Meringue and Mischief

by Ramona Ransom

  “What do you know so far?” Chloe asked.

  “Laverne Donahue was killed. She had money, and from what I know, it was a lot. She wasn’t nice to service workers and expected people to do things for her, even if she paid them well. Ranger said he was scared of her if that means anything.”

  “Scared of her? That doesn’t sound very good.”

  “I think she’s the kind of person that people want to impress. Clint got a job working at the house while she’s there, and he was so happy about it that you’d think he’d won the lottery. Between the money she pays out and the high-profile status she seems to have, I guess it makes sense why people would act oddly around her.”

  “Why would she be paying him at all? It’s not even her house,” Chloe pointed out.

  “That’s a good question,” Nessa said, wishing she knew the answer.

  “You say she’s not nice. Maybe she was so mean to someone that they killed her.”

  “Could be. I hadn’t thought about it much until now.”

  Nessa couldn’t stand people who were rude to others. It was worse because it seemed like this Laverne woman was rude simply because she thought her money would redeem her. There was a good chance that she’d made the wrong person angry, and they’d retaliated. Of course, it wasn’t okay to kill someone, no matter how rude they might have been, but it was still a real possibility that’s what happened.

  “Soooooo,” Chloe said, tapping her fingers on the kitchen table. “What are you gonna do now?”

  Nessa laughed. “I’m going to The Shack after dark, I guess. But before that, I think maybe I should talk to someone that knew Laverne. I just have to decide who.”

  “Who are your options?”

  “Renata, Clint, Mavery, and Ranger.”

  “What about Faye and your grandfather? Didn’t they know her, too?”

  “Yeah, probably, but they haven’t seen her since she’s been here this time. I’d rather talk to someone who saw her recently.”

  “Well, Ranger is out, right?” Chloe asked. “You probably don’t want to involve him. And if Bizzie was the one to write you that note, you won’t want to have to deal with both of them in the same day.”

  “Bizzie or not, talking to Ranger about this is out of the question.”

  “Then I think you should skip Mavery, too, since she works with Ranger. Not that she has a big mouth or anything, but the less that gets back to him, the better.”

  Nessa was impressed with Chloe’s response. She was a regular old Jessica Fletcher.

  “Good point. If we follow that logic, then I should cut out Clint as well.” She trusted him, but personal relationships could muddy things. “He’s dating Mavery and might accidentally let something slip.”

  “That leaves Renata. Do you even know her?” Chloe puttered around the kitchen, looking for something to eat. “Are you hungry? All this investigating has got me starving.”

  “I’ve met her a few times, but I don’t know her well. I think talking to her will be easy enough, though. Maybe we can go to lunch before we have to get to work.” Nessa looked at her phone, seeing they still had plenty of time to get ready, get food, and maybe even talk to Renata before they were due at the bakery. She was loving having a full staff.

  Chapter Seven

  “Are you sure this is a good idea?” Chloe asked, scanning their surroundings.

  “It’ll be fine if you stop acting like we’re undercover officers waiting to catch a bad guy.”

  “I’d make a terrible undercover officer.”

  “Yes. Yes, you would,” Nessa joked.

  Nessa had gotten ready for the day, and stopped at the bakery to find the order form from Renata’s cherry pie order, so that she could get her phone number. She told her grandfather and Faye that she was getting some paperwork for the website, and they’d believed her. Lying wasn’t her intention, and she wasn’t trying to hide her meeting with Renata, or she’d never have asked the woman to meet her at The Shack in the first place, but she didn’t want to come out and tell anyone, either.

  To her surprise, Renata had immediately agreed to meet her, and all Nessa had to do was promise her a few of whatever no-bake creation she came up with next.

  “I think she’s here. Is that her?” Chloe asked, pointing to a woman headed their way.

  “It is. Now, settle down before you scare her off.”

  Chloe snickered but composed herself before Renata got to their table.

