The Diva Frosts a Cupcake (21 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY

Dear Sophie,

I just don’t get what everyone else sees in cupcakes. They’re always dry, even when I bake them at home.

Parched in Dryville, Pennsylvania

Dear Parched,

That’s a common problem. You’re probably baking your cupcakes too long. Cut back their baking time by a minute or two.

Sophie

If Daisy hadn’t wagged her tail and pulled me over to Alex, I probably wouldn’t have noticed him.

His mouth grim, he said quietly, “Clarissa alert on the right at the bottom of the stairs behind the azalea bush.”

“Did you follow me?”

“No. I followed Clarissa, who followed you. And I might add that I am not pleased with you. The second I left, you ran to Spenser. Did you tell him about the fava beans?”

We walked down the stairs, Alex to my right. “I did not. Didn’t even mention them.”

“What did you talk about?”

“Spenser wants to be like the general when he’s that age.”

Alex laughed. “Who wouldn’t?”

“You’ll probably be just like him.”

“I doubt it. It’s a joke in our family that I got the general’s serious side, and Nick inherited his flair for women.”

“Don’t sell yourself short.”

His fingers twined into mine. Suddenly the walk home was positively romantic, and I wished I lived farther away.

At my front door he leaned in to kiss me, but Humphrey practically barged into us.

Loaded down with a giant duffel bag and a laptop case, he said, “Quick, open the door before they see me here!”

I unlocked the door, and Humphrey hurried inside.

“Is this about Renee and Myra?” I asked.

“They won’t leave me alone.
Please
, can I stay here tonight? Sleep! I need sleep!”

“Of course. Pick a bedroom and make yourself at home.”

I turned to Alex, but the moment was gone. He brushed my lips lightly with his and departed. Just as well. His divorce wasn’t final, and there were enough rumors about me as it was.

In the morning, I was still floating in the glow of a new romance—until I saw Mars peeking in the window of my kitchen door. I opened the door, and Daisy’s tail spun in circles at the sight of him.

“I haven’t had coffee yet. I hope you’re not here because of a problem.”

“I just came by to ask if you would drop Daisy off at my house this morning. I’m on my way to a breakfast meeting or I’d take her.”

I hated to think of Daisy locked in Mars’s home office all day. “Why don’t you pick her up on your way home?”

“It’s okay. Leon is there. He has promised me that he won’t let Natasha lock her in my office anymore.”

I put the kettle on and spooned coffee into the French press. My heart heavy, I agreed. It wasn’t as though I had much choice. Daisy had already spent part of Mars’s week with me. “Poor Daisy.”

Mars kissed me on the cheek, tickled Daisy under her chin, and took off out the door.

I let Daisy out into the backyard.

Humphrey shuffled in from the foyer, still wearing pajamas. He stretched his arms above his head and yawned. “Glorious quiet. Thanks for letting me hide out here, Soph.”

“My pleasure. Hash browns and eggs with runny yolks?” It was one of his favorites. I poured coffee for both of us.

He ambled over to the island and located my grater. “That would be wonderful. Do you mind if I hang out here?”

“Not at all.” I handed him the potatoes. “What should I tell Renee or Myra if one of them calls?”

Daisy scratched at the door. I let her in, and she danced in excited circles.

“Hmm, would you mind if we didn’t answer your phone? You have an answering machine, right?”

Daisy ran to the door to go out again.

“What’s with you this morning? You were just out there. Make up your mind, Daisy.”

I let her out, washed my hands, and sliced fresh strawberries for a fruit salad while Humphrey grated the potatoes. “Okay. I can hear if it’s a business call. But you’re going to have to face them sooner or later. What are you going to do while you’re in hiding?”

“Ah! I have big plans for my uninterrupted peace. I must get to the bottom of this terrible accusation of grand larceny. I intend to make spreadsheets to consider the various possibilities.”

I had never considered spreadsheets. “Good idea,” I said. “Sometimes it helps to write down the facts. To look at the information in a different way.”

“For instance,” said Humphrey, “are you aware that none of this started, not even Muffin’s murder, until that Alex fellow came to town?”

I nearly cut my finger. “You can’t be serious. He doesn’t even know the people involved.”

“Then why has he been hanging around Cake My Day at odd hours?”

I hoped he’d been spying on Spenser. “He’s considering the purchase of a building next door to Cake My Day.” My heart thudded a little bit, though. Who visited a building at odd hours? I tossed the strawberries with sweet chunks of cantaloupe and tart green grapes. A squeeze of lemon and a breeze of sugar, a couple more good stirs, and I set the bowl on the table.

Daisy had returned. I opened the door. “Are you sure you want to come in this time?”

She trotted in, wagging her tail, but she didn’t settle down. She sniffled around on the kitchen floor. Looking for crumbs, I assumed.

