A Potluck of Murder and Recipes

by Jeanne Cooney

  Hanging up, I donned my pink flannel pajamas and climbed into bed, slipping under the covers and propping up the pillows. Then, with Otto beside me, I started in on my dessert plate, determined to replace all scary thoughts with nice, sugary ones.

  My first selection was a Fabulous Fudge Bar, made famous by Bread and Chocolate, a small eatery in St. Paul. But, despite its gooey goodness and the cacophony of festive music and high-spirited voices from the party below, a sense of dread filled me until there was no room for anything else. Not even incredible chocolate.

  Returning the half-uneaten bar to my plate and my plate to the nightstand, I flicked off the lamp and snuggled under the blankets. I willed Randy to phone, if for no other reason than to talk me out of the fear that had me in its grip. The clock on the nightstand read 11:45 p.m. Otto wiggled against my back. And I must have nodded off.

  I AWOKE TO THE WIND howling and the stairs creaking. It was 3:00 a.m. The party was over. No more music. No more laughter.

  The wind didn’t bother me, but the noise coming from the stairwell caused goosebumps to sprout along my arms and legs. I told myself the sounds were nothing but the aching of any old building, the result of wood shifting against the cold. And I almost had myself convinced until the creaking grew louder, as if moving closer.

  I shook my head to clear the sleep that dimmed my senses and listened more intently. No, it wasn’t simply the groan of stairs. It was something else. I leaned forward, sticking an ear out front. It sounded an awful lot like . . . footsteps. Yes, footsteps. And they had topped the landing and were crossing the hallway.

  I picked up my phone, and punched in Randy’s number. Again, the call went to voicemail. My muscles tightened before a thought worked its way through my sluggish mind. Maybe the boots drumming against the floor outside my door belonged to Randy. Maybe he was in the hallway. I dropped my phone and hollered his name, suddenly feeling foolish for allowing my nerves to get the best of me. “Randy, is that you?”

  Nothing. No answer. And, just like that, feelings of foolishness were replaced by the weight of impending doom.

  I grabbed the phone again. I’d call 911 and reach Randy that way. Or, if not him, Tiny or Ed. I pressed a button. The screen lit up. And that’s when I caught a whiff of smoke.

  My call forgotten, I fumbled for the bedside lamp, almost knocking it over before locating the switch. Twisting it on, a pool of light illuminated the room enough for me to see smoke seeping in under the door.

  I threw off my blankets and discovered Otto behind my knees. I swept him into my arms, swung my legs over the edge of the bed, and stuffed my feet into my tennies.

  I needed to call for help. But where had I set my phone? I’d just had it. I tossed the covers about. Checked the floor as well as between the bed and the wall. But it wasn’t anywhere to be found.

  Unwilling to waste more time searching, I grabbed my purse from the bureau, hitched it over my shoulder, and rushed toward the door, Otto snug against my chest. Once there, I hesitated. Was someone on the other side? Had I really heard footsteps? Or was it only the crackling of a fire?

  I shook off those questions. The answers didn’t matter. Regardless of what was going on in the hallway, I had to pass. I had to get out. And I had to do it now.

  Cautiously, I extended my free hand and patted the door, surprised to feel no heat. I touched the knob, first tentatively, then more insistently. No, the knob wasn’t hot, either. Still, smoke persisted in filtering into the room and curling through the air. How could that be?

  Totally confused, I leaned my ear close to the door but heard nothing. No more sounds of fire. No creaking or crackling. Yet, smoke continued to wind its way in.

  I unlocked the deadbolt and slowly turned the knob. I inched the door toward me until I was able to peek into the hall. And once I had, I blinked as my brain worked to make sense of the scene before me.

  There was no fire. Not a house fire, at any rate. Rather, Sheriff Halverson was crouched in front of me, a stack of Styrofoam, café, to-go boxes on the floor next to him. In his hands, he held one of those boxes and a lighter. Much of the box was burning, creating a lot of smoke and a terrible stench.

  He stood when he saw me, a sneer tipping the corners of his mouth. “Great for making smoke,” he explained, waving the box in the air.

  “What are you doing?”

