Murder with a Cherry on Top

by Cynthia Baxter

  At least as impressive as her fancy car was her outfit. She was wearing a simple white dress that, from the way it fluttered in the light breeze, was undoubtedly silk. From the way it was cut, and the way it draped over her obnoxiously thin Gwyneth Paltrow frame, it just oozed expensiveness. Her shoes looked as if they’d cost a lot, too, since they had bunches of bling attached to them. As if that weren’t enough to make me imagine a triple-digit price tag, the heels were so high they had obviously been made for someone who spent a lot of time sitting at a desk, making important decisions.

  Perched on her nose was a pair of sunglasses, the gold insignia of the designer glinting in the bright afternoon sun. And even from this distance, I could tell that her robin’s-egg-blue leather purse was Kate Spade. Not one of the outlet store ones, either. This was the real deal.

  Ashley had clearly done well for herself, making me wonder, just for a fraction of a second, whether I’d been wrong to go into ice cream rather than baked goods.

  But that fleeting thought left my head in a flash. Instead, fury curdled in my stomach as I watched her position herself in front of her despicable hand-lettered sign, pull out her phone, and take a bunch of photos. Even more annoyingly, she then stepped in front of the sign, plastered a big phony smile on her face, and snapped a few selfies.

  “Grrrr!” I growled. “I bet nasty old Ashcan is going to find a way to get that picture on the front page of the Daily Roost,” I muttered. “She’s such a manipulator that she’s going to make sure that the fact that her shop is now selling ice cream is the biggest news in town. The next thing you know, this new sideline of hers is going to drive me out of business!”

  By this point, Ashley had tossed her cell phone back into her Kate Spade purse. She slithered in front of her car, checked for traffic, and strutted across the street.

  Making a beeline for my shop.

  “O-M-G,” Willow muttered under her breath. “Kate, do you believe this? She’s heading our way!”

  “No! She wouldn’t . . . she couldn’t . . . !” I leaned closer to the window, wanting to see for myself.

  But she would. And she could. She was getting closer and closer. She stepped up to Lickety Splits’ front door, pulled it open, and strode inside.

  Even in my frenzied state, I couldn’t help noticing the smirk her bright pink lipsticked mouth was drawn into. She paused, pulling off her designer sunglasses and surveying my shop appraisingly.

  Instinctively I glanced around the store. The customers who were sitting at the marble tables appeared to be completely oblivious to the drama unfolding before them. They were too absorbed in devouring their mounds of Melty Chocolate Malt (a particular favorite of mine, especially since I made it with chopped-up pieces of chocolate malted milk balls) or my amazing Better Butterscotch or refreshingly tart Lucky Lemon Raspberry Swirl.

  Just then, a group of three middle-aged women also wandered into the shop, so close behind Ashley that they nearly tripped on her. Two of them were carrying shopping bags from Stitchin’ Time, a quilting shop a half a block away from mine.

  “I’ll help these customers,” Willow said. In a whisper, she added, “Kate, behave yourself.”

  I decided to do just that.

  “Ashley! What a pleasant surprise!” I greeted the she-devil as the group of quilters headed toward the ice cream display cases, leaving Ashley and me to ourselves.

  “Hardly,” Ashley replied. She eyed me up and down before adding, “Goodness, time certainly has taken its toll, hasn’t it!”

  I gritted my teeth, wishing that that morning I’d styled my lank brown hair instead of simply washing it, put on some makeup, and worn anything but jeans and a white cotton shirt that had lost its crispness hours earlier.

  And taken off the eight pounds I’d put on since high school. Well, ten.

  And hating myself for caring.

  As politely as I could, I asked, “Is there anything I can get you?”

  Ashley glanced over at the display of ice cream, then pretended to shudder. “Heavens, no. We’re not all in such a hurry to let ourselves go.”

  “Interesting comment from a bakery owner,” I commented. “I wonder how your customers would feel about it.”

  “My customers are positively addicted to the goodies I sell,” she retorted. “They don’t care about anything or anyone but getting their fix of my Chocolate Coconut Dream Bars or my Apricot Almond Muffins.”

