Death by Scones

by Jennifer Fischetto

  "How are you today?" he asked.

  I gave him a big smile. "Better now that I'm back in the kitchen." I loved this town, but the more I worked here, the more I realized I really preferred hanging with the flour and sugar.

  The night the police took Mrs. Hendrickson away, Jared had gone with me to the police station to answer a bunch of questions. I'd decided then that I didn't want to stay with him until Grams and I were back on our feet. It was too sudden, and too much had happened. We needed to take things slowly, and living together, even if just for a bit, wasn't slow. I'd spent that night back at Tara's.

  Max had visited the next day, and I'd learned that he had called the cops on Holly too. He hadn't pressed charges as long as she and Gloria promised to get out of town and stay gone. They did. And he offered for Grams and me to stay at Nathan's. It was a huge place. He certainly had the room. We'd accepted. It was nice getting to know him better, and Tara visited daily. She wouldn't admit it, but I believed her crush was more than just a physical thing, but time would tell. They had a date tonight. She was giving him tango lessons.

  He ended up telling me that the reason he'd hung out in front of Doc's was because he'd found something in Nathan's belongings that I needed to know. He hadn't told me right away because he wasn't sure if I'd needed anything more on my plate. So he'd waited outside, wondering if he should get me, and suddenly I came running back out of Doc Eckhardt's.

  As it turned out, Nathan was sterile. Max had found the paperwork from his uncle's doctor. Nathan had learned about it a couple of years after the car accident. There was no way I was Nathan Dearborn's child, yet even though he knew this, he'd still left me part of his estate. I didn't understand why. Maybe it was guilt money because of the accident, but it definitely created a warm spot in my heart for him. I was also still furious for what he did to my family though. And I had the rest of my life to get through the jumbled emotions.

  "You're quiet today," Jared said.

  "Sorry. I have a lot on my mind."

  He reached around me and gently took the bag from my hands. He laid it on the counter and turned me toward him. "It's okay if you're not back to your old self yet. It's only been a week."

  I nodded, but it wasn't that at all. I hadn't felt so hopeful in a long time. There were no obstacles in front of me, and I had the best set of family and friends. Well, there was the lingering Erin problem, but that was Jared's headache, not mine. And there was Will. He and I no longer knew how to act around one another. I didn't have to figure it out today though.

  "I'm great. Really. I have you. How can I not be?" I stood on my tiptoes and pressed my lips to his cheek.

  Yes, everything was fine in my world. Mrs. Hendrickson had been right about one thing. I had my family, friends, my health, and this awesome bakery.

  What more could a girl want?

  * * * * *

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  * * * * *

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  Jennifer Fischetto is the National Bestselling Author of the Jamie Bond Mysteries. Unbreakable Bond, her adult debut novel, has received a National Reader's Choice award nomination. She writes dead bodies for ages 13 to six-feet-under. When not writing, she enjoys reading, cooking, singing (off-key), and watching an obscene amount of TV. She also adores trees, thunderstorms, and horror movies—the scarier the better. She lives in Western Mass with her family and is currently working on her next project.

  To learn more about Jennifer Fischetto, visit her online at: http://jenniferfischetto.com

  Elizabeth Ashby was born and raised in Danger Cove and now uses her literary talent to tell stories about the town she knows and loves. Ms. Ashby has penned several Danger Cove Mysteries, which are published by Gemma Halliday Publishing. While she does admit to taking some poetic license in her storytelling, she loves to incorporate the real people and places of her hometown into her stories. She says anyone who visits Danger Cove is fair game for her poisoned pen, so tourists beware! When she's not writing, Ms. Ashby enjoys gardening, taking long walks along the Pacific coastline, and curling up with a hot cup of tea, her cat, Sherlock, and a thrilling novel.

