Flourless to Stop Him (12 page)

Darn, I still hadn’t gotten any Christmas presents. I looked at the busy kitchen. It smelled of spice and molasses mixed with vanilla and chocolate. Meghan had put up a three-foot artificial tree in the corner of the counter nearest my office. Its fiber-optic lights glowed through the construction-paper ornaments she had placed on it.

Christmas. I had only so much time to make cookies and fill orders. The regular fun of the season was lost in the sheer volume of work I was trying to get done.

The good news was that my family didn’t mind the seconds that piled up haphazardly on plastic platters. Burnt sugar cookies always reminded me of Christmas. My mother tended to get distracted making cookies. Having six kids would do that.

My poor mother would be a wreck if she were alive today to hear that the police thought Tim was a drug dealer and a possible murderer. In fact I could feel her ghost standing behind me with her arms crossed, tapping her foot, wondering why I wasn’t moving heaven and hell to see that Tim was proved innocent.

“I
saw Grandma Ruth trying to pop a wheelie on her scooter,” Meghan announced as she came into the kitchen. With a smooth move she took off her camo green coat and hung it on the coatrack. Her hat and gloves were stuffed inside.

“I don’t think that’s possible on a Scootaround,” I said as I crumb-coated the three cakes that had to be out the door this afternoon. Cakes tend to have crumbs that get into the frosting. Bakers use buttercream to make a light first layer all over the cake to catch all the crumbs. We called that the crumb-coat. Once frosted, the cakes went back into the fridge to set.

“All things are possible with Grandma Ruth.” Meghan grabbed an oversized bib apron from the hooks on the wall and wrapped it around her slender figure.

Oh, to be nineteen and slim again. Not that I was curvy by any stretch of the imagination. When people described me they usually mentioned Popeye’s girlfriend, Olive Oyl.
I guess that was better than being compared to Little Lotta. Still, it was hard to work with an attractive nineteen-year-old. Not that we would date the same guys or anything. For goodness’ sake, I could be her mom.

I shook my head to clear my thoughts. I was tired. That was all. I finished the crumb-coats and put the cakes in the freezer. Meghan started on the giant pile of dishes. Her black hair was casually twisted into a messy bun at the nape of her neck. She wore a white tee shirt and black slacks. When she’d come in, she’d traded her snow boots for a pair of comfortable athletic shoes. When you spent eight to ten hours on your feet each day, you were glad for sensible shoes.

“Did you sleep here again?” Meghan asked.

I grabbed a coffee mug and poured the dark brew. Then I sat at the table and put my tired feet up on the chair across from me. “I’m still five orders behind.” I rubbed the back of my neck. “It’s good to be busy.”

“Not if it kills you.” Meghan glanced at me. Her thick black eyeliner accented the sparkle in her eyes. “Please take care of you. I need this apprenticeship.”

I smiled at her and took a swallow of my coffee. “You want me to take care of myself purely for your selfish reasons.”

“Yes.” She nodded. “And because you haven’t taught me how to make Danish yet.”

“If I get these cookie orders done and delivered, I’ll make Danish for the Saturday-morning crowd.”

“Oh, cream cheese or jelly?”

“Both, plus lemon.”

“You are my new favorite person.” She turned back to the dishes. The doorbells rang. I glanced at the clock. It was after nine and the morning rush had already happened. Whoever had come in would get the morning leftovers. I hadn’t had time to start on the tea and desserts for the late-afternoon crowd.

“I’ll get it,” I said and waved at Meghan to finish the
dishes. “I need those bowls to make more cookie dough. If I can get it in the freezer in the next hour I’ll finally be on track to catch up.”

“If you don’t get caught up, it won’t be because of me.” She turned back to the sink.

“Hello?”

I pushed open the kitchen door to see Mindy standing in front of the counter. “Mindy, Grandma left some time ago.”

“I wasn’t looking for Grandma,” Mindy said. She bared her teeth in an insincere smile. Pulling off her gloves one finger at a time, she looked around. “So this is your bakery.”

