Muffins & Murder (Sweet Bites Book 3) (Sweet Bites Mysteries) (3 page)

All day, the shop had been filled with a succession of customers dressed as witches, vampires, flappers and poodle-skirted teens. It seemed like the whole town of Silver Springs took Halloween to a new level of seriousness, and I was glad I’d let Honey talk me into wearing my cupcake costume. Okay, so maybe it was a little predictable, but that’s not always a bad thing. 

Lenny rocked the Danny Zuko getup, and Kat’s Scooby-Doo Daphne was flawless—and whether they’d planed it that way or not, both suited their personalities to a T. Though business had been picking up as time passed, we were slammed with curious people who heard I had found Francine the previous night—proving again that local gossip traveled at twice the speed of light.

The bell rang over the door again and I let out a sigh before pasting on a smile and turning to find Honey on the other side of the counter, her three children in tow. “Ah, my favorite munchkins!” I said as I came around to snatch three-year-old Zoey out of her mom’s arms, giving her a tight hug. “How are you guys?”

“Good, me hearties!” Chance said in a terrible pirate voice. “If ye don’t give us some cupcakes, we’ll make ye walk the plank.”

I set Zoey on the floor, held up my hands in pretended fright, and backed away again. “In that case, I better make sure you’re all sugared up before you start trick-or-treating.”

“Right, because they might face an evening without sugar if you don’t help them.” Honey rolled her eyes a little and tugged her Afro-wig back into place. Her hundred-plus tiny braids were no doubt pinned up on her head in a flat bun so the wig would fit. It went perfectly with her orange-and-yellow disco costume. I told her just to do her own hair in an afro—her hair had the tight kinkiness required, but she complained that putting it back in cornrows was way too time consuming.

 “We definitely can’t have that sugarlessness!” I leaned back behind the case, pulling out a cupcake for each kid as he or she pointed out their favorites.

“Give me the baby,” Kat demanded, reaching for Zoey.

“Not a baby!” Zoey insisted, even as she leaned toward Kat.

I grinned, Kat was so cute with Honey’s kids.

Honey shooed them all over to a table, grabbing a booster seat for Zoey. Then she came back and I passed over the pumpkin cupcake I knew she wanted, even though she hadn’t mentioned it yet. “You didn’t call me last night,” she said. “I drove out here after I got the kids settled down—finally.” She grinned and her eyebrows lifted. “I saw you and Jack in here, holding hands, looking all snug. I decided not to stop after all.” Her voice was low, so as not to draw the attention of the two geriatric ladies at the table in the corner. “I wanted to come in first thing this morning, but it’s been crazy. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” I couldn’t help but smile as I remembered the half-hour Jack had spent in my shop. “He stopped by to make sure I wasn’t too rattled. It was sweet.”

“You and Jack are up to hand holding?” Kat asked, joining us at the counter. “Since when?”

“Hmmmm.” Honey didn’t say anything else about it as she peeled back the wrapper from her cupcake. “I wonder if he would have gone out to check on
any ol’ person
in your situation.” Her eyes said no. Kat’s agreed, shooting me a pointed look.

Despite not being very impressed when I first met Jack, I’d since learned he was thoughtful and considerate with everyone—and he was the cutest dad, which couldn’t be undervalued. “He was just being a friend,” I said, hoping I was wrong. My feelings for him had been growing in the past months and I really wanted to see if we could have something more than friendship.

“Right. What did the two of you talk about?” Honey asked.

“Stuff.” I shrugged lightly, not ready to discuss everything yet.

“Hey, quit standing around here giving away our merchandise,” Lenny said, nudging me out of the way as he brought over a fresh tray of piña colada cupcakes from the kitchen. “It’s never been so busy here before.” He glanced toward the other side of the display and sighed. “Did we really sell out of those jack-o-lantern cookies already?”

“Just a few minutes ago. And I pulled everything from the back, so that’s it for the day,” I said. The cupcakes were the last batch we had planned to bake and trick-or-treaters would be out en force soon. “I guess you’re done as soon as we clean up the kitchen.”

