Cookies and Scream (A Cookie Cutter Shop Mystery) (6 page)

Ellie frowned as she watched her daughter gather her pancake remains into a neat pile shaped like a coffin. “And how is Del doing, Livie?” Ellie asked. “Has he shared more with you about his situation?”

“Not much.” Olivia picked up her knife and sawed the pancake coffin in half.

Maddie bounced to attention. “Are you telling me Del is still helping that crazy ex-wife of his?”

Ellie reached across the table and patted Olivia’s hand. “You’re upset, I can tell.”

Olivia shrugged one shoulder, and said, “I don’t mind that Del is helping Lisa. She’s in a frightening situation . . . which she brought on herself, but never mind. What irks me is that Del has called me exactly twice, and our conversations were brief . . . almost impersonal.”

“And you are afraid he is falling, once again, for his ex-wife?” Ellie said.

Olivia shrugged, then nodded.

“Del isn’t that stupid,” Maddie said. “This conversation requires more coffee. Maybe some fresh raspberry sherbet.” She slid out of the booth and held her empty cup in the air. A new server materialized at once, filled their cups, and took their orders for sherbet. “I love this place,” Maddie said as she resettled next to Olivia and reached for the cream. “Now, fill me in. When Del called, did he say anything about what’s going on? How much danger is Lisa in? Or is she just playing the damsel in distress to get Del back?”

“I wish I knew,” Olivia said, cradling her steaming cup in her hands.

Ellie plopped her elbows on the table as if she were about to deliver a lecture. “I don’t know Lisa,” she said, “but I do know Del. He won’t fall for a damsel-in-distress act. Given what I’ve heard, Lisa is in real danger from her abusive husband, and divorcing him is unlikely to end that danger. I suspect Del is very busy trying to keep Lisa safe during the divorce proceedings. Once those are finished, he’ll want to get her as far away from her ex-husband as possible.”

Olivia felt a sliver of hope. “I hadn’t thought about that,” she said. “That won’t be easy, and it sounds . . . scary.”

“And it will take some time.” Ellie squeezed Olivia’s hand. “The last thing Del would want to do is involve you in any of this. He might very well be trying to keep you safe, too.”

Olivia shivered, and not because of the air-conditioning.

“On the plus side,” Maddie said, “we can take comfort in the fact that we are in Chatterley Heights, and Lisa lives in some little town in western Maryland, so there’s a bunch of miles between us. I’d be more precise, but I don’t do numbers. Even if Del has Lisa safely hidden, she’ll still have to appear for divorce proceedings and so forth, so he wouldn’t send her here to escape from her ex.” Maddie frowned into her coffee cup. “At least, not right now. Maybe after the divorce is—”

“Livie, dear, won’t it be interesting to meet Greta Oskarson?” Ellie asked, smoothly changing the subject. “From everything I’ve heard, her collection of antique cookie cutters is impressive and quite valuable. What fun that she chose you to help her sell it.”

Olivia ate her last bite of sherbet, paid the bill, and left a generous tip. As she reached for her cell phone, it began to play “Too Darn Hot” sung by Ella Fitzgerald. “I’m guessing we’re about to find out when I’ll be meeting Greta to start the process,” Olivia said as she flipped her phone open. “Hi, Constance, what’s up?”

“Tomorrow morning, eleven a.m.” Constance said. “That’s when Greta Oskarson agreed to be at my office for our meeting. Bring the cookie cutters stored in your safe. I heard Maddie’s back in town; you can bring her along if you wish. And your mom, too. Ellie has a way of calming the atmosphere. Does this meet with your approval?”

Olivia winked at Maddie and her mother. “Perfect. Thanks, Constance. We’ll be there.” Olivia flipped her phone shut and relayed the message to Maddie and Ellie.

“This will be fun,” Maddie said. “I’ll whip up some cookies for the meeting.”

“Good idea,” Olivia said. “Oh, and Maddie? When did Ella Fitzgerald sneak into my cell phone?”

Maddie grinned. “When you excused yourself to visit the ladies’ room. And I can’t take full credit. Ellie chose the song. Aren’t you glad we’re all together again?”

“I’ll get back to you on that.” Olivia slipped her phone into her shorts pocket. “Mom, Maddie and I need to pick up some baking supplies. How about coming with us? Then we can all return to The Gingerbread House together. I want to tap your voluminous knowledge of Chatterley Heights and anyone who has ever lived here.”

“I wish I could, Livie, but I’ve scheduled several private yoga sessions. The first one starts in fifteen minutes, and the second is tomorrow at nine a.m. It was lovely to get out of town, but I had so little time to keep up my practice. I feel . . . disjointed.”