“How can you be so sure about Alex?”

“How can you be so sure about Renee?” I heated a frying pan for the eggs. “There’s no evidence tying Alex to anything. That’s silly. You’d make more progress if you thought about Renee.”

“As irritated as I am with her constant neediness, I still don’t think she murdered Muffin. And she most certainly didn’t steal that cupcake. Hey, did you take trash out to the alley last night?”

“No.”

“That’s strange. I could have sworn I heard you. I was exhausted, though. Maybe I dreamed it.”

The potatoes sizzled in the pan and turned a crispy golden brown. Humphrey slid them onto plates, and I topped them with the eggs. I’d made an extra one that I put in Daisy’s bowl for her breakfast with a little bit of the crispy potatoes.

We sat down to eat. “Is Spenser one of your suspects?” I asked.

“Should he be?”

“He seems like such a nice man. Almost too nice. Generous when his friends need help. Yet I can’t help thinking that he’s involved somehow.”

“I’m more suspicious of Nick.”

“Nick? Why?”

“You heard Myra and Joy talking about him. He took every cent Joy had. He enticed her with romantic notions of a life together and left her broken and broke. A golden cupcake would make him salivate.”

“But would he have brought it to the gala cupcake dinner with him? What would be the point of that?”

Humphrey and I tossed ideas around with no success. We ate the last few bites of our breakfast, and cleaned up the kitchen.

I showered and pulled on a skort. The memory of Alex’s touch came flooding back to me, and I swiftly changed into a casual sky blue dress with a square neckline. A pair of gold earrings, a necklace, and I was ready to go. It was still a little early for sandals, but I didn’t care, because they looked so cute with the dress. The blue discoloration around my eye had lightened in spots to a sick yellow-green. Lovely. I managed to cover most of it with makeup, but it still showed.

And then I had to do the thing I’d been putting off—deliver Daisy to Natasha. I clipped the leash onto her harness. She pulled me to the kitchen door. It eased my reluctance to let her go. If she was that excited, it wouldn’t be fair to deny her fun time with Mars.

But when we stepped outside, she yanked on the leash so hard that it slipped out of my hand. She raced for the backyard.

I could see her snuffling something by the back gate. I broke into a run. Was someone lying in my backyard?

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Dear Sophie,

My wife says we should use dog treats to train our dog. I think he’ll get too many and become overweight if we do that. Do you use treats as a reward for your dog?

—Dooley’s Dad in Treat, Arkansas

Dear Dooley’s Dad,

Daisy loves treats. The thing to remember is that dogs don’t care about the size of the treat—they care about getting that little reward. Use very small treats. Dooley will be just as thrilled as he would be if you gave him a big treat.

—Sophie

I screamed. Was it a corpse? Or was he still alive? His face was a bloody mess. He wore jeans and a black leather bomber jacket. He didn’t move, even when Daisy stuck her nose right over that horrific face.

I ran back to the kitchen, slipping and sliding in the sandals. Daisy galloped ahead of me. I threw open the kitchen door. “Humphrey! Call 911! We need an ambulance right away. Tell them to come to the alley.”

I slid off the sandals and wet an entire roll of paper towels. Daisy wanted to go back with me. I dodged her at the door and, barefoot, ran back to the man.

I knelt beside him, afraid to touch him. His nose was bent at an unnatural angle that made me wince. Should I wipe the blood off his face or not?

Reaching for his wrist to check for a pulse, I pulled my hand back in horror. He wore gloves. We were way past glove weather. Unless he’d ridden a motorcycle to get there, I couldn’t think of a good reason for him to be wearing gloves. He’d been up to no good.

Some teeny little part of me feared he might jump at me like a bad guy in a horror movie, but he lay so still that I suspected he had died.

A siren sounded in the distance, and Humphrey ran across my yard toward me.

He gasped at the sight of the man. “Is he alive?”

“I don’t know. I’m afraid to do chest compressions. What if he’s bleeding internally?”

The first responders rushed in.

I moved out of their way, not having done anything to help the poor guy.

Wong hustled toward me. “Do you know who that is?”

“No. Maybe I should have looked for identification.” I filled her in on how Daisy had found him.

“Have you touched anything?”

“I didn’t even touch
him
. I didn’t know what to do.”

“I have a pulse,” said one of the emergency medical technicians. “Hate to cut this sleeve, though.”

Nevertheless, he sliced through the sleeve of the man’s leather jacket and slid a needle for an IV into his vein.

“Must have been out here all night,” said Wong. “It’s too hot for a warm jacket like that now.”

She walked closer to him. “What’s that?”

The medical technician closest to the man’s head shrugged. “Beats me. The prongs of a ring maybe?”

