Eclair and present dange.., p.7
Éclair and Present Danger, page 7
“Okay . . .” she prompted, waiting.
Bridget looked from Winnie to Mr. Nelson and back again, her exasperation at an all-time high. “Why are you humoring him, dear? You know this is going to end up in one of his ridiculous little jokes that aren’t the slightest bit funny.”
Winnie stood and joined her housemate next to the railing. “Go on, Mr. Nelson.”
“The school bus stopped at the end of the road just like always. And just like always, I watched Sissy meet Ava outside the bus and walk with her down the street.”
Lovey wound her way around Mr. Nelson’s legs . . . the cane . . . the legs of just about every chair on the porch . . . and then looked up at Winnie and hissed. This time, though, Winnie gave the exchange only a passing notice as she waited for her friend to continue.
“When they got to right there”—Mr. Nelson pointed to the street between their home and Bart’s—“Sissy whispered something in Ava’s ear, and Ava ran right through Bart’s flower bed, trampling everything in sight. See?”
Winnie’s gaze traveled beyond the road to the flower bed that encircled Bart’s mailbox. Sure enough, all signs of spring that had been starting to form had been crushed into the mulched earth.
“I guess I missed that when I brought the pie over after dinner,” she mused.
Bridget’s hands moved to her mouth but not before she released yet another gasp. Eventually, she spoke, her disgust rivaled only by disbelief. “How could she tell her child to do that especially after what happened the first time?”
The answer was on the tip of Winnie’s tongue, but she let Mr. Nelson spell it out for their next-door neighbor. “Based on what Winnie just said, Bart was already dead by as much as six or seven hours when school let out.”
“I realize that,” Bridget said. “But Sissy couldn’t have known that.”
Mr. Nelson’s hand tightened on the handle of his cane. “She could if she was the one who held the pillow . . .”
Chapter 9
Winnie pulled the sponge from the bucket, squeezed out the excess soapy water, and moved around to the driver’s side of the ambulance. “Don’t look now, Renee, but your number one fan is headed this way.”
Renee’s head popped up from the other side of the car as she, too, took note of Mr. Nelson and his cane headed in their direction. Lovey followed at a safe distance and with a slightly lazier pace. “Maybe he wants to help dry.”
“Maybe he wants to gawk at you in that formfitting T-shirt.” She finished the door panel and moved down the length of the ambulance, stopping to dip her sponge into the bucket as she went. “In fact, if I’m right on the time, Mr. Nelson is giving up his noon sighting of Channel Five’s meteorologist to get a closer look at you.”
“He is good for the ego,” Renee said in a half whisper before she made her way around the hood of the ambulance to meet Mr. Nelson at the end of the driveway. “Mr. Nelson, hello. Don’t you look dapper today?”
Winnie stopped washing and turned in time to see Renee straighten the man’s clip-on bow tie, a gesture that earned her former and soon-to-be-again employee a sweet smile in return. She shook her head in amusement and returned to the task at hand.
Mr. Nelson cleared his throat and hobbled a few steps closer to Winnie. “Lovey seemed anxious to come outside and see what you were up to, so I let her out. I hope that’s okay.”
“It’s fine, Mr. Nelson.” She waved a soapy finger in the direction of the gold-colored eyes staring out at her from the oak tree on the opposite side of the driveway.
Lovey, in turn, blinked twice and then hissed.
Progress . . .
“Once you get to rinsing, make sure you rinse and dry one section at a time. Looks better that way.”
“Will do, Mr. Nelson. Thanks for the tip.” She got to the end of the driver’s side and stood, the ache in her legs after three sides of bending and washing making her more than a little grateful for Renee’s help. “Phew. Time to rinse. Renee, you want to spray it down?”
“I’ll do that!” Mr. Nelson stepped forward, took the garden hose from Renee’s hands, and hit her with the first shot.
“Oooh!” Renee squealed. “Oooh, that’s cold.”
He released his hold on the trigger, his eyes wide. “Oh. Miss Ballentine. I’m so sorry. Can I help dry you off?”
