Fudge Cupcake Murder

by Joanne Fluke

  The program was almost over when Hannah caught a glimpse of an orange and white blur out of the corner of her eye. It was Moishe, heading off to the laundry room, even though he’d just come from there a few minutes ago. Now that she thought about it, Hannah was almost sure she’d seen him take the same route several times.

  “Are you okay, Moishe?” Hannah asked, getting up on her feet. Moishe never went into the laundry room unless he needed to use his litter box. If his new senior food was upsetting his stomach, she’d call the vet in the morning.

  When Hannah stepped into the laundry room, she found Moishe standing by his litter box. But instead of getting in, as she expected him to, he just leaned over the side, dropped something in, and reached out with a paw to cover it.

  “That’s strange,” Hannah commented, watching as her cat headed back to the kitchen again. Several months ago, Moishe had buried the back half of a mouse in his litter box. Perhaps he’d caught something and was giving it the feline version of a decent burial.

  Hannah grabbed the scoop and exhumed the item that Moishe had buried. It wasn’t a mouse, or a part of a mouse. It wasn’t even a cricket, or a moth. It was a pristine nugget of his new senior cat food. Suddenly suspicious, she dug around a bit in the litter box, uncovering more evidence of Moishe’s distaste. By his choice of burial spot, her cat was making a graphic comment about the palatability of his dinner.

  “Okay,” Hannah sighed, accepting the inevitable. Nothing was ever as easy as it seemed.

  As she stepped into the kitchen, Hannah glanced over at Moishe. He was standing by his food bowl, watching her every move. His yellow eyes seemed to brighten as she headed for the broom closet and his stash of old kitty crunchies. When she took out the bag, his eyes fairly gleamed with an eager light.

  “You win, Moishe,” Hannah said, rinsing out his bowl and filling it with his regular chow. She knew she was surrendering in the war between feline wits and human wits, but there was no way she wanted to listen to hungry yowls all night.

  The next day, The Cookie Jar was crowded. It seemed that almost everyone in town had heard about Sheriff Grant’s murder, and Hannah suspected that her own mother had spread the word to at least half the population of Lake Eden all by herself.

  “Absolutely not,” Hannah said, pouring more coffee as she responded to Bertie Staub’s question. It was the same answer she’d been giving all morning. Everyone who came in for cookies and coffee wanted to know if she’d be investigating.

  “But don’t you want to help?” Bertie asked, turning to smile at Andrea, who’d just come in the front door.

  “I’ll help in any way I can, but only as a private citizen.”

  “But what if they ask you to help? Would you do it then?”

  “They won’t.” Hannah slid over to make room as Andrea ducked behind the counter. “One of their own has been killed and they’ll want to run their own investigation. I wouldn’t dream of interfering and I’m not involved in any way.”

  “Yes, you are,” Andrea hissed, just loud enough for Hannah to hear it. Her lips were perfectly stationary and fixed in a smile, and Hannah was impressed. She hadn’t known that Andrea had ventriloquism skills.

  “Kitchen,” Andrea said under her breath and around the fixed smile she still wore. “I need to talk to you.”

  Hannah motioned for Lisa to take over the counter and led Andrea back through the swinging door to the kitchen workstation. Her sister settled on a stool and Hannah sat down beside her. “What is it? You look rattled.”

  Andrea paled at that observation. “Oh, no! Do you think anyone noticed?”

  “You mean out there?” Hannah gestured toward the coffee shop.

  “Yes.”

  “No one except me. And that’s only because I know you so well. What’s wrong?”

  “Everything! My world is spinning and there’s nothing I can do to stop it!”

  Hannah decided not to remind Andrea that spinning is what the world did, and without the pull of gravity, they’d all fall off. “I think you need some orange juice. You look a little pale.”

  “Coffee,” Andrea corrected her. “I didn’t have my one cup this morning. I was too upset to make it.”

  As Hannah went to the kitchen coffee pot to pour Andrea a cup, she wondered how anyone could be so upset, they couldn’t make coffee. This was especially puzzling in Andrea’s case, since all she did was put a spoonful of instant coffee in a mug, fill it with water, and microwave it until it was hot enough to drink.

