Double Fudge Brownie Murder (Hannah Swensen series Book 18)

by Fluke, Joanne

  “Okay.” Michelle picked up her phone again. “Let us hope that Ross does get the job at KCOW. Then Hannah will have time to judge whether her affections for him are real or simply a reaction to her boring, single life.”

  Hannah didn’t say anything at first. She just thought about what her mother had written. Then she shrugged. “I don’t think my single life is boring, but Mother’s got a point. Las Vegas was a romantic fantasy. A man from my past that I’d always wanted to date showed up unexpectedly and swept me off my feet in an exciting interlude away from my ordinary life.”

  “Was that all it was?” Michelle asked, and Hannah thought she sounded a bit disappointed.

  “I don’t think that’s the case at all, but I can see why Mother might think so.”

  “She’s interfering in your life again, isn’t she?”

  “Yes, but only because she loves me and wants the best for me.”

  Michelle looked thoughtful. “I guess that mitigates it a little, but I know that I wouldn’t like it.”

  “Of course not. I don’t like it either. I understand it, though.”

  “You’re a bigger woman than I am!”

  “Oh, I know that,” Hannah said with a perfectly deadpan expression. “I haven’t been a size three since I was two years old!”

  Hannah had just taken the Hot Jam Cookies from the oven when there was a knock on the back door. “That’ll be Mike.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I made Hot Jam Cookies for him. That means there’s food involved. Need I say more?”

  “Probably not,” Michelle said and went to open the back door. “Hi, Mike.”

  “Hi, Michelle. Is Hannah here? I need to talk to her.”

  “Of course,” Hannah called out. “Come in, Mike. I’ll pour a cup of coffee for you.”

  “Something sure smells good,” Mike said, taking his usual place on a stool at the stainless steel work island.

  “Hot Jam Cookies,” Hannah told him. “If you wait three or four minutes, you can taste them for me.”

  “I’ve got time. I need to talk to you anyway. Are you busy right now?”

  “Not at the moment.” Hannah poured a glass of juice for herself and sat down across from Mike.

  “So,” Mike said, “I understand you went to see Mrs. Colfax.”

  Hannah tried to read his expression. He didn’t really look that angry. “Yes, I did,” she admitted. “Michelle and I went to pay a condolence call. Michelle baked Strawberry Muffins and we took some to Nora.”

  “And Seth Colfax. I checked in on him this morning and he said he’d talked to you and Michelle at the Eight Ball Bar. Really, Hannah!”

  “What are you so upset about? The fact that I’m meddling? Or the fact that Michelle and I went to the Eight Ball Bar?”

  Mike stared at her for a long minute. “I’m not sure which one’s the worst.”

  It was time to take the bull by the horns, but it might help to sweeten that hunk of beef up first. Hannah got up. “Hold that thought. I’ll be right back.” Hannah headed straight for the baker’s rack where she picked up two cookies for Mike.

  “Try these,” she said, carrying them back to him. “The green is mild pepper jelly. The red is hot pepper jelly.”

  “Pepper jellies?” Mike said, biting into the green one. “Wow! That’s really good.”

  “That’s the mild one. Let me know what you think when you get to the hot one.”

  Mike picked up the other cookie and took a bite. “Oh, yeah! Really good!”

  “Do you think the red jelly is too hot for ordinary people?”

  “No. I know about twenty guys that’d love it. Can I have a couple more, Hannah?”

  Hannah got more cookies and then she handed him something else, a piece of information he might not have. It was time to trade it for something he had that she didn’t have. “I went to see Margaret George. And Michelle checked out her daughter, Sara.”

  “Who are Margaret and Sara George?”

  “Judge Colfax’s mistress and the daughter he fathered by her. Michelle and I interviewed the mother this morning.”

  “How did you find them?”

  Hannah hesitated. She didn’t want to get Dave Johansen in trouble. “I don’t exactly remember. Does it matter?”

  Mike thought about that as he ate another cookie. “Not really, as long as you cleared them. And you didn’t go to see Chad Norton?”

  “Uh . . .” Hannah thought fast. “No, I didn’t.”

  “Then how did you clear him?”

  Hannah hemmed and hawed for a moment and then she noticed that Mike was laughing. “What?”

  “I know how you cleared him. I just wanted to put you on the hot seat for a minute. I know you cleared him. You saw the phone records.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because I made sure you saw those phone records. I gave them to Bill and told him to put them in his briefcase to take home.”

  “But . . .” Hannah stopped speaking as the full implication of what Mike had just told her sunk in. “You knew Andrea would find them and copy them for me?”

  “Sure, I knew. She always does.”

  “But if you knew what was going to happen, why didn’t you just give them to me in the first place?”

  “I couldn’t. I told you before, cops have rules. I couldn’t deliberately break them, but I figured out a way around them.”

  “And you’re not hiding anything from me?”

  Mike shook his head. “No, I’m not. I’m stuck on this one. And there’s a lot of pressure on me to solve it fast. You’re not hiding any leads from me, are you?”

  “No. I don’t have any other leads.”

  “So we’re both stuck.”

