In Hot Fudge And Cold Blood

by A. R. Winters

  Chapter 3

  Sarah had almost succeeded in persuading me to close up the shop for a break.

  "Come on. I need to grab some stuff from the shops," she said with a smile that was supposed to be persuasive. It kind of worked.

  "What kind of stuff?" I asked, hands on my hips and trying to look like a boss.

  "Flyers, menus, postcards, all the important things," she said.

  "Important things? Sounds like a load of junk to me. If you got here earlier in the morning, you could go through my mail and find mountains of the stuff. I don't suppose you're interested in bills too, are you?"

  Sarah shook her head emphatically, swinging her braids around like whips.

  "Of course not. They’re for my scrapbook, see."

  She showed me a large two-page spread that she had titled "Downtown Sequoia Bay." It was currently decorated with one of my business cards and nothing else.

  "Fudge!" screeched Kiwi down at us.

  "Okay, okay, okay," I relented. "Come on, let's go."

  Although it was only mid-morning, it felt like the right time to take a break. Bridal shops aren't usually busy in the mornings, because the exciting activities like trying on dresses and making wedding plans are more afternoon activities than mornings ones. Usually, we would only deal with specifically booked appointments in the mornings, and today we had none of those.

  "Come on," said Sarah, tapping her shoulder for Kiwi. He flew down and landed as light as a feather and began to nuzzle Sarah's neck. He knew who would be doling out the fudge today.

  "First stop is Randi's fudge shop," I said. "Kiwi won't shut up about it."

  "Fudge," he said, a little more quietly than he had been screeching recently.

  "Don't you think your mom will be mad?" asked Sarah with a frown.

  I shrugged my shoulders and laughed.

  "Maybe! Let's go."

  If you walked briskly, it was possible to get to Randi’s in a quick five minutes, but it took us nearly twenty minutes as Sarah kept finding the most fascinating garbage to collect along the way. Well, what I call garbage, she calls mementos of Sequoia Bay living.

  It was a slightly chilly day and every time Sarah stopped to peel off a flyer taped to a lamppost or snatch up a restaurant’s take-out menu, I could feel the cool, damp air beginning to seep into my bones while I waited for her.

  "Good morning," said Randi when we finally entered Randi Blake's fudge shop.

  "Hi," we all greeted her, Kiwi included, though his greeting was in the form of an excited squawk.

  "What can I get for you?"

  "I'll take some original, and a piece of double cream,” I said.

  "And I'll have the strawberry and vanilla!" declared Sarah.

  "Original!" screeched Kiwi.

  Randi looked at my parrot with a smile. "Good taste."

  It had surprised me when I first discovered Kiwi's love for fudge, but now I had to put up with it, I regretted giving him his first taste.

  When we had collected our treats, I was about to lead us all outside when Kiwi started to bang his head against mine repeatedly, and shout "Fudge! Fudge! Fudge!"

  My plan for a brief picnic on one of the benches on Main Street was knocked askew by my greedy parrot who apparently couldn't wait another second.

  "Okay, okay, here you go."

  I broke off a little corner from the block of ‘original’ and held it up for Kiwi, who snatched it out of my fingers so fast I worried he might one day take a chunk out of me with it.

  There was a brief moment of silence while the parrot noisily chewed the treat, opening and closing his beak with relish.

  Then he stopped.

  "What's wrong, Ki?" asked Sarah.

  Kiwi treated us to an ear-splitting screech that resonated around the small shop, before spitting out what was left of the fudge I'd given him onto the floor.

  "What's the matter with you?" I said to Kiwi. "I am so sorry," I said to Randi, who was looking at us with an alarmed expression.

  Kiwi let out a series of complaining shrieks, though of course he couldn't explain exactly what the problem was when there were other people around.

  "There must be something wrong with the fudge," said Sarah.

  She opened her own bag and peered into it as if looking for signs of tampering or spoilage.

  "I'm sorry," I said again to Randi Blake, who was still staring at our little group with apprehension written all over her face.

  "Did you change the fudge?" asked Sarah with a frown.