Winnie snorted, then laughed, then snorted again. “You’re as bad as a teenage boy, Mr. Nelson!”
“What?” he countered, his non-cane-holding hand splayed. “My hand slipped. It happens sometimes.”
She stepped over to the folding chair tasked with holding their car-washing supplies and liberated the first towel from the pile. “Here, Renee.”
Renee took the towel, dried off, and then wrapped it around her body. “Th-that’s b-better.”
“You gonna keep that towel there?” Mr. Nelson asked.
“F-for a lit-tle while,” Renee managed between teeth clatters. “Th-that wa-ter is c-cold.”
“Oh.” Mr. Nelson dropped the hose, lifted his left forearm into view, and consulted his watch. “Well, I better head inside. The noonday weather report will be coming on in four and a half minutes, and I need to see what the day will bring.”
Winnie retrieved the hose and pointed at the sky with the nozzle. “I’m pretty sure it’s going to be sunny today, Mr. Nelson. There’s not so much as a cloud in the sky.”
“You never know, Winnie. You never know.” And then he was gone, hobbling down the driveway and up the front steps to their porch with a speed he rarely possessed—unless Renee or a weekday forecast was at the other end.
“Was it something I said?” Renee asked.
“Nope. It was something you did.”
“What did I do?”
“You covered up the T-shirt he intentionally soaked.” Slowly, Winnie moved around the car, spraying off soap as she went. When she reached the end, she waited for Renee to catch up and then handed the woman a can of soda from the cooler. “Thanks, Renee. For everything. I’m not sure I could pull this thing off without you.”
Renee tossed the car-drying towel onto the chair, took a sip of soda, and then added her body towel to the mix. “Think that’ll get him back out here?”
“Not until the weather report is over.” She leaned against the pin oak tree at the edge of the property and took a sip of her own soda. “You haven’t asked about my time at the ambulance district with Master Sergeant Hottie. You feeling okay?”
“I’m fine,” Renee said, shrugging. “Just missing Ty, I guess.”
“He’s only with Bob for two more days.” She looked at her friend closely and noticed some unfamiliar circles under the woman’s eyes. “Are you sleeping?”
“Some.” Then, with a flick of her hand, bubbly Renee was back. “So tell me . . . how’d it go?”
She considered pressing Renee on the subject of her recently finalized divorce and the resulting split custody schedule, but she let it go. Her friend needed a distraction from life, not a rehashing. When Renee was ready to talk, she’d talk. “It went well. Greg is really nice. He thinks my—”
“Nice?” Renee shouted. “Nice? I don’t want to hear that he’s nice!”
“Well he is. And as I was starting to say, he thinks my idea for the Emergency Dessert Squad is great.”
Renee finished off her soda with two long pulls, set the can down on the chair next to the towels they hadn’t used, and reached for Lovey. Instantly, the cat settled into Renee’s arms and began to purr. Loudly. “Anyone with a brain in their head would think it’s a great idea, because it is. Did he let you look at one of the ambulances?”
“Yup. And I came up with an idea for those desserts that call for a drizzle of icing or glaze.” It was hard not to feel a little hurt by the affection her new cat seemed to show everyone except her, but she shook it off. Besides, she had bigger fish to fry. “When we deliver them up to the door on the gurney, I’ll drizzle on the topping via an IV bag.”
“An IV bag?”
“That’s right. And it will hang from an extendable pole just like a real IV bag would.”
“Cute.” Renee stroked her hand down the top of Lovey’s neck and then returned her fingers to the same general starting place to administer a well-received scratch. “We’ll have to figure out a way to keep the chocolate warm so it stays at the right consistency, won’t we?”
“Yes, but I don’t think that will be too difficult. We won’t have to hang the bag until we’re unloading the ambulance for delivery.” She set her half-empty can down on the ground at her feet and slowly walked toward Renee and Lovey. The closer she got, the narrower the cat’s eyes became. Two feet from her intended destination, she stopped. “Do you think this cat is ever going to like me? I mean, she was left to me, you know . . .”