  Hannah sighed and nodded. “We’re both stuck, Mike.”

  “Okay. If you think of anything, will you call me? Or text me? Tracey told me she taught you how to text.”

  “I will. Can I count on the same consideration from you?”

  “You can. You’re good at this, Hannah. You’re better than anyone else in my department. I don’t really want to admit this, but you might even be better than me.”

  “Never,” Hannah said. “You’re the best. Don’t you remember all the advice and the books you gave me? What I learned, I learned from you.”

  “I wish you’d learn one more thing from me, Hannah.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I wish you’d learn how much I love you,” Mike said. And then he turned and walked out the door.

  HOT JAM COOKIES

  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F., rack in the middle position.

  2 cups white (granulated) sugar

  1 and ½ cups salted butter, softened to room temperature (3 sticks, 12 ounces, ¾ pound)

  ¼ cup pepper jelly (I used Reese Mild Pepper Jelly made with green jalapeno peppers, but if you want more heat, you can use Reese Hot Pepper Jelly made with red jalapeno peppers)

  2 large eggs, beaten (just whip them up in a glass with a fork)

  ½ teaspoon baking soda

  1 teaspoon salt

  4 cups flour (pack it down in the cup when you measure it)

  cup white (granulated) sugar for later

  ½ cup pepper jelly (use whatever kind you used in the cookie dough)

  Hannah’s 1st Note: I used an electric stand mixer to mix these up. You can also do it by hand in a large bowl with a wooden spoon if you don’t have a mixer.

  Hannah’s 2nd Note: When Lisa and I make these cookies down at The Cookie Jar, we use mild pepper jelly for half the cookies and seedless hot pepper jelly for the other half. It’s become almost like a test of manhood with the men in Lake Eden. If one of our male customers orders two Hot Jam Cookies, everyone cheers. If he orders one mild and one hot, everyone claps politely. If he orders two mild, everyone just shrugs.

  Place the white sugar in the mixer bowl.

  Add the softened butter and beat until it’s light and fluffy.

  Melt the j
am in the microwave or in a saucepan over low heat. Once it’s the consistency of syrup, take it off the heat (or out of the microwave) and let it cool on the counter for 5 minutes.

  Mix the melted jam in with the butter and sugar. Beat until it’s thoroughly incorporated.

  Add the eggs and beat until everything is well mixed.

  Sprinkle in the baking soda and salt. Mix well.

  Add the flour in half-cup increments, beating after each addition.

  Scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl with a rubber spatula and then take the bowl from the mixer. Give it a final stir by hand and stick it in the refrigerator to chill slightly while you prepare your cookie sheets.

  Prepare your cookie sheets by spraying them with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray, or lining them with parchment paper.

  Place the cup of white sugar in a shallow bowl for coating the cookie dough balls.

  Take the cookie dough out of the refrigerator and roll it into one-inch diameter balls with your impeccably clean hands.

  Hannah’s 3rd Note: If the cookie dough is too sticky to roll into balls, cover it with plastic wrap and stick it back in the refrigerator for more chilling, but if you do this, don’t forget to turn off your oven. You can preheat it again when the dough has chilled enough to roll.

  One by one, place the cookie dough balls in the bowl of sugar and roll them around until they’re coated.

  Place the sugar-coated cookie dough balls on your prepared cookie sheet, 12 balls to a standard-size sheet.

  Flatten the dough balls slightly with a greased spatula or your impeccably clean hand.

  Use your thumb to make an indentation in the center of each cookie. Be careful not to poke all the way through the cookie. Then the jelly you’re going to drop in the indentation will leak out from the bottom of the cookie. (Lisa and I use a tool for this at The Cookie Jar, but when Lisa bakes these cookies at home, she uses the small end of a wine bottle cork to poke the holes.)

  Use a small spoon to fill the indentation with the pepper jelly you’ve chosen, but be careful not to overfill.

  Bake the Hot Jam Cookies at 350 degrees F. for 10 to 12 minutes.

  Let the cookies cool on the cookie sheet on a cold stovetop burner or a wire rack for 2 minutes. Then use a metal spatula to transfer them to a wire rack to finish cooling. (If you used parchment paper, there’s no need to take the cookies off the paper. Just pull the paper onto the wire rack and wait until the cookies are cool to remove them.)

  Yield: 8 to 10 dozen, depending on cookie size.

  Hannah’s 4th Note: If you’d like to make a half-batch of these cookies, simply reduce each ingredient by half EXCEPT for the baking soda. Leave that measurement at ½ teaspoon.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Hannah and Michelle were just mixing up the last batch of cookie dough when Ross came through the swinging door that separated the coffee shop from the kitchen.

  “Hi, Ross,” Hannah greeted him. “We’re almost through here.”

  “Great. Why don’t you let me take you two to dinner at the Lake Eden Inn? I haven’t seen Sally and Dick yet.”

  “Thanks for the invitation,” Michelle said quickly, “but I can’t. I promised Lonnie that I’d go over to his parents’ for dinner.”

