by Emily Greene
“We definitely will, thanks for the warning.”
She gave us both one last hug as we said our goodbyes and then Carrie and I left. Everything that had just happened was like something out of a movie. An upscale gentleman’s club, the wealthy fiancé, underground poker, an enforcer…it felt unreal. Except it wasn’t.
As we headed back to Prairie Cove the following day, I realized I really had my work cut out for me. The first thing I was going to have to do was contact Detective Sloane. The second thing I was going to have to do was convince him to let me help him on Sarah’s case. That was going to be an uphill battle, but I was ready to take it on.
Chapter Eight
The bakery was busy as usual and I was just putting a batch of cookies into the oven when that shrill voice wafted through the air.
“Harper, honey! Are you back there?”
I wiped my hands on my apron and rushed out to the front before my mother caused an even bigger scene than she was already causing.
She lit up when she saw me and she had an exaggerated look of relief on her face.
“I have been worried sick about you!” She exclaimed as she wrapped her arms around me.
“Mother, what on earth are you talking about? I told you I was going to New York with Carrie.”
“Yes, but you did not call me or answer my texts so that I knew you made it home safely. Anything could have happened to you in that big city!”
“Mother, I am a big girl, I know how to take care of myself. We were fine, we had a good time.”
“Harper, the next time you go traipsing off to a big city, check in with me so that I know you are okay.” Her face was stern so I didn’t even argue.
“Okay, I will.”
That bright smile came back when she heard what she wanted to hear and I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes and shaking my head. My mother was too much sometimes. It was time to change the subject and get her focus off of me.
“Have you talked with Katie? How are the wedding plans coming along?” I asked as I arranged a cupcake tray.
As if on cue, my mother grinned from ear to ear. It was the perfect subject to keep her occupied for a while.
“They are going well! Katie and Mike have picked their colors and they know the venue they are going to use.”
“Oh? Have they picked a date?”
“Yes, the second Saturday in June.”
“That is so exciting! I am going to have to call Katie and get all the details.”
A line was forming and I had to kindly suggest it was time for my mother to leave, because if I didn’t say anything she would have been there all day. I made a point to glance at the growing line and then looked at my mother. She looked at the line and held her finger up, stopping me before I could say anything.
“I am way ahead of you, darling. I can see that you are busy here so let me get out of your hair. I have to meet the girls at the country club in about 30 minutes so I’d better get going. Have a lovely day, sweetheart!”
My mother glided out of the bakery and Carrie looked over at me with a knowing smile. She knew my mother was a character and sometimes she jokingly felt for me because my mom could be so overbearing. It was a lot sometimes, but I always knew she was coming from a good place.
A few minutes later, I was in the back frosting cupcakes when Carrie rushed back to see me. Her eyes were wide as saucers and her cheeks were flushed. Something was definitely up.
“You will never guess who is here!” Her words were a hurried whisper.
“With that look on your face I am expecting you to tell me a celebrity just walked into my bakery.”
“Justin! His clingy sister is with him as well!”
“Carrie, why are you so flushed and panicked about that?”
“His sister wants to talk to you about making a tribute cake for Sarah.”
“Okay…and why is that a big deal?” I didn’t get why she was so panicked.
“Harper, it’s the way she said it, almost like it was killing her to even request it.”
“Oh, I’m sure they both are having a hard time with Sarah’s death. People grieve in different ways, Carrie. Maybe she’s not very emotive. She might be the type of person who isn’t open about her feelings. She’s very close with her brother, right?”
“Yes, that’s what we’ve heard.”
“I’m sure she is the one taking care of everything for him regarding Sarah during this difficult time. Let’s try to be sensitive to their needs and make the most beautiful cake we can for Sarah. Come on, I want to meet Justin’s sister.”
Carrie seemed to relax a bit which was a relief to me because she could sometimes go overboard with her imagination. It didn’t happen often but when it did happen let’s just say my best friend had an overactive imagination. I could see her shoulders relax as we walked out to the front of the bakery. We had a long line of customers so Carrie went to tend to them while I chatted with Justin and his sister.
Justin was standing at the counter looking like he’d lost his best friend and I felt so sad for him. I didn’t know him that well but I felt I had to say something comforting to him, so I walked over to him and gently squeezed him arm as my eyes held his.
“Justin, I am so sorry for your loss. Sarah was such a sweet girl and I know she loved you very much.” I mentally crossed my fingers as I said that last part because it wasn’t really true, but that was not the time to be honest about what a jerk Sarah was.
He managed a small smile and I could tell my words made him feel a tiny bit better.
