Sweet Masterpiece - The First Samantha Sweet Mystery (11 page)

Kelly arrived on a beautiful May morning and
it was scary to see that the child had the same brilliant blue
eyes, curly brown hair and charm-you-out-of-anything ways as her
father.

Those blue eyes fixed on Sam now, as she
walked into the kitchen.

“Mom! Hi! Surprise!”

“Kelly. What are you doing here?”

She’d made herself right at home. Dishes were
piled in the sink, smeared in red sauce from the spaghetti Sam had
left in the fridge a few days earlier. Through the door to the
hall, she saw a large black suitcase on the bed in the guest room.
A guest room now. At one time it was Kelly’s and she still
obviously felt entitled.

“You look great, Mom. Have you lost
weight?”

Hardly. But that’s the kind of charmer Kelly
was. She had an amazing ability to ignore criticism and just plow
forward with a sunny outlook and a batch of compliments. That
cheery disposition got them through her teen years without a death
in the house.

Sam plopped her pack on the counter and
washed her hands at the sink.

“What time did you get in?” she asked. “You
should have told me you were coming. I would have made dinner.”

“Oh that’s okay,” Kelly said. “I found
something.” As an afterthought she asked if Sam had eaten anything
and offered to warm the rest of the pasta. The tea kettle was hot
and so Sam pulled mugs from the cabinet and dunked teabags for both
of them.

“So, you got a few days off?” she asked, once
they were settled at the table.

“Well, that’s the thing.”

I’m in trouble
, Sam thought. “What
‘thing’?”

“You know how I’ve been stressing over
Deborah lately.”

Kelly’s supervisor truly did sound like the
office witch at the mid-sized corporation where she’d been working
her way up the ladder.

“This week was the pits. She’s been on my ass
for two weeks, but it got to be more than her usual PMS or
whatever. She has it in for me, Mom. I can’t handle her
anymore.”

They’d had this discussion by phone quite a
few times. Kelly swore she’d discussed Deborah’s behavior with
company management, that everyone else in the department agreed
with her, but that nothing ever changed. Sam had been sympathetic
but was getting the uneasy feeling that tea and sympathy wasn’t
what Kelly was after now.

“I’ve quit,” she said.

“Quit? A seventy-thousand a year job, and
you’ve just quit?”

“It’s not like there aren’t better jobs, Mom.
I’m getting my résumé out there.”

How many places could have possibly received
her résumé since, what, Friday? All sorts of thoughts went through
Sam’s head—mainly, how was Kelly going to pay back the cash she
taken. Unemployment money wasn’t an option if she’d just walked
out. And there certainly wouldn’t be any golden parachute.

Kelly got up and went to the cookie jar,
helping herself to the last of the butter cookies. “Don’t stress
over this, Mom. Something great is going to come through.”

Sam rinsed her mug and put the dirty dishes
into the dishwasher, refusing to guess at why Kelly left Los
Angeles on a moment’s notice, or to dwell on the fact that she’d
never find a job of that caliber here in Taos.

“I’m tired,” Sam said. “We’ll talk about this
tomorrow.”

She closed her bedroom door and put on her
nightshirt. A quick call to Beau to let him know there was no
emergency and that they could talk more tomorrow. From the living
room a reality show began blaring on television. The smell of
microwave popcorn drifted through the house. This was too much like
the last time Kelly’d shown up, right after her college graduation.
Sam pulled the pillow over her head and tried not to think.

Chapter 14

Sam woke early, with an uneasy mix of images
running through her head. Beau’s kiss last night came back to her,
creating an ache inside. Then she remembered that Kelly was in the
next room and suspected that she’d only heard half the story about
her quick exit from L.A. and her job.

The phone was ringing in the kitchen when she
stepped out of the shower. When it became apparent that Kelly
wasn’t going to get herself out of bed to answer it Sam threw on a
robe and dashed for it. A female voice was leaving a message about
a cake. She grabbed up the receiver before the answering machine
cut off. At this moment, any business was good business.

