Wedding Cake Murder (24 page)

Mike raised his eyebrows. “You mean . . . Moishe?”

“No.” Hannah laughed. “I mean Michelle. She’s here, but she just went in to take a quick shower.”

Mike looked thoughtful. “Maybe I should call Lonnie and tell him to get over here. We could all watch together.”

“Sure. Lonnie’s always welcome.” Hannah gave a little laugh. “And since we seem to be having a footage-watching party, maybe you should call Norman, too.”

“Great idea! I’ll do that right away. Norman can stop at Bertanelli’s on his way out here and pick up more pizza. P.K. is only bringing two. And Lonnie can stop at the Quick Stop and get some other snacks we can eat while we’re watching.”

Ross came back into the living room just in time to hear Mike’s comment. “Do you want me to call P.K.? He might have some insights about Chef Duquesne. He was with me when I did all the interviews and he can tell you if he noticed anything unusual last night.”

“How many people does that make?” Ross asked Hannah.

“You, me, Mike, Michelle, P.K., Lonnie, and Norman. That’s seven . . . unless we count Moishe.”

“I’d better go out to the car and get my flat screen monitor and my laptop. My flat screen is twice the size of your television set. I can rig it to play on all three screens, and then everyone will have a good view of one screen or another.”

Mike jumped up. “Great idea. I’ll help you carry things.”

Hannah sat next to Ross on the couch, her steno notebook open in her lap and her pen in her hand.

“You’re taking notes?” Ross asked her.

“Of course she is,” Mike responded before Hannah could open her mouth. “Not only did Michelle find the victim, Chef Duquesne was actually nice to Hannah in the competition. That means she feels honor-bound to solve his murder.”

Hannah locked eyes with Mike. Instead of the glare she expected, he looked amused. “You’re right,” Hannah said, giving him a little nod of acknowledgment. “I’ll be happy to share my notes with you, if you want me to.”

This comment earned a frown from Mike. “Thanks, but I’m taking my own notes. Since we’re watching the same footage, I doubt that you’ll catch anything that I miss. I’m used to analyzing evidence like this. You’re not.”

“Very true. You’re the expert and I’m not.” Hannah gave him a sweet and what she hoped was guileless smile.

“Knock it off, you two,” Ross said, tightening his arm around Hannah’s shoulders. “This isn’t a competition. It’s a murder investigation, and all that matters is that someone catches Chef Duquesne’s killer.”

“You’re right,” Mike said, surprising Hannah. “Sorry, Hannah. I didn’t mean to get testy with you. Of course I’d like to go over your notes with you.”

Hannah just smiled. Perhaps Mike’s sudden change of heart had something to do with Ross’s intervention, but she highly doubted that was the case. He’d probably realized that she might spot something he’d miss because she was familiar with the other contestants, their assistants, and the judges. And he wanted to know exactly what clues she might discover because of that knowledge. The Food Channel
Dessert Chef Competition
wasn’t the only competition she had entered. Mike regarded her as his rival in the race to solve Chef Alain Duquesne’s murder case.

“They loved the Butterscotch Sugar Cookies,” Michelle said as soon as the door had closed behind Ross, Mike, Norman, Lonnie, and P.K.

“I know. Did you have one?”

“One?” Michelle gave a rueful laugh. “I had four, and my jeans are going to know it when I try to zip them up tomorrow morning.”

“Stretch out on your back on the bed to do it,” Hannah advised.

“Does that work?”

“Like a charm. I’ve been using that trick for years when I put on extra weight.” Hannah switched gears. “Let’s take a second to talk about the competition tomorrow night. We’re serving the cookies, that’s a given, but I thought the flavor of the White Chocolate Mocha was a little sweet with the butterscotch. What did you think?”

“I think you’re right, but I have a solution. We can serve the same champagne cocktail that Sally served at Mother and Doc’s wedding reception. That wasn’t as sweet as the White Chocolate Mocha. But if we do that, we’ll lose the benefit of coffee in the drink.”

Hannah thought about that for a moment. “That’s true, but we can serve the coffee
after
the champagne cocktail.”

“Great idea!” Michelle said, smiling at Hannah.

“Thanks.” Hannah yawned and rubbed her eyes. “I don’t know about you, but I’m really tired. It’s almost midnight and we have to be at the Lake Eden Inn at six-thirty to practice.”

“That’s more sleep than I usually get, but it’s probably a good thing. Tomorrow’s going to be a busy day with the practice so early in the morning and the competition at night. I’m almost sorry the producers gave us an extra practice session to make up for the one we didn’t get to finish.”

“Me too. I’m so tired, I can’t keep my eyes open any longer.” Hannah got to her feet. “I’ll see you in the morning, Michelle. I’m too tired to talk about the footage tonight, but let’s compare notes tomorrow. Ross isn’t stopping by on his way to work in the morning, so all we have to do is make a pot of coffee and drink it on our way out to the lake. We can eat breakfast at the Corner Tavern on our way back from the practice session, and we’ll talk about the footage then.”

“That sounds good to me.” Michelle looked around the living room as they headed for the hallway and the bedrooms beyond. “Where’s Moishe? He didn’t get out, did he?”

“No. He’s on his pillow sleeping. He conked out about halfway through the footage.”

“You mean when the last piece of pizza was gone?”

“That’s exactly when. And I don’t think that was a coincidence.”

The two sisters parted ways near the end of the hallway. Michelle turned right to go into the guest room, and Hannah went straight into the master bedroom. Just as she’d told her sister, Moishe was stretched out on a feather pillow, but it wasn’t
his
feather pillow.

“Not again,” Hannah sighed, but she was smiling. She had bought a second expensive feather pillow, the exact duplicate of her pillow, to keep Moishe from stealing hers in the middle of the night. The two pillows were interchangeable, but he always stole her pillow anyway.

