The Missing Ingredient

by Diane Noble

  Something was wrong.

  Kate blinked, watching them with narrowed eyes.

  They were too nonchalant for the kind of mission they were on. Too cocky. Too perfect.

  “They’re decoys,” she hissed to Renee and Sybil. “That whole ghost business in the windows was a show put on for the benefit of anyone who might be watching.”

  Sybil and Renee were still watching the couple make their way to the creek.

  “We’ve got to split up,” Kate whispered. “You two follow that couple. Find out what you can.”

  “Where are you going?” Renee asked.

  “Back to the service entrance, just to keep an eye on things.”

  Without another word, Kate pulled up the collar of her coat, and holding the hood close over her head, she trotted back across the dark, icy parking lot to the service entrance.

  She arrived just as the door pushed open slowly and there he was. Even in the darkness, she recognized the man exiting the hotel as Newt Keller. She faded back into some brush and held her breath as he swung the beam of his flashlight around. Then, silently, he made his way around beyond the rear of the hotel.

  Kate followed, not daring to flip on her own flashlight. She strained to see the objects on the ground in front of her. If she tripped, the man would hear her and know he was being followed. Worse, she might hurt herself, and at her age, she could ill afford breaking any bones.

  The dark figure stayed close to the hotel until he reached the side by the creek, then he cut through some dense brush and disappeared.

  Kate stopped, breathing hard from the exertion. Her heart was pounding so hard her ribs moved with each beat. She put her hand to her heart and willed it to slow down to a normal rate.

  She almost laughed. It was asking a lot of a heart to chase a suspect through unfamiliar terrain at midnight in an ice storm.

  Taking a deep breath, she tried to get her bearings. Where had he disappeared to? And how could she follow if all she could see was darkness all around her? She strained to see a flicker from his flashlight, but either he had turned it off, or the brush was so dense she couldn’t see it. She assessed her choices. She could continue feeling her way along with her feet in the dark, or she could flip on her flashlight and charge into the brush, hoping to surprise Newt. That was, supposing he was there. Neither option brought her much comfort.

  That’s when she heard voices ahead. She halted, listened for a moment, then crept forward inch by agonizingly slow inch.

  She had just lifted her foot to take another step when she was hit in the face with a blast of light. She held her hand up to shade her eyes.

  “What are you doing out here?” a voice growled.

  She blinked as her eyes tried to focus. “Move your light, and I’ll tell you,” she said. She reached into her pocket to retrieve her flashlight.

  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Newt said, moving closer. The light still blinded her.

  “I was just reaching for my flashlight,” she said.

  He studied her for a moment, then said, “Don’t even think about it.”

  She breathed a quick prayer and, trying not to be detected, moved her hand agonizingly slow, toward her flashlight. She remembered the pepper spray. It would come in handy now, if she could get to it as well, but she didn’t want to push her luck.

  “You’re supposed to be missing. And hurt,” she said.

  Newt Keller laughed. “Oh yeah, that.”

  “My friend has been accused of abducting you.”

  “Actually, I was sorry about the way it turned out. She actually walked right into my plan, and once the police made the connection, I just let it happen.”

  “Because she saw you at the creek?”

  “Yes. She followed me out there and gave me what-for because of how I treat people. We had a scuffle, I cut myself, and well, the rest is history.”

  He laughed again. “It was supposed to be another ghost story—haven’t you figured that out? What a convenient time to rev up the Precious McFie story, add mine to it, boost ratings, and create an atmosphere of suspense. Slipping around the hotel at night, grabbing a snack from the kitchen by candlelight, all so easily explained. A producer’s dream.”

  “All for publicity,” Kate said.

  He stared at her for a moment. “That’s show biz,” he said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me. I have a boat to catch.”

  “Oh no, you don’t,” said a voice behind Kate.

  She whirled to see Renee gingerly picking her way along the rough terrain. She was breathing hard with the exertion and put her hand to her chest to catch her breath when she reached them.

