Bite the Biscuit (A Barkery & Biscuits Mystery) (31 page)

“But which one would do that? And why? And why offer my recipes to Harris?”

“I haven’t a clue—but I think your initial questions to them need to be expanded.”

“With something more than just my suspicions,” I agreed. “I can’t tell you offhand which one brought treats to the clinic that day—assuming it wasn’t me. But it was Thursday, right, that Arvie and you discovered the problem with the treats?”

It was. And I believed that Dinah had been working with me at the shops that day, while Judy had had it off. Had Dinah taken the cookies to the veterinary clinic that morning? I would have packed them, but I didn’t inspect the package afterward so I wouldn’t have known if she’d decided to do something so nasty. I hadn’t had a shift at the clinic that day, but Reed had called to ask me to come in, and Arvie and he had scolded me for the mistake … which might not have been a mistake at all.

“I’m not sure if I had a supply of those chocolate chip cookies that day that could have been taken by Dinah,” I mused. “But my computer records would give some indication, since all our sales receipts are copied there. We keep chocolate chip cookies around on most days, and I might be able to tell if we had any left over from the day before that Dinah could have brought to the clinic that morning. Or … ”

“Or?” Reed was leaning over the table toward me, but he moved back when our food was placed in front of us.

“Or,” I said when we were alone again, “there are other possibilities. I usually start that kind of baking early in the morning, depending on whether we have any cookies left from the day before. They’re usually fine to keep for a day without worrying about them going bad. I need to review the records for a couple of days. But if we had none left when I came in on Thursday morning, that could be an indication that we’d sold out on Wednesday—or the ones that showed up at the clinic were brought then and stored there.”

“Will you be able to tell from that which of your helpers was more likely to have brought them?”

I shrugged. “Not sure, but it may give me more ammunition when I question each of them again, not just about the recipes, but about the cookies … ” I looked down at the hamburger on my plate. “Of course, this combining of my two problems could all be in my head, to give me the ability to try to blame Judy or Dinah for my own carelessness. These issues might not be related.”

“Then again, they might be.” Reed looked excited on my behalf. I supposed he didn’t really want me to be guilty of endangering the dogs at the clinic. Well, neither did I.

But I’d reserve judgment on whether I could be exonerated till I at least checked the computer—and spoke with my assistants yet again.

I couldn’t wait. When we finished eating, Reed returned Biscuit and me to my shops. I’d had to bring a box of hamburger home since my appetite had all but disappeared thanks to the change in my mood. But this was a good change—the anticipation of resolving a couple of problems.

And there was more. It made no sense, but what if all three of my problems were somehow related?

But why on earth would either Judy or Dinah kill Myra, then try to frame me for it?

No, that couldn’t be. But my sense of hope had expanded every-
thing.

“Would you like Hugo and me to come in while you check things out?” Reed asked as he pulled up in front of my shops on Summit Avenue.

“No need, but thanks. I don’t know how long it’ll take.” And if I found something that appeared to be an answer, I wasn’t sure how I’d sleep that night.

But how could I find an answer just by forming an educated guess about how many chocolate chip cookies I’d had available when?

No, I’d need to talk with Judy and Dinah again, and I planned to figure out the best approach rather than accusing them not only of trying to steal from me but also trying to make me look bad as a vet tech.

“Okay, then.” But Reed didn’t let me out of the car right away. Instead, he leaned over and gave me one big, sexy kiss.

It felt like whatever our problems had been before, they were now fully resolved. Or was it my own re-stoked optimism making me feel that way?

No matter. I participated in that kiss, and then, picking up the bag containing my hamburger, I got Biscuit out of the back seat, patted Hugo goodbye, and entered the Barkery side of the shops.

Turning on the lights, I waved goodbye to Reed and hooked Biscuit’s leash up to her crate. I gave her a hug and then headed through the kitchen, where I deposited my leftovers in the fridge on the Icing side. Then I adjourned into my tiny office.

I turned the computer back on and waited for it to boot up. Was this a fantasy on my part?

