Creamsicle Murder: A Frosted Love Cozy Mystery - Book 11 (Frosted Love Cozy Mysteries) (4 page)

Missy
had to deliver dozens upon dozens of cupcakes to graduation parties all over
town, so her amateur sleuthing had to be put on hold for longer than she’d
anticipated. It was five o’clock before she knew it, and the growling of her
stomach alerted her to the fact that she hadn’t had anything to eat since a
hastily consumed blueberry cupcake and cup of coffee around 4 a.m. Heading home
for dinner and to walk the dogs, Missy had to pull over onto the shoulder of
the two lane road that ran through the heart of town. A long line of vehicles
which included an ambulance, a fire truck, and six patrol cars zoomed by with
lights and sirens ablaze. She looked in her rearview mirror to see if there
were any large plumes of smoke behind her, but seeing none, once the emergency
vehicles had passed, she pulled back onto the road thinking nothing more of it.

Toffee
and Bitsy were more than excited to see Missy, and frolicked happily at the
park for more than an hour. Leading the two joyfully tired canines home,
Missy’s thoughts turned to what she might want to fix for dinner. There had
been a text from Chas earlier in the day, which had said simply, “We need to
talk.” Not wanting to be rude, but still needing to avoid him while her
emotions were raw and there was an investigation to pursue, she’d merely responded,
“K,” with no intention of making arrangements to see him anytime soon.

She’d
been spending so little time at home lately, that her refrigerator and pantry
were pretty sparse. Grabbing a sandwich and a bunch of plump, chilled grapes,
she sat at the kitchen table, reviewing the notes she’d taken regarding Ian’s
murder. Everything that had been turned up pointed to Ivana as the culprit –
jealous comments, irrational behavior, temper tantrums, and other suspicious
acts that unfortunately had no direct physical evidence tying them to Ian’s
murder. There had to be something that she was missing. Missy tapped the
notebook with her pen, trying to read between the lines and figure out her next
move.

It
was no use, she had to gather more information before she could successfully
shift the focus off of her and onto Ivana. Carefully stashing her notebook and
papers back into the kitchen drawer, she grabbed her keys and purse, tossing
treats to Toffee and Bitsy on the way out, she headed for the movie site. On
her way out of town, she saw the emergency vehicles again, headed in the
opposite direction, moving equally as fast.

“Hi
Charlie,” Missy greeted the private security guard standing at the entrance to
the site. “How are you this evening?”

“Hey,
little lady,” the rugged Texan drawled amiably. “You just missed all the
excitement around here,” he said, sucking on a toothpick clenched between his
teeth.

“More
excitement?” Missy chuckled. “What on earth could have happened now?”

The
guard’s expression darkened. “It’s bad, ma’am. One of the detectives, who’s
been spending quite a bit of  time “interviewing” Miss Ivana, took a knife
right in the back. Don’t know how bad he was hurt, but he wasn’t moving when
they took him out,” he shook his head.

Missy’s
heart pounded and her stomach lurched. “One of the detectives? Which one?” she
clutched at Charlie’s arm.

The
guard looked at her curiously. “It was the LaChance guy – tall, dark and
handsome – looked like he was one of the actors.” He looked at Missy with
concern as she swayed unsteadily in front of him. “Ma’am, are you okay?” he
called, as she turned and fled toward the parking lot.

If
Missy had been even remotely conscious of her actions, she would have realized
that she was breaking nearly every traffic law that ever existed, running red
lights, speeding, and weaving in and out of what little traffic crawled down
the streets of town as she rushed to the hospital. Fortunately, the good folks
of LaChance tended to roll up the sidewalks of the sleepy town at around 9:00
every night, so there was nearly no traffic, and almost every law enforcement
vehicle was currently at the hospital, awaiting news about Chas.

Missy
could barely breathe, her heart was in her throat and tears rolled freely down
her cheeks as she parked her car and ran for the hospital lobby. She managed to
convince the sweet elderly ladies at the help desk, to whom she had delivered
cupcakes for more than one social, to divulge Chas’s location. He was currently
still in surgery for the knife wound, but the ladies were unable to provide
information about his condition. Taking the elevator to the surgery waiting
room, she saw a roomful of policeman milling about, looking grim, and
approached an officer that she recognized vaguely from having stopped by the
station numerous times to pick up Chas, to ask  if he’d heard anything about
the detective’s condition. The officer looked at her strangely and shook his
head dismissively.

Missy
started to panic. The love of her life was in surgery for a knife wound and no
one was telling her anything. Shaking, she approached the officer again.