“Thank you, Harper, I know she really liked having you as a boss and she appreciated you giving her this job. She always had nothing but nice things to say about you.”
I hoped what he was saying was true, and even if Sarah didn’t really say those things about me, it was nice to hear them anyway.
“Thank you, Justin.” I gave him a warm smile.
“Oh, how rude of me. I’m sorry. Harper, this is my sister, Caroline.”
“Hi Caroline, it is nice to meet you.” I gave her a warm smile and extended my hand which hung in the air for a bit too long for my liking. Caroline was definitely not the warm and fuzzy type. She gave me a cool stare, looked at my hand, and reluctantly extended her hand. The handshake was as weak as could be and the quickness with which she let go of my hand was as if she was burned by my touch. It was just plain weird.
I saw her glance at Justin who was watching her reaction to me, and she instantly turned on the charm. A smile spread across her face but did not reach her eyes as she retuned my greeting.
“It is so nice to meet you, Harper. Justin has such nice things to say about you.”
I furrowed my brow as I shot Justin a curious look.
“Really? We’ve only met briefly a couple of times.”
Justin jumped in. “Sarah always had such nice things to say about what a wonderful boss you were, I found myself repeating it to my sister.”
“That is very sweet, Justin. Can I get you guys anything?”
“Yes, Sarah raved about your chocolate dream cupcakes so I thought we would get a couple to go. Caroline isn’t a big sweets fan but I am positive your cupcakes will convert her.”
“I hope so! There is nothing better than a delicious homemade pastry!” I smiled at both of them but I was getting a strange vibe from Caroline.
She wrapped her hand around Justin’s arm as she gently nudged him with her hip.
“I’m not sure sweets are such a good idea right now, Justin, we have a lot of work to do and all of that sugar is going to make you crash and not want to do a thing.”
Justin gave her a playful smile. “Not possible. I’ll be able to work long into the night if necessary.”
I looked at both of them. “Oh? Are you working on some special project?”
Caroline once again gave me a cool stare and cocked her head to the side.
“No. Just tying up loose ends with Sarah’s belongings.”
I
didn’t want to know any more and was pretty sure Caroline would have put the kibosh on any questions I had if I had asked them. She was strange and I didn’t want to be around her any longer than was necessary. I just nodded my head as I boxed two cupcakes.
“Enjoy, you two, and good luck with the stuff you have to do.” Before I could stop myself, the next words rolled off my tongue. “Justin, if there is anything I can do to help you just let me know.” Sometimes I was too nice for my own good.
His smile was sincere. “Thank you, Harper. I appreciate that.”
I returned his smile and when my eyes met Caroline’s, my smile fell. She was openly scowling at me. She grabbed his arm and practically pulled him out of the bakery.
“Come on, Justin. We have a lot to do.”
I could have sworn Justin gave me an apologetic look as he was ushered out of the bakery, and as I replayed the entire encounter the only word I could think of to describe it was ‘strange’. Justin’s sister was extremely possessive of him and it was odd. I realized I was thinking about it too much and had my own work to do and then it hit me. She didn’t ask about making a tribute cake for Sarah. Why would Carrie tell me that if it was not true?
The whole thing was weird and I decided not to dwell on it. If she came back and requested a cake in Sarah’s honor I would be happy to make it for her. Until that happened, I decided to just push Justin and his strange sister out of my mind.
Later that afternoon I packed a box of donuts and I decided to swing by the police department to let Detective Sloane know that I had a possible lead on who might have had something to do with Sarah’s death. I figured a little afternoon treat would be a nice pick me up for the officers. As I opened the door, greeted by Doreen’s smiling face, I noticed little butterflies dancing in my belly. I had not seen Andrew in over a week and I realized that I missed him. I smiled to myself at that realization, and just as quickly as I smiled, the smile fell away as I remembered his beautiful girlfriend. I slowly let out a disappointed sigh as I forced myself to smile at Doreen.
“Harper, it’s nice to see you, honey. What can I do for you?”
“Hi Doreen, is Detective Sloane available? I need to talk to him about something.”
“I’ll check hon’, one sec,” she said as she dialed his extension. A few seconds later she sent me back to his office.
He greeted me with a smile and I thought I was going to melt into the ground. He was so handsome and for just a few seconds, I forgot why I was there.
“Ms. Madison, isn’t this a nice surprise. How can I help you?”
I kind of shook my head to focus on the reason I was there and he gave me a curious half smile.
“Harper, are you okay?”
“Me? Sure! Of course!” Wow, I needed to bring that energy back down to a sane person’s level.
