Murder Actually

by Stephanie McCarthy

  “Do you want to make out?”

  I gave him a little push, grimacing at the sudden pain in my shoulder. “Grant! I told you I needed time to think about it!”

  “I was joking…sorta. Take all the time you need, you know where to find me.”

  He leaned over and kissed me softly and then was gone. I sat down at the kitchen table and put my head in my hands. Blue eyed me appraisingly and I wondered if he’d somehow orchestrated the whole thing to keep Ingrid away. I groaned and leaned back in my chair.

  Figuring out mysteries was a whole lot easier than figuring out love.

  Chapter 31

  My books always end well for my heroines.

  They find a man, get married, and ostensibly end up having a family, although I never include that part (Paula says there’s nothing romantic about spit-up and poopy diapers).

  Coco Ware’s arrest and subsequent conviction kept returning to the front pages for months, and every time All Hallows was under siege from reporters, journalists and camera crews. Coco was eventually sentenced to three consecutive life terms in the New York State Penitentiary, and the media circus packed up and left All Hallows.

  Ainsley and Grant left, too. Rumor surfaced she’d won a major award from the Hudson Valley Press Club and I heard she and Grant were back in Albany… together. I tried to forget the things Grant said the last time we were together. I thought he’d respected my space a little too much: I hadn’t heard one word from him, not even a drunk dial.

  In the meantime, the first delicious hints of fall had come to All Hallows. The light breezes blew crimson and gold leaves across the old stone walkways and the cottages glowed in the burnished sun. The smell of crisp autumn air mingled with chimney smoke, and hay bales dotted the hills, adding to the Irving-esque beauty of Point Savage.

  I was looking forward to some peace and quiet to finish up The Cupcake Chronicles. I’d changed the character of Tessa Oglesby to the more biddable Kaitlyn Asher, and the transformation was going quite well. Tessa continued to give me dirty looks from the margins but I didn’t care. I had a deadline.

  Julia and I were meeting for lunch at Sweet Annie B’s, and as I finished my salad I sat back and sighed.

  “What’s going to happen to the Gazette?” I asked.

  “Nora’s buying it. She wants to make sure All Hallows has a local voice.”

  “Nora’s a peach.”

  Julia nodded. “She feels guilty about Crispin’s death and wants to make some kind of atonement. Plus, she and Alex are officially engaged now and I think she’s going to convince him to run a newspaper.”

  “The divorce was pretty fast.”

  “It seems that if your spouse is convicted of triple homicide the court turns a blind eye to requests for marital counseling.” Julia reached into her handbag and pulled out a small box. “Well, it’s our first official success. Nora’s paying us five thousand dollars for our work on the case. Take a look at these!”

  I opened the box and pulled out a delicate pink card edged with a leopard-print border. There was an image of a magnifying glass in one corner and a red stiletto in the other.

  Confidential Inquires

  Berry & Gray

  If you have this card, you know how to reach us.

  “Isn’t it cool, Betts? Kind of like the A-Team, you know: if you need us and if you can find us, you can always call…Berry & Gray.”

  I was exasperated. “I thought the whole point of a business card was to give potential clients our phone number.”

  “We did. It’s on the back. That’s how they know how to reach us.”

  I flipped the card over with a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. “It’s my cell phone number!”

  Julia eyed me reproachfully. “Well, I couldn’t give them my number. My phone is paid for by Essex University. It would be a shocking misappropriation of funds.”

  For someone who played fast and loose with our client retainer account I considered this a bit hypocritical. “I guess I can get a new phone for personal use,” I said. “But now every quack with a problem is going to be calling me up. Or worse, the ones who want a date.”

  “How is that worse? This could open up a whole new dating venue for you! That reminds me, the All Hallows Historical Society will let us advertise in their guidebooks if we volunteer our services.”

  “Doing what?” I asked suspiciously. “I’m not dressing up like a Victorian serving wench again.”

