“And to score more advertisers, I’d imagine.”
“Of course!” He sipped more eggnog, sending whiskey fumes wafting. “That’s where all the pressure came in. The Sentinel is hanging on by a shoestring. If we don’t maintain our readership, we’re all unemployed. I didn’t get into journalism for the money, but paying for groceries and electricity are nice perks.”
I empathized. “I’m a freelancer myself. I have a financial cushion, but that doesn’t mean I’m not serious about my work.”
“Exactly.” A nod. “Besides, it’s Christmas! At this time of year, money is tight. I couldn’t afford to risk getting fired.”
“So . . . ?” Danny had been oddly discreet about this part.
“So I sneaked into the theater during rehearsals,” Josh admitted. “I was planning to get a story about the show or die trying. Oops!” He covered his mouth with his hand, seeming (too late) to think better of his choice of phrases, given what had happened to Melissa. Cheerily, he waved away his carelessness. “Anyhow, I’m crawling in through the window—wearing all black, naturally!—and along comes the theater’s security guard.”
“Busted?” I gestured, urging him to tell me more.
“No! I would have gotten busted, sure.” Josh’s eyes went wide at the memory. “Except that’s when Danny showed up.”
“He has a way of doing that. Right on time.”
“Yeah. He didn’t even know me, but he bailed me out.”
“He’s always had issues with authority figures,” I said. “I’m not surprised he’d wind up on your side of the situation.”
“Whatever, I’m glad! He kind of swaggered over, saw what was going on and, in the most poker-faced way you can imagine, told the security guard that he’d been staging a test of the theater’s policies and procedures. ‘You failed,’ he said.”
Remembering it, Josh chortled. “I was about to pee my pants, I was so nervous,” he admitted. “But Danny just hauled me the rest of the way over the windowsill, brushed me off, then took me backstage with him. It wasn’t until later that I found out he was Tansy’s bodyguard. After that, nobody said a word to me about reporting on the show. They just let me hang around.”
I imagined Danny had a lot to do with that turnaround.
“Maybe the Balthasars didn’t realize you were with the Sentinel?” I theorized. “If they had a blanket ‘no press’ policy, then their refusal to give you a story wasn’t personal.”
“It felt personal to me.” Josh glowered into his eggnog. “It felt personal the whole time it was endangering my job.”
I examined his brooding face. He had a right to feel bitter about the Balthasars having put his employment at risk, however inadvertently they might have done so. But had Josh felt bitter enough to try another break-in? Say, at the B&B two nights ago?
Had Josh Levitt wanted revenge against Melissa?
Hastily, I drowned those thoughts in another gulp of creamy eggnog. Danny wouldn’t have let me come here if that was so.
I tried another angle. “I read your story about Melissa Balthasar’s death.” Josh’s theater beat explained the slant he’d taken—that her demise had endangered the show’s opening. “It’s impressive that you manage to cover the local arts scene and crime, all at the same time. That must keep you hopping, right?”
Josh waved off my praise. “Well, around here, there’s usually not enough crime to warrant a full-time reporter.” He chuckled in the glow of his Christmas tree’s lights. “Sproutes is a peaceful small town. Nothing much happens here. That’s why it was such a big deal when the Christmas in Crazytown production came in. We were all hoping for big things—the paper, local businesses like restaurants and hotels, stores downtown.”
I nodded, wishing (not for the first time) that I was a police officer or a detective—someone who could really grill a witness or informant and find out what I wanted to know. But I was only me, an itinerant expert in all things cacao related.
“It must be a boon having so many people working here now.”
“It’s got its ups and downs,” Josh said cryptically. He peered into his now empty eggnog cup. “Would you like a refill?”
“No, thanks. I’m still enjoying this one. You go ahead.”
He did, leaving me alone to scrutinize his living room while he puttered in the kitchen. I looked for signs of secret homicidal rage against the Balthasars but found nothing.
Unless owning several DVD box sets of TV murder-mystery shows made a person into a killer, Josh Levitt was in the clear.
