And with that, she crumpled to the floor.
• • •
All I can say is that sometimes it’s nice having a good portion of a college football team on staff—albeit temporarily. I’d been a little concerned about them missing so much class time, but they’d all assured me they could watch their lectures online. It took Darnell and his cohorts, and a cup of Amber Lee’s high-test, to get Ellen on her feet again. And even then she wobbled, supported with a little help on either side by two young football players.
“Can we get her home, do you think?” I couldn’t think of any place to let her sleep it off in our shop—unless we draped her over the fieldstone table in the consulting nook. “What about if we lay her in the back of the delivery van?”
Liv glanced at her watch. “The delivery van is already loaded to take to the Rawlings’. The CR-V, too. And I need the boys to carry for me if we’re going to get those arrangements set up before the afternoon visitation hours.” Liv’s hand flew to her forehead. “I don’t know what to do. Ellen’s timing stinks.”
“Don’t treat me like a baby. I can get home.” Ellen shook off her supporters, then fumbled in her purse and pulled out a set of car keys. “Without any help from you.” She held up the keys and lurched forward. “And do you know why?”
Darnell snatched the keys from her hand and held them high out of her reach.
Ellen made a jump for them, but the sudden motion made her wobble. “Oh, dear. I’m a little dizzy.” Then she passed out, cold. At least the football players used their quick reflexes to catch her before she reached the ground.
At that moment, the bell over the door sounded. What a time for a customer!
I whirled around to see Nick Maxwell. His eyes scanned the situation, Darnell’s two friends struggling to support the dead weight that was Ellen Whitney. I guess it’s safe to say, in the brief time since we’d met, I hadn’t made the best impression on the handsome baker. But then again, what did I care? I wasn’t ready for another relationship anyway. Was I?
“I see Ellen came for her refund,” Nick said.
“How did you know that?” I asked.
“She hit the bakery three hours ago and talked me out of the fifty-dollar deposit on the cake. Looks like she drank it.”
“Audrey,” Liv interrupted, “I need to get those flowers delivered now. I should have left ten minutes ago.”
Maybe Ellen would end up draped across the fieldstone table after all.
“Do you need help with her?” Nick asked.
Liv pounced on that simple offer. And I’m not sure how it happened, but soon it was decided that Nick and I would see Ellen home in the back of the bakery truck. If Liv had taken up matchmaking again, I could think of an infinite number of better ways than escorting a belligerent drunk home.
He pulled his truck into the back alley. I recalled seeing the white box truck with the cupcake logo before but wondered how I’d missed the large sliding glass windows on the side.
“I just had those installed last week.” He pointed them out as he rounded to the back and opened the doors. “I’d like to take the cupcakes mobile. Maybe hit some local events this year. Ball games. The summer concerts.”
“Good idea.” I could imagine all the belts in Ramble being loosened a notch just at the prospect.
That also explained the stainless steel counter inside the truck, just below the window. Racks were affixed to the area just behind the driver.
“It looks new back here,” I said. “Are you sure you want to do this?”
He shrugged as the football players deposited Ellen onto the carpeted floor. “I was going to replace the factory carpet with a surface that’s nonskid, yet easier to clean, so if . . .” He left the rest unsaid. Better that way.
He drove, gently negotiating the streets and hills of Ramble while I rode in the back with Ellen. I felt a bit like an ambulance attendant. I wondered if maybe I should check her vitals, hook up an IV, or randomly yell “stat” like they did on the TV shows. Yet her steady snore assured me she was alive and breathing. Only when the snore stopped did I lean over.
She mumbled something incoherent, belched, then started snoring again.
Minutes later, the truck stopped, the motor grew silent, and Nick Maxwell opened the back door. He rubbed his hands together. “So, how do you want to do this?”
I jiggled the keys that Darnell had confiscated. “I guess we should open up the house first.”
He offered his hand to help me down from the back of the truck. I surreptitiously wiped my palm on my clothing. I was not going to repeat that potting soil fiasco. I grasped his hand—strong and warm. I guess bakers must develop strong hands, too. Then I tried to climb gracefully from the back of the truck and down the two feet to Ellen’s unkempt stone driveway.
Yeah, that bad.
I guess I should explain that I still wore my dress and heels because of my scheduled bridal appointment. And high heels and stone driveways just don’t mix. My left foot landed squarely enough, but my right heel sliced against a large stone, leaving me toppling, just as badly as Ellen had. If it weren’t for Nick, who caught me.
Okay, maybe escorting a drunk woman home is good matchmaking. Score one for Liv. Because—cue the violins—we had a moment. One of those corny movie moments where I look up at him, and the entire world melts away except the warmth of his body next to mine as I stare into his limpid eyes. Whatever “limpid” means. But all the world was suspended and empty and faded into the background. Nothing mattered that moment but Nick and me.
Until Ellen belched loudly, then vomited all over Nick’s truck.
Cut the violins.
• • •
Quite a bit of time had passed since I’d been in the Whitney home. After Jenny’s dad died, Ellen and her daughter had moved into the nondescript ranch home just outside Ramble, one of a dozen identical affordable homes built on postage-stamp lots, manufactured with the lowest-end material possible. Bottom-of-the-line carpets, discounted linoleum, particleboard. And tiny.