  Julia shook her head. “Guides for the All Hallows Haunted Tours! And don’t be surprised if our groups have murder on the mind. Inkwell Books and the Gazette office are both included in the tour.”

  “I think I’ll be too busy with my writing,” I paused and looked away. “My agent wants me to write mysteries… cozy mysteries.”

  Julia sputtered into her tea. She was laughing…at me.

  I was indignant. “What’s so funny? I’m a writer, aren’t I?”

  “Yes, but the idea of you writing cozies…it’s ridiculous! You don’t even like them! Your readers would know you were faking it.”

  “You can’t ‘fake’ fiction. That’s the whole point of fiction, it’s fake. I can’t believe you think I can’t write a cozy. It’s not rocket surgery.”

  “I’m sure you can do it,” she said soothingly. “All you have to do is follow the rules.”

  “What rules?”

  Julia rolled her eyes. “The rules, Betts! Any crime reader of the Golden Age knows the rules of the game: all clues must be available to the reader, twins are suspect, nuns are evil, and inquisitive spinsters are the best source of information.”

  “Like us?”

  She ignored me. “Most important, no matter how improbable the murder and its conclusion, the factual details of the crime and investigation should be accurate, or as close as you can get them.”

  “Sounds pretty straightforward to me.”

  Julia eyed me skeptically. “I thought you weren’t going to write mysteries.”

  “I’m not! But if I did I could write a cozy that would leave Ms. Weebles’s fans shaking in their Little Rascals.”

  Julia held up her hands. “Fine, you can write a mystery. Does this mean you’ve accepted your fate as a part-time detective?”

  “I’ve been called worse.”

  Julia cleared her throat. “Speaking of name-calling, I updated my blog this morning and per your request deleted the poll on Edgar versus Grant.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t you want to know who was winning?”

  “Absolutely not. Grant obviously has no interest in resuming our relationship despite all his apologies.”

  Julia looked uneasy. “Well, I was able to replace your news with something bigger. Nora’s selling Black Birches.”

  I snorted. “In this market? Good luck.”

  “I’m not sure she really needs any luck. She already has a buyer.”

  “Who?”

  Julia avoided my gaze. “Now, Elspeth, promise me you won’t freak out.”

  “Why?” My voice rose. “Why would I freak out? Who’s buying Nora’s place?”

  She didn’t answer and I saw her gaze shift to a spot somewhere behind my head. I turned to the door and nearly groaned.

  It was Grant. He looked as grayishly handsome as ever in a green fisherman’s sweater and jeans, and I watched his face break into that old, cocky grin.

  “Hello, neighbor.”

  The End

  Elspeth’s Recipe for Strawberries N’ Cream Cupcakes

  Wait until strawberries are in season.

  Buy Strawberry Cream Cupcakes from Sweet Annie B’s Bakery.

  Destroy bakery box prior to serving (preferably by fire, Blue always pulls things from the trash).

  Serve.

  Bask in glow of unearned praise.
r />   Go to confession; take cupcakes for Father Foy.

  About the Author

  Stephanie McCarthy obtained a BA in English from Southern Illinois University and a J.D. from Southern University School of Law. She is the author of Haunted Peoria, based on the folklore of her hometown, and her debut cozy/chick-lit mystery, Murder Actually. She is currently an attorney living in Peoria, Illinois with her husband and three lively children. In her free time she enjoys reading mysteries, writing mysteries and plotting the elaborate deaths of her enemies (take that, Comcast guy). She blogs about mysteries at Love is Murder ( http://stephaniemccarthyauthor.wordpress.com/ ) and guestblogs for Smitten by Britain and Criminal Elements.

  Acknowledgements

  I’d like to thank my agents, Sarah Jane Freymann of the Sarah Jane Freymann Agency, and Jessica Sinsheimer for their hardwork, enthusiasm and patience with a newbie; and my editors Anselm and Eloise at Attica Books, for all of the professional advice and expertise. On a personal note, I’d like to thank my husband, Tim, for all the time he lets me spend on my books while he watches our adorable monster children, David, Madeline and Nathan. I’d also like to thank my mother, Liz Zentz, and mother-in-law, Lynn McCarthy, for all of their assistance and support.