“So your editor tapped you to write the Melissa piece because of your theater access?” I theorized at a shout toward the kitchen, keeping my voice casual. “Because you know people at the playhouse?”
Josh laughed as he returned with his second eggnog. “Hardly. It was because I know the police officers who responded to the scene. My brother works for the force,” he explained, shoving aside a holiday-print throw pillow as he sat in the easy chair opposite me on the sofa. “Honestly, I know almost everyone in town, of course, but that was the critical connection.”
“That makes sense. Your brother must be quite a guy.”
“Yeah.” Josh nodded. “I can tell you one thing, though. Things would have been very different that night if the chief of police had been on the scene.” A wave. Another hearty slurp of eggnog. “In fact, that might be why Sproutes has such a low crime rate. Everyone around here is scared of the chief.”
“Really?” I had to meet this super crime fighter. “But I thought Melissa’s death wasn’t being considered a murder, so—”
“Oh no you don’t!” Josh’s gaze took on an impish gleam. “Not so fast!” He got up, wobbling slightly. Exactly how strong had he made his spiked eggnog, anyway? “Danny told me you have a particular interest in Melissa’s case, and I’m willing to play along, but finding out what I know is going to cost you.”
Maybe I could shortcut this. “I have some chocolate samples with me,” I tried. “I could offer you your pick. Fudge, caramels covered with chocolate, a variety of truffles . . . or all three?”
He seemed tempted, just as I’d intended. But no dice.
“What I need right now are cookies. Whoops!” Josh flailed his arms and narrowly avoided spilling his eggnog. He’d upset his balance while vehemently refusing my offer-slash-bribe. He laughed. “This is a trade, remember? I tell you what I know—”
“What didn’t make it into your story,” I specified.
Specifically, exactly how Melissa Balthasar had died.
“And you rescue me from looking like a loser at the annual Sproutes Sentinel Bake-Off and cookie swap tomorrow. Deal?”
I nodded. We needed to get started before he became too tipsy to chop or stir. I hefted my bag of supplies. “Let’s go.”
In Josh’s small kitchen, the first thing we did was preheat the oven. Then I briefed him on my baking plans for the evening.
“Naturally, these are going to be chocolate cookies,” I told him. “Chocolate cookies with white chocolate–peppermint icing and candy-cane sprinkles. Is that okay with you?”
“Sounds scrumptious!” He rubbed his palms together. “There’s a prize, by the way. Did Danny tell you that? Winning would be even better than not being embarrassed. Last year, I got one of those boxed cookie mixes and tried to pass off the results as homemade. My editor took one bite and ratted me out.”
“She must have a refined palate. Is she a good baker?”
“Her cookie-swap cookies are good,” Josh specified with a meaningful look, “but I’m pretty sure she doesn’t bake them herself. I’m told that her son is handy with a mixing bowl.”
“Aha.” I grinned at him. “Your next exposé, after you crack the Melissa Balthasar case?” I wanted us to get back on track.
But Josh appeared somewhat mystified. “There’s nothing to ‘crack.’ Her death really was accidental, at least according to my brother. I know you’re hoping for more, but . . . Hey, watch out!”
Josh yanked me out of the way. Heavy slabs of metal clanged to the floor in a jumble and landed with a loud crash.
I’d been opening and closing cupboard doors, trying to seem nonchalant about my questions while assembling supplies. One of the cupboards had indeed contained the baking sheets I was looking for, but several of them had almost crushed my skull.
“Sorry!” my friendly host yelped. “All my tidiness is just a sham, I’m afraid. I’m one of those people who jams everything into the closet, then calls it clean.” Red faced, he scooped up the wayward cookie sheets and set them on the counter. “We’ll just run those through the dishwasher before we use them.”
My heart pounded. But I managed a wave. “No need. A good rinse and towel dry will be fine. We’re baking on parchment.”
I showed him my roll of baking paper. It was one of my secret weapons, ensuring that my baked goods didn’t stick to the pans and lightening my cleanup load. Temporarily derailed from my questions, I demonstrated how to measure the parchment paper to fit the sheet pans, how to roll it to easily trim it to size, and then—my super top-secret tip—how to crumple it and then smooth it, the better to ensure it lay flat beneath cookies.
