Murder Wears White

by Stephanie Blackmoore

  “Did you ever hear her ask people for a bribe?”

  Hunter frowned and looked surprised. “A bribe for what?”

  “Never mind. Thanks, Hunter.”

  He left with a friendly wave, and I made my way to the kitchen to fix lunch. Ezra was gone, but my mom and Rachel bustled around, making sandwiches.

  My mother frowned and reached out to Rachel. “Hunter is so handsome, and he’s very nice, dear. I just wonder . . .”

  Rachel gave Mom a dubious glare. “Say what’s on your mind, Mom.”

  “If you’re moving too fast. I wouldn’t want to see you get hurt.”

  “I can take care of myself.” Rachel swallowed hard and shook her head.

  My mom took a deep breath. “Just don’t give the milk away for free.”

  Rachel dropped her sandwich and wheeled around. “Like you did with Jesse?”

  “How dare you!” Mom quivered in her moccasins, then tucked in her chin. She grabbed her sandwich and minced up the back stairs in a huff.

  It was going to be a long afternoon.

  Chapter Eleven

  I left my mom and Rachel on opposite sides of the house and set out to meet with the florist and chocolatier. Whitney was accompanying Porter to one of his many medical appointments, and I was going to see if I could create Whitney’s vision in record time. And while I was at it, maybe I could follow Bev’s tips and find out whether Lois had solicited bribes from them. I could mix a little sleuthing with wedding planning. I pictured Truman’s heavy frown in my head and pushed the image away. I liked to snoop a little bit. Okay, a lot.

  “Welcome!” The florist, Lucy Sattler, emerged from the back of her shop and hustled forward to shake hands. She was about my age, with a wild tangle of dark curls held back from her heart-shaped face with a glittery gold headband. She’d dressed her curvy short frame in a pretty red plaid shirt and jeans and topped her ensemble with a robin’s-egg-blue apron bearing the name of her store, The Bloomery, in silver embroidery script.

  I breathed in the heady scent of hundreds of flowers. Lucy’s store was outfitted for October. Heavy harvest wreaths fashioned from sunset-colored leaves and crimson berries lined the windows. Terra cotta vases held clusters of cheery sunflowers. Rustic arrangements of pinecones, gourds, and gold and amber ribbon wound their way around the store.

  “Let’s see what we can do for Whitney.” Lucy rubbed her hands together in anticipation and got down to business.

  “Whitney loved the idea of a river of mums, which is good, since you can definitely supply them, right?”

  Lucy nodded eagerly and stood to wheel over a cart with a few more varieties of mums. “That’s all we can get on such short notice in the volume she wants. It’ll be a mum explosion, which will transform them from a standard fall flower into something special, just by virtue of how many we place down the banquet tables. And we can add some special varietals that I’m able to get in stock.”

  Lucy set out a lush flower that looked like the inside of a juicy pomegranate, the petals compact and beaded purple in the middle of the bloom, fanning out to intricate curved edges of mauve tinged with a soft pink.

  “This is a candid mum, and this one is a moira.” The second flower was a tight starburst, a mass of delicate petals, all in a dreamy lilac.

  “They’re gorgeous.” I couldn’t resist running my fingertips over the velvety flowers. “And perfect. Whitney can’t get enough purple, in every shade.”

  I approved the rust, plum, burnt orange, and cream mums that would form the bulk of the arrangements on Whitney’s behalf, as well as the ribbons in chocolate, satin, and café au lait organza that would be wound around the flowerpots.

  We hashed out the number of potted blooms we would need for each long table and moved on to Whitney’s bouquet.

  “She sent me pictures.” Lucy grabbed her iPad and zipped her finger across the screen to show three photographs of elaborate bouquets. “I’ll be able to create something stunning based on what she likes.”

  “Thank you for working with us on such ridiculously short notice.” I glanced around at The Bloomery, with its buckets of arrangements, ranging from cheerful ten-dollar bouquets of Gerbera daisies in primary colors to lush groupings that seemed more like sculpture than flowers.