“Yes.” I put my hands behind my back to hide the rough, dry skin and supershort nails that were more than a little ragged.

Today Mindy wore a neat navy shift dress with black tights that showed off her long legs. Her coat was a knee-length wool overcoat in a classic beige with big black buttons. “The décor is . . . quaint.”

“Thanks, it’s supposed to be,” I said and watched her circle the room taking in everything from the front windows to the yellow-painted walls to the wrought iron café tables and chairs.

“With a name like Baker’s Treat—I would have thought you would have gone for a more English tearoom look.”

“There are two cabbage-rose-print wingback chairs.” I pointed to the two chairs in the far corner grouped around a wrought iron side table. “In the summer we’ll put the wrought iron out on the sidewalk like a café. Then I’ll get a few more English teahouse pieces,” I said. “Can I get you a cup of coffee? We have organic coffees as well as other gluten-free, organic, and allergy-free products.”

“Sure,” she said and waved at me dismissively as she studied the paintings I had bought from students at the junior college.

I grabbed a fat oversized white cup and matching saucer
and set them on top of the glass counter. “The coffee is at the coffee bar.” I waved toward the three containers of coffee and the one hot water for teas. “There’s cream, half-and-half, skim milk, and soy or almond milk. There are also a wide variety of sugars. I recommend the agave. It tastes the most like sugar, but it’s healthier.”

“Thanks.” Mindy put her gloves in her coat pockets, picked up the mug, and stepped over to the coffee bar. “Everything looks so . . .”

“Good?” I added.

“Hmm, I was going to say
professional
.” She pumped coffee into her cup, added a splash of cream, and turned back to me. She raised the cup to her red-painted lips.

“What do you mean, ‘professional’?” I drew my brows together and tilted my head.

“It looks like a real bakery,” Mindy said. “Smells like one, too.”

“It
is
a real bakery,” I countered. “What did you think it was?”

“Oh, I don’t know, some sort of hippie kitchen. You have this weird, granola-like diet.”

“Gluten-free is not a granola, health-freak way of living. Lots of people live with food allergies. Just because they can’t eat fried Twinkies doesn’t mean they’re hippies. Because I bake allergy-free doesn’t mean I’m not a ‘real’ professional.”

“Oh, did I sound insulting?” She batted her perfectly mascaraed false eyelashes. “I didn’t mean to insult. I’m simply surprised. That’s all. You’ve been busy since your mother died.”

Mindy was my cousin and from New York, so I decided to believe her when she said she didn’t mean to sound insulting. “I like to stay busy. It helps me work out my issues.”

“Your issues?” She raised the cup to her lips.

I shrugged. “Between my divorce and mom passing on I’ve been reexamining my life.”

Her head tilted and her shoulders dropped a bit. The mask of perfection slipped for a fraction of a second. “I’m sorry about Auntie. I have no idea what I would do if my mom died.” In the next second she was back to her cool perfection. “Don’t you feel stifled in Oiltop? I mean, you lived in Chicago for years. It’s not New York, but it’s a long way from Oiltop.” She looked out the window to the windswept gray of Main Street in December. “There’s nothing here. It’s like being stuck in time.” She turned her attention back to me. “Even the radio stations are still playing music from when we were kids and would come visit Grandma. Have you noticed that?”

I shook my head. “I listen for the weather and such. If I want music I’ll put on my MP3 player.”

The corners of her mouth lifted slightly. “The small town might be backward, but you work around it, don’t you? How resourceful.”

“Mindy, why did you stop in? I’ve got to get back to baking.”

“I wanted to know more about Brad Ridgeway. Tim tells me he went to KU and was a basketball star.”

“Why don’t you come on around to the back? That way I can work while we talk.”

She eyed the door skeptically. “Is it dusty? This is a designer outfit. I don’t want to get whatever you call flour on it.”

