Sprinkle with Murder (5 page)

“Not yet,” Mel said. “I really haven’t known her that long.”
Uncle Stan gave her a hard stare, and Mel fought the urge to squirm. Why did he have to look so much like her dad? It made it impossible to hide anything from him.
She had done nothing wrong, and she certainly wasn’t going to give him any reason to think that she had. Still, she couldn’t help but notice that her hands were sweaty and her heart was thumping harder in her chest than normal.
“Cooper,” one of the crime scene workers called, and both Mel and Stan answered.
“I think that’s for me,” Uncle Stan said with a small smile. The tense moment was broken.
“Stick around. I may have more questions for you. If you think of anything urgent, call my cell.”
“Okay.” Uncle Stan had been programmed into every phone she had ever owned. You never knew when you might need a family member on the force.
He escorted her back out the door and gave her a quick hug before he went to talk to the crime scene personnel.
The other detective was standing with Tate. Mel stood off to one side and waited. Tate looked as if someone had sucker punched him. He kept shaking his head as if trying to make it all go away. The detective handed him a card, and Mel went to stand beside him.
“How could this be?” he asked. His voice cracked with emotion, and Mel looped an arm around him. He was trembling. She patted his back, wishing she knew what to say.
After a moment, he pulled away. “I need to call Christie’s parents.”
Mel nodded, and watched as he drew out his BlackBerry. She sat back down on the concrete bench while he walked to the corner to make the call in private. She did not envy him this task.
“What’s going on?” a voice asked just behind Mel.
She turned on the hard bench and saw Alma, the goth designer, standing behind her and smoking. Again, she was all in black from her spiked black hair to her scuffed black combat boots.
Mel wasn’t sure what to say. Should she be the one to tell Christie’s staff what had happened? She didn’t think so. Phoebe, the blonde with the superbouncy personality, joined them. Her hair was up in a ponytail and held back by a wide headband. She was wearing cherry red leggings with a red and white zebra-striped top. She pushed her sunglasses up onto her head and studied the door to the studio, which someone had propped open with a brick.
“Hiya,” she said, as chipper as a morning songbird. “Why are we out here?”
Mel glanced around for Uncle Stan. There was no sign of him.
“It seems . . . well . . .” she stammered, hoping someone would show up and rescue her from this task, but no one did. “It seems that Christie, well, she’s dead.”
Alma squinted at her through a plume of smoke. Mel could tell she thought she was messing with her.
Phoebe, on the other hand, laughed. “You’re so funny. Seriously, what’s going on? Did the fire alarm go off again?”
Just then Tate walked by with his phone pressed to his ear. He was pacing, as he did when he was agitated, and Mel heard him say, “The police don’t know what’s happened. My friend Melanie Cooper arrived to meet with Christie this morning, and that’s when she found her. She was nonresponsive.”
Alma and Phoebe looked at Mel with wide eyes and, seeing the confirmation of Tate’s words on her face, Phoebe let loose with a scream that drew Mel’s nerves as tight as a piano string before it snapped.
Several officers came running, one of whom caught Phoebe as she fainted. Mel rose to help, but an EMT arrived and half carried, half dragged Phoebe to a nearby ambulance.
Alma slumped onto the concrete bench. “So, it’s true, then? The wicked witch is dead?”
“I’m afraid so,” Mel said. She was taken aback by the hostility in Alma’s tone, but she said nothing.
“I don’t suppose I should be surprised,” Alma said, lighting another cigarette. “Someone was going to do the bitch in sooner or later. I guess I just thought it would be later.”
Mel had not been a fan of Christie’s, but she was stunned by the callousness in Alma’s tone. What had Christie done to the young designer that she hated her so much?
She was about to ask when one of the EMTs came rushing back. “Excuse me, are you Alma?”
She turned towards him. “Yes?”
“Your friend is asking for you,” he said.
“We’re coworkers, not friends,” she corrected him.
“Okay, your coworker is asking for you,” he replied, looking irked. “Could you put that out and come with me, please?”
Alma took one more long drag before she crushed the cigarette under the hard rubber toe of her boot. She gave Mel a put-upon look before she followed the man in the blue uniform.
When Mel looked up, Tate was standing in front of her. He looked shattered. Without thinking about it, Mel put her arms around him and hugged him tight.

Six

A flash popped, and Mel looked over her shoulder and saw a photographer standing there. He was all aquiver like a dog with a juicy bone. It didn’t take a genius to realize that because of Tate’s fortune and Christie’s quasi celebrity, this was going to be front-page news. Tate hugging another woman at the scene of his fiancée’s death wasn’t going to look good, no matter how you sliced it.
