wanting to save me."

  He gazed down at me and water from his hair dripped onto my face. "Anytime, babe."

  I stood on my tiptoes to kiss him, and even though his lips felt cold, kissing him still sent a current of warmth through my body. The sound of Richard clearing his throat made me pull away.

  "I hate to break this up, but one of you has a wedding to run, and the other has a wet criminal to process."

  "He's right," I said. "I need to get back to the wedding."

  Reese looked over at Marcie, who was also wrapped in a blanket but looked furious as two firemen were holding her tightly. "And I have a killer to interrogate."

  A big part of me wished I could be at the interrogation instead of at the wedding. "You know I'm here until midnight."

  He kissed me one last time. "I'll wait up for you at home."

  Another throat clearing from Richard. "I don't mean to be a nuisance," he said pointing to the fire truck, "but if we don't get Kate now, she very well may ride off with the cute firemen."

  I looked to where Kate sat in the driver's seat of the fire truck with a shiny red helmet on her head.

  Reese laughed as I let out a long weary breath. "You can't ever say your job is dull, babe."

  He was right about that.

  32

  "I finally chased down that ring bearer who went rogue with his bow and arrow," Fern said as he strode into the room and plunked a small white bow and a quiver filled with white feathery arrows onto the table.

  We were all taking a break after making it through the ceremony, cocktail hour, and bridal party introductions, and were seated around a banquet table in one of the smaller meeting rooms set aside as a break room for wedding vendors. A long table filled with trays of sandwiches, pasta salad, and cookies ran along one side of the room with a smaller table at the end that held a silver bowl filled with ice and a selection of bottled waters and sodas.

  "Where's the errant ring bearer now?" Kate asked, propping her bare feet up onto a chair.

  "I put him in a time out," Fern said. "Those arrows may be plastic, but you try getting shot in the rear with one."

  "Next time we'll make them without points," Mack said to Buster as he filled a plate with pasta salad.

  "I'd hoped the arrow motif was a one-time thing," Buster said.

  "I don't know." Kate shook her head. "People were pretty impressed by the escort card display with all the arrows in the Lucite heart target, and just wait until the photos appear in a magazine."

  "If this becomes a trend, I may need to find a different profession," Fern said, touching a hand to his backside.

  I stifled a laugh. "Thank you again for running the processional without us. I'm sorry you got shot in the process."

  Fern fluttered a hand at me. "It's not your fault, sweetie, although I might ask that in the future we don't arm the youngest members of the wedding party. I'm just lucky I had my scepter."

  Since Fern had singlehandedly gotten the bridal party down the aisle, I'd decided not to mention his use of the contraband scepter, especially since it sounded like it had been useful in corralling the flower girls and ring bearers.

  "Now that we can take a breath, do you want to explain what happened?" Fern asked as he sat down. "One minute you were there and the next you were running out of the hotel and Richard screamed at me to start the processional."

  "I wouldn't say 'screamed,'" Richard said from where he stood at the buffet table examining the food. "Kate had cued the string quartet, so the bridesmaids' song was already playing. I had no idea how long it would last, so I assumed time was of the essence. I merely prodded you to get the bridesmaids down the aisle."

  Fern mouthed the word 'screamed' behind Richard's back.

  "Well, it seems to have gone off without a hitch," I said, twisting the cap off a mini bottle of Coke. "The bride didn't say a thing when she recessed up the aisle."

  "I told her you were both fluffing her train and wouldn't let her look behind her," Fern said. "She had no idea you weren't in the hotel."

  Kate gave him an appreciative nod. "Good work. I don't know if I could have sold that one."

  "It helped that the rogue ring bearers were a distraction and that the oldest flower girl dragged one of them down the aisle in a headlock," Fern said with a giggle, then stopped when he saw my expression. "The little tyke was fine, of course."

  "I'm just glad the hard part is over," I said. "On both accounts. The killer is in custody, and Amelia is officially married."

  "Explain to me again how you and Reese figured it out," Mack said, putting his heaping plate down on the table.

  Richard cleared his throat. "I do believe my information was crucial in the process."

  "It definitely steered us in the right direction to confirm that the killer bought an identical chocolate box the same day Richard delivered his to the Capital Weddings office," I said.

  Kate swung her legs down from the chair. "The most confusing part of the case was trying to figure out how the poison could have gotten into the truffle and why someone would poison just one of them. It didn't make sense."

  "Until we realized that there had been a second box of chocolates, and the second box was the one that was poisoned," I said.

  "But that box wasn't the one Marcie gave to her assistant?" Buster asked, leaning his forearms on the table.

  I shook my head. "Nope. I suspect she offered him a poisoned chocolate sometime earlier, probably when it was just the two of them, then she gave him the other box later to pass out to the staff."

  "Which explains why there was more than one truffle's worth of chocolate in his stomach, but the staff swore up and down that he only ate one." Kate stood up and walked to the cookie tray. "And why it appeared that the killer was after Marcie because they poisoned the one she would have eaten."

  "She was clever about it," I said. "She laid clues to make us think the poisoned chocolate was meant for her. I'm sure she broke the lock on her office door herself to make it look like someone was after her and to make it look like the killer had access to the box of chocolates that she left on her desk."

  "When really she poisoned the truffles at home and brought in the tainted box the next day," Richard said.

  Mack shook his head and swallowed a mouthful. "She went to a lot of trouble."

  "I think she realized what a liability her old friend was after she hired him." I took a sip of Coke. "We now know she probably owed him big time if he took the fall for her back in college, but she must have resented having that hanging over her head."

  "And everyone mentioned that he liked to gossip," Kate said, picking two chocolate chip cookies and handing one to me. "She must have assumed that he'd eventually let something slip and she could get f
ired."

  Richard took the seat next to me. "Depending on the statute of limitations, she could even be charged with that old crime."

  "Those are certainly motives to kill someone," Fern said. "I've known Potomac wives who knocked off their husbands for less."

  We all stared at him.

  "What?" He shrugged. "I mean, I can't know for sure, but I do have a lot of widows for clients. There can't be that many rich men with dodgy hearts."

  Kate nibbled on the edge of her cookie. "He makes a good point. Rich men do seem to have more heart attacks."

  "I still don't get how you connected it to Marcie," Mack said. "Unless you didn't know until you saw her today."

  "And why was she searching our planters?" Buster asked.

  "To be honest, we still thought Cassandra was the killer until Reese decided to dig deeper into Marcus's past," I said. "When he called me and told me about the second person at the scene of Marcus’s felony, we knew it had to be Marcie and that gave her a serious motive. I wasn't 100 percent sure until I saw her pull something out of the bottom of one of your trees."

  "How did she get the decoy chocolates into one of Buster and Mack's trees?" Kate asked. "It doesn't make any sense."

  "I don't know for sure," I said, "but I think she had the poisoned box in her bag when she came to Love Brunch the day of the murder. She probably knew the offices would be searched, so she brought it with her intending to dump it somewhere. Maybe she forgot until she saw the cops, but she must have stashed it under all the moss and planned to retrieve it later."

  Kate slapped the table. "That's why she was at the hotel the other night. Not to talk to her ex. She thought those trees were part of the hotel's regular decor."

  "And we told her they weren't and also told her where they'd be the next day for our wedding," I said. "So she showed up looking for the box she'd hidden, because she knew someone would stumble upon it sooner or later."

  "Unfortunately, Annabelle spotted her before she could make a clean getaway," Richard said.