“If you say so, Mom.” Olivia led the group to the restaurant’s front exit.

“However, I’ll come to the store right after yoga tomorrow morning,” Ellie said as she stepped outside. “I’d love to accompany you to your meeting with Greta. I’m so curious to find out if the rumors I’ve heard about her are true.”

“Do you mean about her marriages,” Olivia asked, “and how they ended?”

Ellie remained quiet. Her hazel eyes flicked around the park as if she were searching for an answer. With a slight shake of her head, she said, “No, dear, I wasn’t thinking about Greta’s marriages, though they do bring questions to my mind. I was referring to much earlier rumors.” Ellie stood on tiptoe and gave Olivia a one-armed hug. “I’ll see you after yoga tomorrow, dear. We’ll talk then.” With a distinct sense of unease, Olivia watched her mother’s tiny figure head across the park.

Chapter Six

“Ugh. It must be a million degrees out here,” Maddie said as she trudged up the front steps of The Gingerbread House. “Lugging all these bags of groceries doesn’t help. Livie, you did crank up the air-conditioning in The Gingerbread House, right? Because I really need to bake. Oh, and I forgot to mention, I had another great idea while you and your mom were discussing yoga. It will require lots of baking, which is fine with me as long as the air-conditioning holds out.”

“And your idea is?” Olivia prodded.

Maddie plopped down on a porch rocking chair to wait while Olivia dug out her keys. “I think we should host a store event for Greta Oskarson,” Maddie said. “You know, like an official welcome to Chatterley Heights. We weren’t planning to reopen The Gingerbread House until Tuesday. Tomorrow is Saturday. We could hold the event tomorrow afternoon, maybe about one o’clock. I’ll have today and tomorrow morning to bake while you put the store together again.”

Olivia hated to give up her last hours of vacation leisure. “One p.m. sounds tight to me. We’re meeting with Constance and Greta at eleven a.m. Also, I’ll need some time to think before our meeting.”

“You’ll have plenty of time to think, I promise. I’ll do practically all the preparation. And a two-hour meeting is an eternity. We’ll have to plow through Constance’s agenda, whatever that is, plus the oohing over Greta’s fabulous cutter collection. If we get everything set up for the event before we leave for Constance’s office, Greta could come back here with us. Constance, too, for that matter. Please, Livie?”

“All right,” Olivia said. “A store event would be a great way to introduce Greta to Chatterley Heights, and it would help us spread the word about the sale of her cutter collection.”

“Uh-oh, what if Anita Rambert shows up and tries to corner Greta?” Maddie asked. “Geez, she might even try to convince Greta that you don’t have enough expertise to sell her collection.”

Olivia chuckled. “I’m not too worried. Greta sounds more concerned about trust than expertise. Anyway, all we have to do is put Mom to work at the event. She can pass the word, ever so gently, that Anita tends to jack up prices so she can take a substantial cut of the profits on private sales. Many collectors already know that, anyway, though they’ll put up with it if they can’t get what they want through another agent.”

“Ooh, and let’s not forget to ask Constance for help,” Maddie said. “She isn’t fond of Anita, and she isn’t as gentle as your mom.”

When Olivia opened the front door, cool air spilled out from the foyer. She stepped gratefully inside. Maddie followed, slamming the door behind her. The inner door to The Gingerbread House opened at once, and Bertha Binkman’s plump, cheerful face peeked out. “I thought all that noise might be you two,” Bertha said. “As soon as I saw Spunky in his chair by the window, I knew you’d beaten Willard and me back home. My goodness, you must be so hot and tired after carrying those heavy bags. Here, let me take one. Come on in out of that dreadful heat. By the way, I didn’t have anything to do, so I gave the kitchen a good scrubbing.” Bertha locked the door behind them and bustled off toward the kitchen.

Spunky hopped to all fours on his chair as Olivia passed, hoping to be allowed in the kitchen again. “Sorry, kiddo,” Olivia said. “The kitchen is sanitized, and we’ll be unpacking food, so you can’t come with us. It’s back to guard dog duty for you.” Spunky curled into a ball on the chair’s woven seat and closed his eyes. “Or you could just take a nap,” Olivia added, laughing.

While Bertha and Maddie stocked the kitchen shelves, Olivia switched on her laptop. She was hoping Del might have emailed, since he’d been stingy with his phone calls to her. As the computer awakened and yawned, Olivia helped Bertha tote the bags to a storage cupboard. “What brought you home early?” Olivia asked. “Don’t tell me you and Mr. Willard had a tiff, because that would destroy my fondest illusions.”