  “Thanks, Hannah.” Andrea accepted the mug and curled her hands around it. Then she took a long sip and sighed gratefully. “That’s so good! I feel much more in control now.”

  “Good. Why did you feel out of control in the first place? And what did you mean by what you said back there?”

  “What did I say?”

  “I was telling Bertie that I wasn’t going to interfere in Sheriff Grant’s murder investigation and you said, Yes, you are. And you said it without moving your lips.”

  “Oh, that. I learned how to talk that way in seventh grade. Mr. Becker used to give us demerits if he caught us talking in class, so we learned to talk without moving our lips. He never caught on and we did it all year long.”

  “Not that! I’m talking about when you said I was going to interfere in Sheriff Grant’s murder investigation.”

  “You are. You have to do it, Hannah. Bill needs you.”

  “Are you sure about that?”

  “I’m positive.”

  Hannah gave Andrea a long level look. “Are you telling me that Bill asked you to ask me to investigate Sheriff Grant’s murder?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “How, exactly?”

  “It’s Mike.” Andrea took another sip of her coffee and her eyes began to flash fire. “He’s a first-class jerk! I still can’t believe that I invited him into my home and fed him sandwiches and everything, and then he turned on us like a rat in the grass!”

  “Snake,” Hannah corrected her automatically.

  “What?”

  “It’s snake in the grass, not rat in the grass. What did Mike do?”

  “He betrayed our trust, that’s what he did! If you ever speak to him again, I’ll…I’ll disown you!”

  Since Andrea only used that threat when she was upset, Hannah decided not to mention the fact that sisters couldn’t disown sisters. If looks weren’t deceiving, Andrea was working herself up into a full-scale snit. Her cheeks were red and her eyes were flashing fire. Hannah hadn’t seen her this angry since high school, when someone had spilled grape soda on her favorite pink cashmere sweater.

  “Mike is…just awful! He’s a…a…” Andrea stopped and covered her tummy with her hands. “I’d better not say what I’m thinking. I just read an article that said babies hear sounds before they’re born and I don’t want little Billy to hear how mad I am.”

  “Just take it easy and tell me what Mike’s done to get you so riled up.”

  “Mike…” Andrea stopped and took another deep breath, letting it out with a whoosh. “Mike thinks Bill murdered Sheriff Grant!”

  Chapter

  Five

  H

  annah felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach. She was about to ask Andrea what she meant when she noticed the color of her sister’s face and rushed to the counter to get her a medicinal dose of chocolate.

  “Here, Andrea.” Hannah shoved two Black and White cookies into her hand. “You need chocolate.”

  “What I need is for Mike to drop dead!”

  “Understandable, considering the circumstances.” Hannah gestured toward the cookies. “Eat. Now.”

  “All right, all right,” Andrea sounded peeved, but she took a big bite of the first cookie. Then she took another bite, and another, finishing it in a gulp. The second cookie was gone just as quickly as the first and Hannah was relieved to see that a little color was beginning to come back to Andrea’s cheeks.

  “You look better,” Hannah
told her, feeling a lot better herself. Andrea had turned so pale she’d wondered if she ought to call Doc Knight.

  “I feel better. But I’m still mad at Mike.”

  “Can’t blame you for that,” Hannah said leaning over to pat Andrea’s hand.

  “It’s just awful, Hannah! I’m so mad I’m speechless.”

  “No, you’re not,” Hannah said, regretting the words the moment they’d left her mouth. Now was not the time to argue semantics. “Just tell me exactly what happened. Maybe there’s something I can do to help.”

  Andrea shook her head once to clear it and then she took a deep breath. “It all started this morning at work. Mike said he had to suspend Bill because Bill was home alone last night and he didn’t have an alibi for the time when Sheriff Grant was killed.”

  “Hold on a second. Mike suspended Bill? How did he have the authority to do that?”

  “He’s acting sheriff, now that Sheriff Grant’s dead. It’s right in the rulebook. The highest ranking deputy assumes the sheriff’s position until a new sheriff is elected.”

