Cinnamon Peters & The Rabbit Bandit

by Meg Muldoon

  I had never officially met Frank Burke before and knew him by reputation only. He was a former millworker who, in retirement, had turned to sculpting and now his work was featured in a few local galleries. My grandfather Warren had known him back when Frank worked in the mills. The man had a reputation even back then for being quiet and keeping to himself. He didn’t ever seem to be too comfortable around people, I remembered Warren saying once, and he never went out with the boys for a drink after work.

  Frank Burke lived in town, but sometimes you didn’t need to live in the country to be a recluse.

  We headed down the path to the front door of his small green house. A row of daffodils had bloomed along the concrete and it took everything I had not to stop and take in a big greedy breath of their delicious scent.

  There was no doorbell, so Daniel knocked a couple of times on the door.

  That was followed immediately by a series of deep-throated, menacing barks erupting from somewhere inside the house.

  I jumped back as two massive paws hit the floor-to-ceiling window next to the door.

  And that was when I first laid my eyes on Henrietta’s accused killer.

  He was a large, black and white mutt with a mean snarl. His ears were flat against his head as he barked, but I could see that they were badly scarred. As if he’d been through some hard fights in his life.

  I glanced at Daniel.

  Like him, I didn’t like pointing fingers without evidence. But I imagined the dog behind the glass could make quick work of a little rabbit like Henrietta in no time at all.

  “Oreo – sit!” a voice sounded from somewhere in the house.

  The dog stopped scratching at the window and did as his master commanded, but the menacing barks continued.

  A couple of seconds later, the front door opened and a man with a gray beard in an oversized paint-splattered T-shirt appeared in the doorway.

  His eyes grew a little wide when he saw Daniel standing there.

  “Oh… hi,” he said, looking past our shoulders for a split second toward the Billings’ house.

  “Howdy, sir. I’m Sheriff Brightman and this is—”

  “I know who you are,” Frank said, flexing his hands awkwardly. “I voted for you in the last Sheriff’s election.”

  Daniel paused for a moment, smiling slightly.

  “I appreciate that, sir,” he said, tapping his cap. “Uh… this is my wife, Cinnamon Peters and—”

  “I know her, too,” he said, looking at me. “Granddaughter of Warren. I had one of your pies once. Cherry, I think it was. I ate so much, I got sick and nearly had it come back up on me.”

  I forced a hesitant smile.

  It sounded like a compliment of sorts, but I couldn’t be sure.

  “We’re sorry to bother you, sir, and we don’t want to alarm you,” Daniel said. “This isn’t official Sheriff’s business. But we’re looking for a rabbit that went missing yesterday and we’re wondering if you might have seen it? It would have been about 4:30 p.m. or so that it went missing.”

  I studied Frank Burke as Daniel spoke. I saw his pupils widen and his face turn ashen when Daniel said the words “rabbit” and “missing.”

  Oreo, who was somewhere behind Frank in the house started barking again.

  “Quiet!” Frank rasped back to the dog.

  The barking died down. Frank suddenly looked ill.

  “Anyway, we were wondering if you knew anything about it,” Daniel continued, his hawk-like lawmen eyes studying Frank. “If, uh, maybe you were walking your dog sometime that night and might have seen something?”

  Frank hesitated for a long moment, looking past our shoulders again at the Billings’ house.

  “Nope,” he finally said, shaking his head. “I haven’t seen anything suspicious, Sheriff. Nothing whatsoever. At all.”

  Frank glanced back at his dog, then eventually cleared his throat.

  “So, um, is there anything else you folks want to ask me?”

  After a long second, Daniel shook his head.

  “No, sir. That was all. Thank you for your time.”

  Frank Burke nodded at both of us, then shut the door quickly.

  We left the porch – hearing Oreo’s barks all the way to Daniel’s truck.

  Chapter 4

  “I’m no detective, and I’m no expert in reading people. But if I were a betting woman, I’d put all my money on Frank Burke knowing what happened to Henrietta the rabbit.”

