Lorna Barrett - Bookmarked For Death

The phone bleated again.

“If I were you, I’d unplug the thing. That is, unless you’re willing to be interviewed again and again—and again.”

“They’re certainly not catching me at my best,” Angelica said, and pulled at the cord, which led her to the jack just above the baseboard by the side of the bed. She unplugged the phone, but the extension in the kitchen continued to ring. “You take your shower first, Trish, while I go unplug the kitchen phone and get the coffee started.”

“Deal.”

Fifteen minutes later, and still toweling her hair dry, Tricia entered the kitchen to find Angelica bent over the kitchen island, coffee mug in hand, reading the morning paper.

Angelica straightened, her expression wary.

“What’s wrong now?” Tricia asked.

“Why don’t you have a nice cup of coffee,” Angelica offered sweetly, and stepped around to the countertop to grab a clean cup from the cabinet.

Tricia hung the towel around her shoulders and moved to take Angelica’s former position. “I suppose they’ve already got all the dirt about the murder,” she said, and folded back the front page of the Nashua Telegraph . There, in full color, was Zoë Carter’s smiling face—and the blouse she wore looked very familiar. Tricia squinted to read the photo’s copyright. “Russell Smith?” she read in a strangled voice. “Russ—my Russ—sold one of the photos he took last night to a competitor? Talk about blood money.”

“Now, Trish, dear, you don’t know that he sold it.”

“Well, I’m sure going to find out.”

Tricia stomped over to the phone, which lay on the counter where Angelica had left it after wrenching it from the wall. She picked the thing up, trying to find the connector, and mashed it against the wall. It immediately started to ring. She lifted the receiver and set it down again, effectively cutting off whoever was on the other end, then snatched it up again and punched in Russ’s telephone number.

It rang and rang. Either it was off the hook, or he was conversing and ignoring his call waiting.

She slammed the receiver back onto the switch hook. The phone started ringing once again.

Angelica pushed her aside, yanked the offending instrument from the wall once more, and set it aside. “How about that coffee?” she asked cheerfully.

“I don’t get it. He was worried about how it would look that his paper had no news on the murder, and now his photo appears in a rival paper.”

“Don’t you think you ought to talk to him before making all these assumptions? And anyway, what’s so bad about that? People are curious. They’ll want to see the last pictures taken of a dead celebrity. Although, let’s face it, she’s not half as newsworthy as old Anna Nicole was when she took a dirt nap.”

Tricia stared at the photo. What was she so angry about, anyway? That Russ had betrayed her trust? Exactly how? She’d known those photos were going to be reproduced in a newspaper—he just hadn’t figured it would be used in such a sordid way, or that it would appear so quickly.

“How about that coffee?” Angelica asked once more, wrapping Tricia’s hand around a warm mug. “I have a feeling it’s going to be a very long day.”

A lumbering, Granite State tour bus passed by the Cookery at nine fifty-five. Within minutes, the horde of book lovers would descend upon the village, charge cards in hand, and Haven’t Got a Clue would not be their destination. The red closed sign and yellow crime scene tape around the door would handle that. Any inquiries by telephone would be handled by the new outgoing message Tricia had recorded earlier that morning.

Behind the bus trailed a WRBS News Team Ten van, its uplink antenna neatly folded down the side. Tricia moved away from the Cookery’s big plate glass display window, farther into the interior of the store. She’d deleted the messages from newspapers and TV stations on her voice mail, but doubted she’d make it through the day unscathed. And she hadn’t been able to get hold of Russ, either at his home or via his office or cell phone.

Across the store, a tight-lipped Ginny, clad in a yellow Cookery apron, stood beside the register, getting her orders from Angelica, who fired them off like a drill sergeant. Ginny had worked in the store under its previous owner, and it had not been a happy experience. And as for Mr. Everett, in an effort to beef up his limited culinary repertoire, he had shown up for all the cooking demonstrations under the old administration, but since he never bought anything, his attendance at these minilectures had made him customer non grata.

Tricia wandered over to the horseshoe-shaped food demonstration area that dominated the center of the store, unsure what her role was to be. Too many workers in the shop would only get in the way of customers, and as cooking was the least of her domestic skills, she wouldn’t be able to make thoughtful recommendations. Still, she’d learned a lot about bookselling in the year since she’d opened her store. Time to put that knowledge into action for her sister . . . and hope the effort would be appreciated.

But that’s not what she wanted to do. She had no doubt Sheriff Adams would keep Haven’t Got a Clue closed for as long as possible, just to spite her. With nothing to read—she’d forgotten to bring along the newest book in the Deb Baker Dolls to Die For mystery series that sat on her bedside table—she’d lain awake half the night listening to Angelica softly snoring on the other side of the bed. She’d spent a good portion of those hours going over her limited options. The sooner the crime was solved—or at least a suspect was identified—the sooner she could reopen. It was up to her to expedite the process.

And how was she going to gracefully exit the Cookery to do so?

Finishing with Ginny and Mr. Everett, Angelica moved her gaze, zeroing in on Tricia. Did cartons of heavy books need to be shelved, or did the washroom need cleaning? Tricia didn’t want to find out. Instead, she went on the offensive. “Hey, Ange, have you thought about offering your customers cookies? You’ve got that beautiful demonstration area just sitting idle. Or maybe I could just nip on down to the patisserie and get some for you.”

“Are you kidding? Now that I have competent help—” Angelica threw a glance in Ginny’s direction—“I intend to make my own.” She grabbed a book from one of the shelves, Betty Crocker’s Cooky Book . The former owner had disdained that entire line of cookbooks, but once confided to Tricia that they were among her best sellers. Apparently Angelica had discovered the same thing. “Should I go for plain old chocolate chip, or maybe some blond brownies? The aroma will drive people nuts, and I’ll sell a stack of cookie books.”

Tricia resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “What ingredients are you missing? I could whip on up to the store for supplies.”

“Good idea,” Angelica said, still flipping pages. “But not the convenience store. I’ll bet they rarely sell flour. Their stock probably has weevils. You’ll have to go to Milford.”

That hadn’t been the direction Tricia had planned to go, but she was more than ready to make her escape.

Angelica headed for the register and grabbed a piece of scrap paper. “Hold on, I’ll write up a list.”

Tricia wasted no time waiting for Angelica to change her mind, and retrieved her jacket. Five minutes later, however, she was feeling uncomfortably warm as Angelica added yet another two or three items to her list. “Come on, Ange, you’re making a couple of batches of cookies, not feeding a regiment.”

“I know, but I’ll need supplies for several days. With Ginny and Mr. Everett here, I can go back to my first love—cooking!” She checked over her list again.