“Great.” Lenny adjusted the chef’s jacket on his skinny frame and finished shifting the baked goods around and then joined us, going onto the customer side of the counter so he could slide an arm around Kat’s waist. “While you were setting up the wedding cake this morning, I had a few people in here wondering if you were going to assist Detective Tingey with the investigation. It seems some people doubt his ability to take down the murderer without your help.”

I breathed on my fingers and buffed my nails against my chef’s jacket. “Well, I am pretty amazing.” I chuckled because though I had worked hard to find out the truth in the previous two murder cases, I hadn’t exactly done it by myself. “With a little help from my friends, I can do amazing things.”

“So, are you going to look into it?” Honey asked.

“Why does everyone keep asking me that?” I folded my arms over my chest. “It’s not like Tingey is incapable of doing his job. He’s a good detective. He detects... stuff all the time.”

“He’s not exactly an expert in homicide, and
you
solved the previous two, not him,” Honey pointed out a little gleefully—she’d enjoyed helping me track down the killers. “Besides, he already decided it was Mary Ellen Perkins because of the quilted table runner that was wrapped around Francine’s neck. And she couldn’t possibly have done it.”

I stared at Honey. “How do you
know
these things? Aren’t they keeping it quiet right now?”

“Of course, but when I stopped to gas up on my way here, I overheard Officer Mitchell talking about how they were searching Mary Ellen’s house for the fabric swatches used in the runner.” She popped the last of her cupcake into her mouth, wadded the wrapper into a ball and tossed it into the garbage can behind the counter.

Lenny’s brows furrowed and he leaned against the display case. “Wouldn’t the killer consider it sweet revenge if Francine had made the runner herself and it was done from quilt blocks that were very similar to the patterns she’d stolen from Mary Ellen?”

“That’s terrible,” Kat reprimanded him.

“I don’t have a problem with Francine, I was thinking from someone else’s point of view,” Lenny defended himself.

“I suppose so. But I still don’t think Mary Ellen would have done it.” When he turned and gave me a look of disbelief, I huffed a little. “I know she’s a snob who treats you like she’s afraid you’re going to mug her, but you didn’t exactly make a good first impression—nor have you tried to improve her opinion of you since. And that doesn’t mean she’s a murderer.”

I was downplaying the bad impression he’d made the first day he arrived in town. He was a total mess after driving straight here from Chicago, smelled like an ashtray, and his several tattoos had been displayed for everyone to see. Any one of those things would have put him on Mary Ellen’s list of people to avoid, but combined, they made a dangerous combination. She wasn’t the most tolerant person around. I was surprised she still shopped here.

“Some people need to keep their—”

I cut off his sentence, putting my hand up to his face so it nearly covered his mouth. “We have customers in the store, and little children around. Watch your language.”

He glared at me, then let it go. “So if it wasn’t Mary Ellen, who do you think killed Francine?”

“I don’t know.” I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it, however.

More customers came in and Honey and Kat sat at the table with her kids while Lenny went back to the kitchen, muttering something about making mums for an anniversary cake next week. I focused on the newcomers, but even while I bagged and rang up their orders, my mind wouldn’t stop turning over the possibilities. There must be someone else who had a grudge against Francine besides Mary Ellen. I tried to remind myself that I’d been surprised by people in the past and I shouldn’t completely discount her from my suspect list until I knew more.

After the customers were seated, Chance came up to talk to me. “Auntie Tess, are you going to find out who killed Miss Clark?” His dark brows furrowed and his expression was uncharacteristically serious. “Mom said you aren’t.”

“Sweetie, I don’t have a reason to investigate. Detective Tingey will figure it out.”

His brows lowered. “No he won’t. You’re the smart one; everyone says so. Besides, he thinks the quilt lady did it. That’s stupid—she’s too nice for that.”

