Nightshade on Elm Street: A Flower Shop Mystery (8 page)

“So,” she said, picking through an odd assortment of utensils, “I hear you and my son have a new case.”

“Yes, we do.”

“Aha! Here it is.” She knocked the drawer shut with her hip. “This job is for your former fiancé?” She plopped a large spoonful of pasta smothered in a red meat sauce
loaded with onions, garlic, oregano, basil, and—I sniffed the air; was that a hint of cinnamon?—onto a plate and set it in front of me.

“Yes, it is.”

“The man who broke your engagement and your heart? And now comes to you for help? And you have agreed to this?”

Amazing how her voice rose with each question. It was the inquisition all over again. “I—sort of had to.”

“You
had
to?” She dropped her voice. “Is this slime boy blackmailing you?”

Before I could answer, she leaned so close we were practically eyeball to eyeball. “You didn’t
pose
for him for one of those
sext
messages, did you?”

My jaw dropped so fast I heard two pops near my ears. “No! I—
ew
!”

“Because I will have Marco break the slime boy’s knees if he demanded that of you.”

In the first place, Pryce didn’t know what a sext message was. In the second, Marco would never break anyone’s knees unless it was to save a life. In the third place, Pryce was as far away from something slimy as an überfastidious man could be. And in the fourth, did she really see me as someone who would pose without clothes? If so, double
ew
!

“I truly wish I could tell you why I felt compelled to take the case, Francesca, but I promised someone I wouldn’t.”

She rose back up, her eyebrows lifting. “I see.”

Translation:
You don’t trust me enough to tell me.

“As soon as I have permission, I’ll tell you.”

“Good.” With a straight face, she said, “Now, are you going to eat my mostaccioli or sit there jabbering all day?” Then she broke into a wide smile and put her arms around my shoulders. “I’m teasing you,
bella
.”

Whew. She’d frightened me there for a second.

“How are the shower preparations coming along?” she asked.

“They’re coming,” I said cheerily, hoping she’d leave it at that. But did that ever happen in Abby’s world?

“Do you have lists of what you need?” she asked.

“I keep a notebook and check things off as I order them.”

“Are you still determined to do all the work for this big shower yourself?”

“I am.”

“Even though it breaks your mother’s heart not to be included? And your cousin’s? And your guests will miss out on the best lasagna they’ve ever eaten in their lives?”

I blinked rapidly, trying to think of something to say. Then I saw Francesca lift an eyebrow, and I smiled. She was teasing again.

She put the baking dish in the fridge and walked to the doorway, pausing to give me a pitying glance. “I am afraid you will regret this decision one day,
bella
.” Then with a heavy sigh, she left.

Not teasing.

Once Francesca had gone and Grace and Lottie were in their accustomed places, I turned my attention to the orders on the spindle. The first one was an arrangement for a woman’s fortieth birthday. Her husband had requested brightly colored blossoms using anything but roses, which he considered extravagantly expensive, so I circled around the big slate-topped worktable in the middle of the room and walked over to the giant coolers where we stored our fresh flowers.

Inside the left cooler, I surveyed my stock and decided on an orange and yellow color scheme, perfect for
late summer. I pulled stems of
Dahlia
‘Golden Charmer’, with its wonderfully large flower head; the delicate, lilylike
Crocosmia
‘Rowallane Yellow’; the creamy yellow spikes of
Gladiolus tristis
; and
Chrysanthemum
‘Sunny Le Mans’, a yellow flower with an orange center. I added green fern leaves to the mix, then carried them back to the table where my tools lay.

Nothing relaxed me as much as arranging flowers. While I prepared the pot, trimmed stems, and created my living masterpiece, I was in a zone, totally engrossed in what I was doing. In that state, I worked my way through seven orders, until a familiar “Yoo-hoo” from the other side of the curtain caught my attention.

Mom had arrived.

Correction: Mom
and
her latest work of art—my third piece of bad luck. The day was complete.