  * * * * *

  BOOKS BY JENNIFER FISCHETTO

  Danger Cove Bakery Mysteries:

  Death by Scones

  Dead by the Numbers Mysteries:

  One Garish Ghost & Blueberry Peach Jam

  A Christmas Ghost & Zero Regrets

  Jamie Bond Mysteries:

  Unbreakable Bond

  Secret Bond

  Lethal Bond

  Disturbia Diaries:

  I Spy Dead People

  We Are The Weirdos

  DANGER COVE BOOKS

  Secret of the Painted Lady

  Murder and Mai Tais

  Death by Scones

  Four-Patch of Trouble

  Deadly Dye and a Soy Chai

  Killer Closet Case

  * * * * *

  SNEAK PEEK

  of the next

  DANGER COVE MYSTERY

  FOUR-PATCH OF TROUBLE

  A DANGER COVE QUILTING MYSTERY

  BY

  GIN JONES & ELIZABETH ASHBY

  CHAPTER ONE

  A year after I quit practicing law, I was still arriving early for meetings as if I needed the time to complete last-minute, on-site preparations for a trial. Today, all I had to do was introduce myself to the director of the Danger Cove Historical Museum, exchange business cards, and be personable enough that he'd hire me to appraise the quilts they were planning to acquire. I could do that in my sleep. And yet, I'd arrived twenty minutes ahead of schedule.

  Rather than lurk impatiently outside the director's office, I opted to go back down to the first floor and wander through the exhibits. I'd only moved to Danger Cove a few months ago, and this was my first visit to the museum. Its collections were housed in a massive, two-story brick building that was itself of historical interest, having been built in 1898. The museum's mission was to preserve local history, with a particular emphasis on the Danger Cove Lighthouse, maritime artifacts, and pioneer settlements.

  Despite the building's age and size, the exhibits were fairly sparse, and I managed to visit all of the public spaces, not counting the tiny gift shop, and still make it back to the suite marked "Gil Torres, Museum Director" with a couple of minutes to spare.

  In the waiting area, six otherwise unremarkable wood chairs had had the seats and backs upholstered with the museum's signature textile, a traditional paisley in red, white and blue, reproduced from a quilt in its collection. The chairs flanked a small table nestled in the corner of the room, where there was a collection of brochures and flyers. The walls were similarly decorated with promotional materials, most of them posters for the annual quilt show jointly sponsored by the museum and the Danger Cove Quilt Guild.

  I picked up a brochure just as a petite blonde woman breezed into the room. Except for the hair color and short height, the woman could have been me twelve months ago. She was about my age, maybe a year or two older than my thirty-eight and she wore a pale linen suit much like mine, perfectly tailored, and in a style conservative enough to impress a jury. She was also in an obvious rush, radiating tension, something I'd been all too familiar with a year ago. Unlike me, though, she had perfectly smooth skin, somehow managing to avoid even the beginning signs of the deep age lines that stress was prematurely carving on my forehead. She was also wearing spike-heeled sandals that were a great deal more flattering than my walking shoes, but now that I was no longer able to drive and had to walk everywhere, I needed to be practical about my footwear.

  The door to the museum director's inner office opened, and a stunningly beautiful dark-skinned woma
n who was at least three or four inches taller than me, putting her at six feet tall, emerged. She smiled in my direction and said, "You must be—"

  The blonde interrupted. "One of the vendors at the quilt show has a problem, and I need it resolved right now." She pushed her way into the director's office.

  The tall woman smiled ruefully at me. "I'm terribly sorry. This shouldn't take long."

  I fought the impulse to jump to my feet, state for the record that I objected, and my appointment should be honored. Standing quickly was no longer an option. It could trigger a syncope episode, and passing out, while dramatic, seldom helped to win an argument.

  I took a deep, calming breath. I wasn't in a courtroom, and I didn't need to defend my dominant status. I'd given up that lifestyle on doctor's orders, and a little rudeness wasn't worth my ending up in the hospital. I wasn't in that much of a rush, and it wasn't the assistant's fault that her boss didn't honor his appointments.

