Moonshine & Murder: Moonshine Hollow Series #1

by Brooks, Kathleen

  For the three weeks it had taken Zoey set up her shop, she had lived in the small studio apartment upstairs until she knew how much money she would have left to find a place to live. She hadn’t needed to worry. Her apartment in LA sold after two weeks. Three days after she opened Zoey’s Sweet Treats, a check arrived from her realtor. Zoey also sold her flashy sports car in LA and drove the rented moving van to Moonshine Hollow, leaving her to look for a place near downtown that wouldn’t require a car. She found her house only three blocks away from her bakery and was able to buy it with the money from the sale of her condo and car. It was a cute cottage house painted blue, more of a nautical blue than navy, and trimmed with white. There was a small porch with a wooden swing, all painted white, and flowers lining the short brick walkway from the street to her porch. The view from her porch was lovely and the view from her back patio was breathtaking.

  Moonshine Hollow was a small town of under a thousand people. Most had lived there since their ancestors climbed the mountains, following explorers who had pushed the American frontier farther west. The town was settled when the pioneers found the small meadow with a mountain stream running next to it, nestled between the Appalachian Mountains. Originally it had been Earnest Creek, named after Ned Earnest who had been the leader of the group of ragtag settlers who founded the area in the late seventeen hundreds. It stayed Earnest Creek until 1920 and Prohibition. The residents of Earnest Creek put out the finest moonshine in the country. People traveled all over looking for that “Holler where the moonshine is made.” Earnest Creek became known as Moonshine Hollow, and in a town meeting for the history books, the town outvoted the Earnest family and changed the name to Moonshine Hollow.

  As a new homeowner and resident of Moonshine Hollow, Zoey spent her evenings on her back patio, staring at the mountains and watching the waters of Earnest Creek while recipes came to her—like the Chocolate Temptation she just finished making in the bakery. Zoey moaned with the pleasure of smooth chocolate melting in her mouth as the pink bell tinkled, indicating someone had opened the front door.

  She set down the chocolate torte to see who it was. She’d received a mixed reception when she’d arrived in town three months earlier. The town was used to people leaving, not arriving. At first they’d walked by the shop and stared through the large window while they whispered to each other. But when Zoey had finally opened two months ago, there hadn’t been a shortage of people coming in for a free sample. Ever since then, she’d had a steady flow of customers. Enough that she was no longer reaching into her savings account to pay for groceries, and enough to keep her busy so that LA was just a distant memory, even though she still received notifications of her name popping up in legal magazines every now and then.

  “I told you she’s baking up something new.” Zoey heard the old twangy voice and immediately knew who was there. She smiled at the pleasure of having found people like Vilma and Agnes. Who knew she’d find a family all the away across the country? But the two old women had become just that.

  Zoey grabbed a tray of cupcakes and carried them out front. “Hi Vilma. Hi Agnes.” Zoey smiled to the two old sisters who had adopted her since her arrival. They lived a few houses down the road from her and had brought her a basket full of muffins they swore would give her energy to clean. Sure enough they had. Since then, they saw each other practically every day and Zoey considered them family. In those short months, they were more loving, supportive, and kind than her own mother had ever been.

  “What did you make today?” Agnes asked as she sat down and patted her tight steel gray curls. The women must have just come from the hair salon down the street. There wasn’t much on Main Street, but it was the only place to go in Moonshine if you needed something. There was a salon, a small grocery, a hardware store, a clothing boutique, a bank, the courthouse, the only lawyer’s office, a small diner, and a large hunting equipment store. It was the South after all.

  “I told you, it’s gonna be something special,” Vilma said as she rubbed her wrinkled hands together. Her white hair was in similarly permed-within-an-inch-of-its-life curls. The two sisters were of an undetermined age somewhere between old and ancient and always wore complementing tracksuits. Today Vilma was in a pale yellow velour suit while Agnes wore a pale blue one.

