The Chocolate Raccoon Rigmarole

by JoAnna Carl

  Hogan held up his pen. “Did you see anything unusual before you opened the door?”

  “Not before! The fun started when—when I opened it. I saw something then, or thought I did. But purty little Miss Paige started yellin’ her head off.”

  Mike’s face screwed up until he looked like an ogre who had smashed his big toe with his own club. Then he dropped his head between his hands. “That woman’s crazy! How could she say she didn’t recognize me when Vinton introduced me to every single person in his department! The two of us talked for about ten minutes.”

  “I wondered about that,” Joe said. “In a department that small . . .”

  Mike gave a vigorous nod. “Right! And let’s face it! A mug as ugly as mine’s not that easy to forget. Even in a dark alley. And what was that Paige doin’ herself, sitting parked in a dark alley?”

  Hogan spoke in his most soothing voice. “Mike, I sure understand how bad she acted . . .”

  But Mike waved his words away. “That’s not the problem, Hogan. I understand people can be scared or surprised or—well, have some other trouble, but whatever caused her to act that way, it kept me from doin’ my duty!”

  “Your duty?”

  “Yes, Hogan. I think I saw something! Just as I got out of the truck! But I didn’t get to chase him, or her, or it, down, because of Paige!”

  “Okay, Mike! Tell me, what did you see?”

  “I think I saw somebody down at the end of the alley. Behind the shoe shop. Running!”

  Someone in the alley? Wow! That was a real development! I opened my mouth to ask whom he had seen.

  But Mike was shaking his head. “I didn’t have a clear look. Paige—she began to raise a ruckus. And when she pointed her gun at me, I quit lookin’ down the alley right quick!”

  Hogan spoke very quietly. “There’s something about being held at gunpoint that destroys your concentration, Mike. Think about it calmly. Picture it in your mind. Can you remember anything about what the person looked like?”

  Mike gave a deep sigh. “I’m just not sure, Hogan. I could have imagined the guy. I think—think—I saw someone running. But it was dark. Maybe he was wearin’ black.”

  The three of us looked at him silently. I knew Mike had been picked for his job partly because he had particularly good eyesight and steady nerves. I felt that anything Mike saw was likely to be a real thing.

  But as he described it, the episode happened in our dark alley. Sure, there were lights here and there, usually over a back door, but could Mike really have seen anything? And if the cops searched, would it be possible to find any evidence there?

  Hogan echoed my thought. “I doubt you imagined it,” he said.

  Mike raised his head. “To tell the truth, Hogan, I thought Paige acted so weird about the whole thing—well, I felt that she could be mixed up in the deal. Am I crazy?”

  “Her behavior was definitely odd.” Hogan pulled out his phone. “And it might be hard to find evidence in a place like that alley. But we’d better check. I’ll call Jerry and tell him to hang around there until daylight. Then I’ll get the state police to give that alley a once-over.”

  Hogan got up and went into the dining room, where he called Jerry Cherry, one of his longtime deputies, and held a quiet conversation.

  Mike shifted his attention to me. “I guess you know you’ve got a critter under your shop’s back porch.”

  “A critter?” I’m sure I sounded incredulous.

  “Yup. I’ve seen it every night this week.”

  “What kind of a critter?”

  “A raccoon, Lee. I think there’s a dozen or so scattered around downtown. Urban raccoons. Mostly mamas. There’s at least three living in that alley.”

  Joe and I began to laugh. “Oh my gosh!” I said. “We’ve had them out here on the lakeshore. But this neighborhood’s semirural. I can’t believe they’ve moved into downtown Warner Pier.”

  “Oh yes. You and Dolly be careful—and Mrs. Nettie, too. All of you need to be sure to make a loud noise as you go out the back of the shop. If you step on one of those suckers, you could lose a toe. They can be fierce. And they each have forty teeth—forty! Including four in the front that a vampire would be proud to show off!”

  Hogan came back to find Joe and me laughing at the thought of being attacked by a cute little vampire raccoon. Joe repeated Mike’s report on the urban raccoons. Hogan smiled, but he also endorsed Mike’s report.

