One Dead Cookie (11 page)

When the customers had dwindled to two women looking through cookbooks, Olivia beckoned
Bertha over to the cash register, and asked, “Did Jennifer ever call to say why she
didn’t show up this morning?”

“I found a message from her on the machine.” Bertha’s round face puckered with concern.
“I know she hasn’t been working here for long, but I can’t help but think something
is terribly wrong…. I mean, for Jennifer to simply leave a message with no details.
She’s such a conscientious young woman, so good with the customers.”

The last two browsing customers headed toward the front door, so Olivia asked, “Are
you comfortable working the sales floor on your own for a few minutes while I check
with Maddie in the kitchen? She might have heard from Jennifer by now. If not, I’ll
ask her to call around and see if she can find temporary help on such short notice.”

“Oh, I’ll be just fine. Don’t fret now,” Bertha said with a maternal pat on Olivia’s
arm. “If a busload of customers suddenly bursts through that door, I’ll poke my head
in the kitchen and ask for help.”

Olivia opened the kitchen door to hear Maddie singing “Can’t Take My Eyes off of You”
along with her earbuds. In time to the music, she squirted tiny electric purple flowers
on a cookie shaped like a wedding dress. Olivia waited for Maddie to finish before
waving to get her attention.

“Hey.” Maddie pulled out her earbuds. “How was your
meeting? And more important, how did your baking session with your mom go yesterday?”

“Fine, and none of your business,” Olivia said. “Any word from Jennifer? Is she ill?
If she isn’t coming in at all today, we’ll need some backup.”

“About backup, remember that soul-numbing institution called school? The one that
doesn’t release its prisoners until June?” Maddie selected a pastry bag and squeezed
a minuscule dab of forest green icing to create a leaf. “School is where most of our
temps are for the next month or so. The rest of them graduated, got desperate for
full-time work, and moved to DC or Baltimore. I found one who could come in next week,
but right now she’s filling in for a waitress at the café. And to answer your first
question second…nope, no word from Jennifer. All she said in her message was she had
to deal with a family emergency.”

“Hard to argue with a reason like that,” Olivia said.

“Except…” Maddie capped her pastry bag and sank into a chair. “Maybe I misunderstood,
but I thought she said during her interview that she didn’t have any family in this
area.”

Olivia opened the kitchen door wide enough to peek into the store. Bertha was discussing
sanding sugar with a middle-aged woman, while two more customers chatted near the
mixers. “Under control for the moment.” Olivia pulled up a chair across the worktable
from Maddie. “Any idea where Jennifer is staying?”

“She’s renting a room from Gwen’s aunt Agnes,” Maddie said.

“That makes me think she doesn’t have family in or near Chatterley Heights,” Olivia
said. “Maybe that’s what she meant. If her ‘family emergency’ is in another town or
state, we have no clue how far away she is or when she might return. Did you try calling
her cell? Or Aunt Agnes?”

“I did,” Maddie said. “Her cell goes directly to voice mail, and Aunt Agnes didn’t
even know she was gone. She checked Jennifer’s room, and her belongings are still
there. She has paid up through May. I’m out of ideas. I promise I’ll never again hire
someone without your prior written and notarized approval. Jennifer seemed so perfect.
And I’m normally such an extraordinary judge of character.”

The kitchen door opened, and Bertha’s plump, friendly face appeared. “You’ll never
guess who just showed up. Jennifer.” From anyone else, those words might have been
sarcastic, but Bertha sounded her usual cheerful self.

“Did she offer any details about her family emergency?” Olivia asked.

Bertha slipped through the door and closed it behind her. “Not a word, but then, maybe
it was too personal. She hunkered right down and got to work helping a couple of women
looking for cookbooks. You know, I do worry that she is trying to hide how upset she
is. If there was a death in her family…” Bertha’s eyes glistened, and Olivia wondered
if she might be remembering the cruel murder of her beloved employer, Clarisse Chamberlain.
With an emphatic shake of her head, Bertha said, “It isn’t healthy to push your feelings
down too far, it just isn’t. Maybe I should talk to—”

“Why don’t I talk to Jennifer and see how she’s doing,” Olivia said. “I haven’t had
a chance to get to know her.” She knew Bertha wouldn’t push too hard for information.
Olivia, however, wanted very much to learn why Jennifer was suddenly disappearing
from work.