  Zoey smiled and held up her finger to indicate they should wait. A second later Zoey brought a slice of the torte and three forks to the bistro table they were sitting at. “I call it Chocolate Temptation.”

  The sisters oohed and dove in. “Oh my Goddess, um goodness, this is amazing,” Agnes moaned.

  “This is pure magic,” Vilma sighed.

  “I take it you think I should add it to my menu?” Zoey smiled as she wiped her hands on her apron and picked up the fork to take a bite. The pleasure Zoey got from seeing her creations enjoyed eclipsed the pleasure she’d felt when she’d negotiated a multimillion dollar deal. She never would have guessed she could feel so fulfilled when she’d left her old life behind.

  “It would be a sin to not make it every day,” Agnes said before taking another bite and closing her eyes.

  Zoey laughed and picked up the empty plate. Something in her soul had found peace in Moonshine. Agnes and Vilma were a large part of the reason why, along with the other friends she’d made. Her body knew what to do when it was time to bake. Zoey couldn’t understand it, but Agnes and Vilma said they did. They’d spent hours sitting outside watching the creek, eating Zoey’s creations, and talking about life. She’d found something that had eluded her, despite all of her previous success. She’d found happiness.

  2

  Zoey closed the box of the last batch of desserts to be delivered and stacked the boxes into her large pink and white polka dot canvas wagon with Zoey’s Sweet Treats written across the side. She had three deliveries to make tonight before the town’s gathering at Earnest Park to pick the newest Moonshine of the Year flavor.

  The famous distillery started all those centuries ago by Ned Earnest was still going strong and was the bulk of the town’s economy. Nearly everyone either worked for or had retired from the distillery. Because of that, the citizens of the town were more than simply residents—they were lifelong friends. It had taken Zoey months, but finally she was no longer looked at with suspicion. However, she wasn’t quite one of them yet. Zoey accepted that as she packed her wagon. The baking helped keep her mind off such things. And while she may not have been born and bred in Moonshine Hollow, she was slowly becoming accepted. People had even begun to share all the latest gossip with her when they came into her bakery. That made Zoey feel like she belonged. Nothing brought people together like gossip.

  Zoey pulled her wagon out of the store and locked the glass door. Her first stop was two doors down at the Lodge of the Order of the Opossum. Zoey stopped at the thick wooden door and knocked. The eye-height six-inch wooden panel slid open and a pair of old brown eyes narrowed at her.

  “What’s the password?” he demanded.

  Zoey rolled her eyes. “Bart, do I have to do this every week?”

  “No one can enter without the password,” Bart told her as he slammed the panel closed.

  Every. Freaking. Week. Zoey knocked on the door again and Bart slid open the small panel. “Password.”

  Zoey let out a sigh. “Oh great opossum, I beg entrance into this hallowed lodge to deliver the sustenance for your passel. The password is jacks,” Zoey said the word referring to male opossums.

  Bart looked down at her wagon, “You brought those opossum cookies for us?”

  “Yes, Bart,” Zoey said as she smiled. She brought the cookies every week. They were sugar cookies decorated to look like opossum. After her first week in business, she’d been contracted to bring them every week. They’d been her first big client.

  The bolt to the door opened and Bart stepped back to let her into the sacred lodge. The lodge consisted of a bar and a large television hooked up to a satellite dish. The opossums were a group of old married men who
simply wanted to watch sports and drink in peace. Women were strictly prohibited from the lodge, but they made an exception for Zoey for the simple reason they didn’t know how to cook and depended on her for snacks. Every week Zoey brought them cookies and was immediately caught up on the town’s gossip.

  “Hey Zoey,” Billy Ray called out from behind the bar. None of the opossums were younger than fifty. They called any married man who hadn’t been married for thirty years a newlywed. Once you’d been married for thirty years, you could join the Order of the Opossums.

