A Food and Wine Club Mystery Boxset Books 1 through 5

by Cat Chandler

  “Are you all right?”

  Jane’s gaze tracked from Nicki’s face over to the townhouse across the street. “Are you positive we should go in there? We might be interfering with police work. Not obeying a police chief who is in the middle of a murder investigation seems very wrong to me. I’m not sure this is the appropriate time for us to go snooping around.”

  “It isn’t snooping if we were invited by the chief,” Nicki assured her.

  The admin turned a questioning stare on Nicki. “We were? I didn’t hear him say that.”

  “Oh, Chief Turnlow did, in his own way.” Nicki tried an encouraging smile. She’d pretty much promised Matt that she’d try to have Jane with her when she was working on Viola’s murder, and she didn’t want to break a promise to him either.

  But Jane still didn’t look too sure. “If you’re certain…”

  “I am,” Nicki quickly cut in. “Believe me, the chief would be very disappointed if we didn’t show up. He’d probably send his deputy over to check on us, which would really interrupt his investigation. Danny’s the only deputy he has.”

  Sighing, Jane finally nodded. “Well, if you’re sure.”

  “I am.” Nicki inclined her head toward Viola’s townhouse. “We’d better hurry. Danny’s in the doorway waiting for us.”

  Since the deputy was standing in the open door at the front of the townhouse, Nicki felt no guilt in using his presence to hurry Jane along. It didn’t take more than a minute to reach the young deputy with the light hair and blue eyes, who snatched off his hat as the two women approached him.

  “Hi, Nicki.” He flashed his boyish grin at her and then Jane as he stuck out his hand. “I’m Deputy Findley. And you must be Ms. Markley. The chief told me to expect you.”

  Jane’s whole expression immediately brightened. “He did?”

  “Yep,” Danny said, his grin firmly in place. “I’m on my way to get a plastic garbage bag out of the chief’s cruiser, but I’m sure he’d want you to go straight in.” He nodded at Nicki. “You’ll know the way since it has the same layout as your place, and the chief said you’d already taken a peek through the window.”

  “Did he?” Nicki gritted her teeth a little. Why did the chief have to make her sound like some kind of overly snoopy neighbor?

  But Danny only gave her a friendly salute as he stepped aside and continued down the walkway. Thinking that she wasn’t making the best impression on the very conservative Jane with all the talk about lurking about and peeking in windows, Nicki led the way to Viola’s office.

  Jenna and the chief were there, standing in front of Viola’s laptop’s screen. They were both frowning down at it. Nicki crossed the room and slipped in behind Jenna, leaning to one side to see around her much taller friend. The screen had a colorful background picture of the Swiss Alps, with a blank field running across the center.

  Password, Nicki thought as her heart sank a little. Of course Viola would have protected her laptop with a password.

  “Have any ideas?” The chief’s question was directed at Jenna.

  “If you know her personal information, I could try the usual combinations of initials, birthdates, social security number, that kind of thing.”

  The chief crossed his arms over his broad chest. “Aren’t there programs that you can plug into and it comes up with the password?”

  Jenna smiled. “It’s a little more involved than that but yes, there are programs. We generally call them password crackers, but that type of software is usually only owned by serious hackers. Which I am not. It’s a gray area that slides easily into doing something illegal. Which I do not do.”

  “Uh huh.” The chief stared at the computer geek. “You got into the computer of that winemaker that worked at Holland Winery.”

  Jenna glared back at him. “An act I’ve apologized for profusely, and I didn’t hack into it. George didn’t have a password on his computer.”

  “Hmm.” The chief shook his head. “Too bad. We’ll have to send it to the State forensic lab for this kind of thing. Given Soldoff’s place on their priority list, it will probably take months before they get around to it.”

  “Excuse me?”

  All three of them standing behind the laptop looked over at Jane who’d taken up a position in front of the desk. “Am I to understand you need a password?”

  “That’s right,” Jenna confirmed. “And we’ve already searched through the desk. It doesn’t look as if Viola wrote it down where we could easily stumble across it.”

  “She might have it on her phone,” Nicki said. “A lot of people put that information on their phone.”