Seriously, it works like magic. Without that final step, you’ll find that your parchment paper wants to curl right up on itself, accidentally shielding your baked goods from the heat they need to bake and brown properly in the oven. It’s genius.
“I have a box of that stuff, but I never use it,” Josh admitted. “It’s too much trouble. But you make that look easy.”
“It is,” I promised. We spent a few minutes clearing space on the kitchen countertop, removing rolls of holiday gift wrap, cellophane tape, and a bag of colorful bows. “So is baking, once you have a system. The first thing to do is read the recipe.”
I’d already printed it while at the B and B’s mini business center. I stuck it to the fridge with a Christmas magnet.
Josh glanced at it. “Okay, got it.” He handed me an apron.
I laughed. “No, really read it. Start to finish, making sure you understand all the steps and have all the ingredients on hand. That’s important. What if you get halfway through baking and realize you don’t have a critical ingredient?”
A shameless grin. “That’s what you’re here for.”
I liked his jovial attitude. “Not next year, I won’t be.”
“Fair enough.” Josh pushed up his sweater sleeves. With his merry “Mrs. Claus” apron worn over his outfit, he looked up for the challenge. He read the recipe. “Okay. Got it. For real.”
I gave him an approving smile. “Now, ingredients.”
“Oh, don’t worry! I already got everything you e-mailed me.”
I’d sent a list earlier, so he’d be ready for the cookie swap.
“Let’s get out everything, anyway. Right on the counter,” I said. “This is where we make sure we have enough of everything, and it’s in good shape to use. Ideally, we’d do this well in advance, in case we need to soften butter or bring eggs to room temperature, but the cookies we’re making don’t need either of those things.” I smiled. “I wanted to keep it foolproof.”
“I like that idea!” Complaisantly, Josh assembled flour, sugar, good-quality cocoa powder, leavening, and more. There were, of course, a few breaks for slurps of eggnog, but I was no taskmaster. It was important to enjoy time in the kitchen, too.
“Next, equipment,” I said. “Bowls, measuring cups and spoons, wax paper, and a big ole wooden spoon for stirring.”
“I have a fancy mixer.” Josh nodded at it. He cracked a teasing grin. “It’s barely used. Only a few minor disasters.”
“For these cookies, you won’t need it. They’re easy.”
His raised eyebrow indicated he doubted it. “I need ‘stupid easy.’ I burn toast. On the regular. I tried one of those ‘easy mug cakes’ in the microwave and almost started a kitchen fire.”
I gave a knowledgeable nod. “Did you leave in the spoon?”
“So that’s what did it!” Josh rolled his eyes and shook his head. “I forgot you can’t put metal in a microwave. Duh.”
“This is easy,” I assured him after offering to share my own (delicious) chocolate mug cake recipe. “Especially if you use my culinary scale.” I showed him how it worked. “You just set your mixing bowl on the scale, add ingredients, and tare it in between.” That step was necessary so that each ingredient could be weighed individually. We’d still need spoons, but . . . “No muss, no fuss, no sticky measuring cups to wash afterward.”
“Cool. All right.” Josh seemed game. He surveyed the scene we’d made, with ingredients and equipment strewn across the countertops. “I’ve gotta say, this actually looks worse than when I bake alone.”
“There’s a method to the madness, I promise.”
It was time to show him. So I did. See, what trips up many bakers is the unfamiliarity of it all, coupled with the need to multitask. To beginners or part-time bakers, it often seems that a million things are happening at once. But it’s possible to slow down the process. It’s even possible (really!) to enjoy it.
All you have to do is take things slowly, step-by-step.
First, Josh weighed ingredients into a medium bowl set atop the scale. He carefully spooned in the flour, then studied it.
“Shouldn’t I be scooping and sweeping or packing this into a measuring cup or fluffing it up or sifting or something?”
