Lexy Baker Cozy Mystery Series Boxed Set Vol 1 (Books 1 - 4) (Lexy Baker Cozy Mysteries Boxed Sets)

by Leighann Dobbs

  Lexy saw Helen’s brows wrinkle together. “We didn’t find any police record for Bronson.”

  “Yeah, apparently all the records were sealed, or whatever they do to them to get them out of public view. That’s what money can do for you, I guess.”

  “Speaking of money...the ex-girlfriend, Trixie, must have been upset about getting dumped. I wonder if getting back with Xavier and his money would be motive enough for murder.” Ida asked.

  Lexy savored the last few bites of the outside edge of her Danish while she watched Helen’s fingers tap quickly on the iPad. Helen gave a final, exaggerated tap then nodded with approval spinning the tablet around so everyone could see the screen. “It looks like Trixie does have some priors.” Helen said, pointing her finger at the screen.

  Priors? Lexy smiled to herself. The police jargon seemed odd coming from a 70-ish woman, but then again so did the fact that she was using an iPad to investigate murder suspects.

  Lexy craned her neck over the table to get a better look at the information displayed on the tablets’ screen. It reminded her of the police blotter listing. "That looks official, how did you find it?"

  Helen shrugged sheepishly. “I’m not supposed to tell, but your friend Jack gave us special access to the police database, seeing as we help them so much and all."

  Jack had given them special access? Great! He’d probably been spending more time with the Ladies Detective Club lately than he had with her. Her stomach flip-flopped at the thought of him. She remembered the message he had left, apologizing for being so busy lately. She made a mental note to call him back as soon as she was done. After all, he had made the first move and she should at least give him another chance.

  Nans’ voice brought her attention back to the iPad. "These all look like minor things; fights with other women and complaints. But if the stakes were high, including millions of dollars, maybe Trixie would see her way to something more fatal than just a catfight.”

  "But she wasn't in the house that night so she might have had a motive but not the opportunity." Ruth chimed in.

  "Well, actually she might have. Blake told me the back door to the kitchen was open, so it looks like anyone could have come in the house through that door, murdered Chastine and slipped out again.” Lexy popped the gooey apple covered center of the Danish in her mouth.

  "Well, there are so many suspects; this is going to be an interesting one to unravel," Nans said, her eyes bright with the challenge. “We do have our feelers out about that pin you said was missing from Chastine’s blouse. If someone pawns it, we’ll know.”

  "I bet we’ll learn a lot at the wake," Ida said excitedly. "On TV that’s where they find out the best information.” The other ladies nodded their agreement.

  Lexy let out a sigh. She hated going to wakes, but when her ex had been murdered earlier in the summer, the ladies had insisted she go to his. They had been right. She had learned quite a bit of information there. "Blake said it is scheduled for tomorrow at three PM."

  "Great! You can pick us up here at two-thirty and we’ll all go together!” Nans said excitedly, with Ruth, Ida and Helen nodding in agreement.

  Lexy’s mind conjured up an image of the four women skulking around the wake in tan London Fog raincoats taking notes on their iPads. She could hardly wait.

  11

  Lexy sat in her car in the retirement center parking lot thinking about the messages Jack had left on her phone. The mid-fall sun beat through her windshield raising the temperature in the car to summer-like levels. The Danish she had polished off inside suddenly felt like a lead weight in her stomach.

  She stared at the cell phone in her hand. She wanted to call Jack but the thought of talking to him sent her stomach into a tailspin. She did want to clear the air and work things out with him, but she had to admit she had an ulterior motive for calling. She wanted to know if they found the murder weapon in the dumpster. She realized she should probably come clean about the missing knife. She didn’t want it to reflect badly on her if Jack discovered she had withheld that little tidbit of information. She took a deep breath and pressed the call button.

  "Perillo." She heard Jack’s voice bark his customary greeting.

  "Hi Jack…its Lexy," she said tentatively, not sure what exactly to expect.

  "Oh, Lexy. I was hoping you would call." Lexy's heart did a flip-flop upon hearing the tenderness in his voice when he said her name.