Olivia returned to the sales floor as Jennifer unlocked the cabinet containing The
Gingerbread House’s stock of valuable vintage and antique cookie cutters. A well-dressed
woman, her face lit with excitement, watched Jennifer select one of the store’s most
valuable and expensive cutters, a
duck shape with a flat back. Jennifer held the cutter in the palm of her hand and
discussed its attributes. Olivia moved closer to listen. Jennifer and her customer
seemed absorbed in their exchange and unaware of Olivia’s presence.

“We think this dates back to the early twentieth century, possibly even the late nineteenth
century,” Jennifer said. “It was handmade by a tinsmith and has been lovingly used
by several generations of bakers. As you can see, it has an air hole cut into the
back to allow air to escape. It’s large enough to put your finger through if you need
to push the cookie dough out of the cutter.”

Jennifer placed the cutter in the customer’s hand. The woman ran her finger over the
metal, and said, “It’s in such good shape. Although clearly it has seen use. There’s
the sweetest little dent right there on the duck’s bill. I can just imagine a child
playing with it like a toy while his mother baked cookies for him.” She stared into
space as if envisioning the scene. “Or maybe she was his grandmother. Grandmothers
are generally more tolerant. His mother would probably have told him to stop playing
with the cookie cutter before he damaged it.”

Olivia smiled at the customer’s comment. Vintage cookie cutters had that effect on
people. Her smile faded when the store’s front door opened and in walked Chatterley
Heights’s least favorite postal carrier, Sam Parnell. Though it was still spring,
Sam had already switched to his United States Postal Service summer uniform, complete
with hat. Olivia tried to quell her more judgmental reactions, especially when it
came to looks, but she had to admit the outfit wasn’t flattering to Sam. It included
shorts, which revealed Sam’s spindly legs. If he were a kinder person, Olivia thought,
she probably wouldn’t notice.

Jennifer and her customer were too engrossed in vintage
cookie cutters to notice Sam’s entrance. He held a white box with a red stripe and
blue print. Sam always personally delivered Priority Mail, hoping to get a sneak peek
at the contents, and he headed straight toward Olivia. She wished she’d been quick
enough to slip back into the kitchen.

“Is that package for us?” Olivia asked.

“So that’s the new girl.” Sam cocked his head in Jennifer’s direction. “First time
I’ve seen her. I deliver mail all over Chatterley Heights, and I’d remember a pretty
girl like that. Looks kind of standoffish, though. That type usually is.”

Olivia caught herself before she launched into an automatic defense of Jennifer’s
personality. Sam elicited gossip with well-honed skill, then delivered it to Chatterley
Heights citizens as if it were First-Class Mail. It was part of his daily routine.
If he didn’t have any new gossip to dispense, he would invent some. Olivia found it
best to show as little interest as possible.

“I hope this is the shipment of cutters I’ve been waiting for.” Olivia slipped the
package from Sam’s hand while he studied his newest quarry. Sam stared at his empty
hand, then at Olivia. She tried not to squirm as his watery blue eyes narrowed to
slits. She reminded herself that Sam could be irritating, but he was usually harmless…unless
he felt humiliated.

“Sorry to hear about you and Del.” Sam’s sneery smile exposed his crooked front teeth.
“But I guess it’s easy to understand, now that I see how young and pretty your new
clerk is.”

Old news, Olivia thought with relief. “Now, Sam, everyone knows that was one of Binnie’s
little attempts to invent news.”

“Huh. That’s not the way I heard it.” Sam’s expression reminded Olivia of a vulture.
“Of course, it all depends on how much you trust your own friends. Someone sure is
feeding Binnie some juicy insider information about you and the sheriff.” When Olivia
didn’t respond, Sam added, “Maybe you and Stacey Harald had a fight? She’s been mighty
touchy lately, what with that husband of hers going off the wagon. And then she got
laid off from her job.”

Olivia so dearly wanted to grab Sam by his scrawny neck and stuff a very sharp cookie
cutter down his throat; on the other hand, that might damage a perfectly good cookie
cutter. “You’re not making sense, Sam, and I have work to do.” Turning her back on
him, Olivia said, “Thanks for bringing the package so quickly.” She tried not to look
back as she closed the kitchen door, but she couldn’t keep herself from glancing at
Sam’s profile as he watched Jennifer discuss vintage cookie cutters with her enthusiastic
customer. Sam was smiling, and it wasn’t in a friendly way.

