Murder with a Cherry on Top

by Cynthia Baxter

  “I’m staying here a while longer,” I told Emma. “I’ve got a customer coming in who’s interested in holding her little girl’s birthday party here at the shop.” I didn’t want to tell her the whole story because I didn’t want her to worry. And I was certain that Lindsey would be more willing to be open with me if there was nobody else around.

  Emma looked uneasy. “Are you sure you’ll be okay, Kate? Staying here by yourself? The entire town is pretty much shut up for the night. It’s actually kind of creepy downtown after hours.”

  “I’ll be fine,” I assured her.

  “I could just hang out in back—”

  “Emma! Go home!” I commanded.

  “You’ve got your cell phone, right?” she asked me nervously.

  “Good night, Emma,” I said firmly, practically pushing her out the door.

  Ten minutes later, as I was scrubbing a clump of mashed chocolate chips that had somehow become wedged between the wall and the baseboard, the front door swung open. Lindsey Mather came bustling in, dressed in a pair of gray sweatpants and a white T-shirt that looked as if they’d just been retrieved from the laundry basket. Her dark blond hair was pulled back into the same messy bun as the last time I’d seen her. I’d thought it was an afterthought, but it occurred to me that maybe that was simply how she wore her hair.

  When she wasn’t working, that is.

  “Made it!” she announced with a grin. Her cheeks were flushed a bright shade of pink that exactly matched the Dora the Explorer backpack she was carrying. That, I assumed, had been borrowed from Violet.

  “Thanks for letting me come right over like this,” she went on. “But as I told you on the phone, Rob is home and the kids are all asleep, so—”

  “No problem,” I assured her as I abandoned my scrubbing project. “In fact, the timing is great. So, want to sit down so we can work out the details of Violet’s ice cream extravaganza?”

  “Sure,” Lindsey replied. “But before we do that, do you think it’d be possible for you to give me a tour of the place?”

  I looked around Lickety Splits. “This is pretty much it, actually. I mean, there’s a small work area in the back where we actually make the ice cream and store it, but there’s not much to it.”

  “That’s what I meant,” Lindsey said. She giggled nervously. “This probably sounds crazy, but when it comes to food, I’m kind of obsessive about cleanliness. Especially where my kids are concerned. It’d make me feel much better if I could just get a look at where the ice cream is made.”

  “Of course,” I replied. While I did, indeed, think her obsession with cleanliness leaned toward the crazy side, I certainly had no qualms about showing off my kitchen. Not only was it immaculate, I also happened to be quite proud of the magic place where wonderful things happened with my favorite substance in the universe. “Come on back.”

  Still clutching her pink backpack, Lindsey followed me to the work space at the rear of the store.

  “The work area isn’t very big,” I chattered away, “but it’s got everything I need. The mixers, the refrigerator and the freezer, and some counter space where I make ice cream cakes and do all the other behind-the-scenes work.”

  “Still, it looks very clean,” she observed politely.

  “Speaking of ice cream cakes,” I said, “I can make any theme cake that you and Violet want. I can do something traditional, of course, a round cake that’s decorated with roses or pictures of balloons or whatever else you can think of. But I can also do something like a Dora the Explorer cake.”

  Or at least Emma can, I was thinking, glad I had an artist in residence.

  By that point, Lindsey and I were standing in the kitchen. I eyed it critically, glad I’d just finished cleaning up in here. I actually felt a burst of pride. It really was immaculate.

  “So this is pretty much all there is to see,” I said, making a sweeping motion with my arm. “Here’s the sink, and this is where I store the ingredients that don’t need refrigeration.”

  Lindsey nodded, meanwhile unzipping the pink backpack. “It’s very nice. Very sanitary.”

  She reached into the bag. I expected her to pull out a notebook, or maybe a camera.

  Instead, she pulled out a gun.

  Chapter 17

  “In 1843, Nancy Johnson of Philadelphia received

  the first U.S. patent for a small-scale

  hand-cranked ice cream freezer.

