Clobbered by Camembert

by Avery Aames

  I didn’t have time to explain.

  CHAPTER

  In her brochures, Violet called her Victoriana Inn a state-of-the-art bed-and-breakfast. In my humble opinion, the terms were mutually exclusive. While Lois had decked out the Lavender and Lace B&B in cushy couches, exquisite old carpets, and lace curtains, Violet had streamlined her inn using spartan furniture, no carpeting, and sleek blinds. Lois lured customers with home-cooked meals; Violet’s chef offered spa food that would make even a vegetable-loving rabbit lose weight. From the rear of Lavender and Lace, guests could take long walks into the hills. At the back of Violet’s Victoriana Inn, there was a gym filled with stair steppers, treadmills, and weight machines. If I were on vacation, I would opt for Lavender and Lace every time.

  But Violet’s Victoriana Inn didn’t lack for clientele. The parking lot was filled with BMWs, Mercedes, Lexuses, and other high-end automobiles. The great room swarmed with well-dressed people talking about their days’ adventures.

  Violet, wearing a white jogging suit that was one size too small for her chunky shape, danced behind the reception desk, keeping time with the jazzy music being piped through the overhead speakers. Her marshmallow-colored pigtails flopped in syncopated rhythm. “Hi, Charlotte. Can’t stop. On a diet.” Violet’s weight swung like a pendulum. Up thirty pounds, down thirty pounds.

  “I’m looking for Georgia Plachette.”

  “At this time of night?” She huffed and puffed.

  “It’s not even nine yet.”

  “That’s late in Providence.”

  “Please, Violet.”

  She grabbed a white towel from beneath the check-in counter and wiped the sheen of perspiration from above her fleshy lips. “It’s so sad what Georgia is going through. Did you know she’s Kaitlyn Clydesdale’s daughter?”

  I nodded. I didn’t add that I suspected Georgia might have put a hit on her mother. Too much information. “Is she here?”

  “Funny you should ask. I just called her room to say her guests had arrived.” She wiggled her fingers at the elderly woman and gentleman who had been at the pub with Georgia. They sat on a stiff-backed bench that was situated between two perfectly trimmed and potted ficus trees. “Georgia’s packing. She’s heading off with them soon.”

  “Are they her grandparents?” I asked, to verify my assessment.

  “Sure are. Sweet couple. I hear they’re going back to California to have a burial at sea.” She wrinkled her nose. “Me, I’m all about ritual. A person should have a real funeral service and be buried in a casket in a cemetery. This whole ashes-to-ashes thing gives me the heebie-jeebies.”

  Cremation didn’t bother me. My parents had specified in their wills that they wanted whoever survived them to bury their remains at the top of Kindred Hill. My grandparents had asked that an oak be planted on top of their ashes. From the center of town, I could see the thirty-year-old oak tree, and I drew strength from it.

  I said, “Do you think I could visit Georgia in her room?”

  Violet reached for the telephone.

  I tapped her wrist. “Please don’t call her. We’re friends. I simply want to make sure she’s got everything she needs before she leaves town. She’s in room …” I let my voice trail off.

  “You know I can’t tell you that.”

  “I’ll help you get a date with the guy who runs Café au Lait.” Only last week, I had noticed Violet making eyes at the guy in The Cheese Shop. She usually liked soft-centered cheeses, but she had inched toward the brick cheese section where he was standing and had started chatting about terroir—like she knew anything about how cheese drew its flavors from the earth.

  “Room two thirteen,” Violet whispered.

  Easy as bringing a cheese to room temperature.

  * * *

  A minute later, I rapped on Georgia’s door and mumbled, “Peanut butter watermelon,” a trick I had learned from Grandmère when she directed crowd scenes on stage. The words slurred together and sounded like a whole slew of other words.

  Georgia, clad in yet another revealing black sheath and clunky five-inch heels, opened the door. The instant she saw me, she slapped a hand on her narrow hip and frowned. “You’re not housekeeping.”

  “Didn’t say I was.”

  She grumbled. “What do you want at this time of night?”

  “May I come in? I thought I would get a chance to chat with you at the pub, but you left so quickly.”

