Itsy-Bitsy Murder (Chocolate Cozy Mystery Book 2)

by Wendy Meadows

  “Right,” Olivia said and dropped them, so they hung around her neck from the strap.

  Arthur Pink’s orange-streaked coat stood out beneath the fluorescent lights. He hurried down the road, then turned left and disappeared.

  “Hurry,” Olivia said. She jogged after her mark and halted at the point he’d disappeared. She peered down the road and gasped.

  “What is it?” Alvira breathed into her ear.

  Olivia flinched at the warmth. She pointed to Arthur’s figure. He’d stopped right outside a small, brick home with a lovely garden and fence.

  “That’s the Jujube house,” Alvira whispered. “He’s come back to the scene of the crime.”

  Pinkie drifted out of the vignette of light from the lamppost, but he didn’t leave. He hovered in place, hands thrust into his pockets and gaze glued to the Jujube abode.

  A light flicked on in the upstairs window, and he shrank back farther.

  “What? I thought Jana was in the hospital?” Alvira whispered.

  “She is,” Olivia replied. “I think Jessica’s staying there now.”

  A silhouette waxed in the upstairs window, behind the fine, filmy curtains that blocked the person from view. She disappeared from sight again, but the light stayed on.

  “Why’s he here?” Alvira asked.

  They stared at Arthur Pink. The Cuddle Clinic assistant placed his hands over his heart and swayed from side to side. Low sobs rang through the night.

  “Oh dear,” Olivia whispered. “I think he’s mourning for Jana.”

  “But she’s not dead,” Alvira countered.

  Olivia turned and walked back the way they’d come. She’d seen enough here. Either Arthur Pink had come to plot an attack on the next eligible Jujube or to mourn the assault on the one he’d clearly loved.

  Either way, there wasn’t much she could do in the situation.

  “Should we call the police?” Alvira asked. “I mean, he’s just standing there. It’s really weird.”

  “I guess we could,” Olivia said, “but no. If Detective Keene knows I’m anywhere near the Jujubes or Arthur Pink, I’ll get in a world of trouble.”

  “I can call them,” Alvira said.

  Olivia didn’t answer. Already, her brain swirled around the possibilities. Thoughts formed and swished off into the darkness. Could Arthur have planned Jana’s attack? Why was Jessica so averse to questioning?

  “Olivia!” Alvira grasped her by the arm and tugged her into the bushes. Olivia’s stomach dropped. What on earth had gotten into her assistant?

  Heavy footsteps dragged on the sidewalk. Boots scraped across concrete. Alvira pressed her finger to her lips and pointed toward the road.

  Arthur Pink walked down the sidewalk opposite them, his head bowed and his eyes unfocused. His shoulders drooped lower with each step he took toward his house.

  “I guess we don’t have to call the cops after all,” Alvira muttered.

  Pinkie hurried up the front stairs of his porch. He disappeared from view, and a door slammed a second later.

  “Poor guy,” Alvira said and stepped out of the bushes. She plucked a few leaves from her hair. “He must be really upset if he’s acting like this.”

  “Yeah,” Olivia replied. “Which is weird, since Jana is alive. She’s recovering, right?”

  “I’m not sure.” Alvira tapped her chin with her thumb. “You should speak to Albie about it, but I overheard a snippet of her gossip with Lanie Hayden today. News on the block is that Jana’s not doing too well.”

  “Goodness. That’s what Lanie gossips about? That’s kind of morose,” Olivia said. She emerged from the bushes, too, then set off down the path toward the end of the street.

  It was a ten-minute walk back to Alvira’s house, and then another five to the store. Luckily, Chester was a relatively small town.

  “I hope she makes it,” Alvira whispered, and her gaze strayed in the direction of Arthur Pink’s house.

  “Me too,” Olivia said and kept her eyes on the road.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Olivia shuffled down the stairs and stifled a yawn. Boy, she sure loved her job, but waking up at the crack of dawn wasn’t easy. The chocolates couldn’t wait, though, and they’d had more and more orders each day.

  “Are you okay, Olivia?” Alphonsine asked, her French accent thickened by sleepiness. She shut the gate and blocked off Dodger’s frantic attempts to dart down into the store.