  This was the first that Hannah had heard of it and she wondered if Michelle was refusing because she wanted to give them more time alone together. Whatever the reason, Hannah wasn’t about to quibble about it.

  “Hannah?” Ross turned to her.

  “Thank you, Ross. I’d love to have dinner with you. Just let me stick this cookie dough in the cooler, and I’ll be ready to go.”

  “I’ll take your truck, Hannah,” Michelle offered. “I’ll feed Moishe for you. Lonnie’s picking me up at the condo anyway and then you two can go straight out to dinner.”

  Hannah glanced down at her second-best pants and top. “I was going to change clothes.”

  “You look great just the way you are,” Ross told her. “Let’s go.”

  “I never argue with a man who has food on his mind,” Hannah said, smiling at Ross. “Especially when I’m hungry, too.”

  They arrived at the Lake Eden Inn just as it opened for dinner. Dot was at the reception desk and she ushered them to one of the elevated, curtained booths.

  “I’ll be right back with your water and rolls,” she said, rushing off toward the kitchen.

  “I love these booths,” Ross said, reaching across the table to take Hannah’s hand. “I feel like king of the world up here.”

  “We’re the first ones here,” Hannah said, looking down at all the empty and perfectly set tables. “I don’t think I’ve ever been the first diner here before. It’s like preferred seating in an empty banquet room.”

  Dot came back to their table much faster than they’d expected. She set down a basket of rolls and two glasses filled with water, lemon slices, and ice. “Sally’s making you a drink,” she said, and then glanced at their clasped hands. She looked from Hannah to Ross and then back again, and promptly left, pulling the curtains shut behind her.

  “I guess Dot thinks we need privacy,” Hannah said with a laugh.

  “She’s right. We haven’t had much of that. This gives us a chance to talk in private.”

  “What would you like to talk about?” Hannah asked, and then she wondered if that was too forward. Perhaps Ross was only making idle conversation.

  “I’d like to talk about us, but we’ll get to that later when we’re really alone. Right now I want to know how your interview with Peggy George went.”

  “It went just fine. She was very cooperative, and Michelle and I found out that she has an alibi for the time of Judge Colfax’s murder.”

  “You sound disappointed.”

  “Not really. She’s a very nice woman.”

  “How about the daughter?”

  “Same thing. She’s an assistant professor of biology at the community college. She was teaching a lab session when her father was killed. I’m fresh out of suspects, and I don’t know where to go next. It’s the first time this has happened to me.”

  “How about Mike? Do you know how he’s doing?”

  “Yes. Mike dropped by this afternoon and told me he has the same problem. Not only that, but the department is getting a lot of pressure to hurry and make an arrest.”

  “Pressure? From whom?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t ask him. Do you think that’s important?”

  “It could be. Why don’t you call Andrea and see if she can find out who’s applying that pressure? Call Michelle, too. Lonnie’s working with Mike, isn’t he?”

  “Yes. That’s a good idea, but I won’t call. I’ll send Andrea and Michelle a group text message. Tracey showed me how to do that and they’re both techno geeks. They’ll respond faster to a text than a phone call.”

  “Atta girl!” Ross said, watching her send the message. “I’m glad to see that you’re catching on to all this. And that reminds me . . . did you get the text I sent you this afternoon?”

  “No. My phone was in my purse and I guess I didn’t hear Big Ben chime.”

  “You can read it now,” Ross told her.

  Hannah checked her phone and found Ross’s text immediately. When his message came up on the screen, she began to smile.

  I’m taking a break and I just want to say how much I love you, Hannah.

  Instead of looking up, she sent another text message, this one to Ross.

  I love you, too.

  Ross’s phone beeped almost immediately and he looked down at the screen. There was a smile on his face as he looked up at her again. “Do you realize that we’d never have to talk? We could just text each other all the time, even when we were together.”

  “But where’s the fun in that?” Hannah asked, reaching out to touch his arm. “Some things are better said and done in person, aren’t they?”

  “They are,” Ross agreed, capturing her hand and bringing it to his lips for a kiss.
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  A moment later, Sally came by with two champagne cocktails. “I made these for you.” She turned to Ross. “It’s really good to see you again. Are you here in Lake Eden for long?”

  “I hope so. I applied for a job at KCOW Television. If I get it, I’ll be moving here.”

  “That’s good to hear. I can name quite a few people who’ve missed you.” She turned to look at Hannah.

  Hannah blushed slightly. “Can you join us for a minute, Sally?”

  “Just for a minute. I’ve got a new sous-chef in the kitchen and I want to keep an eye on him.” Sally slid into the booth next to Hannah. “Are you working on Judge Colfax’s murder case?”

  “Yes. It’s a tough one.”

  “I wish I had something for you. I do keep my ear to the ground out here. And sometimes I even use your invisible waitress trick.”

  Ross turned to look at her inquiringly, and Hannah explained. “If people are talking about something important, they don’t seem to notice the waitress when she refills their coffee cups or brings things to the table. They just go right on talking.”

  “Unfortunately, I haven’t heard a thing about Judge Colfax,” Sally continued, “except for the lunch reservation, of course.”

  “What lunch reservation?” Ross asked her.