  Her gaze darted to the sleek satin bed. A suitcase piled with black clothing lay on top. Pairs of platform shoes were lined up at the foot. Her red briefcase stood on the zebra-striped area rug beside one of the bed’s legs. Files poked from the opening. Something drew my gaze back to the suitcase. A toiletry kit sat on the back flap of the suitcase. An iPhone was perched on top of that. It looked like Chip’s. Had Georgia wrested it away from Oscar?

  “Leaving town with your grandparents?” I asked.

  “How’d you know who they were?”

  “I’m psychic.” I winked, trying to keep things light.

  She huffed. “That Violet. She can’t keep a secret.”

  “You look like your grandmother. You have the same eyes, the same pretty chin.”

  Reflexively, Georgia’s hand moved toward her face. She stopped short and sneezed. Clearly exasperated with me, she traipsed to the bureau, her five-inchers clip-clopping as she reached the hardwood floor, and grabbed a tissue from a box. “Dang cold.” She blew her nose.

  Without invitation, I moseyed into the room. My fingers itched to get hold of the cell phone. “I hear you’re returning to California. Violet said you’re planning a burial at sea.”

  Georgia muttered, “Violet,” and rasped a series of dry coughs.

  “Brandy would soothe your throat.”

  “Yeah, like Violet would have something as decadent as brandy in this place. There’s no wine, no beer. Nothing. I can order chamomile tea, but I’m tea’d out. What I need is a good cough syrup.”

  I pulled an herbal cough drop from my purse and handed it to her. A peace pipe couldn’t have been more warmly received. She peeled off the paper, slipped the lozenge into her mouth, and murmured her relief.

  Treading softly, I said, “I saw you sitting with Oscar Carson at the pub.”

  “Oscar.” She sighed as she worked the lozenge to the inside of her cheek. “He didn’t really work for Ipo Ho. He—” She started coughing again.

  I patted her back, but she waved me off, raced to the bathroom, and kicked the door closed. I heard the clatter of a glass, followed by water gushing into the sink. I glanced at the cell phone and didn’t hesitate. I needed to learn what Oscar had seen on it. As I reached for it, it rang.

  “Drat.” Georgia opened the bathroom door a couple of inches and waved her arm. “Could you hand that to me?”

  I picked up the iPhone. The readout read: Nana, which meant the phone wasn’t Chip’s. Both of his grandmothers had died years ago. I offered it to Georgia.

  Without a thank-you, she closed the door, and I heard her mumble, “Yes, Nana. In a sec, I told you.”

  I peeked at the briefcase beside the bed. No time like the present. If Georgia had a clear-cut motive to kill her mother—like a will ceding her a sizeable estate or making her the sole owner of Clydesdale Enterprises—Urso deserved to know about it. I started with the file bearing her full name on the label. In it, I found a contract for employment, which included a starting salary that was measly at best. No language stated that she would receive bonuses for a job well done. In addition, the file included a copy of Georgia’s graduation certificate from the University of Southern California. Post-its had been attached to both documents, with handwritten notes saying Kaitlyn had reviewed and approved them. I didn’t detect a hint of favoritism, as Georgia had implied in our previous meeting at the Clydesdale Enterprises office.

  The second file contained a list of the company’s holdings, which included several strip malls across the country. As I feared, a megastore wa
s the anchor at each. Kaitlyn hadn’t been interested in returning to Providence and soaking up the local flavor. She had intended to change the landscape for profit. How many locals had known? How many of those people would have wished Kaitlyn a speedy and not-so-fond farewell?

  The third file held plat maps of Providence properties. I flipped through them, looking for a document or will granting Georgia millions buried within them, but found nothing.

  As the door handle to the bathroom turned, guilty heat gushed through my veins. I couldn’t let her catch me snooping. As I raced to restore order to the briefcase, Georgia’s cell phone jangled a second time.

  From within the bathroom, Georgia said, “Now what?”

  Using those few precious seconds, I stuffed the files into her briefcase. I was rising to full height when Georgia stepped out carrying a pair of scissors. She pointed them at me, her face pinched with what could only be described as intense pain.

  I gulped. Did she mean to run me through? Where had she left her cell phone? I would have preferred it to the scissors. I raised my hands, palms toward her in a placating gesture. “You’re upset.”