  "She's not worth stressing over," I told the tall woman. "I'll go make another round of the exhibits."

  I went back downstairs to the lobby, where I heard my name being called. I turned around to see Lindsay Madison, once my paralegal, coming toward me.

  Lindsay was in her mid-twenties and of average height but muscular from the weight-lifting she did as training for ringing big bells, the multi-ton behemoths found in churches and other public towers. She wore a light blue sweater set and navy tailored pants, but the professional image was marred by the way she'd absently misbuttoned the cardigan and gotten a smudge of white correction fluid near the right pants pocket.

  My biggest regret about retiring from the practice of law had to do with Lindsay. The law firm had promised to keep her on, subject to the usual employment terms for all its staff. Unfortunately, those usual employment terms were likely to get Lindsay fired within a few months. She was smart, well-meaning, and hard-working, but she just couldn't seem to focus on her work consistently. She could memorize hours-long bell-ringing patterns, but she couldn't remember to run spellcheck on every single document.

  "Why aren't you at work?" I was afraid I knew the answer.

  Lindsay glanced over her shoulder. "I sort of had some time off. I heard you were going to be here this morning, and I wanted to ask you for a favor."

  "You need a job reference?" I pointed at the misbuttoned sweater.

  "No." Lindsay peered down at her chest for a moment uncomprehendingly before running her fingers along the buttonholes and then fixing the misalignment. "I was sort of wondering if you would talk to someone about a legal question."

  I knew a slippery slope when I saw one. I hadn't been ready to end my career as a lawyer, so it would be easy to fall back into old habits, like giving legal advice when asked by someone who was in trouble. And then I'd be the one in trouble, passing out from the stress of feeling responsible for everyone around me. I couldn't let that happen. "I'm not doing legal work right now. There must be someone at the firm who could help you."

  "I sort of tried that already, and no one would take the case." Lindsay hunched deeper into herself, somehow making her muscular frame seem fragile. "You're my last chance, and I can't just give up. It involves my grandmother and her best friend. I kind of can't say no to them."

  "So you expected me to be the bad guy?" That was one thing I didn't miss about the practice of law.

  Lindsay glanced back at the museum's main entrance again. "Aren't you bored? Ready for a challenge?"

  "I have plenty of challenges." First and foremost, I was trying to figure out how to follow my doctor's orders to relax and go with the flow, when it just made me feel like I was caught in a riptide and about to drown. Beyond that, this week was likely to be a turning point in my new appraisal career. Not only was there a window of opportunity here at the museum, but I was also going to be the keynote speaker at the local quilt show on Friday, and I was having trouble writing the speech. It should have been easy, not much different from an opening argument to a jury, which I'd done hundreds of times before, but the drafts I'd written were terrible. Definitely not something that would make a good first impression on the many dedicated quilters and quilt collectors—potential clients for my appraisal services—who came to this event from all over the Northwest.

  "I'm sorry," Lindsay said. "Are you still fainting all the time?"

  "I don't faint." I hated being seen as weak, even by someone who wasn't trying to use it against me. "I pass out. There's a difference. And it doesn't happen all the time."

  "That's good. I think." Lindsay glanced at the entrance again. "But you'll talk to my grandmother, right? She'll be here any minute. It just takes her a while to walk around from the parking lot out back."

  I checked my watch. Ten minutes past the hour and no sign of the director's assistant searching for me. I should be able to spare a few minutes for Lindsay. I pointed at the bench outside the tiny gift shop. "I'll wait over there while you get your grandmother."

  Lindsay scurried over to the main entrance with all the energy she seldom applied to her work. She returned a few moments later, ushering two elderly women over to the bench. The older, shorter one appeared fragile and was assisted by a taller and sturdier woman, who appeared to be about ten years younger but still at least in her mid-sixties. The older one was dressed for business, in a skirt suit with nylons and pumps, while the other one wore embroidered capris with a matching short-sleeved top.