“Your name, miss?” the photographer asked.
“Oh, hell, no!” Tate snapped.
He shoved Mel behind him and took a step towards the guy like he was going to punch him, but Mel held on to his arm and forcibly pulled him back into the studio to wait for Christie’s parents.
“Tate, don’t,” she said.
As they hovered near the wall on one side of the studio, Mel’s phone began to ring. It was distinguishable by her
Gone With the Wind
ring tone. She scrambled to pull it out of her purse and checked the number. It was the cupcake shop, so she knew it was Angie.
“Hello,” she said.
“ ‘I know the perfect way to kill someone. You clog their arteries with whipped cream, chocolate mousse, butter . . . they go like that!’ ”
“Angie, what are you saying?”
“I’m quoting
Manhattan Murder Mystery
. Don’t tell me I got you with that one. I thought it would make you laugh. You must be about ready to wring bridezilla’s neck by now.”
“Oh, man, I thought . . . never mind,” Mel said with a sigh. Tate looked at her with a frown. “Listen, something has happened over here at the studio.”
“What?” Angie demanded.
“I don’t know if I should say over the phone,” Mel replied. She could see Uncle Stan and the other detective having a heated conversation with the coroner, and every once and a while the other detective glanced towards her and Tate. It didn’t give her the warm fuzzies; in fact, she felt herself beginning to sweat.
“Oh, come on,” Angie said. “You can’t start to tell me and then stop. What’s going on? Is Christie being a nightmare or what?”
“I’m going to wait outside for Christie’s parents,” Tate said. “They’ll be here any minute.”
“Okay.”
“Okay, what?” Angie asked. “Are you going to tell me now?”
Mel slid down the wall towards the back of the shop, where she figured she could speak without being overheard. In a quiet voice, she said, “Angie, Christie’s dead.”
“What?” Angie shrieked.
It was loud enough that Mel had to move the phone away from her ear or risk blowing out her eardrum. Quietly, she described the events of the morning. Angie said nothing, and a few times Mel had to ask her if she was still there.
“How’s Tate taking it?” Angie asked, her voice tight with worry.
“I think he’s in shock. I don’t know what to say to him.”
“Do you want me to come over?” Angie asked.
Mel glanced around the room. She would love to have Angie with her to bolster her through this nightmare. But the medical examiner’s people were swarming the building, and the police were in every inch they weren’t. Spectators were beginning to gather outside, and several news vans filled the parking lot. No, Mel was going to leave as soon as Uncle Stan told her she could. There was nothing Angie could do but stand helplessly with her, and really, what was the point of that?
“Thanks,” Mel said, “but I’ll meet you at the shop as soon as I get done here. I’ll text you if there’s anything to report.”
“Let me know if you change your mind,” Angie said. “And give Tate a hug from me and tell him to call me if he needs me.”
“I will,” Mel promised, and closed her phone.
It seemed like days passed before Uncle Stan sent her on her way with a hug and a promise to call her later. She had told her story about finding Christie three times to him and the other detective, and watched in sympathetic horror when Christie’s parents arrived.
Her father was short and pudgy, clad in pastel golf duds. He was still wearing his spikes, and they scratched against the floor like fingernails on a chalkboard. Her mother was rail thin and mature, but fighting the aging process for all she was worth. Wearing a beige Donna Karan wrap dress with a fat strand of pearls at her throat and diamond clusters at her ears, she looked as if she had just left a ladies’ brunch. This was not the way they had planned to spend their day, to be sure.
When Christie was placed in a body bag and wheeled out to the van that would take her to the medical examiner’s office, Mel felt her throat get tight as Christie’s mother broke down and sobbed onto her husband’s shoulder. He patted her with an awkward hand, his own eyes misty with unshed tears. Mel couldn’t even imagine the depth of their pain. When she glanced at Tate, he looked as if he’d been run over by a truck.
Mel felt the same helplessness she’d felt when her father died. She’d watched her mother suffer and grieve, and had not known what to say or how to help. Now she was watching one of her closest friends go through the same thing, and again she didn’t know what to do. Granted, she was not paralyzed by her own sense of loss this time, but still, she felt woefully inadequate to help Tate.
Then Christie’s father glanced over at her. He studied her face as if memorizing it for a police lineup. His eyes narrowed and his nostrils flared, and Mel got the distinct impression that she would soon be hearing from Mr. Stevens. She doubted it would be to place an order for cupcakes.

When Mel arrived at Fairy Tale Cupcakes
,
the shop positively sparkled, and she knew Angie had channeled her worry into cleaning.
“How’s Tate? What happened? How did she die? Should I bring him some soup or cupcakes?” Angie barraged Mel with questions.