“I know this is short notice, but is there
any way you could do a wedding cake by Thursday?” the female voice
inquired, once she realized she was speaking to a real person.

Sam got the details on size and colors and
quoted a price, with a little added premium for the fact that she
would once again have to drive to Santa Fe for delivery. Sam’s own
inclination, if she were the customer, would have been to look for
the nearest local bakery but as the baker she was more than happy
to accept an order. It wasn’t as if she were swamped with extra
business right now. If Sweet’s Sweets was ever going to get off the
ground Sam had to jump through a few hoops to get that necessary
can-do reputation.

The minute she hung up she made a quick
inventory of supplies and calculated a schedule. The three cakes
for the tiers would have to be baked the night before assembly and
delivery. But she could get busy on the flowers and trim pieces
right away. She whipped up a batch of buttercream frosting, tinted
part of it in the bride’s chosen mauve and started making roses and
buds. A darker tint for some of the flowers would add dimension.
Even with a traditional cake like this customer wanted, Sam liked
to add special touches. She’d no sooner slipped the baking sheet
full of roses, on their small paper squares, into the fridge than
Beau called.

“How did it go last night?” he asked.

“Same song, next verse. I don’t think I’m
getting the whole story.” She glanced toward Kelly’s room. The door
remained closed. Some job hunt.

“Thought you might be interested in knowing
that some kind of plant toxin showed up in Riley Anderson—uh,
Pierre Cantone’s system. The M.I. said there was fluid in the
lungs, maybe pneumonia, so I don’t know if the two are
related.”

“Odd. Maybe he was having an allergic
reaction to something and that caused the fluid.” Sam realized that
she was merely making wild guesses. “I’m still wondering where the
roommate went, too. How weird is it that he just vanished. Do you
think someone might have harmed him?”

“No real evidence of that. Maybe with
Cantone’s death, he simply had no reason to stick around.”

That was certainly possible.

“Sam . . . I’d really like to see you again.”
His voice held that familiar ache.

She glanced again at Kelly’s closed door and
lowered her voice. “Me too. But it’s awkward right now. Your
place?”

“Well, that’s awkward too. My mother is
here.”

He’d mentioned his mother before. “Visiting?”
she asked, daring to hope.

“No, and that’s the thing. She’s getting
fragile and I’ve been debating what to do. Nursing homes are just
so depressing.”

Sam could only imagine. Her own parents were
still going pretty strong, and her sister Rayleen lived less than
ten miles from them. Whenever Sam talked to friends who were
dealing with the elderly and frail, it made her appreciate her
situation.

They ended the call without really making any
plans.

She was brooding over it when the phone rang
again. Delbert Crow. He had another house for her to take care of,
this one between town and the Taos Ski Valley. Not exactly a
convenient drive, but hey, income was income. She wrote down the
details and asked whether there was a key or if she’d need to break
in. She knew what the answer would be. Luckily, her tool box was
still out in the truck. She told him she could get on it that
afternoon.

With another glare at Kelly’s closed bedroom
door, Sam made herself a sandwich for lunch, knowing she still had
to talk to her daughter about repaying the money. Dreading it.

Sam went out to her truck to be sure her
tools and lawn equipment were loaded. She doubted that a property
on the ski basin road would have an actual, formal lawn but she
never knew. Best to be prepared.

Back in the kitchen she grabbed an apple and
chips to go with her sandwich and noticed that Kelly’s bedroom door
stood halfway open. A flush from the bathroom, and she meandered
out wearing an oversize T-shirt and loose silk kimono.

“Morning, Mom,” she said with a yawn, coming
into the kitchen and touching the side of the coffee carafe to see
if it was warm.

“It’s nearly noon,” Sam said. “Coffee went
cold hours ago.”

Kelly hmmm’d and filled a mug with the cold
leftover brew, sticking it into the microwave.

“I’ve got a property to attend to this
afternoon. Do not get into those roses in the fridge. They’re for a
customer.” One of Kelly’s favorite things as a teen had been to pop
a whole frosting rose into her mouth and just let it melt. “What
are your plans today?”

