Buttercream Bump Off (8 page)

“No, it doesn’t,” Mel said. “It’s just my mother being weird. Malloy didn’t die because of her dress.”

“How do you know?” Angie asked. “It could be cursed.”

Mel rolled her eyes and picked up the finished raffle box and placed it prominently on the front counter. They would run the raffle for one week. That should give them plenty of entrants for the drawing.

The front door was pushed open, and in shuffled an older gentleman. Mel looked more closely. No, there was nothing merely “older” about him. This guy was a fossil. She was only surprised he didn’t leave a trail of dust behind him when he walked.

His back curved like a question mark, leaving him significantly shorter than he’d most likely been a half century before. He wore dark pants that were hitched a bit too high by a pair of wide, red suspenders. His shirt was white with thin blue stripes, buttoned up to the collar and covered in a thin cardigan sweater in nondescript beige. He wore gold-rimmed glasses that slid low on his nose, and his hair . . . well, it was more of a removable hair hat in a shade of reddish brown that his head had not produced on its own in at least thirty years.

“Good afternoon, sir,” Angie greeted him. “May I help you?”

The man shuffled forward in his orthopedic shoes and smacked the newspaper down on the counter. “I want to enter the contest.”

“Well, it doesn’t actually start until tomorrow,” Angie said.

“I might be dead tomorrow,” the old man grumped.

“He has a point,” Mel said. “I think we can let him enter today.”

“Okay,” Angie said. “When you buy a four-pack of cupcakes, you get an entry form, and you can fill it out and put it right in that box. What four cupcakes would you like?”

“How should I know?” he snapped. “What do you have?”

Angie looked over her shoulder at Mel, who shrugged. It had been long established that Angie was the cranky magnet. It never failed that if a cranky person came in, he went right to Angie.

“What’s that one?” he asked as he tapped the glass of the display case.

“This one?” Angie asked, pointing to a Death by Chocolate.

“No, the other one,” he said. His tone made it clear that he didn’t think she was very bright.

“That’s our Blonde Bombshell,” she said. “It’s an almond cupcake . . .”

“Then why is it pink?” he asked.

“It’s not pink,” she said.

“Then it’s not the one I’m asking about,” he said. “What’s the pink one?”

“That’s called a Tinkerbell,” Angie said.

“Stupid name,” he grumbled.

Angie took a deep breath through her nose and kept going. “It’s a lemon cupcake with a raspberry buttercream frosting.”

“Give me four,” he said.

“Okay, then,” she said. Angie reached below the counter to get a box, but he stopped her.

“I don’t need a box,” he said. “I’m going to eat them here.”

“All four?” she asked.

“Yep,” he said. “And don’t forget my entry form.”

“Certainly,” Angie said. “Anything to drink?”

“Water,” he said.

The man filled out the form with a shaky hand while Angie rang up his order. He handed it to Mel and asked, “Can you read it?”

The writing resembled spider tracks, but it was still legible.

“Yes, Mr. Zelaznik,” she said. “I can read it.”

“Good,” he said. “I have a hot mama I’ve been planning to ask out, and your contest is just the ticket to show her a good time.”

Angie and Mel exchanged a glance and then Mel turned back with a smile. “Well, good luck.”

She tucked his form into the box while Angie took his tray to a nearby booth. Mr. Zelaznik trailed after her, easing into the booth as if he were afraid he might fall and be stuck on his back like a turtle on its shell.

Two hours later, Mr. Zelaznik was still in his booth. The Sunday afternoon tourist crush had come and gone, and still he sat working on his sixteenth cupcake.

“Do you think he might go into sugar shock?” Angie asked. “I love sweets more than anyone, but even I’d throw up if I ate that many cupcakes in one sitting.”

Mr. Zelaznik looked red-faced and sweaty. His hair hat was askew, and his eyes were becoming glassy. Mel was worried he’d had a four-pack too many.

“Maybe we should call him a cab,” she said to Angie. She had locked the front door and flipped the hanging sign on the front window to CLOSED.

“Mr. Zelaznik,” she said. “It’s time to go home.”

He looked at her, but she could tell he hadn’t heard a word she’d said.

“Mr. Zelaznik, put down the fork!” Angie barked in her schoolteacher voice.