  “Evening, Billy Ray,” Zoey called out, and she pulled her wagon to the bar. Billy Ray was sixty-five and had a gray beard that would impress lumberjacks. He said he hadn’t trimmed it in five years, ever since he wife told him to cut that nasty thing off his face.

  “Did you hear? Peach kicked Otis out of the house last night.”

  Zoey looked to where Otis stood, leaning on his cane and guzzling a beer as he was being timed by a couple of the men. “He looks heartbroken.”

  “Heck, no. He’s been married forty-eight years. He’s having the time of his life. We figure Peach will call him home in a couple days when the yard needs to be mowed. Until then, he’s living it up.”

  Zoey handed over the boxes of cookies and Billy Ray slid her an envelope in cash. Zoey had gotten a credit card scanner, but no one in Moonshine used credit cards. The IRS could track them, and the IRS was more feared than Satan himself.

  Zoey waved goodbye to the group of men and headed to the building across the street. The large front window had stained glass in the image of a purple iris. A wooden door was similarly painted with a field of irises. Zoey knocked on the door, and it cracked open on a security chain.

  “Password,” a little old lady said pleasantly.

  “Hello, Peach. I heard about Otis,” Zoey said with a grin as she looked at Peach, semi-hidden behind the door.

  “Ugh. Don’t remind me. I worked for three weeks to get him to leave and finally gave up and kicked him out when he said my meatloaf was a bit dry. As if. And it’s been blissful without him there this week. I’ve cleaned out his closet, had the house painted by that young Justin Merkle, and ate at the club every night. It’s been heaven. Now, what’s the password so we can get a bite of this new dessert Vilma was telling us about.”

  Zoey let out a long suffering breath. She wasn’t a member of the Opossums and she wasn’t a member the women’s counterpart, the Irises, but she was required to comply with their secret traditions anyway just to enter their clubs to drop off her deliveries.

  “Men are stupid, bless their hearts.”

  Peach closed the door and the chain slid free before the door opened wide. Peach’s hair was dyed honey yellow and worn in a cute chin-length bob, presently pulled back from her face by an old fashioned decorative comb. As Zoey stepped inside, she almost laughed at the differences between the Irises and the Opossums. The Opossums’ den was dark and dirty with wood floors, wood walls, wood bar, and old torn furniture. The Irises lived in light and beauty. Their couches were fresh and clean with bright floral patterns. The walls were painted a light purple, the bathroom a fresh green, and there was a full kitchen that would make any chef envious.

  The Irises also had satellite television, but it was mostly on The Hallmark Channel. Once a month, they would buy a pay-per-view event of The Thunder From Down Under or some Vegas show that involved scantily clad men.

  “Good evening, Zoey!” The heads of white, gray, and dyed hair called out from their places on the couches around the room.

  “Evenin’ sugar. Are you excited to vote for the new flavor of moonshine for this year?” Fay asked as she got up to help with the food. Fay was tall and thin with a hairstyle that looked as if it hadn’t changed since the 1950s. She was every bit Southern from the tip of her perfectly manicured hands that could outshoot most of the men to her pedicured toes that had grown up hiking these woods and dancing the jig.

  “I am. I’ve heard the rumors that the Opossums came up with a new flavor.” Zoey wanted the scoop. Every year the Opossums, the Irises, and the Mountaineers, the other club in town, all developed a different flavor. The town would vote on their favorite and the Moonshine Distillery would manufacture the winner as a limited edition special for one year.

  “Ha! Probably Dirty Laundry Moonshine,” Peach said sarcastically as she started setting out the tortes and slicing them up.

  Fay got up and passed out the plates. Zoey smiled at the collective moan of pleasure as the group tried the first bite. This was way better than winning any mediation. Here, everyone was happy.

  “Who needs a husband when we have this?” Peach cried out as the group of white hairs tittered with laughter in agreement.