  Once the older, fragile woman was seated, Lindsay hovered beside her. "This is Dee, my grandmother. Grandma, this is Keely Fairchild."

  Dee pointed at my quilted messenger bag, a checkerboard pattern of light-colored squares alternating with darker squares, no two of them alike. "That's lovely. Did you make it?"

  "I wish I had, but I don't sew. I commissioned this at a quilt show last year when I decided to set up shop as an appraiser. The fabrics are all reproductions, so it works as an informal reference tool for historic fabric styles."

  The other woman helped Dee settle onto the bench before saying, "I'm Emma Quinn. We want to get Randall Tremain pilloried."

  "Emma may be overstating matters a little," Dee said, straightening her skirt. "I'd love to see Tremain punished by being locked up in a public square for people to point and laugh and maybe even throw some rotten food at him. That's definitely what he deserves, but we'd settle for having him charged with fraud and his shop shut down."

  "He's selling counterfeit antique quilts at his shop," Emma explained. "And now he's going to be selling them at our quilt show. People will think the guild endorses his business practices. Lindsay said you'd know what we could do."

  I raised an eyebrow in Lindsay's direction.

  "You know about quilts and about the law," Lindsay said. "If anyone can stop Tremain, you can."

  "It may be too late to do anything to keep him out of the quilt show." I'd seen the contract for the vendors, and it was solid. "You'd have to prove he'd breached his contract somehow, and four days isn't much time to do anything in the legal system."

  "You're our last hope," Emma said.

  "We could always hire a hit man, if push comes to shove," Dee said matter-of-factly. "I'm not sure the guild treasury has enough money for that, though, so we thought it would be better to exhaust our legal options first."

  Not all of my clients had been that wise. "I do appreciate your preference for the legal route. I'm just not sure I can do anything to help you. Perhaps the local prosecutor would look into it."

  "We've been there already," Dee said, "but the condescending twit of a baby-faced prosecutor wasn't interested in any crime that didn't involve blood and guts. I was tempted to show him some blood and guts. His own."

  "I tried to tell him there's usually some blood on antique quilts," Emma said. "You know, from needles pricking fingers."

  "That wasn't gory enough to interest him or anyone else in law enforcement," Dee said. "We contact the media, but they weren't interested either."

  "One nice reporter sp
oke to us, dear," Emma said. "Remember him?"

  "You mean Matt Viera? He is lovely. He did try to help, but he's a freelancer, and he couldn't get his editors interested in the story. Not even at the Cove Chronicles, where they're always looking for filler." Dee smiled at her granddaughter. "We were almost out of options when Lindsay mentioned you. She said you're smart and efficient."

  "But Lindsay also tells us you don't have any patience whatsoever," Emma said, shaking her head. "I'm afraid you'd never make it as a quilter."

  I'd already figured that much out myself. I'd always admired quilts, and I'd once thought I might become a quilter when I retired—many, many years in the future—and had some free time. Then when I left the law firm and had the time to try quilting, I'd quickly realized I had no aptitude for it. I could easily spend a solid week inspecting and researching every detail of a quilt someone else had made, but I couldn't make myself spend more than two minutes in front of a sewing machine.

  "All that matters," Dee said with a quelling look at her friend, "is that Keely knows enough about quilts to identify Tremain's fakes."

  A year ago, I would have jumped at the challenge. Now, my main priority was avoiding even the slightest whiff of stress. I was already anxious enough about my upcoming debut at the quilt show. I didn't need anything else to worry about right now. Even if I wanted to help, the women didn't have standing to file a case in court since they hadn't been harmed by Tremain themselves. "I'm sorry, ladies, but there really isn't anything I can do."

  "I understand," Dee said. "We're going to have to move on to Plan B, then."

  The hit man, I thought as my light-headedness increased. It was the first step in the chain of symptoms that, if not stopped, would lead to my passing out. Syncope, the doctors called it. Mine was of unknown origin, presumed to be stress-induced.