“Oh my, no,” Bertha said with her husky laugh. Olivia noted with relief that Bertha’s laughter no longer triggered a gasping fit. Since she and Mr. Willard had begun “seeing one another,” as Ellie put it, Bertha’s weight had gradually descended to what her doctor called “a healthy range.” She was now merely on the plump side, which was fine with Mr. Willard.

“Dear Willard and I had such a lovely time visiting museums and historical sites, but we were ready to come home. I must admit, we were both so curious to see Greta Oskarson.” Bertha hefted a sack of flour onto a high shelf and brushed off her hands on her apron.

“Did everyone know about Greta’s arrival except me?” Olivia was beginning to feel left out.

“Now, Livie, I’m sure your mother intended to call you as soon as she heard about it, but everything happened so quickly. Ellie was most concerned about finding out all she could about Greta, especially after Sadie Briggs called her. That’s really why Ellie called me: because I’m old enough to remember Greta. I didn’t know her well, of course, but I’d certainly heard about her, mostly from dear Clarisse. They were friends off and on, you know.”

“Off and on?” Olivia asked. “Did something happen to make Greta and Clarisse stop being friends?”

Bertha’s forehead puckered as she opened a bag of sugar and set it on the worktable for Maddie, who was impatient to begin measuring cookie dough ingredients. Bertha lined up the remaining sugar bags on a low shelf, and said, “I do hate to spread old gossip, because you never know . . . I suppose it’s possible that Greta has come back to make amends. Maybe that explains why Sadie thought she seemed genuinely sorry to hear that Clarisse had passed away.”

Make amends?
Olivia tried to avoid gossip, but Greta was about to become her client. She wanted to know what she might be facing. Olivia heard the whir of the stand mixer. Maddie’s attention seemed focused on the flat beater as it moved around the bowl, blending flour, sugar, and butter into cookie dough. “Bertha,” Olivia asked quietly, “did Greta hurt Clarisse in some way? Why would she need to make amends, all these years later?

Bertha’s thin white eyebrows shot up as if the question startled her. “My goodness, Livie, for the usual thing, of course. She had an affair with Martin.”

Olivia gasped at the same moment the mixer stopped. “Are you sure? Because—”

“Are you kidding?” Maddie abandoned her half-mixed dough. “Clarisse’s husband?
That
Martin? Why haven’t I heard about this? I don’t believe it, not for a moment. Clarisse and Martin were totally, absolutely devoted to one another.”

“Now, now, Maddie,” Bertha said in her firm, yet motherly tone. “I know you’re only just married and all, and Lucas is a fine young man, no doubt about that. I’m sure he’ll be loyal as the day is long. But anyone can stray. If that happens, it doesn’t mean the marriage wasn’t good to begin with, and . . . well, sometimes a couple can weather the storm and feel even closer.”

“Bertha, I’m confused,” Olivia said. “Clarisse was several years younger than Greta. I heard that Greta left the country at eighteen, so Clarisse would have been about fifteen. She hadn’t even met Martin. If she and Greta corresponded from separate continents, how could Martin have. . . .” Olivia remembered a long-ago talk she’d had with Clarisse about raising children. Although Clarisse and Martin had built several lucrative businesses together, the burden of child rearing had fallen upon Clarisse. She’d hired Bertha to help, but she hadn’t wanted to abandon her boys to a full-time nanny. Clarisse had genuinely wanted to be a mother. So she’d stayed home when the family businesses required travel. “Martin sometimes flew to Europe, didn’t he?” Olivia asked. “Clarisse mentioned that to me maybe a year before she was . . .” The memory of Clarisse’s murder invaded Olivia’s thoughts less frequently now, but it still hurt. “I remember Clarisse seemed to regret never having traveled to Europe.”

Bertha snorted. “Her regret went a lot deeper than that. There she was, staying home with her little boys because they both had chicken pox, and Martin goes traipsing off to Europe by himself. He didn’t have to go, mind you. The trip was supposed to be part business and part vacation for him and Clarisse. I was planning to stay with the boys. Then they got sick, and what with Clarisse being trained as a nurse, she decided she should watch over them. I know she was hurt when Martin wouldn’t postpone the trip until the boys were well.”

“I’d do more than feel hurt if Lucas did that to me,” Maddie said. “I’d punch him in the nose. Hey, do you suppose Martin decided to go to Europe alone because he was already carrying on with Greta? Maybe they’d been writing each other and planning how to get together.”