“Look,
I’m sorry to bother you, but please, if there’s anything that you can tell me
about his condition, anything at all…” she pleaded, before being abruptly cut
off.

“You’ve
got a lot of nerve coming here, lady,” the cop said, shaking his head in
disbelief. “If you think I’m going to give you the time of day, you’re crazier
than we thought, and if anything…” the angry officer swallowed hard. “If
anything happens to that man in there,” he jabbed a finger in the direction of
the surgical unit, “there’ll be hell to pay. Mark my words.” The officer turned
away, leaving Missy scared, heartbroken, and utterly mystified. She couldn’t
fathom why the cop was so angry with her, and why no one would tell her
anything.

She
fled the hospital, and not knowing what to do, she picked up her dogs and an
overnight bag, and drove straight to her friend Echo’s house, desperately
needing to talk to someone. Echo was a free-spirited ex-Californian who owned
the vegan ice cream shop across the street from Crème de la Cupcake. Her
soothing manner and practical wisdom was something Missy could really use a
super-sized dose of at the moment. When her beatific, red-haired friend opened
the front door to her bohemian cottage, Missy fell into her arms sobbing. She’d
tried to be strong, but seeing that loving, familiar face broke through all of
her defenses, and the tears that she’d been suppressing for days flowed freely.

Echo
wrapped an arm around her despairing friend, murmuring soothingly and led her
into the house, seating her on the overstuffed sofa. She handed Missy a box of
tissue, and disappeared into the kitchen to whip up a pot of chamomile and
lavender tea. Returning with two steaming mugs of the comforting brew, she
gently encouraged her friend to let it all out and tell her what was wrong.

The
two hadn’t really had a chance to catch up since Missy had started baking for
the cast and crew, and Echo wasn’t one to read the newspaper or listen to the
radio, so she’d been blissfully unaware of the heartache with which her friend
had been dealing for the past few weeks. She shook her head in disbelief and
shared in Missy’s pain as the story unfolded.

“But
why was the officer at the hospital so mean to you?” she asked, baffled.

Missy’s
tears had now turned to a numb, quiet grief. “I don’t know,” she
half-whispered, unconsciously shredding a tissue in her angst.

“Do
you think that they actually believe that horrible actress and think that you
murdered Ian?” she asked quietly.

“Probably.
Ivana is apparently convincing enough to have totally bamboozled Chas. He’s one
of the most intelligent men I’ve ever known, and he seems to have fallen for
her, hook, line and sinker,” Missy said miserably.

“I
doubt that,” Echo shook her head. “That man is crazy about you, sweetie. He’s
not just going to toss aside everything that the two of you have for some
Hollywood psycho,” she said, sipping her tea.

“It
is
hard to believe that he can’t see through her little fantasy world,” Missy
admitted.

“Did
you ever stop to think that he may be pretending to like her just so he can get
some insider info?”

“It’s
possible, I suppose,” she sounded skeptical. “I just hope that he’s okay.” Her
eyes welled with tears. She couldn’t bear the thought of something happening to
that amazing man. Even if he had fallen for Ivana Cherie, the world would be a
darker place without him in it.

“I
have an idea…” Echo said, putting her mug of tea down on the coffee table, and
playing with Toffee’s ears. The dog had settled on Missy’s feet, picking up on
her discomfort. Bitsy had taken up residence in her lap and was sleeping
soundly.

“What?”
Missy looked up hopefully.

“Well,
you couldn’t know this, because we haven’t talked in a while, but I recently started
seeing someone,” she smiled.

“Oh,
Echo, that’s great, I’m happy for you,” her friend smiled wanly.

“Yes,
it is, but that’s not the point,” she sat forward. “My new…friend is a reporter
for the News Gazette. I bet he can make some phone calls and find out how Chas
is – he’s pretty good friends with the Chief of Police,” she said excitedly.

Missy
sat up straight. “Yes – call him, please!”

Echo
got on her phone and told Joe, her new beau, what was going on. He promised to
see what he could do, and told her he’d call her back when he had news. The two
women didn’t have to wait long, within half an hour, Joe had called back to let
them know that Chas was out of surgery, but still in Intensive Care. The knife
had punctured a lung, which had subsequently filled with blood and collapsed.
His condition was not yet stabilized, and doctors were saying that if he made
it through the night, he might have a chance at survival. Might.

“I
also have some pretty bad news,” Joe confided to Echo on the phone. L

Leaving
Missy drinking a fresh cup of tea in the living room with the dogs, she
wandered casually into the kitchen under the guise of grabbing a snack, but in
reality so that she could talk to Joe with some degree of privacy.