  He snorted. “Getting you to open the door. I didn’t think you’d do it if I knocked.”

  “But . . . why?” I had trouble finding the words needed under the circumstances because the circumstances made absolutely no sense. “Why are you here? Why are you doing this?”

  “Why? Because you’re causing me problems.” His eyebrows twitched. “I warned you there’d be trouble if you stuck your nose in my business, but you just couldn’t help yourself, could you?”

  My heart picked up its pace, the pounding reverberating in my ears. “But I didn’t—”

  “Stop! Don’t lie to me. I’m well aware that you and that nosy bitch of a newspaper lady were asking questions. Snooping around.”

  “No, not anymore.” With fear squeezing my chest, my breathing grew shallow, making it difficult to speak more than a few words at a time. “I’ll admit it. We poked around. But we stopped.”

  “That’s not true. You were caught eavesdropping twice tonight.” He dropped the Styrofoam box and lighter and raised both arms, bracing them against the door frame.

  “But . . .” I stepped back. “I didn’t hear anything. I just happened to be—”

  “Save it! I know you’re on to me. And I wanted those idiots, Booger and Delmont, to do something about it, but they can’t do anything right.” His eyes were almost fully dilated. “They couldn’t even shake off your boyfriend and that federal agent, so I guess I’ll have to take care of you myself.”

  “Take care of me?” As I repeated the words, the reality of the situation hit me. The sheriff intended to kill me!

  I jumped forward and pushed against the door, desperate to get away. But the crazy man in front of me shoved his foot across the threshold and used his shoulder to bang against the partially closed door, sending Otto and me stumbling backwards onto the bed. I grabbed Otto, sprang to my feet, and slapped the man, while Otto growled, barked, and nipped.

  The sheriff pushed me back onto the bed. “Don’t even think about leaving.” He rubbed the cheek I’d hit. “You had your chance. You should have left town when I told you to. But you didn’t. Now, it’s too late.”

  “I don’t . . . I don’t understand. Why are you doing this?” Terror engulfed me. I was being held captive in a bedroom above an empty café, in a tiny town that was fast asleep.

  “You really aren’t very bright, are you? Everyone considers you some sort of whiz kid because you’ve ‘solved’ a couple murders. But you just tripped over the truth both times, didn’t you?”

  “T-That’s r-right.”

  “You aren’t a better investigator than me, are you?”

  “N-No, I’m not. Not at all.”

  “Neither is Ed.” His eyes glazed over, as if watching something at another time and place. “He’s never solved squat. Yet, he has some cockamamie idea that he’d make a better sheriff than me.”

  I slowly scooted to the edge of the bed. He appeared distracted by his thoughts, and I was hellbent on taking advantage of that.

  Before I could press my feet to the floor, however, he slapped my face and yelled, “Stay put!”

  My head jerked back, my right cheek stinging, and the metallic taste of blood trickling down my throat. My eyes filled with tears. Even so, I glared at him defiantly, refusing to let them spill down my face.

  “I figured that cow who runs the newspaper would be my biggest problem.” Spittle sprayed from his mouth as he spoke. “But I came up with a damn good plan to take her out of the picture.” He had the face of an insane person. I knew the look. I’d seen it a couple times before. Right here in Kennedy. “I’d make her nut-job husband take the f
all for the murder.” He tilted his head. “Get it? Take the fall? I didn’t even try to be funny, but I was.” He shrugged. “Comes natural. I’m smart like that. Too smart for the likes of you or my no-account deputies or even the feds.”

  I couldn’t think straight. Since I was too scared to plan an escape, I had no choice but to buy time by keeping him talking. “How did you make Tom the main suspect?” I did my utmost to sound intrigued instead of scared out of my gourd. “How did you know he couldn’t get his investment money back?”

  “The President heard him and Owen Bair arguing in the parking lot next to the Maverick.”

  “But I thought . . .”

  “Yeah, I know what you and my deputies thought. Remember, I was at the law enforcement meeting this morning. Hell, I was the one who scheduled it.” He smirked. “How else was I to keep tabs on what my men were discovering? How else was I supposed to direct their moves?”

