Cherry Cheesecake Murder (27 page)

Hannah tested the gate. It wasn’t locked. She could step in at any time. She did her best not to think about the dire consequences that could follow her action, but her mind continued to drown her in a cascade of scenarios. The bull would attack her, pin her to the rails, and gore her. That was the first scenario. The second scenario had the bull turning on Andrea and attacking her instead of Hannah. But if that happened, Hannah would still be in danger because Bill would attack her the minute he got back from Florida. The third scenario was a little less ugly but equally scary. The bull wouldn’t attack anyone, but he’d start bellowing, and Winnie would come out with her shotgun and shoot both Hannah and Andrea. There was also a fourth scenario and Hannah liked that one the best. The bull would fall in love with Hannah’s cookies, become her mascot at The Cookie Jar, and sit beside Moishe on one of the tables by the front window, sniffing cookies the way Disney’s Ferdinand had sniffed flowers.

“Hannah!” Andrea’s voice roused her from the last and most ridiculous scenario. “What are you waiting for? Larry likes Peanut Butter Melts and I’ve only got two left!”

“Okay,” Hannah said and opened the gate to the pen. She slipped inside, went straight to the box on the wall, and opened it. “Jackpot,” she breathed, pulling out a plastic bag. But it was far too light to include a gun, even a prop gun. They’d struck out and put themselves in danger for nothing!

“Hurry, Hannah. I’m on the last cookie and Larry doesn’t like anything but peanut butter.”

“Okay. I’m almost through.” Hannah exited the bullpen without incident and made sure the gate was securely latched behind her. She was just preparing to give Andrea the bad news when all the lights in the barn went on.

“Freeze, you varmints! I’ve got you covered six ways to Sunday!”

Hannah glanced toward the door to see Winnie heading toward them, a shotgun cradled in her arms. She was about to raise her arms in surrender and advise Andrea to do the same when she realized that Winnie wasn’t wearing her glasses.

“Down,” she hissed, pushing her sister down in the hay. “Follow me. We’ll hug the side wall of the barn and crawl out.”

“But…won’t Winnie see us?”

“She can’t see a thing without her glasses and she’s not wearing them. Just follow me. It won’t be pretty, but we’ll make it.”

Truer words were never spoken. By the time they’d crawled through the feed trough that ran along the outside of the stanchions, Hannah and Andrea were covered with liquids and solids that would give a microbiologist a nice workout.

The smaller door was standing open and Hannah raised her head to check on Winnie’s whereabouts. “Run!” Hannah hissed, grabbing her sister’s hand and pulling her through the open door.

Both sisters were breathing hard by the time they arrived at the Volvo. Andrea used her remote to open the door, and she was about to slide into the driver’s seat when she looked down at herself. “Yuck!”

“And another yuck for me,” Hannah said, realizing that she was just as filthy as Andrea. Do you have any blankets in the trunk?”

“Of course I do! I have two thermal blankets. They’re part of my Minnesota Winter Driver Survival Kit. Bill puts it together and he doesn’t let me take it out of the trunk until June.”

“Smart man,” Hannah said, recalling that they’d once had a blizzard in May. “You take one blanket and I’ll take the other. We’ll sit on them so we won’t get your upholstery dirty.”

“What is this stuff, anyway?” Andrea asked, popping the trunk and taking out the blankets.

“It’s muck. Drive straight to my place and we’ll take showers.”

“A shower would be good, but I don’t have any clean clothes with me.”

“Michelle left a pair of jeans and a sweatshirt the last time she stayed over. You can use those.”

“But…maybe I should just go home.”

“And let this muck dry on you? Don’t be silly, Andrea. Cow pies are like plaster. Once they set, nothing less than a flamethrower can dislodge them.”

“Cow pies?” Andrea turned to her sister in shock. “Are they the same as muck?”

“Pretty much. At least in our case.”

“Well, why didn’t you say so in the first place?! Hang on and we’ll be at your place in less than ten minutes!”

“You look like you’ve been through the wars,” Lisa said when Hannah came into the kitchen of The Cookie Jar the next morning.

“That about covers it.” Hannah headed to the sink to wash her hands.

“Where’s Moishe?”

“Home sleeping. He doesn’t have any scenes today.”

“I bet he’ll miss all the attention he gets when he’s here.”

