Chloe Cook Cozy Mystery Bundle

by Kayla Michelle

  “I didn’t expect anyone to be poking around over my shoulder.” Jennifer stared closer. Suddenly, a look of recognition came to her face. “The least of which you.”

  “You’re a murder suspect--”

  “So are you. I saw you in the lineup today,” Jennifer said.

  “Then you know I have a verifiable alibi, which is more than I can say for you,” Chloe replied.

  “What are you trying to pull here?”

  “I’m just trying to find Marty Diamond’s killer.”

  “Then you came to the wrong place.”

  Jennifer put her phone back in her purse and grabbed her laptop, eager to make a quick exit.

  “In a hurry?” Chloe asked.

  “I can’t wait to get away from you.”

  “Just so you know, it doesn’t matter where you go. As a murder suspect, you should expect every aspect of your life to be under intense scrutiny from now on,” Chloe insisted.

  “Keep your advice to yourself, and stay out of my life,” Jennifer declared.

  Jennifer then walked away.

  Chloe wasn’t about to give up that easily. She followed Jennifer out of the coffee shop.

  Once outside, Chloe called out. “Why are you running? It only makes you look guilty.”

  Jennifer kept walking but yelled back as she moved on. “I don’t have to talk to you. You’re not a police officer.”

  “Don’t you want to hear what Delia Diamond said about you?”

  Jennifer stopped dead in her tracks all of a sudden.

  “What’s the matter, did I touch a nerve?”

  Jennifer turned around. “You shouldn’t listen to anything that woman tells you.”

  “Even if she said that to find her husband’s killer, you’d be the person to talk to?” Chloe asked.

  Jennifer let her hatred for Delia Diamond get the best of her. Chloe was able to catch up with her as Jennifer went nuclear.

  “I can’t believe she said that about me,” Jennifer replied.

  “Why not? You were sleeping with her husband.”

  “Why would I want to kill Marty? I loved him…more than she did.”

  “Maybe that’s the problem. You loved him, but Marty loved money more than anything. Definitely more than you. And we all know what can happen when love goes wrong.”

  “How dare you accuse me or murder? The fact is, it’s Delia that you should be after.”

  Chloe laughed.

  Jennifer became more outraged. “What’s so funny?”

  “How quickly you threw each other under the bus. Just because you want her to be guilty, doesn’t mean it’s true.”

  “Delia doesn’t exactly have a rock solid alibi.”

  “Neither do you. Especially now,” Chloe said.

  Jennifer was confused. “What are you talking about?”

  “For someone who supposedly was asleep at ten o’clock last night, you sure have some serious bags under your eyes. And when you throw in that jumbo-sized java you had at the coffee shop, it looks like you went to sleep really late rather than really early.”

  “I put in a lot of late nights lately. Last night, I tried making up for it. Guess it wasn’t enough to make the bags go away.”

  “Really, you’re going to try to fool a cosmetics saleswoman with that story? Why don’t you tell me what you were really doing at the time of the murder?” Chloe asked.

  “I already told the police I was sleeping. Why don’t you go back to selling makeup and get out of my life?” Jennifer suggested.

  With that, Jennifer got in her car and drove away.

  Chloe sighed.

  Even though she didn’t get the answers, she wanted knew it could be worse. At least she didn’t have a door slammed in her face this time.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Walter Gold would make for an interesting interrogation. Part of that was because Chloe would be confronting him at his job. The other part was the fact that Walter decided to show up to work in the first place. There was an added wrinkle as well. With the news breaking overnight of Walter’s illegitimate daughter, he was juggling more things at once than the average murder suspect.

  When Chloe arrived at the Gold Family Mattress Emporium, she didn’t quite know what to expect. She wouldn’t be surprised to find a mob of angry townsfolk with pitchforks in hand ready to storm the castle, metaphorically of course.