  “What now?” Keller growled. “As I was saying, I’d love to stay and chat, ladies, but really, I must go.”

  “Maybe you didn’t hear me,” Renee said. “You’re not going anywhere.”

  He started to back into the brush. “You can’t stop me.”

  “Maybe this will,” Renee said. In one swift movement, she swung her camera to her eye and snapped a picture.

  Newt Keller just laughed. “That won’t prove anything. With Photoshop, anybody can tamper with a photograph.”

  Kate took a step toward him. “You’re probably right about that. But this little gem?” She fished around in her pocket for the walkie-talkie and held it up. “It’s recorded every word you just said to me.” She grinned at Renee. “Glad you got the one with all the bells and whistles.”

  “Give that to me!” He lunged for the unit, but Kate did some fancy footwork, and he missed, only to trip and fall facedown in the mud.

  “You’re going to the hoosegow,” Renee said, standing over him, her foot planted on the small of his back. “I hope for a long, long time after what you’ve put this town through. What with the fake haunting on top of everything else, likely to scare our townsfolk to death.”

  He struggled to get up, but before he could right himself, Renee gave him a quick shot of pepper spray. He fell again into the mud, Renee’s foot again anchored to his back.

  His face in the icy mud, Newt mumbled something to the effect that he knew nothing about a fake haunting.

  Kate’s eyes widened. He knew nothing about the haunting? Her mind took off in a dozen directions, trying to connect those remaining dots. But she would have to work through it tomorrow. For now, all she wanted to do was get home and get warm.

  “Did you call 911?” she asked Renee.

  “I told Sybil to when I ran after you.”

  Newt struggled again to get up, but Renee kept her foot atop the man’s back. She continued chatting with Kate as if he were nothing more than a lump of laundry. Very cold and muddy laundry.

  A lump of laundry that kept insisting he had nothing to do with the haunting of the hotel.

  WITHIN MINUTES, Deputy Spencer drove away with a handcuffed Newt Keller in the back of the black-and-white, and Sybil went back into her office to call her corporate headquarters with the news.

  When Kate and Renee reached Kate’s Honda, Renee said, “How did you figure out how to use the recorder on the walkie-talkie? I didn’t even know it had one.”

  Kate opened her car door. “Want a ride to your car?”

  Renee nodded and climbed in the passenger side.

  “I made that up,” Kate said. “I didn’t know whether it had a recorder.”

  They both chuckled all the way to Renee’s car.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Kate sat with her Copper Mill friends in the studio audience, relishing the buzz of excitement that seemed to touch everyone around her. It was the final taping for the Taste Network’s on-location shoot, as well as the final taping of Grits 101. And it was the first time since Susannah’s release that she was once again part of the taping.

  “I’ll miss that little French gal,” Joe Tucker said from the row behind Kate. His Groucho impression had never been better.

  “I’m glad we’ve moved on to grits,” Caroline muttered.

  “Most TV personalit
ies are airheads. But this cute little director Daryl Gallagher sure has done a good job, stepping in as she did,” Millie Lovelace said. “It’s like she was born for it.”

  “She’ll go places,” Eli Weston said. “She may be sweet and cute, but she’s got ambition. I can see it in her eyes.”

  “Nothing like her mother,” LuAnne said. “As far as being sweet, I mean. Her mother’s so cold, she’d break like an icicle in a windstorm. How could a woman like that raise a warmhearted daughter?”

  Kate turned back to watch the preparations for Grits 101. At her feet, Kisses growled from his designer tote and Renee bent down to calm him. Kate noticed Renee’s questioning glance. Kisses had a tendency to growl in just that manner before the appearance of a ghost, or rather, the onset of gas.

  Livvy leaned over to speak to both Renee and Kate. “How do you feel now that the excitement is over? You two are quite the heroes of Copper Mill.”

  “It’s not over,” Kate said.

  Renee looked surprised. “We took down the perp. What else is there?”

  “I just have this feeling,” she began as Renee and Livvy exchanged worried glances. “There are too many unanswered questions.”