  “I knew there were some around,” he said. “Animal control tries to trap them. I’ll call about them again tomorrow.”

  “I may just hire somebody,” I said.

  Mike stood up and motioned toward the back door. “Listen, you guys, I guess that’s all I had to say. Dolly’s really worried about all this. I guess I’d better run by her place and try to calm her down.”

  Joe and Hogan walked out to Mike’s truck with him and waved him off. But I was surprised when Hogan came back into the house with Joe. I was also a little annoyed. It was getting extremely late, and I had to go to work early. Still, I tried to seem welcoming. I even offered Hogan more coffee.

  “Oh no,” he answered. “I’m out of here, but I did want to ask Joe what he thought about the way Paige acted.”

  The two of them leaned against the kitchen counter, and both stared at the ceiling. Finally Joe spoke.

  “Well, Hogan, I’m asking myself just what Paige accomplished by that little stunt.”

  “I’ve been thinking about the same question. You got an answer?”

  “All I can see is that she kept Mike from chasing the—ghost? The phantom? The whatever it was that he saw running toward the shoe shop.”

  Hogan nodded solemnly. “Yep. And was that an accident? Or was it on purpose?”

  Mysterious Food

  The Chocoholic books use food for a background. In the world of the mystery novel, this classifies them as “culinary mysteries.”

  And one of the conventions of culinary mysteries is that they contain recipes.

  When the series began, I immediately foresaw a snag. The featured food in the books is always “Luxury Chocolates in the Dutch Tradition.” Their author, JoAnna Carl, practices fair-to-middlin’ mom’s home cooking in the American tradition. I couldn’t create a luxury chocolate in anybody’s tradition. What to do?

  Aunt Nettie, my fictional chocolatier, is described as spending a year in Amsterdam developing this skill. She would have worked hours every day learning to do this. I did not have a year to spend. My deadline was nine months off!

  But my editor was understanding. She suggested that we substitute “lore,” or information about chocolate, for recipes. So I interviewed real chocolatiers and read lots of books about chocolate. It was fun.

  Now and then I would throw in things I thought were interesting, such as Cary Grant originating the custom of fancy hotels putting a chocolate on your pillow each night. (I rather doubt Cary did this, but that’s what the source said.)

  After a few books, some recipes did creep into the Lore. But not one of them was for a “luxury chocolate.” Yet if I met a reader at a convention, say, or at a book club meeting, she was extremely likely to tell me she really liked my grandmother’s recipe for fudge. Very rarely did she mention the report that Montezuma drank chocolate spiced with hot peppers before he visited his harem. Readers seemed to enjoy the recipes, even though they were not for “luxury chocolates.”

  So for this book, all the Lore concerns recipes, not one of them for a “Luxury Chocolate in the Dutch Tradition.” I don’t have that particular skill, and I can’t write about it.

  But all of the recipes have been tested by a genuine American home-cookin’ mom. Enjoy!

  And the next time you pass one of those fancy chocolate shops, go in and buy something. When it comes to delicious, nothing compares to a genuine “luxury chocolate.”<
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  Chapter 5

  Ghost? Phantom? They were getting too wild for me. Or was I simply tired?

  “Okay, y’all,” I said. “You think Paige is in with the burglars? That would be a serious matter.”

  “You’re right,” Hogan said. “I’ll talk to Vinton tomorrow. Find out more about her. Her background and training.” He grinned. “We’d better not send her up the river until we’ve figured out a little more. For now, I’ll go home, let you two get some rest.”

  “Not yet!” I said. “I want to point out that Hogan said he wanted to ask us to do something, and he’s leaving without doing it.”

  “Oh, it’s just an idea I had,” Hogan said. “I’ve been thinking about the coffee club you and the guys have, Joe. They’re a gang who really gets around—including at all hours. You know—if people need a plumber, it may well be in the middle of the night. Could you ask them if they have seen anything suspicious?”

  Joe and I both burst out laughing.

  Hogan was not amused. “Why do you two think that’s funny? Lee, you and Nettie joke that the Warner Pier Rest-Stop coffee club knows all the news first.”