  I propped my feet up on the railing of our backyard deck and took a sip from my pint of beer. It was the first batch of a brand new Apricot Honey Lavender summer beer that Warren had just bottled this past week, and lucky me, I got to be one of the old man’s first taste-testers.

  I guess you could call it a perk of having a beer brewer in the family.

  “You’re selling yourself short there,” Daniel said, running his hands through Huckleberry’s fluffy fur and taking a sip of his own beer. “You’re a mighty fine detective, and you’re pretty damn good at reading people, too.”

  Daniel looked over and smiled at me.

  I felt a chill of the good sort work its way up my spine.

  I didn’t think it was the cool night air causing it, either.

  I zipped up my fleece jacket further.

  “So what’s your take on all of this?” I asked.

  “Well, if I were a betting man, I’d say he was guilty of knowing something, too.”

  I nodded.

  Great minds thought alike, I supposed.

  “Oreo seemed mean, didn’t he?”

  “Everything seemed mean about him but his name,” Daniel said. “And Frank looked mighty guilty, all right. He knows something. And he’s a pretty bad liar.”

  Daniel took another swig of his ale.

  “The problem with all of this is proving it. If there’s no evidence – if nobody actually saw the dog with the dead rabbit hanging out of its mouth or saw a blood trail leading up to the Burke house, then there’s nothing we can do. No body, no evidence, no crime.”

  I let out a sigh.

  I had realized as much already and knew that Kara wasn’t going to be all that pleased by it.

  “But I’ll keep trying,” Daniel said. “There were those two neighbors on the north side of the street who didn’t answer their doors. First thing in the morning I’ll go back and see if they’re home. Maybe one of them saw something.”

  I smiled, reaching for Daniel’s hand.

  “You’re the best, you know that?” I said.

  He shrugged, his cheeks growing a little red in the light of the full spring moon.

  “Aw, it’s the least I could do after that slice of pie you brought me earlier.”

  “You liked it?”

  Daniel hadn’t mentioned anything all evening, so I figured that maybe the Peanut Butter Easter Candy Pie wasn’t his thing.

  “Did I like it? I’m plumb crazy for it, Cin. Banana, chocolate, and peanut butter cups in a pie? Every fluffy, creamy delicious bite was heavenly. In fact, I think you ought to change its name to Heaven Pie.”

  I grinned, shaking my head at his over-the-top compliments.

  “There you go again, Mr. Brightman. Flattering me senseless. No doubt for some devious reason of your own.”

  He smiled mischievously at me.

  “No doubt,” he said.

  We finished our beers and watched as a swollen cherry moon rose high into the night sky over the meadow.

  Chapter 5

  The next morning, I was in the dining room brewing up a fresh pot of hazelnut coffee for the many customers crowding the booths, when I heard a voice that I had never expected to hear in my establishment.

  “Shouldn’t there be more than one person up at the cash register? Wouldn’t any other business make serving customers a priority?”

  The woman’s voice was high-pitched and scratchy, and clearly had quite a few years on it.

  That same voice had been at my Thanksgiving table a few years a
go, berating the butter content of my savory fig and goat cheese pie.

  I turned around and headed for the pie display case.

  “Sorry, ma’am, but I’m moving as fast as God allows me to—” Tobias was saying to the elderly woman.

  But he stopped speaking when I put a hand on his shoulder.

  “It’s all right – I got this Tobias.”

  He smiled gratefully at me and moved on to helping another customer.

  “Hi, Mrs. Billings,” I said. “I’m so glad you decided to stop by today. What can I get you?”

  Edna Billings eyed me suspiciously from behind her thick, oversized glasses, the way she always did when I saw her.

  It was like Kara’s mother-in-law didn’t trust my friendliness, and she was just waiting at any minute for me to turn into a two-headed monster.

  “What’s the healthiest pie you got?” she barked.

  I pursed my lips, thinking it through.

