by Diana DuMont
“Thank you so much, Izzy. I’m sorry for all the times I wasn’t exactly nice to you in this process.”
I shrugged. “I’m sorry if I wasn’t nice at times, too. Trust me: I understand the stress you’ve been going through. I’m just happy that the real perpetrator has been caught, and I’m looking forward to getting on with my life now.”
Todd smiled. “Me too. I can’t wait to go back to San Francisco without feeling like a fugitive.”
I smiled. There had been a time in my life that I would have been eager to get back to San Francisco as well. But that time was over. My life was in Sunshine Springs now, and I had a feeling that after the events of today, I had cemented my standing as a local in the community.
And what a community it was. Scott was reaching over to put an arm around me to make sure I was okay. Grams was shaking her head, muttering how she couldn’t believe that Violet had had her fooled. And Molly was scrolling through her phone to her social media accounts to post her selfie. I knew that within minutes, the gossip train in Sunshine Springs would be running full speed.
But this time, I would be the hero on the gossip train, and not the villain.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The next day, the line in the Drunken Pie Café was out the front door. Everyone in town was once again stopping by to see whether I could expound on the local gossip. I had been a little bit afraid that people would be angry over the fact that I’d been responsible for putting Violet away. After all, I was still viewed as somewhat of an outsider, and Violet had been a local for decades.
But it turned out that I’d had nothing to worry about. Violet hadn’t been very well liked in the community after all, but no one had wanted to admit it until she was accused of murder. And everyone was grateful that I’d gotten Theo out of prison. He was something of a local celebrity, and no one in Sunshine Springs wanted him behind bars.
The lines kept coming until I turned the sign in the window over to “Closed.” It still took about an hour after that for me to finish serving everyone, but I wasn’t about to kick anyone out. I was happy for the business, and I was happy to finally feel like part of the community. When at last my final customer had left, I started cleaning up. I was almost done when I heard a knock at the front door. I turned around and looked up, thinking I would send this person away. I didn’t have much pie left to sell even if I’d wanted to. And at this point, I wasn’t sure I wanted to. I was exhausted, and ready to go take a nice, long bath at home.
But when I looked up and saw the face outside the front door, it was Theo grinning back at me. I grinned myself, and then went to open the door for him.
He’d called me last night to say thank you, but I’d missed the call. I’d been quite exhausted by the time I’d gotten home from the winery. I had to admit, I’d been a little disappointed that I hadn’t seen Theo in the pie shop today. But I knew he probably wasn’t ready to face the crowds yet, and I couldn’t blame him for that.
Now that things were quiet, here he was. And he was looking much better than he had the last time I’d seen him. Gone were the dark circles under his eyes, and his formerly pale skin glowed with a healthy color once again.
“Hey,” he said softly as I let him in and then locked the door behind him. “I heard that this is the best place in town to come both for pie and also for help if you’ve been accused of murder.”
I grinned. “It’s definitely the best place for pie. But don’t go spreading the word that I help with murder cases. I made a special exception for you, but I’m really trying to phase out my lawyer career.”
“Fine. Your secret’s safe with me.” Theo winked at me. “But I did want to come by and say thank you. I seriously don’t know how I can thank you enough, but I at least had to tell you that I’m in your debt forever.”
I blushed with pleasure, but waved him away. “It was nothing. I did what any decent person would have done when they thought someone had been falsely accused. Now, come on. You have to try this drunken pie I made. It’s called death by chocolate, and it’s a chocolate red wine pie made with your 2016 reserve.”
Theo threw back his head and laughed. “Not a special 2016 reserve, I hope.”
I grinned at him. “Nothing special about it, except that it tastes delicious.”
I cut him an extra big slice of pie, and then poured two glasses of wine. I raised my glass to his and smiled. “Here’s to not being thrown in jail for the rest of our lives for a murder we didn’t commit.”
“I’ll toast to that.” Theo clinked his glass with mine. Then he took a sip of his wine, followed by a bite of the pie.
“Oh gosh, this is delicious. How do you make it taste so good?”
I beamed, pleased at his praise. “I can’t tell you, or I’d have to kill you.”
Theo groaned. “Okay, enough with the murder jokes already. But seriously, this is an amazing pie. I don’t think you’re going to have any trouble getting this café off the ground. I’ll definitely send business your way from the tasting room. After all, people need to eat a little something after a wine tasting. They might as well eat a boozy pie and continue the party.”
I grinned. “Thanks. I really appreciate it. I’m feeling better about everything now, but for a few days there I was worried that I had wasted my life’s savings on a pie shop that was never going to work out.”
“I’d say your days of worrying are over. You’re pretty much a hero in town. But more importantly, you helped clear the streets of Sunshine Springs of a very dangerous character. A couple of dangerous characters, actually.”
