Sugar Coated Sins (17 page)

Closing it back up, I put it by
the side door, where I’d have to pass by it in the morning.
 
Maybe I’d take it to work with me at the
donut shop and look at it all again with fresh eyes.

For now though, it was time to try
to sleep once more.

Chapter
19

I stumbled out of bed five hours
later and realized that it was going to be a very long day.
 
As I got older, my ability to go without a
full eight hours of sleep diminished.
 
This was going to be a morning that I needed coffee just to make it out
the door.
 
I nearly stumbled over the box
of Ben’s things as I left the cottage, but I decided to take it in with me
anyway, not that I’d most likely have a chance to examine its contents
again.
 
There were times when I went to
sleep without grasping something and my slumber would somehow provide the
answer, but today wasn’t going to be one of those moments.

“Good morning.
 
Isn’t it lovely outside this time of the
night?” Emma asked later when she came into Donut Hearts.
 
I could see for a moment how some folks found
morning people a little annoying, despite the fact that I was normally one
myself.

“I’m not all the way awake yet
myself,” I said as I started dropping donut batter into the fryer.

“Maybe I should do the cake donuts
this morning,” she suggested as she grabbed her apron and put it on.
 
She was fully qualified to do it, since there
were times when I left the entire shop in her very capable hands.
 
“We wouldn’t want any accidents, would we?”

“I’m fine,” I said as my finger
slipped on the release mechanism, creating a monstrosity of dough three times
its normal size in the oil that would most likely have to be thrown out.

“Are you sure?” she asked me.

“Were you under the impression
that was an accident?
 
It’s something
I’ve been wanting to try forever.
 
I’m
thinking about calling it a family-sized donut.
 
What do you think?”

“Who knows?
 
It might catch on,” she said a little
skeptically.

I looked at her for a second, and
then we both started laughing.
 
After
flipping the dough beast and letting it fry on the other side, I said, “Nobody
in their right mind is going to buy this thing.”

“Let’s ice it anyway and give it a
try,” she suggested.

“What would we even price it at?”
I asked her.

“Well, it’s three times the size
of a regular donut.
 
How about three
times the price?”

“Why not?” I asked with another
chuckle.
 
“I didn’t get much sleep last
night.”

“If you want to crash and take a
nap on one of the couches out front, I can take over for an hour or two.”

I shook my head.
 
“As much as I appreciate the offer, I think I’ll
stick it out.
 
I’ll be fine.”

Emma thought about that for a
moment, and then she asked, “May I make another suggestion, then?”

“I’m willing to listen.”

“Why don’t I put some of my
specialty coffee on for our break?
 
I’ve
been dying to try a new blend that’s guaranteed to keep you awake for at least
twenty-four hours straight.”

“Wow, that sounds strong.
 
How much of it did you buy?”
 
While I was in charge of the donuts, Emma got
to order some special blends of coffee from time to time.
 
Her selections were sometimes hit or miss,
but we had enough intrepid customers to keep it as a viable option, at least
once a week.

“I didn’t order much, but I think
you could use it.”

“Maybe we’d better not,” I said,
after thinking about it for a few seconds.
 
“After all, I plan on getting to bed early tonight, and if I drink any
of that, I’ll be awake until this time tomorrow, when I will surely crash.”

“Maybe that’s for the best after
all,” she said.
 
“How many of those are
you going to make?” she added as she pointed to the dough beast, now finished
and sitting at the icing station.

“I think one is more than enough,”
I replied.
 
“Go set up the front, and
I’ll drop the rest in normal-sized portions.”

“It’s a deal,” she said.

The rest of the donut batters were
dropped without further complications, and I called Emma back after I’d pulled
the last one out of the oil.
 
I finished
icing the last batch as Emma began on the dishes.
 
She was still working when the dough for the
yeast donuts was ready to rest.
 
“It’s
time for our break.
 
You can finish those
afterward.”

“Wonderful,” she said.
 
As we moved outside in the darkness for our
daily break, she added, “I just love this time of year.
 
It’s not hot yet, and the stars are
absolutely beautiful.”

“You’re in a particularly good
mood this morning,” I said as we sat down at our table out front.
 
“You haven’t met anyone recently, have you?”

Emma grinned at me before she
answered.
 
“Is it that obvious?”