“Maddie, my friend, you’re making my head hurt,” Olivia said. “I doubt Martin would have planned to take Clarisse with him if he intended to meet up with Greta once he got there. Anyway, I’m fairly sure Martin couldn’t have predicted his sons would get chicken pox.”

Maddie’s green eyes sparkled like emeralds, a sure sign her imagination had burst its constraints. “Maybe he knew chicken pox was going around. Or maybe . . . you know, Clarisse and Martin’s biggest company dealt with medical supplies, plus they had all those drugstores. What if Martin got his hands on some chicken pox serum or something, and then he—”

“Maddie, please stop, I beg of you.” Olivia nodded toward the abandoned stand mixer. “Don’t you have dough to mix, roll, cut, and bake?”

“You never let me have any fun.” Maddie tried to pout but started laughing instead.

“Oh, you two,” Bertha said. “I never know when you’re joking around.”

Maddie turned her back on the mixer. “I am now shifting into serious mode. If Martin had an affair with Greta, even a brief one, it isn’t really very funny. So did he confess and all was forgiven?”

“If you want my opinion,” Bertha said, “there’s a type that strays, and then there’s men like Martin. He adored Clarisse and loved his boys, but he lived to build up those businesses. Couldn’t be bothered with the rest. I believe Martin went off to Europe because it was about business to him, plain and simple.” With a sad smile, Bertha said, “I remember when Martin and Clarisse would throw parties to entertain buyers and such like. Clarisse was a charming hostess. She kept everything going smoothly, while Martin . . . well, he didn’t like to socialize. He’d smoke like a bale of hay on fire and talk business all evening. Never talked to the wives or girlfriends, didn’t even look at them. When the conversation turned more personal, Martin would excuse himself and go to his study. Just like that. Clarisse would carry on until the party ended.”

“Didn’t Clarisse resent having to do all the people work?” Maddie asked. “Not that it would feel like work to me, except for the talking business part.”

“Oh my, no.” Bertha sighed. “Clarisse loved it all.”

“Well, I’m convinced,” Maddie said. “Greta must have initiated the affair. Martin probably didn’t have a clue until it was too late.”

Olivia smiled to herself. Clarisse had been her friend, older and wiser, but she’d also provided a strong mentoring presence. Olivia was convinced that everything she had accomplished since her return to Chatterley Heights wouldn’t have happened if she and Clarisse had never become friends. Would Martin have risked losing her? On the other hand, Olivia knew from painful experience that marriage was far more complex than a business partnership . . . or even a good friendship.

Olivia glanced at the clock over the kitchen sink. “We’ll probably never know what really happened all those years ago. Clarisse and Martin are gone, while Greta has reappeared, bought a house, and intends to settle in Chatterley Heights. I’d like to start out on the right foot with her, especially given she has asked me to handle the sale of her cookie cutter collection. I’m thinking it would be a good idea to keep the story of Martin and Greta to ourselves.”

With a dramatic sigh, Maddie said, “Oh, I suppose you’re right. I’m amazed it isn’t common knowledge already.”

“I haven’t thought about that episode in years,” Bertha said. “I’m not one to gossip. It’s so destructive, and you never really know where someone else has been.”

Olivia tried to feel reassured, but she was afraid the story would be all over town five minutes ago.

*   *   *

B
y early evening, Olivia had dusted all the shelves in the Gingerbread House sales area, as well as every item on those shelves. She’d left the disturbed sparkling sugar display as she had found it in the early morning hours. Neither Maddie nor Bertha had mentioned noticing anything amiss. Olivia wasn’t deeply concerned about how or why the colored sugars wound up out of order, but she couldn’t let it go, either. The puzzle niggled at her.

Olivia had begun arranging items on the display tables when the snow and the holiday season popped into her mind.
Why?
Autumn certainly wasn’t nipping the air, since the outdoor temperatures were stuck in the nineties. Olivia glanced back at the shelf of cookie decorations, where the jars of red and green sparkling sugars were still clustered together, ready for holiday baking. Maybe that accounted for her flash-forward in time.

As Olivia worked her way closer to the sales counter, the luscious aromas drifting from the kitchen grew stronger. Maddie had begun the baking phase, and Olivia realized at once why she’d thought of the holidays. She smelled cloves and . . . was that cardamom? An interesting choice, cardamom. Delicious, too, though a little went a long way. Why would Maddie choose cardamom-flavored cookies for a summer event? Unless . . . of course, Greta’s family was Swedish. Leaving a display table partially arranged, Olivia entered the kitchen and walked into a cardamom cloud laced with tangerine. Maddie was removing two octagonal shortbread molds from the oven.