by Gayle Trent
What if one of Dr. Bainsworth’s patients told him something while under anesthesia? What if the dentist confronted the patient about it later, and the patient got angry? That could make sense. But then, even if the police questioned every single one of the dentist’s patients, the guilty person wasn’t going to speak up and say something stupid like “Yeah, I slipped into his office to bash him on the head because I confessed to him that I was embezzling from my company while I was all hyped up on nitrous oxide.”
I wondered if Myra was up for some undercover investigation. Fortunately, before I could dwell on Dr. Bainsworth’s murder suspects any more, I found the car I needed for my template. I printed it out and went to bed, resolving to start carving the cake first thing tomorrow morning. This way, I could give it a trial run. And if the cake went wrong, I could make another in plenty of time for the party.
THE NEXT MORNING, I hurried outside to get the newspaper to see what was being written about the Bainsworth investigation. There was the handsome dentist’s face plastered on the front page with the headline POLICE SEARCH FOR DENTIST’S KILLER. The article related how “two local women, one of whom was a patient of Dr. Bainsworth,” had found the body Saturday night at the dental office. Thankfully, they hadn’t named Myra or me in the article. I didn’t need bad publicity to further drive down the market for baked goods in Brea Ridge.
The Chronicle went on to list Dr. Bainsworth’s attributes before saying that police were pursuing several leads in connection with his murder. They weren’t specific about those leads, but at least the paper didn’t say “especially the patient and her friend.”
After reading the paper, I made myself a task list. Mr. Franklin wanted five football-themed cakes for the Save-A-Buck and five party trays to psych people up for the Super Bowl. I decided I would make one yellow, two chocolate, and two white cakes—all sheet cakes. I’d go with chocolate chip, oatmeal raisin, and snickerdoodle cookies for the party trays, along with the brownies and some white-and milk-chocolate-covered pretzels.
The phone rang. I hadn’t put on my headset yet, so I picked up the receiver.
“Did you see it?” Myra asked excitedly. “We made the front page of the paper!”
“Was that us? I thought it was Dr. Bainsworth.”
Myra huffed. “Oh, you know what I mean. Did Ben mention anything about the suspects?”
“No,” I said. “Actually, he told me that the police were being kind of cagey on the subject.”
“On Law and Order that always means they don’t have any suspects at all,” she said.
“Not even the two lovely costars who made the front page of the paper?” I asked sarcastically.
“That would only work if one of us had been having a fling with Dr. Bainsworth. I wasn’t. Were you?”
“Yep.”
She blew out a breath. “Oh, you were not. And don’t say you were, not even joking! You’d be arrested for sure.”
I laughed. “I’d better get back to work. I’ll talk with you later.”
“Call me if you find out anything,” Myra said.
“Likewise.”
Before I got started on all that baking, I needed to start carving on the peanut butter and banana cake. I retrieved my template, slipped on my apron, and put on my telephone headset. Then I stacked the three sheet cakes with buttercream between the layers to hold them together, and I started carving.
To be honest, I was nervous about the carving. I haven’t done all that many three-dimensional cakes. But as I carved, I became more confident. The cake was actually starting to look like a car.
I was using a round biscuit cutter to make the wheel wells when the phone rang. “Daphne’s Delectable Cakes, how may I help you?”
“It’s me, Daph.”
It was my sister, Violet, and she sounded exasperated.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I just read about you and Myra Jenkins in the paper. You found the dentist dead night before last? I can’t believe you didn’t call me first thing!”
“How could you tell from what was written in the paper that Myra and I were the ones who found the dentist?” I asked.
“Educated guess. Whenever anything weird happens in this town lately, you and Myra are at the heart of it. Now, why didn’t you call me?”
“Well, I didn’t call you from the jail because you were at Grammy Armstrong’s party,” I said. “How did that go, by the way? Did she like her cake?”
“It went fine, and she loved the cake. Everyone did,” she said. “Don’t change the subject though. Why didn’t you call me?”