  “I…well…umm…” she said, faltering.

  Sarah stepped up to the counter, placing her palms down on it and wearing an expression like she would brook no funny business. “Well?”

  Kiwi was now perched on Sarah’s shoulder and the two of them looked like a formidable pair, both of them staring intently at the shopkeeper.

  “I had to get a new fudge supplier. I used to use Sandra, but she stopped supplying me. She started selling it out of her own house and didn’t want the competition.”

  Sarah glared at Randi. “So you’ve been selling fake fudge?”

  “No! It’s not fake fudge. It’s just not Sandra’s fudge.”

  “Fake!” shrieked Kiwi. “Fake! Fake! Fake!”

  “No, it’s not!” said Randi defensively.

  “Sorry about that,” I apologized for what felt like the millionth time, trying to calm the situation. “They’re just a little obsessed with Sandra’s fudge in particular. I’m sure this fudge is just fine, though.” I gave Sarah a look. “Come on, let’s go.”

  Sarah and Kiwi reluctantly followed me out of the store to the street. Tentatively, I raised a piece of the cream fudge to my mouth and took a nibble. “Blech!”

  “See?” said Sarah.

  “Fudge!” said Kiwi.

  I had to concede that this fudge really was not as good as Sandra’s.

  There was a rattling from the direction of the shop and I turned to look at it.

  “I’m not surprised,” said Sarah shaking her head.

  Kiwi let out a shriek.

  The lights in the shop had been turned off, the sign in the window had been flipped from open to closed, and the rattling sound had been Randi locking it up.

  “It looks like if we want the good stuff, we’re gonna have to go to the source,” said Sarah.

  “Yes, it does, doesn’t it? But we don’t have time for that now. We’ve got a shop to run.”

  Kiwi let out a wail of disappointment as we headed back to work.

  Chapter 4

  I was out with Jack. That's Detective Jack Bowers when he was working, but at the moment, we were definitely not at work.

  We had just finished enjoying a delicious "home-cooked"—though in a restaurant of course—Italian meal at Mama Victoria's Italian Kitchen and he was doing the gentlemanly thing of walking me home.

  Downtown Sequoia Bay is small enough that you can easily walk the entire area without breaking too much of a sweat, and since I lived above my shop, I was fortunate enough to live in the downtown area.

  We weren’t taking the most direct route home though. It was such a lovely evening, and we were so stuffed after the delicious but perhaps a tad too rich meal, that we had decided to wander around a little more.

  "Did I tell you about Mom and Donovan?"

  "You did. So what's your mom going to do about Donovan?" Jack asked me.

  I had filled him in a little, but he still wasn't privy to all juicy details.

  "Well, I'd like to say she's going to break up with him..."

  "But that's not your mom's style, is it?"

  He squeezed my arm when I giggled.

  "No. That’s not really my mom's style, unless it involves copious amounts of screaming, shouting, and possible acts of magical violence," I said grinning.

  "Violence, huh? Well, as long as it doesn't involve me being called. That would be awkward, wouldn't it?"

  "It sure would.”

  SQUAWK!

&
nbsp; "That's the strangest thing," I said.

  "That bird. It didn't sound like an owl," said Jack, and I could tell that he was frowning. The way he said it had been in his policeman’s voice, which meant he was thinking about it very carefully. But there was no need to for him to do that. I was going to enlighten him.

  "No, it didn't sound like an owl. It sounded like an Amazonian parrot.”

  "An Amazonian parrot? Here in Sequoia Bay? That seems un... oh."

  "Kiwi!" I called out.

  Jack had met Kiwi several times before, though he had never interrupted us like this.

  SQUAWK!

  "Look, up there," said Jack pointing on top of a lamp post.

  "What are you doing up there, Ki?" I shouted.

  With a flutter of wings noisier than you'd expect, he descended, landing on my shoulder with a solid thud.

  "Fudge!" he shrieked in my ear.

  "Did he say 'fudge?'" asked Jack, confusion plain in his tone.

  "Yep, he did. He learned the word a little while ago and unfortunately he's obsessed with it—well, with what it actually is."

