by Avery Aames
Around two, when we ran out of Stilton, I said, “Did we advertise some kind of super-saver sale?”
Rebecca laughed. “I think it was the newsletter.”
Thanks to Bozz, the first of our many newsletters had gone out by email yesterday. I had included a recipe for my Stilton-Mascarpone torte, and Matthew had written an entire page about Chilean wines. He had already put in an express order for more malbec to be shipped to the store.
“Perhaps we could suggest substituting Gorgonzola for the recipe?” Rebecca said.
“Good idea.”
As if our newsletter-responsive crowd wasn’t keeping us busy enough, we had to take care of minor emergencies, too. The Mystic Moon Candle Boutique owner needed cheese to impress her future in-laws, Gretel Hildegard absolutely had to have a bottle of the wine that she’d tasted at the barbecue so she could share the liquid ambrosia with the pastor, and La Bella Ristorante had run out of Taleggio. Could we bring over ten pounds, ASAP?
Needing a breath of fresh air, I opted to make the delivery. Luigi was waiting, arms opened wide, outside the restaurant. I handed him one of our gold-toned bags filled with cheese.
“Thank you,” he said. “I was so certain we had enough, but the Taleggio and asparagus appetizer was such a big hit, we had to bring it back.”
“I sure loved it.”
“Who’s that?” He hitched his chin.
I looked in the direction he indicated. Vivian stood outside Europa Antiques and Collectibles, laughing and gripping the muscular arm of what could only be described as an Adonis. Blond hair, tan, and twenty years her junior. He carried a hefty gym bag over one shoulder. “Her personal trainer.”
Luigi’s face pinched with concern.
“Don’t worry. She’s not dating him,” I said. “He comes to the shop twice a week and takes her through a workout.”
“In the store?”
“She spends all her waking hours there. She only breaks free for the occasional yoga class or Cheese Shop visit.” I cocked my head. “Didn’t you talk to her at Felicia’s party?”
“For a second.”
“And did you ask her out?”
“I don’t know if she’s playing hard to get or if she’s not that into me.” He forced a smile, but sadness rimmed his eyes.
I patted his arm. “Take her some flowers. Be bold. She’s a very busy woman. I’ve always felt that Vivian appreciates directness.”
He saluted with two fingers and returned inside his r estaurant.
Feeling like I had done my Cupid duty for the day, I headed back to The Cheese Shop, a grin on my face. Around four thirty, my smile disappeared. Felicia, dressed in a mint green chiffon frock that made her red hair look like it was ablaze, strolled in with her sister. Lois, her arms laden with packages, looked like she had spent the entire day shopping Providence’s wonderful boutiques. I braced myself for another diatribe from Felicia, knowing I deserved it.
I was surprised when all she said was, “Don’t you look lovely, Charlotte.”
“You, too,” I stammered.
Something flickered in her eyes, but it wasn’t hurt or anger. I detected amusement.
“Charlotte,” Lois said. “I simply must have some of those soft-rind cheeses that you told me about. I’ve been telling Felicia that they’re not all that fattening.”
“Not as fattening,” I said, stressing the word as, and fetched a wheel of Brie. “Try this.” I carved off a thin slice.
Lois popped it into her mouth and hummed her satisfaction.
“Obviously, she loves it, Charlotte,” Felicia said. “Wrap up a pound.”
“A pound?” Lois chirped.
“You can afford it, Sis. Charlotte, why don’t you sell Lois some of those condiments you included in your newsletter?” Felicia eyed me, and I started to understand her glee. She was making her sister spend a lot of money, punishing Lois through her pocketbook for not corroborating her alibi.
Lois was a grown woman. It wasn’t my place to protect her. I suggested the chestnut honey for the Tartuffo, the basil pesto to match an artisanal goat cheese from a Wisconsin farmer, and a variety of jams to go with the Double Cream Gouda from Pace Hill Farms.
After Lois paid for her purchases, Felicia prodded her. “Do it.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“One last thing.” Lois’s cheeks turned crimson. “Felicia was right. I was wrong. I visited our aunt a week ago, not the night of the murder. Felicia was with me. And I did see Felicia the night Ed died. It was around nine thirty.” She tittered. “Silly me. I can’t blame it on liquor, can I? Just getting’ old, I guess.”