He dropped his fork and blinked at them.

“You know, you don’t have to eat the cupcakes all at once,” she said. “You could take some home and share them with a friend.”

“Nah,” he grumped. “I don’t want anyone to know what I’m doing. They’ll steal my idea.”

He shuffled out of the booth. Mel was encouraged to see he was moving faster than when he came in, but that could be all the sugar coursing through his bloodstream.

“Would you like us to call a ride for you?” she asked.

“Nah,” he refused. “The trolley will take me right to my house.”

“If you’re sure,” she said.

Angie dumped her apron and grabbed her purse from the back room.

“I’m going to follow him to make sure he gets home okay,” she said.

“Good idea,” Mel said. “See you tomorrow.”

Mel locked up the bakery, cleaning as she made her way to the back. It was just after five, and she still needed to get to her mother’s to collect “the dress.” Suddenly, she wanted nothing more than to climb up the back stairs to her apartment, put on her jammies, curl up in bed, and watch all the episodes of
Inspector Lewis
she had saved on her DVR.

As she locked up the bakery and walked to her car, she flipped open her phone and sent a text to her brother, Charlie. He was coming down this week to be with their mom. She told him to call her when he arrived. It was good to have backup.

She drove over to her mother’s house. She parked in the wide driveway, and before she was even halfway up the walk, the door opened and her mother came steaming down the cobbled path towards her. In her hand she held a Dillard’s bag, which she thrust into Mel’s arms.

“Take it,” Joyce said. She turned her head dramatically to the side, very Bette Davis. “I never want to see it again.”

Mel flung the bag into the back of her car.

“Have you eaten?” Joyce asked, her inner drama queen being squashed by her more common role of ever-vigilant, worried mother.

“Depends,” Mel said. “What do you have?”

“Uncle Stan just left, but I made us sloppy joes and Tater Tots, and I have plenty of both left.”

“Tots?” Mel asked. “I’m in.”

Mel sat at the counter in her mother’s kitchen. The high-back stools were the same ones she’d sat on as a kid. She took the one on the right, because she always sat on the right, and noticed that it still wobbled, because one leg was shorter than the other three.

Mel had been a chunky kid, and one of the brackets on the bottom of the stool had broken off when she sat down too heavily one day. She’d cried for an hour and then eaten an entire bag of Doritos.

She remembered doing her homework at this counter with Charlie beside her, the two of them sharing a plate of cookies while Joyce cooked dinner and grilled them about school. Back then, the counter had been white Formica with tiny gold flecks. Now it was brown-and-gray granite. It was colder to the touch than she remembered and, suddenly, she longed for the old Formica.

She missed it like she missed the feeling of absolute safety she’d had as a child. No matter what happened, it would be okay because her mother and father were there to take care of things. All of that had changed ten years ago when her father had died. Sometimes she was shocked by how much she still missed him.

“What are you thinking about?” Joyce asked as she slid a plate and a glass of milk in front of Mel.

Somehow a small side salad had appeared on the plate next to the Tots and the hamburger bun filled with sloppy joe. Mel smiled. That was so like her mother, bribing her with Tots and sneaking in a salad.

“I’m thinking that I’m lucky to have you, Mom,” she said.

Joyce teared up and patted her hand. “I miss your dad, too.”

Mel decided to change the subject before they both got soggy. “Is Charlie coming alone, or is he bringing Nancy and the boys?”

“They’re all coming,” Joyce said. She sounded happy, and Mel was relieved to see the familiar sparkle light her eyes. Joyce loved her grandsons.

They spent the rest of Mel’s mealtime making plans for the boys, and then Mel gave her mom a big squeeze good-bye.

“What are you going to do with it?” Joyce asked as they walked out the door. Mel knew she meant “the dress.”

“It’s probably better if you don’t know,” Mel said, which was her way of stalling for an answer because she really had no idea what she was going to do with it.

“You’re right.” Joyce gave her one more solid hug and then stood waving while Mel pulled away.

If the dress had to be destroyed, she supposed she could bag it and put it in a Dumpster. But then someone might fish it out and resurrect it and, with her luck, Joyce would run into that person at the library or the post office. South Scottsdale was like that.

