Murder, Money & Marzipan (A Lexy Baker Bakery Cozy Mystery)

by Dobbs, Leighann

  Contents

  Murder, Money & Marzipan

  Copyright

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Epilogue

  A Note From The Author

  Murder, Money & Marzipan

  Leighann Dobbs

  This is a work of fiction. None of it is real.

  All names, places, and events are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to real names, places, or events are purely coincidental, and should not be construed as being real.

  Murder, Money & Marzipan

  Copyright © 2013

  Leighann Dobbs

  http://www.leighanndobbs.com

  All Rights Reserved.

  No part of this work may be used or reproduced in any manner, except as allowable under “fair use,” without the express written permission of the author.

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Cover by: http://www.coverkicks.com

  Chapter One

  “She said the marzipan was atrocious!” Lexy looked down at the miniature fruits she had carefully sculpted the day before with the help of her assistant, Cassie. The tiny candies were made from her own almond paste recipe and had been carefully shaped, painted, and sugared to look like miniature versions of actual fruit. She thought they had come out perfectly.

  Cassie wrinkled her forehead. Popping a tiny pear into her mouth, she chewed enthusiastically. "Tastes great to me. Sergeant Saunders is just mean and I'll tell you, she doesn't seem to like us at all."

  Lexi nodded in agreement. Amanda Scott-Saunders had been a judge at the national bakers competition, Bakery Battles, for the past ten years. She was known for her harsh criticisms and nasty remarks. She had brought contestants to tears more than once, much to the delight of the sponsors who claimed it was good for ratings.

  Lexy thought it fitting that everyone called her “Sergeant Saunders” behind her back. The woman had all the sensitivity and finesse of a drill sergeant and delighted in crushing the hopes of contestants. She had taken a particular dislike to Lexy. No matter how pleased the other judges were with Lexy’s work, Saunders always found something to complain about. It was a miracle Lexy was tied for first place in the competition.

  “She said if I kept producing food like the marzipan, I would be out of the competition.” Lexy felt her face flush with anger. “If you ask me, the competition would be much better off if she was out of it.”

  Lexy heard a giggle from the booth next to hers. She swung her head towards the sound. Her eyes locked on the ice-blue gaze of Aurea Pearce, her closest competition with whom she was currently tied for first place.

  “I guess the Sergeant didn’t like your little fruits,” she said in a sickly-sweet voice. Lexy noticed her lips were curled in a smile that didn’t reach her hard, cold eyes.

  Lexy wasn’t fooled by the sweet, Barbie doll appearance of the petite blonde. Aurea was the type that acted nice to your face, but stabbed you in the back as soon as you turned around. She was a ruthless competitor who would stop at nothing to win.

  Lexy plastered a smile on her face. “You win some, you lose some,” she said matter-of-factly as if the dressing down she received the afternoon before didn’t faze her in the least. She’d be damned if she’d let Aurea Pearce know it bothered her; the other woman would probably find some way to use it against her.

  Lexy turned back to Cassie. “I’m going to put these in the community freezer.” She held up the tray of marzipan.

  Cassie nodded, her head bent over a three-tiered wedding cake that was the subject of the days competition. Lexy smiled at the contrast of Cassie’s pink spiked hair against the traditional white roses she was applying to the cake.

  Lexy took a deep breath. The sting of the previous days judging still hurt, but today was another day and she was determined not to let the harsh words of Amanda Scott-Saunders throw her off course and ruin her chances of realizing her childhood dream.

  Lexy looked around the giant stadium hall that housed the set of Bakery Battles, a yearly competition of the best bakers in America. The space consisted of dozens of kitchen areas, one for each baker. She was honored to be chosen and thrilled she had already made it through several rounds. She considered it one of the greatest accomplishments of her culinary career. The exposure for her bakery The Cup and Cake plus the chance of winning a $100,000 prize and a spread in American Baker Magazine didn’t hurt either.

  With renewed vigor for the days competition, she hurried off to the giant community freezer to store the marzipan, the echo of her Christian Loboutin stilettos tapping on the concrete as she made her way across the vast stadium.

  ###

  Lexy reached out for the smooth handle of the freezer, the tray of marzipan balanced in one hand. The door opened easily, welcoming Lexy in a blanket of icy air.

  She felt herself shiver. They must have the thermostat turned way down today. Not wanting to spend too much time in the arctic environment, she hurried down the aisle to her designated storage spot. Her heel caught on one of the open holes of the thick rubber mat. Jerking forward, she caught herself from falling but not before a dozen assorted marzipan fruits fell to the floor.

  “Damn it!”

  Lexy put the tray on the shelf and bent down to retrieve the marzipan. With a surge of annoyance, she noticed a few pieces had bounced under the metal shelving. She almost had to lie on the floor to reach under the shelf to get them.

  Her apron dragged through the dirt on the mat. She made a mental note to pick up a new one from the hangers in the back of the freezer.

  Stretching her arm under the shelf she felt blindly for the fruit. Her hand encountered something squishy...and big.