  “She might have, but it’s locked up in the safe back at the station.” the chief said. “Our search of the house didn’t turn up a second one, and there weren’t any other notebooks around either.”

  “Excuse me?”

  The chief stuck his thumbs in his belt and glanced over at Jane. “Yes, Ms. Markley?”

  “Did Viola Richards have an assistant by any chance?” She raised an eyebrow at the blank faces staring back at her. “If she did, any good admin will know the boss’s password.”

  As Nicki reached for her phone, the chief looked around the room. “I don’t know if the techs found anyone’s name written down. She didn’t have a lot of paper lying around.”

  “Hi, Maxie?” Nicki waited a moment for the usual greetings before coming straight to the point. “The chief, Jenna, Jane, and I are in Viola’s office staring at her laptop. But we don’t have the password.” She went silent for a moment, listening. “No, no, I wasn’t expecting you to know it, but was wondering if Viola had an assistant to help her with her business? Maybe she contacted you to arrange the details about Viola staying in the townhouse?”

  Nicki started to reach for the pad and pen sitting on the other side of the desk when she saw Jane with her phone out, finger poised, ready to key in whatever she heard. Nicki gave her a “thumbs up” sign just as Maxie came back on the line.

  “Yes? Okay. Five-five-five- two-one-two-two. That sounds like a USA number. Oh, she does. What’s the area code? Seven-one-six. I have it. Uh huh. Well, okay. See you in a bit.” She clicked off and looked over at the chief. “Maxie is on her way over.”

  “Sure. What’s a murder without a party of civilians at the crime scene,” the chief muttered, but he nodded his acceptance. “I guess we now call the admin?”

  “I’ll do it,” Jane volunteered. “Getting information out of other admins is right up my alley.” She headed for the door, passing Danny on his way back in, carrying a black plastic garbage bag.

  “Sorry it took me so long, Chief. I had to dig under your gym bag.” He looked at the three people lined up behind the desk. “What did I miss?”

  Jenna wiggled her eyebrows at the police chief. “Gym bag? Do you spend much time working out, Chief?”

  He kept his thumbs stuck in his belt as he shifted his not inconsiderable weight back and forth. “Nope. But I have very good intentions. And the gym bag carries a change of clothes in case I need one.”

  “Very practical,” Jenna grinned. She smiled at the young deputy. “I take it that you still work out? Looks like you’ve kept that football physique from those high school days.”

  Danny turned red right up to his hairline as he cleared his throat. “Um. What should I do with this bag, Chief?”

  “Hold on to it until we’re ready to unhook the laptop and transport it back to the station. Which we’ll be doing if Ms. Markley can find out what the password is.”

  “Ms. Markley?” Danny’s forehead wrinkled as he looked from the chief to Jenna. “I thought Jenna was the computer expert.”

  “She is,” Matt’s admin said as she marched back into the room. “But I’m an expert at getting information from tough cookies. Not that Melinda was tough. She was actually very cooperative. And professional. I might have to talk to Matt about her.”

  The chief heaved a heavy sigh. “We’ll hold the employment seminar l
ater. Did you get the password?”

  “Of course.”

  Jane tore a sheet of paper out of her notebook and handed it to Jenna, who looked at it and started to laugh.

  “Pussyfoot? Really?”

  Nicki slapped a hand against her forehead. “I should have guessed it. Viola was always saying someone or other was pussyfooting around. Her clients, her contacts, the wait staff at her favorite restaurant. Just about anyone she knew.”

  “Wonderful,” Jenna snorted as she carefully keyed in the word. The room went silent for a long moment before a quiet ping came out of the machine and Jenna’s face lit up with a smile. “There you have it. We’re in.”

  She bent over and started working the keyboard. Stopped and frowned and then went back to keying. That process repeated itself for a good quarter hour before Jenna straightened up and rubbed the small of her back. She shook her head at Chief Turnlow. “I’m afraid it’s terminal.”

  “What?” Nicki leaned closer to the screen and frowned. “What does this mean, no files found?”

  “It means that most of the documents on this laptop have been wiped out. And so has her calendar.”