“Oh? Did they figure out who was working with Violet?”
“Yup. They figured out a lot of things, actually. Once Mitch got Violet in the interrogation room, she sang like a bird. She agreed to tell him pretty much everything as long as he agreed to petition the judge on her behalf for a lighter sentence. Not that it matters much how many years she’s sentenced to. She’s so old that even a light murder sentence will probably have her behind bars for the rest of her life.”
“I suppose so. Who did she implicate?”
“She told Mitch which City Councilman was helping her steal money. He was a treasurer, and he was giving Violet money in exchange for her continued support of him as a City Councilmember. Seems that at some point a few years ago, she found out he was stealing from the city. Instead of turning him in, she agreed to keep quiet as long as he would share the funds he stole with her.”
“Sheesh. And then when they were almost caught they decided that murdering someone was better than owning up to stealing money?”
Theo nodded sadly. “I guess so. I’ll never understand some people. Then again, I don’t understand how someone could steal like that in the first place, so I really don’t understand how someone could commit murder over the money. Poor Caitlin really got mixed up in a bad deal.”
“How did Caitlin get mixed up in it, anyway? It seems odd that a reporter from San Francisco would have the emails and account records she did. How’d she get them?”
“One of the other City Councilmen suspected that something was going on. He did some investigating on his own, but couldn’t find much. He brought it to the mayor, and the mayor couldn’t find much either. They decided that if they put it in the hands of a journalist, that journalist might uncover clues they were missing. Of course, they never expected that things would turn out the way they did, and that the journalist would end up dead. Mitch was having a fit about all of it. You should’ve heard him ranting about how everyone wants to play detective instead of leaving the detective work to the real detectives.”
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah he’s given me a speech or two about that. But he can’t be too mad at me. After all, I did solve the murder in the end.”
“That you did. And you were right. It was the special 2016 reserve. Violet paid off one of the tasting room employees to have a special poisoned bottle of wine that he would serve to whomever she asked. He swears he didn’t know it was actu
ally poisoned. He says he thought it was just a laxative or something.” Theo shrugged. “I guess I’ll let the courts work that out. All I know is that he’s definitely lost his job in the tasting room, and that bottle of special wine has been turned over to the police for evidence.”
I frowned. “Do you think that’s going to hurt your business?”
Theo laughed. “I was quite worried about it, but I have to say that if today’s sales are any indication, the infamy of this whole murder case is actually going to help my business. You should’ve seen the tasting room. It was packed wall to wall.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I bet. This has all been good for my pie shop as well.”
I looked around for a few minutes as I sipped my wine, taking in the pristine café and the fact that it was all mine. Everything seemed to have worked out exactly the way I needed it to, but as Theo finished up his last bite of pie, I did have one more question for him.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you…remember when I saw you that day talking to the mayor and Mitch outside of the police station? What were you guys talking about? I have to admit I thought the meeting looked suspicious. But since you’ve been completely cleared and Violet has been implicated, I’m assuming the meeting wasn’t anything shady.”
Theo furrowed his brow for a moment, trying to remember. Then his face brightened. “Oh! That! We were planning a hundredth birthday party for Edgar Bates. He’s the oldest citizen in Sunshine Springs, and he’s turning one hundred next month. The mayor wants the winery to provide the drinks. He just happened to be at the station that day to talk to Mitch about something else, so he was asking me a few questions about the party. You should come to that party, by the way.”
I smiled. “I’d love to.”
Theo gazed at me intensely for a moment, then lowered his voice and said, “You should come as my date.”
I blushed. “Listen, Theo. About that…I think I’ve realized that I need some time to heal. As you know, I just got divorced, and I’m not sure I’m ready for anything romantic quite yet. Although, if you don’t mind, I would like to finish up the tour of your winery. We never did get to finish looking at the grapevines.”
Theo smiled. “Okay. I’m not going to lie—I’m a little disappointed that you’re not interested in a date. But I understand. Maybe in the future?”
The hopeful look in his eyes melted my heart. “Maybe. With any luck, I’ll be staying in Sunshine Springs for a long, long time. And with any luck, things will quiet down a bit now. I moved to a small town because I thought life would move at a slower pace here.”
Theo laughed. “I wouldn’t count on things slowing down too much. You seem like the kind of person who attracts adventure.”
I gave Theo a flirtatious wink, and then grabbed his fork from him. I scooped up the last bite of his pie and popped it into my mouth.
“You might be right,” I said with a shrug and another wink. “We’ll just have to wait and see.”
* * *
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Diana DuMont lives and writes in Northern California. When she’s not reading or dreaming up her latest mystery plot, she can usually be found hiking in the nearby redwood forests.
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