Chocolate Chip Cookie Murder

by Joanne Fluke

  Hannah wrote down Herb’s name. “What time was this, Mr. Harris?”

  “A minute or so past eight. I was listening to the radio and the eight o’clock news had just started.”

  “You’ve been very helpful, Mr. Harris.” Hannah turned to wink at Andrea before she asked her final question. “Perhaps this has nothing to do with our case, but could you tell me why you decided not to buy the Peterson property?”

  For a moment Hannah thought that Mr. Harris would refuse to answer, but then he cleared his throat. “My fiancée said she wanted to live in the country, but she broke off our engagement on Tuesday night. That’s why I came to Lake Eden so early. I couldn’t sleep and I decided that driving might make me feel better. I suppose I should have told Mrs. Todd the reason that I passed on the house, but I really didn’t want to discuss it.”

  “That’s certainly understandable.” Hannah made a note on her pad and passed it to Andrea. “Thank you, Mr. Harris. We appreciate your cooperation.”

  Andrea waited until Hannah had hung up the phone and then she pointed to the note. “Mr. Harris was buying the Peterson place for his girlfriend?”

  “That’s what he said. She broke off their engagement on Tuesday night. You would have sold it if she’d hung on for just one more day.”

  “Oh, well. You win some and you lose some.” Andrea shrugged and drained the last of her wine. “After all I’ve been through tonight, I think I deserve another glass of wine. It’s really excellent, Hannah. I wasn’t sure at first, but it definitely has legs. There’s more, isn’t there?”

  Hannah went off to fetch her sister another glass of Chateau Screw Top. If Andrea wanted to get a little smashed, that was fine with Hannah. She just hoped that when Bill arrived, Andrea wouldn’t need to be slung over his shoulder like a gunnysack and carried down the stairs.

  The night wasn’t peaceful, not by a long shot, and when Hannah’s alarm went off at six the next morning, she felt as if she’d just closed her eyes. Her dreams had been peppered with bullet holes, blood, and stiff, cold legs sticking out like boards behind couches, chairs, and bookcases. There had even been a cow in her dreams—a huge, homicidal Guernsey that had chased her over fences and past bubbling vats of cream.

  Hannah groaned and sat up in bed. Duty called. She had to bake the Black and Whites for the sheriff department’s open house.

  As she padded into the kitchen, stepping carefully to avoid Moishe’s morning rubs against her ankles, she wondered about the new hotshot detective from the Minneapolis Police Department. Would he approve of the way that Bill was handling the double-homicide case? Sheriff Grant had obviously been impressed with the new man. According to Bill, he’d set up an interview the day that his application had come in the mail.

  “Here’s your breakfast, Moishe.” Hannah dumped dry crunchies into Moishe’s bowl and gave him fresh water. Then she stumbled toward the coffeemaker and poured her first cup. She must be a caffeine addict. She really couldn’t function without a wake-up cup, or three, in the morning. She just hoped the FDA and the president’s drug czar didn’t ever turn her into a criminal by classifying coffee as a drug.

  Some days it was easier to operate on automatic pilot. Hannah didn’t want to wake up to the point where she recognized how tired she really was. She slugged down only one cup of the steaming brew, enough so that she wouldn’t fall asleep and drown in the shower, and then she went back to her bedroom to get ready for work. When she had showered and dressed, she came out to empty the rest of the coffee into the large-sized car caddy that Bill had given her for Christmas. She refilled Moishe’s food bowl, grabbed her jacket and keys, and stepped out into the predawn freeze.

  The blast of cold air that greeted Hannah caused her eyes to snap open all the way. Her breath came out in white puffs and she shivered her way down the outside stairway to the garage. It was time to break out her full winter gear.

  The garage was deserted, the cars lined up in even rows against the painted cinderblock walls. Hannah hurried to her Suburban and jumped inside, cranking the motor over twice before it started. Time to plug in her truck, too.