  “By who?” Jane asked.

  “I can’t tell you that,” Jenna said patiently. “But I’d guess it was done right from this terminal, with this password. So either Viola deleted them all, or someone else sitting at her desk did.”

  “Now isn’t that interesting.” The chief stared at the blank screen. “Very interesting.”

  “Is there a genealogy program on there?” Nicki asked. She pointed at an icon that looked familiar. “How about that?”

  Jenna nodded. “Same program Maxie has. I’ll take a quick look.” She tapped a few keys and frowned. “The application is here, but there’s no data in it. If she had any entries in here, they’re gone now.”

  Nicki leaned back. That was very odd for someone who made a living building that kind of data.

  “And you said her calendar is wiped clean too?” the chief asked.

  Jenna tapped a few keys and brought the last two months up on the screen. “You can see for yourself. No entries.”

  “Yoo hoo?” Maxie’s voice preceded her by a few seconds. Once she’d crossed into the office, she stopped and beamed at everyone. “So? What have we found out?”

  Jane nodded at her. “We aren’t looking for anything. The police, who are in charge of this case, have just been told that Ms. Richards’ laptop has been wiped clean, including her calendar.”

  Maxie’s bright smile instantly dimmed. “Oh. That is a shame.”

  “Excuse me?”

  Every eye in the room turned in Jane’s direction.

  “Am I to understand that you now want to see Ms. Richards’ calendar?”

  Chief Turnlow narrowed his eyes. “Yes, Ms. Markley. You understand that correctly.”

  “Aside from essential information such as passwords, any good admin will always keep a copy of her boss’s calendar. And Melinda struck me as a very good admin.”

  Nicki laughed. “And you’d be able to spot one for sure. Would you mind calling the very professional and accommodating Melinda again?”

  Jane glanced over at the chief. “It would be helpful if I could assure her that I’m part of the official investigation.”

  The former LAPD detective rolled his eyes but waved his hand in the air to indicate his approval. “Fine, fine. Whatever it takes to get hold of that calendar.”

  Jane gave him a serene smile. “All right. I’ll just step out for a moment.”

  Chapter One Hundred Twelve

  The chief stared after Jane for a long moment. “Matt’s assistant, huh?” His mouth twitched as he glanced over at Nicki. “And he’s assigned her to be your watchdog? I’m betting she’ll be pretty good at it.”

  “Jane is a lovely person, and it’s long past time she paid us a visit,” Maxie declared. “Now. Clearly I’m behind in the latest developments.” She turned her attention to the chief. “You said that Viola’s death wasn’t an accident?”

  “It’s looking that way,” the chief confirmed.

  A sheen of moisture appeared in Maxie’s eyes, which she made no attempt to hide. “That’s very distressing. My Mason is going to be shocked.”

  Nicki quickly stepped around the desk and went to Maxie’s side, curling an arm around the older woman’s shoulders. “I’m so sorry, Maxie.”

  Her landlady reached up and patted Nicki’s hand. “I am too. But it’s a comfort to know we’ll be part of the official investigation.”

  “Temporarily,” the chief stated in a firm voice.

  Maxie lifted her chin and almost looked down her nose at the police chief. “How temporary are you thinking, Paul?”

  He shrugged. “About the length of Ms. Markley’s phone call.”

  Not surprised by that answer, Nicki gave Maxie’s shoulders a gentle squeeze. “Don’t worry about it now.”

  “Oh, I won’t, dear. We have our own resources after all.”

  “Which would be?” the chief asked.

  “Well obviously, Chief Turnlow, if this has anything to do with Viola’s work, you’ll need help from an expert in genealogy. And I happen to be the only one within a hundred miles.” Maxie smiled. “Or more.”

  “Great.” The chief shuffled his feet as he pinned his young deputy with a hard stare. “Are you waiting on something, Deputy Findley?”

  Danny scrambled across the room and lifted his bag as if he was going to throw it over the laptop.

  “Hang on there, son.” Chief Turnlow looked at the ceiling and gave every appearance of counting very slowly to ten. After a long pause, he looked back at Danny who had frozen in place. “It would be better if you turned it off first.” The chief pointed at Jenna. “Get Ms. Lindstrom to help you out.”