  Read on for a preview of Theft by Chocolate, another whimsical and laugh-out-loud mystery from Attica Books...

  Theft by Chocolate - Preview

  by

  Luba Lesychyn

  Chocolate addict Kalena Boyko wasn’t prepared for this. Heading to work at Canada’s largest museum as an administrator, she hoped for quiet and uninterrupted access to her secret chocolate stash. Instead she’s assigned to manage the high-profile Treasures of the Maya exhibition with her loathed former boss Richard Pritchard.

  With no warning, her life is turned inside out and propelled into warp speed as she stumbles across an insider plot that could jeopardize the exhibit and the reputation of the museum.

  After hearing about a recent botched theft at the museum and an unsolved jewel heist in the past from security guard and amateur sleuth Marco Zeffirelli, Kalena becomes suspicious of Richard and is convinced he’s planning to sabotage the Treasures of the Maya exhibition. Her suspicions, and the appearance of the mysterious but charming Geoffrey Ogden from the London office, don’t help her concentration. The Treasures of the Maya seem cursed as problem after problem arises, including the disappearance of a key artefact - the world’s oldest piece of chocolate...

  Chapter One

  I scrambled beneath the humbling granite archway that framed the Canadian National Museum’s staff entrance, water dripping from me as if I had just slipped out of the shower. The quivers that waved through my body triggered an uncomfortable realization, not that I was cold from my drenched state, but that I’d transitioned into the first stage of chocolate detox. I hadn’t had a crumble of the substance for at least eighteen hours.

  The tinted glass of the door before me mirrored a startling reflection – “harrowing” would have been a kind descriptor. The morning had started as a good-hair day, but the flash-flood rains that had caught me sans umbrella put a different spin on the do. So not fair. Why was it that Audrey Hepburn looked positively radiant after being soaked in a torrential downpour in Breakfast at Tiffany’s? I looked like Breakfast at Wal-Mart. Mind you, I didn’t resemble Audrey Hepburn at the best of times except perhaps for the dark, doe-like eyes I shared with the Hollywood icon.

  I tilted closer towards the glass, raised my index fingers to the corners of my eyes and elongated the fragile skin upwards planing out the subtle crow’s feet. Maybe I did have a bit of Hepburn going on. The image grimaced back at me. Who was I kidding? The Hepburn I was channeling was Katharine when she was fished out of the Ulanga River in African Queen.

  “Are you going inside or are you planning on staring at yourself all day?”

  Embarrassed that my self-deprecation had been interpreted as vanity, I rotated towards the person with the after-hours-club voice. The young woman I faced sliced away any traces of my self-esteem in a nanosecond, bulldozed past me and vanished behind the second set of doors.

  I mustered a handful of dignity only to lose it after slipping and lurching on the stone floor opposite the security control room. Through the triple-glazed, bullet-proof glass, there was a beehive of activity. Security command central was crammed full of people, and I discerned guards who didn’t usually work the morning swing. The news must have broken over the weekend. But I had eyeballed all the dailies before stepping onto the subway – The Globe, The Post, The Star and even skimmed the free Metro paper, but none referred to the disappearance of the porcelain Tang horse from the Chinese gallery the previous Friday.

  One more set of doors steered me to the main security checkpoint where a boyish newbie guard was planted behind the counter of black polished laminate. I instantly dove into his eyes. Emerald green pools like that are a rarity. The combination of those eyes with his dirty blonde faux bed-head was an irresistible combination. His neck was a tad thick, but I suspected there was a body-builder’s frame hidden beneath the uniform.

  “Good morning.” I hoped my voice would drown out the sound of my heart palpitating.

