Cast Iron Motive (The Cast Iron Cooking Mysteries Book 4) (12 page)

“I’d love to hear it.”

“I think I saw more wood like this when we walked the lake path last night. Let’s go check it out.”

“Should I just leave this here then?” I asked her as I gestured with the limb still in my hands.

“No, you’re right. Until we figure out what we’re going to do, we need to keep an eye on it. Bring it with us.”

I wasn’t sure that I wanted to be seen carrying the murder weapon around in my hands. “How about if I store it somewhere no one will be able to find it?” I asked her.

“Where can you do that?”

“We could always put it in the back of your car,” I suggested. “At least that way we’d be able to lock it up.”

I could tell Annie wasn’t too thrilled with my plan, but when she couldn’t come up with another one on the spur of the moment, she agreed. I grabbed her car keys and put the wood in back, pulling the cover over it so no one could see it if they happened to glance in the back. The Subaru didn’t have a trunk, per se, more of a cargo space, but there was a cover that retracted which we could use to hide what I’d just found. It felt good getting it out of my hands, and I wiped them both on my jeans subconsciously, trying to get rid of the taint of death from them.

“I’ll follow you,” I said when I got back to Annie, and we started walking down the path we’d taken the night before. I hadn’t spotted any wood on the side of the way, but then again, I hadn’t been holding the flashlight, either. Sure enough, between us and the crime scene tape, some thick branches had been recently cut to clear the path a little. It was obvious that the piece I’d just hidden in Annie’s car had come from this cutting.

Annie reached down and picked up another piece that came close to matching the murder weapon in length and diameter. “Here’s what we’ll do. We put this where you found the other one, and if the killer comes back for it, he won’t be suspicious about its absence.”

“Only this one’s missing hair and fiber samples,” I said.

“They aren’t going to be looking at it that closely. What do you think?”

“It sounds like a good plan to me. I’ll feel better once we get this back in the other one’s place, grab our firewood, and get away from that deck altogether.”

“Me, too,” Annie said as we walked back toward Davis’s place in single file.

We almost made it without being seen.

The key word was “almost.”

Chapter 14: Annie

“W
hat are you two up to?” a voice called out from ahead of us on the lake loop path.

I nearly dropped the wood in my hand when I saw that it was Chief Cameron. Without a word, my brother stepped in front of me, allowing me to be shielded for a moment before the chief could see us clearly. At least we’d been coming around the bend, and thus out of his sight, before he’d called out. The branch in my hand was large and heavy, and not at all easy to shove into my pocket. I couldn’t let the police chief see me with it, though. There was only one thing I could do. I hiked up Pat’s jacket, shoved the branch under it, and then I tucked the edge of it down his pants. He jerked a little, and I knew that the bark must have taken off a little skin, but to his credit, he didn’t cry out.

“Hello, Chief,” I said as I stepped out from behind my brother. “We decided to take a little walk before we started working on dinner. I’m so glad that you’ll be joining us.”

“With all of my suspects gathered together, how could I refuse?” he asked, still watching us both suspiciously. “That’s why you’re doing this, isn’t it? You want to get everyone together like some kind of mystery from the forties and name the killer.”

“You’re reading way too much into it. We’re just having a meal,” I said.

“Sure. I believe you,” he said in such a way that it was clear that he didn’t trust us at all.

“See for yourself this evening,” Pat said. “By the way, what are
you
doing out here? I figured you’d be busy working on your case.”

“I am. I keep thinking that we’re missing something, so I decided to walk the path from Della’s to the spot where Cheryl was murdered to see if there’s anything I might have missed. You two haven’t seen anything, have you?”

It was the perfect time to come clean with him, but I wasn’t about to do it, and I knew that Pat was just as reticent as I was about sharing our recent find. Was Chief Cameron really out looking for clues, or had he come to retrieve the murder weapon? If so, he’d already found that it was missing, and we had to be his main suspects, given our proximity to the deck.

“No, not so much,” Pat said. I knew without even glancing at my brother that he was thinking the same thing I was. This man could be extremely dangerous to us, and we might have inadvertently tipped our hand without realizing it. If he’d seen the branch in my hand before I’d managed to hide it under my brother’s jacket, we’d both just drawn targets on our backs. The police chief may have just been one of several of our suspects, but he was certainly the most well-armed one.

“We need to get to work if we’re all going to be eating in time, so we’ll see you this evening,” I said as he walked past us. He glanced back at Pat, but I’d maneuvered myself to block the chief’s view of the bulge in my brother’s back.