  The heater kicked in about the time she turned onto Old Lake Road. Hannah reached over and turned the levers on both vents to direct the warm air to her side of the vehicle. As she zipped down the dark road, she flipped on the radio, and the impossibly cheery voices of Jake and Kelly, the crazy duo that hosted KCOW’s “News At O’Dark-Thirty Show,” assaulted her ears. She switched to WEZY’s mellow strains and thought about the peculiar call letters of Minnesota radio stations. If the transmitter was east of the Mississippi River, the call letters started with a W. If it was west of the Mississippi, the call letters started with a K. The same was true for television stations. It was all controlled by the FCC. Hannah wondered what the bureaucrats would do if a station built a bridge over the Mississippi and mounted their transmitter in the middle.

  Deliberately averting her eyes from the dairy as she passed it, Hannah made her way into town. There was no way she wanted to be reminded of Max’s lifeless body this early in the morning. She spotted Herb Beeseman a block from her shop and flagged him down. Plying him with the rest of the Chocolate-Covered Cherry Delights in exchange for information, she verified that he’d talked to Mr. Harris at the Peterson farm at eight on Wednesday morning.

  Hannah pulled into her parking place at six forty-five. After she’d locked up her truck, she plugged in the head-bolt heater and opened the back door to the bakery. The sweet dark scent of chocolate greeted her, and Hannah began to smile. Next to coffee, chocolate was her favorite aroma.

  After she’d flicked on the lights, fired up the ovens, stuck on her cap, and scrubbed her hands at the sink, Hannah got out a mixing bowl. She had to make a sample batch of Old-Fashioned Sugar Cookies for the woman who’d catered the Woodleys’ party.

  Hannah poured herself a cup of coffee from the car caddy and read over the recipe while she ingested more caffeine. Mixing cookie dough was something she never did on automatic pilot. She’d tried it once and left out an ingredient that was essential to every cookie: sugar.

  When the dough was ready, Hannah covered it with plastic wrap and stashed it in her walk-in cooler. The dough for the Black and Whites was thoroughly chilled and she grabbed a bowl and carried it over to the work island. She’d just finished rolling enough dough balls for two sheets of cookies when Lisa came in the back door.

  Hannah glanced at the clock. It was only seven-thirty and Lisa wasn’t scheduled to come in until eight on Saturdays. “Hi, Lisa. You’re half an hour early.”

  “I know. I just thought you might need some help with the customers this morning. We’ll be packed.”

  “We will?”

  “You bet. They’ll all come in to find out what you know about Max.”

  Hannah’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “How did you find out so fast?”

  “I was listening to Jake and Kelly, and they said that Max was dead. Those two guys are crazy. They were making bad cow jokes and calling it a tribute to Max.”

  “Bad cow jokes?” Hannah looked up from her task of rolling the dough balls in powdered sugar.

  “You know the type,” Lisa explained as she hung her jacket on the hook by the door. “‘Why did Farmer Brown buy a black cow? Because he wanted to get chocolate milk.’ That was the best of them. The rest were so bad, I don’t even remember them. Do you want me to start the coffee and set the tables up in the shop?”

  Hannah nodded and slid the first two cookie sheets into the ovens. She set the timer for twelve minutes and walked back to the work island to start rolling more balls. Lisa was right. If Jake and Kelly had discussed Max Turner on their show, The Cookie Jar would be flooded with customers this morning. And when the news got out that she’d been the one to find Max’s body, it would be standing room only. Hannah sighed as she rolled more dough balls in powdered sugar. If she were ever unlucky enough to find a third body, she’d probably have to buy the building next door a
nd expand.

  Old-Fashioned Sugar Cookies

  Do not preheat oven yet—dough must chill before baking.

  2 cups melted butter (4 sticks)

  2 cups powdered (confectioners’) sugar (not sifted)

  1 cup white (granulated) sugar

  2 eggs

  2 teaspoons vanilla

  1 teaspoon lemon zest (optional)

  1 teaspoon baking soda

  1 teaspoon cream of tartar (critical!)