“Fine. I’ll get yours later,” she said, heading off to the master bath to take her shower before she went to bed, so she wouldn’t have to shower in the morning.

Ten minutes later, Hannah had toweled dry and she was dressed in her oldest pair of flannel pajamas. They had been marked down to five dollars at CostMart and after one glance, Hannah had immediately known why. The pajamas sported the most hideous tartan design in bright yellow, screaming pink, and neon green that Hannah had ever seen.

“Note to self,” she said after one glance in the mirror. “Do not take tartan pajamas on your honeymoon.”

When Hannah reentered her bedroom, Moishe was still in the same, cat-run-over-by-a-snowplow position on her pillow. He was snoring softly, making little beeping noises that she found endearing. She watched him for a moment until her eyelids started to feel very heavy and then she carefully removed his pillow from his side of the bed, pulled hers, complete with snoring, sleeping cat on top, over to his side of the bed. She plunked his pillow down on her side, and crawled in under the covers. She was happy, she was in love, and she knew what she was baking for the competition tomorrow. Life was good in Lake Eden, Minnesota . . . if you didn’t count the latest murder.

WHITE CHOCOLATE MOCHA

5 and ½ ounces white chocolate chips
(
Michelle used half of an eleven-ounce net weight bag of Ghirardelli Classic White)

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

2 and ½ cups whole milk

¼ teaspoon cinnamon

1 Tablespoon instant coffee granules
(Michelle used Taster’s Choice)

Sweetened whipped cream to garnish

Freshly grated nutmeg to sprinkle on top

Place the white chocolate chips, along with the vanilla extract, in a microwave-safe bowl on the counter.

Heat the milk and the cinnamon in a saucepan on the stove at MEDIUM LOW heat, stirring constantly, until it begins to steam and bubbles form around the edges of the saucepan. DO NOT LET IT BOIL!

Sprinkle the 1 Tablespoon of instant coffee granules over the top of the heated milk and stir them in. Make sure they are dissolved.

Pour the not-quite-boiling mixture over the white chocolate chips in the bowl. Stir once, and then cover it with a clean dish towel, a lid that’ll fit it, or a piece of heavy-duty foil tucked in around the edges of the bowl.

Let the bowl sit on the counter for 5 minutes.

Take off whatever you used for a lid and whisk briskly until the chips are melted and the mixture is smooth and creamy.

Hannah’s 1
^st
Note: If the chips haven’t entirely melted, you can stick the bowl in the microwave and heat the contents on HIGH for 1 minute. Let it sit in the microwave for one more minute and then take out the bowl and attempt to stir it smooth. If that doesn’t do it, heat it again for 30-second intervals followed by 30-second standing times, until you can stir it smooth.

Pour the White Chocolate Mocha into mugs and top with sweetened whipped cream sprinkled with freshly grated nutmeg.

Hannah’s 2
^nd
Note: If you like, you can serve this with a cinnamon stick in each mug for stirring. If you don’t feel like making sweetened whipped cream, you can simply drop a handful of miniature marshmallows on top of each serving.

Michelle’s Note: It was hot under the lights at the Food Channel competition so I didn’t have any trouble getting the white chocolate chips to melt, but Lisa told me that if she makes White Chocolate Mocha at home, she usually puts the white chocolate chips in her food processor and uses the steel blade to chop them up before she pours on the almost-boiling milk and coffee mixture. This takes less whisking than if you leave the chips whole.

Chapter Eighteen

“P
erfect,” Hannah said as they left Sally’s kitchen and locked the door behind them. “We had plenty of time to do everything, Michelle.”

“I know. It was a lot easier than making all those long ropes of cookie dough and combining them into rolls. And I think the cookies showcase better the way we’re doing it now.”

“This way, Michelle.” Hannah guided her around the corner and knocked on Sally’s office door. “I want to see if Sally’s in yet.”

The door opened immediately, almost as if Sally had been waiting for them to stop by, and there was a smile on Sally’s face as she motioned them inside.

“I knew you’d stop by,” she said, pouring each of them a cup of coffee from the pot she kept on a stand under the picture window that overlooked the kitchen. “You’re doing it again, aren’t you?”

Hannah nodded, but Michelle looked puzzled.

“Doing what?” Michelle asked Sally.

“Investigating,” Hannah answered her sister. “Sally knows that I can’t be hands-off when one of us is involved.”

“You can forget about the
one of us
part,” Sally told Hannah. “All you had to say is that you can’t be hands-off.”

“You’re right,” Hannah admitted. “We really need to figure out who killed him.”

“Yes, and the sooner, the better,” Sally agreed. “Every single one of my busboys is leery about going into the cooler. I watched them last night and no one wanted to be the first one in there.”

“What did you do?” Michelle asked.

“I marched in the kitchen and went into the cooler. That shamed them into it, but I have to admit that it was kind of creepy just knowing that Chef Duquesne had been murdered in there. Then I had them bring me buckets of hot water and I scrubbed the floor with bleach.”

Michelle shuddered. “You’re a brave woman, Sally. I don’t know if I could have gone in there again, especially alone.”

“I just kept repeating what my father used to say when my mother would say she’d seen a ghost. He’d tell her,
The dead can’t hurt the living
.”

“And that helped you?” Hannah asked.

“Not really, but it didn’t help my mother, either. I just kept telling myself that the killer wouldn’t come back to the cooler to commit another murder with all the busboys and waiters standing around in the kitchen watching me.” Sally paused and took a sip of her own coffee. “Anyway, you probably want to know my impressions of the judges and the contestants, and whether I saw anything pertaining to Chef Duquesne that I thought was unusual . . . right?”