  Zoey said her goodbyes as she was slipped a light purple cash-filled envelope with her name written across it in beautiful script. No one, even the smart and sassy Irises, would pay with a credit card. Zoey stepped outside and took a deep breath. Spring was in the air. The leaves were in full bloom and the night air smelled of new beginnings. She had three boxes of cookies to deliver to the Mountaineers at the other end of Main Street before she could go home and get ready for the big vote that night.

  The Mountaineers were completely different from the older groups she had just visited. The Mountaineers were the younger people of Moonshine Hollow. Anyone twenty-one years and older could join. It was a co-ed group filled with young couples full of love and affection, along with single people just wanting a place to hang out. They constantly made fun of their parents in the Irises or the Opossums. Zoey just smiled, knowing in twenty-eight more years these honeymooning couples would be plotting and lying to get away from each other and go to their respective clubs.

  Zoey had been appalled at first, but then she realized the couples were actually still very much in love. They just needed some time apart with friends to stay happy. She guessed after thirty years everyone needed a little bit of a break or someone might end up dead with their face in an apple pie and a fork in their back. And by someone, she meant one of the husbands. Bless their hearts.

  The Mountaineers didn’t hide behind wood doors or stain glass windows. Anyone could look in at them laughing, playing pool, or even making out like the newlyweds some of them were. Their numbers were also smaller than the other groups. Younger people from Moonshine left the hollow in large groups at the age of eighteen. Some went to Knoxville or Nashville to experience the big city and never came home. Some went off to college and never came back. Those who remained were a mix of people went to work at the distillery or a family business in town after high school. Finally there was a smaller number of people who left the town for college or excitement, but came back to their roots.

  Sometimes these people brought new spouses back with them. Zoey could spot those newcomers by their constant look of surprise or confusion. She’d had that same look for the first month she was in Moonshine. Zoey had been asked to join their club, but before she could answer the sickeningly happy couples were already trying to set her up, so she’d politely claimed she was too busy setting up her new shop to join just then.

  “Zoey!” her new best friend, Maribelle, called out.

  Maribelle was dating another member, Dale, and was in the moony-eyed courtship period of their relationship. Her red hair and freckles were adorably cute, which was a word Maribelle hated. It didn’t help that she had a young face and was barely five feet two inches tall. Maribelle was Zoey’s neighbor. She was twenty-six and had moved back to Moonshine a year ago, after teaching in Chattanooga for a couple years. She was the newest teacher at Moonshine High School, and Zoey adored her. Together they could laugh, tell secrets, and just be young friends trying to figure out their lives.

  It seemed like yesterday Maribelle had frantically knocked on Zoey’s door for something pretty to wear on her first date with Dale. Dale was Maribelle’s complete opposite. Maribelle was talkative, outgoing, short, and full of energy. Dale was six foot four and two hundred
sixty pounds of solid muscle. His voice was deep, and he was quiet, but you could tell a lot went on under his neatly trimmed beard and thick brown hair.

  “Evening, Maribelle. Are you ready to debut your moonshine flavor tonight?” Zoey asked as she starting stacking the chocolate chip, moonshine frosted, and chocolate peanut butter chip cookies on the folding tables. Where the Opossums’ furniture screamed bachelor basics and the Irises’ reeked of elegant mom, the Mountaineers’ cried poor college students. Their decor consisted of old couches from their parents, folding tables, plastic crates with an old door across it to form a low table, and pillows for people to sit on around the makeshift table. Their bar was full of moonshine, cheap beer, and boxes of wine.

  “We are so excited. It’s going to be fantastic. Something those old fogies would never think of.” Then Maribelle whispered, “And, Dale is taking me tonight.”

  Zoey followed Maribelle’s gaze and smiled in wonder. “That’s wonderful. So it’s getting serious?” The man wasn’t just a Mountaineer, he was the whole freaking mountain. His strong face was hidden under a trimmed light-brown beard. Dale was also a catch. His family had been farming the area for a hundred years. They had a small family farm at the edge of the hollow. They had some crops, but mostly goats that were happy in the mountains.