  1 teaspoon salt

  4¼ cups flour (not sifted)

  ½ cup white (granulated) sugar in a small bowl (for later)

  Melt butter. Add sugars and mix. Let cool to room temperature and mix in the eggs, one at a time. Then add the vanilla, lemon zest, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt. Mix well. Add flour in increments, mixing after each addition.

  Chill dough for at least one hour. (Overnight is fine.)

  When you’re ready to bake, preheat oven to 325 degrees F. and place rack in the middle of the oven.

  Use hands to roll dough in walnut-sized balls. Roll dough balls in a bowl of white sugar. (Mix white sugar 2 to 1 with colored sugar for holidays—green for St. Pat’s Day, red and green for Christmas, multicolored for birthdays.) Place on a greased cookie sheet, 12 to a standard sheet. Flatten dough balls with a greased spatula.

  Bake at 325 degrees F. for 10 to 15 minutes. (They should have a tinge of gold on the top.) Cool on cookie sheet for 2 minutes, then remove to a rack to finish cooling. They can be decorated with frosting piped from a pastry bag for special occasions or left just as they are.

  Used these for the chorale’s fund-raiser decorated with music notes in fudge frosting—rave reviews!

  Yield: 8 to 10 dozen, depending on cookie size.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Hannah had just turned over the baking to Lisa and poured herself a cup of coffee when the phone rang. “That’s got to be Mother. She’s the only one who calls me this time of the morning.”

  “Do you want me to get it?” Lisa offered helpfully, even though her hands were covered with powdered sugar.

  “No, it’ll only postpone the inevitable.” Hannah lifted the receiver and gave her standard greeting. “The Cookie Jar. Hannah speaking.”

  “I’m so glad I caught you, dear. I promised the girls I’d check. Are you booked for the second Thursday in December?”

  Hannah stretched out the phone cord and walked over to her calendar, flipping the pages to December. No one booked this early, and Hannah knew that her mother was just fishing for information about Max Turner. “I’m free, Mother.”

  “Good. I joined a new group.”

  “That’s nice.” Hannah gave the appropriate response. She really should be more grateful. Delores had become a joiner since Hannah’s father had died, and her groups always booked Hannah to cater their events. “What’s the name of this group, Mother?”

  “The Lake Eden Quilting Society, dear. They meet every other Thursday in the back room at Trudi’s Fabrics.”

  Hannah obediently wrote down the information, but she was puzzled. As far as she knew, her mother had never picked up a needle in her life. “You’re sewing now, Mother?”

  “Good heavens, no! I managed to find them two quilting frames at an auction last month and they awarded me an honorary membership. I just go to be sociable.”

  “How many groups does that make now, Mother?”

  “Twelve. When your father died, Ruth Pfeffer told me that I should develop outside interests. I’m just taking her advice.”

  “You’re taking Ruth’s advice seriously?” Hannah was shocked. Ruth Pfeffer, one of her mother’s neighbors, had volunteered to do grief counseling at the community center after only one two-credit class at the community college. “Ruth’s a dingbat—you said so yourself—and she’s not qualified to counsel anyone. I’m surprised she didn’t suggest suttee!”

  Delores laughed. “You’re right, dear. But that’s illegal, even in India.”

  “Very good, Mother,” Hannah complimented her. Occasionally Delores’s sense of humor kicked in, and those were the times when Hannah liked her the best. “What kind of cookies would you like?”

  “How about those Chocolate-Covered Cherry Delights? Andrea told me that they were fabulous.”

  Hannah jotted it down and then she realized what her mother had said. Andrea had tasted those cookies for the first time last night. If she’d mentioned them to Delores, it must have been earlier this morning. “Did you call Andrea this morning, Mother?”

  “Yes, dear. We had a lovely chat. As a matter of fact, I just got off the phone with her.”

  Hannah’s eyes widened. Her sister was not a morning person. “You called Andrea before eight? On a Saturday?”

  “Of course I did. I wanted to make sure she was all right. The poor dear sounded dreadful. She told me that her head was still reeling from that awful migraine.”