“Hey, I remember the feeling of
new love.
 
It’s pretty intoxicating,
isn’t it?”

“Things aren’t cooling down
between you and Jake, are they?”

“Not one little bit.
 
I love being married to him.”

“It shows,” she said.
 
“I’m not the only one happier around
here.”
 
Emma frowned for a second, and
then she took a deep breath before she spoke again.
 
“Suzanne, we need to talk.”

“Okay.
 
I’m listening.”
 
I wasn’t sure what Emma was about to bring
up, but I had the feeling that I wasn’t going to like it.

“You know how I hate to come
between my dad and you.”

“Then don’t,” I said quickly.
 
It had been the only way that we’d managed to
keep working together, even after some of the stunts her father had pulled in
the past.
 
We’d made a pact not to bring
Ray into our working or personal relationships, and I wanted to see that record
stay intact.

“This is a good thing.
 
Don’t worry.
 
He’s sorry for what he did, and he wants to make amends.
 
Dad knows that he pushed you too hard, and
he’s genuinely upset about it.”

“That’s quite a change of heart
for him to have,” I said reluctantly.
 
“How did that happen?”

“I won’t mention the fact that Mom
and I had a long talk with him, so let’s just assume that he’s seen the error
of his ways.
 
As a way of apologizing for
his behavior, he’s willing to grant you one favor, any favor, without requiring
any quid pro quo at all.”

I was about to turn her offer down
as a matter of course when I realized that I could use her father’s help after
all.
 
“Okay.”

Emma’s smile gleamed in the
darkness for a moment.
 
“Do you mean
it?
 
That’s wonderful.
 
There’s no need to use your free pass right
away.
 
Keep it in the bank if you’d like,
since there’s no expiration date.”

“I want to use it right now.”

“Now is good, too,” Emma
said.
 
“What do you want?”

“There was a photo taken fifteen years
ago when the time capsule was first interred under the town clock.
 
I’ve seen a copy of it taken from the
newspaper at the time, but now I want to see the original.
 
Would it be possible for him to make a copy
for me to have?”

“If it’s still in the archives, I
can guarantee it.
 
How soon do you need
it?”

“Yesterday would be perfect,” I
said, half in jest.

“I’ll call him right now.”

I put a hand on hers before she
could dial her cellphone.
 
“Emma, just
because we’re awake doesn’t mean that anyone else in April Springs is.
 
It can wait until seven.”

“Maybe, but this is going to be
part of his penance.
 
I’ll see you
inside.”

I was going to argue further with
her, but my timer went off, so I had to get back inside and work on the yeast
dough.
 
“Thanks.”

“My pleasure,” she said
happily.
 
My assistant looked truly
pleased about the prospect of waking her father up, and if I was being honest
with myself, I wasn’t all that unhappy with it, either.
 
I hoped that he still had the negatives on
file in his office.
 
Having a fresh print
of that shot might go a long way toward helping us figure out who had confessed
to killing Benjamin Port.

“Jake, what are you doing here so
early?” I asked as I unlocked our front door to let our first customer of the
day in.
 
I hadn’t been expecting to see
my husband until possibly later.

“Aren’t you happy to see me?” he
asked.

“Always.
 
Would you like a donut?”

“No, I’d better not,” he said as
he patted his stomach.
 
“The uniform’s
getting a little snug as it is, and there’s no way that I’m going up another
size.
 
Having your mother drop a
chocolate cake off at the cottage doesn’t help matters.”

“Did you have some last night when
you came home?”

“Two helpings,” he admitted.
 
“Thanks for leaving me that note that it was
okay to eat.
 
I’ve got to back off the
sweets or crank up my exercises.”

“If you’re not here for treats,
did you come by just to see my smiling face?”

“That, and to tell you that I got
the results of the pie analysis back.”

I looked at the clock.
 
“Already?”

“I called in a favor,” he said.

“I thought you were cut off from
using your old state police connections.”

“I am.
 
This is one I made as sheriff,” he explained.

“You work fast, don’t you?”

“I asked the tech to do it as a
favor, and he stayed up all night to do the analysis.”

“Don’t keep me hanging.
 
Had the pie been doctored, or were we just
being paranoid?”

“Oh, no.
 
There was a foreign substance in it, all
right.
 
Someone doused it with syrup of
ipecac.”