“It’s probably just a reaction to your stress. Cats can sense stuff like that, I think.” Renee clicked her tongue against the back of her teeth and smiled down at Lovey. “The day you got her, you closed down the bakery and found a dead body. That’s not the kind of stress a person can hide real well.”
“You’re stressed about Bob and not seeing Ty this week . . .”
“Okay, but—”
She held up her hand and continued. “And Mr. Nelson and Bridget are both stressed beyond belief about Bart’s death . . .”
“Yeah, but—”
“So your stress theory doesn’t hold up, Renee.”
“Then I’ve got nothing.” Shrugging, Renee lowered herself to the ground and repositioned the cat against her legs instead of her arms. Once she was sure Lovey was going to stay, she pointed to the house across the street. “So what’s going on over there, anyway?”
Winnie retraced her steps back to the tree and leaned against its trunk. “We have no idea. Since the crime scene tape came down yesterday morning, we haven’t seen any more police.”
“No suspects?”
“I can’t speak for the Silver Lake PD, but Mr. Nelson and Bridget and I have come up with two.”
A flash of movement at Mr. Nelson’s front window let her know that the weather report was over and that her neighbor was trying to determine whether it was worth venturing outside again. The fact that Renee’s chosen patch of ground was outside of the man’s visual path had Winnie guessing Mr. Nelson would remain inside.
“Did one of you see something?” Renee asked.
She smiled and waved at the elderly man. “I saw something after the fact that gave us the first suspect, and Mr. Nelson saw something that gave us the second.”
“Care to share?”
“Yesterday, while I was at the station talking to Greg, I saw a flyer on a bulletin board listing Bart’s house for sale. When I asked how it got there, one of Greg’s coworkers said it came from Bart’s stepson, Mark Reilly.”
Renee made a face first at Winnie and then at Lovey as the cat abandoned her cuddle spot in favor of smelling her way around the ambulance and the assorted car-washing paraphernalia scattered across the ground. “I admit the timing is pathetic, but maybe the guy can’t afford the mortgage on the house now that his stepfather is dead.”
She watched Lovey lick a bead of water off the outside of the garden hose and then continue on, stopping only to stalk a butterfly and a falling leaf before contemplating a dash across the street. “Lovey, stay over here,” she cautioned. Surprisingly, the cat lowered herself to the grass, swished her tail from side to side, and remained on their side of the road.
Looking back at Renee, she continued. “But here’s the thing. Mark was copying these flyers hours before I found his stepfather’s body.”
“Maybe Bart agreed to the sale.”
It was a wrinkle she hadn’t considered.
Now that she did, though, she couldn’t help but wonder if Renee was right. Bart had grown increasingly more depressed since the death of his beloved Ethel. Even Winnie’s peach pie deliveries couldn’t keep a smile on his face for more than a few minutes. Maybe the memories of a life shared in that house had become too painful . . .
“I guess I hadn’t thought of that possibility,” she finally admitted. “I suppose you could be right.”
“Maybe. Maybe not—oh, there she goes!”
Winnie pushed off the tree and whirled around in time to see Lovey dash across the street and right through the middle of Bart’s trampled flower bed. “Lovey! Come back! Come back here right now!”
Renee stood, readjusted her still-wet T-shirt against her body, and joined Winnie in her own dash across Serenity Lane. “Cat Lesson Number One: Cats only listen if they want to listen. So that whole ‘come back, come back’ thing you just yelled? Completely ineffective.”
“Now you tell me,” she mumbled as Lovey scampered around the side of the Wagners’ house. Darting left, Winnie half ran, half jogged around the back of the house and stopped. “Lovey?”
When there was no response, she threw her hands in the air. “Great. Two days into my role as cat owner and I’ve already lost the cat.”
Renee called for silence with her index finger and then cocked her head toward the house. Seconds later, she lowered the same finger to point at a partially askew screen next to Bart’s patio. “Cat Lesson Number Two: Cats are curious. Period.”
She looked from Renee to the basement window and back again. “Huh?”
“Lovey is in there.”