“What’s
the bad news?” she whispered, peeking out of the door of the kitchen to make
certain that Missy hadn’t followed her.

The
reporter hesitated, not wanting to have to be the one who broke this particular
news. “There’s a warrant out for your friend’s arrest.”

As
painful as it might be, Echo knew that she had to break the news of the arrest
warrant to her already distraught friend, in addition to the grim update on
Chas’s condition. Missy absorbed the information in a state of shock. Too numb
to react, she simply nodded.

“What
are you going to do?” Echo asked gently, taking her friend’s cold, limp hand.

“I’m
going to turn myself in,” Missy mumbled, staring into space.

“But,
honey, you haven’t done anything!”

Missy
slowly turned her lifeless gaze to her dear friend. “It really doesn’t matter
anymore Echo. Chas could die, and if he does, I might as well sit in a jail
cell and rot for the rest of my life. My heart will have died anyway,” she said
dully, her grief more than she could bear.

“There
must be something we can do. This isn’t right,” her friend insisted, scared at
Missy’s numb acquiescence.

“No,
it’s not right. It’s not right that one of the finest human beings on the
planet might die. It’s not right that a sleazy little selfish actress is going
to get away with murder, and it’s not right that my life might as well be over.
It’s not right, but it’s reality,” Missy stood, resigned to her fate. “Will you
take care of my babies for me?” she asked, tears beginning to flow as she
kissed the furry faces of her beloved pets. Echo nodded, her own tears falling.
“And let Cheryl and Ben know that the stores are now their responsibility until
further notice,” she added, gathering her purse and keys and heading for the
door.

“Where
are you going?” Echo panicked.

“To
say goodbye,” Missy said softly, closing the door behind her without a backward
glance.

**

Missy
drove to the hospital much more carefully this time, dry-eyed and determined.
She didn’t want to get pulled over and arrested before she had one last chance
to see the love of her life. It didn’t matter that he may have fallen out of
love with her because of Ivana Cherie, it didn’t matter that the entire
LaChance police force thought that she had killed Ian and tried to kill Chas,
it didn’t matter that by going to jail, she would most likely lose everything
she’d ever worked for. What mattered is that she needed to see that handsome
face one last time. Chas might die, and she couldn’t bear the thought of not
seeing him just once more. Even if he lived and she went to prison, she’d probably
never see him again, she wouldn’t be able to bear the disappointment that would
inevitably be in those deep blue eyes.

Taking
a deep breath, she went in the back entrance of the hospital and took the
elevator to the fourth floor, where Chas was being kept in Intensive Care. She
exited the elevator into a sterile hallway with gleaming light grey floors and
walls in a color of green that was supposed to be soothing. There was nothing
soothing about the antiseptic smell and faint beeping of monitors. She strode
past the nurse’s station as though she had every right to be there, turned a
corner, and was met with a wall of black uniforms.

The
policeman who had treated her so rudely in the surgical waiting room stepped
directly into her path.

“Well,
it looks like you’ve saved us the trouble of having to find you to take you to
jail,” he sneered, towering over her.

Missy
rose to her full 5’5” inches, refusing to be deflected from her course of
action. Squaring her shoulders and taking a deep breath, she looked the officer
directly in the eye. “Believe whatever lies that you want to about me, I don’t
care. Take me to jail in a few minutes, I don’t care. What I do care about is
the man lying in that bed,” she gestured at the door behind the officer. “That
man is the love of my life. He means more to me than anything, and if you have
any semblance of a human heart at all, you’ll at least let me see him and say
goodbye before you take me to jail for something that I didn’t do,” she said
quietly, her eyes flashing. Her heart pounded wildly. She had no idea what
she’d do if this belligerent cop denied her access to the last glimpse of her
love.

“How
dare you come in here and presume to make demands, you little…” the cop stepped
toward her menacingly.

“Parsons!”
a commanding voice barked at the advancing officer. “Stand down.”

The
supervisor put a restraining hand on the officer’s shoulder, then turned to
address Missy, who was standing with her hands over her mouth in horror,
looking past the two cops at the woman who had just emerged from Chas’s room.

Ivana
Cherie pounced on Missy like a feral cat, tearing at her face and golden curls
with claw-like hands and snarling like an animal. “You vicious wretch!” the
actress screamed, trying to wrestle Missy to the floor. Parsons stepped in,
roughly wrenching Missy away from the out-of-control diva, and cuffing her
hands behind her back, as alarms began to sound in Chas’s room.