  “Oh.” Hannah grabbed her shoulder bag purse and pulled out one of her ever-present stenographer’s notebooks, the kind she used for important notes. “You said Bill didn’t have an alibi for the time that Sheriff Grant was killed. What time was that?”

  “I don’t think Bill knows. Mike hustled him out before he could find out anything about the investigation.”

  “Okay. You also said that Bill was home alone. Where were you?”

  “I took Tracey and two of her friends to a movie at the mall. Now I wish I hadn’t. The movie was awful, one of those horrible cartoony things where the people don’t even look real and the…”

  “Okay,” Hannah interrupted what she figured would be a tirade about the quality of children’s movies. “Let’s get back to Bill’s suspension. Is this just a procedural thing? Or does Mike really think that Bill killed Sheriff Grant?”

  “I don’t know for sure. But Bill told me that Mike really sounded serious when he suspended him. I’m still reeling in shock. I thought Mike was Bill’s best friend and I just can’t believe that he’d betray him this way.”

  “It’s hard to believe, all right.” Hannah agreed, since she was having trouble digesting it herself. But unless Mike’s evil twin had come to town and was keeping the real Mike hog-tied in a closet, that was exactly what he’d done.

  “Bill didn’t do it, Hannah. My husband’s no killer.”

  “Of course he’s not,” Hannah said in her most comforting tone. It was true. Bill wouldn’t hurt a fly, unless he wanted to use it for fishing. “Let’s approach this systematically, Andrea. Exactly what did Bill do last night while you were gone?”

  “He watched football on our new dish. And he told Mike that. He even gave Mike the highlights of the game, but Mike said that wasn’t good enough, that Bill could have seen all that on the sports news.”

  Hannah reached out to pat her sister’s hand again. “We’ve got to prove that Bill stayed at home last night. Maybe one of your neighbors saw him. All it takes is one person who passed by the house and spotted him inside at the critical time.”

  “I know. I already thought of that. I called everyone on the block this morning, but no one saw Bill.”

  Hannah watched as Andrea twisted a paper napkin into a rope. Was she imagining that it was made of hemp and it was tightening around Mike’s neck? Mike had been a friend, a confidant, and practically a member of the family. Hannah could understand why her sister felt betrayed.

  “Will you help, Hannah?”

  “Of course I will. Don’t worry, Andrea.”

  “I can’t help it! The future looked so rosy yesterday. The new poll was out and Bill had a really good chance of beating Sheriff Grant in the election. But now that Sheriff Grant’s been murdered, everything’s changed for the worse. Now, by the time Little Billy is born, Bill might not have a job. And if Mike gets his way, he could be in jail for murder!”

  Hannah shook her head. “That’ll never happen. I promise it won’t.”

  “But how do you know?”

  “I won’t let it happen. Go home, Andrea. Bill’s got to be feeling pretty rotten and none of this is his fault. That means he’s going to need some tender loving care. I’ll come over right after my catering job and we’ll work out a game plan to clear him.”

  “Okay.” Andrea looked relieved that Hannah had given her something constructive to do. “What time is your catering?”

  “At noon. I should be at your house by one-thirty at the latest.”

  “Perfect.” Andrea levered herself to her feet. “I’ll make us lunch. We’ll have toasted peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.”

  “Sounds good to me,” Hannah said. Andrea was the world’s worst cook, but making toasted peanut butter and jelly sandwiches didn’t require a high level of culinary expertise.

  The rest of the morning was busy and space in the coffee shop was limited to standing room only. It took both Hannah and Lisa to wait on the crowd until the predictable lull came at shortly past eleven, when most Lake Eden residents decided it was too late for a morning cookie and too early for a lunch cookie. The moment the last patron had gone out the door, Hannah motioned Lisa over to their favorite booth in the back and told her about Bill’s suspension.

  “You’re kidding!” Lisa gasped, her eyes wide with surprise. “Mike actually suspects Bill?”

  “That’s what Andrea says. And it must be true because he put Bill on suspension.”