  “I’m fine,” Olivia replied. “I’ve just got some things on my mind.”

  “Is it Jana?”

  Olivia waited at the bottom of the stairs for her live-in A and rubbed the sleep out of her eyes. “Yeah, but let’s not talk about that now. Let’s get a cup of coffee and discuss the batches we need to make for today.”

  “Oui,” Alphonsine said. She hurried to the coffee machine in the corner and brandished two cups from the silver tray beside it.

  Olivia yawned and dragged her feet over to the front counter. The empty trays glared up at her, demanding their usual supplies of chocolaty treats.

  Knocks rattled the glass door, and Olivia hurried toward it. Alberta and Alvira had arrived, right on time, as usual.

  “It’s freezing out here,” Alberta called out, grasping at the top of her turtleneck. “Hurry, dear.”

  Olivia unlocked the front door, then opened it and let them in.

  Alberta bustled past her and rubbed her hands together. “Is that coffee? Pour me a cup, please, dear.”

  Alphonsine scooped another two cups from the tray and arranged them beneath the coffee spouts.

  Alvira entered the store and bumped the door closed behind her. Her jaw creaked with a yawn.

  “How are you this morning?” Olivia asked. She had kept the poor girl up far later than usual.

  “Exhausted, but I’ll survive,” Alvira replied. “I like coming with you on your investigative adventures, Olivia. I think I just like sleep a little more.”

  Olivia chuckled and strode to the back of the store. Alphonsine handed her a cup, and the rich scent of coffee curled toward her nostrils. She inhaled deeply and squeezed her eyes shut.

  Just the aroma injected her with the will to live. Scratch that—the will to create chocolates that would make mouths water.

  “All right,” Olivia said and slurped up some of the good stuff. She swallowed, and her willpower strengthened. “I want two batches of our sticky cherry truffles, another two of the cocoa cream balls and let’s do the nut butter truffles to finish.”

  “Yum,” Alvira said, “they’re my favorites.”

  “You say that about every chocolate,” Alphonsine replied.

  “True, but I mean it every time.” Alvira’s sneaky grin brought joy to the room.

  This was the atmosphere Olivia wanted in her store. Happiness—her As smiling and the warm scents of coffee and chocolate in the air. It would be Christmas soon, too.

  “Oh gosh, we’re going to have to spend some time putting up decorations,” Olivia said. “We’ve got Christmas right around the corner. How could I forget?”

  “I love Christmas,” Alvira whispered. She clasped her hands in front of her chest. “The lights. The presents.”

  “The snow,” Alberta groaned. Her phone trilled to life in her pocket, then fell silent again. The elderly woman whipped it out and tapped on the screen. She was the most technologically savvy of the group.

  Olivia took another sip of her coffee and planned the positioning of the store’s Christmas tree.

  “Oh my gosh,” Alberta breathed. “Oh no.” She clapped her hand over her mouth. “Oh, Olivia.”

  “What’s going on?” Olivia asked.

  “It’s a message from Lanie,” Alberta said, and she choked on the words. “It’s Jana Jujube.”

  That warm coffee-scented air solidified around Olivia. It suffocated her, squeezing the breath from her lungs and replacing it with a fresh load of anxiety. “What about her?” she asked.

  “She’s dead. She passed
about an hour ago in the hospital,” Alberta whispered. She pressed the phone against her chest. The fingers of her other hand didn’t drop from her lips.

  Olivia grasped the countertop behind her and exhaled. The long week had just gotten even longer.

  “Il ne peut pas être,” Alphonsine whispered. She sat down heavily on the floorboards.

  Alvira stood, frozen with the mug halfway to her lips. The steam drifted from the top of the brown liquid.

  “Are you all right?” Alberta asked Olivia.

  “I’m—I won’t lie, I’m not feeling anything but sad at the moment.” She hadn’t been the best of friends with Jana, but the woman had been a wonderful person. An addition to Chester who’d wanted to do good for the community. The Cuddle Clinic was a testament to that fact.

  Alvira lowered her coffee cup and placed it on the countertop. “This is terrible.”