Mel raised her hand to signal “Whoa!”
“Sorry, I’ve just been so worried.” Angie twisted her pink apron in her hands.
“I think I need a Death by Chocolate, although that’s an unfortunate name, given the circumstances,” Mel said. She led the way back to the kitchen. In the walk-in, a huge tray of chocolate cupcakes sat waiting. Mel took two and went to sit at the worktable.
Angie sat across from her, and they silently unwrapped their decadent dark-chocolate-on-chocolate treats. Mel didn’t bother with a plate or a fork.
“I know emotional eating is bad,” she said. “But if not now, then when?”
Neither of them spoke until the cupcakes were gone.
“Tate’s in shock,” Mel said. “I don’t know what happened. I don’t know how Christie died. And I don’t know if Tate would be up for cupcakes just yet. Maybe in a few days.”
Angie nodded. Mel went on to recount the morning’s events, and Angie listened. When Mel finally wound down, they sat silently together. Neither of them knew what to say.
The front door opened with a jingle of bells, and Angie jumped up to greet their customer, probably relieved to get away from the grim news. Mel wadded up their spent cupcake papers and tossed them into the stainless steel garbage can beside the table.
For a moment, she toyed with the idea of closing the shop, but then, what would she do? Go home and relive this morning in all its Technicolor glory? No. Instead, she pulled on her apron and followed Angie back into the shop.
After helping with the morning crush, she spent the next hour baking a fresh batch of strawberry cupcakes called Pretty in Pinks. Mel was inventorying the display case while Angie packed up an order for a customer, when she glanced up and saw Olivia Puckett’s refrigerated van drive by.
“How many times has she driven by today?”
“That would be the eighth,” Angie replied.
“That’s it,” Mel said. “I’ve had it.”
“What are you going to do?” Angie asked. “You can’t stop her from driving down the street.”
“No, but maybe I can discourage her.”
Angie raised her eyebrows as Mel hurried back to the kitchen. Before Angie could stop her, Mel dashed back out the front door with a bowl of the leftover buttercream frosting in one hand and a spatula in the other.
When Olivia’s pink van circled back to crawl by the shop again, Mel counted to three and scooped up a spatula of pink frosting and let it fly. It landed with a deliciously satisfying
splat
on Olivia’s windshield.
Olivia stopped hard with a yelp of her brakes, and hopped out of the van.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she demanded.
“Oh, oops!” Mel said, completely unrepentant. “I was just mixing, and I guess my frosting got away from me.”
She lifted another spatula full and flicked it onto the other side of the windshield.
“Hey, you did that on purpose!” Olivia accused.
“Did not.”
“Did, too.”
Olivia clocked in somewhere in her early fifties. Her corkscrew gray hair was twisted into an untidy knot on top of her head, and her sallow complexion was mottled with ire. Mel was pretty sure that if Olivia had had something to throw back at her, like a rock, she would have.
“Puckett, why don’t you get a life and stay out of mine?” Mel asked in her most scathing tone.
“Ha! I can’t help it if I have so many deliveries in this area,” Olivia said. “What’s the matter? Afraid I’m cutting in on your business?”
“Really? Deliveries?” Mel scoffed. “You drive by fifteen times a day. I see more of you than my own mother, and that’s saying something.”
Olivia huffed out a breath and swaggered towards Mel. She stuck a meaty finger into the bowl of frosting and popped it into her mouth. She wrinkled her nose in disgust.
“You call yourself a chef?” Olivia spat the frosting onto the sidewalk. “That’s disgusting.”
Acutely aware of the crowd that was gathering, Mel did her best to look superior. “Coming from a woman who models her cupcakes after store-bought ones, I’d say that’s high praise.”
Olivia sucked in an indignant breath. “I do not!”
“Do t . . .” Mel’s words were cut off when she was yanked back into the store by her apron strings.
“Have you lost your mind?” Angie demanded. Then she stuck her head out the door, and yelled, “Playtime is over. We just got an order for over two hundred cupcakes. Olivia, you might want to go back to Confections and bake something!”
Olivia gave Angie a bug-eyed look and scooted back into her van. She sped off with her windshield wipers flapping frosting in all directions.
Angie turned back to Mel. “Seriously, what were you thinking?”
Mel sagged, clutching her bowl of frosting to her chest. “I wasn’t. I’m just not having a very good day. Did we really get that big of an order?”
“No, it was for four dozen,” Angie admitted. “But hey, it got Olivia moving, didn’t it?”
The front door jangled and several customers poured in, probably curious after the ruckus. Mel was grateful, not only for the business but also because, if she kept busy, then she could stop thinking about finding Christie dead. Or so she hoped.