  “But that’s…that’s…that’s ridiculous!” Lisa sputtered.

  “Of course it is. I can’t help hoping this is all a huge misunderstanding. But if it isn’t…”

  “You’re going to solve the case and clear Bill,” Lisa interrupted. “Of course you will. What else can you do? You’ll save him, Hannah.”

  Hannah laughed. “You make me sound like Superwoman.”

  “I guess,” Lisa gave a slightly sheepish grin, “but you’re good at investigating murders, Hannah. Everybody says so. And I don’t want you to give a second thought to business. I’ll take care of The Cookie Jar.”

  Hannah reached out to pat her partner on the back. “I know you will. Sometimes you’re just too good to be true, Lisa. Nobody can be that nice. I keep wondering if you don’t have some kind of perfectly dreadful secret vice.”

  “Like what?” Lisa looked intrigued.

  “I don’t know. Give me a little time and I’ll come up with something. In the meantime, see if you can figure out what Beatrice Koester’s missing ingredient is. She called me again this morning, all worried that Alma’s recipe won’t go in the cookbook.”

  “I’ll work on it,” Lisa promised. “I tried marshmallow cream last night, but that turned out to be a big gooey mess. Do you want me to help you load up?”

  “Load up?”

  “For the catering,” Lisa explained. “You’re due there in less than an hour.”

  Hannah thunked her forehead with the heel of her hand. “Right. For a second there, I forgot all about it.”

  “That’s not surprising. You have a lot on your mind.”

  “True,” Hannah gave Lisa a smile. “I guess it’s a really good thing that I live in a small town.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because even when I don’t know what I’m doing, somebody else always does.”

  Hannah had just stashed the last box of cookies inside her truck when Mike pulled up next to her and got out of his cruiser. He looked so handsome she had all she could do not to rush into his arms. But as much as she might like him to put his arms around her and kiss her, and she’d like that a whole lot, she had to remember that this was the man who had suspended Bill and practically accused him of murder.

  Mike took one look at her expression. “What’s the matter? You look like someone just took away your favorite toy.”

  “That figures,” Hannah muttered under her breath. She still wanted Mike. Nothing could change that. But family
loyalty came first. “How dare you suspend Bill! It’s preposterous!”

  “You heard?”

  “You bet I heard!”

  “I didn’t want to suspend him, Hannah, but I had to. Try to look at it from my point of view. Bill had a motive. Sheriff Grant was his opponent in the election and several people heard them arguing before Bill left the station last night. You know Barbara Donnelly, don’t you? Sheriff Grant’s secretary?”

  “I know her.” Hannah had known Barbara Donnelly for years and Barbara didn’t pull any punches. If she’d told Mike that Bill had argued with Sheriff Grant, then he had.

  “Barbara was sitting at her desk when Bill stormed out of Sheriff Grant’s office and she heard Sheriff Grant shout, “You’ll win over my dead body.”

  Hannah gave an exasperated sigh. “That was just a figure of speech. I’m really surprised that Barbara took it seriously.”

  “She didn’t take it seriously. But she did say that both Bill and Sheriff Grant were pretty steamed up. If they met up later, tempers could have flared. Somebody was mad enough to bash in Sheriff Grant’s head. And since Bill doesn’t have an alibi for the time of the murder, I had no choice but to remove him from the investigation.”

  Hannah had to admit that Mike had a point, but she wasn’t about to tell him that. “You said that Bill had no alibi for the time of the murder. What time was Sheriff Grant killed?”

  “Between eight and nine-thirty.”

  Hannah made a mental note of that and then she turned to face Mike squarely. “I’m really surprised at you, Mike. I thought partners always stuck together. Don’t you have any loyalty to Bill?”

  “Of course I do!” Mike looked outraged at the question. “Bill’s my best friend. You know that. But I have to put my personal feelings aside in a murder investigation. It’s be- cause Bill is my partner and my friend that I have to bend over backwards not to give him any preferential treatment. It’s really important that I follow the rulebook on this one. And since I’m working it alone, it’s not going to be easy.”