  Joe shook his head. “But we don’t know anything about crime. We just know gossip like whose wife caught him at the Podunk Tavern having a tall one after he promised he was going on the wagon. Or who’s getting his house painted because he and the wife are thinking about putting it on the market. Nothing serious.”

  Hogan lifted his eyebrows. “Really?”

  “Hogan,” I said, “you can’t believe that anybody here in Warner Pier has anything to do with these silly break-ins. It’s got to be out-of-towners.”

  Hogan looked at me. “If you heard a little item about whose husband fell off the wagon, who would you repeat it to? A friend here in town? Or a stranger?”

  I ducked my head. “I hope I wouldn’t repeat that to anybody. But you’re right, of course. Maybe the coffee crowd would know something. I sure don’t.”

  “Think about it.”

  I stared at Hogan. I shrugged. Then I laughed. “The only thing that’s made me wonder lately—well, it’s just silly. But maybe Joe found out what it was all about.”

  Hogan and Joe both frowned at me. “What was it?”

  “Joe, do you remember the morning I went to coffee with you?”

  “When we drove on into Holland? Yah, I remember. What about it?”

  “It was Mike. He made that peculiar phone call, and he said he was coming to see somebody and he wasn’t going to bring a lawyer.”

  Joe laughed. “I remember.”

  “Did you ever find out what was going on with that?”

  “With what?” Hogan sounded a little impatient.

  Joe repeated Mike’s remark: “ ‘I’ve killed a lot of guys for minimum wage. I’ll be over to see you this afternoon, and I’m not bringing a lawyer.’ ”

  Hogan laughed then. “So somebody owes Mike money. Did you ask him about it?”

  “Nope. That seemed a little too nosy.”

  “He was talking to somebody named Bob,” I said. “Joe, do you know who Bob is?”

  “Nope.” Joe shook his head. “Hogan, did you want me to ask him about it?”

  “Probably not. I doubt it meant anything. But help me out! Just keep your ears open.” Hogan looked at his watch and sighed. “If I leave now, I might get two or maybe three hours of sleep before morning arrives. But if either of you remembers any coffee club gossip—well, pass it along no matter what time it is.”

  We waved Hogan off, locked up the house, and went to bed. I was glad our bedroom was on the first floor; I was too tired to climb up to one of the second-floor rooms.

  Yet I didn’t sleep a nickel’s worth that night. I had to get my worrying done.

  After all, I was concerned about Alex Gold being tied up and shoved into a closet, about Mike maybe seeing somebody running down the alley, about Dolly’s stress over his almost-arrest, and about the possibility of burglars hitting my own business, TenHuis Chocolade. Not to mention the chance that some of the silly gossip that bounced around Warner Pier might mean something—plus the reliable report that our store had a mama raccoon living under the back porch. Every time my eyes closed, they immediately popped open again.

  I’ve always suffered from seasickness, and the way I tossed and turned that night gave me an advanced case of the queasies. By five a.m. I felt as if I’d been over Niagara Falls in a kayak. Twice.

  By that time I’d been in bed a total of only three hours. That may well have been the reason I felt so rotten. I gave up and got up. Lying in bed any longer simply seemed useless.

  I moved to the living room couch, pulled an afghan over myself—and the next time I stirred, it was nine a.m., Joe had left for his shop, and I was late for work. My day didn’t brighten up until noon, when Joe called and asked me to go to lunch with him.

  “I’m not sure I can,” I whined. “I was so late this morning . . .”

  “Hogan’s invited us,” Joe said. “He had a long talk with Ben Vinton this morning.”

  “Where should I meet you? I’ll be there in five minutes.”

  I wasn’t going to miss any available information about Deputy Paige—I still didn’t know her last name—and the mystery of why she had been hanging around in our alley. As well as why she had thought Mike was a burglar when he had already been introduced to her as a lawman. Seemed as if he’d at least get the benefit of the doubt.

  As Joe and I walked into the back room at Herrera’s, I saw that Hogan was already there. I hoped he had uncovered something and was ready to Tell All.

  I looked at him expectantly. “What’s the tale on Paige?”