She shot Sam a look that said she’d hoped not
to do anything at all.

“We need to talk. Later.” Sam gathered her
pack and left.

She reached the ski valley property quickly
enough. Posted the requisite signage that USDA provides, notifying
the world that the property was now under their jurisdiction. The
place was high enough in elevation to be largely covered in trees,
mostly piñon but with a few taller pines as well. Aside from a
summer’s worth of mountain wildflowers and grasses to be leveled
with the weed trimmer, the outdoor work would be minimal.

The house was a charmer, a picturesque log
cabin with a wide porch across the front and a large redwood deck
at the back. Wooden planters once held lush annuals, but crisp
brown stalks provided the only evidence of them now. Overall, the
place was well maintained and Sam wondered what had caused the
owner to abandon it.

Inside, it was clear that they’d taken their
time moving out. No furniture remained, the kitchen was neat, the
refrigerator empty. Utilities had been cut off, apparently, but she
checked the breakers anyway and made sure the hot water heater was
shut off. This place wouldn’t need much at all in the way of
cleanup, just some routine maintenance to keep it in showable
condition until it sold. She guessed that a sale would come along
soon—the property had that kind of curb appeal.

She spent an hour or so inside, sweeping up
the few bits of mouse evidence and swiping at some corner cobwebs
with a duster, draining the pipes and pouring a little antifreeze
into each drain. With freezing temperatures approaching in the next
month or so, and no heat in the cabin, frozen pipes would be the
biggest potential problem. That done, she replaced the locks and
turned her attention to the outdoors.

A split-rail fence surrounded an area that
was probably two or three acres. Of that, most had been left
natural with just a perimeter of twenty feet or so immediately
around the house trimmed, either for appearance or as a firebreak.
Sam cranked up her gas weed trimmer and set to work on it,
concentrating on the drive and walkways first. The drone of the
engine and monotony of cutting neat swathes gave her peace from
dwelling on her daughter’s messed-up situation. Instead, she found
herself thinking of the artist Cantone, imagining that he might
have found inspiration in an idyllic mountain setting like
this.

The sun had gone behind the surrounding
mountains by the time she finished, darkening the property and
narrow lane with shade. She packed up her gear, rechecked the locks
and headed out.

As long as she was at this end of town, Sam
decided she might as well dash by the Cantone property and give
things there a quick checkover. It wasn’t more than ten minutes out
of the way and there was still daylight once she got away from the
steep hills surrounding the ski valley.

She zipped along the county road, enjoying
the fact that she was out of the house, doing something on her own
for a few extra minutes. Betty McDonald’s car was in her driveway,
Sam noted as she turned in at Cantone’s. Some weeds were sprouting
along the driveway but otherwise the property looked fairly
neat.

Inside, nothing had changed. The smell of
drywall mud from her little patch job gave the house an air of
freshness, like new construction. In the kitchen she found herself
staring at the places where she’d previously seen the greenish
haze, but it was harder to spot this time. A faint dusting, barely
noticeable now. She still wondered about that, whether she should
mention it to Beau.

She locked the front door and turned toward
the truck. Beside the driveway were some short plants that she’d
never noticed before. They had an odd color, similar to the unusual
green she’d spotted inside. On a whim, she walked over and plucked
a stem from one. Handling the stem, some of the same substance came
off on her fingers. It looked identical.

That probably explained it. Maybe the plant
was something Cantone used to mix his paints. Or maybe it was
edible and they cooked with it. She found an old sack on the back
seat of the truck and carefully wrapped a few stems of the plant in
it. She would ask Zoe, her friendly plant expert.

At the Y intersection at the north end of
town she happened to glance down at her cell phone on the seat
beside her. She’d missed a call, probably while she was behind the
hills all afternoon. She recognized Rupert’s number and dialed
him.

“What’s up?” she asked.

“Interesting news flash in the art world.” He
paused, obviously waiting for her to beg to hear it. She obliged.
“Two Cantone paintings have just showed up at an auction house in
New York. I inquired, through Esteban, and word is that they came
through an artist rep in Santa Fe.”