  “What the heck…”

  Lexy put her face down at floor level to peer under the shelf. She felt a jolt run through her body. Her lungs burned, filling with a deep breath of icy-cold air. Her mouth opened to yell, but nothing came out. Her eyes blinked closed as if to erase what she was seeing. Fear squeezed her heart when she opened them again and realized the scene was still the same.

  She was staring into the cold, dead eyes of Amanda Scott-Saunders.

  Chapter Two

  “Why were you in the freezer?”

  “I was dropping off some marzipan…to freeze for later.” Lexy squinted up at the police detective. Feeling a bit light headed, she rubbed her temples.

  “Are you all right, ma’am?”

  “Yes.” Lexy shook herself. “It’s just that I don’t find bodies every day. It’s a bit disturbing.”

  The detective- Detective Ryan, it said on his badge- put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “You sit here and relax. Detective Stone will have more questions for you.”

  “Detective Stone?”

  “The detective in charge. Nik will be here shortly, until then just sit tight…and don’t leave the area.”

  Detective Nik Stone. The name made her think wistfully of her boyfriend back home, Detective Jack Perillo. They had actually met under similar circumstances: Lexy’s ex-boyfriend had been poisoned with cupcakes from her bakery and Jack had been the detective in charge. Hopefully Nik Stone would be as easy to work with, and hopefully she could get things to go in her favor with a
few well-placed flirtations, just like she had done with Jack.

  Lexy heard a commotion to her right. The place was crawling with police who all seemed to stop and look in the direction of the commotion. Suddenly the detective was back at her side.

  “This is the woman who found the body. Lexy Baker - Detective Stone.”

  Lexy stuck out her hand, then felt her eyes grow wide. Her mouth dropped open as she stared at the head detective. Tall. Commanding. Exuding as much authority as any man Lexy had ever met.

  Except Nik Stone wasn’t a man. Detective Nik Stone was one of the most beautiful women Lexy had even seen. So much for getting things to go my way by batting my eyelashes.

  Nik grabbed Lexy’s outstretched hand. Even though her hands were delicate and perfectly manicured, her handshake was firm and strong - not a girly handshake at all. Lexy watched the detective pull up a chair opposite her. Her no-nonsense black flats planted on the floor seemed to accentuate her long, thin legs. Lexy noticed her willowy frame had been well equipped in the chest department. Lexy felt a pang of jealousy; the woman had the body of a showgirl.

  Detective Stone leaned forward, her copper-red hair billowing around her alabaster skin like a cloud. She fixed Lexy with a commanding stare, her golden orbs drilling into Lexy’s green ones.

  “OK, Ms. Baker, why don’t you tell me what you were doing here and how you found the body.”

  Lexy recited the story of her tripping on the mat, then finding the body under the shelf in an attempt to retrieve the marzipan.

  “I see. So you are in the competition?”

  Lexy nodded.

  “And what is your relationship to the judge?”

  Lexy bit her bottom lip. “None. I mean, only that she’s a judge here. I didn’t know her before or anything.”

  “She judged your baking?” Nik fired off the questions rapidly, giving Lexy little time to think.

  “Yes.”

  “Favorably?”

  Lexy felt a nervous tic start in her eye. “Well, not really. I mean, she was supposed to be critical of them.”

  Nik nodded, then leaned even closer. “So, you might say you had an adversarial relationship with the victim?”

  Lexy felt her shoulders start to tense up. “Well, not just me…pretty much everyone here did.”

  She glanced around. The activity in Bakery Battles Stadium had come to a halt. Most of the bakers and their assistants were standing around, trying to get a good view.

  She saw Cassie push her way through the crowd, elbowing people aside to get to Lexy.

  “What’s going on?” Cassie looked from Lexy to Nik.

  Lexy took a deep breath and lifted her chin toward the freezer. “I found another body.”

  “Another body?” Nik arched a perfectly plucked brow.

  Lexy felt her cheeks grow warm. She stabbed her index finger into her eye to stop her spastically twitching eyelid. “I found one before…not here…on a catering job back home,” she stammered.

  Nik stared at her incredulously. “So, you make it a habit to stumble over dead bodies. That sounds a bit suspicious to me.”

  “I don’t kill them, I just happen to be the one who finds them.” Lexy shrugged, then breathed a sigh of relief when the other detective - the nice one - returned, commanding Nik’s attention.

  “The M.E. is almost done with the body. Did you want to look at it?”

  Nik stood. “Yes, what was the TOD?”

  “She said it’s hard to tell since the body was frozen but her guess is around 4 am.”

  “Cause of death?”

  “Strangled…with something very thin. We haven’t found it yet though.”

  Nik nodded. “Have Styles and McManus interview everyone else in the stadium. Don’t let anyone leave until they’ve talked to them. And get the crew looking for what she was strangled with.”

  Nik turned to Lexy. “You can go now, but don’t leave the city. I’m going to want to talk to you lat-”

  A commotion over by the freezer door stole Nik’s attention. A third detective appeared in the doorway holding something up in his latex-gloved hands. “Found the murder weapon.”