*   *   *

O
livia sorted through her new shipment of cookie cutters, adding each to the store’s
inventory list, but her mind was on Stacey Harald, a good friend since childhood.
Stacey hadn’t mentioned anything about losing her job, which she sorely needed. Her
ex-husband Wade’s now-and-then child-support payments weren’t nearly enough to round
out Stacey’s income from her position as office manager at the Chatterley Heights
Elementary School. The couple’s two teenage children lived with Stacey. If Wade was
drinking again and had lost his job at the Struts & Bolts garage, Stacey and the kids
would be in serious trouble.

“Livie? Are you with us, or have you left for your own little happy place?”

Olivia, startled by Maddie’s voice, turned too quickly and whacked her hand against
the arm of her wooden chair. “Ouch!”

“Oh dear,” Bertha said. “I know how to stop that from bruising very much. My great
aunt taught me. She knew such wonderful home remedies.” Bertha dug to the back of
the freezer for a tray of ice. She emptied the cubes into a dishtowel, which she folded
into a makeshift ice pack. “Hold this on your hand as long as you can stand it,” she
said as she handed the lumpy concoction to Olivia.

“Will that really work?” Maddie asked.

“It will, if you use it right away,” Bertha said.

“If I remember to use it at all.” Olivia fumbled with the loose pack, which wanted
to come apart.

“Or you could stop walking into solid objects,” Maddie suggested.

“Yeah, that’ll happen.” Olivia examined the array of cookies covering the table. “You’ve
made great progress on the extra cookies for Saturday. They look great.”

“Of course they do,” Maddie said. “Bertha helped with the decorating while you were
handling the Jennifer situation. How did that go, by the way?” The oven timer dinged.
Maddie opened the oven and switched a batch of baked wedding dresses for unbaked ones.

“Unfortunately, the Jennifer situation became the Snoopy standoff, so I never managed
to speak with her. She’s still up-selling vintage cutters to a fascinated customer,
or she was when I escaped from Sam. By the way, he insinuated it was Stacey Harald
who started the rumor that Del dumped me for Jennifer.”

Maddie snorted in derision. “Stacey? Not a chance. And for Jennifer? Oh, please, that’s
the silliest part of the rumor. I mean, Jennifer is certainly pretty in a serious,
intense sort of way, but she seems so…”

“Serious?” Olivia lifted the ice off her hand to give it a rest.

“Exactly,” Maddie said. “And intense. Del is sheriff; he has enough intensely serious
stuff in his life.”

“So I’m light and fluffy?”

“Don’t be silly, Livie.
I’m
light and fluffy. You are…well, I guess you verge on serious, at times anyway. However,
you are never intense, or hardly ever. The point is, you’re a lot more fun than Jennifer,
unless there’s a side to her I haven’t seen. For instance, I can’t imagine Jennifer
hiding with me in a root cellar while a deranged killer runs amok right above our
heads.”

“I must admit, that was fun, in a terrifying sort of way.” Olivia dumped her melting
ice cubes into the sink and wrung out the sopping towel. She examined her hand and
was impressed. There were only light signs of bruising.

“Oh, you two,” Bertha said. “I should head back to the sales floor to help Jennifer,
unless you need me here.”

“I’ll join you later,” Olivia said. “Leave Jennifer to me. I intend to find out about
this mysterious family crisis of hers.”

When the kitchen door closed behind Bertha, Olivia selected a nearly empty pastry
bag and used the last bits of lilac royal icing to accent a pale pink wedding gown
cookie. “Maddie, have you heard a rumor that Stacey Harald got laid off from her administration
job at the elementary school?”

Maddie’s deep green eyes widened. “Not a word. Is it true? School funding must be
really low. Stacey is the principal’s right-hand woman.”

“The rumor came from Sam Parnell, so the odds are it isn’t true.” Olivia mixed a couple
drops of teal gel food coloring into a small batch of royal icing. Teal was her favorite
color, and she was getting tired of purple in all its various hues. “On the other
hand, I did see Stacey and Wade arguing in the park this morning. She doesn’t normally
waste energy like that.”

“You don’t think they’re back together, do you?” Fluffy tendrils of red hair escaped
from Maddie’s purple bandana and softened the outline of her face. Although she was
in her early thirties, at that moment she looked barely old enough to date, let alone
marry. “Because if those two reunited,” Maddie said, “that would be tragic. I’d have
to intervene.”