“I didn’t get home until almost seven yesterday morning, and then I went to sleep. When I got up, I had to go to the Save-A-Buck and then get started on a cake I’m doing for a new client.”
“The Chronicle said Dr. Bainsworth had been bludgeoned to death with a blunt object. Was it horrible?” she asked.
“Of course,” I said. “But it wasn’t as gory as all that. In fact, I thought he’d only been knocked out when I saw him. He didn’t appear to be hurt all that badly.”
“Oooh, that’s so scary that it happened just before you got there. I mean if you’d been just a couple minutes earlier . . .”
“Tell me about it,” I said. “Myra and I thought we heard the killer in the waiting area.”
Violet gasped. “What did you do?”
“We grabbed the only things we could find to use to defend ourselves, a tooth and a toothbrush.”
“Daphne!”
“What would you have done?”
“I honestly have no idea,” she said. “I’m just glad you’re all right. Let’s change the subject. So, who’s the new client?”
“The EIEIO,” I said.
“That bunch of Elvis impersonators that have descended on the town? Are you making a cake shaped like Graceland?”
“No; fortunately, the Elvis I spoke with apparently didn’t think of that. He’s getting a pink Cadillac,” I said.
Violet laughed. “Be sure and take pictures. This I’ve gotta see.”
“I will. Hey, they’ve invited me to their concert at the hotel tonight,” I said, going back to working on the wheel wells. “Would you like to go?”
“No, thanks. Once Jason and I were eating dinner in a restaurant in Gatlinburg—it was before the children were born—and an Elvis impersonator started performing. He tried to give me his sweaty scarf. It was sopping wet—and it smelled!” She made a gagging noise. “I’ve never been able to look at Elvis impersonators the same way since.”
“Gee, thanks for getting me all excited about the event,” I said. “I can only hope I’ll be offered a scarf.”
“Sorry,” she said with laughter bubbling into her voice. “Didn’t mean to ruin it for you. Some of those impersonators are really good . . . just not the one we saw.”
“I’m taking Myra. I feel I owe it to her since it was my cashew brittle that caused her to lose her filling and have to go to the dentist in the first place.”
“Daphne, you have to stop blaming yourself for every little thing,” Violet said. “If the filling was in that bad of shape, she’d have lost it anyhow.”
Even though Violet was my younger sister, she often took a maternal tone with me. I guess being a mom had done that to her over the years.
“True,” I said, “but maybe it wouldn’t have been Friday night and maybe we wouldn’t have found Dr. Bainsworth bleeding on the floor of exam room one.”
“You’ve got a point. But still . . .” She trailed off, apparently unable to think of anything to counter my point.
“Ben said Dr. Bainsworth was going through a messy divorce,” I said. “Do you think his ex-wife might’ve murdered him? I mean, maybe it wasn’t even on purpose. They could’ve been arguing over the resolution of their property or whatever, and she could’ve lost her temper and hit him with . . . something.”
“I doubt it. I sold Angela her new house on the outskirts of town, and she seemed like
a really nice person,” Violet said. “Plus, despite the way their marriage ended, it appeared to me that Angela and Jim had a pretty amicable parting. The way she talked, he was giving her just about anything she wanted.”
“Of course she was going to tell you everything was rosy, Vi. You were her real estate agent.”
“I think if Angela had been going to kill Jim,” Violet continued, “she’d have done it when she found out about the affair—the first affair, I mean. I could see her acting in the heat of passion then but not killing the guy four or five months after the fact.”
“Wait. You said the first affair,” I said. “There was more than one?”
“Oh, yeah. After the hygienist he was seeing left her husband thinking she was destined to be the next Mrs. Bains-worth, Jim started dating someone else—a patient, I believe.” She thought a second. “Yes, it was a patient. It was Maureen Fremont.”
“Maureen Fremont?” I asked. “I thought she was dating Steve Franklin.”
“She is now. This was before that. Her divorce had just become final, and she was vulnerable and apparently more than a little stupid,” Violet said. “I mean, she had to have heard all the gossip about Jim and the hygienist. Anyway, their little fling didn’t last long either.”