  Hannah started to grin. It wasn’t surprising that Andrea’s head was reeling. She’d polished off four glasses of that “impudent little wine” before Bill had come to drive her home. “I’ve got to run, Mother. It’s late and I have to get ready to open the shop.”

  “You don’t open until nine this morning. How about Max Turner? I heard on the radio that he was dead.”

  Hannah rolled her eyes at Lisa, who was trying not to look amused at her attempt to end the conversation. “That’s true, Mother.”

  “I know it’s not nice to speak ill of the dead, but Max made a lot of enemies here in Lake Eden. I don’t think anyone is going to shed tears for him.”

  “Really?” Hannah thought she knew exactly what her mother was talking about, but she wanted to hear it from Delores. “Why is that?”

  “He wasn’t a nice man, Hannah. I don’t want you to repeat this, but I heard that several families lost their homes because of Max Turner.”

  “Really?” Hannah did her best to sound as if this was the first she’d heard of it.

  “He was a…” Delores paused, and Hannah knew that she was attempting to think of the proper word. “What’s that term, Hannah? I know it has something to do with a fish.”

  “A loan shark?”

  “That’s it. You have such a good vocabulary, dear. I think it comes from all that reading you did as a child. I wonder what’ll happen to those loans now?”

  “I don’t know,” Hannah replied, making a mental note to ask Bill if he’d found any current loan papers in the stack of files he’d confiscated from Max’s safe. But those files would only serve to eliminate suspects. If Max had been killed over a current loan, his killer would have taken the papers.

  “I’ve already had four calls this morning about Max,” Delores informed her. “The whole town’s talking, and everybody’s got a story to tell.”

  That gave Hannah an idea and she started to smile. Delores belonged to a dozen groups and she heard all the gossip. What if her mother heard about a loan that Max had made, a name that wasn’t on any of the files that Bill had removed from the safe? That person could very well be Max’s killer. “Will you do something for me, Mother?”

  “Of course, dear. What is it?”

  “Keep your ears open and call me if you hear anyone discussing any business dealings with Max. It’s important. I really need to know.”

  “All right, dear. I’m sure there’ll be talk—there always is. But I don’t see why it’s so import—” Delores stopped, and Hannah heard her gasp. “They didn’t go into any details about Max’s death on the radio. Was he murdered?”

  Hannah groaned. There were times when Delores was much too perceptive to suit her. “I’m not supposed to say anything about that. It could cost Bill his promotion.”

  “Then I won’t breathe a word. You can count on me, Hannah. I’d never do anything to hurt Bill’s career. But it’s just going to kill me not to tell Carrie!”

  “I know, but the news should break any minute. Just keep listening to the radio.”

  “How do you k
now? Did Bill tell you or…” Delores gasped again. “Don’t tell me that you discovered Max’s body!”

  “I really can’t talk about it, Mother.”

  There was another lengthy pause, and then Delores sighed. “You really have to stop doing this, Hannah. You’re going to scare all the eligible men off if you keep on finding murder victims. The only one who might give you a second glance would be a homicide detective!”

  “I suppose you’re right.” Hannah started to grin. Perhaps finding bodies wasn’t so bad, after all. “I really do have to run, Mother. Just remember to call me if you hear anything, okay?”

  Hannah hung up and turned to Lisa. “That woman can talk longer than anyone I know.”

  “Mothers are like that,” Lisa responded, but she looked very grave. “I couldn’t help hearing your end of the conversation. Was Max murdered?”

  “I’m afraid he was.”

  “That doesn’t surprise me. He was a loan shark. One of our neighbors almost borrowed some money from him, but Dad looked over the papers and told him not to sign. He ended up getting a bank loan instead.”

  Hannah was about to ask her the neighbor’s name when she realized that it didn’t really matter. If the neighbor hadn’t signed, he’d have no motive to kill Max.

  “Why don’t you sit down, Hannah? You look beat and it’s only eight-thirty. And think seriously about taking the day off. You know I can handle things here.”