One Dead Cookie (27 page)

On impulse, Olivia poked her head into the kitchen. Maddie had just removed a sheet
of rosewater cookies from the oven. For a moment, the sweet floral fragrance helped
soothe Olivia’s jitters.
Who needs meditation when there are cookies fresh from the oven?

“Bertha,” Olivia said, “would you mind filling in on the sales floor for a bit? I
just want to confer with Maddie.”

“Of course.” Bertha capped her pastry bag of royal icing and left.

Maddie set the cookie sheet on a cooling rack. “What’s up? Did you think of someone
to investigate, I hope? Because much as I love baking and decorating, this is getting
a bit old. I could use a little distraction. Plus, I was thinking we ought to clear
up this murder thing before my engagement party. It could seriously get in the way
of Lucas and me being the center of attention tomorrow. Or is that selfish and callous?”

“No comment,” Olivia said, laughing for the first time since breakfast. “How about
a breather from the baking? I need some computer magic.”

“Sure. In fact, I declare the baking finished. More or less. I made a couple extra
batches, just in case. We do have to complete the decorating and assemble the cookie
cake…assuming our organic rose petals ever arrive. The company did call, by the way,
to tell us there’d been a delay, but we should be getting the package this afternoon.”
Maddie washed flour off her hands, and asked, “What would you like my dancing keyboard
fingers to ferret out for you?”

“First, I don’t want anyone to know what you’re doing, so keep the screen out of sight,”
Olivia said. “I’m frustrated. We have bits and pieces, but they don’t add up to much.
Nothing leads anywhere. This is just a hunch, but see if you can track down anything
about—” Olivia paused to peek out at the sales area. Jennifer was helping a customer,
and Bertha had taken over the dusting. “Let’s move out of earshot.” She led Maddie
to the storage cabinet at the far end of the kitchen.

“Ooh, clandestine research,” Maddie said. “How exciting.”

“As I said, I might be way off base, only the dates are suggestive.” Olivia spoke
softly, aware that Jennifer was in the store. “Remember what Stacey said about ‘Jennie’?
The girl she thought might be Jennifer? She said there was an older sister who might
have been murdered when ‘Jennie’ was about nine. I think that was about the time Trevor
and Dougie were juniors or seniors in high school.”

“And Howie, too, though he was a couple years younger,” Maddie said. “So you’re looking
for a possible connection between those guys and this Jennie’s older sister? Yeah,
that’s a long shot. Yet somehow intriguing.” Maddie rubbed
her hands together in gleeful anticipation. “You tell Bertha to keep Jennifer busy
on the sales floor, so she won’t pop into the kitchen.”

When Olivia returned, Maddie had turned the laptop screen so it couldn’t be seen by
someone entering the kitchen. After furiously tapping for about thirty seconds, she
stopped and said, “Oops.”

“Oops what?”

“I know it’s masochistic, Livie, but I requested an alert when Binnie Sloan publishes
one of her wretched blog posts. I’m skimming her latest and…Oh my.”

“Oh my
what
?”

“Short version,” Maddie said. “Binnie leads with a picture of Spunky snarling at her,
but the rest is way different from what I expected after this morning. She claims
Spunky is merely reflecting the rage of his owner because she…that is, you…have been
dumped.”

“I have?”

“Yep, says so right here. Del finally dumped you, once and for all eternity, in favor
of Jennifer. Okay, here’s the scoop: Binnie found out about the hammer the police
found in the band shell. She claims Stacey put it there to protect ‘that useless drunk’
Wade. Binnie’s words, not mine.”

“Somehow I guessed that,” Olivia said.

“Del let Stacey leave town because, according to Binnie, he is too distracted with
Jennifer to do his job as sheriff. Ooh, and here’s the best part: Binnie speculates
that Jennifer might be the real murderer. Jennifer and Trevor came to Chatterley Heights
at about the same time. Jennifer came from Twiterton, as did Trevor originally. And
Jennifer got a job with the sheriff’s girlfriend, maybe to keep an eye on the sheriff
‘
while she carried out her plan for cold, calculating revenge.
’ I think Binnie has finally snapped.”

“Finally?”