  The ice cream freezer was a pewter cylinder.”

  —https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_cream_maker

  I felt as if all the blood in my body was rushing to the floor in a sudden swoosh. For some crazy reason, the image that popped into my head was of an ice cream cone that someone had put in a microwave.

  Talk about an instant meltdown.

  This is why she wanted to get me alone in back of the shop, I thought. Even if someone walked by—highly unlikely, since as Emma had warned, Wolfert’s Roost was a ghost town at this hour—that person wouldn’t be able to see us through the window.

  Here I’d thought I was setting a trap for Lindsey. Instead, she had set one for me.

  So Lindsey is the murderer, I thought, feeling something that bordered on relief over having finally solved the case. I didn’t know why Ashley had been killed, but at least I knew who had done it.

  But whatever relief I felt over having finally learned the truth lasted less than a second. Almost instantly I was back to the horrifying realization that I appeared to be the next person on Lindsey’s list.

  My mind raced. I can’t let this happen, I thought. I have to take care of Grams. And Emma.

  I could picture both their faces in my mind.

  And then another face appeared. Jake’s face.

  Stay calm, a voice inside my head commanded. At least as calm as a person can be while a gun is pointed at her.

  And stall for time.

  “What’s going on, Lindsey?” I asked, doing my best to sound as if she and I were having a normal conversation.

  “You know, don’t you?” she replied, her eyes as steely as the gun she was pointing right at me. “You’ve known all along.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. I tried to keep my eyes fixed on her ice-cold gaze. But I couldn’t keep them from darting down to the gun every few seconds.

  “I think you do, Kate,” Lindsey said coldly. “For one thing, somehow you managed to find out that Ashley’s bakery was simply a front for her real business: an escort service. She used Sweet Things to make it look to the rest of the world like she was running a legitimate business, when really it was just a way to hide what she was actually doing. It was a way to launder all the cash she was raking in, too.

  “But what you probably don’t know is that Ashley’s business didn’t start out that way,” she continued. “Sweet Things in the Valley was originally a legitimate escort service. The women who worked for her back at the beginning, including me, really did supply nothing more than our good looks and our company.

  “All we were expected to do was act as companions. Her clients were businessmen who’d come to New York City or the Hudson Valley from out of town, from anywhere from Cleveland to Japan. Some of them actually lived around here. All they wanted was someone pretty to go to business dinners or cocktail parties with them. They wanted to walk into an important business event with the prettiest girl in the room on their arm. It was innocent, it was fun, and it paid really well. Like I could make as much as a thousand dollars in a single evening. And all I had to do was get dressed up in a slinky black dress and high heels, go to a fancy restaurant, and eat a big steak while the guys I was sitting with talked business.

  “Even my husband approved,” Lindsey went on. “Rob felt terrible that he’d been out of work for so long, especially with three small children to support. So he was thrilled that we had money coming in. Good money. In fact, he used to babysit while I went out on jobs. He would joke about how he had to stay home and watch Full House
reruns and eat Cheerios that he picked up off the floor while I got to go out to glamorous restaurants and drink champagne.

  “And when I came home, no matter how late it was, Rob would have waited up for me. We’d sit at the kitchen table together, and I’d tell him all about what I’d done that evening. We’d make fun of the obnoxious businessmen who’d paid good money just to have me sit next to them.”

  With a little shrug, she added, “Of course, every once in a while, one of them would try something. Put his hand on my knee or whisper something about coming back to his hotel with him. But I had clear instructions from Ashley about exactly what to do. ‘That’s not part of the service!’ she told me to say. ‘You didn’t pay for that!’ She instructed me to be very clear with the clients about the fact that in no way was there to be any funny business. The Sweet Things in the Valley Escort Service was exactly that: a service that provided escorts. Anything more was simply not on the menu.”