“I didn’t realize that was
poisonous.”

“In its unadulterated form it is,
but not this batch.
 
It’s an
over-the-counter version.
 
The analyst
told me that besides the actual ipecac, it’s got glycerin, sugar syrup, and
methyl-something.
 
It induces vomiting,
but you’d need to drink a tub of the stuff for it to be fatal.”

“So whoever baked that pie wasn’t
trying to kill us,” I said.

“No, but they weren’t out to do us
any favors, either.
 
The ingredients
would have made us both pretty sick if we’d eaten any of that pie.
 
I believe that it was a warning, not a direct
attempt on our lives.
 
This time,
anyway.”

“Do you think the killer is going
to try to come after us again?” I asked, horrified by the very thought of
it.
 
Poison was a sinister thing, a
sneaky way to kill someone without actually having to face them.

“If we keep digging into this,
there’s no doubt in my mind,” he said.
 
Was that the hint of a smile on his face?
 
“We’re getting to them, Suzanne.
 
We need to push hard now more than ever.
 
If they try again, we’ll be ready for them.”

“I hope you’re right.”

Jake wrapped me up in his arms and
hugged me tight.
 
“Don’t you worry.
 
There’s some good news, too.”

“I could use some of that,” I
said, comforted by his embrace.

“I had ipecac in my house as a
kid, and I’m willing to bet that you did, too, but it hasn’t been manufactured
since 2010 because of real doubts about its effectiveness in treating
poison.
 
Whoever dosed us had an old
batch on hand.”

“How is that good news in any way,
shape, or form?” I asked him.

“Whoever did it must have been
desperate to use it against us.”

“And you’re sure that’s a good
thing?”

“Positive.
 
Just be careful, okay?”

“You bet I will.
 
Right back at you, all right?”

“I promise.”

It wasn’t until after he was gone
that I realized that I had still failed to tell him about Jan Kerber’s erased
meeting with Ben the day before his death.
 
It would have to wait again, for now.

I had customers coming in for
their donuts, and I didn’t have the heart to delay their purchases for another
minute.

Chapter
20

“Hey, Jan.
 
It’s so good to see you again.
 
What can I get you?”

“I’m not here for any treats.
 
Suzanne, do you have a second?”

“Sure.
 
What’s up?”

Jan looked around the donut shop
and saw that it was half full of customers.
 
“Is there someplace else we could talk?”

“How about outside?” I
offered.
 
“I can get Emma to watch the
front.”

“If it’s all the same to you, can
we do it in the kitchen?
 
It’s starting
to get warm outside, and I’d rather not have folks watching us.”

“Sure.
 
Why not?
 
Come on back.”

We went into the kitchen and found
Emma putting away some of the sheet pans she’d just finished drying.
 
She was about to say something when she saw
Jan trailing behind me and clearly changed her mind.
 
“What’s up, boss?”

“Would you watch the front?”

“Sure thing,” she said.
 
“Hi, Ms. Kerber.”

“Hello, Emma.”

Once my assistant was gone, Jan
said, “So, this is where the sausage gets made.”

“No sausage, just donuts.
 
So, what’s going on?”

“Thanks for meeting back
here.
 
Sorry about the intrigue, but I
wanted to speak with you about your earlier request.
 
I’m afraid that I’m not going to be able to
help you out.”

“I don’t understand.
 
It was a simple request.
 
Why can’t you come up with a list of names of
the people working in your department fifteen years ago?
 
It’s not like there’s some kind of
confidentiality agreement about it.”

“That’s not it.
 
I can’t find the official records, and I’m
having a hard time remembering everyone who worked there at precisely that time
period.
 
The clerk at the time had a tendency
of firing and hiring back then on a whim, so there’s no way to come up with an
exact list.”

Actually there was, through the
photo I was about to get from Ray Blake, but I wasn’t going to tell Jan
that.
 
“Okay.
 
I understand.
 
Thanks anyway.”

“How’s the case going?” she asked
me, not too subtly trying to get some information out of me.
 
That explained why she’d made a special trip
to the donut shop to deliver null information.

“We’re making progress,” I said as
vaguely as I could manage.

“Are you having any luck narrowing
down your list of suspects?”