I smiled. Mary Ellen liked kids a lot, but she was still single and childless. It was impossible not to like a kid as adorable as Chance, so she was very good to him. “She is nice, isn’t she?”

Lenny snorted from the doorway to the kitchen. I shot him a quick glare, then returned my attention to Chance.

“So you have to find out who hurt Miss Clark,” he insisted. “Please? She’s my favorite teacher and whoever hurt her needs to be caught.” Tears swam in his eyes.

My heart nearly broke watching how upset he was about it. Dang it. How could I let him down? Especially when I agreed with him. “Fine. I’ll look into it.”

“Really?” His whole face lit up and a dimple formed in his left cheek.

“Yes. But don’t tell everyone, okay? I want to check things out in secret.” I lifted the pass-through flap into the customer area and scooped him into a hug, which he eagerly reciprocated.

“I won’t tell anyone,” he said in a stage whisper, which any of the customers in the store could hear. “Thank you, Auntie Tess!”

“Hey, no promises okay? But you’re welcome.” I smiled as he rushed to tell his mom.

Honey came over a moment later, smirking a little. “I’ve been thinking about it,” she jumped in as though she had been waiting for me to cave. “You know the Thanksgiving pageant Francine was organizing? Connie Larabee was pretty mad that her daughter got some minor part instead of the lead. She’s always pushing Jasmin into dancing, singing and acting and all of those kinds of things. Seems to think Jasmin is going to be a TV star someday.” Honey rolled her eyes. “If I had a nickel for every parent who is sure their kid is going to be famous. She goes totally overboard, like Jessica Grizzle with her son’s baseball teams this summer. He’s only eleven for heaven’s sake.”

“It beats the alternative,” Kat said. “Not enough to do just means they’re more likely to get into trouble.”

“What’s wrong with a happy medium?” Honey asked.

“So, Connie’s cut from the same cloth as Jessica, huh?” I’d known a few people like that over the years. “You think she might have been mad enough to kill Francine? I don’t know, blaming her for stunting her daughter’s progress?” I didn’t know Connie, but almost anyone was more likely than Mary Ellen.

Honey shrugged. “No idea. But she was there last night—she dropped off the cupcakes, remember?—and she looked pretty put out when I saw her from across the room.”

I nodded, thinking. “Now to figure out how to approach her without making her think she’s a suspect.”

Honey considered for a moment. “Madison is in the dance class the hour before Jasmin on Monday. Connie always stays for the whole class so she can work with her during the week, track her progress and get after the teacher if she thinks Jasmin’s talents aren’t being used well enough.”

The thought of Mary Ellen wrongly suffering for Francine’s murder cemented my promise to Chance. I wasn’t going to dig hard enough to get me killed, just to find out some details. I tipped my head. “Don’t you think you could use a hand getting Madi to class Monday? I mean, you’re going to be terribly busy dealing with that
one
client.”

She caught on right away. “Oh yes. I’ll be tied up in a conference call all afternoon. I really do appreciate you agreeing to help me out.” Her white teeth flashed against her café au lait complexion.

That was settled, but it was still two days away, and I didn’t want to wait for the opportunity to land in my lap. I decided I’d have to check into other possibilities in the meantime.

Cupcakes

2 eggs

1 cup sugar

1 1/2 cups pumpkin

1/2 cup milk

1 tsp salt

2 tsp baking soda

2 tsp cream of tartar

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/4 tsp cloves

1 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp ginger

2 cups flour

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Cream the butter, sugar and eggs until smooth. Mix in cocoa and then the milk. In another bowl mix the salt, baking soda, cream of tartar, spices and flour, then add slowly to the wet ingredients, mixing as you go. Spoon the batter into cupcake liners so they are about 2/3 full.

Bake for 18-20 minutes. The recipe makes about 2 dozen cupcakes.

Frosting

1/3 cup butter or shortening, softened

1/4 cup milk

1 tsp vanilla

1/4 to 1/2 tsp ground ginger (to taste)

2 1/2 cups powdered sugar