  Chloe pulled into the parking lot and saw the opposite was the case. The place looked like a ghost town. Chloe appeared to be the only customer in sight, and she didn’t even come to buy anything, the least of which a set of lies.

  The showroom wasn’t any better. The place was completely dead. Chloe didn’t see a single soul, employee or otherwise. If the front door wasn’t unlocked, Chloe would have thought the place was closed.

  Then, cutting through the silence, was the sound of yelling coming from the back room. One voice was unmistakable—it belonged to Walter Gold. The other voice was female, and judging by the content of their conversation, it sounded like his wife.

  Chloe crept up as close to the back room as she could get so she could listen in on the argument without being spotted. The back room had a door leading to it with a porthole window that allowed Chloe to watch Walter and his wife go at it. Walter’s wife was a blonde woman in her mid-fifties with a full figure.

  What a blistering fight they were having.

  “I don’t want to hear your excuses anymore,” Walter’s Wife yelled.

  “I made a mistake,” Walter argued.

  His wife wouldn’t let him get in the rest of his thought. “This was more than just a mistake. It changes everything.”

  “I’m sorry. Tell me what I can do to make this right and I’ll do it.”

  “You can get out of my life. There’s no fixing this,” Walter’s Wife declared.

  “Come on. It happened over twenty years ago,” Walter insisted.

  “And we’re still paying for it. That was our money you were using to pay her off with. I want it back, as well as half of everything else. I’ll see you in court, you scumbag.”

  “But--”

  Walter tried to reason with his wife, but it was no use. The woman stormed out the back door.

  Walter stood alone for a moment, then burst into a fit of rage and kicked the wall. Things couldn’t seem worse for him. He was a murder suspect, his marriage was imploding, and his reputation as a family man had been forever smeared. His wife was determined to take half of everything, but it was unclear how much money would be left.

  This scandal was pure poison for him. The Gold Mattress Emporium prided itself on being a family business. Walter painted himself in commercials as a family man. The revelation that Walter had an affair that resulted in an illegitimate kid all but killed the image that he was a man who put family values first.

  Back in the showroom, Chloe started wondering if maybe she’d come at the wrong time. She was happier than ever to have taken self-defense classes in the past. Still, she was still hoping she wouldn’t have to use them. Given Walter’s mood, she couldn’t be sure.

  ***

  After Walter’s outburst, he stormed out the back door as well. Chloe decided to leave the showroom and confront Walter at the back of the building. When Chloe caught up with him, Walter was smoking a cigarette beside the back door.

  “It’s been a rough couple of days for you,” Chloe said.

  Seeing how irritable Walter was, Chloe kept a safe distance.

  “Were you just listening in on my conversation?” Walter barked.

  “Anyone standing in that showroom could hear everything you and your wife were arguing about. I just happened to be the only one in there at the time.”

  “Why did you come here, just to stir up trouble?”

  “By the looks of it, trouble went and boiled over without me. I’m just trying to figure out what you’re doing showing up to work today, pretending like everything is business as usual. The only person you’re fooling is yourself,�
�� Chloe insisted.

  Walter threw his cigarette on the ground and stomped it out. “I don’t have to take this. I have customers to get back to.”

  “Really? I was just in there, and customers are in short supply. Face it, Marty Diamond killed your business. The question is, did you kill him to return the favor?”

  Walter glared. “You have a lot of nerve.”

  “And you have a gap in your story,” Chloe pointed out.

  “What are you talking about?” he snapped.

  The more out of control Walter’s emotions got, the calmer Chloe tried to stay. She was hoping cooler heads truly did prevail.

  “At first you lied to the police and told them you were at home with your wife at the time of the murder. When pressed, you finally told the truth, that you stayed at your rental property last night,” Chloe said.

  “So?” Walter asked.

  “So the only reason you would have stayed at the rental property was because your wife kicked you out of the house. The story about your illegitimate daughter didn’t come out in the news until this morning. So according to your own alibi, your wife must have found out about the illegitimate daughter sometime before ten o’clock. There’s no way you were the one to tell your wife the news, which means Marty must have told her after the barbecue.”