She debated chopping it up and make a pair of bright blue pillows out of it. Nah, her mom would freak if she saw them in Mel’s apartment. The dress had to die, but how?

She spun her Mini Cooper back towards Old Town and zipped along Camelback Road until she was just south of Tate’s penthouse apartment. Ding! He had an outdoor gas grill. That would work.

Tate owned one of four corner penthouses in a luxury building that sat on the north side of the canal. She parked in the garage below his building and called him to make sure he was home. Then she zipped up to the top floor, clutching the Dillard’s bag.

When the elevator announced her arrival, the doors slid open to reveal a marble foyer, tastefully decorated with large topiary bushes and long mirrors. Tate was standing in the open door of his penthouse, looking as if he’d been about to go to bed.

“ ‘Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine,’ ” Tate said, doing a very bad Humphrey Bogart impression.

“Casablanca,”
Mel said, identifying the quote. “Way too easy.”

“I know, but I just caught the end of it on the big screen, and now it’s stuck in my head. He never should have let her get on that plane.”

“Agreed.”

“So, what brings you here?” Tate asked.

“I need a favor,” she said. “I have to burn my mom’s dress.”

“What did it do to you?” He ushered her into the apartment.

“Not me—her. She’s convinced it’s cursed.”

“That’s . . .”

“Crazy?” Mel supplied.

“I was going to say highly imaginative.”

They paused in the kitchen, where Mel stopped to get a glass of water.

“So, can I fire up your gas grill?” she asked.

“Have at it,” he said. “That thing burns so hot it’s almost an incinerator.”

“I know. Remember those steaks we cooked when you first got it?”

“You mean the charcoal we made? Yeah, I remember. It took weeks for my eyebrows to grow back.”

They stepped through one of the open glass doors that led to the veranda. More topiary plants, trimmed into the shape of flying birds, decorated the marble balcony. The view of downtown Scottsdale was all plush dark sky and twinkling lights, with the city of Phoenix visible beyond in another layer of lights. Mel felt a peace settle over her as she looked down at the hustle and bustle of the streets below.

A soft breeze blew across the balcony, and she waited while Tate started up the grill and set it for optimum heat.

“Have you talked to Angie today?” she asked.

“No, I sent her a text earlier, but I haven’t heard back. Why?”

Mel wondered what to say, if anything. Oh, who was she kidding? Angie had a date. This was news!

“She’s probably busy,” she said. “Shopping for her date and all.”

“Her what?” Tate whipped around. “What did you say?”

“Her date. Angie has a date.”

The thermometer on the grill was reaching its high point. Tate stared stupidly at her while Mel lifted up the lid on the steel grill. A blast of heat hit her face, and she felt as if it had singed her eyelashes. Quickly, she took her mother’s dress out of the bag and tossed it on the grill.

There was a loud
whoosh
sound as the blue fabric ignited. A terrible smell filled the veranda, and Tate reached around her to slam the lid shut.

“Good grief, what is that thing made of, formaldehyde?”

They both gagged and stepped back from the grill.

“Hey, you don’t think the police would find it odd that you just torched the dress your mother was wearing on the night she had a date with a man who was murdered, do you?”

Mel looked at the grill and back at Tate. “Now? You point that out to me now? Not before I toss it on the flames?”

“Sorry, I just thought of it,” he said.

“Well, I’m sure they could make something of it, but that would be ridiculous. I mean, it’s just a dress,” Mel said. “Right?”

“I need a drink,” Tate said and led the way to the other side of the veranda, which housed a wet bar with a mini-fridge. He reached in and grabbed two beers, Fat Tires, and handed one to Mel.

They were quiet for a while, watching a noxious dark gray smoke seep out from under the lid of the grill.

“Angie hasn’t had a date in . . .” He paused.

“A long time.”

Actually, it had been since Angie and Tate had flown to Paris to visit Mel while she was taking a course at a culinary school there. According to Angie, it had been a passionate flight over the pond in Tate’s private jet, but Tate had stopped it from becoming a habitual thing for the sake of their friendship. Angie thought it was because he was in love with Mel, but Mel didn’t agree. In twenty-two years of friendship, she had never gotten that feeling from Tate. Never. Not once.