  “Nessa, right?” Renata asked. Once she confirmed she was in the right place, she joined them and lifted her menu.

  “Thanks for meeting us. This is my friend, Chloe. She works at the bakery, too.”

  The women introduced themselves and ordered sandwiches before they got down to business. Nessa didn’t want anyone interrupting them while they were talking and made sure to let Mallory, their waitress, know. She was glad that Daniel ran the place, or she might have come off as rude when she told Mallory to leave them be for a while.

  They made awkward small talk until their food arrived, and then Renata blurted out something that surprised both Nessa and Chloe.

  “I’m not saying it was her, but I think I might know someone who was upset about Laverne renting my house.”

  “Why would someone be upset about that?” Nessa asked. “I thought Laverne came every year.”

  “She does, but she came early this year, and it was a surprise. So much of a surprise that I may have had to make a choice that I’m not proud of.” Renata moved the food around on her plate. “I had a tenant already in there. Well, she had already started moving some of her things in. I rent fully furnished, so there wasn’t much, but a few of her personal belongings were already in there when I had to break the news to her.”

  “What news?” Chloe asked, missing the point.

  Nessa wanted Renata to have to say it. It sounded like she’d rented the house to someone, but when Laverne showed up, she kicked the other lady out to make room. That wasn’t something to be proud of.

  “The house was going to be vacant for the next two months. I usually stop rentals for at least a few weeks every year before Laverne comes. She’s very particular, and I like to get things ready for her, which means I have to go without rental income for a while. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to find a renter this year who only wanted to be around for a short time, especially since it’s not exactly tourist season. When Abby came to me and told me that she was tired of apartment living and was looking to buy and wanted to know if I knew of anything available, I suggested that she rent my house to see if she liked living in a home by herself. Right now, she’s living in a small apartment with a friend of hers, so it would have been a big change.”

  “Then Laverne showed up, so Abby is back in her apartment,” Chloe added. “Why would you do that?”

  Nessa kicked her under the table, hoping Renata wouldn’t see.

  “Ouch!” Chloe shrieked. “I mean, how come you didn’t tell Laverne that you didn’t have anything for her?”

  “Laverne was the very first tenant that I ever rented to, and she’s come back every year since. But it’s not only that, she also… well, she umm,” Renata trailed off.

  “Pays well?” Nessa finished for her.

  “Yes,” Renata agreed. “That’s a good way to put it.”

  Nessa shared a look with Chloe. She was beginning to see a trend when it came to Laverne. Everyone gave her a break simply because she had more money than others.

  “She paid you more rent, so you kicked out the other lady?” Chloe asked as any unfiltered young person would.

  Nessa would never have been so blunt, but Chloe had said what she’d wanted to say herself. She might be able to understand it if Abby hadn’t already started moving her things into the house, but beyond that, she didn’t see a way to justify it. What Renata did wasn’t nice.

  “So, what happened to Abby?” Nessa asked, realizing that Renata wasn’t going to reply to Chloe.

  “She’s bac
k at her apartment with her roommate. I can’t very well rent to her now,” Renata said.

  Chloe gasped and excused herself from the table. Nessa couldn’t blame her. Renata was as callous as they came.

  “You said that some of her things were at the house already. Did she have any contact with Laverne?” Nessa asked. She had to know. If she were Abby, she’d be furious at Renata.

  “Abby had to go back and get her things, and I told Laverne she’d be coming. I haven’t gotten the chance to ask Abby anything yet, and the police aren’t letting me in the house right now, so I don’t know if she went there or not.”

  “Did Abby have a lease?” It had been a long time since Nessa rented anything, but she knew landlords and tenants pretty much always had a lease or contract of some sort.

  “She did, and I broke it. I know, I know, I’m a terrible person. But Laverne said she’d pay, and I couldn’t tell her no.”

  “Said she’d pay what?” Nessa looked around, trying to find Chloe, who had left in a huff.