I shrugged. “Your choice.” I turned on my heel and pushed the kitchen door open. In the back it was warm and the air was filled with the scents of yeast, cinnamon, chocolate, and ginger. The radio played popular music and Meghan danced while she finished up the dishes.

Mindy must have really wanted to talk, because she followed me into the back. “Oh, hello.”

Meghan stopped and cautiously observed Mindy and her designer duds. “Hey.”

“Mindy, this is my assistant Meghan. Meghan, this is my cousin Mindy. She’s here to visit for a while.”

“Hello,” Mindy said again and stood just inside the door balancing on her sky-high stilettos as if she had suddenly entered a lion’s den.

Meghan gave Mindy a small smile then turned to me. “I pulled the ingredients for the plum pudding that’s next on the list.”

“Thanks.” I went to the small sink and washed my hands with soap and water. It was a bakery policy to always wash your hands when you entered the kitchen. I glanced at Mindy, who hadn’t moved. She seriously looked scared. I had pity on her. “Mindy, you can sit at the table. That way we can chat and you won’t be in the way.”

“Okay.” She carefully teetered her way to the table, pulled out one of the chrome-and–red vinyl chairs, and sat down. Her coffee cup rested carefully on the table while she maintained a wary distance from the surface as if it were covered in an invisible contaminant that might ruin her outfit.

“Can I take your coat?” Meghan asked her. “We usually hang them on the hooks near the door.”

“No thank you, I’m fine.” Mindy waved her away.

Meghan shrugged. “Suit yourself.” She turned to me and rolled her eyes. Her silver eyebrow piercing wiggled when she raised an eyebrow. “I’ll go change out the coffee.”

“Thanks.” I nodded. It was policy to change the coffee every hour so that it remained hot and fresh throughout the day. If the coffee was good, people tended to stop by more often, and if they bought coffee they were more likely to purchase something to go with it.

“She is certainly interesting to look at,” Mindy said when the door swung closed behind Meghan. “Is she a Goth?”

“I think
Goth
is passé,” I said carefully. “Meghan is highly creative and a hard worker. She’s apprenticing under me so that she can move on to culinary school in Chicago and New York.”

“Huh.” Mindy raised her cup and refused to lean back
against the chair. She looked so stubbornly uncomfortable, but she was a grown-up and it wasn’t for me to change her mind. Still, I couldn’t help thinking how silly she was being.

I added ingredients to the spotlessly clean stainless steel bowl, my back to Mindy. I hated to be rude, but I was swamped and not ready to indulge her insults with my complete attention.

“So tell me about Brad,” Mindy said as I measured vanilla and brandy flavors.

“What do you want to know?”

“Well, what is he doing here in Oiltop? Is he seeing anyone? Not that that matters—as long as he’s not married, he’s mine.”

“That’s a tad arrogant, don’t you think?” I kept my voice bland and refused to look at her.

She laughed, a clear, bright, and lovely sound. “Dear, dear cousin, I’m from New York and I’m gorgeous. There’s no way any man from little Oiltop, Kansas, could resist this.” I caught her movement from the corner of my eye as she waved her hand over her outfit as if she were a living, breathing goddess.

Part of me envied her for feeling that way. Part of me wanted to slug that smug grin off her face. Mostly I took a deep breath and decided to be a grown-up about it. “As far as I know, Brad’s not seeing anyone right now. He moved to Oiltop when his dad was terminally ill. As for why he stayed, well, you’ll have to ask him.”

“Oh, I will,” Mindy said with a gleam in her eye. “Trust me. This time next week, that gorgeous lawyer will be putty in my hands.”

“Didn’t you say you were going back home? Why bother with an Oiltop man if you plan on leaving soon?”

“Oh, honey, it’s no bother to have a vacation fling with a man like Brad. Besides, if things work out, neither one of us will be in Oiltop after the new year.”

C
andy Cole came tearing back into the kitchen through the front door, Rocky Rhode on her heels taking pictures as he walked. “Tim’s been arrested,” Candy announced into her phone’s recorder. “Did he really kill that poor man? Do you know why he did it?” She shoved the phone under my nose.