  Renee looked around, then lowered her voice. “You mean there’s another perp out there?”

  Kate nodded. “Too many things don’t add up.”

  “You’re still in danger, then,” Livvy whispered. “I thought it was over.”

  Kate pondered that for a moment. The feeling of imminent peril had been growing the past few days. She couldn’t pinpoint why; she just knew it was there.

  The audience hushed as Daryl Gallagher came running in with a wide smile. She was back to her pep-girl persona and seemed ready to break into a cheer as she revved up the audience for the show.

  “First of all,” she said, “in the event that you haven’t heard, Newt Keller has been found alive and well.” There was polite applause from the studio audience, and a smattering of groans from the Taste crew onstage.

  She then turned to the three celebrity chefs standing in the wings and motioned them out. As Daryl waxed eloquent about their contributions to Celebrity Chefs of the South, Kate sat back and frowned. Why had there been no mention that Newt Keller’s abduction was a hoax? Or Nicolette ’s role in it?

  No one else seemed to notice, and Kate went back to watching the three chefs interact as if there’d never been any tension among them. These women, as stellar as their cooking skills were, were also incredibly adept actors. Especially Susannah, who bantered and smiled with Nicolette, Birdie, Daryl, and the audience.

  The Grits 101 taping continued without a hitch. Daryl was in fine form with her combined talents of revving up the studio audience and demanding excellence from the chef and crew. She had fit into the role of director like Cinderella’s foot in the glass slipper.

  As soon as the taping was over, Daryl again stepped in front of the audience. “You may have heard rumors already about this, but we at Taste Network are joining forces with the Bristol to throw a Western-style barbecue for you all.” She gave them more details about the time and place—the hotel parking lot, weather permitting. “At any rate, we’ll have the grills up and running by two o’clock, and run them until we close down after dark. Everyone in town is invited, and there will be no charge. It’s just our way of saying thank you for letting us take over your town for as long as we have.

  “Meantime, we have some final shoots to take care of during the next few days, some special segments about the hotel, especially its interesting history, plus a feature on some of the unique characters who’ve stayed here through the years. So if you see us around town, you’ll know what we’re up to.”

  Kate stood and clapped with the rest of the audience, then she hurried down the risers to talk with Susannah.

  She halted midstep when she saw Nicolette huddle with her daughter. The two had moved slightly away from the others, then continued to move toward the swinging doors of the Bristol kitchen.

  Everyone else in the studio audience was chatting or otherwise distracted. Kate glanced around to make sure no one noticed, then followed the mother-daughter duo at a distance.

  She stepped toward the back of the studio kitchen set and moved as close as she dared to the cardboard-thin faux kitchen wall. Though the two women spoke in low tones, she could hear every word.

  “I need to borrow your phone,” Nicolette said.

  “What’s wrong with yours?” Gone was the sunny cheerleader persona. In its place was barely contained anger.

  “Look, honey, I know you’re upset with what happened. I couldn’t tell you. I didn’t want you to get involved.”

  A short, bitter laugh erupted from Daryl. “You think I didn’t know what you and Newt had planned?”

  There was a moment of silence, then Nicolette said, “You knew?”

  “Of course I knew. I’m not stupid, Mother. I overheard you two scheming months ago. I knew every bit of it, start to finish. It all worked out perfectly for me.”

  “Because it gave you a chance to show off your star power to the execs, including your new ‘best friend,’ Jacqueline Keller? I wondered how you moved into that role with such ease.”

  “Think what you will, but you wouldn’t understand anyway. You never have understood me. Or maybe I should say, you’ve never made the effort.”

  “Understand what?”

  “Here’s the phone, Mother.” The last word dripped with sarcasm. “You’re welcome to it, but you’ll have to talk fast. The battery is almost dead.”

  Kate faded back into the studio audience, then turned just as Nicolette strode from the studio, the cell phone in her hand. Kate followed just long enough to see her punch in some numbers, listen for a dial tone, shake the phone, punch numbers in again, then finally flip the phone closed.