  "Look, I want to apologize. I guess I've been neglecting you. I didn’t mean to...it's just that I've been so busy on the other case I am on. I tend to get wrapped up in my work.” Jack sounded nervous which made Lexy’s heart melt, washing away the past two weeks of anger and hurt feelings. She realized how silly she had been to think he had lost interest in her. He just got busy with work. How insecure could she be?

  "Well, I was feeling a bit neglected,” she laughed, “I didn't know if you were trying to give me the brush-off."

  "No, it’s nothing like that. You know how I feel about you." Did she? Come to think of it, Jack had never said how he felt about her, but he did act like he cared. And he sure sounded like it on the phone right now. Lexy decided to let go of her insecurities and accept that things were good with them.

  Having that out of the way, she turned to more pressing issues. "Were you looking for something in the dumpster, today?" She asked, trying to slip the words in as if they were just conversational.

  "Were you?"

  "I asked first."

  Jack’s deep laugh warmed her from the other side of the line. "Okay, I give. We were looking for the murder weapon. It still hasn't shown up. Now it's your turn, what were you looking for?"

  Lexy crossed her fingers. "I was looking for some of our supplies which seem to have disappeared from the house." She hoped her voice didn't reveal the little white lie, but she didn't want Jack to know she was looking for the murder weapon because she knew he would be mad at her for “meddling”.

  "Oh really? Like one of your knives maybe?"

  Damn, he already knows the murder weapon was my knife.

  "Well, now that you mention it, I am missing some knives," she said innocently.

  "Lexy, I wasn't born yesterday. I know you were looking for the murder weapon in there and I know it was one of your knives. What I don’t know is why you would be trying to find it yourself instead of leaving it up to the police."

  Lexy didn't have a good answer, other than the police were being too slow in finding the murderer. She chose to remain silent.

  She heard the rustle of papers from Jack’s end, then he said, "I have to run, but maybe we can talk about this later...say over dinner Thursday night?"

  "OK." Lexy didn't know if she should be happy at the prospect of having dinner with Jack or nervous because he wanted to talk more about the murder weapon.

  "Good. I'll pick you up around seven, oh, and Lexy?"

  "Yes…"

  "I really mean it about staying out of the case. There is a killer on the loose and you could be in danger. I don't want anything to happen to you. Will you promise me that you'll stop your investigation?"

  "What? You're breaking up I can’t hear you…" Lexy grabbed an empty candy bar wrapper that was laying on the console and made crinkling noises with it near the phone. "I'll see you Thursday night,” she said into the phone, then snapped it shut.

  Jack held the phone away from his ear and looked at it with amusement. He knew Lexy had manufactured the cell phone disturbance to avoid the question. He had to admit he thought it was kind of cute...and funny. He thought lots of things that Lexy did were cute and funny—that’s what he liked about her. Really liked.

  Thinking about her made his heart do a somersault—he hoped she would take his warning seriously. According to what the investigation was revealing, they could be dealing with a very dangerous and unstable person. He didn’t want Lexy to put herself in danger by continuing to investigate on her own.

  Jack leaned back in his chair. He was surpris
ed at the way his stomach knotted up when he thought about harm coming to Lexy. She’d become very important to him over these past few months. He had real feelings for her, feelings he didn’t think he would ever have again after his breakup with Caitlin.

  The breakup with his former fiancée had been hard on him, mostly because Jack blamed himself for always putting his job first and neglecting her. The same thing he had been doing the past two weeks with Lexy. A deep feeling of dread washed over him at the thought of losing Lexy. He couldn’t let that happen. He would have to make a conscious effort to pay more attention to her. He hoped it wasn’t already too late.

  “It looks like our suspicions were right about the Toliver boys.” Jack jerked his head up, startled by his partner, John Darling, who had suddenly appeared beside his desk.