“See you then,” he said as he moved on, scouring the path in front of him, at least pretending to look for something significant. Before Cameron turned the corner, I saw him glance back in our direction out of the corner of my eye, but Pat was pointing to some nonexistent object out on the water, and I pretended to be mesmerized by it. The police chief followed our glances, but he clearly couldn’t see our imaginary focus point, and he quickly moved away out of sight.

“That was quick thinking,” Pat said as he retrieved the branch from his jacket.

“Sorry if I scraped some skin jamming it back there,” I said.

“Hey, I’m just glad he didn’t see what we were up to. He didn’t, did he?”

“I wish I could say for sure, but I think we’re in the clear,” I said. “That depends on whether he hadn’t already checked under the mayor’s deck for the murder weapon, that is.”

“Have we suddenly decided that Chief Cameron is the killer?” Pat asked me curiously.

“No, I don’t have any real reason to think that, at least not any more than I do the others, but it does seem rather suspicious that he shows up here at this moment, just after you discover what was really used to send Cheryl Simmons tumbling into the lake.”

“Then again, he might just be telling the truth, and he’s out looking for clues like he said he was.”

“If that’s the case, then we just deprived him of finding anything, didn’t we?”

“For now,” Pat said. “Are you having doubts about our plan?”

“No, but we should keep an eye on our guests and see if any of them venture under Davis’s deck while we’re not looking.”

“I can do that,” Pat said. “I’ll plant this branch back where I found the other one and grab some firewood while I’m down there. Are you about ready to start seasoning that iron, or did I interrupt you too soon?”

“No, I was just about finished with the marinade, and Aunt Della offered to put it in the fridge for me when I left to join you.”

“What excuse did you make for leaving so abruptly?” my brother asked me.

“I told her you dropped your wallet somewhere, and I was going to help you look for it,” I said apologetically. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to make you sound like a dolt.”

“It could have been a whole lot worse. You could have said that I lost my pants.”

“I’ll save that for next time,” I said with a grin.

“What makes you think there’s going to be a next time?” he asked me with a smile of his own.

“Face it. With us, there’s
always
going to be a next time,” I replied. “Build a good fire. I need some hot coals to get the iron up to temperature.”

“I’m on it,” Pat said.

We parted ways after I helped him carry a load of wood from Davis’s place to Aunt Della’s. Pat was starting the fire as I ducked inside, only to find Aunt Della standing at the back door staring at me.

What was this about, I wondered?

“Did you find it?” she asked me.

For a moment I panicked, forgetting what excuse I’d used to get away from her so quickly. Then it came back to me. “We sure did. It turned out to be the last place we looked.”

“Well, I certainly hope so, else why would you keep looking?” she asked. “I need to ask you something.”

Oh, no. Had she seen what we’d done? I hadn’t realized it, but from where we were standing, my aunt had a perfect view of the path below us, right where I’d jammed that branch up Pat’s jacket and down his pants. “Fine,” I said, trying to keep my expression neutral as I gathered up the Dutch oven’s top and pot, the olive oil, a hot pad, and a roll of paper towels.

“Annie, how many people did you invite tonight?” she asked me.

It was all I could do not to show my relief upon hearing her question. “We’ll have a minimum of four, and a maximum of seven.”

“Seven people? I’m worried that there won’t be enough food,” she protested.

“We can all share, and if we need more, we can always dip into the leftovers from lunch,” I explained.

“Well, we certainly can’t eat outside, given the number of guests we’ll be feeding,” Aunt Della said. “The picnic table won’t hold that many, and besides, where are we going to put all of the food? Can’t you cook the ribs inside?”

“I could, but I like them better cooked in coals outside,” I said. I really did prefer that method, but it wasn’t why I was pushing for it at the moment. I wanted our suspects to be tempted by Davis’s firewood. If someone kept glancing over there, it might tell us something. Then again, if they made it a point to never look in that direction at all, that could tell us something as well. Dining inside was not in my plans.

Evidently I didn’t have the final say in the matter, though. “I’m not at all sure that’s going to work out,” Aunt Della said as she looked around. “If we add the leaves to my table, we’ll have plenty of room, and there’s space on the island to pile up the food. Besides, it’s going to be too chilly outside to have a picnic.”

“But we’ve already…”

I was interrupted by my aunt’s hand being held up in the air. “It’s already been decided, Annie. You may cook out there if you’d like, but we’re eating inside, and that’s final.”

“I suppose that would be fine,” I said as I headed for the door.

Aunt Della glanced at the clock. “Surely it’s too early to start cooking now.”