B
efore I could mentally prepare myself for her latest atrocity, the curtain parted and Maureen “Mad Mo” Knight burst into the room with a big box in her arms. She was followed by my thirteen-year-old niece, Tara, who bounced with excitement.

“Grandma has a surprise for you, Aunt Abby,” Tara sang out.

The noun
surprise
never did Mom’s creations justice.
Shock
, maybe.

I put down my floral knife and pasted on a smile. “Oh, boy. Can’t wait.”

“I hope we’re not disturbing you, Abigail,” Mom said, looking around for a place to set the carton.

Whether I was disturbed would depend greatly on what was inside the box.

You would never know it from her often outrageous creations, but my mother is a quiet, kindhearted, churchgoing kindergarten teacher who raised my two brothers and me with a firm hand. She stands five feet five inches tall, has light brown hair shot through with a few gray hairs, golden brown eyes, and creamy skin with nary a freckle to mar it. Lucky her.

Usually her outfit was geared to working with five-year-olds, but because she was still on summer break, she was wearing a short-sleeved floral-print blouse and light green capris with beige sandals.

Tara twirled around me. “Set it on the worktable, Grandma. Hurry! I can’t wait to see Aunt Abby’s reaction.”

Being a teen, Tara took enormous satisfaction in viewing any form of torture, especially when it involved me. She’s the only grandchild in our family, born when I was fourteen years old, which sometimes makes her feel like my kid sister more than my niece. She also looks a lot like me, with blunt-cut, shoulder-length red hair, short nose, freckles, and short stature. Today she had on a bold pink short-sleeved T-shirt over a plum cami, a stack of silver bangle bracelets on each wrist, skinny white ankle jeans, and silver flats.

“Calm down, Tara,” Mom said. “Abigail, turn around and close your eyes.”

“Wait, Grandma,” Tara said before she could open the box. “Let’s tell Aunt Abby what we named it and see if she can guess what it is.”

“You tell her,” Mom said. “You’re the one who came up with the name.”

“It’s
Night Shades on Elm Tree
.” Tara pressed her hands together, her eyes sparkling impishly. “Okay, now guess!”

“I give up.”

“Come on, Aunt Abby, you didn’t even try!” Tara whined.

“Aunt Abby is kind of busy,” I said, giving my mom a pleading look.

Mom responded by opening the box. “We don’t have time for games, Tara. Your aunt needs to get back to work so she can keep her business from going under.”

She stuck her hands inside the box and lifted. Out
came a two-foot-tall elm tree made from brown and green clay. “
This
should help draw in the customers.”

Okay. Nothing freakish about a tree sculpture, even one with the same name, coincidentally, as the street on which the Osbornes’ cottage was located. Nothing that would scare away customers either—or draw them in.

Mom pulled out a handful of fabric and handed it to Tara. She reached in for another handful and the two set to work decorating the tree, their backs blocking my view.

With a “Ta da,” they stepped back for me to see. What I saw were brightly colored, coaster-sized felt flowers strung on green cords, two blossoms per cord. Still nothing freakish about them, but what was their purpose?

Drawing a blank, I said, “Colorful!”

Tara giggled. “You don’t know what they’re for, and that’s because you haven’t thought about the name I gave them.”

“Night shades on elm tree?” I plucked a green cord off the aforementioned tree. The cord was stretchy and had two daisies attached to it. “Is it a mask?”

“What kind of mask?” Tara asked, bouncing up and down on her toes.

“Put it on over your eyes,” Mom said.

I did as requested. “Okay, not a mask because I can’t see anything. And the cord is really tight. Ouch. Oh, wait! Is it a sleep mask?”

“Ding, ding, ding,” Tara cried.

“Hold still,” Mom said. “I’ll take a photo with my phone.”

“Lordy!” I heard Lottie cry. “What the hollyhocks is that?”

I snapped off the mask and saw her staring at me in amazement.

“They’re night shades,” Mom said. “Look at the cute picture I took of Abigail wearing them.”