Again she followed the path of Renee’s finger, and again she took note of the gap between the screen and the windowsill. “In there?”
“Uh-huh.”
“But how am I supposed to get her out?” she asked.
“You’re the creative one. You’ll figure it out.” Renee waved, pivoted on the toes of her bare feet, and headed back around the side of the house.
Winnie ran to catch up. “Aren’t you going to help me?”
“Nope.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m not about to blow your chance to play damsel in distress.”
“Damsel in distress?” she repeated.
Renee’s answering grin was decidedly wicked. “That’s right. Lovey just did you a huge favor.”
“A—a favor?” she stammered. “How the heck do you figure that?”
“Damsel in distress, Winnie. Damsel. In. Distress.”
Chapter 10
A cup of chocolate chips—check.
A half teaspoon of baking powder—check.
Three-quarters of a cup of brown sugar—check.
Winnie looked up from her list of ingredients and shook her mixing spoon at the four-legged creature eyeing her with boredom from the windowsill. “You have no idea how lucky you are that you came out of Bart’s house all on your own.”
Lovey yawned, her mouth opening wide enough to display her long pink tongue. When she was done, she stood up, walked around in a circle, and then dropped into a ball, clearly undaunted by Winnie’s reprimand.
She kept talking. “I get that you’re not happy about this situation. I’m not, either. But Gertie was my friend, and she left you in my care. One way or the other, we’re going to have to make this work. I’m doing my part by providing you a litter box, food, and a window bed. How about meeting me in the middle and at least pretending you like me?”
“Knock, knock . . . It’s me, dear.” Bridget peeked around Winnie’s always-open door, gave a quick scan of the kitchen and living room, and then cocked her head ever so slightly. “Winnie, dear? Who were you speaking to just now?”
“Myself, apparently.” She loosened her grip on the spoon and used it to wave her neighbor into the apartment. “If you stick around for a while and you’re game, I have a new dessert I’d like to try out on you.”
Bridget crossed the entryway and stopped at the edge of the counter. “Will this one have a cute little rescue name, too?”
“I’m working on that.” Winnie returned to her drawer of measuring tools and selected the sizes she needed for the next two ingredients on her self-made list. She pointed the four-ounce cup at Bridget’s left hand. “Are you heading off to work?”
“I’m here to work, dear.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I’d like to talk to you—on the record, of course—about the Emergency Dessert Squad.”
She lowered the cup back down to the counter, bouncing her attention between her latest recipe and Bridget. “While I think I can be up and running on a limited scale as early as Monday, I’m not sure anyone will be calling. Maybe we should wait until I have customers.”
“A piece in the paper will get you customers, dear.”
“That makes sense, I guess. So? What do you need from me? To let you”—she let go of the cup and used her fingers to make air quotes—“overhear something about my new business venture?”
Bridget’s stare was so intense, Winnie recovered the measuring cup and took a half step back. “What? Your column is called ‘Overheard.’”
“My column is, yes. But I’m going to interview you for a full article that will run in this weekend’s paper . . .”
“Oh. Wow. Thanks, Bridget. That would be fantastic.” She looked at the mess in front of her and then back at her neighbor. “Um, do you want me to put this on hold while you ask me questions?”
“First, I want to know why you were talking to yourself when I arrived. Is everything all right, dear?”
Winnie used the one-cup measuring tool to scoop sugar, and the three-quarter-cup tool to scoop white chocolate chips. One by one, she added each ingredient to the first of two bowls and then gave them a quick mix. “Mostly. But, honestly, how do I get Lovey to like me?”
At the mention of the feline, Bridget inventoried the floor around the counter and the various seating options in the living room before finally locating Lovey in her spot in front of the window. Within moments, the cat was awake and purring as Bridget lovingly scratched around her ears and under her chin. “Just do what I do, Winnie.”
“I would if she’d let me get close. But she doesn’t. Every time I try, she hisses at me.”
“Have you tried bribing her, dear?”
“Bribing her?” Winnie set the dry ingredients to the side and moved on to the next bowl and the eggs, milk, and oil waiting to be mixed together. “With what?”
