Fat Cat Takes the Cake (8 page)

A
s soon as Chase got to the Bar None, Anna hurried over. “Good, you're back. Are you doing anything tonight?”

Chase took off her coat and scarf and hung them on a hook by the rear door. “Nothing special.” She had thought she would inspect the state of their inventory and maybe go over the financials for the shop.

“I've just talked to Julie. She's feeling pretty low. We need to cheer her up.”

“Okay. I'm all for that. What do you have in mind?”

“
Holmes Sweet Holmes
is playing tonight at the Orpheum. Julie's talked about it and I think it would do her good to get her mind off everything.”

“Don't you want to practice for the Batter Battle tonight?”

“I'm getting sick of it, to tell you the truth. I could use a night off. Then I'll hit it fresh on Friday.”

“And win the contest next Saturday!” Chase had no desire to do the books tonight. They'd be there tomorrow.

“One hopes.”

Chase went to the office to try to do a little work on ordering items for the shop. That was something she had to keep up with. If they ran out of baking supplies, they were out of product to sell. They could run to the local grocer for a few things, but she needed to stay on top of the major items. She completed most of her ordering, but didn't know if they needed more eggs or not. Those were ordered separately from a local farmer. So she went into the kitchen to count them.

Mallory stuck her head into the kitchen, spotted Chase, then came over close to her. “Ms. Oliver? Someone is here to see you.” Her voice was quiet.

“Who is it?”

“She didn't tell me. She said she has something for you.”

Chase gave Anna a shrug, closed the refrigerator, and went to see who it was. Patrice, Mike's cousin, stood by the glass case, her back to Chase, gazing out the front windows to the shops across the street. She turned when she heard Chase and Mallory come in.

“Hi, Patrice,” Chase said. “Mallory says you have something for me?”

“Is there somewhere private we can talk?”

Now Chase was truly puzzled. She ushered Patrice through the kitchen, to the office. Quincy, showing no favorites, twined
around first Chase's legs, then Patrice's after Chase closed the door. Anna had given them a quick glance, no doubt wondering what was going on.

“Hello, you handsome fellow.” Patrice stooped to pet Quincy and his purr motor started on high.

“What is it you have, Patrice?”

She looked around the room.

“Would you like to sit down?”

“No, I won't be long. I came to give you this, but please don't tell anyone where you got it from.” She opened her small purse and pulled out a folded paper. After a moment's hesitation, she thrust it at Chase.

“I heard you talking at lunch,” she said. “I thought you would like to have this.”

Chase was getting a bad feeling about whatever it was she held. She slowly unfolded the paper. At the top of the sheet, in all caps, it said “BANANA RICE WONDER CAKE.” Scanning down, it seemed to be a cake recipe, made with rice flour. “What is this?”

“You said Anna would like to see Grace Pilsen's recipe.”

Chase's mouth dropped open. “You . . . stole Grace's recipe?”

“You said Anna needed to see it.”

“I don't think I said she
needed
to see it.”

“It sounded like you said that.”

Patrice had been listening in on her and Eddie. Chase had known that at the time, but hadn't foreseen the consequences. After all, Patrice got a kick out of stealing things.

Chase tapped on the paper, trying to decide what to do.
She had already seen it, so she couldn't pretend she hadn't. “Is this the only copy? Does Grace have another one?”

Patrice nodded. “I copied it and put it right where I found it.”

The woman was a skillful thief, Chase had to admit. “And no one saw you do it?”

“Of course not.”

“How did you get this?”

“I don't think I can to tell you that. It's my secret.”

Chase didn't want to go into the business of stealing recipes, but was curious how Patrice had gone about it. However, she wasn't going to find out.

“This is going to help you out, isn't it? I wanted to make up for taking your ring at the fair.”

“Yes. Well, I guess this will do it. We're completely even now. You don't need to steal any more things for me, Patrice.” She meant well, Chase thought. Didn't she?

After Patrice left, Chase stayed in her office, ostensibly finishing up her work, but really dithering about what to do with the recipe. On the one hand, she thought this would be an easy one to beat. The ingredients wouldn't go together well. Rice flour needed a stronger flavor than banana to make a delectable dessert. The cake recipe wasn't likely to wow the judges. So not showing it to Anna shouldn't change a thing. On the other hand, Anna seemed so very nervous about competing with Grace that it might make her feel better knowing Grace's entry wasn't a winner. But, if Chase had a third hand, there was something else to consider. Was this actually Grace's recipe? Even if it belonged to her, was it the one she was using for the Batter Battle?

Since Chase had no idea where or how Patrice had gotten it, she couldn't be sure it was the real thing. She wouldn't show it to Anna. Tucking it into the pocket of the smock she hadn't taken off, she felt good about that decision. It sounded busy out front, so she went to help out until closing time.