I edged over, trying to see without getting in the way. The shoulder of the jacket had been damaged, but so slightly that I hadn’t even noticed. Tiny dots formed a circle about a quarter of an inch in diameter. The shape seemed familiar to me, but I couldn’t quite place it.

They removed him in minutes, leaving Humphrey and me with a pack of cops securing the alley and my backyard.

I was about to retreat to the house for a much needed cup of tea when Wong called me over.

“Recognize this?” She pointed to a shovel.

“I have one just like it in my garden shed. I’d be willing to bet it’s not there now, though.”

She followed me to the shed. “Don’t you lock these doors?”

“No. There’s nothing in here except garden equipment.”

Exactly as I had expected, the shovel was gone.

Humphrey and I returned to the kitchen. I put on a pot of tea and thanked Daisy for alerting me. She eagerly accepted her reward of a homemade dog cookie in the shape of a bone.

The last thing I wanted to do was take Daisy over to Natasha’s house. But when she called and insisted, I had no choice. In a gloomy mood, I walked Daisy over to Natasha’s.

I rapped the knocker on the door. Martha yipped inside.

Natasha opened the door a crack, quickly stepped outside, and pulled it almost shut behind her. “You brought Daisy. Thank you!”

Strange conduct for Natasha. Why did she want Daisy so much all of a sudden? She positioned herself in front of the door, reminding me of Clarissa’s odd behavior when I went to her house to tell her I wasn’t seeing Spenser. “Are you hiding something from me?”

“No.”

“Then why are you acting weird?”

“Sophie, I have no idea what you’re talking about. If you don’t mind, I’m in the middle of something.”

“Is that why you closed the door instead of inviting me inside?”

She huffed at me. “No, it’s because of Martha. She’ll run out into the street.”

Of course she would. How many times in my life had I done the same thing because of Daisy and Mochie? Did Spenser and Clarissa have pets? I hadn’t seen any when we picked up the desk. No one had said anything about not letting a cat or dog out.

“Sophie!” Natasha squealed.

“Thanks. You’ve been very helpful.” I jogged down the stairs with Natasha yammering at me.

For once, I actually ran the few houses to Nina’s. I hammered on her front door.

She opened it wide. “What’s wrong?”

“Aha! You don’t have a dog in here. Where’s Spenser’s cell phone number?”

She handed me a slip of paper with the number on it. “What’s going on?”

I grabbed the phone on her kitchen wall and dialed. When Spenser answered, I asked, “Do you or Clarissa have any pets?”

“No.”

“Hah!” I raised my palm to high five with Nina, who looked at me in complete confusion. “I think Clarissa has Buddy.”

Spenser agreed to meet us at his home in fifteen minutes. Nina laced on running shoes, and we walked over as fast as we could. On the way, I filled her in about the man who had been hurt in the alley behind my house. Spenser met us at his house, plunged his key into the lock, and opened the front door.

The house was silent. Too quiet.

“Do you think Clarissa is home?” I asked. I certainly didn’t want a scene. Then again, if I was right about Buddy, it would be worth the risk.

Spenser glanced at his watch. “She’s probably still having her nails done. We’re safe.”

But when we walked into their living room he howled. “What the blazes has she done?”

I had to admit that it looked a bit sparsely furnished.

He waved his hand toward the fireplace. “She sold the painting. And the antique tea table.”

Spenser appeared dumbfounded.

“Mind if we look for Buddy?” asked Nina.

He didn’t reply, as though he was deep in his own thoughts.

Nina motioned to me. In the entrance hall, she said, “I’ll scout around down here, you take the upper level.”

I dashed up the stairs, my optimism waning. I hadn’t heard a bark or a growl. Buddy would be impossible to hide. Peering in the bedrooms and the closets was eerily reminiscent of the day we’d found Muffin’s body.

Footsteps on the stairs proved to be Nina.

“I don’t see anything downstairs. I think you were wrong, Soph. I’m sorry. It was a good thought.”

I was having serious doubts of my own. We peered into the master bedroom. Clarissa had chosen sea foam green walls with a white ceiling and white woodwork. A fireplace served as the focal point, flanked by tall windows. A mahogany bed and matching nightstands dominated the room. White linens covered the bed, which hadn’t been made. One side was covered with books. I tilted my head to look at them. All by Agatha Christie.

I sighed and entered Clarissa and Spenser’s walk-in closet. I’d been so hopeful.

The closet had been expertly outfitted. Even in my dreams I hadn’t conceived anything so fabulous. Clarissa’s dresses hung in orderly sections. Her shoes were lined up like little soldiers on special shelving. A rainbow of purses were organized by color. She’d tossed some clothes over chairs in the middle of the closet. The sleeve of a suede jacket hung down, and on top of it lay jeans she’d worn. And there, sticking out of a pocket, was a tiny corner of yellow.