Probably. But I had an urge now to fire both my employees and start over. Neither act—endangering dogs with the wrong kinds of treats, or trying to sell a boss’s recipes—would wind up in the perpetrator’s being thrown in jail. I liked both Judy and Dinah personally—or at least I had. But maybe I needed a completely fresh start here. Maybe who’d done it was irrelevant. Maybe—

There. The computer was finally ready. I got into the pertinent files that contained copies of receipts and started going through them, starting on Monday of this week. And maybe that wasn’t even early enough. If one of my assistants had been taking cookies in preparation for leaving them at the vet clinic to make me look bad, she could have been collecting them for a while. They hardly needed to be fresh for something like that.

I heard Biscuit give a woof out front. I’d left the lights on, so maybe someone outside thought we were open. I went back into the Barkery and turned off the lights, giving Biscuit a hug. Then I returned to the computer.

Cookies. We’d baked a lot over the past week—or at least we’d sold a lot. Brenda hadn’t kept much of an inventory of her Icing baked goods, so I hadn’t started one for either shop. What was important was a tabulation of expenses, including purchases of ingredients, as well as another accounting containing sales and income. But maybe now I’d keep better track of what was baked first, then sold.

I couldn’t tell from my records which of my assistants might have been the one to collect potentially dog-harmful cookies. And I realized that this had always been somewhat wishful thinking on my part.

I still could have done it myself, by horrible error.

I nevertheless sat at the computer letting my mind go a bit wild. If I assumed that one of my assistants had done these nasty things, which would it be?

Brenda had warned me that both had had hopes of taking over Icing when she’d left. Could this somehow be an outgrowth of their rivalry?

If so, I could let my imagination move a little further and consider the possibility that whoever had done it might have also wanted to frame me for murder. But that was bizarre. Would either Judy or Dinah really have killed Myra for something as ridiculous as trying to get rid of me?

But as much as I tried, I wasn’t able to get my imagination in check. I recalled bits of conversations I’d had with both of them.

And then I realized, if any of this was true, which of them I suspected most.

It was almost as if I’d conjured her up when the back door of the kitchen burst open and one of my assistants came in—holding a gun.

Judy. Of course.

TWENTY
-
NINE

“
W
HY A GUN,
J
UDY?”
I felt pleased that my voice sounded relatively normal despite the way my heart was pounding. “You used a leash and rock to kill Myra.”

“I caught her unawares with the leash and strangled her till she was unconscious first.” Judy no longer looked so pretty and pleasant. Not with her eyes narrowed, her mouth grinning evilly. “But I didn’t think that would happen with you, so I came prepared.”

“Well, you were right, sort of. I knew it was you who killed Myra.” For all of three minutes I’d had some small degree of certainty, at least. “What I don’t know is why.”

I had stood at her arrival and remained standing at the door to my office. Biscuit had heard us talking and was now barking out in the shop. I had hopes that someone would pass by and call the cops, but why? A dog barking inside a dog bakery didn’t mean there was anything wrong.

“Because she deserved it.” Judy’s nostrils flared as her lips tightened. “You should never have been put in charge of Icing, let alone been allowed to change it this way.” She waved her free arm bitterly toward the Barkery part of the kitchen, and I noticed she had some kind of tote bag under that arm. “Brenda told me a long time ago that I was her gem, her perfect helper—but that was before she decided she needed even more help and hired that witch Dinah. But I could live with that—until Brenda said she had to leave town. I begged her to put me in charge, but Dinah wanted it too.”

Her gun hand was waving. I had a feeling she was giving me an explanation so I’d somehow understand when she pulled the trigger. The longer I kept her talking, the longer I’d live—and maybe I’d figure out a way to save myself. But I was too far away from any of the drawers to pull out a knife, even if I could get close enough to her to use it before she shot me.

And Biscuit, bless her, kept on barking.

“So you argued about it, I gather,” I said. “That’s why Brenda decided it was in the best interests of the shop not to choose either of you to run Icing when she left.”

I cringed as Judy took a step toward me.