  Lindsey’s expression darkened. “But then, out of the blue, the business started to change,” she went on. “Ashley started to change. She began taking on different kinds of clients. And before I knew it she’d turned things around a hundred and eighty degrees. Instead of telling us not to go along with the clients’ lewd suggestions, she started doing the opposite.”

  Lindsey swallowed hard, as if her mouth had gotten dry from just thinking about it. “In fact, Ashley started making these really crazy demands. She said things like, ‘You’ve had it so easy up until now. But let’s be real. These guys aren’t paying the huge fees we charge them just to look at a pretty face across a dinner table. If they want a little more for their money, don’t get all uptight.”

  So Billy had been right, I thought. It was about money. From what Lindsey was telling me, Ashley had been running a legitimate and lucrative escort service. But she wanted more money. She got greedy—at the expense of the women who worked for her.

  Ashley had changed the deal.

  “At first,” Lindsey said, “I thought I could manage the clients. That I could find ways to discourage them and keep things going the way they had been. My plan was to be nice about it, of course. I didn’t want to upset the clients and I sure didn’t want to upset Ashley. But it wasn’t long before I found myself in what I guess you’d call a compromising position.”

  By that point Lindsey had a faraway look and her voice sounded shaky. “There was this one time . . . Well, let’s just say that I ended up in a situation where I had no choice but to go along with the guy’s demands.”

  Her eyes filled with tears as, in a near whisper, she said, “I never told Rob about what happened, of course. He would have gone ballistic. Who knows what he’d have done?”

  She paused. “Actually, I know exactly what he would have done.” She nearly choked on her words. “He’d have blamed me. And from then on he’d have looked at me differently. That’s kind of how he is. He’s got this thing about people taking responsibility for what happens to them, as if there are never any factors that are out of their control....

  “So I didn’t say a word to anybody, including Ashley. Unfortunately, this creep, this guy who’d been the client, had plenty to say. The very next day he called Ashley and told him what a great time he’d had with me. In fact, the slimeball couldn’t wait to set up another ‘date’ with me.” She paused to take a deep breath. “And when I told Ashley I refused to go out with him again, she told me point blank that if I didn’t agree to keep working for her—under her new terms—she would tell Rob what I’d done.”

  For a few seconds, I actually felt sorry for Lindsey. She had taken on what sounded like the perfect job as a way to help her family through a tough time. Yet in the end, she’d suffered consequences that no one should ever have to experience.

  “I’m so sorry this happened to you, Lindsey,” I said softly. And I meant it.

  “If you’re really that sorry,” she said crisply, “you’ll understand that I was cornered. But I still thought I could get Ashley to back down. Not that I intended to hurt her. In fact, I was feeling pretty optimistic about the two of us talking it through when I went to the bakery late that night—that Thursday night—after Ashley had closed.” With a shrill laugh, she added, “Guess what I found her doing? Sitting in the back room, counting her money! Stacks of bills. Big bills. Hundreds, mostly, that she’d lined up in neat little piles. The image of it made me sick.

  “But even though I was furious, I still hoped I could talk her into letting me just walk away, without her telling Rob anything or expecting anything more from me. I begged her. I even offered to give her money. But do you know what she did? She laughed at me. She laughed. She said, ‘Sorry, girlfriend. But you and I are in this together.’”

  Lindsey’s entire body was trembling. “The way Ashley reacted sent me into a rage. I was desperate. My entire life was on the line. And she wouldn’t budge. Honestly, I hadn’t intended to hurt her when I went to the bakery that night. I really thought I could change her mind. But when I saw that I wasn’t going to get her to budge, I grabbed this big knife that happened to be lying on the counter and the next thing I knew . . .”

  “Lindsey,” I said gently, “I’m sure if you go to the police and explain—”

  “Hah!” she cried. “If I were stupid enough to do that, do you know what would happen? I’ll tell you: everything would come out. Even if for some reason I wasn’t convicted of murder—and let’s face it, I probably would be—I’d still lose everything. My husband would walk out on me. I’d lose my kids because I’d be considered an unfit mother. I’d lose my house, my friends, my whole life.”