“Not as early as you think, but the truth of the matter is that I still need to season the cookware before we get started.”

“Doesn’t it come preseasoned?” she asked.

“The new stuff does, but this is all vintage cookware. I need some time to build up a little seasoning, or everything’s going to stick to the bottom.” I could have cheated by using too much oil and layering the veggies, but I couldn’t bring myself to do that to vintage Griswold cast iron. As it was, I was pushing things quite a bit, but I didn’t have six hours to bake the pot’s seasoning in Aunt Della’s oven. Besides, the process would have filled the house with a smell that I doubted my aunt would appreciate. It wasn’t exactly a burning odor as the oil baked into the iron, but to the unappreciative, it probably didn’t smell all that great, either.

“Very well, but at least take some mittens with you,” she said as she tried to shove a pair into my hands.

“Thanks, but I have my own gloves.” I hadn’t worn mittens since kindergarten, and I didn’t even realize they made them in my size.

Pat had a nice fire going outside when I joined him, and he’d managed to already begin building up a lovely set of coals. “Well done.”

“Don’t give me too much credit,” he said with a grin. “This is some pretty awesome firewood.”

“Nothing but the best for the mayor, right?” I asked. I would season the outside of the pan later, but right now, I needed to take care of the inside. I’d already wiped the dust from all of the surfaces, so I took some oil and spread it thinly using a paper towel on the bottom and sides of the pot. The top would get a light coat before the first bake, but that could wait. After I wiped off the excess with a clean paper towel, I nestled the pan into the coals, allowing the metal to heat up slowly as it absorbed the oil. In five minutes, the surface oil was gone, so I added another small dollop, being careful to spread it around again. There was no puddling yet, which meant I was doing a good job adding thin layers at a time. Some folks tried to speed up the process by adding enough oil to choke the pores of the metal. That led to too much oil on the surface and not enough absorbed into the pot, and nothing good ever came from that. I kept up the process for half an hour, watching things carefully. After I was satisfied that I had a good start, I wiped out the last of the oil and, using the paper towel, I wiped the top of the lid’s surface as well. Placing the oven back on the coals with its lid in place, I had Pat add some on top as well to give us a nice even bake.

“There, that should do for the next hour, and then we’ll do it once more,” I said.

“Will two seasonings be enough?” Pat asked me. We were both good with cast iron, but by virtue of our jobs back at the Iron, I had more daily exposure to cooking with cast iron, whereas Pat kept up with everything else we handled. I would have a tough time running the register up front, especially making the final report and balancing the books, but I could do it in a pinch, which described my brother’s cast iron care and maintenance abilities as well.

“It’s not perfect, but it should be okay,” I said. “I still feel guilty about how we got this iron.”

“Hey, you paid the asking price on the Dutch oven and the skillet,” Pat said. “You shouldn’t beat yourself up about that.”

“I’m talking about getting Tommy fired,” I said.

“He said it himself. You probably did him a favor.”

“I suppose so. Did you ever imagine that Gary White could turn out to be so mean after how nice he was when we first met him?”

“You never know with some folks,” Pat said. “He’s got himself a temper, there’s no doubt about that.”

“I know, but could he have gotten mad enough to try to kill Aunt Della just because she wouldn’t alter the parade route?” I asked my brother. “It just doesn’t seem reasonable.”

“How about all of those road rage incidents we keep hearing about?” Pat countered. “Do those acts of violence seem logical and well thought out to you?”

“No, I see what you’re saying. I just can’t buy him trying to kill her so passively, though.”

“What do you mean?” Pat asked as he stoked the fire to the side where his feeding coals were coming from. He was really good at tending a fire, but what man wasn’t a little boy at heart when it came to dancing flames? Every man I knew reverted to their youth given a hearty fire and a stick to prod it with.

“The snowman off the roof doesn’t seem like a rage-driven attempt, does it?”

Pat thought about that for a second before he answered. “No, but it could have just been an accident. Those snowmen are bulky. Who could have possibly thought that putting a few of them on the bank roof was a good idea?”

“I know. They must have gotten caught up in the spirit of the festivities. Don’t quote me, but given Aunt Della and Henrietta, it’s amazing the whole thing came off as well as it did.”

“They make quite the pair,” Pat said, adding another small chunk of wood to the fire. “It’s no wonder the operation is in the red, though. I hope folks had fun at the festivities, because from the sound of it, that’s all anyone’s going to get out of it.”

“Let’s get back to the attempted murders. Even if we assume that the falling snowman was an accident, how about the idea that someone pushed Aunt Della out in front of the fire truck?”