For Cheddar or Worse (30 page)

Before she could, I grabbed her hand and guided her toward our celebrity chef section. Luckily
Hurricane Jenna
hadn't demolished that area. The shelves were tidy and alphabetically arranged.

“Is this it?” I pulled a book from its slot. “Raichlen's
How to Grill:
The Complete Illustrated Book of Barbecue Techniques
or
A Barbecue Bible!
” Raichlen offered a lot of show and tell as well as step-by-step instructions.

“That's the one.”

“We also have
Bobby Flay's Grill It!
and
Smokin' with Myron Mixon: Recipes Made Simple, from the Winningest Man in Barbecue
.” I had stocked up on a few basic books from the Weber grill company as well, and made sure we had Guy Fieri's
Guy on Fire: 130 Recipes for Adventures in Outdoor Cooking
. Reviewers said his book really appealed to male customers, of which we had many. It wasn't your
typically pretty tabletop cookbook; it was filled with humor. I loved the fact that Guy called his outdoor tools his
arsenal
.

I nabbed a few more books from the shelf and handed them to Ava. Hands occupied and snapping waylaid, she continued to browse, so I ventured to the display table and did a quick re-do, without standing the books up. Call me foolish once, not twice.

Next, I shifted to the display window to tweak our latest exhibit. Bailey and I had spent all day yesterday putting items in place. We set out a crisp checkered tablecloth and built levels beneath it, and then we added colorful barbecue tools with a variety of handles, a mini hibachi, some grill lights for late-night grilling, long tubes of matches, and candles. We included a corny-looking chuck wagon cookie jar—I had stumbled across an assortment of kooky cookie jars online and had purchased twenty of them—and we added a huge wicker picnic basket, red plastic cups, and a red pitcher. As a finishing touch, we set out wicker baskets packed with retro-style cinnamon candy sticks plus mason jars stuffed with gumballs.

Staring at the display now, I felt something was missing, but what? A split second later, I snapped like Ava. Books.
Duh!
Yes, we sold lots of unique cooking items in our store, but mostly we sold books—and the display had none.

I roamed the shop and plucked a few titles that I thought would appeal to passersby. Two children's books:
The Gingerbread Cowboy
, and
Little Red Cowboy Hat
. As a savvy marketer, I realized that children often pulled their parents into stores. “Mommy, buy me that!” they would cry. Deep in the recesses of my mind, I expected to get paid back in spades when I had children—
if
I had children. They would tug me this way and that, and I would have to comply.
Too-ra-loo
, as my aunt would say.

I added a fun adult book called
The Cowboy Hat Book
, a coffee table–style book that contained the history of the hat, and I placed a used edition of
The All-American Cowboy Cookbook: Over 300 Recipes From the World's
Greatest Cowboys
next to that,
used
because it was out of print, which was too bad. There were colorful stories within about a few old-timer Western stars like Gene Autry and Roy Rogers. I had purchased the book for a song at a garage sale. I vowed I would never sell it, but I probably would. For the right price.

“Jenna!” Ava beckoned me with a
snap
. “Help me with these.” She had collected a dozen books.

I hurried to her—see what I mean? That snapping gets people to obey—and carried her haul to the checkout counter. “What a lot of books. Are you having a party?”

“Just between you and me,
shh
”—she winked twice—“yes, I'm having a private party. Private because a certain somebody will not be invited to attend. I've asked a few of my neighbors, including your father, to come for cocktails and heavy hors d'oeuvres tomorrow night. I think your father has invited his beloved. That's entirely all right.”

My father, a former FBI man, is a widower and retired and currently dating Bailey's mother. Seeing them together always makes me smile. Dad was lost after my mother died.

“Why the secrecy?” I asked as I packed her books into one of our specialty shop bags and tied the handle with rattan ribbon.

“It's a community gathering, if you will, but that certain
someone
is not, I repeat
not
, to hear of it. Do you understand?”

I nodded, but how could I tell that
someone
if I didn't know who it was?

Ava peered over her shoulder and back at me, a triumphant—or was it malicious?—gleam in her eye. “See you.”

As she left, a shiver ran down my spine. At the same time a door slammed. Outside the shop.

I glanced through the window at the parking lot and saw the rear lights of a dark blue Prius flare. Something else flickered, too, inside the car, like sunlight bouncing off a lens of a camera or binoculars. Was someone spying on the store? On Ava? No. Of course not. I was being silly. The
driver of the car—I couldn't tell whether it was a man or woman—was probably doing business on a cell phone or using the utility mirror on the visor.

In spite of that logical explanation, another shiver cut through me.
Sheesh, Jenna
.
Lighten up!
I flicked my fingers at the air as my aunt had taught me, trying to rid myself of bad vibes, but it didn't work. A third shiver jolted me to my
core.

Agatha Award–winning author
Avery Aames
loves to cook and enjoys a good wine. She speaks a little French and has even played a French woman onstage. And she adores cheese. As Daryl Wood Gerber she also writes the Cookbook Nook Mysteries. Visit her at averyaames.com.

Looking for more?
Visit Penguin.com for more about this author and a complete list of their books.
Discover your next great read!