  Suddenly her face crumpled and tears began streaming down her cheeks. “I was at a point in my life when I finally had everything I’d ever wanted. I don’t like to complain, but I had a really tough childhood. I grew up just assuming that I’d always be alone and miserable. Then I met Rob, and then we had Violet, and then we got the house.... It all seemed too good to be true. I couldn’t believe how lucky I was. And then when Rob lost his job and it looked as if everything might fall apart . . . Don’t you see? All I was trying to do was hold on to everything I had. And now, if any of this comes out everything will vanish!”

  She took a deep breath. “I can’t let that happen, Kate. And when you called about that ridiculous free birthday party—as if anybody ever gets anything for free—I immediately knew that you’d figured it all out. That after sniffing around the way you did, asking too many questions, you knew that it was me who killed Ashley.”

  It didn’t seem like the best time to explain that she was giving me more credit than I deserved—that I hadn’t really figured it out until the moment she’d pulled a gun on me. Instead, I decided to try reasoning with her.

  “Lindsey, there’s no reason why anyone besides you and I has to know any of this,” I said. I was trying to sound calm and practical. But even I could hear the desperation in my voice. “You had a terrible experience, and no one can deny that what happened to you drove you to commit a desperate act. I feel for you. I really do. And I promise you that I’m not going to say a word to anybody—”

  Yet as I spoke, I sensed that she was far, far away. Her eyes glazed over, maybe because she was picturing what her life would be like without her kids, her husband, the life she’d treasured.

  It seemed like the perfect time to pounce.

  My eyes drifted away from Lindsey, away from the gun, to the wardrobe-size freezer she was standing next to.

  More specifically, the door.

  Even more specifically, the handle.

  Suddenly, in a single, swift gesture, I reached over and grabbed the handle of the freezer door with my left hand and pulled it. At the same time, I used my right hand to push Lindsey as hard as I could in the direction of the open door.

  “Wha-a-a-!” she cried as she lost her balance and fell toward the freezer. As she did, her ankle hit the bottom ledge, sending her crumpling to the floor in a heap.

  As she fell, the
gun went off.

  But even the shock of the blast didn’t keep me from slamming the door shut and locking it.

  My heart was pounding jackhammer hard and my head was buzzing. Yet some logical part of my mind somehow remembered an important fact I’d read in the manual that had come with the freezer. And that was that there was enough air in there to keep one person breathing for at least fifteen minutes.

  That didn’t give me much time to get the police into my shop and Lindsey out of there—preferably, in handcuffs. Of course, the fact that she was yelling nonstop and undoubtedly using up the oxygen faster than normal didn’t help.

  But I’d hardly had time to pull my cell phone out of my pocket before I heard sirens.

  Someone must have heard the gunshot and dialed 911. And fortunately, crime was enough of a rarity in Wolfert’s Roost that the local police didn’t have that much to keep them busy.

  I called anyway, wanting to make sure the police knew exactly where they’d find the scene of our little town’s latest crime. Or at least it’s almost crime. As calmly as I could, I gave the dispatcher the address—and suggested strongly that the police officers on their way over move as fast as they could.

  No more than three minutes later, Pete Bonano exploded into Lickety Splits, bursting through the front door with as much force as the bullet that had just been discharged.

  “Kate!” he cried when he saw me standing in the middle of the shop, still clutching my cell phone. “I mean, Ms. McKay!”

  “Forget the formalities, Pete,” I replied impatiently. “There’s a murderer locked in my freezer.”

  As if to verify what I’d just said, we both heard Lindsey’s voice muffled by layers of stainless steel and Freon, yelling, “Get me out of here! Let me out!”

  “I guess we should let her out,” I said to Pete. “But first, I’d better tell you what just happened.”