  Here at Cinnamon’s Pies, we weren’t necessarily health ‘unconscious’. But we made pie under the assumption that if a customer was eating it, they were probably indulging themselves and wanted a good, tasty, no-punches-pulled kind of slice.

  “Well, I suppose that would have to be our Dark Chocolate Coconut Pie,” I said. “It’s got a gluten-free crust and we use some coconut oil in it, too. I’ve heard that’s supposed to be very healthy. Plus, it has a lower sugar content than our other pies and—”

  “Then I will take a very small sliver of the coconut pie,” she said, sticking her nose up in the air. “And I expect to be charged less for the smaller slice, too. I know how you small businesses like to rip people off.”

  As a policy, we didn’t normally let customers pay based on the size of their pie slice, but I was already going to give Mrs. Billings the slice on the house anyway.

  “Whatever you like. It’s just a nice surprise to see you in here. I can’t remember you ever having visited before.”

  “Well, pie is certainly not part of my normal diet,” she snapped. “It’s a health catastrophe when you break it down between all that sugar and fat. But I was out walking downtown and... well, I guess you could say my day hasn’t been the best one.”

  I felt my eyebrows draw together.

  Was this Edna Billings actually confiding in me?

  In the years I had known her, she’d barely said two full sentences to me. And they’d always been vaguely insulting sentences at that.

  “Did something happen today?” I asked, cutting her a small slice of the coconut pie in the case.

  “Oh… you know. Just Kara being difficult like always. I swear, she gets some sort of sick enjoyment out of picking fights with me.”

  I doled the coconut pie out on a plate and set it on the display case.

  “I’m sure that’s not true,” I said. “Kara always has nice things to say about you.”

  That last part was one of the biggest lies that I had told in recent memory, but I said it anyway, figuring that telling her how much she got on Kara’s nerves wasn’t going to help anybody in this situation.

  “Well, I would never know that, the way she fights with me,” Edna said. “Is it so wrong for me to worry about my grandchild? Is it so wrong for me to have an opinion? After all, I know what it’s like to be a parent. I know more than she gives me credit for.”

  “Is this about the rabbit?” I asked.

  Something flashed across Edna’s old eyes when I said that.

  “Partially,” she said. “I never thought it was a good idea for a rabbit to be in the house. Laila’s far too young and a rabbit is far too dangerous of a pet.”

  Edna sighed.

  “But mostly, it’s just Kara being Kara,” she said. “You know, I ordered her and Laila this huge, wonderful box of Easter jelly beans and chocolate from Harry & David last week. I know it arrived because the post office notified me by email. But does she thank me for my generosity? No. Not a peep. She knows that I’m on a fixed income and how hard it is for me to even cover the cost of my vitamins let alone buy special treats for…”

  Edna trailed off, and for the first time, I actually felt for the woman.

  The Edna I had always known was critical, judgmental, meddling, and harsher than a shot of cheap whiskey on an empty stomach.

  But now I could see that Edna Billings was also sensitive and maybe even a little vulnerable.

  “Anyway. It just would have been nice to be thanked,” she concluded.

  “Edna – I’m sure Kara doesn’t mean anything by it. She probably just forgot to thank you. She’s pretty busy these days raising Laila and running her ornament shop. And then there’s been this whole rabbit fiasco. The box of candy probably just slipped her mind.”

  “I think she just hates me,” Edna said. “That’s probably the real reason why she didn’t thank me.”

  I studied Edna’s downtrodden face.

  If I had sent someone a box of candy and never gotten a thanks, I guess I’d feel a little hurt, too.

  I handed Edna the plate of pie.

  “Anyway, don’t tell Kara anything about this,” Edna said, taking the plate. “I… I don’t even know why I told you in the first place. It’s not going to help anything.”

  She turned, and started walking away to a table, her old face somehow looking even older and bitterer than it had before.

  “Wait, Edna?”

  She glanced back.

  “Um… what are you doing for Easter?”

  “Going to church, of course,” she snapped. “Just like every other God-fearing person in this town.”

