Ginny Gold - Early Bird Café 03 - Dead and Berried (4 page)

Kori nearly walked straight into Holly Barton as she rushed back to her booth.

“Hey Kori. Everything okay? You’re moving like there’s a fire,” Holly said, forcing Kori to pause and acknowledge her mistake.

She and Zach had parted ways at her car so he could survey the area and make sure the security was tight.

“Sorry about that Holly. How are the pony rides going?” Holly owned Meadowlark Dairy, where Kori bought all of her milk, yogurt and most of her cheeses for the café. Holly had eventually expanded to reach a broader audience and had horses, ponies, cows, goats and sheep. Holly worked all summer long at events where pony rides or petting zoos were requested and her husband took care of the milking. All of the ponies, goats and sheep were here this weekend.

“They’ve been a huge hit, as expected. And Jackie’s been a huge help. She told me she helped you unpack your car this morning.”

Kori nodded, disappointed that she wouldn’t be able to get Jackie to help in her own booth this afternoon and tomorrow. “She’s a hard worker. You’re lucky to have her.”

“Well,” Holly chucked, “I’m not sure she’s there for the love of the ponies. My nephew is also helping out. She hasn’t been able to take her eyes off him all day.”

Kori smiled. She’d been right this morning when she suspected Jackie wanted to be here because of a boy and that’s why it had been so hard to convince her mom to not work at The Treasure Chest all weekend. So much for getting her to work weekends at the café if she just followed boys around.

“Well, I’ve gotta get back to my tent. No one’s serving right now. I had to leave it alone so I could get some lunch.”

“Bye Kori.” Holly waved and continued heading toward her pickup and horse trailer.

Kori tied Ibis back to the tent post next to her bowl of water and Ibis quickly lapped it all up, then lay down and closed her eyes. She was always spent after a visit to Milo and Otis.

Kori found everything just as she’d left it. She started unpacking her supplies, focusing on serving the strawberry rhubarb pies now that everyone would have eaten lunch. She was counting on them being ready for some dessert.

As she placed the first pie on her table, she saw her mother approaching and braced for some dramatic revelation. Gale always had an epic story to share. At least
, epic in her mind. Kori was often either underwhelmed or already knew about it.

“Kori, you’re back! I can’t believe you took time away from your tent.”
Gale always participated in the crazy hat contest and was still donning her pride and joy—she always wore the same thing. Years ago she had fashioned a small birdcage from thin wire. Inside was a bird flying down to a strawberry plant. She had to get a new plant each year, but there were always plenty around to use. She’d won the first year she’d worn it and had opened the flood gates to crazier and crazier hats. But she’d never made anything more outrageous, just stuck with what worked. Once.

Kori rolled her eyes as discretely as she could manage.
“I had to eat,” she told her mother with the little patience she had for her today.

“Do you need help? I could cover breaks for you.”

Kori couldn’t say no, but she wished someone else was offering. Gale had a mind of her own and was usually on a mission of her own to match it. “That’d be great. I should be all set for the rest of today but if you could come tomorrow at eleven I’ll get you setup to be here alone from noon to one.”

“Of course. I’m going to the
pie toss now. I volunteered to let pies be thrown at me. Can you believe it?” Gale was nearly in hysterics at the thought of kids throwing pies at her face and Kori wished she could see it.

As Gale left, Jay approached, like he’d been waiting for their mother to depart before coming to talk to his sister. Kori found his arrival much calmer than
their mother’s.

“Hey Jay, what’s up?” she asked him while piling more pies on the table and starting to cut them.

“Need some help?” He didn’t wait for a response and headed behind the table, picking up the second knife and laying into a pie.

“Thanks. Today has been crazy. What have you been doing?”

“You won’t believe this, but Jenna talked me into helping paint faces.”

Jay was right, she couldn’t believe it. “How’d she manage that?” she asked through her laughter.

“I’m still not sure. But when one kid walked away looking like a lion when he’d requested to be a tiger I got fired. By the kids, not by Jenna.” Jay was laughing by now too.

Just then Holly walked back through the front gates from the parking lot looking panicked.

“What’s up, Holly? Everything okay?” Kori asked as Holly blindly walked near her tent.

Holly looked up, a confused look on her face.
“I … I’m not sure. I can’t find my shovel and the ponies never stop pooping. I swear I brought three but I can only find two now. I feel like I’m losing my mind. Oh well. They’ll just have to shovel faster.”

Before Kori or Jay could offer to help in whatever way they felt possible
, Holly headed away from Kori’s tent, back toward the pony ride area. Kori knew she couldn’t help anyway, but Jay’s mouth was hanging open like he was going to offer to go to her farm to check.

Without giving her missing shovel a second though
t, Kori asked Jay, “How are you and Lani? Still going strong?”

Jay wouldn’t look up to meet her gaze but nodded while he continued slicing pies. “Yeah. We’re going to the fireworks together tonight.”

A fireworks show was always put on after the first night of the festival and it was tradition for Jay and Kori to avoid going with their mom.

“That’s great. I’m glad you have an excuse this year. Last year didn’t you go with Mom?”

“Yeah. I couldn’t believe how excited she was over every single firework that went off. It was like she was three and seeing them for the first time.” They both laughed. “What about you? Are you going with her?”

“I doubt it. I’ll be too tired by the time I close my booth at five. I’m not even going to try to come up with an excuse other than I’m too tired.”

“You use that every year.”

“And it’s always true!”

Finally, customers started arriving and buying pie by the slice. As soon as the first person showed interest, it was a domino effect and Kori was relieved that her lunch break hadn’t turned everyone off of her treats.