  “Good morning, ma’am. Looks like you forgot your umbrella today.”

  Ma’am? Seriously? Clearly my cougarishly-tight skirt wasn’t fooling anyone. “You can call me Kalena. And I suggest you drop the word ‘ma’am’ from your vocabulary, at least around here.” I was doing him a favour. He could lose his head if he used that term on one of our resident feminazis.

  “Uh…noted. My name’s Marco…Marco Zeffirelli.”

  “Like the director?” Franco Zeffirelli’s screen version of Romeo and Juliet was my all-time favourite version of the story of the star-crossed lovers.

  “I thought the Director’s name was Carson James.”

  “Never mind.” Eyes you could lose yourself in – yes. Knowledge of Italian film directors – no. I plunked my purse down and rummaged for my ID badge. No point asking a keener if he’d swipe me through. “What’s going on in the control room?” I scrounged deeper into my bag with the fervour of a manic dog trying to surface a buried bone.

  “They caught the guy that stole that horse.”

  “Are you kidding?” So far I’d found a bottle of dark plum nail polish and some rogue shavings of chocolate in my bag. I licked my fingers.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t kid about a thing like that. It’s only my third day on the job.”

  “Sooooo, who was it?”

  “One of the contract construction workers. Have you found that ID yet, ma’am, I mean, Kalena?”

  “How did they catch the guy?”

  “Seems he was a suspect in the theft of that small Group of Seven painting from the Art Gallery a couple of months ago? They’ve been keeping an eye on him. The perp’s a total amateur.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “International art thieves go for big ticket items. Like that opal collection that went missing from here.”

  “That was almost thirty years ago.” My eyebrows arched into an unnatural point. Was this kid even born when the gems went missing from the Canadian National Museum? “You seem to know a lot for someone who’s been on the job for only three days.”

  “Personal interest of mine, art theft, that is. The crime’s second only to drug trafficking. About $6 billion worth of art is stolen every year.”

  “Who knew?” I spied the woman who’d almost bowled me over moments earlier as she whizzed through the corridor bordering the rear of the security desk.

  “By the way, do you know the woman that came through here just before me?”

  “The one who’s a lead singer for a death metal band?”

  I tried to suppress a chortle, but failed. “I think you profiled that one pretty accurately.”

  “It’s not a profile. I saw her front a ba
nd a couple of months ago. She’s the new IT Help Desk person – still has her temp badge. Doesn’t really have customer service written all over her, if you ask me.”

  Finally my fingers landed on a familiar plastic shape. I whipped my hand out of the bowels of my purse as though withdrawing it from an alien’s guts. Out fell my BlackBerry as well as heaps of gold foil wrappers that feathered the security log book.

  “Ferrero Rochers for breakfast again?”

  I budged my head towards the nauseatingly familiar voice and was walloped by a blast of Gucci cologne. “Good morning to you too, Richard.” I scooped up the week-old chocolate wrappers and with a deft sleight of hand they disappeared back into the depths of my bag.

  “That’s a great suit, sir. Is it Cavalli?” said Marco.

  “Who are you?” said Richard.

  “My name’s…”

  “It was a rhetorical question.” Foam was forming in the corner of Richard’s mouth. “I didn’t really expect an answer.”

  Marco’s face soured. Poor kid. Nothing like being verbally bitch-slapped first thing on a Monday morning.

  Richard Pritchard was my former boss and current Director of Exhibits and Programs. When he was recruited to head the division in which I’d worked for almost fifteen years, it was as if a gnarly chunk of metal had been thrown into a finely tuned piece of machinery. I fled the toxic environment as quickly as possible and joined a newly created department called Museum Consulting Services.

  Richard slid back the finely-woven sleeve of his jacket and eyed his Movado. “Running right on time as usual, I see.”

  I elevated onto my tiptoes and transfixed my gaze to Richard’s forehead. “If I were you, Richard, I’d request a refund for the Rogaine. I really don’t think it’s doing the job.”