  I had a few ideas about what she could do with her muffins, but I kept them to myself.

  But I noticed that while I was doing an admirable job of restraining myself, Ashley’s voice was getting louder.

  Willow noticed, too. “Excuse me, Kate,” she called across the shop, her voice as sweet as the Earl Grey Tea with Shortbread ice cream she was scooping into a waffle cone for one of the quilters. “It might not be a bad idea for you and Ashley to continue your conversation outside.”

  Of course, I would have been perfectly happy not to continue our conversation at all. But as I glanced over at my customers, I realized they could hear every word we were saying. The girl in the purple glasses and her root-beer-loving pal were suddenly eating much faster than before, and a couple of the ice-cream-cone eaters were gathering up their things, acting as if they couldn’t wait to get themselves and their portable treats out of there.

  Once Ashley and I were out on the sidewalk, all bets were off.

  “Okay, Ashcan,” I said, “what do you think you’re doing, suddenly deciding that your true calling in life is going into the ice cream business—and doing it the very same week I open my shop?”

  She waved her hand in the air. “It’s a free country,” she said, sounding like a seven-year-old. “Chalk it up to free enterprise. The spirit of capitalism. Pursuing the American Dream.”

  “American Dream?” I cried. I was really seething by that point. “Given the fact that you’re driving a Corvette—in a color that clashes horribly with your lipstick, I might add—it looks like pursuing the American Dream has already done you enough good. It seems to me that you don’t exactly need to start stomping all over my business just to make yourself feel like you can do anything I can do!”

  “But of course I can do anything you can do, and so much better!” Ashley replied. “I already know that.” She sighed. “It’s just that it’s so much fun seeing you squirm. It always has been. And I guess some things never change.”

  “You’re not going to get away with this!” I insisted. “Just because you make a decent coconut bar—”

  “Chocolate Coconut Dream Bar,” she corrected me haughtily. “Made with seventy percent dark chocolate. From the Amazon!”

  “Amazon, my foot!” I returned.

  By this point, my voice had gotten louder. In fact, it was loud enough that several people turned to look at us. Not in a good way, either.

  But I wasn’t about to retreat.

  “Ashley Winthrop, you’re a complete phony!” I yelled. “I bet the ice cream you’re selling isn’t even homemade!”

  A sly smile crossed her face. “Prove it!”

  Her response only made me even more furious. “I’ll call the board of health! The truth in advertising squad! I’ll—I’ll call Consumer Reports!”

  Ashley just laughed. “Good luck with that. I doubt anyone will care.” Sweeping her blond hair back over one shoulder, she added, “And if they do, I’ll just find a different adjective. ‘Artisanal,’ maybe. Or ‘totally natural.’ Or here’s one: ‘gluten free!’”

  “Ice cream is always gluten free!” I exclaimed.

  “In that case, I really will be telling the truth,” she replied.

  I suddenly noticed that right behind us, a small crowd had gathered. Three or four people, anyway, including one dog walker. But everyone on the street—quite a large number, given what a lovely day it was—seemed to have stopped in their tracks and turned their head to get a better view of the dramatic scene unfolding on Hudson Street. And that was probably a few dozen people or
so.

  I was suddenly mortified.

  “Look, Ashley,” I said. “I’m not going to waste my time arguing with you. Why should I, when you haven’t been even close to reasonable since you were five years old? You’ve gotten so used to getting your way that it’s never even occurred to you that anyone could stop you. But this time is different. This time, it’s not about Skippy or the prom or—or yellow paint! This time, I’m different! And I will now leave you with this promise: This isn’t over!”

  With that, I turned, let out a huge “Hrmph!” and stalked back to my shop. As I strode by the onlookers, I did my best to hold my head high, acting as if I’d actually won.

  I sure didn’t feel that way.

  “Welcome back,” Willow said as I slunk back into Lickety Splits, my shoulders slumped and my mood even slumpier. “Who won?”

  “Ashley always wins,” I returned. “It’s as if the universe is punishing me for something I did in a previous life.”