“Wow. Livie, listen to this: ‘
We suspect that Jennifer lured Trevor Lane to Chatterley Heights for her own secret
reasons…a childhood crush, perhaps? Did the great Trevor Lane once brush her off like
a gnat? Did he do so again after returning to his ancestral home? And has he paid
for it with his life?
’”

“Ancestral home?” Olivia leaned against the kitchen counter so she could keep an eye
on the door. Something about Binnie Sloan’s bizarre assertions sparked Olivia’s curiosity.
If she could only figure out—

“Livie? This is planet Earth hailing your ship. Please tell me you don’t believe anything
Binnie says.”

“Hm? Oh no, of course not. Binnie is speculating wildly, as always, but…well, why
isn’t she making up a nasty fictional story about
us
?”

“I’m okay with that, really I am.” Maddie sounded confused, verging on impatient.
“Are you saying you feel slighted because Binnie is picking on Jennifer more than
you? Because I’m thinking gratitude makes a lot more sense.”

Olivia began to pace around the kitchen table, hoping her thoughts would fall into
logical order. “Okay, we—that is, you and I, Mom, Spunky, even Bertha—humiliated Binnie,
and she vowed vengeance. After that, she wrote a blog post that rehashed her earlier
innuendos about Del and Jennifer. Old news, no one cares. Then she singled out Jennifer
and accused her of ‘cold and calculating’ murder. That strikes me as very strange.
It doesn’t make sense.” Olivia pulled a chair next to Maddie, angled so she would
notice if the kitchen door began to open. “I think Binnie is privy to information
we haven’t discovered yet,” she said. “Either she has been scouring the Internet,
or she’s getting
information from someone else. You and I need to do some serious dot-connecting.”

“Cool.” Maddie flexed her fingers. “My computer skills are at your command.”

“See if you can find any evidence that Trevor, Dougie, Howie, and Jennifer are all
linked to one another in some way, perhaps in their teenaged past. Besides the fact
that they’re all from Twiterton, that is.”

“Jennifer is a lot younger than the guys,” Maddie said. “She wouldn’t have gone to
school with them.”

“True, but what about her older half sister? Stacey mentioned she didn’t attend school
because she was ‘slow,’ but it’s an angle worth investigating. I really want to know
how she died. I’d also like to know more about the tensions among the three men, especially
post–high school. While you’re at it, hack into my email and see if Allan sent an
email about Howie.”

“I’d love to,” Maddie said. “Have you changed your password?”

“Haven’t had time.”

“Well, it isn’t hacking if I know the password. It won’t be as much fun.”

“I think I’ll have a chat with Jennifer. I’ll have Bertha watch the sales floor, so
you’ll be alone in here.”

Jennifer was ringing up a sale when Olivia joined her at the register. As the customer
left with her package, Olivia said, “We seem to be short on customers today.”

Jennifer smiled, but her deep green eyes were un-readable.

“Why don’t you and I straighten the cookbook nook for a while?” Olivia said, leading
the way into the nook. “Bertha can keep an eye on the sales floor, in case a customer
wanders in by mistake. Honestly, I don’t know what’s
happened to Chatterley Heights. You’d think we’d be swarmed with curious citizens,
what with a murder and the press descending on us this morning.”

“I wondered about that, too. Maybe they’re saving their appetites for the party tomorrow.”
Jennifer rescued a bouquet-shaped cookie cutter from under the bookcase, where it
had bounced during Binnie’s destructive exit from the cookbook nook. As Jennifer ran
her finger over a new dent in the top edge, her pale eyebrows drew together in an
angry frown.

“Or maybe they’re too busy emailing each other and reading blogs to sate their curiosity
about this morning’s drama in The Gingerbread House. You know what outlandish stories
find their way online.”

With a slight shake of her head, Jennifer said, “I’m afraid I’m out of step with my
peers. I don’t have a computer, so I don’t use the Internet much. My cell phone has
Internet access, but I rarely use it, and I have no interest at all in blogs. Cookie
cutters are much more fun.”

“I agree,” Olivia said. “You are very knowledgeable about cookie cutters. Did your
mother teach you?”

For the first time since Jennifer’s arrival at The Gingerbread House, Olivia saw a
genuine smile light her face. “Oh yes,” Jennifer said, “my mother loved cookie cutters.
We had lots of them, all passed down from my grandmother and great-grandmother. My
mother told us about the cutters while we baked.”

Jennifer had said “us,” yet had made no mention of any possible siblings. Much as
she wanted to ask directly, Olivia was afraid Jennifer would shut down. Instead, Olivia
asked, “Does your mother still have all those cutters?”