“What?” My hands were covered in rice flour from kneading sweet dough for cinnamon rolls. It had been a heck of a day. First Grandma, then Mindy, and now this. I glanced at the clock. It was nearly 7:00
P.M
., and I hadn’t had much of a break all day. The good news was that my to-do list was shrinking . . . some. The bad news was that Meghan had been taking more calls and clocking in the e-mails for web orders all day. As the old saying goes,
When it rains, it pours. . . .

“Your brother Tim was arrested,” Candy said with a salacious gleam in her eye. “Officers Strickland and Emry were seen going into the FedEx warehouse and they brought your brother out in handcuffs.”

“What?” I asked again, unable to comprehend the full meaning of her words. “Why would they do that?”

Candy’s eyes lit up. “That’s what I’m finding out. My readers want to know . . . Did your brother kill that man?”

“They arrested Tim?” I felt a bit numb. I knew I was tired from working and a bit desperate due to my financial crunch, but I also knew Tim was innocent. They couldn’t arrest an innocent man. Could they?

“Sit down.” Candy looked at Rocky and motioned to the stool beside him.

Rocky went to sit down when Candy gave him the evil eye.

“Oh,” Rocky said and pushed the stool toward me. He then had the nerve to photograph me while I sat down before my shaky legs caused me to collapse.

“Do you need water?” Candy asked, suddenly concerned for my welfare. I didn’t believe it. She was concerned for her story and didn’t want me to pass out before she got it.

“Candy, are we really friends?”

“Of course!” She handed me a glass of water. “I told you that we are. Didn’t we meet for coffee two weeks ago? What about when I helped you with George Meister’s killer?”

“Candy, you tried to prove I killed George,” I pointed out and sipped my water. I had watched her get it from my sink; otherwise I might be afraid she dosed me with something.

“That was just me doing my job.” She waved it off. “Just like I’m doing my job now. I’m a reporter, Toni. It’s what I do, and I can’t keep letting your Grandma scoop me. I’ll be out of a job. Now, what do you know about Tim being arrested this evening?”

“I don’t know anything.” I guzzled the water. My thoughts ran wild. Did Brad know Tim had been arrested? What did they have on Tim? How did he go from being a person of interest to being arrested? Who was going to pay Tim’s bail? How would they pay it? My stomach clenched.

“You’re Tim’s sister. He’s staying at your house. Are you telling me you had no clue he murdered that man?” Candy moved her phone speaker from herself to me.

“I’m telling you, I saw the crime scene. There is no way my brother Tim or anyone I know could do something so violent and so horrific.” I put the glass down on the counter. The scene in the hotel room flashed in front of my eyes, and my stomach was queasy at the idea that another human being would do such a thing.

“Tell us about the crime scene,” Candy pushed. “Did you see anything that would incriminate your brother? I understand you called Tim the moment you found out his name was on the registry. Why did you alert him to the investigation? Did you suspect him?”

“I called my brother to see if he was all right,” I said. “Whoever killed Harold might also have killed Tim. I was worried, that’s all.” I shook my head. “I don’t ever impede the investigation. The law is the law and, for the most part, it works.”

“You didn’t believe that when you were a person of interest.”

“It still worked,” I argued. “Chief Blaylock never arrested me.”

“They arrested your brother Tim. That means they believe that they have enough evidence to indict him. What do you know about the circumstances of the case? Did your brother and Harold fight? Was there a disagreement in the weeks before the murder? What evidence do you think they have against Tim?”

The shock cleared from my brain. I realized that Candy was recording whatever I said. I also realized that Tim needed help. I had to stall Candy enough to get to the police station and find out what needed to be done to help my brother. Suddenly my decision to trust the police to do their job felt weak and stupid.

I stood and went to the sink to wash the gluten-free flour from my hands.