I’d planned on holding off
interviewing her about her appointment with Benjamin Port until I had a chance
to discuss what I’d found with Jake, but I’d learned long ago in my
investigations to take advantage of opportunities, and this one was practically
shouting in my face.
 
“Why are you so
interested, Jan?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?
 
You’ve got to admit that it’s fascinating
that a confession would show up all these years later, especially when everyone
thought the victim died accidentally.”

“There’s more to it than that,” I
said, “and you know it.”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re
talking about,” she said diffidently.

“And I’m equally sure that you
do.
 
We found Ben’s appointment
book.
 
The day before he was murdered,
there was an entry that had been partially erased, but we managed to read the
name anyway.
 
Why were you meeting with
him, Jan?”

The Register of Deeds looked
positively stricken by the news of the discovery.
 
“I don’t…I just assumed…it’s not what it
looks like.”

“Then enlighten me.
 
Were you sleeping with Benjamin Port, too?”

“What?
 
No!
 
Of
course not!”

Her denial was completely
believable.
 
“Then why the intrigue?
 
What were you meeting with him about?”

“I cancelled it,” she said
defensively.
 
“The meeting never happened.”

Maybe that was true, and maybe it
wasn’t.
 
“What were you going to
discuss?”

“I’d rather not say,” she answered
meekly.

It wasn’t the first time a suspect
hadn’t wanted to talk to me.
 
I
shrugged.
 
“Fine.
 
I wanted to get the story from you before I
told my husband.
 
I’m sure that he’ll be
contacting you about it soon.”

I’d started to leave the kitchen
when she put a hand on my arm.
 
“Wait.
 
Please don’t.”

“Talk to me, Jan.”

She bit her lower lip, and then
she hung her head.
 
“I’m too humiliated.”

“Don’t be.
 
We’ve all done stupid and crazy things in our
lives.
 
You said you weren’t dating him,
right?”

“No, what Ben wanted from me was
strictly business.”

I couldn’t wait to hear this.
 
“I’m listening.”

“Suzanne, he wanted me to ‘misplace’
a deed book,” she admitted.
 
“He wanted
to buy some land outside town that was under contract to someone else.
 
He thought if he could stall the sale, he
might be able to outbid the buyer and get it after all.
 
There couldn’t be a legal transfer without
the book, and it would give him time to make his move.
 
I refused, but he kept upping his offer.
 
It’s important to remember that I was dead
broke at the time.
 
I know that it’s no
excuse, though.
 
The morning of the
meeting, I called him and told him that I couldn’t do it after all.
 
When he threatened to expose me, I told him
that I hadn’t done anything wrong yet.
 
He said that he didn’t need any proof to taint my character, and that if
I didn’t go through with it, he’d have me fired.”

“Is that why you killed him?” I
asked softly, looking around for something I could use as a weapon against her
if she decided to strike out at me.

“What?
 
I didn’t kill him!”

“It’s understandable,” I said,
reaching behind me for the drawer that held some of our knives.
 
“You were scared, and you didn’t know what to
do.”
 
I had to be careful not to grab the
blade end of a knife, but fortunately Emma and I had a system for stowing them,
so I was fairly confident that I would be okay.
 
Sure enough, my hand found the handle of one, and not the blade.

“I told him to do his worst, and
then I hung up on him.
 
I never kept the
meeting, and the next thing I heard, he was dead.
 
I didn’t wish any harm on him, but at least
his threats were idle after that.
 
I went
about my business, relieved that I hadn’t gone through with it, and then I did
my best to forget about him completely—until that note appeared.
 
Even though I didn’t write it, if the truth
got out about what happened, I’d be ruined.
 
My only hope was that Benjamin hadn’t kept any record of our
meeting.
 
Now that I know he did, I guess
there’s nothing I can do but resign.”

“Hang on a second.
 
I didn’t think you did anything wrong,” I
said.

“Maybe not in actuality, but if
the thought were the deed, I was guilty, and what makes it worse is that I’m
running the office now.
 
I have to be
above reproach.”

“Jan, there’s no need to quit,
especially if you didn’t kill him.”

“I didn’t.
 
I swear it.
 
But this is going to come out one way or the other; I just know it.
 
Ben approached me, and I didn’t tell anyone
about it.
 
True, I didn’t do what he
wanted me to do, but I still compromised the office.”

“Don’t beat yourself up too badly
about it,” I said, “and don’t do anything you might regret later.”