  "They're both flat broke and living off Daddy's money," John continued, handing a stack of papers to Jack. "Not only that but I'm digging up some really creepy stuff from their high school days. You remember the murder of that young girl back about twenty years ago?” Jack nodded. “Well, it seems like either Blake or Bronson or maybe both of them may have been mixed up in it.”

  Jack rubbed his face with his hands. He didn't like the idea of a dangerous murderer on the loose in his town but he didn't have anything concrete on either of the boys to bring them in and hold them on. He wasn’t sure that either of them actually was the murderer and there was a long list of other suspects to eliminate first.

  “We have to think about who had the opportunity. It had to have been someone in the house, or someone who had access. We know the front door was open that morning and the back door was too—but who opened them and why?” Jack asked.

  John spread his hands. “There’s a lot of questions waiting to be answered. Why did Chastine leave Texas so abruptly? Why can’t we find anything about her assistant, Candice? Who left the doors open?”

  Jack looked up at him. “The biggest question I have is...why was Chastine down in the kitchen all dressed up in fancy clothes at two-thirty in the morning when she should have been in bed sleeping? That would seem to indicate she was meeting someone. I think if we find out who that someone was we may have our killer.”

  12

  Lexy breathed a sigh of relief that Nans and the girls weren’t wearing trench coats like she had imagined. They were quite tastefully dressed, complete with fresh hair-do’s and toting their gigantic purses. Lexy wondered if their iPads were inside them.

  Lexy jumped out of the car, pushing up the front seats so the ladies could have access to the back. She eyed the tiny space in her VW beetle uncertainly. Could three elderly women contort themselves into this space?

  “This is pretty cramped, are you guys going to be able to get in here?” She voiced her concern.

  "Oh don't be silly," Ruth waved her hand, "we do yoga so this is a piece of cake." To prove the point Ruth, Ida and Helen all piled into the back seat with the ease of gymnasts.

  Nans took the passenger seat and Lexy hopped back into the driver seat, putting the car in gear and heading off toward the funeral parlor.

  She pulled up in front of McGreevy’s, dropping the ladies off at the door, marveling at how easily they extracted themselves from the back seat.

  Lexy drove around back to the parking area. Getting out of the car, she inspected her black skirt for any spots of flour, twisting around to look at the back. She'd been so busy at the bakery she’d barely had time to do a quick change and fluff up her hair before driving over to pick the ladies up. Once she was satisfied that her skirt was flour-free, she straightened her peach-colored silk blouse and strode off toward the front.

  The ladies were waiting for her on the steps. Ida looked her up and down, stopping at her black suede Stuart Weitzman four-inch pumps. The contrasting silver metallic pointed toe added a touch of glam to the understated shoe.

  “I used to be able to wear heels like that," Ida said wistfully. Then she leaned in toward Lexy and whispered, "You shouldn't wear them too often though, dear, or you'll end up with bunions like mine.”

  Lexy looked down at Ida’s feet. They were clad in low-slung sandals. The open toe style, which Lexy thought was a little late for this time of year, afforded a perfect view of Ida’s big toe that contorted over to the side, bunching up her other toes. It looked painful. Lexy shuddered looking back down at her own feet. Maybe she should rethink her choice of footwear from now on.

  The women hurried up to the oak doors that were opened as if by magic by two somber looking gentlemen in dark suits.

  Lexy followed them inside. The funeral home was exactly as she remembered it from Kevin's wake. It was elegantly decorated and exuded the faint scent of flowers. The hushed tones of low voices and hymnal music filled her ears.

  They had the casket set up in the room to the right. Nans and the others made a beeline in that direction. Lexy almost had to jog to keep up. She got in line behind them, dutifully waiting her turn to file past the body on her way to pay her respects to the family.

  On the other side, Xavier, Blake and Bronson were standing in a receiving line. Lexy was surprised to see a blonde woman hovering around Xavier alternating between handing him tissues and shoving a small glass of water in his hand. Lexy poked Nans in the ribs. “Who’s that?” she whispered indicating the blonde with a nod of her head.

  “That’s his ex., Trixie. I guess she didn’t waste any time trying to get her hooks back into him.”