It would be fun going to the show tonight with Anna and Julie.

T
he show was perfect, both hilarious and dramatic, with snappy songs that Chase was sure would rattle around inside her head for days. In fact, as they were leaving the show, Chase realized she had forgotten about the whole Ron-North-murdered, Julie-Larson-suspected mess. Maybe Julie had, too.

“You know, that developer, Langton Hail, had an excellent motive to want Ron North dead,” Julie said, climbing into the backseat of Anna's Volvo.

Chase, already belted in the front seat, realized that Julie hadn't forgotten about a thing. She twisted around to talk to Julie. “Have you been thinking about this all during the show?”

“No. Well, a little bit. Detective Olson has to talk to me at the station again tomorrow.”

Chase turned to the front and tried not to let her dismay show.

“But developing property,” Julie went on, “buying cheap and making money on it, is Hail's livelihood. He would have a lot to lose if Ron's story cast him in a bad light. It might have made someone investigate what he's doing. Even if it only shut him down for a while, it would hurt.”

“And,” Chase said, turning halfway around again as Anna started the car, “it looks like Hail was paying blackmail money to Ron. If so, he knows that what he's doing is wrong.”

Anna cranked the heater up all the way. Chase stuck her hands next to the vent. She hadn't been able to find her good gloves and hadn't wanted to wear her disreputable everyday ones with the holes to the theater.

“You know, Eddie said that someone might have slept in his car all night after the reunion.”

“Someone who got awfully drunk, you mean,” Julie said.

“Yes, maybe he stayed there to sleep it off instead of driving.”

“It was cold that night,” Anna said.

“So,” Julie said, “this person might have spent part of the night killing Ron North, then slept in his car for a bit. What exactly did Eddie see?”

“You're seeing a lot of Eddie,” Anna said to Chase.

Chase ignored Anna. “He saw a car and someone was in it.”

“That doesn't mean anything, then, does it?” Julie said.
“Someone could have killed Ron and he could have been too drunk to move after that. It's a wonder he didn't freeze to death.”

“God,” Anna said, “protects fools and drunks.”

“And if you're both,” Chase added, “you're doubly blessed, aren't you?”

Chase hated the fact that Olson was continuing to badger Julie. She would call him first thing in the morning to tell him to take a closer look at who might have been in the car the morning after the reunion.

When she got home from the theater it was late and she had to open the shop in the morning.

The treat giver started to go into her bedroom. However, the cat ran ahead of her and started howling. When she noticed, he ran into the kitchen. That was when she realized that he hadn't had a single treat today, only din dins. After the treat was warmed and put into his dish, he let her know what a transgression this was by turning his back, gulping down the treat, then, after a whisker cleanse, jumping onto the couch for the night.

“Oh, come on, you're not so mad that you're going to sleep on the couch, are you?” Chase said, her hands on her hips as she regarded the indignant cat. “I might as well have a husband.”

Once again, she headed for the bedroom. She always left the door open, so she figured Quincy would be in sooner or
later, to sleep on the bed, which was made much cozier than the couch by having a human in it. As she began to drowse, she felt his warm body snuggle up to her back. She fell asleep to the sound of deep, throaty purring. The moment before she lost consciousness, she thought that maybe a cat would be better than ever having a husband. Especially one who stood you up to class reunions.

First thing in the morning, before she could call the police station, Mike rang her.

“It's Friday,” he said.

“Yes, it is.”

“Hey, you're not still mad, are you? I'd like to take you to dinner tonight. There's a new place on the other side of campus. Small, Italian. One of my patient's owners likes it, and she's Italian, so it should be good.”

Was she to ignore the fact that he was shooting daggers at her yesterday? Or was he taking her to dinner to make it up to her?

“Sure,” she said. “That sounds nice.”

“You're not busy with that other guy?”

Chase huffed into the phone. “He's a
business
associate. It was a
business
meeting.” Sort of. If she said it enough times, maybe it would be true. Maybe she would forget that tingle she got when Eddie touched her. “What time tonight?”

After they settled the details and hung up on good terms—as far as Chase could tell—she dialed Detective Niles Olson.

His answer was abrupt. That either meant he was very busy solving the murder, or he recognized her number and wasn't looking forward to speaking with her. “Olson here,” he barked.

“Detective, I've come into some information—”

“What else is new?” Did he have to sound so weary?

“I wasn't questioning anyone, I just learned that a car was in the parking lot of Hammond High Sunday morning.”

“You saw a car there? Whose was it?”

“No, Eddie Heath saw it. I don't know whose it was. Probably the killer's, don't you think?”