The two women stood side by side, gazing at the image on her phone. Lottie was trying hard not to laugh. Grace glided through the curtain and peered over Mom’s shoulder; then Lottie and Grace looked at each other. The expression on their faces said it all.

“Come see, Abigail,” Mom said, while Tara stood off to one side pinching her lips shut.

Heaving a resigned sigh, I took a peek. With my red hair sticking out at all angles where the cord pinched my scalp, and a big white daisy with a yellow center covering each eye socket area, including my eyebrows, I resembled a cartoon bug.

“Look how cute you are,” Mom said.

Cute? Only if I’d been cast in a movie entitled
Cowboys and Alien Flower Heads
. Luckily, she’d made only a dozen or so.

Grace plucked another mask from a branch of the tree and held it up. “Are these petunias?”

“Yes, and they come in pink or purple,” Mom said. “We also have oak-leaf masks for men and maple-leaf masks for our Canadian friends.”

“You need anthurium masks, Grandma,” Tara said, then giggled. “My friends would totally buy them.”

“Stop that, Tara,” Mom said sharply.

My niece dissolved into laughter. She found anthurium immensely funny because of its spadix, a cylindrical spike that protruded from the shield-shaped petal called a spathe.

“My sea glass sunglasses sold out, so I thought I’d keep the eye theme going,” Mom said, slipping on a purple petunia mask to demonstrate. “These are better than anything sold in the drugstores because each flower operates independently, so if you need to reach for something on your nightstand, you needn’t remove the entire mask. Just flip up one side.”

“Clever idea, Maureen,” Grace said.

“How much for a pair?” Lottie asked. “I could use some myself. Herman reads with his light on till all hours.”

“What do you think, Abigail?” Mom asked.

“We sold the sunglasses for ten dollars a pair,” I said. “We can’t charge more than that.”

“Six dollars and ninety-nine cents,” Grace said.

Mom smiled. “That’s perfect. I’ll go get the other boxes. Come help me, Tara.”

I could hear Lottie’s and Grace’s sharp intakes of air as Mom’s words echoed through the shop.

Other
boxes?

“She made night shades?” Marco asked, as we headed toward the Osborne cottage.

“More like fright shades,” I said, blotting mustard off my lip. “And now we have fifty pairs to sell. Correction, forty-eight. Grace and Lottie each bought a pair. I think they took pity on Mom. And by the way, delicious roast beef sandwich.”

“Thanks. Maybe I’ll buy a pair of the shades for my mom and Gina, and then you’ll only have forty-six to sell.”

I leaned across the console to lay my head against his shoulder. “You’d do that for Mom?”

“I’m doing it for you, baby.”

My heart did a cartwheel. Make that a pinwheel. One theme at a time. “Have I told you today that I love you?”

Marco’s mouth turned up at the corners. When he gazed at me, I saw love shimmering in his dark eyes. He reached over for my hand and brought it to his lips.

Sometimes words weren’t necessary.

I inhaled, expanding my lungs, feeling such happiness that I wondered if I could sustain it. If I thought too much about it, would I jinx myself?

My cell phone rang. I dug it out of my purse and saw Grace’s name on the screen. “Hi, Grace. What’s up?”

“Abby, love, I was checking our Web site for orders and saw a message for you from a party supplier. I thought you might want to act on it.”

“What does it say?”

“They are low on the flower pinwheels for your shower. They can put them on back order, if you’d like, but it may take three weeks before they get them in.”

“I’ll have to order them from another supplier. Thanks for letting me know, Grace.”

“Would you like me to ring up another company for you?”

I hesitated, wavering. If I let Grace help with my shower, would the others be far behind? But without a smart phone at hand, when would I have time to call around? “How about finding the numbers of a few other places so I can make the calls when I get back to the shop?”

“I shall leave them on your desk, dear. Ta.”

I dropped my phone into my purse with a sigh. “Wonderful. I thought I had everything lined up except for the juggler.”

Marco gave me a sidelong glance. “You’re going to have a juggler at the shower?”