  “None of this proves anything,” Walter insisted.

  Chloe pressed on. “Except that it means at some point last night you were driving around livid after being kicked out of your house, all because Marty Diamond revealed your darkest secret to your wife. And you expect me to believe that you didn’t swing by Marty’s Mattress Mart and get your revenge on him?”

  Walter gave Chloe a death stare, then threatened her.

  “Get off my property or I’m going to call the police.”

  Chloe shook her head. “No, you won’t. The last thing you want is for the police to show up.”

  “We’re done here,” Walter declared.

  Walter then stormed back into the mattress emporium and locked the door.

  When Chloe went around the front, she saw that he’d locked that door as well. It was clear Chloe wasn’t going to get any more information out of Walter, so she decided to move on to the next suspect.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Just as Chloe’s patience for belligerent suspects was growing dangerously thin, it was time to pay Lucy Lemke a house call. When Chloe turned onto Lucy’s street, she realized Lucy had company. Lucy was in the front yard of her clapboard cape, standing in the driveway with her boyfriend, Stewart Diamond.

  Chloe wished she could get closer to hear what was being said, but that would blow her cover. Instead, Chloe held back and remained in her car, parked on the sidewalk a little ways down the street from Lucy’s house.

  As much as Chloe wished she could eavesdrop on the conversation, Lucy and Stewart’s body language said plenty. It was quite eyebrow-raising. The day before, it looked like Marty Diamond’s threat to take away Stewart’s inheritance had the couple on the brink of breaking up. But now, just sixteen hours after his father had been murdered, Stewart looked as happy as could be.

  Lucy and Stewart were being lovey with each other, kissing like crazy, neither wanting to let the other out of their arms. They looked as happy as could be. That raised a whole slew of red flags in Chloe’s mind.

  Chloe knew they had to let go sometime, which would bring up a crucial decision for her. She could only confront one of them now. The problem was, the moment Chloe was done interrogating the first suspect, they would no doubt call their significant other to warn them about Chloe. That meant Chloe needed help.

  ***

  Chloe called Kristina immediately.

  “How are things going?” Kristina asked, picking up the phone.

  “I need an emergency favor,” Chloe replied.

  “What is it?”

  “Drop everything and get over here to Maple Street. I need you to follow Stewart Diamond while I confront Lucy Lemke.”

  “I’m on my way now.”

  Luckily, Kristina only lived a few blocks away. Even more, after pulling back from a kiss, Lucy and Stewart seemed to get into a whole new mini conversation. What a stroke of luck. This gave Kristina enough time to drive over to Maple Street.

  ***

  A few minutes later, Stewart finally gave Lucy a kiss goodbye before getting into his car. Thankfully, Kristina’s car had just pulled onto Maple Street. This gave Kristina the ability to follow Stewart while Chloe set her sights on Lucy.

  Stewart’s girlfriend was so focused on watching Stewart’s car drive away to her left that she didn’t even notice Chloe approaching on her right. It was the perfect distraction for Chloe to use to get a leg up on her. It also helped that Lucy was in a love daze. This all played into Chloe’s hand.

  “Lucy, just the woman I want to talk to,” Chloe said.

  Lucy snapped out of her daze in a hurry. The moment she saw Chloe, she took a few steps back.

  “What are you doing here?” Lucy asked.

  With Lucy already on the defensive, Chloe didn’t have time to ease her way into things. She had to get straight to the point.

  “I’m trying to find out the truth about Marty Diamond’s murder.”

  “Then you’ve come to the wrong place.”

  “I’ll be the judge of that,” Chloe insisted.

  “You’ll be the judge of nothing. You sell cosmetics,” Lucy snapped.

  “First of all, never underestimate a saleswoman. Second, stop trying to deflect.”