  “You don’t believe in previous lives,” Willow pointed out. “Besides, if the universe was out to get you, I have a feeling it could come up with something worse than having some full-of-herself competitor selling second-rate chocolate ice cream across the street from you.”

  At the moment, I was unable to imagine anything worse.

  Still, as I glanced around, I got more than a little pleasure from seeing what I’d already accomplished—and in just a few short weeks. My brand-new ice cream shop was already running smoothly, even though it had only been open for a few days. A few happy ice cream eaters were sitting at the tables, and a new bunch of customers had gathered in front of the display cases, oohing and aahing over my beautiful creations. A few were studying the menu posted on the wall above, no doubt trying to decide which irresistible concoction to choose.

  I only hoped Ashley wouldn’t mess it all up.

  I suddenly wanted to get away. My ugly interaction with the pastry princess had left me feeling shaken, and I couldn’t stand being so close to her or her shop for another minute.

  Turning to Willow, I said, “I have an errand I’ve been meaning to run, and this seems like the perfect time to do it. Would you mind looking after the shop for me, just for an hour or so?”

  “No problem,” she replied. “In fact, I’ve got nothing on my schedule for the rest of the day, so why don’t you go take care of whatever you have to do and then just go home?”

  “Really? You wouldn’t mind?”

  “Not at all,” she said, already pushing me toward the door. “It’s gotten pretty hot today, and you could probably use some time to cool off.”

  I knew perfectly well she wasn’t talking about the weather.

  Chapter 2

  New York is the nation’s fourth largest dairy producing state, with 5,000 farms and 600,000 cows.

  —New York Times, August 31, 2016

  I was still steaming as I drove my shiny red pickup truck along Route 9, a winding highway that runs along the Hudson River. Usually I love taking that road, since it passes through both breathtaking forested areas and, as a wonderful contrast, some of the ever-more-trendy towns dotting the valley. The route also offers amazing views of the water that always have a calming effect on me.

  Not today.

  Today, I felt like I was a child again, and not in a good way.

  In fact, my street fight with Ashley Winthrop made me feel like that five-year-old kindergartener who’d just had the daffodil yellow paint grabbed away.

  And Willow’s deep breaths weren’t going to take care of it.

  Think of something positive, I told myself. Something happy, something that will make you feel better.

  As was so often the case, I decided to focus on ice cream.

  Ah, ice cream. My favorite food for as long as I can remember. Whenever I think about my childhood, my fondest memories are of walking into the luncheonette in town with the handful of change I’d just earned by doing some chore and treating myself to a double dip cone of Chocolate Mint Chip and Vanilla Fudge Swirl. When my mother took my two older sisters and me to an amusement park, my favorite part wasn’t the whirligig or the Ferris wheel or the merry-go-round. It was the ice cream pops we bought at a vending machine, hard, frozen bars of vanilla ice cream slathered in coconut or chopped nuts or a crisp chocolate shell that would break into smaller pieces when you bit down on it.

  The summer I was nine years old, Mom and Grams and my sisters and I spent a week in New Jersey, visiting relatives. I still have fond memories of a day trip we took to Atlantic City. But even though I loved the beach and the boardwalk’s entertaining sideshows, that wasn’t what impressed me the most. Instead, it was all about the smooth, luscious, soft-serve frozen custard sold at a stand called Kohr’s that had started in 1919. The ice cream and custard at Kohr’s came in flavors unlike any I had ever seen, flavors like Bubblegum and Cotton Candy and Black Raspberry and Orange Cream. Deciding which to choose seemed like the hardest thing I’d ever had to do.

  But there was even more behind my passion for ice cream. Aside from the euphoric experience of something creamy and sweet and icy cold dissolving on my tongue, filling my mouth with a burst of flavor that seemed almost too good to be real, at least as meaningful to me was my father’s love of ice cream.

  I don’t have that many memories of him, since he died when I was just five years old. But I do remember that we both were committed to marking each and every important event in our lives with our favorite frozen treat.