  As Jenna gave the chief a mock salute, Jane walked back into the room. She shoved her cell phone into her always-present tote bag before looking up at the group staring at her in complete silence.

  Nicki held her breath. If they couldn’t at least get Viola’s calendar, she had no idea where to start looking for any clues to her murder.

  “It’s all taken care of,” Jane announced. “A copy of Ms. Richards’ most recent calendar should be coming to Nicki’s email within the hour.”

  The chief turned his flat cop stare on Nicki. “Which means I expect it sent to my email within the hour, and deleted from yours.”

  “Of course, Chief,” Nicki immediately agreed. “I wouldn’t think of doing anything else.”

  “Uh huh.” The chief frowned. “I mean what I said, Nicki. Until we have an idea of what we’re dealing with here, I want you and your band of amateur snoops to stay out of this.” He switched his gaze to Jane. “And I hope you do your job well enough that I don’t get any phone calls from her irate boyfriend in Paris.”

  “Of course, Chief Turnlow.” Jane’s voice was smooth without a single ruffle in it. Nicki had to admire that, but then the admin had probably dealt with her share of annoyed men in the course of working in the rough and tumble world of publishing. Although she doubted any of those encounters had been with the police.

  “This whole thing has been very upsetting,” Maxie said. She made a very long dramatic sigh. “I believe I need to lie down for a while.” She leaned on Nicki who had to brace her much smaller frame to keep from toppling over. “My Mason has gone into town, and I hate to bother him when he’s on city business.”

  Nicki fought a grin. Like rescuing dying plants?

  Jane stepped up and took Maxie’s other arm. “Of course you should. I’m sure we can make you quite comfortable at Nicki’s.”

  “That would be wonderful, dear.” She smiled at a skeptical-looking Chief Turnlow. “You’ll keep me informed of the investigation’s progress?”

  “Tell Chief Edwards to give me a call and I’ll fill him in on the details.”

  “Thank you, Paul. That’s very kind.” Maxie started toward the door, practically dragging her two suppo
rt people in her wake.

  Nicki quickened her pace to keep up and waved a hand behind her back when the chief called out to remind her to send that email along. Once they were clear of Viola’s, and headed across the street to Nicki’s place, Maxie withdrew her arms from her two “helpers” and walked along briskly on her own. “Come along, ladies. We need to see that email and update our murder board.”

  The women made a beeline for Nicki’s office, and within five minutes, the petite chef and blogger was pulling up her email. The newest one was from an M. Orker. Jane pointed at it.

  “There it is, Nicki. Melinda Orker.”

  Nicki quickly opened the email and then the attachment, and without pausing keyed in the first thirty pages and hit the print button. As her printer came to life, she stared at the electronic attachment. “It says there’s over a hundred and fifty pages to this document.”

  “I asked Melinda to send an entire year.” When Nicki turned to stare at her, Jane shrugged. “In case her murder had anything to do with her research. If it does, she likely has been pursuing it for quite a while.”

  “Very good thinking, dear.” Maxie nodded her approval. “Genealogy research is not done in a day. It can take months, maybe even years.”

  “Hmm...” Nicki answered absently. She opened a desk drawer and pulled out a small flash drive. Inserting it efficiently into her computer, she tapped a few buttons then sat back and waited as the calendar attachment sent by Melinda was copied onto the flash drive.

  Maxie watched her with a puzzled look on her face. “What are you doing, dear?”

  The chef-turned-amateur-detective grinned. “I’m making a copy before I forward the email to Chief Turnlow and then delete it off my drive exactly like I promised him I’d do.”

  “I don’t believe the chief intended you to make a copy, Nicki,” Jane said.

  “Splendid.” Maxie clapped her hands together. “Let’s take a look at the last month and see what Viola’s been up to in Soldoff.”

  Nicki reached over and plucked the papers out of the printer tray and spread them out on the desk. Several minutes passed by in silence while all three women went over the papers in front of them. Nicki took out a pad of paper and a pencil that was quickly confiscated by Jane.