“I don’t know,” she said.

“Trust me, you’re not in any shape
to make that kind of decision.
 
Let our
investigation play out, and if you still feel that it’s important for you to
quit, go ahead, but don’t do anything until then.”

“Why are you being so nice about
this?” Jan asked.
 
“You barely know me,
when it comes right down to it.”

“I’ve been judged in the past
based on things I didn’t do as well, so I know how it feels.
 
He approached you to do something unethical,
and in the end, you refused.
 
What more can
you ask of yourself?
 
Let me ask you
something.
 
If it happened today, what
would you do?”

“I’d refuse, of course, and then
I’d call the sheriff.”

“So that the criminal could be
prosecuted for tampering with a government official?”

“Exactly.”

“And then, in the course of time,
you’d expect justice to be carried out.”

“Yes, that follows.
 
I don’t get your point, Suzanne.”

“Jan, Benjamin Port died the very
next day.
 
He was beyond any more
punishment at that point.
 
The only
person you can hurt now is yourself.”

“Okay.
 
I’ll think about staying.”

“There’s no one better for the
job,” I said as I slid the knife back into the drawer, hopefully without her
seeing it.

“I’d like to think so, but some
days I’m not so sure.”
 
She surprised me
by hugging me tightly.
 
“Thank you.”

“I haven’t done anything,” I said
after a moment.

“Getting that off my chest has
made me feel years younger.”

“I’m glad that I could help,
then.
 
I don’t see how what happened with
you could affect the case, so why does anyone else need to know?
 
Just out of curiosity, who was the buyer he
was trying to outbid?”

“It was your mother,” she said.

“I’m not all that surprised.
 
My momma has been wheeling and dealing around
this town since before I was born.”

“She keeps us busy,” Jan
said.
 
“You mustn’t think your mother had
anything to do with the murder, Suzanne.”

I laughed, though it was probably
a tad bit inappropriate.
 
“Jan, I know
without a doubt that my mother would never use poison as a murder weapon.
 
Now if he’d been run over by a car or pushed
off a cliff, I might be a little more worried, but if she were going to get rid
of someone, it would be face to face.”

“You sound pretty sure about
that,” Jan said.

“It’s money in the bank as far as
I’m concerned.”

After the Register of Deeds left,
I called Grace to tell her what had happened.

“So, her name goes off our
list.
 
Have you told Jake about it?”

“To be honest with you, I forgot
to tell him in the first place.
 
Let’s
just keep this between the two of us, okay?”

“Are we back to keeping secrets
from the police again?” she asked a little gleefully.

“Just this one, and only because I
don’t think it has any bearing on the case.
 
If it turns out that I was wrong, Jake will be the first person to
know.
 
Are we still on for after lunch?”

“I won’t be able to come by until
two p.m.,” she said.
 
“One of my sales
reps is in dire need of a stern talking to.”

“Is she goofing off during regular
business hours?” I asked playfully, since the same could often be said of
Grace.

“No, she’s been suspected of
stealing from the company.”

“That’s terrible,” I said.

“It happens more often than you
might think.
 
We can’t prove anything
yet, but I figure she deserves one opportunity to make things right before we
lower the boom on her.”

“Good luck with that,” I
said.
 
“I’m happy that I just have one
employee.”

“I envy you that sometimes, but
certainly not your business hours.”

“You can have the kitchen again,”
I told Emma as I walked out front.
 
To my
surprise, she was smiling.
 
“Why the big
grin?”

“I just sold the giant donut you
made.”

“You’re kidding.
 
Who bought it?”

“Max,” she said.
 
“He thought it looked cool, and he wanted to
show Emily before he ate it.”

I had to laugh.
 
My ex-husband didn’t ordinarily indulge in my
treats, but lately he’d loosened up a little on his strict diet.
 
“Is he seriously going to eat the whole
thing?”

“He claimed that Cow, Spots, and
Moose were going to get bites, too, but I think he’s really going to share it
with Emily,” Emma said.
 
“You should make
more of them tomorrow.
 
A couple of
customers commented on it.”
 
Constantly
and consistently referring to the stuffed animals as being alive had most
likely been the way that he’d won Emily’s heart.

“No, that one was just a happy
accident.
 
I think I’ll stick to single
donuts from here on out.”