I didn’t want to talk about Dr. Bainsworth anymore. “How are my sweethearts?” I asked, speaking of Lucas and Leslie.
“Hoping every single morning for a snow day. At least, it has them glued to the morning news until after schedule changes are announced, and I can pretend they have a keen interest in current affairs.”
I laughed. “Do you think they might like peanut butter and banana cake balls if I dip them in white chocolate?”
“Peanut butter and banana cake balls?” She groaned. “Maybe. They like to try weird things.”
“It’s the flavor of cake Elvis requested. Actually, I tasted a bit that I carved off, and it’s pretty good.”
“Really? Want the kids to come over one evening this week and help you make the cake balls?” Violet asked.
“I’d love it. Their aprons are by the door waiting for them,” I said. “Does Wednesday work for you?”
“Wednesday is great.”
We said our good-byes and hung up. Well, she hung up. I pressed end on the headset.
Violet’s twelve-year-old twins, Lucas and Leslie, love to make and decorate cakes, cookies, candy, cinnamon rolls . . . you name it. I think they like the eating part better than the baking and decorating these days, but that’s okay too. I love to have them over.
I don’t have children of my own. Given my troubled marriage to Todd, it was a blessing we’d never had children. But at forty, I felt like my chances at motherhood were dwindling. I sometimes wonder what I’ve been missing out on.
My thoughts turned back to Dr. Bainsworth. I tried to picture what he must have looked like when he wasn’t lying on his white tiled examination room floor with a small puddle of blood stemming from a head wound. He’d been tall—I imagine he was over six feet—he had an athletic build, and he had thick, dark brown hair. He looked youngish. I’d have taken him to be in his early thirties. Violet knew of one affair he’d had with a patient. Had there been others?
Three hours and an aching back later, I had finished carving the Cadillac and had covered it in peanut-butter-flavored buttercream frosting. It looked good. I could really envision it coming together. I loosely covered the cake in plastic wrap and put it into the refrigerator. I’d tint some fondant pink and cover the car tomorrow.
I made enough batter to make a chocolate half-sheet cake. Cut in half, it would provide the two fourth-sheet cakes—or roughly nine-by-thirteen-size sheet cakes—for Save-A-Buck. While the cake was baking, I cleaned up the kitchen and got ready for my meeting with Juanita.
I keep cake samples in the freezer, and I’d set some out this morning to thaw. I had also found some cake-decorating books with quinceañera cakes in them. With some families, a quinceañera is almost as important as a wedding.
By the time Juanita came at five, the cake was on the island cooling. I’d even taken a shower and gotten ready for the Elvis concert. I didn’t want to call too much attention to myself—Violet’s sweaty-scarf anecdote was still too fresh in my mind—so I was wearing all black. With my dark hair and eyes, I hoped my ebony sweater and wool pants would help me blend into the background. Black boots and a heavy silver braided necklace and matching earrings rounded out my outfit.
“Oh, you look elegant,” Juanita said when she arrived. “Do you have plans this evening?”
“Actually, Myra and I are going to the hotel tonight to see the Elvis concert,” I said. “Are you going?”
“Yes, I am. I don’t want to show up alone, though. Would it be okay if I ride with the two of you?” she asked.
“That’ll be great,” I said. “I spoke with Myra earlier, and she thinks China York will be going with us too. So it’ll be a foursome.”
Juanita put her hand to her mouth and tried to suppress a giggle. “Ms. York? Ms. York is an Elvis Presley fan?”
I smiled. “That’s what I thought, too. But then, Elvis fans come in all varieties, I suppose. Remember that little Hawaiian girl Lilo in that Disney movie?”
“I do.” She shook her head. “Still . . . Ms. York? She doesn’t strike me as the type of person who would go in for Elvis impersonators. Some of them are . . .” She struggled to find the right expression.
“Over the top?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. “Very much over the top.”
I shrugged. “I imagine we’re in for an interesting performance. For now, though, let’s get to work on your sister’s quinceañera.”