“Satisfied?” Felicia said to me.
I didn’t know how to respond. I wasn’t the one she had to convince. Urso was. “Uh, sure, whatever.”
They left, Lois bubbling over with excitement about tasting her new purchases, and I couldn’t help but wonder why Felicia had needed to corroborate where she was on the night Ed was murdered. As the door slid shut and the shop fell silent, Felicia’s name edged back near the top of my suspect list.
Seconds later, Rebecca hurried to my side. “It’s girls’ night out. Do we have time before Grandmère’s rally for a little . . . ?” She mimed a drink. “Matthew said he’ll watch the shop.”
I glanced at the telephone by the register. I’d been hoping Urso would call. I was eager to know what he had gleaned from his encounters with Gretel and with Ed’s divorce attorney. On the other hand, I was edgy, business had slowed to a standstill, and Rebecca looked eager for an hour of gossip.
“Sure,” I said.
“Oh, goodie. Freckles and Delilah are coming, too.”
I gave Bozz, who had stopped in for two hours of tweaking our website, the job of taking Rags home.
As always, the pub was jam-packed. The electric violinists were having a dueling match. The crowd clapped in time to the music.
Rebecca, Freckles, Delilah, and I settled into a booth. I glanced at the appetizer menu. I had forgotten to eat lunch, and with the flurry of afternoon business, hadn’t stopped to snarf a snack. A slice of Morbier didn’t count. My stomach grumbled in protest.
“Look over there.” Rebecca pointed.
“Where?” Freckles said.
“At the end of the bar.” Rebecca wiggled her finger. “Isn’t that Jordan’s sister?”
All of us craned our necks for a look. Jacky Peterson looked incredible in tight jeans and a plaid shirt with a red bandanna slung around her neck. She hovered by the waitress station, her foot tapping in time to the music.
“She’s a waitress here?” I said.
“Started yesterday.” Delilah wagged her hand trying to get Jacky’s attention. “Wish she’d come take our order.”
“You in a hurry or something?” I grinned.
“Sometimes,” Delilah snapped.
“Touchy, touchy,” Freckles said.
“We’re in tech rehearsal,” Delilah explained.
“That’s no reason to attack your pals.” Freckles grabbed the appetizer menu from me. “What’s your favorite dish here, Charlotte?”
“Tim’s mushrooms stuffed with goat cheese and herbs.” I needed a fix of those delicacies at least once a month. “And the potato skins, smothered in Cheddar cheese and chives.” One would think that, working in a cheese shop, I would grow tired of food made with cheese, but I didn’t. I craved it.
“Yum. I’m getting the potato skins.” Freckles slid the menu back to the end of the table. “So the ballet opens next week?” she said to Delilah. “Is it any good?”
Delilah smirked. “Guess you’ll have to come to find out.” “I’ve got a ticket.” Rebecca flailed her hand like an overeager student.
“Me, too,” Freckles said. “Charlotte, when are you going?”
“Opening night.” I always went to Grandmère’s productions the first night, not because she demanded that I attend, but because there was an electricity in the air that I couldn’t explain. I only hop
ed she would be able to attend this one.
I glanced at my watch. Eight minutes had passed since we sat down. Tim employed three waitresses, none of whom seemed to notice us. I joined Delilah with the hand-waving. Finally Jacky acknowledged us by holding up a finger, indicating she’d be there in a second.
Freckles drummed the table as if it were a set of bongo drums. “So, who’s got the scoop?”
“On what?” I said.
“On Jacky Peterson. She’s here a week and she already has a job at the most popular place in town.” Freckles winked at Delilah. “Next to the Country Kitchen, of course.”
“She’s divorced, but that’s all I know.” I watched Jacky out of the corner of my eye. If she had changed her identity, like Octavia suspected, and was in hiding, getting a job at Tim’s wasn’t the best idea. Inside a week, everybody in town would know her or want to find out more about her. The guys, especially.
“Hush!” Rebecca flapped her hands to quiet us. “She’s coming this way.”
“What’ll it be, ladies?” Jacky set four cardboard coasters with Tim’s logo on them in front of us. “Oh, hi, Charlotte. How nice to see you again.”