  Lexy watched her from her spot in line. She seemed generally concerned about Xavier, almost motherly. Could she have killed Chastine? She didn't look like a hard-boiled killer, but then Lexy didn’t really know what one was supposed to look like.

  Lexy shuffled up to the casket behind Nans, Ruth, Ida and Helen. The four of them stood together, looking down at Chastine.

  "She was really beautiful." Ruth said. The rest of them murmured their agreement. Lexy remembered the few times she had met her in person. She had been a true beauty. No wonder she was able to charm Xavier into marrying her.

  Nans turned to the receiving line. She went straight to Xavier, giving her old friend a hug and telling him how sorry she was. Trixie flitted around in the background keeping a respectful distance but staying at the ready whenever Xavier seemed to need a pat on the back or a fresh tissue.

  Lexy followed behind Nans, giving her condolences to Xavier, then Bronson. She was surprised to find Bronson was rather civil—nice even. But he was behaving rather nervously, his eyes darting around the room as if he was looking for someone.

  Blake was at the end of the line. He spent a little more time than necessary hugging Lexy in an attempt to grope certain parts of her. The man was shameless! She offered her condolences and he shrugged it off by opting to ask her out on a date instead. Lexy extracted herself from his clutches by promising to catch up with him later, then escaped from the receiving line as fast as she could.

  She regrouped with Nans and the girls in a small room off to the side.

  "I say we split up and canvas the room to see if we can find anything out," Nans whispered.

  The others nodded and then everyone took off in different directions. Lexy headed straight for the side room where they usually kept the refreshments.

  The room was long and narrow. It was set up much the same as it had been for Kevin's wake with a long table against the wall loaded with trays of cookies and pastries. She wondered what bakery they came from. Grabbing a lemon cookie, she gingerly took a bite. They weren't nearly as good as hers were. Maybe she should bring the funeral director some samples.

  Lexy drifted over to the corner of the room, the lemon cookie balanced in one hand on top of a napkin. Voices drifted toward her, allowing her to pick up snippets of conversations.

  "…loved her so much."

  "She was a real…"

  "I could have killed her myself…"

  Lexy's ears perked up when she heard that last bit. She honed in on the conversation like a guided missile. Three people sh
e didn't recognize were huddled together in the corner just outside the snack room. Lexy slipped out of the room, and edged along the wall, sidestepping a little closer. There was a tall potted plant between her and the three people and she used it for cover, standing behind it, but with her ear cocked toward the threesome.

  "Y'all knew I had to come just to make sure that bee-atch was dead.” It was a woman with a heavy southern accent.

  "That's raat, after what she did to Bob, we owed it to him to fly up." Another southern accent—this one a man.

  "I couldda spet on her, but t’wouldn't be gentlemanly."

  The voices got softer. Lexy couldn't hear what they were saying so she leaned closer. She was practically in the tree but leaned in even closer still. A jolt of horror shot through her when she realized she had gone too far. The giant plant was tipping over!

  She dropped her cookie on the floor. Her hands grabbed at the plant, trying to keep it from falling but managing only to pull off a handful of leaves. She felt her stomach sinking as she watched the plant descending toward the group. Luckily, one of the men had quick reflexes. He jumped up blocking the plant from falling and setting it upright again.

  "Well little lady, I guess maybe you should be looking where ya’all are goin’." The man said with a friendly wink.

  Lexy felt her cheeks grow hot. "I'm so sorry," she stammered.

  The man let out a chuckle and stuck his hand out toward her. "I'm Dinty Carter, and this here is my wife Mandy and my brother Harold." He pointed to the other two people who were with him.

  Lexy put her hand out. His handshake was firm and warm. "Lexy Baker." She introduced herself. "You don't sound like you're from around here. Were you friends of Chastine’s from back home?"

  Mandy let out a snicker, "Haadly, that woman din’t have no friends."

  Lexy raised her eyebrows. "You didn't like her but you came all the way here from…" She let her voice trail off; she didn't actually know where they were from.