The nice thing about Ellen’s vomiting episode was that it meant she was conscious—or, rather, semiconscious—when we got her into the house. We each took an arm and were able to direct her up the steps.
While I got Ellen undressed and settled in bed, Nick took a roll of paper towels we found in her kitchen and headed out to his truck.
By this time, Ellen had transitioned from angry to weepy.
“You’re a good girl, Audrey,” she told me, squeezing my chin. “Your mama must be proud.”
I inhaled sharply. “Let’s not go there right now. You should be proud, too. Jenny is a sweet girl. The chief will figure out she didn’t do this thing.”
“She is. She’s a good girl.” Ellen curled into a ball. “I know she’s a good girl.”
I sat at the edge of her bed. “Then why won’t you go see her?” I asked. Now might be the time to ask the questions—when Ellen was less likely to keep her guard up and might not even recollect what I asked.
“She won’t want to see me. I messed it all up.”
“Messed what up?”
“Messed it all up,” she insisted.
This was not working. “What did you do to mess it all up?” Surely she couldn’t mean she’d killed Derek.
“I encouraged her. Encouraged her, that’s what I did.”
“Encouraged her to do what?”
“To set her cap for Derek. She never would have . . .” Ellen trailed off into a round of bawling.
I waited, making soothing sounds and rubbing her arm.
“She liked him. She didn’t know that like sometimes just needs a little push to become love. So I pushed her—just a little bit. It’s like that sometimes, isn’t it, Audrey?”
“I guess it is.”
“And Derek wasn’t so bad. He’d settle down
like his father, with the help of the right woman—at least that’s what Jonathan Rawling told me. Told me that’s what happened to him. And he could provide a good life for Jenny, too. That’s why I did it. Do you believe me, Audrey?”
“Of course.”
“And gambling’s not so terrible. Most people gamble a little, don’t they? The lottery. Bingo. Why, even a lot of churches sponsor raffles. There are worse habits for a man to have, aren’t there?”
“I suppose.” It wasn’t much of a segue, but I thought I’d give it a try. “Speaking of habits, Ellen”—I winced—“was Jenny taking any kind of drugs that you know of? Prescription, I mean, or . . .”
She seemed not to hear me as she snuggled under her covers and spoke to her pillow. “She’d settle him down, and he’d give her a good life. That’s all I wanted. All those plans, all that work to get them together. And now he blames me.”
“Who?”
“Jonathan. That man was sweet as pie just a week ago. He and his wife even invited me to tea. Tea. We had scones. Have you ever eaten a scone, Audrey? I mean a real scone.”
I shushed her and pulled her shades to cut out the afternoon sunlight.
“With clotted cream,” she mumbled as I closed her door, leaving her to sleep it off.
When I stepped out of the bedroom, I found Nick was in the kitchen, stripping off a pair of loose-fitting food service gloves. He tossed them in the kitchen trash can, then washed his hands in the sink. “How’d it go?”
“She’ll sleep it off now,” I said. “I hope.”
“Do we dare leave her keys?” Nick asked.
“I don’t see why not. Her car must still be parked somewhere in town, and that’s a long walk from here. She can pick it up later when she’s sober.”
“I couldn’t help but overhear what she said.” Nick held the door open for me. “Sad.”
“You know, Ellen hasn’t been to see Jenny. I thought she was mad at her. But it sounds more like she’s blaming herself for trying to get Derek and Jenny together.”
“I heard that part—something about gambling.” He held the passenger-side door open for me. No riding in the back this time. The smell had crept into the cab of the truck, so I rolled down my window.
When Nick climbed in, he did the same. “It’s not true, though.”
“Derek didn’t gamble? Or was he involved in more than gambling?”
Nick laughed as he backed out of the driveway and turned onto the road. “I’m afraid I didn’t know Derek well enough to answer that. I just meant that sometimes a little gambling isn’t a little thing—and it takes more than the right woman to make it all work.”
I’d been thinking the same thing, so I just nodded.
“My uncle, he started out with just lottery tickets. He’d blow twenty a week on them. And then something awful happened. He won. Won a million-dollar instant prize.”
“Awful because . . .”
“At first it didn’t seem so bad. He paid off his house, bought new cars for himself and his wife. Sent his kids to college. Did all those things people say they’ll do if they win it big. Except he kept buying lottery tickets. Then a trip to Atlantic City. Then Vegas, with enough little wins to keep him coming back. In just a few years, the money had all trickled through his fingers. He took out a mortgage on his house, trying to win the money back, then got involved in a number of get-rich schemes—some of them on the shady side. Soon my aunt left him. Now he has nothing. So it kind of fits.”
“Fits?”
“If Derek had a gambling problem, then he likely had a money-acquisition problem. Who knows what he was involved in, what kinds of shady deals he might have been part of?”
“So you’re thinking one of his shady gambling connections might have killed him.” I stared out the window, watching the green hills and white-fenced farms of Virginia streak by the passenger window. It made sense—at least more sense than Jenny killing Derek.