  “Anything to help out a fellow new business owner. I want to help make your venture as successful as mine has been.”

  “There are so many things to do still to get off the ground,” I lamented carefully. “My house still hasn’t been rezoned to accommodate a business, though I do have all of my permits to renovate. You’d think if one were approved, the other would automatically follow.”

  Lucy rolled her big violet eyes heavenward. “Tell me about it. That was the hardest thing of all, cutting through the red tape in this town to start my business.” For the first time, I detected a bit of a twangy lilt to Lucy’s words. “I’m from West Virginia and moved here to be with my boyfriend. I was surprised they made it so hard to open a shop. You’d think they’d want to revitalize downtown.” She glanced around her store to see if anyone else was listening in, but so far there was only one customer on the other side of the flower shop.

  “Before she passed away,” I began carefully, “Lois Scanlon made a strange comment to me about getting rezoned. I could have been mistaken, but—”

  “Let me guess,” Lucy held up her hand with neatly trimmed nails and a few red prick marks. “She solicited a bribe from you, didn’t she?” Lucy’s mouth turned with a heavy frown like a marionette whose strings had been pulled down.

  I brought my hand up to my mouth with careful mock surprise, though I’d guessed what was coming. “She did.” I waited for Lucy to continue.

  “And you didn’t take her up on her offer?”

  “Of course not!” I didn’t mention that Lois expired from this earth less than a minute after she made her pitch.

  “Well, I didn’t, either.” Lucy balled up her fists and buried them in her apron. “I was shocked, and I let Lois know it. She said this was prime corner real estate, and all of the plants filling the tables might be a fire hazard.” The shop was crowded with blooms and a long table where Lucy’s assistant worked assembling bouquets and ringing up the lone customer, but the effect was to make it a little wild and luxuriantly green, not hazardous.

  “This Victorian started off residential, and Lois cautioned it should probably remain an apartment building, rather than be rezoned a shop. Then she mentioned she could approve the permits for the shop anyway, if I made it worth her while. She was bluffing, and I called her on it. I told her that soliciting bribes as an official for the city was illegal. She just laughed it off! My permits were approved the next day. But I know what I heard. She was not joking.”

  Lucy filled me in on the rest of her process of getting her business up and ready, and after chatting for a few more minutes, I stood to go.

  “It doesn’t shock me that Lois was murdered.” Lucy walked me to the door. “I can’t imagine we’re the only ones she tried to shake down for money.”

  I headed west on foot to the corner of Maple and Laurel to meet with another new Port Quincy business owner, Penelope Jelinek. Penelope’s store, Mellow Cocoa, had beckoned me before, but I’d resisted the luscious smell of truffles and fudge for weeks. I was excited to try some chocolate and bring it back to Whitney in the name of wedding planning. I stopped before the elaborate Halloween wonderland window display. A milk chocolate witch on a pretzel broom flew against a giant white chocolate moon. Tawny owls fashioned from light and dark truffles joined the witch in her flight. They hovered over gingerbread houses decked out for autumn with miniature marzipan pumpkins and piles of candied leaves.

  “Come in, come in.” Penelope was short and stout and jolly, a bit like Mrs. Claus with her red apron, tidy cap of white curls, and delicate, clear half-moon glasses.

  “I’ve died and gone to heaven!” The air was scented with cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice. Different scents of c
hocolate wafted over me, and I didn’t know which one I wanted to try first.

  “Whitney is a chocoholic, yes?” Penelope set a small covered dish on the table between us.

  “She is a self-professed chocolate addict,” I agreed.

  “Let’s bring some of these back to her and see what she thinks. I designed three savory chocolates as favors for her guests.” She whipped off the silver cover, and there lay three kinds of truffles, two gleaming like chestnuts and one sparkling with sugar crystals and cocoa on a deep red napkin. “There’s cayenne, rosemary sea salt, and tarragon.”

  I tried to hide my shock, and Penelope laughed, a pleasant warm trill escaping her lips.

  “Most people don’t think of marrying savory spices and herbs with chocolate, but you’ll find them to be quite complementary.” Her bright blue eyes twinkled behind the half-moon glasses, and she waited expectantly for my reaction.