“There's no reason to think that, because a car was left in the parking lot, it belongs to a killer. Some heavy drinking was going on and someone probably had the good sense to leave a car there and get a ride.” There was a pause. Was that a good sign? “The car wasn't there when we processed the scene, so the driver must have left early. Hail and Snelson both said they spent the night together at Snelson's house. Hail was too drunk to drive. Snelson's wife even backed him up. I'll find out if Langton left his car there, but this might not mean anything, Chase.”

It worked so much better when he was calling her “Chase” and not “Ms. Oliver.”

“There might have been someone in the car,” she said.
Depending on how much she trusted what Eddie thought he saw.
“You're welcome.”

“Yeah, thanks. But”—his voice grew stern—“do not do any digging into this. We'll figure out whose car it was.”

“I told you, I wasn't digging. If I hear anything else I should tell you, right?”

“Yes, but don't do anything about it. Tell me and no one else. And stay away from Snelson and Hail. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.”

She did. One of them could be a killer. They had alibied
each other, but both could be lying. If so, where were they that night? Whose car was in the parking lot? She wasn't going to investigate, not exactly, not officially, but she sure was going to keep her ears open.

As she dressed, she glanced out the window. Lovely, soft flakes of snow were falling. It lifted her spirits when the flakes of perfect crystals floated past her window. She hummed “My Favorite Things” from
The Sound of Music
on her way downstairs.

Both Inger and Mallory were working the front today, so she hung out in the kitchen with Anna, helping put together some treats. Anna had hit upon a wonderful bakeless Chocolate Peanut Butter Bar that could be made quickly and easily. Of course, nothing could exactly be easy with Anna in the picture. So she and Anna were piping frosting in the shapes of stars, Christmas trees, and holly wreaths on each piece in red and green frosting.

When Inger came in for her lunch break, she was enchanted with their efforts. “How soon can we start selling those? We won't be able to keep them in the shop. Everyone will love them.”

“Try it,” Anna said, holding out a star-decorated bar.

Inger bit into it. “I've died and gone to heaven.”

Chase wasn't crazy about peanut butter and chocolate together, but she knew a whole lot of people were. This was a good idea.

She went to cover for Inger while she ate lunch. Soon after she entered the salesroom, Bart Fender burst into the shop. Of course, he probably burst into any room he entered. He was a very physical person. Short, but powerfully built. He
wore a stocking cap on his bald head, protecting it against the cold.

“Bart,” Chase said. “How nice that you've dropped in.” She hadn't seen him in years until the reunion. He hadn't changed much, except for piling on some more muscles and losing all his hair. He'd been an athlete then and remained one today as the high school wrestling coach.

“Thought I'd look the place over. What do you have here?”

“Lots of different flavored dessert bars. Do you have a favorite?”

He took off his gloves and rubbed his chin. “I'm not much on chocolate. Used to be, but sweets don't taste that sweet anymore. I don't know what it is. Maybe the situation with Dillon.”

“What do you know? Any changes?”

“No, and there aren't going to be.” He frowned. “Her family . . . they drive me crazy. They won't admit . . . Oh, enough about that. Do you have something that's super sweet?” He was a couple of inches shorter than Chase, but stood with a wide stance and took up nearly the whole aisle between the tables of products.

She pointed out the Raspberry Chiffon Bars. “These are pretty sweet, and there's the delicious raspberry taste.”

His eyes lit up. “I like raspberry. I'll try a couple of those. Maybe I could taste them better.” He cocked his elbow back to extract his wallet from his jeans pocket. Unfortunately, his elbow connected with a pile of stacked dessert boxes and they tumbled to the floor. The floor was tracked with melting, rather slushy snow.

Bart turned an alarming shade of red. Not just his face,
but his whole head. It wasn't embarrassment, more like anger at something. Himself? The easily dislodged boxes? His lips curled into a snarl and invectives streamed from between his clenched teeth.

“It's okay, Bart.” Chase hoped he couldn't tell how scared she was. He was a volcano about to erupt. His reaction seemed entirely out of proportion. “We'll take these and repackage the goodies that got wet. The dessert bars are probably fine.”

Mallory was already swooping up the fallen wares and whisking them into the kitchen. She cringed, as frightened of the man as Chase felt.

Chase touched his arm. One of his fists unclenched, then the other. “No big deal, Bart. Really. Why don't you take these two on trial? If you like them, come back and buy some more.” She slid the bars into a bag and held it out to him.

He swiped it with a hammy fist. He gave a grimace that was probably supposed to be a sheepish grin, and stalked out.

Chase deflated a bit when the door closed. Then she squared her shoulders and continued waiting on the steady stream of customers. The shop was so crowded, most of them hadn't noticed a thing.