  As a parting shot to her daughter, instead of returning the cell, she tossed it in a rather elegant trash receptacle by the service exit.

  As soon as the woman had walked outside to the parking lot, Kate dove for the trash receptacle. She found the phone immediately, resting atop some paper napkins.

  She flipped it open. The tiny battery icon was almost empty. The phone would go dead within seconds. With trembling fingers, she tapped the buttons to access the text-message files, those sent and those received.

  She saw just a glimpse of what she was looking for before the phone went dead. She had the strange sensation she was being watched. She turned as Daryl Gallagher stepped from the hotel entrance.

  “Is that my phone?” Gone was the smile, the bouncy pep girl.

  Kate looked into her eyes and saw stark fear.

  “I-I saw your mother drop it,” Kate said. “I went to retrieve it.”

  “It’s mine, not hers.” Daryl yanked the phone from Kate’s grasp. “You flipped it open.”

  There was something about her petite figure, the way she moved as she stepped closer, the ballerina stance, the hint of a demiplié that was familiar. Again she remembered taking her daughters to their ballet lessons. The lessons only lasted one hour a week for six weeks, but Kate still remembered the foot positions and a few of the terms. The girls had practiced at home for months, long after the lessons were over.

  “Why did you flip it open if you saw my mother drop it?”

  “I...I—”

  “Yoo-hoo,” Susannah sang out as she rolled her suitcase out of the hotel. Though she had moved her coach to the Hanlons’ earlier, she’d left some of her belongings in the hotel.

  Kate smiled with relief and gave her friend a wave. “Are you packed and ready to go?”

  Susannah nodded. “I hate to leave. Our friendship has come to mean so much to me all over again.” She looked at Daryl. “I want you to know how proud I am of you. You’ve done a stellar job filling in the way you did. Everybody’s saying so. Congratulations.”

  Daryl turned red, mumbled her thanks, then quickly skittered off.

  Kate and Susannah continued making th
eir way across the parking lot to the Miata. It was parked next to the Sumptuous Chocolates star coach. Susannah rummaged through her purse for her keys.

  “Well, dear friend, this is about it,” she said.

  Kate started to give her a hug, then remembered the stained-glass votive. “Oh dear, I almost forgot. I made something for you. Wait here.”

  She trotted across the parking lot to the Honda, clicked open the trunk, and lifted out a carefully padded and wrapped cardboard box. She carried it over to Susannah.

  “My goodness,” Susannah said. “Can I open it here?”

  Kate nodded. “I’d love that.”

  But before she could unwrap the package, the whining roar of a motorcycle heading into the parking lot caught their attention.

  Kate blinked in surprise as it rounded the first row of cars, then the second, and finally the third. It was as if the driver was looking for a specific car. Or person.

  Then, as if in slow motion, the motorcycle careened toward where Kate and Susannah stood.

  Susannah screamed as the driver put the vehicle into a sideways slide and skidded into them.

  Kate’s scream caught in her throat as she was slammed against the Miata, then tumbled to the ground. Susannah crumbled like a rag doll beside her.

  The driver was dressed in black leather, and his face was covered by the dark visor of his helmet. He revved the engine, spun around the parking lot once more, then skidded by the two women again and lobbed a heavy object at Kate. It clunked against her temple, and she fell backward, tumbling into deep black velvet nothingness.

  Kate groaned as she came to then touched her head to see if there was any blood. She winced. No blood, but a goose egg was already forming.

  “You okay?” she whispered shakily to Susannah. Her voice came out in a hoarse whisper. She tried to stand, but her shaking legs wouldn’t support her.

  “I don’t think anything is broken. How about you?” Susannah said weakly as she pulled herself to standing. She hobbled over to Kate, and helped her up.

  By then, people were streaming out of the hotel and running toward them. Someone shouted “Call 911!”

  “Did the package break?” Kate asked Susannah.