  Lexy felt her heart clench. He was holding one of the aprons the competition doled out to every contestant. The aprons were all the same, except each was embroidered with the contestants initials. The one he held up had the initials “LB”.

  Amanda Scott-Saunders had been strangled with one of Lexy’s aprons.

  Chapter Three

  “I thought she was going to lock you up on the spot!” Cassie looked at Lexy wide-eyed.

  Lexy nodded in agreement. Detective Nik Stone had seemed quite suspicious of her, especially after the apron was found, but Lexy knew Stone would need more than that to arrest her.

  “I can’t say I’m sorry she’s dead,” Lexy admitted. “But I don’t like the way some of the evidence points at me.”

  “Well, at least now we might have a better chance of winning the contest,” Cassie pointed out.

  Lexy glanced over at the next booth. Aurea was huddled in the corner whispering with Grace Harvey, one of the alternate judges. Lexy felt her stomach drop as she realized someone would have to replace Saunders. If that someone was Grace Harvey, things might be even worse for her.

  There wasn’t much she could do about it at the moment, so she turned her attention to more pressing matters.

  “The filming is canceled for today, but I think we should still work on the cakes so they will be perfect for judging tomorrow.”

  Cassie nodded her agreement, then went straight to the fridge at the back of the makeshift kitchen and pulled out several cake tiers. The next part of the contest would judge them on their cake-decorating skills as well as on the complexity and taste of the cakes.

  Lexy had planned to “wow” the judges with a traditional white three-tier cake decorated to the nines with a quilted-texture fondant covered in white frosting roses and silver leaves and balls. The cake itself was vanilla and she was adding in raspberry liqueur filling to give it some extra punch.

  The grooms cake was a funky contemporary design with geometric tiers offset and covered in bright, colors and decorations. The frosting was all smooth fondant cut out into interesting shapes. Chocolate fudge cake with toffee caramel filling would please the palates while the decoration of the cake would please the judges eyes. Or at least that’s what Lexy hoped.

  The mornings events, however, had somewhat dampened her enthusiasm for cake decorating. Would she even be around to present the cakes or would she be sitting in jail…or worse: disqualified from the competition?

  Lexy looked around the stadium. Each row was sectioned off with fabric in the back so she couldn’t see the entire room. From her kitchen she could see the other kitchens in the same row as well as the ones across from her. Glancing around, she noticed most of the bakers were focusing on getting their cakes made, but some were looking over at her suspiciously. Did they all think she had done it?

  Lexy went over to the fridge and pulled out a bowl of golden caramel that had been setting up in preparation for its role in the grooms cake. She grabbed some toffee from her supply rack and started crushing it with a rolling pin, adding it in small amounts to the caramel.

  “We need to do something to help catch the killer soon so I can put my energies into the contest and not have to worry about when Detective Stone is going to appear with a pair of handcuffs in my size.”

  Cassie nodded. “We’re both up to our eyeballs here with work, but maybe tonight we can set aside some time to talk to some of the other bakers and see if we can find anything out.”

  Lexy popped a piece of toffee into her mouth, rolling it around on her tongue. She moved it from side to side savoring the buttery taste while she brushed the rest of the toffee into the bowl and covered it with plastic wrap.

  “Yeah, it’s too bad we are so limited on time…” Lexy’s head jerked up. “Wait a minute, we don’t have a lot of time, but I know someone who do
es and she’s the perfect person to help us find the killer.”

  Cassie arched her brows. “You don’t mean…”

  “Yes, I do.” Lexy whipped off her apron and threw it on the shelf. “You stay here and mind the fort, I think I know just where to find her.”

  ###

  Lexy stood in the wide entrance to the casino. The clamor of bells and blinking lights caused a momentary disorientation. She scanned the rows of slot machines looking for her grandmother's familiar bluish-gray head.

  She spotted her on the other side of the casino. Mona Baker, or Nans, as Lexy had called her since childhood, sat at her favorite “Wheel of Fortune” slot machine happily pressing buttons. Lexi smiled at the flushed look of excitement on the woman's face.

  When Lexi had made the reservations for her Las Vegas trip to compete in Bakery Battles, she had invited Nans along, knowing how much the older woman loved playing the slots. She figured since she had rented two rooms for her and Cassie anyway, it would be an inexpensive way for Nans to have a vacation. Little did she know she would have to avail herself of the older woman's detective skills to help solve a murder.

  Lexy aimed for Nans, navigating the sea of gamblers. She passed a little bar inside the casino. Someone inside the bar caught her eye. She slowed down for a better look.

  Was that…?

  It was! Amanda Scott-Saunders’s husband sat at the corner of the bar. Normally, the man was meticulously groomed; Lexy felt a pang of sympathy as she noticed his rumpled shirt, tired eyes and stubbled chin. Sympathy soon turned to suspicion, however, when she saw that one hand held a tall drink and the other was draped around the back of a chair that held a striking blonde. Her eyes narrowed as she watched them talking and laughing.

  Hours after his wife was found murdered? She mentally added Peter Saunders to her suspect list, then continued to navigate her way over to the bank of blinking slot machines where Nans was seated.