  “It’s all right, As. Jana is in a better place now,” Olivia said. “I’m confident of that.”

  Alphonsine bowed her head and studied the floor.

  Olivia’s cell phone rang in the pocket of her jeans, and she hopped on the spot. Who on earth would call her at five o’clock in the morning? She whipped out the cell and clicked the green button, then placed the cool plastic against her ear. She shivered.

  “Hello?”

  “Olivia?” The phone’s reception crackled, and she blocked her other ear to compensate for the noise.

  “Hello? Who is this?” she asked and exchanged glances with her three assistants.

  “Olivia, it’s Jake Morgan. I just wanted to give you a call. I don’t know if you’ve heard but—”

  “I’ve heard,” Olivia said and gritted her teeth against the fresh wave of sadness. “You don’t need to repeat it.”

  “I see,” Jake said, and cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, Olivia. Look. I’m still investigating this, and I stand by what I said before, but I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

  “I’m fine,” Olivia replied. This time, her gritted teeth had nothing to do with sorrow and everything to do with Jake’s insistence on keeping her out of the case and in check.

  If anything, it drove her determination levels higher. She had to get to the bottom of this now, for Jana’s sake. For the entirety of Chester.

  “Olivia, are you sure? I know this is going to be a difficult time for a lot of people,” he said, and the sincerity leaked from his tone.

  “I'll be all right, Jake. Thank you for your concern.”

  “I’ve spoken to Jessica Jujube. There’s going to be a memorial service tomorrow afternoon. I’m sure Jana would have wanted you to be there.”

  But Jessica definitely won’t. And that meant Olivia had to be there.

  “I’ve got to go, Mr. Morgan. Thanks for your call.” She hung up.

  The As stared at her, pale and wide-eyed.

  “Well, ladies, we’ve got some chocolates to make,” she said. She wouldn’t go to the memorial service empty-handed.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Jessica Jujube had laid out a table of food beneath the trees in the back yard. People milled around it. A few of them picked up napkins and ate finger sandwiches; others gulped down the sticky cherry truffles Olivia and the As had brought with them.

  The sky had cleared, and the sun shone its rays on the beginning of winter.

  “Look there,” Alvira whispered and nudged Olivia’s elbow with her own. “It’s Arthur Pink.”

  Olivia focused on the rosy-cheeked receptionist. He stood off to one side and stared at the far window on the side of the house, just beside the back entrance. Flowers wilted beneath it.

  Shock jolted through Olivia’s stomach. That was Jana’s bedroom window! How on earth would Pinkie have known which window was hers unless he’d come here frequently?

  Oh wait, he had said he’d visited Jana on several occasions, hadn’t he? It figured that he’d know where her window was situated from the back of the house.

  “Olivia, quit staring,” Alvira said. “You’re going to creep him out.”

  Olivia flinched and focused on the table of food instead. Jessica had swept through the crowds earlier, and she’d barely managed to evade her.

  “Hello.” Pinkie stepped into view. He raised a hand in greeting. “I’m surprised to see you here.”

  “Yeah, we’ve been keeping a low profile,” Alvira replied and glanced back up at the house. Jessica had disappeared inside fifteen minutes ago and hadn’t come back out.

  “She wouldn’t want you to be here,” Pinkie said, and he glanced up at the house, too. “She’s horrible. She tells me what to do in the meanest ways and calls me names.” Arthur’s lower lip trembled.

  Olivia looked away to avoid the moment.

  “Jana would’ve been happy to see you here, though,” Pinkie said. “She really liked you, Olivia. She thought you were great. And everyone loves your chocolates.”

  “I don’t,” a woman snapped.

  Olivia looked in Pinkie’s direction again, then exhaled. Oh boy, this would be fun.

  Mrs. Bitsworth hovered nearby. Once again, she swayed from side to side and grasped at thin air. Did she have an inner ear issue or something?

  Bitsy raised her napkin and pointed at the chocolates. “You’re trying to kill people with these.”

  Olivia’s insides twisted. The last time she’d heard that line, it’d been because one of her chocolates actually had killed someone, through no fault of her own, of course.

  “Pardon?” Olivia asked.