  “I’m sick.”

  Okay, I could go with that. Twisted, perhaps.

  “Are you spying on me?” Brandishing the scissors, she indicated the briefcase.

  I cursed silently. One of the files was jutting up—a dead giveaway. Rebecca would be appalled at my shabby sleuthing skills. “Um … I was interested in what Clydesdale Enterprises was up to.”

  She edged toward me.

  Though my pulse raced, I would lie, lie, lie if it would save my hide. “Rumor has it that your mother was trying to buy parcels along the northern route out of town. I wanted to see which—”

  “Buy? Are you kidding me?”

  I ogled the scissors. “Um, why don’t you put those down so we can talk?”

  Georgia glimpsed at the shears and back at me, then sneezed. The intense expression on her face faded. Had she been trying to hold in the sneeze? Her mouth turned up in a wry smile. She flipped the scissors around in her hand and offered them to me, butt first. “I was hoping you could trim a lock at the back of my head. I can’t reach it.” She spun around and pointed. “See it? Dead center. Curls are tough for even the best hairdressers.”

  I felt myself blush with relief. She didn’t want to kill me. She wanted a helping hand. Trying to keep the conversation going, I said, “You seemed surprised when I said your mother wanted to buy property north of town.”

  Without looking at me, she said, “It was the word buy that got me. She wasn’t trying to buy anything. She was blackmailing people for the parcels.”

  “Really?” I said innocently. I could act as dumb as the best of ’em. I snipped off the offending inch-long curl and held it out to her.

  Georgia took the lock and strode to the bureau. She checked out the back of her hair in the mirror and nodded with satisfaction. She held out a hand for the return of the scissors. I was a bit reluctant, needless to say, but I granted her wish. She set the scissors on the shiny silver runner that ran the length of the bureau and gazed again at me. “Townsfolk didn’t want to sell,” she said. “Many were savvy to my mother’s wiles. So she resorted to her true nature. She got dirt on people and voilá.” Her mouth pursed with distaste.

  “I thought you said you liked your mother.”

  She sniffed, but this time it wasn’t from her illness. “Truth? I feel like I can trust you.”

  I felt a smidge guilty for having raided her files, but not guilty enough to dissuade her from continuing.

  “I hated her. No, that’s much too gentle a word. I despised her. She didn’t approve of anything I did. Who I dated. Where I lived.”

  I thought of the Post-its in Georgia’s personnel folder. What kind of contempt had she suffered from her mother throughout her lifetime?

  “I got over it,” Georgia went on, “because I didn’t approve of her either. I didn’t like the way she did business or of the way she treated people. She was vicious.”

  And yet Chip said Georgia had been acting with similar heinous intent. So did the Burrells. She had been stalking them and ruining their reputation. Was she playing me?

  “Why did you work for her?” I asked.

  “When I graduated college, I needed a job. Nobody was hiring.” She worried her hands together. “I thought I could put in a year and find another job, but I couldn’t. It took fifteen years.” She muttered something about a weak economy. “The day before my mother died, I learned that a realty firm specializing in purchasing hotels wanted to hire me. I asked to quit, but my mother wouldn’t let me.” Georgia tilted her head, eyeing me like an apprehensive puppy. “Please don’t think I would’ve killed her over a contract. Mother was tough, but in time, I could’ve persuaded her to release me.”

  “Not everyone could have.”

  “True.”

  “Like Oscar, for instance.”

  “Good old delusional Oscar.” Georgia wrapped a curl around a finger.

  “Do you know where he is?”

  “Home, I expect, sleeping off a few too many beers.” She released the curl. “Did you see him at the pub prancing around with Chip’s iPhone? Men!”

  Did she like him? There was a sparkle in her eye. However, despite her more relaxed demeanor, I couldn’t erase the vision of Oscar looking fearfully at her at the pub. “Why did he want Chip’s cell phone?”

  Georgia coughed out a nasal laugh. “He made Chip a bet that he could win the heart of anyone Chip had in his little black book. Chip didn’t want to give him the phone, but Oscar”—she clopped the floor with her heel—“let’s just say he can be quite persistent.”

  “Do you know he’s in love with you?”