“No, she…” Jennifer’s smile faded. “My mother passed away. I’m keeping the collection
of cutters packed away for now.”

Hoping to lighten the mood, Olivia asked, “You lived in Twiterton as a child, didn’t
you? Was it as gossipy as most small towns?”

Jennifer hesitated for only a moment. “Yes, I suppose so,” she said. “I do remember
my mother complained that everyone was into everyone else’s business. She was a very
private person.”

Olivia took a bound notebook and pen from a locked drawer in an antique bureau. “Since
it’s so quiet, let’s do a little inventory, shall we? I like to keep track of stock
in the cookbook nook, since customers are often alone in here. Not that I don’t trust
my customers.”

“It’s smart to be careful,” Jennifer said with an edge in her voice. “People can’t
always be trusted.”

Olivia handed the notebook and pen to Jennifer. “I’ll rearrange the cookbooks in alphabetical
order, and you can mark them off on the inventory list.” They had worked through the
A’s and B’s before Olivia said, casually, “I don’t know many folks from Twiterton.
I can only think of one who lives here in Chatterley Heights. He works at the bank.
His name is Howie…Howie Upton, I think. Do you know him?”

Jennifer dropped her pen and bent down to pick it up. “The name doesn’t sound familiar,”
she said, focusing on the inventory list. “I haven’t had a chance to open an account
yet. Anyway, I was a kid when we left Twiterton.”

“Why did you decide to move to Chatterley Heights instead of back home?”

“Twiterton isn’t the town I remember. Now it’s more of a bedroom community,” she said,
responding with ease and confidence. “I wanted more of a small-town feel.”

“Well, you’ve come to the right place,” Olivia said. “I guess that’s why I’m a bit
of a small-town gossip myself. I
am so curious about Trevor Lane and Dougie Adair. I know they were both from Twiterton.”

With a light laugh, Jennifer said, “I can understand your curiosity, given what’s
happened. I honestly can’t tell you anything about them. They were a lot older than
I was. All I ever heard was that Trevor and Dougie played football.”

Since Jennifer sounded more relaxed, Olivia decided to dig a little deeper. “If my
experience is any clue, high school football heroes leave a mark for years. I remember
seeing our school corridors lined with trophies and photos of quarterbacks. And, of
course, there were photos of prom kings and queens, who were usually football players
and cheerleaders.”

“Oh yeah,” Jennifer said. “I heard Trevor Lane was a big football hero, even after
he left town. Especially after people found out he’d become an actor.”

“I’m amazed that he and Dougie Adair maintained their friendship over all these years.”

Jennifer was marking off cookbook names as if she’d done inventory her whole life.
“I’m not positive that Trevor and Dougie are such great friends,” she said.

“Really?”

Jennifer’s pen froze in midair. “I don’t know for sure, you understand, only it seemed
to me that Trevor hogged the spotlight, and I don’t think Dougie Adair was very happy
about that. I mean, when they were here in the store. That’s what I heard, anyway.”

Was Jennifer in the store when Trevor, Dougie, and Lenora were holding court? I thought
she hadn’t shown up for work.
“You could be right,” Olivia said carefully. “Trevor did seem to outshine his companions.”
Olivia sneaked a peek at Jennifer’s profile as she made quick work
of the cookbook inventory. The shy softness of her mouth had tightened. She looked
nervous…or angry.

*   *   *

“
W
e’ve got to stop meeting like this,” Olivia said. Maddie barely smiled, she was so
engrossed in her computer search. “Bertha is back on the sales floor keeping Jennifer
busy. I had an interesting and revealing conversation with Jennifer.”

“Uh-huh,” Maddie said without taking her eyes from the screen.

“While we were talking, a herd of performing rhinoceroses entered the store. They
want us to do a circus-themed cookie party under a big top.”

“Aha!” Maddie leaped up from her chair and did a little celebration dance.

“Why do I suspect your joy has nothing to do with the rhinoceroses?” Olivia glanced
at the screen but had no idea what she was looking at.

“You’re seeing rhinoceroses?”

“Never mind,” Olivia said. “What have you found?”

Maddie plopped onto her chair and pointed to the computer screen. “Somebody scanned
this newspaper article and posted it online. It’s an old article, wrinkled and yellowed,
so it’s blurry in spots. However, since my eyes are two months younger than yours,
I can read it to you. Pull up a chair. We don’t want curious ears to hear this.”