“Same here. You sure got a job fast.”
“Jordan is friends with Tim. I was really lucky. What’ll it be?”
We ordered our drinks and appetizers. As she glided away, her hair swinging sensually across her back, I reflected again how happy I was that she was Jordan’s sister and not a significant other.
“Speaking of Jordan . . .” Delilah said.
“What about him?” Rebecca twirled her coaster.
“I wasn’t talking to you.” Delilah looked at me slyly and said with a leading tone, “Did I hear right? Did Jordan ask you on a date?”
“Oh, Charlotte, I forgot to tell you.” Rebecca clapped a hand over her mouth, then spoke between split fingers. “He stopped by the shop while you were at the twins’ school.”
With the flurry of the day’s activities, I’d forgotten about Jordan’s and my resolution to fix “this date thing.”
Rebecca lowered her hand. “Will you forgive me?”
“Is he pining for you?” Delilah drew out the word, pi-i-i-ining.
How did I know? He could have stopped by to cancel our date entirely. Eager to keep my concerns about Jordan to myself, I said, “Not like Luigi pines for Vivian.” I told them about seeing Luigi earlier and urging him to take Vivian some flowers.
“You know,” Rebecca said, “for a good looking man, Luigi lacks a little confidence, don’t you think?”
“He’s all bravado,” Freckles teased. “Pretty hair, great smile, but not a lot to offer in here.” She thumped her chest. “He could use a little retooling on his depth quotient, I think.”
“Really?” Delilah said.
I looked at her sideways and was surprised to see that she seemed a little forlorn. Was she interested in Luigi? He was years older. There were plenty of other guys in Providence closer to her age who had shown interest. Luigi’s younger brother, for one. I sighed. There was no accounting for who one fell in love with.
“Look, look,” Rebecca said, jerking her head to the right.
Prudence and Tyanne, still wearing her linen suit and carrying the oversized yellow purse, tramped to a table and sat down. Neither looked happy.
“What’s with the dour faces?” Rebecca said. “Do you think they just got wind of how people intend to vote tomorrow? I mean, customers at the shop today were adamant that your grandmother is the hands-down favorite.”
I wasn’t sure that Tyanne would care at this point, not after Kristine had lambasted her at the school.
“How do you think Kristine’s handling the scuttlebutt?” Freckles said.
“In her usual way.” Delilah framed her eyes with her hands. “With blinders on.”
“You know, I saw this rerun of Matlock.” Rebecca pulled on her ear lobe. “Or maybe it was CSI: New York—”
“Big difference,” Freckles cut in.
Rebecca giggled. “I’m addicted to all of them.”
Jacky appeared with drinks and silverware setups. As she set a glass of wine in front of Delilah, then delivered Rebecca’s Cosmopolitan, Rebecca continued.
“Anyway, there was a woman running for office, and she was so out there, you know, stumping all the time, and—” She threw her arms wide and landed a blow to Jacky’s wrist. The glass of beer she was setting in front of Freckles went flying and frothy liquid spilled down the table and over the edge.
Onto me.
“I’m so sorry,” Jacky cried. She tossed a silverware setup to me.
I quickly unfurled it, dumped the silverware on the table, and tried to stop the flow of beer, but the napkin was one of those fabrics that wouldn’t sop up anything. Totally useless.
“Go, go!” Freckles scooted out of the booth. She yanked me after her and propelled me in the direction of the ladies’ room.
I bent forward, trying to keep the beer from hitting my brushed denim skirt. I pushed the restroom door open, hurried to the sink, grabbed a handful of paper towels, and dabbed my blouse, but unless I did something drastic, I was going to smell like a brewery when I went to Grandmère’s rally. Risking exposure, I unbuttoned my blouse, whisked it off, and ran water through the spill. I’d rather be wet than stinky.
At the same time, a stall door opened. Tyanne emerged and gasped. Hadn’t she ever been in a women’s locker room?
“Sorry,” I blurted. “Beer spilled and—”
“Are y’all alone, sugar?”
“Yes, why?”