  Hogan chuckled. “On Paige?”

  “Yah,” Joe said. “The more I think about it, the more peculiar her behavior seems. Does she have any explanation?”

  “She and Ben Vinton are joining us. You can ask her yourself.”

  I yelped. “What?” Joe gave a low whistle. Then the waitress appeared.

  Joe and I ordered quickly. But Hogan dawdled over the menu—a menu each of us had read so often that we had it memorized. He was obviously stalling, and I wanted to kick the guy, even if he was married to my favorite aunt. When the waitress finally left, Hogan spoke. “Here come Paige and her boss. I’ll let them handle their own explanations.”

  So Joe and I sat quietly, biting our tongues, while Paige and Sheriff Vinton perused the menu the way Hogan had.

  And I got my first real look at Paige. The night before, she had been nothing but a vague shape in the dark alley and under the harsh lights of the jewelry shop. Today I saw that she was a beautiful shape.

  Paige was around five-six and curvy, with dark hair and dark eyes. I guessed her age at late twenties. Her hair was cut short, and it curled around her head. Her ears were small and well shaped. Her eyes were gorgeous—expressive and warm. Her hands, her figure, her face—every bit of her was feminine, dainty, and—well, beautiful.

  Except for her wardrobe. Paige was wearing a standard sheriff’s office uniform, khaki tan. The only thing striking about her outfit was her belt, which carried accessories such as a pistol, handcuffs, and a Taser. These items had probably cost more than the typical woman’s jewelry was worth, but no one could call them attractive.

  She also had a name tag. deputy paige timothy, it read. So now I knew her last name. I felt stiff and uncomfortable. I was still angry with her, and I didn’t feel eager to let go of that resentment. She’d treated my friends Mike and Dolly poorly. The prospect of eating a friendly meal with the deputy wasn’t pleasant.

  After the waitress left, Paige looked at the sheriff. He nodded, and she spoke.

  “I want to apologize,” she said. “I acted foolishly last night, and I hope I’ll be able to make amends.”

  I wanted to ask what the heck she’d been playing
at, but I left the questions to Hogan. And he didn’t ask any. All he did was wait expectantly.

  Paige went on. “I’m new at law enforcement, as all of you will have guessed. My job as a deputy is an entry-level job. But I want to do it well.” She smiled ruefully. “I want to be an asset to the force and to Sheriff Vinton. I guess I got too ambitious.”

  Hogan answered in his kindest voice. “There’s nothing wrong with any of that, Paige, though it seems to have backfired on you. But how did you come to waylay Mike?”

  “I have two friends who live on that block. Newcomers—they are newcomers to Warner Pier. Their apartment backs up to the alley. Their front door faces Dock Street, in the block behind Peach Street, and they have a garage that is reached through the alley. So they’d noticed Mike’s pickup parking there frequently, and they didn’t know what he was doing back there. I guess they did a bit of spying.

  “I really feel dumb, but after they told me all this, I began to wonder what was going on myself. Especially after a couple of silent alarms went off downtown last week.”

  Paige hung her head and gave a shamefaced smile. “I pictured myself catching a criminal and making a major arrest. I realize now how unrealistic that was.

  “But all this alerted me to the situation in the alley. So after I left my friends’ apartment last night, and I ran into the suspicious pickup they had described—”

  Paige rolled her beautiful eyes. “I made a complete fool of myself,” she said. “Sheriff Vinton has said he will forgive me, and I hope that Patrolman Mike will, too.”

  She gave Hogan a melting look. A look with a lot of eyelash-batting in it. “I hope you will also forgive me, Chief Jones. And help me to become a conscientious and efficient police officer.”

  Hogan smiled. “Law enforcement certainly needs all the conscientious and efficient officers we can get,” he said. “And I’ll be glad to help you attain that goal in any way I can. But how about Officer Mike Westerly? Doesn’t he deserve some help, too? And how about Alex Gold? He also needs help. After all, Alex could have been killed last night. We all got so caught up in the confusion with Mike that Mr. Gold was locked in that closet a lot longer than he needed to be.”