Kori also saw Nora walk in and finally set
up her booth. Mayor Devlin stopped by Nora’s tent and exchanged some words with her but Kori couldn’t make them out. He didn’t look happy that she came half a day late. Kori couldn’t really blame him, but given the circumstances …

As soon as Nora got her display arranged, she was swarmed by festival goers. There were plenty of Hermit Cove residents who’d been waiting all day for Nora to arrive so they could buy her homemade strawberry jam. It was a particular favorite and Kori would be serving it as often as possible at the café.

For the last two weeks Kori had helped Nora can the strawberry jam late into the evenings. They’d made everything from low sugar to no pectin and it would sell out by the end of the day tomorrow. Some preferred bigger chunks of strawberries still intact—preserves—others were looking for something more resembling paste—jelly—and finally there were those who wanted something in the middle—jam.

They’d made it all.

With Jay’s help, the rest of the afternoon went smoothly and Kori wasn’t quite as tired as she’d expected—though she wasn’t going to tell her mother that. Just before five, Gale came walking toward her tent and Jay took off, promising to help tomorrow as well.

“You’re going to the fireworks tonight?” Gale asked, just as Kori had expected her to.

“Sorry, Mom. I’m dead tired after serving all day. These days are longer than my normal days at the café so I’m going to have to skip them this year.”

“No problem.” Gale glanced around her before continuing in a whisper
, “I actually have a date.”

Kori made a point to not let her jaw hang open at this revelation. Maybe that was why her mother had been so calm right after lunch. Gale’s smile was that of a five year old on Christmas morning.

“Wh—who’s the lucky man?” Kori stammered, not sure she really wanted to know.

“Norm Devlin.”

“The
mayor?
” Kori asked, this time unable to keep the surprise from leaking through. She had to pause in her packing up to fully focus on this conversation.

Gale nodded like a giddy school girl. “I’ll see you tomorrow before noon.” Then she smiled and turned
to walk away.

Kori had to consciously refocus on the task at hand and finish packing up her tent. She decided to leave
her cooking tools out rather than putting them back in her car for the night. She’d only have to bring the coolers home to refill the batters, fillings, toppings and pies.

Just as she was finishing, Nora walked over and picked up a pile of two nearly empty coolers. “Need help?” she asked.

“Sure. They all have to go back to the café so I can bring everything for tomorrow. Thank God I already have everything made. I don’t know if I’d be able to manage working longer today.”

“Tell me about it. I don’t think missing the morning even had an effect on my sales.”

“You still have enough jars of jam for tomorrow?” Kori asked, grabbing two more coolers and following Nora out to her car, Ibis tailing her, leash dragging on the ground.

“Yup. And strawberry plants too. You have dinner plans?”

Kori put her coolers down next to her car and popped the trunk. She had no idea how she’d fit all the coolers and supplies in her car earlier and still found a spot for Ibis. She packed the coolers into the trunk before answering. “Just something premade from the freezer. And a bottle of wine. Want to join me?”

“Love to. Let me just stop by home to feed the dogs and I’ll see you in half an hour.”

As soon as Kori got home and took Ibis for a quick walk, she set to work making sure she had everything all set for tomorrow morning. She arranged all of the crepe and waffle batters, toppings, fillings and more pies near the front of the walk-in fridge and then headed upstairs.

Just when the oven was preheated and she was putting in a couple frozen spinach enchiladas, Nora walked through the front door.

“Oh good, you let yourself in. I couldn’t remember if I’d left the café unlocked,” Kori said, turning around and placing a bottle of red wine on the island.

Nora took a seat on a stool and started opening the bottle. “I locked it behind me. I hope you weren’t expecting anyone else.”

Kori pulled out veggies for a quick salad and grabbed two glasses from the cabinet for Nora to fill. “Did you find out anything else this afternoon about Dan Roche?” Kori asked, ignoring Nora’s obvious line about having Zach join them and getting straight to the topic they needed to discuss.

Nora shook her head. “I think you’d be in a better position for that. But I did spend all afternoon distracted thinking about possible suspects.”

Kori paused in her veggie chopping and pulled the piece of paper with their only suspect listed so far—Stanley Roche—from her pocket and was ready to add another name. “Did you come up with anyone?”

Nora got the bottle of wine opened and talked while she poured two glasses. “AJ Long. You know that name?”

“Yeah. Actually I hired him last month to help me take care of an ant problem in the café. He would definitely have access to rat poison.”

AJ had been the only pest exterminator in Hermit Cove for as long as Kori could remember—all the way back to when she was a kid and he would spray
yards for mosquitoes. She was glad that fad had ended.

“But I was thinking about Stanley too. And so would he.”

“As a teacher? I don’t know.”

“A
chemistry
teacher,” Nora stressed. “Even if he didn’t have any, I bet he could make some.”

Kori was skeptical. “Maybe.” She sipped her glass of wine and turned back to the salad she was making.
“But you said yourself that a teacher couldn’t be a killer. And his own brother?”

Nora nodded. “I know. I just feel like we have to keep him on the list.”

“Oh, he’ll stay on the list. But I think we should talk to him. Find out what he was doing Friday night. And what kind of stuff is in the chemistry lab that he’d have access to over the summer.”

“Good point. He’s not even working right now. Back to AJ. What might he have against Dan? Why would he want to kill him? He definitely has access to rat poison, but what about a motive?”

“I’m not sure. And when I hired him, he was all about natural remedies. I used ground cinnamon and lemon juice around entrance points and my ant infestation was gone within a week. And it was all stuff I had. I didn’t even have to buy anything from him. Maybe he
doesn’t
use poisons.”

“Come on. Of course he does. But you were trying to get rid of ants in a café. Maybe it’s not up to code to use poisons.”