  Staring at me, he uttered, “Not very bright at all.” He crossed his arms and propped the door frame with his shoulder. “Yeah, the President stopped in Lake Bronson to buy a bottle of whiskey at the off-sale. He heard them arguing, just like he said. But, instead of going into the Maverick, he called me. See, I wanted to talk to Owen Bair, but I couldn’t find him.”

  “Then, you followed him to the park?”

  “No, the President did. On his snowmobile.” He stopped me from interrupting by saying, “He supposedly likes to ride in bad weather. Gives him some kind of thrill or something.” His disgust for the man was evident by his tone.

  “Anyhow, I was on duty, but I was grabbing lunch at John’s Bar, in Halma.” He smirked again. “Even a dedicated cop has to eat.” He chuckled at that. “I told the President to tail him until I got there. So, that’s what he did. I only found out later you were supposed to meet the guy at the Visitors’ Center.”

  “I was late.” The words were barely audible.

  “Yep,” he nonetheless replied. “Makes all of this your fault in a way, doesn’t it?”

  I attempted to swallow the surge of guilt that rose against the panic lodged in my throat.

  “Anyhow, the President parked his snowmobile in the woods and kept to the tree line, so Owen Bair never even noticed him. Then, when I got there, I had me a chat with him. Mr. Bair, that is.”

  “That doesn’t explain what happened in . . . the observation tower.”

  He lifted his brows. “That was a mistake. I only intended to talk to the guy. But I saw someone in the woods. It ended up being the President, though I didn’t know that at the time. I didn’t recognize him. He had his snowmobile suit on. Helmet, too.” He altered his stance. “Anyhow, I was afraid we were going to be interrupted, and since I wasn’t done speaking my piece, I asked Mr. Bair to go with me to the tower.”

  “And he went willingly?”

  “Well, I’ll admit I had to ‘encourage’ him a little.”

  “‘Encourage him?’”

  He shrugged. “I’m a cop. I carry a gun.”

  “So you planned on killing him all along?”

  He gawked at me, as if I were a simpleton. “No! I already told you I only wanted to talk to him. I needed to persuade him to leave my wife alone.” He shook his head. “You really have to keep up.”

  Despite his snide remark, I couldn’t stop myself from seeking clarification. “You wanted to talk about your wife?”

  “Yeah. She’s a good woman, but she’s easily swayed. And he’d convinced her to . . . spend time with him.” He dragged his hand over his face. “It’s partly my fault. I work too much. And she gets lonely. Still, he had no business leading her on.”

  “And what happened when you confronted him?”

  “He got cocky. Started going on about how she had initiated the whole thing. Claimed he wasn’t the only one, either. Said she’d hooked up with lots of guys, including the President.” He shifted from one foot to the other. “Naturally, I called him a liar. Told him I’d heard that rumor. That I’d even asked the President about it.”

  “And?”

  “And the President said that folks got the story mixed up. That Mitzie was really running around with Owen Bair, not him.” His eyes flashed with hatred.

  “What happened then?”

  “Bair made fun of me. Called me gullible. Said it was no wonder my wife couldn’t stand me. I wasn’t even man enough to face what was happening in my own marriage.” He stared past me and spoke in a modulated tone, as if merely narrating what he was watching. “That’s when I hit him. And he hit me back. We struggled over my gun, though it got away from both of us. He was strong, but I’m strong, too, and I’m a whole lot bigger. So, before I knew it, I had him bent backwards over the ledge. He jerked, and I pushed, and he fell.” He stopped for the count of two. “I knew he was dead as soon as he hit the ground. His neck was broke. I could tell by the angle.”

  With a deep breath, I attempted to ease my pounding pulse. It was hard to listen to the details surrounding Boo-Boo’s death. Granted, I’d wanted to know them. But, now that I did, I wished them away.

  “Anyhow, here we are,” the sheriff muttered.

  His words tugged me back into the moment. “You’re saying it was an accident?” My tongue was sticking to the roof of my mouth. “People will understand an accident. In fact, I’ll help you explain what really happened.” Not really. But he didn’t need to know that.