  Jack tapped his chin thoughtfully.

  "You mean, he likes fudge? And he knows the word for it?"

  "Fudge!" screeched Kiwi, standing up tall on my shoulder and extending his wings.

  "Yep. Pretty much."

  "Pretty smart bird," said Jack.

  I shook my head in disagreement.

  "Pretty dumb bird," I said. "What's he doing out here? He could have gotten lost, or attacked by seagulls, or goodness knows what."

  I love Kiwi and I'm always happy to see him. Well, almost always. On this particular occasion, my 'love' for seeing him was tainted by the fact that he was interrupting a date. An actual date. With Jack Bowers, with whom I'd shared a gentle flirtation for years, which finally resulted in us going out on two separate occasions now. And the possibility of more occasions in the future. Unless Kiwi ruined it all for me.

  "Fudge!"

  "So, err, I should probably get going soon," said Jack.

  "Oh. Right," I said for want of a better answer.

  "I’m working the early shift tomorrow. Up before dawn and all that. Hence the early dinner."

  "Right.”

  It had been an early dinner. For us, it seemed like the logical thing to do. I could go straight from my shop as soon as we closed up, and he could walk over from the police station. It did mean that we were the youngest diners by about half a century, but that was okay. We went out to be in each other's company, not that of the other diners.

  "Shall I walk you home?" I asked.

  There was a pause and what sounded like Jack kicking himself, but I was too distracted by the great weight on my shoulder to really be sure.

  "I can see myself home," said Jack.

  "And I suppose we're going to get some fudge," I said with a sigh.

  "I, umm, I saw you this morning" said Jack.

  "Oh?"

  Oh. He must have seen Sarah, Ki, and me.

  "You were buying fudge at Randi's," he said. "I saw you through the window and I heard shouting, but when I saw that everything was resolved peaceably, I didn't intrude."

  "How embarrassing! You must think I'm some kind of fudge addict," I said, defensively dropping my arm to my stomach.

  "Yes."

  "What?" I was startled by his brazen honesty.

  "I mean, no! Not you! That is—I think you've got a fudge-addict on your shoulder, by the sounds of it."

  We both laughed and Kiwi let out a chattering complaint. He didn't like to be talked about in negative terms like 'addict' when he couldn't justifiably respond.

  "I think you're right. Every day he keeps asking me."

  "Isn't it bad for him? Eating it several times a day?"

  I nodded.

  "I'd say it probably is. But he didn't actually eat the fudge at lunchtime, hence the noise you heard. It turns out Randi doesn't carry Sandra's fudge anymore, and this little fiend wouldn't accept any substitute."

  "Goodness. He can tell the difference?"

  "Yeah. He's annoying like that."

  " I'll leave you to it. Enjoy the rest of your evening, Aria."

  Our eyes met and there was something. A hint. A flash. But then his eyes dropped to my brightly-attired shoulder and the moment was gone, and instead, he took my hand and gave it a squeeze in an odd kind of handshake.

  "Good night, Jack."

  As he turned and walked away, I twisted my head to glare at my shoulder. This didn't have the desired effect, as Kiwi's head was entirely too close to mine to give a properly menacing stare. It also made my neck ache.

  "What on earth do you think you're playing at, Ki?"

  "Fudge," he said, quietly this time, a hint of contrition in his voice.

  "Are you serious?"

  Chapter 5

  There was no gate to the driveway of Sandra’s house, meaning it was completely open to the street outside so that customers could easily access the building. She even had a little wooden sign outside, reading “Sandra’s House of Fudge.” But thanks to the thick, swirling fog, we couldn’t even see the front door of the house from the street.

  “Spooky,” said Kiwi in my ear.

  “Is not,” I whispered. “You’re only saying that because of the fog, and I made the fog.”

  “Still spooky.” He was a stubborn bird.

  The driveway was paved and smooth, and even with the poor visibility, there was no problem reaching the front door. The definitely not spooky fog had the side effect of muffling all the sound in the neighborhood, which I had to admit did make it just a little bit unsettling. It was barely seven o’clock, but with the fog also blocking out the day’s last rays of sun, it felt much closer to midnight than barely dusk.