  I bit into the first one.

  “That’s the cayenne.”

  A slow burst of heat joined the velvety dark chocolate, enough to warm up my tongue but not burn it. A subtle hint of cinnamon completed the truffle.

  “This will be amazing on a cool November day.” My eyes fluttered open, and I swallowed the warm dark chocolate goodness.

  “And this is the tarragon.”

  I bit into the second truffle, and a delicate top note of anise melted with the chocolate. It was surprising and sophisticated.

  “And now for the rosemary sea salt.” Penelope had saved the best for last. The rosemary complemented the milk chocolate in a burst of piney, sharp flavor before my taste buds picked up the slight bite of sea salt.

  “These are decadent and delicious! Whitney will be delighted.” I dabbed at my mouth with a napkin and eyed the rest of the chocolates.

  Penelope actually clapped her hands together. “I love my job. Dreaming up new truffles and chocolates—this has been my wish for years, and now it’s coming true.”

  I didn’t want to ruin the warm fuzzies we’d exchanged, but I had to know if Lois had offered Penelope a bribe too.

  “You must need a lot of paperwork to get a store like this up and running. I know I’m drowning in it at the moment with my wedding-planning business.”

  Penelope’s eyes lost a degree of their twinkle and became guarded and narrow. “Yes, there was a mountain of paperwork and red tape too to open Mellow Cocoa.”

  “The thing that surprised me the most,” I went on, not wanting to beat around the bush, “was this crazy request from Lois Scanlon. I swear I heard her offer to move my rezoning issues along if I’d just pay her to make it happen.”

  The rosy glow drained from the two spots on Penelope’s papery cheekbones as if she’d wiped them with a napkin. She pushed her chair back slowly and rose from the table.

  “She did it to you too?” She picked up a rag from behind the counter and began wiping down the glass cases that flanked the cash register, which held truffles of every flavor and shape laid out like jewels.

  I nodded and waited for her to spill the beans.

  “I can’t say I wasn’t a little relieved when I heard about Lois’s death.” Penelope quivered and put down the cloth. “She wouldn’t leave me be!” She glanced around the empty store. “Lois hinted at a bribe to grant my permits to renovate this space from a hair dresser to a chocolatier. Instead of telling her to buzz off, I got scared. So she dropped by nearly every day until I caved. She claimed to have seen a rat on the premises. A rat! Of course, there were none. She was just threatening to tell the board of health to ensure I paid her.”

  “How much did she want?”

  Penelope looked at her apron and wouldn’t meet my eyes. “A thousand dollars.”

  “One thousand dollars?” My voice ended in an unladylike squeak. Not enough to build up her supposed fortune, but not chump change, either.

  Especially when someone was opening a new business and needed every penny they could get. Lucy had shut Lois down fast, and Lois never approached her again. Penelope had waffled and ended up paying a bribe.

  “I had to!” Penelope’s eyes pleaded with me to understand. “She was dogging my every step. I started to think of her as my stalker in tweed. After I paid her, in a stack of twenties, she left me alone. That vile, terrible woman! I managed to avoid her until a week ago, at the chocolate convention at the Senator Hotel.”

  I jerked my head up. “She was there?”

  “Yes. Scolding the hotel cook when she caught wind of the luncheon menu, which included a crab-cake sandwich. Lois went ballistic. She dressed the poor man down as if he were a child and claimed he was trying to kill her.”

  “How many people witnessed this?”

  Penelope brought up her hands and raised them in a shrug. “The convention room was packed. There were candy makers and people from Port Quincy tasting and sampling chocolate.”

  Interesting. The chocolate convention had brought many people to town, and they had all witnessed Lois revealing the perfect way to kill her.

  “Did Lois spend a lot of time at the convention?”

  “She sure did, and she made something of a spectacle of herself in other ways. She chastised an employee for not wearing the proper attire. The poor woman’s skirt was rather short, but it wasn’t the time or place to embarrass her, with all the conventioneers milling around. She left her belongings and her dogs to run after the girl, muttering about embarrassing the hotel, but she was really embarrassing herself.” Penelope sniffed in disdain and took a bite of a rosemary truffle.