  “Yes.” She sighed. “He was going to talk to my mother that night to beg out of his contract so he could ask me on a date. She was dead before he could.”

  “Do you think he killed her?”

  “Oscar?” She shook her head. Her mane of curls bounced with abandon. “Not a chance.”

  “Are you sure? He’s an actor. Did you know that?”

  She gaped. Apparently she didn’t know.

  “That would make him a good liar,” I said.

  Georgia offered a dismissive wave of her hand. “He didn’t kill my mother. He’s much too passive.”

  “When he was playing with Chip’s cell phone, he looked at you oddly. Like he was scared.”

  Her mouth twisted up on one side. “He’d better be scared. I told him if he called one of those women, he was toast.”

  Aha! So she did like him.

  But that didn’t solve my quandary. Oscar had wanted out of his contract. What if he met with Kaitlyn? What if she laughed in his face? What if rage, fueled by his love for Georgia, made him lash out?

  CHAPTER

  I spent another few minutes with Georgia. Although she wouldn’t buy into my theory that Oscar might be guilty, as a favor to me and to our illustrious police force, she promised not to depart Providence until noon tomorrow. She assured me that as long as she was around, Oscar wouldn’t leave town. I had to give her credit for believing in the power of her female allure.

  As I drove home, headlights glaring through the windshield, wipers whisking icy rain off the glass, a chill gripped my body. A short while later, in the warmth of my kitchen, with my Briard and Ragdoll for companionship—the rest of the household was quiet—I settled at the table with a soothing cup of Cinnamon Stick tea and dialed Urso to update him on my findings. The clerk at the precinct answered. She explained that Urso and both of his deputies were dealing with another round of emergencies. Urso and the new-hire deputy were roping off a flooding road; the other deputy was aiding a stranded driver whose engine had erupted.

  Frustrated that Urso and I had yet to complete a conversation in the past few days, I trudged upstairs. Rocket and Rags followed. I didn’t tell them no. I needed company.

  In the privacy of my room, I nestled on my bed and hit th
e first number on my speed dial. Jordan answered after one ring.

  “Hey, gorgeous.”

  Hearing his throaty voice sent a rapture of good vibes through me. I didn’t care that he hadn’t said what I had hoped he would say at the pub when he and Chip had faced off. I was simply happy that we had gotten over the hump of his secret past, and I loved him. That was all there was to it. He would say he loved me, in time.

  I asked him about Quigley.

  “He’ll sleep it off. How was the recital?”

  I told him about Sylvie and Prudence’s spat. He laughed.

  “I miss you, sweetheart,” he said. “We need a night. Or two. Or six.”

  More yummy feelings swirled through me. I murmured, “Soon.” I didn’t tell him about Emma Burrell’s collapse or my meeting with Georgia. I didn’t want our conversation to end with a warning to be careful. I whispered, “Soon,” again and sent kisses through the receiver.

  After washing my face and brushing my teeth, I cuddled beneath my duvet, read three delicious chapters of a new Domestic Diva Mystery, and finally, unable to keep my eyes open any longer, drifted to sleep.

  * * *

  The next morning, while coffee was brewing and a San Simon cheese frittata cooked on the stovetop, I trotted to the porch to fetch the newspaper. Bracing myself for the crisp morning air—more inclement weather was imminent, promising a sturdy wind and the possibility of a wintry mix—I swung open the door. Hundreds of icicles had formed after last night’s rain and hung from the eaves. I ducked beneath a huge one and headed down the steps but stopped short when I spotted luggage sitting on the veranda at Lavender and Lace. Seeing one of the suitcases whiplashed me back to memory lane, to the first day of freshman year at OSU. Chip had appeared in the doorway of my dorm room, brown leather satchel in his hand, camera at the ready, dimple etched in his cheek. He snapped a picture of me and whisked me into his arms. “I transferred because of you, babe,” he said. In record time, our relationship had zoomed to the next level. And now he was leaving. For good. I felt relieved and sad, all at the same time. I didn’t love him anymore. I never would. Years ago, I had torn up the mental picture of us as a lifelong couple. Matthew was right. I had been engaged to Peter Pan—the boy who wouldn’t grow up.