  “They have cherries in them,” Bitsy snapped. “I’m allergic to cherries.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that, Mrs. Bitsworth,” Olivia said. “Thankfully, not everyone here is allergic to them.”

  “But I am,” the old woman said and pressed a thumb to her chest. “I had to spit it out.”

  That would explain the strange red smear down the front of her sweater.

  Olivia didn’t have a reply for her. What could she say?

  Bitsy scanned their little group for another target and focused on Arthur Pink instead. “You,” she muttered and readjusted her grip on her tote bag. She wobbled left then staggered right. “I thought you might be here.”

  Pinkie didn’t say a word. Perhaps he wasn’t in the mood to trade words with the bitter Mrs. Bitsworth.

  “What’s the matter, boy? You going to cry?” Bitsy asked and wobbled again.

  “Stop it,” Olivia said immediately. “If you can’t control your mouth, you’d better walk away. This is a memorial service, not a customer call line.”

  Mrs. Bitsworth’s jaw dropped. She blinked several times and stared at Olivia wordlessly. Perhaps, no one had ever told the old lady to quiet down.

  “You rude, horrible—”

  “You’re the rude one,” Alvira said. “You’re being mean to Pinkie when he’s clearly upset.”

  Bitsy couldn’t handle the criticism. She formed fists and punched the air on either side of her, then teetered to the left and crashed into another guest. The man let out a shocked yelp and bent to help her up from the ground, but she swatted his hands away.

  “Don’t you touch me,” she howled.

  The man stepped back and raised both palms. “What’s going on?” he asked.

  No one could give him an answer. Mrs. Bitsworth’s actions had passed beyond reason and into the realm of the mysterious.

  Bitsy grasped her handbag and rolled onto all fours. She crawled across the grass and toward the table of eats, then halted, seized one of the table legs and dragged herself upright.

  Everyone stared. The idle chatter stalled, and the somber mood shifted to one of intrigue.

  Mrs. Bitsworth raised her fist and shook it at Olivia this time. “You’ll pay for this humiliation,” she growled. “You’ll all pay!”

  And then she stumbled toward the end of the table. The plates rattled in response to her weight on the table. The guests stared. Bitsy heaved huge breaths and launched herself toward the back door of the
house.

  “What on earth was that about?” Olivia asked. “I can’t fathom her.”

  “She’s a mean old woman,” Pinkie said, shrugging, “but she’s harmless. She comes in for cuddles all the time but always complains about them. It’s weird.”

  “Hey, what’s that?” Alvira asked and pointed to a piece of paper on the lawn, just ahead of them.

  Olivia bent and snatched it up, then turned it over in her hand. “Oh wow,” she whispered. “This must have fallen out of her bag.”

  “What is it?” Alvira asked.

  Pinkie sighed and stared at the back window instead. Jana’s bedroom window.

  “It’s one of those flyers about the Cuddle Clinic. You know, the one about the Cuddle Clinic being a plague in our town?” Olivia flipped it over so Alvira could get a good look.

  “Why did Bitsy have one?” her assistant asked.

  “Uh oh,” Pinkie said and cleared his throat. He stepped back two steps. “I, uh, I have to go. I’ll see you later.”

  He turned and hurried off in the opposite direction, heading toward the tree at the end of the garden.

  “What was that about?” Olivia frowned and stared at his back.

  “Olivia Cloud,” a woman pronounced. “I didn’t think you’d have the guts to show up here after what you’ve put this family through.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Olivia’s insides turned to ice. She truly hated reactions like that. She wasn’t a coward, for heaven’s sake, but Jessica Jujube’s voice had the effect of nails scratching across a chalkboard.

  “Jessica,” she said and turned on a smile to light a thousand rooms. “It’s wonderful to see you again.”

  “Don’t play coy with me,” Jessica growled. “I know you’re not here to pay your respects to my sister. You’re here to bother me and—and investigate.”

  “Why is that a bad thing?” Olivia asked. “Don’t you want to find out what happened to your sister?”

  “I want peace and privacy!” The aggrieved sister didn’t seem all that sorrowful. She lowered her voice and scanned the crowd of guests and mourners. None of them had heard her outburst, at least.