Her face was tear-stained. Her dark hair, which usually fell smoothly around her plump face, was a rat’s nest like she had been massaging it trying to get blood to her beleaguered brain. She chewed on her lower lip, as if she wanted to say something but couldn’t.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m so sorry about . . .” She shuffled to the sink and rinsed her hands, scrubbing as hard as she could. I thought of Shakespeare’s MacBeth when his wife said, “Out, damned spot! Out!”
“It was not your fault the kids got into a scuffle, Tyanne.”
I wrung my blouse free of as much water as I could. Luckily, it was drip-dry and the pleats wouldn’t pucker. “It wasn’t Thomas’s either.”
“Thomas . . . oh, my sweet Thomas.” She sucked back a sob. “He’s such a darling child, isn’t he?”
I nodded. He was.
“He deserves someone better than me. And his father . . . his father . . . deserves someone better, too. Someone who . . .” Fresh tears streamed down her cheeks. “Oh, my, where do I start?”
“Start what?”
She looked at me through wet eyelashes. “I have something to confess. It’s . . . it’s about . . .” She hiccupped. “It’s about the night Ed died.”
CHAPTER 25
I slumped against the sink and stared at Tyanne in disbelief. Had I gotten my theory all wrong? Had Tyanne, not Felicia, been the one in love with Ed? Had she killed him? It was unlikely she was the woman Gretel saw walking in the hills. She was as tall as Kristine but half again as wide. Was Gretel’s sighting meaningless?
I drew in a deep, calming breath. “Go ahead,” I said, not worried that Tyanne would attack me in a public restroom. She needed a confessional. I would be her priest. “Tell me about the night Ed died.”
“I was so . . . flummoxed. In a flurry, you know? Ed was making eyes at everyone, and Kristine was getting as drunk as a skunk. She couldn’t see straight and she was muttering under her breath to me, and . . . she . . . she . . .” Tyanne licked her lips. “She made me do it.”
“Do what?” I felt light-headed. Had Kristine and her friends banded together for one evil purpose? I’d seen movies of such things . . . read accounts. “Are you telling me you killed Ed?”
“Lord, no! I didn’t . . . Oh, no! I . . .” She whacked her chest with her palm as if to jump-start her sputtering engine. “I lied, sugar. Kristine made me lie. She . . .” Tyanne s
quared her shoulders and stabbed the air with her finger. “Kristine didn’t pick up Willamina from my house the night Ed was killed. I drove her little girl home.”
“Tyanne, that’s wonderful news.” I gripped her hand. “Not wonderful for Kristine, but for you and for Grandmère.”
“But I lied.” She drew the word out.
“To protect yourself from a killer.”
“My family would be mortified.”
“We have to call Urso. My purse is at the table. Have you got a cell phone?”
“I can’t talk to him.”
“I won’t make you. Promise. I just want him to protect you.”
She rummaged through her yellow tote and pulled one out. “You can try, but I warn you, the reception in this place is as slow as molasses.”
After a long wait, Urso answered. I told him I had a big break in the case and to come to Tim’s as quickly as he could, but because of crackling static, I was only able to hear him say, “I’m on my way.” I snapped the cell phone shut and eyed Tyanne.
“Oh, Lord,” Tyanne drawled, looking like a trapped animal, anxious to escape. She glanced at the door, at the narrow window beyond the sinks. There wasn’t a chance in ten that she could slip through it. “If Kristine finds out—”
“She’s not going to. I won’t tell her. Urso will keep this confidential.”
“She’s so proud. And so strong. And . . . Oh, my. Chief Urso’s going to want me to tell him everything. No, no, no. I can’t do it.” Tyanne shook her head like a child having a fit. “I just can’t. I’m so sorry, y’all. So sorry.” She barreled past me, using her shoulder like a defensive guard, knocking me sideways into the bathroom wall. Her jock of a husband would be proud.
By the time I was able to find my footing and put my clammy shirt back on, she was long gone. I hurried back to the table.
Rebecca said, “I’m so sorry, Charlotte. Hey, are you okay? You look like you’re in shock.”
“I’m fine.” I slipped into the booth, my shirt sticking to the Naugahyde.
“We’ve got to get a move on,” Rebecca went on. “Your grandmother’s rally starts in a half hour. Seven sharp, she said.”