We pored over the three cake books in which I’d found quinceañera cakes. Juanita informed me that her sister, Isabel, would be wearing white and that her damas—the young ladies in her court—would be wearing rose. Juanita finally decided on a cake consisting of seven tiers. The main cake would be three tiers tall and set on a pedestal above a fountain. Two two-tiered cakes would be placed on either side—with dolls representing the damas standing on staircases on the sides of the main cake leading from the main cake to the smaller cakes.
After tasting the cake samples, Juanita chose a white cake with strawberry filling and vanilla buttercream frosting.
She clasped her hands to her chest and smiled at me, eyes glistening with tears. “This is so exciting! Isabel’s party is going to be wonderful.”
“Tell me about your quinceañera,” I said. “What was it like?”
“I did not have one.”
Fortunately, the awkwardness of that moment was interrupted by the doorbell ringing. Unfortunately, it was Myra . . . and she had completely and totally lost her mind.
CHAPTER
Four
JUANITA AND I looked at Myra and then at each other with a mixture of alarm and amazement. Myra was wearing tight black cigarette pants and a bright red low-cut sweater that can only be described as va-va-va-voom. She had on a curly strawberry-blond shoulder-length wig. In addition, I think she’d had someone at a mall cosmetic counter do her makeup because it had obviously been applied with the intent to sell her one of everything in the cosmetic case. She’d been given “smoky cat’s eyes,” bright red lips, and contoured cheeks. But what really concerned me were the scarlet, strappy stilettos.
“Do I look like a sex kitten?” she asked, clawing the air in what I imagine she saw as a catlike gesture.
When Juanita and I merely continued to gape at her, she asked, “Don’t you see? I’m Ann-Margret!” She smiled and tottered around in a circle.
“You’re going to hurt yourself in those shoes,” I said.
“Nonsense.” She lifted her chin. “I believe the Bible, and it says, ‘He will make me walk on my high heels.’ New King James version.”
“Myra, they didn’t have high heels in biblical times,” I said.
“It’s the last verse in Habakkuk.” She nodded smugly. “If you don’t bel
ieve me, look it up.”
I cannot simply let a challenge like that slide. I went into the bedroom, got my New King James–version Bible, and returned to the kitchen. I fumbled around until I finally had to look Habakkuk up in the table of contents. Then I flipped to the last verse and read aloud:
The Lord God is my strength;
He will make my feet like deer’s feet,
And He will make me walk on my high hills.
“It says hills,” I said, placing the Bible on the table so both Myra and Juanita could read the verse for themselves. “High hills . . . like little mountains.”
Myra huffed. “Look down at my dear feet. If these shoes ain’t little mountains, I don’t know what are.”
Juanita pursed her lips. “She’s got you there.”
“Are you ready to go?” Myra asked.
“I am. Juanita, are you?”
“Yes, I am ready,” she said.
“Good,” Myra said. “If China will come on, we can get there in time to get a good seat.” She considered Juanita and me for a moment. “You two probably have time to glam up a little bit if you’d like to. This is a live performance, you know. And you can bet those Elvises will be dressed to the nines.”
Juanita had on jeans and an ivory fisherman’s sweater. She looked lovely in a natural way.
“I’ll be fine,” I said. “I believe you’re glammed up enough for all of us.”
“Yes, so do I,” Juanita said. “You look lovely. . . . Very . . . Priscilla, did you say?”
“Ann-Margret,” Myra said. “She and Elvis were in love before he married Priscilla. Ann-Margret is the one who got away.” She looked wistful. “But tonight, maybe he’ll get a second chance.”
I shook my head ever so slightly at Juanita. There was no point in reiterating to Myra that she was not Ann-Margret and that the real Elvis Presley was dead. Myra was in her own little fantasy world at this point.
And when China showed up, she appeared to be in a fantasy world of her own. She’d left her silvery hair unbraided, and it was hanging in loose waves nearly to her waist. She’d also traded in her blue jeans and man’s flannel shirt for a lavender wrap dress. She wore flat-soled boots and carried a black wool trench coat over her arm.