  “She left her things unattended? Like her bag?” I was stunned. That meant an untold number of people, the general public and hotel staff alike, had had access to her mints and bag. All while she drew attention away from it.

  Penelope furrowed her white brows. It was as if I could see the wheels spinning in her head. “Anyone had access to her purse! She came back about fifteen minutes later, all red-faced, to get it and the dogs. Her purse was just sitting out in a booth until she got back. It could have been stolen or tampered with.”

  Did Truman and Faith know this?

  “Do you know of anyone who would want Lois dead?” Hundreds of people at the chocolate convention had access to Lois’s purse, but it only took one person to lace her Altoids with clam-infused Bloody Mary mix.

  Penelope shrank back. “I detested Lois for soliciting a bribe, and I’m angry with myself for paying her, but that’s a far cry from wanting her dead. Although,” she propped her hand on her chin and stared out the front window, “if Lois was willing to solicit bribes, what else was she capable of doing?”

  “What indeed.” My thoughts strayed to Vanessa Scanlon, and we munched on truffles in heavy silence.

  * * *

  The next day, Whitney bit into a rosemary sea salt truffle, and her eyes went wide. “Where has this been all my life? This will make the perfect favor.”

  I grinned, but my smile faded when I recalled Whit’s aunt shaking the jolly chocolatier down for dough. How would Whitney feel if she knew some of her inheritance had been earned from kickbacks from new business owners? I left Whitney on the sidewalk to take a phone call from her fiancé, Ian. I pushed thoughts of Lois’s bad deeds out of my head and entered Fournier’s Jewelry Store.

  Of all the gin joints, in all the towns, in all the world.

  Keith and Becca hovered over a case. Becca ogled the rings. She linked her arm around Keith’s and pulled him closer. “That one! I’m sure of it.” She licked her lips and waited for the clerk to bring up a heavy band of princess-cut diamonds. She pushed it down her ring finger and held out her hand to admire the prisms of flashing light.

  A clerk approached Keith and motioned him over.

  “I just wanted to let you know we haven’t been able to sell . . . it. It’s very large, and most people don’t want a piece that was purchased for an engagement before. We could break the ring down and sell the diamond separately.”

  Keith raised his eyes, and they flicked over to
me for a barely perceptible second.

  Trying to sell my engagement ring? Good riddance!

  I’d last seen the shiny bauble seconds before I’d thrown it down the street. Keith had scrambled after it, and I often wondered if he’d found it in the gutter. I had my answer now.

  “Keep trying,” he muttered testily. “Now, if you’ll excuse me.” He returned to his fiancée’s side, ignoring the clerk.

  A cool breeze from the open door told me another customer had entered the store, and I turned, expecting Whitney. But it wasn’t Whitney. It was Keith’s mother, Helene. She was dressed in her usual nineteen eighties finery, a boxy electric blue suit, pantyhose, and heels. Her shoulder pads were in full effect, and her pageboy was teased out in dramatic puffs like an old-time nun’s wimple. She gave me a regal nod and made her way over to her son and future daughter-in-law.

  She flicked her icy eyes over the platinum ring selection before Becca and shook her head.

  “No, no, no!” Her mouth twisted down in a mean pucker. “You should get a yellow gold band. It goes with everything, Becca.”

  Keith looked caught between his mother and his fiancée, but he didn’t rush to Becca’s aid.

  “But it won’t match my engagement ring,” Becca began tentatively looking at Keith for backup.

  He demurred, stepping back to lean against the window, and Becca started a heated discussion with Helene. Before long, the tinkling door of the jewelry shop sounded.

  Whitney joined me in the store and sent Becca a happy wave, and we made our way to the counter. I was happy to abandon Keith and Becca’s troubles to help Whitney plan her wedding.

  “What can I help you ladies with?” The jeweler, whom I recognized as Mr. Fournier from his billboards around town, leaped up to assist us.