  “Abby paid first and last month’s rent and the security deposit. When I told that to Laverne, she said she’d not only pay me to give Abby back all that money, but she’d also add some extra on to soften the blow.”

  Nessa bit her tongue so hard she’d thought she’d bleed.

  “So, because of Laverne, you ended up with even more money than you planned on getting? She paid you to make Abby leave and gave you money for her, too?”

  “Yes, and don’t worry, I gave Abby the money. It was a thousand dollars, plus she got her first, last, and security back,” Renata said, working hard to make it seem okay.

  “Does Laverne pay anyone else? A friend of mine said he was going to be working around the house, and he made it sound like Laverne was the one paying him.”

  “Yes. She does. She pays for repairs and renovations on the house before she comes. She liked for everything to be perfect.”

  Nessa wasn’t as impressed as she thought Renata had expected her to be. She knew money made the world go around and even felt that way herself sometimes, but Renata had been mean to Abby. She’d pushed her aside for money, and that made Nessa angry. Not angry enough to kill, but she had to wonder about Abby. She had to know if Abby had gone to the house for her things, seen Laverne, and gotten so upset about what Renata did that she’d decided to take it out on Laverne.

  “I think I’m about done here,” Nessa said, calling Mallory over to get her a to-go box.

  “You barely touched your food,” Renata pointed out.

  “You either,” Nessa said. Their conversation hadn’t gone well. She may have learned that Renata wasn’t a great person, and she found out that Abby had reason to be upset enough to kill Laverne, but she didn’t like how she felt. She didn’t feel good knowing that there were people out there who were so heartless. Killing Laverne was worse, but what Renata had done wasn’t fair.

  Once Renata left, Nessa found Chloe, who was still reeling after hearing about what Renata had done and how little she seemed to care. The women went to work, the only thing on either of their minds was what was going to happen at The Shack.

  Chapter Eight

  “You promise to stay here, no matter what?” Nessa asked, giving Chloe a pointed look.

  Chloe had begged her so much that Nessa had agreed to let her come along to The Shack to meet the mystery note writer simply because she was tired of hearing her ask. It wasn’t that she wanted it to be a secret that she was going, because after all, it wasn’t all that smart to meet someone after dark and not tell anyone, but she didn’t know if Chloe was the best person for the job.

  “I swear.” She crossed her heart with her finger. “I won’t move a muscle, and I won’t yell or do anything bad unless I see you being attacked.”

  “No one is going to attack me!” Nessa groaned. “It seems like they are trying to help me solve this murder, not lure me in to murder me, too.”

  “Whatever you say.” Chloe shrugged and sipped her iced tea. She’d decided to sit at a table outside with a book and her drink, making it look like she was a customer at the Shack, so when Nessa met with the mystery person, she wouldn’t be too far away in case something bad did happen.

  Nessa made Chloe promise one more time that she wouldn’t get involved and started her trek. The Shack was on the lake, and the outdoor eating area was close to the building, but as she kept walking, there were still tables and benches where people could sit and enjoy the view of the lake. She didn’t know where she was supposed to be going or who she was looking for, but she trusted that whatever was supposed to happen would.

  She kept walking until she reached the end of the area. She could have kept going, but she’d be heading into the woods, and that wasn’t in the plans. She turned around, heading back, not sure if anyone was even going to meet her at all when she saw an envelope on one of the benches. She heard a rustling near the woods and freaked out. She grabbed the envelope and ran back toward Chloe.

  “What happened?!” Chloe asked, seeing an out-of-breath and fully panicked Nessa.

  “Nothing. There was no one there, or maybe there was. I don’t know, but I found this, and then I ran.”

  “Well, what’s it say?” Chloe reached out, trying to grab at the envelope.

  Nessa looked around, trying to see if she knew anyone nearby. “Is that Bizzie?” she asked, nodding toward a woman coming from the same direction that Nessa had.