“As if it made any sense for her to sell this place to you and let you ruin it.” She was sneering now. “Damn that dog!” Still keeping the gun leveled at me, she backed toward the door to the Barkery. “I’m going to shut her up.”

“No. Please.” Now I really was pleading. “I’ll quiet her down. I promise.” I edged past Judy, unable to reach toward the gun, but at least she let me precede her into the Barkery.

It was late enough that the other nearby shops were closed, so the sidewalks and street would be fairly empty. It was unlikely that anyone would see Judy aiming that gun at me. She kept it low enough that it wouldn’t be visible around the counter, anyway.

I hurried toward little Biscuit, who, quiet now, wagged her tail.

“See,” I said. “She’s okay now.”

“
Now
being the operative word. Tell you what. Bring her back into the kitchen with us. It’ll need to be scrubbed down again before it can be used anyway.” Her grin grew even more evil, if that was possible. I knew her intent was to kill me.

What was one more murder to her, even if she got caught?

Besides, if someone else was convicted of my murder, she might find a way to take over the shops after all. Get rid of the Barkery. Turn the premises back into Icing on the Cake.

That gave me yet another reason to want to live—to thwart her in that as well.

I glanced at the front door, wondering if I could run out and survive being shot in the back. It was locked. I’d made sure of it when I’d entered from the street. I might be able to get out, but no one could get in. It was better that way—unless the person trying to get in happened to be a cop. But at least no one else would be in danger.

“Let’s go back into the kitchen,” Judy demanded.

I obeyed, keeping Biscuit with me. Her being in the kitchen was a minor infraction of the law, especially when compared with what Judy wanted to do.

Once we were all in the kitchen, I said to Judy, “I understand why you were unhappy about the situation here, but why kill Myra?”

“Like I said, she deserved it.” My assistant cocked her head slightly. “You asked me before if I was the one to offer your damned recipes to Harris. Well, the answer’s yes, but he refused to buy them. When I was leaving his shop I ran into Myra. I was glad at first. She was a much better decision-maker than that wimp of a husband of hers. But you know what she did?”

“No, I don’t.” But whatever it was, it had led to her death.

“She not only agreed with Harris about not buying those damned recipes, but she was going to tell you that I’d offered them. She—she had the nerve to call me an ineffectual nobody who couldn’t have run Icing even if Brenda had offered it to me. And when I said I intended to start my own bakery, she just laughed. Said that the fact that I couldn’t even stop Brenda from letting you, an outsider, take over Icing proved my ineptitude.” She was nearly crying by then, and her gun hand wavered frighteningly.

“She knew that had to be your hot-button issue, Judy,” I said softly. “I had the impression that Myra was a champion of that. It was probably why she picked a fight with me about how my Barkery shouldn’t dare to compete with the Knob Hill Pet Emporium.”

“Maybe. But I don’t care why she did it. I needed to shut her up so she wouldn’t tell you. And then I came up with a really ingenious way to get rid of you too—make it look like you were the one to kill her. You made it even easier than I’d imagined by arguing with her. That night was the perfect time to do her in—by going to her place, throttling her first with one of the leashes her dear husband sold at their shop, then bashing her head the way she deserved. Then I left one of your damned dog biscuits beside her so the cops would be sure you were the one who did it. She didn’t expect me to jump her, so it was easy.”

Now that I knew for sure that Judy had been the one who’d offered to sell my recipes, as well as murdered Myra, the answer to my remaining question no longer really mattered. But I had to ask. “Did you also leave the chocolate chip human cookies at the veterinary clinic so I’d look bad there too?”

Her sudden laugh was like a cackle. “Wasn’t that perfect? I followed you there a few times, just like I followed you tonight to your dinner with that vet Dr. Storme so I knew you were here. I saw how you got into the clinic sometimes through the unlocked back door, and then I went in really late one night when hardly anyone was there, only people keeping an eye on the sickest animals. I stuck the box of killer cookies where I knew they kept the treats we brought in. And guess what else I did that night?”

“What’s that?” I knew she wanted me to ask but suspected I didn’t really want to know.

“I picked this up. Good thing you vet people label things so well.” She took a packet out of the tote she carried.