“No need. Whisking all the dry ingredients is as good as sifting, and when you’re weighing, you don’t have to scoop and level flour. You always get the right amount by weighing it.”
“Okay. Next?” He shoved aside the flour bag and waited.
“Next, we put away the flour,” I instructed. This was the next most important step in my practice. I’d learned it from my mentor. “That way, we won’t add it to our cookie dough twice.”
Hands on hips, Josh laughed at the very idea. “I’m not that drunk on eggnog. I can see that there’s flour in that bowl.”
“Sure, but what about baking powder? Salt? Baking soda? If you put away each ingredient immediately after using it, you’ll never forget to use one—because it’ll be there as a reminder—and you’ll never double up, either. Plus, instant kitchen cleanup.”
“Fair enough.” Josh put away the flour; then we proceeded to add the rest of the dry ingredients. “Time to whisk?”
“You’re a quick study.” If only he’d spill some info. “Did you always want to be a reporter? How long have you been at it?”
His gaze met mine. “You already told me not to multitask.”
Rats. I had. “All right, let’s keep going.” I regrouped. “Next comes sugar, then brown sugar.” I watched Josh weigh both. The countertop was clearing rapidly. “Now cocoa powder, then a little milk. Just pour it right into the mix with the vanilla.”
He frowned, with the milk held aloft. “Don’t I need to cream this or something? Whip until light and fluffy? That’s cookies!”
“Not these cookies. Trust me. This is the easy part.”
A few minutes later, Josh had added all the liquids, including some vegetable oil. It doesn’t have the flavor of butter, but it introduces a certain softness to cookies that is difficult to get any other way. It also offers easy baking. Cookies made with butter—which contains water—spread a lot more.
“Using oil means less risk of ‘one giant cookie’ syndrome.”
“When all the batter smooshes together in the oven, ruining all the hard work you’ve done?” Josh asked. “Yeah, been there.”
I had been, too, but not for years. Now I showed Josh how to combine the wet and dry ingredients, portion the dough into equally sized balls using a small metal scoop, then arrange them on the lined baking sheets. We flattened each cookie slightly.
We double-checked the oven temperature. The oven was ready.
So was I. After watching Josh painstakingly slide his first sheet pan of chocolate cookies into the oven, I tried again to get the
information I needed about Melissa’s maybe-murder.
“So, about Melissa Balthasar,” I said leadingly. “Do you know if there will be an autopsy? What was the cause of death?”
This time, I hit pay dirt.
“She drowned,” Josh confided. “Smashed into that punch bowl—probably drunk or high, is what my brother said—and drowned.”
I couldn’t believe it. “Drowned? But there couldn’t have been more than a few inches of wassail in that punch bowl.”
A shrug. “That’s all it takes, especially if you’re too wasted to save yourself. Or if you’ve already passed out.”
I shivered inwardly. Still . . . “Someone would have heard. There were more than a dozen people upstairs. A single shout—”
“Would have been impossible.” Imperturbably, Josh peered into his oven. “The way my brother explained it to me, drowning is silent. Nobody can call for help. That’s because all it takes is for the victim to inhale enough liquid to seal off her trachea. After that, there’s no oxygen to shout—or to live.”
Gruesome. Poor Melissa. She’d died all alone. If only I’d arrived at the B&B a little later that night. Maybe I could have saved her. “So the official cause of death is . . . ?”
“Cardiac arrest, brought on by drowning. Accidentally.”
I couldn’t miss Josh’s emphasis on accidentally.
“Was Melissa known to drink a lot? Or take drugs?”
“Who knows? With these Hollywood types, probably.”
“Were you at the tree-trimming party? Did you see her?”
“I wasn’t invited.” Josh sent me a chary look. “What makes you so interested, anyway? It’s not as if you knew Melissa.”
Whoops. I’d overstepped. I remembered the DVD box sets I’d glimpsed earlier and improvised. “Just curious. Is that morbid?” I pulled a jokey face. “I watch a lot of those TV crime shows.”
That did the trick. Josh lightened up. “Hey, me too!”
The Peppermint Mocha Murder Page 9