  “The one with the furry hood and her head down?” Chloe squinted. “How could I even tell? I can’t see her face, and even if I could, I don’t know her all that well.”

  “We should go home so I can read this.”

  Chloe nodded and followed Nessa back to her Jeep. When they got home a short time later and had settled into the living room, Chloe cleared her throat.

  “You know that you haven’t said a single word to me since we left The Shack. Are you okay?”

  “I’m thinking.” Nessa opened the envelope and read the note, looking up only to confirm her suspicions. “It’s from Bizzie.”

  “Okay, but what does it say?” Chloe asked.

  “It says that she overheard people talking about the murder when she was at the senior center doing her community service. She said that she was cleaning up the dining area after everyone had their lunch and heard a group of people talking, and a fellow community service friend of hers joined in on the conversation. She tried to clean the table next to them and go unnoticed while listening to what they were saying. Her friend, Samson, the community service guy, told everyone that he thinks he knows who is responsible but wanted to go to people who were older and wiser than him for advice before he went any further.”

  “So, who does he think it was?” Chloe asked, on the edge of her seat. Literally. If she’d moved another inch, she’d have fallen off the couch.

  Nessa read the letter again. “He said his friend Cody had a bad experience with Laverne last time she was here. Cody is a cable technician and had gone to Laverne’s because there was a problem with the wires leading into the house. He had to do some digging, and I guess that he didn’t put things back to her liking, so she called his boss and made Cody come back out to the house and rake her rocks.”

  “Rake her rocks. What does that even mean?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she has landscape rocks by the house, and that’s what he had to dig around in. I have no idea. Bizzie doesn’t always explain things very well.”

  “Is she saying that Samson thinks his friend Cody killed Laverne?”

  “That’s what it sounds like to me,” Nessa agreed. “Maybe Cody was the one who found Laverne. I know Rose said that it was a cable technician who found her. Laverne could have made him so upset when he went there that he just lost it. I’ve heard more than once that Laverne wasn’t the kindest person when it came to service workers, and if we are assuming correctly about the rock thing, then she could have said or done something to make him mad.”

  “Yeah. He could ha
ve been bottling up his anger toward her since the last experience and when he went this time, she set him off and he killed her. Then again, the idea of killing someone because they were mad you dug up their rocks doesn’t make a lot of sense,” Chloe added.

  “People do all sorts of things that don’t make sense.” Nessa shrugged. “All I know is that if I was Laverne, and that rock story is true, I’d have called to make sure that the same guy didn’t come to my house again.”

  “True, but I don’t know how any of that works. I wouldn’t want someone who made a mess of my house to come back, but at the same time, it’s not even her house. She could have called Renata to figure things out instead of being mean to the guy,” Chloe pointed out.

  “All of those things make perfect sense, but Renata told me that Laverne pays for most everything that relates to the house. That gives her at least a little reason to care so much about what happens to it.”

  “I guess you’re right,” Chloe said.

  “After all of that, though, I have to go back to the source. Bizzie sent me this note, and while I’d like to think that she isn’t just messing around, I can’t be sure. I don’t know why she’d have written instead of calling me. We live next door to one another. It can’t be that hard for her to knock on my door,” Nessa complained.

  “Did you forget that you haven’t spoken to her in well over a week?” Chloe asked.

  Nessa paused, thinking about how right Chloe was. She was in a bad mood, and having Chloe point the truth out to her was what she’d needed. Nessa had gone above and beyond to be kind to Bizzie over the years, even when Bizzie acted like a horrible person. Today wasn’t the day that Nessa was going to start stooping to her level.

  Chapter Nine

  Feeling like she’d been taken down a notch, something that she’d needed, Nessa knocked on the door to Abby’s apartment. After hearing what Chloe had to say about Bizzie, she knew that it was time for her to stop getting caught up in things that didn’t matter anymore. Sure, Bizzie had made a bad choice, and they’d probably never be best friends, but it looked more like Bizzie was trying to help her than hurt her.