But with the chief investigating Jenny, someone needed to investigate Derek. I contemplated how to do this. Derek’s parents. Derek’s business associates. Derek’s well-heeled friends.
Before long, Nick pulled into the alley behind the Rose in Bloom.
“Thanks so much for helping me.” I reached for the door handle.
“No problem,” he said.
“Except for the carpet.”
“I’ll just rip it out a little earlier than I planned. Nothing to worry about—and certainly not your fault.”
I smiled at him.
“Audrey?”
“Yes?”
“I’ve been meaning . . . well, there’s something I’d like to ask you.”
I turned toward him and pulled a strand of hair behind my ear. This might be it. Did he feel that moment, too, the electrical charge between us? And more important, was I ready to date again? And was he even free to date? After all, he must have given all those flowers to somebody.
“I was thinking that . . . well, when you mentioned the bridal magazines, I thought that maybe . . .”
He turned forward, staring straight ahead, and tapped the steering wheel. He bit his lower lip before continuing. “Well, since you do flowers and I do cake, I thought that maybe we could collaborate . . .”
“Collaborate?”
“Yeah. Like decorating cakes and cupcakes with fresh flowers. So they match the bouquets and centerpieces. It could be a great service for both of us to add.”
He turned back to me, his eyes pleading. It was my turn to stare out the front window. I’d have to call an electrician about my faulty romantic electricity meter. I’d been certain that he felt a spark, too.
“Sure. We could do that.” I reached out to open my door, and he switched off the engine. When he climbed out of the cab, I turned back.
“You don’t need to walk me in. I’m fine from here.”
“I just remembered what I came here for in the first place. I was hoping you might have some small bouquets ready.”
Oh, yes, the mysterious recipient of Nick’s flowers. What a nice guy, coming in to buy flowers but still taking time out to help me carry Ellen Whitney home.
Whoever this mystery lady was, I hoped she appreciated him.
Chapter 9
After Nick purchased a cute little bouquet of delphinium (fun, levity) and daisies (cheerfulness, innocence) and left, I felt like such a slacker. Of course, my feet screamed in my shoes and I would have loved a nap, but I feared I hadn’t done my share around the shop. While I’d been running errands for Jenny and escorting her drunken mother back home, Liv, Amber Lee, and Shelby had constructed even more funeral arrangements. They also must have taken in another order of flowers from somewhere, since our cooler still bulged with new blooms to work with. The fact that not a peach rose was among them I found a tad disconcerting. Of course, Liv was now assembling arrangements with the phone tucked against her shoulder, taking orders and fielding questions while her fingers worked automatically.
Still, I had a nagging feeling that although we’d done so much for the funeral already, we hadn’t officially paid our respects to the Rawling family.
“Liv, what do you say we take this next batch over a little early? Then the second the last guest leaves, we can cart the flowers in.”
Liv sagged onto her worktable. This work was taking a lot out of her, and I hated to add more to her plate. I saw her glance at the stack of work orders still remaining, if not growing.
“You should do it,” Shelby said. “We’ll have more help. The girls are coming back tonight, and I told them to expect it to be an all-nighter. They were pretty excited about the prospect.” He gave us a look down his nose. “Little do they know.”
“And I’d be happy to hold down the shop,” Amber Lee said. “I hate to wish ill of somebody, but if more important people in town died, I’d be able to replace my roof. L
eastwise, now I can afford a repair.”
From anyone else, the statement might seem mercenary. But I suspected Amber Lee was helping us not to feel guilty about all the long hours we were putting them through, letting us know that they were willing and being compensated for their work.
“You’re right,” Liv said. “We’ll go a little early.”
After a quick freshening up, Liv and I were presentable to visit the Rawling estate. Well, without time for a full spa makeover and a NYC shopping excursion with a personal style consultant, we did the best we could.
We left Darnell in charge of the running van parked in the back while we walked around to the front porch, probably best called a veranda, unless some architect had coined some even more highfalutin name. We joined other arriving guests who’d left their high-end car with a servant who parked it. Valet parking. Who knew? I wondered if you were supposed to tip them. Good thing we parked out back.
As we walked in the double doors to the foyer (pronounced “fo-yay,” I learned last time), Worthington’s eyebrows rose almost imperceptibly, but he did nothing more than direct us into the parlor.
Friends and family milled around, surrounded by flowers, reminding me how many trips Liv had taken since the last time I’d been there. She’d done a fantastic job. Across the foyer, other guests served themselves from trays of pastries and sandwiches. Miranda Rawling held court in a Queen Anne chair—which probably traced its origins back to Queen Anne herself—near the casket.
I looked again at Derek.
“How natural he looks. Doesn’t he look natural?”
I winced at the remark of the older gentleman behind me. Nothing was natural about this whole situation. Derek didn’t belong dressed in his best suit, lying in a casket in the parlor. He belonged racing down the streets of Ramble in that silly car of his.
But if the answer to Derek’s death lay in his life—in his gambling or other associates, as Nick suggested—I’d need to know more about Derek, certainly more than his lifeless form could tell me. I started to make my way over to Miranda Rawling.
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