  For my third birthday, my dad took me to an ice cream emporium in a nearby town and set before me the biggest banana split I had ever seen. Believe it or not, I can still remember those three mounds of ice cream—a scoop each of chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry, since this particular shop liked to stick with the classics—smothered in slices of banana and chocolate syrup and whipped cream. And not one but three cherries sat on top, commemorating the specialness of turning three. I seem to recall that I wasn’t able to finish the whole thing, but my partner in culinary crime was more than happy to help me out.

  On my fourth birthday, Daddy surprised both my mother and me by announcing that that year he wanted to take charge of the birthday cake. But instead of whipping up a Duncan Hines cake mix or trotting off to a local bakery, he concocted his own version of an ice cream cake. I watched in awe as he stuffed a layer of Chocolate Marshmallow ice cream into the bottom of a springform pan, then added a layer of chocolate cookies. Next came a layer of Vanilla Fudge ice cream, followed by a layer of vanilla wafers. On top he squished in a third layer of ice cream—Chocolate Mint Chip, my absolute favorite at the time. He covered the top with sprinkles in every color of the rainbow, stuck in four candles plus one in the center for good luck, and as a final touch added a handwritten sign that said, HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KATE!

  I still treasure the photographs I have of that cake. My dad had never exactly displayed any Martha Stewart capabilities, so in the pictures, his creation looks kind of like a throw pillow that somebody sat on for too long. But to me it’s a work of art. To this day I have never had such a magnificent birthday cake.

  Once my dad passed away, Mom, my sisters, and I moved in with Grams. I felt as if my entire world had shifted, but there was one important thing that didn’t change: the starring role that ice cream played in my life. On hot summer evenings, the five of us would sit at the kitchen table, laughing over fun card games like old maid and gin rummy. At least as important as our hilarious rivalries were the bowls of Grams’s favorite ice cream, Cherry Vanilla, that were a part of every evening.

  But Cherry Vanilla ice cream wasn’t the only frozen treat that was available for celebrating summer. The freezer was always stocked with Eskimo Pies or chocolate and vanilla ice cream cups or whatever other ice cream novelty had just been invented. Grams loved to experiment trying different foods, and since she knew how much I loved ice cream, she was happy to indulge me.

  Then Mom passed away the summer I turned ten. Grams suddenly found herself pl
aying the role of mother. She knew how devastated my sisters and I were, and to help us all cope with our confusion, our anger, and our intense feelings of loneliness, she did her best to keep our lives as much the same as they had been before. A big part of that was to keep our family ice cream addiction going, since it was one of the easiest and most obvious ways of linking us to the past and moving ahead with our lives.

  When I grew up and moved to New York City, my strong and happy relationship with ice cream continued. It was my comfort food in a brand-new place, a link to my past even as I struggled to create a new present and future for myself.

  My studio apartment in the East Eighties was tiny, but there was always room in the refrigerator for a pint or two of Häagan-Dazs or Ben & Jerry’s or one of the newer brands that was always springing up. Something new was happening in the world of ice cream. As was the case with so many other foods, ice cream was rising to an art form. New flavors were being developed all the time. Ingredients whose names had never before been used in the same sentence as the words “ice cream” were suddenly popping up in shops and supermarket freezers all over the city, ingredients like cornflakes, chili powder, bacon, cardamom, avocado, gingerbread, lavender, and rose.

  And then, a few months earlier, everything changed. The increasingly debilitating arthritis in Grams’s knees caused her to fall, sliding down three steps at the bottom of the staircase that connected the front hallway with the second floor. Thank goodness for the Wolfert’s Roost Fire Department and their topnotch EMTs. But once the immediate crisis was over, a new normal took over. The tasks of day-to-day living that had been becoming more and more difficult for Grams were suddenly impossible. She needed someone to take care of her. Making the decision to take on that role took me all of three seconds.

  The first couple of weeks after I’d moved back to Wolfert’s Roost were intense, since even though she fortunately hadn’t broken any bones, she was still pretty bruised. I took over running the entire household: shopping, cooking, doing the laundry, paying bills, and keeping the house reasonably neat.