“Come on, Toni.” Candy followed me with Rocky behind her taking pictures. Rocky was the local photographer who did all the senior pictures, weddings, and such for the county. In his spare time he was the photo editor for the
Oiltop Times
. He told me once that photojournalism didn’t pay the bills, but if he didn’t do it he would feel as if he had wasted his talents. So he took studio photos to keep a roof over his head and worked for the newspaper to satisfy the serious photographer in him.

“I’ve got nothing to say.” I grabbed a towel to dry my hands and Rocky took photos of me. “Rocky, stop taking pictures. You won’t be able to use them. I won’t sign a release.”

“Oh, come on, Toni,” Rocky said. “You make a good subject.”

“Thanks, but no comment.” I pushed through the doors to the front of the store, turned the
OPEN
sign to
CLOSED,
and locked the door.

“You can’t close,” Candy said. “Your store hours are until nine and it’s only seven.”

“My family comes before store hours,” I said as I pushed back into the kitchen with Candy and Rocky trailing behind me.

“What about your family should my readers know?” Candy asked.

“Like I said, no comment.” I pulled my coat off the rack, tossed a stocking cap on my head, and prepped for the brisk wind that blew the dry bits of snow around.

“You might as well tell me something. If you don’t say anything publicly, then the story will be what other people think of you and your brother.”

I paused a second before opening the door. “I’m not giving a statement until I talk to my brother and his lawyer and find out what is going on. Now, you can and probably will
print whatever sensationalism you need to sell newspapers, but I won’t say anything that anyone can take out of context. Do you understand?”

“I understand.” Candy lowered her phone. There was disappointment in her blue eyes. “Look, I can’t let your grandma scoop me on this. Ernie told me that he’ll fire me if I can’t do better than a ninety-something-year-old woman.”

“I need to find out what’s happening.” I opened the door into the rush of icy-cold wind. “We’ll talk later.”

“On the record or off?” Candy asked as she stood in the door frame.

“Whichever my lawyer thinks is best.”

“Someday you’re going to have to trust me,” Candy said with a shake of her head.

“That day is not today,” I replied and locked the door behind us. I got in the van. The inside was cold as ice and my breath came out in a thick mist that fogged the windows. After five minutes to warm up the engine and brush the snow off the windows and mirrors, I took off toward the police station.

I had dialed both Tim and Brad but neither answered. Hopefully they were together getting this thing figured out. Luckily Tim’s juvenile record would not be admissible in court. My brother was a good man, and I loved him to pieces, but after Dad died Tim had gone through a period of boundary testing. Unfortunately he’d ended up doing four weeks of community service for shoplifting a pack of cigarettes. Then there’d been a vandalism incident, after which Mom had sent Tim to a summer boot camp for troubled youth.

He met some shady characters at the camp. How shady could a fourteen-year-old boy be? Tim never said. He’d come home after three months of grief counseling and team building a changed boy. He never talked about camp, but he’d come home and joined the football team, the basketball
team, and student council. He was fun to be around, kind and carefree. Tim lived his life as if each day were his last.

It was why he never married. Dad had been forty when he’d died. Tim figured he didn’t have much longer to live so he never settled down. Then last year he’d turned forty—the same age as Dad—and Mom had died. It was Tim’s wake-up call. At Mom’s funeral he’d said his only regret was he’d never given Mom more grandkids to love.

My brother had gotten a steady job and worked long and hard hours. He’d moved out of my house a month ago and was saving up for a nice little house to buy. He’d told me he was counting on the
Field of Dreams
movie statement. If he built it, she would come.

I never had the heart to tell him marriage wasn’t all it was cut out to be. I didn’t want my experience to color his opportunity. Even though my marriage had been a disaster, in my heart I always believed everyone should try marriage at least once. For some people it was a life of sweet companionship. Marriage was a relationship where the good outweighed the bad when both partners did what it took to make it work through the bad times and into the good. Who was I to take away anyone’s chance at a happy ending? So mine didn’t work out. It didn’t mean that all relationships were doomed. Did it?