  “I don’t think so, Miss Malloy. Contrary to what some folks think, I’m not a sucker. At least, not anymore. Besides, I have an election coming up. I can’t be implicated in any wrongdoing, accident or otherwise.”

  With those words, I pictured all my hope circling the drain. “People will figure it out, you know.” I rambled on, not expecting any good to come of it but unable to stop. “Especially if you kill me, too. You have good deputies and—”

  “Shut up! They won’t figure out a thing. They only do what I tell them.” He rested for a second. “Plus, I have a plan.”

  “A plan? What kind of plan?”

  He snorted. “It doesn’t matter. You won’t be around to see it play out.”

  That remark made my knees wobble. “Well, then,” I uttered, my voice equally shaky, “the least you can do is tell me what it is.” Appeal to his ego, a little voice in my head reminded me. Appeal to his ego. “I imagine it’s pretty clever,” I quickly added.

  His face lit up, and his crazy eyes danced. “Oh, it is.” And, after that, he laid it all out for me, the words tumbling from his mouth. “Right after the incident in the tower, I called my wife and got her to admit the President had seduced her. Then, because of that, along with the fact that he had lied to me about it, I wanted to pin Owen Bair’s death on him. But it would have been too risky because he’d seen the whole thing. That’s why I decided to blame Tom Jenson. Steer my deputies in his direction.”

  “And the President?”

  “He liked the idea. Particularly after I told him it would keep Tom’s nosy wife occupied. Keep her from snooping around in the murder investigation or the fraud.”

  “The fraud?”

  He measured me with his gaze. “A few weeks back, the President and Booger and Delmont made the mistake of drinking too much when we were playing poker. Before the night was over, I knew all about that wind-farm scheme.” He pointed his finger at me. “Never drink. You need to be in control at all times.” He wagged a finger at me in warning.

  “Anyhow, I promised not to say or do anything about the scam as long as they gave me the $25,000 Mitzie had invested. See, I have a campaign to finance, and my wife’s not being very supportive about helping out. But they agreed. Then, when Owen Bair died, his death just became a part of . . . our agreement, too.”

  “Is that why the President claimed to enter the Maverick ahead of Tom Jenson?”

  “Yep. We didn’t want anyone questioning the timing of things. If they did, they’d realize Tom couldn’t have done the deed because he was in the bar.” His expression turned stormy. “Besides, the
President’s never had any qualms about lying about anything.”

  It was evident there was much more to that statement.

  “Yeah, the President thought he’d get away with corrupting my wife and lying to me about it.” There was a maniacal bend to his smile. “Took me for a fool. But I’m nobody’s fool.” He puffed himself up. “He got real nervous when he learned the feds were investigating the wind-farm project. We were sure we could manipulate the murder investigation since I was overseeing it. But the fraud investigation was another matter. Even the mighty President had little chance of finagling that, and deep down, he knew it. Plus, I fed the feds information that led them straight to the man.” He stopped. “Get it? I fed the feds.” He chuckled some more.

  “So, how was the President involved in the fraud exactly?”

  He squinted at me. “Why do you care?”

  “Just curious.” I absently petted Otto. I couldn’t keep him talking much longer. I had to come up with a plan for escape. Thus far, though, I was drawing a blank. “Think of it as a . . . last request.”

  He snickered. “Fair enough.” He wiped perspiration from his upper lip. “The President invested lots of money in that project, and when Greg Rogers started missing payouts, he confronted him, and the truth came out. But since the President was so enamored with the guy, it was easy for Rogers to convince him to become part of the conspiracy.”

  “Wait! If you plan to implicate Tom Jenson in Owen Bair’s death and the President in the fraud, why hurt me? It’ll serve no purpose.”

  “I can’t trust you to keep your mouth shut. And you have to admit, I gave you a chance, but you wouldn’t leave town. That means you pretty much brought this on yourself.”

  He contemplated me for a long minute. “You know, when I visited you at the café, I considered incriminating you. I knew you and your old boyfriend had a rocky past, which would prove useful in creating a motive.” He mopped his brow with his forearm. “But your lack of bruises posed a problem. On top of that, you had that damn gas receipt. Given all that, I had to keep to my original plan. Still, I worried about you poking around in my business, and—”