  “Knock! Knock!” said Kiwi, who was eager to get out of the fog and closer to the fudge as soon as humanly and parrotly possible.

  “I was just about to.”

  I rapped my knuckles against the door three times, loudly, and I could hear the echoes inside the house. While I knocked, the door gave way a little, opening inwards a couple of inches.

  “It’s open. For the customers, I guess.”

  “Fudge!”

  “Exactly,” I said.

  I pushed the door the rest of the way open, and we stepped inside.

  “Hello?”

  There was no response.

  “Fudge!” said Kiwi loudly, before launching himself off my shoulder and fluttering forward toward the kitchen.

  Shaking my head, I followed after him. The hall lights were on, and even more light was pouring out of the kitchen door ahead.

  “Hello?” I called again as I made my way through. I don’t normally let myself into other people’s houses and wander around, but this was different—Sandra had turned it into a place of business, and so she must surely expect customers to walk through on occasion.

  Just before I reached the kitchen door, there was a loud squawk from Kiwi. This was immediately followed by a woman’s screech.

  “You! What are you doing here!?”

  I hurried forward to see what was going on. That voice was strangely familiar. It wasn’t Sandra’s, but I knew whose it was.

  “Fudge!” said Kiwi, in a wailing tone of lament.

  I took in the scene and my face blanched. There was a large stove on the far side of the room, next to a window. There were two women by the stove. One of them was my mother, and she did not look pleased.

  It was impossible to read the face of the other woman, due to the fact that it was buried face-down in the pot of fudge that was on top of the stove. I imagined it was even less pleased than that of my mother.

  “Mom?”

  She turned to me with her mouth open.

  “Aria,” she said, clearly trying to keep her emotions under control. “Nice to see you.”

  “I wish I could say the same. Is that…”

  Mom nodded.

  “…Sandra?” I finished, for co
nfirmation.

  Mom nodded again.

  “Is she…?”

  Once again, my mother gave a firm nod.

  "Fudge," said Kiwi softly.

  "Dead," I said with emphasis.

  Mom looked at me, her plumped lips and wrinkle-reduced eyes almost showing emotion.

  "Mom..."

  She shook her head vehemently.

  "You didn't kill her?"

  "Aria! How could you say such a thing? I'm your mother!"

  "I know. So what are you doing here?"

  Mom looked down at Sandra. She was quite a sight. She was still standing, but her upper body was slumped across the top of the cooker with her head buried right inside a giant saucepan full of fudge. Splatters of the chocolate goop were splashed all over the cooker, worktop, and in a couple of patches on the floor. Mom was thankfully fudge-free, which I hoped would bode well.

  "I wanted to speak to her," said Mom primly.

  "I don't think she'll listen, now."

  "No. I don't suppose she will." Mom let out a sigh and shook her head to herself.

  "You came here, and she was just..."

  Mom nodded again.

  "I came in here to give her a piece of my mind. To tell her to keep her hands to herself and off my Donovan, but..."

  "Seems someone beat you to it."

  "I wasn't going to hurt her!" Mom glanced at the body again before returning her gaze to me. “Much,” she said softly.

  “Unbelievable,” I said, shaking my head.

  I stepped closer to the body.

  “Do we actually know it’s Sandra?” I asked.

  “Looks like her, doesn’t it?”

  “The clothes seem about right. And the size.”

  Mom reached out and grabbed the woman by the hair, and began to lift the head out of the pan.

  “No! Don’t do that!”

  Mom let go and with a slurping glomp the head sunk back down. She raised her eyebrows at me in a ‘happy now?’ gesture.

  “We shouldn’t touch the body. This is a crime scene now. We should leave everything just as it is.”

  “I suppose you would know, dear.”

  I glared at her. It wasn’t my fault, but not long ago, a body had been found in my very own shop, meaning I was now an expert on crime scenes.

  “I’ll call Jack,” I announced, pulling my phone out.