“I don’t think so,” Hannah replied, reaching for the soap. “When I told him he didn’t have to come to work with me today, he licked my hand and then he burrowed under the blankets and hid at the bottom of the bed.”

“He must have needed a day off. And speaking of days off, I think you should have taken one. Were you out late last night investigating?”

Hannah shook her head as she lathered up. “I don’t investigate.”

“You don’t?”

“Absolutely not. Only an investigator can investigate. I’m just a small-town snoop.”

Lisa laughed. “Still arguing over semantics with Mike?”

“No.” Hannah rinsed her hands, thought about it for a minute, and then she nodded. “Yes.”

“Let me see if I’ve got this right. You promised Mike you wouldn’t investigate, but you didn’t promise him that you wouldn’t snoop?”

“Something like that.”

“That’s my partner!” Lisa crowed, well pleased with her ability to figure it all out. “So where did you snoop last night?”

Hannah dried her hands and headed for the work island. Lisa was mixing up a batch of Boggles, and the recipe for Cinnamon Crisps was next in line on the recipe holder. “Andrea and I did a little B and E.”

“Breaking and entering?” Lisa looked shocked when Hannah nodded. “Where?”

“Winnie Henderson’s barn.” Hannah headed off to the walk-in cooler to get the butter and the eggs. Once she’d carried them back to her workstation, she gathered the dry ingredients from the pantry and arranged everything in order. She was ready to start mixing the dough when she realized that Lisa was still staring at her. “What?”

“Why?” Lisa countered.

“Why what?”

“Why did you and Andrea break into Winnie Henderson’s barn?”

“Winnie left the dress rehearsal early, so she wasn’t searched. She’s familiar with firearms, and a couple of her husbands had nice gun collections that might have included revolvers that resembled the prop gun. She didn’t want Dean to use the park for the skating scene, and Dean was the kind of guy who wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

“And that’s a motive?”

“It’s a pretty good one. Winnie could have figured that a real suicide on the set would shut the movie down. Then Ross and his company would leave town.”

“Makes sense,” Lisa said, getting out another of the large stainless steel mixing bowls they used and grabbing the next recipe on the rack. “You can ask her some probing questions when she comes in at noon.”

“Winnie’s coming here?”

“That’s what she said when she called this morning. She apologized for not coming in yesterday, but she had to rush home to meet the vet.”

Hannah thought about that for a moment. Winnie had cattle, horses, several dogs, some cats, and a flock of chickens. With that many animals, it was certainly possible that one of them had required medical attention. The excuse was reasonable, but that didn’t necessarily mean it was true. “What was wrong?”

“The bull had some sort of intestinal upset and it made him really ornery. Winnie said he’s usually pretty good-natured, but not yesterday. It took Winnie, the hired man, and four of the neighbors to subdue him so the vet could give him a shot of antibiotics.”

Hannah felt her stomach drop down to her knees and come slowly back up again. She’d gone into the pen with a sick, ornery bull and he could have gored her six ways to the center. Her sister had handed that same sick, ornery bull homemade cookies and heaven only knew what that had done for his intestinal problem.

“The good news is the bull’s fine today. Winnie said that when she went out to the barn this morning, he was as quiet as a lamb. That shot the vet gave him must have worked.”

Forget the shot, Hannah said under her breath. My money’s on the five Peanut Butter Melts that Andrea fed him.

Winnie slid onto a stool at the work island and accepted the mug of coffee that Hannah poured for her. “I sure can use some wake-me-up,” she said. “I kept hearing noises in the barn last night.”

“Really?” Hannah asked, placing two mini cherry cheesecakes on a napkin in front of Winnie and hoping she looked more innocent than she felt.

“That’s right. I could have sworn somebody was in there, but when I checked, everything seemed okay. ’Course I couldn’t see much without my glasses.”

“What happened to your glasses?”

“I knocked ’em on the floor when I jumped out of bed and I couldn’t find ’em until this morning.” Winnie took another sip of her coffee. “I apologize for not getting here yesterday, but I had an emergency. Did Lisa tell you about Larry?”

“Larry?”

“My bull. The grandkids named him.”

Hannah had all she could do not to laugh out loud. The bull’s name was Larry, so she hadn’t been lying after all! It couldn’t be a coincidence. She must have heard Winnie mention it and it had stuck in her mind. “Yes, Lisa told me. I’m glad Larry’s better now.”