He gave me another funny look and I cleared my throat and jumped into why I was there to take the focus off of my over-excited behavior.
“Carrie and I went to New York to see Janice and I found out some interesting information about Sarah.”
“Harper, please tell me that you did not go to New York to investigate Sarah’s murder.”
“We went for a girl’s trip and to see an old friend. We just happened to stumble upon some information that I think you are going to want to follow up on.”
“Was this a pre-planned trip? Did Janice know you were coming?”
Why did that matter? I was trying to give him information!
“Well, not exactly. Carrie and I like to be spontaneous sometimes and this was one of those times. We remembered that Janice lived there and dropped by for a bit. It was completely harmless.”
“Somehow when I hear that from you I am not convinced. I am probably going to regret asking this, but what is this information that you have?”
“Sarah was involved with the underground poker world and she owed a lot of money to some people who are not very nice.”
“Underground Poker? In Prairie Cove?” he asked, looking thoroughly confused.
“Oh! No, no! In New York City. Apparently whenever she visited Janice in New York she disappeared for a couple of days playing underground poker. I guess it became a big problem because she lost a lot of money. Now that I think about it that must have been the real issue when Sarah told me she needed the job because she had fallen on hard times. She owed money to what I can only assume is a loan shark.”
“Did Janice happen to mention the name of this person Sarah owed money to?” Andrew asked.
“Yes, his name is Joe Dibello.”
He started to write down the name and his pen stopped in mid-air as he furrowed his eyebrows and then he looked up at me. He did not look happy as he slowly let out a deep sigh.
“Harper, did you see Joe Dibello or did he see you?”
“No, why?”
Andrew breathed a sigh of relief as he raised his eyes to mine.
“Joe Dibello is a very dangerous man, someone you don’t want to mess with. I know you like to think of yourself as an amateur sleuth, but this is dangerous territory, Harper. You have to promise me that you will not go looking for this guy.”
I had never seen such a look of worry on his face and I was touched that he cared that much. I could tell that he was serious so I didn’t even attempt to make light of the situation. The last thing I wanted was to get hurt so I was going to back off of trying to find Joe…or at least I was going to try.
“Okay, I promise,” I said with fingers mentally crossed.
I would soon find out that some promises had to be broken.
“Is there anything else you can tell me about the trip that might help with Sarah’s investigation?”
“I don’t think so, it was a short trip, and as soon as we found out about her gambling problem we decided that was enough of a lead to look into Joe Dibello. But now that I know how dangerous he is, I won’t be doing any snooping into his life.”
Again, I mentally crossed my fingers.
“That’s what I want to hear. I do still want your help going over the guest list. Do you have some free time now or is the bakery beckoning?”
“I have time now, I just have to call Carrie to let her know I will be gone for a little while longer.”
“Okay, great.”
I called Carrie and had to keep a straight face when she teased me about spending extra time with Andrew. I quickly got off the phone with her and settled into the chair Andrew had pulled up beside him. I glanced at the list and didn’t realize that so many people had been invited. I mean, I guess I knew most of Prairie Cove was invited, but it didn’t hit me just how many people that consisted of until I saw the list.
“Wow, the list is much longer than I thought it would be.”
“I know it looks daunting but if we just start at the beginning and work our way down, you will be surprised at how quickly this will go.” Andrew’s tone was so reassuring and I wanted to do whatever I could to help him.
We worked our way through the list and I recognized nearly every single person. Justin, Sarah, and his sister, Caroline, were all listed together. I thought about the big guy who had harassed Sarah at the bakery and the guy I thought I saw at the Hanson’s party, and I wondered if that was Joe Dibello.
“Andrew, what does Joe Dibello look like?”
“He looks exactly like the person you described who showed up to bother Sarah at the bakery last week. Tall, dark hair, menacing, big…all the things you need to stay away from. Why?”
“I think he was at the Hanson’s party.”
“Hmmm, Sarah must have owed him a lot of money for Joe to travel to Prairie Cove from New York City. I am going to do some digging to see if I can find out how much her debt was to him.”
I looked at him and worry washed over me. “Hey.”
He looked at me with those gorgeous blue eyes and my belly did a little flip. I was painfully aware of how close he was sitting to me and for a few seconds I forgot what I was going to say.
“Yes?” He gently touched my arm and the feeling of worry came back, jogging my memory.
“Just like you told me to steer clear of Joe Dibello because he is dangerous, promise me you will be careful when you look for him.”
A small smile touched the corner of his mouth and I could feel myself blushing.
“Harper Madison, are you worried about me?”
I felt flustered and just knew my cheeks were bright red.