  I supposed that was a jab at Kara and John, who didn’t attend church, despite Edna’s prodding.

  “I mean, what are you doing afterwards?” I asked.

  “Oh, well, I… I don’t know. I…”

  The old woman trailed off and her hollow cheeks turned a little red.

  I gathered that for a somewhat difficult personality like Edna Billings, friends were hard to come by.

  “Daniel and I are having Easter brunch at our house,” I said. “It won’t be anything fancy, but we’d, uh…”

  I was 99 percent sure I’d be kicking myself later for doing this.

  But I knew I’d feel a lot worse thinking that Edna was at home feeling sad on Easter day.

  “We’d love to have you come,” I said.

  She did that suspicious eye thing at me again. Like I was inviting her as part of some elaborate plan to poison her or something.

  Then her expression changed.

  “Fine,” she eventually said. “But I’ll only come on one condition.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I’ll be requiring something healthy at the brunch table,” she said, sticking her nose up in the air again. “Perhaps an Egg White Broccoli Casserole. I can send you the recipe. It takes a lot of time to make, but health is always worth the extra effort.”

  If I didn’t know Edna Billings the way I did, I might have let out a scoff of disbelief at the rudeness.

  But instead I forced a smile and nodded.

  I supposed not all of us could be the lovable type.

  Chapter 6

  I lifted up the flannel blankets and slid into bed. I stretched out, savoring the soft mattress, fluffy pillows, and cozy blankets. It was a cold night tonight, and the local news had predicted there might even be a thin layer of ice on the roads come tomorrow morning.

  It felt good to be in bed after the long day of baking pies that I’d had.

  Even better to have the pooches there at the end of the bed and Daniel next to me.

  “Any good stories from the Sheriff’s Office today?” I asked.

  Daniel put an arm around my shoulder, pulling me close to him.

  “Oh, just caught a few vandals and spent the afternoon in court. Kind of a boring day, all in all.”

  “Did you go talk to Kara’s neighbors this morning?”

  “Yeah.First thing. But nobody saw the rabbit, let alone Frank Burke’s dog eat
ing any rabbit.”

  I bit my lip.

  “Sorry, Cin. There’s not much more I can do other than buy Kara a new Henrietta. Which I’d be happy to do, you know, if it would help any.”

  I smiled sadly.

  “You did everything you could,” I said. “And it means a lot to me that you did all of this.”

  “Aw, it wasn’t anything,” he said.

  “No,” I said, reaching up and resting my hand lightly on his cheek. “It was something all right.”

  I planted a soft kiss on his lips.

  “Now let’s get some sleep,” I said. “I’ve got about a million eggs to dye tomorrow for Sunday’s decorations, and they’re not going to jump into the vinegar themselves.”

  Daniel kissed the ridge of my nose and then reached over, turning out the lamp on the nightstand.

  Chapter 7

  “Well I’ll be a mad magician,” I mumbled.

  My eyes flipped open and I suddenly sat straight up in bed.

  I swung my feet over the side and stood up. I grabbed my phone off the nightstand and then stole across the moonlit floorboards, going for the dresser. I fumbled around until I found a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt.

  I heard the sound of the bed springs creak as Huckleberry jumped down, seeing what all the commotion was about.

  “What’s going on?”

  Daniel’s voice came out raspy and low from the bed.

  I pulled on the sweater and ran my hand along the back of my neck, pulling my hair free.

  “A thunderbolt of revelation,” I said. “That’s what.”

  “Woulda thought I’d hear something that loud,” Daniel mumbled.

  I smiled to myself, putting my phone in my back pocket.

  “I’ll be back soon,” I said.

  “I’m coming with you.”

  He started sitting up in bed.

  “You stay and get some rest here,” I said. “I’ll take Hucks with me.”

  “No, I want to come, Cin.”

  I went around the bed to his side. I leaned down, kissing him on the forehead.

  “Let a woman have some mystery, why don’t you,” I whispered.