“Guess you’re not going to try to talk me into letting them use the park.”

“Why not?”

“Use your head, girl! Now that their big-shot director is dead, they’ll be packing up and leaving town.” Something in Hannah’s expression must have tipped her off, because Winnie cocked her head and stared at Hannah curiously. “Won’t they?”

“I don’t think so. At least that’s not what I heard last night. Most of the important scenes have already been filmed, and there are only four to go. Lynne Larchmont is going to direct those.”

“You mean they still want to use the park?”

“That’s right. I hope you’ll let them use it, Winnie.”

Winnie gave a deep sigh. “I said they could use it if they didn’t move the statue my brother made of the first mayor, but that highfaluting director wanted it out of the way. He said it would ruin the shot. He wanted to move it clear over by the bandstand. I figured for sure they’d break it and Arnie put a lot of work into making it. It’s the only thing of his I got left.”

“Maybe they don’t have to move it that far. How would you feel about it if they just hoisted it up out of camera range?”

“You mean…they could just pick it straight up and leave it dangling in the air while they did whatever they had to do?”

“That’s exactly what I mean.”

Winnie considered that for a minute and then she shrugged. “I don’t know what to say. Would I still get the money?”

“I’ll have to check for sure, but I think so.”

“Well just between you and me, it would sure come in handy right now. Elmer Petersen over in Eagle Bend’s selling off twenty head, and he’s got a couple of Jerseys I wouldn’t mind mixing in with mine. They’re good producers according to Betty Jackson over at the dairy.”

“So you’ll agree if you get the money?”

Hannah was wise enough not to say a word as Winnie thought it over. The seconds ticked by so slowly it seemed that time had stopped, but finally Winnie gave a little nod. “I’ll sign that paper if they swear they’ll just lift up the statue and put it right back down again when they’re through. No moving it anywhere. Just up and back down. And I’m going to be right there to make sure they do it right.”

“I’ll call Ross and find out if it’s a deal,” Hannah promised, refilling Winnie’s coffee cup and then heading for the phone.

“Hi, Hannah,” Ross said, answering on the first ring of his cell phone. “I was just about to call you.”

“Well, I beat you to it. I’m sitting here with Winnie Henderson and she’s going to sign that release form to use the park as a location, with some stipulations.”

“What stipulations?”

“Dean was going to actually move the statue somewhere else and then put it back again. Winnie wants it lifted up in the air, held there by a crane or something, and then put right back down again.”

“We can do that,” Ross said. “We’d have to use a crane to lift it anyway.”

“She wants to be there to make sure you do it right, and she also wants the…hold on a second,” Hannah covered the mouthpiece with her hand and turned to Winnie. “How much did Dean promise to pay you if you signed the release?”

“Five thousand. And it was Connor doing the promising.”

“Okay, I’ll tell him that.” Hannah turned back to the phone again. She was feeling a bit like an agent and she wasn’t sure whether she liked the role or not. “Winnie says Connor promised to pay her five thousand dollars if she signed. Is that okay?”

“That’s fine. We allotted six thousand in the budget.”

Hannah frowned slightly. “I heard Dean tell Connor that five thousand was as high as he could go.”

“Then Dean must have had plans for that other thousand. He was a whittler, Hannah. A lot of the guys who make the big bucks are.”

“What do you mean?”

“They nickel and dime the production companies. It’s like a guy who earns a hundred thousand dollars from a big corporation and steals pens and paper to use at home. He could buy his own, but it makes him feel good to put one over on the company.”

“And Dean did that?”

Ross laughed. “All the time. He just about drove our accountant crazy. You know those cheesecakes you delivered to his trailer? He charged the budget a hundred dollars for paper plates and plastic forks, and Michelle told me they cost less than ten dollars at the Red Owl.”

“Oh, boy!” Hannah breathed, shaking her head. “That really is cheap, especially because if he’d asked me, I would have provided them free of charge.”

“That wouldn’t have made any difference to Dean. He loved to pad his vouchers for out-of-pocket expenses. It was just the way he did business.”

Another reason somebody might have killed him, Hannah thought, but she didn’t say it. Since Tom Larchmont was the moneyman, she’d add it to his motive later. “Shall I tell Winnie it’s a go, then?”