  “What am I deflecting from?”

  “From the fact that you gained the most from Marty’s dead. Judging by what I just saw, you’re reveling in the fact that you get to be with Stewart without his father’s interference, while also getting access to a chunk of Stewart’s inheritance,” Chloe explained.

  “You’re unbelievable. Now get off my lawn, you’re trespassing.”

  “We’re not done yet.”

  “Yeah, we are.”

  “Not with that flimsy motive of yours.” Chloe scoffed.

  “You’re pretty confident for someone who is dead wrong. I was at a movie. I told the police as much. And if it was good enough for them, it should be good enough for you too--”

  “But it wasn’t good enough for the police,” Chloe argued.

  “I’ve said all I’m going to say about that.” Lucy then bolted towards her front door. “Now I’m warning you for the last time, get off my lawn.”

  “You know this only makes you look guiltier,” Chloe insisted.

  Lucy just ignored Chloe and went back inside her house, slamming the door behind her.

  Chapter Twenty

  Chloe didn’t have much time to linger on another door being slammed in her face. She knew the first thing Lucy would do would be to call Stewart to warn her about Chloe.

  Knowing that, Chloe rushed back to her car and called Kristina for a status update.

  “Where is he?” Chloe asked.

  “In line at The Salty Sea Dog,” Kristina replied.

  The Salty Sea Dog Restaurant was a local favorite. They had amazing lobster rolls, crab cakes, and clam chowder. They also had fish and chips that were to die for. Because of their great food, the restaurant was always jammed. Even the line to order carry out food was fierce. The long wait was bad for Stewart Diamond but perfect for Chloe. She made her way over to the restaurant, then spotted Stewart at the pickup window as she pulled into the parking lot.

  Chloe approached Stewart and immediately went to work. She sneaked up behind Stewart as he grabbed his carryout food.

  “Don’t you just look as happy as a clam?” Chloe asked.

  When Stewart turned around and saw Chloe, he immediately recognized her from the lineup and had zero interest in making small talk. He snapped at her.

  “Oh no you don’t,” Stewart replied.

  “What? It’s hard to resist the lure of fish and chips from The Salty Sea Dog.”

  Stewart stared
her down, then shook his head.

  “Lucy warned me about you. Don’t even start with me,” Stewart warned.

  “There’s no fooling you, is there?”

  “Don’t even try.”

  “Fine. I’ll just get right down to it then. Looking at you, it’s almost hard to believe that your father was murdered just last night and that you’re a suspect,” Chloe said.

  Stewart blew his lid. “I told you not to start with me. I ought to--”

  “You ought to what? There are twenty-five people in that line. Are you really stupid enough to make a violent scene in front of all these people when you’re a murder suspect?”

  “You know what? I’m out of here.” Stewart then turned to move back to his car.

  Chloe tried to provoke him. “Headed back to the love nest? Things seemed to have worked out pretty good for you and Lucy. With your father dead, you get to keep both your girlfriend and your inheritance.”

  “I know what you’re trying to do, and it’s not going to work.”

  Stewart then kept walking back to his car.

  Chloe followed him.

  “I’m just pointing out that your life is much better now with your father dead. So I’m wondering, am I supposed to believe it’s a coincidence that someone killed him when really it’s much more likely you did it yourself? I mean, you told the police you were just out taking a drive last night. It’s not really a stretch to believe you stopped by the Mattress Mart and killed your father,” Chloe said.

  Up until that point, Stewart had done a relatively good job of keeping his emotions from getting the best of him. With that statement, all bets were off. He lost control and got a crazed look of rage in his eyes.

  Chloe would definitely get to test how much she learned in her self-defense classes. As Stewart made a move to tackle her, she moved out of the way, grabbed his arm, and used his momentum against him, flipping him to the ground.

  The moment Stewart’s body hit the ground with a big thud, the crowd of customers turned his way. Kristina Miller especially looked on in horror.