Лейганн Доббс - A Twist In The Tail

Millie’s brows drew together. ‘Me too. Then again, maybe it would bring in business. You know how morbid people are.’

‘Hmm… you have a point.’

‘Never mind that,’ Mom tugged on my arm. ‘Mike’s leaving. You’re not going to let him get away, are you?’

I glanced over at his car, half expecting to see Stella inside, but she wasn’t. ‘Yes, I think I am.’

‘Are you sure? Could be your last chance to get him to ask you out on a date,’ Mom said. ‘Millie said he finished up the last task on his list today.’

‘I’m not in the market for a date,’ I said. ‘Besides, it’s probably for the best if he doesn’t hang around here too much. The way he calls me Sunshine is annoying.’

As I watched his truck turn onto the road, I felt a little tug of regret. Now that he wouldn’t be working at the guesthouse, I probably wouldn’t see him much, but surely that was for the best?

Meow!

Meroo!

Nero and Marlowe joined our circle and Millie and Mom bent down to scratch their ears. The two cats strutted around, tails in the air and heads held high.

‘Sheesh, by the way they’re acting, you’d think they’d caught the killer,’ Mom said.

‘They sure do look proud of something,’ Millie glanced up at me, her brows raised in a question.

I looked down at the two cats. They met my gaze with intelligent, luminescent eyes. ‘Funny you say that. I think they did actually help out. It was due to them getting underfoot, that I was able to push Barbara into the basement.’

Millie looked adoringly at the cats, a proud smile on her face. ‘Well then, I say they are certainly taking good care of the guesthouse and their new human. What do you say, Josie?’

‘I agree, in fact I’m getting used to their company. I can’t imagine the guesthouse without them.’

Meow!

Meress!

Twenty-Three

‘I’m so proud that you caught a killer all by yourself while running a new business, Mom.’ Emma’s voice gushed over the phone, swelling my heart with pride. ‘But it sounds like that could have been dangerous.’

‘Not at all, Sheriff Chamberlain was right outside the door.’ I made it sound like I’d arranged for the sheriff to step in so Emma would think I was never in danger.

‘Even so, I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to you,’ Emma said.

‘You don’t need you to worry about me. I’m sure nothing like that will happen again. I mean, what are the odds?’

Emma laughed. ‘Good point. I gotta run. You take care. Love you, Mom.’

‘Love you too.’ I barely got the words out before she disconnected. Kids these days, always running off. Truth was, I’d wanted to give her the same heartfelt warning about her job at the FBI. I took some comfort in the fact that she was an analyst and not in the field, but still, a mother never stops worrying. Unless maybe you were talking about my mother. She seemed to thrive on danger and it didn’t seem to matter which one of us was in it.

It was one week after Barbara’s arrest and Millie, Mom and I sat in the kitchen at the Oyster Cove Guesthouse.

Steam wafted up from mugs of coffee that sat beside warm pieces of sugary sour cream coffee cake on the table in front of us. Nero and Marlowe were there too, of course. They’d been treated like royalty all week and were now lapping up the last of a small bit of cream I’d given them as a treat.

‘At least Stella Dumont did the right thing and decided not to use my coffee cake recipe for the contest.’ Millie forked up a piece of the crumbly top.

‘That would have been cheating,’ My mother said. ‘What’s she using instead?’

‘Her Aunt Sally’s fruitcake, I think.’ Millie said.

Mom laughed. ‘I doubt that will win any prizes.’

I relaxed back in my chair. Honestly, I hadn’t been worried about Stella wining that contest and getting one-up on me anyway. Not much. I was sure my baking would improve over time. Besides, considering how often Millie popped in to help make the breakfasts, I was sure the Oyster Cove Guesthouse would be able to keep its reputation for good eats. ‘It’s nice not have guests to tend to.’

Ava had left two days earlier for a cruise to the Caribbean. The Weatherbys had gone off on a top-secret mission to Antarctica the day after Barbara was arrested and Tina had broken off her affair with Tony and gone back home on Tuesday. I was glad their affair was over, I liked the chicken parmesan at the Marinara Mariner and didn’t want the restaurant to close down if Tony and the Mrs. got divorced.

‘I think things went very well for your first round of guests.’ Millie pressed her index finger to the plate to pick up the last sweet crumbs from the coffee cake, licked them off and then pushed up from the table and headed to the cabinets where she started to assemble bowls, whisks and measuring utensils. Apparently she was going to do some baking. I knew the kitchens were small over at the retirement village, but honestly, if she was going to just keep coming here to bake she might as well make the breakfasts all the time.

At my skeptical look, my mother added. ‘Well, there was that little hiccup of a murder, but you handled it very well, dear.’ Mom patted my arm.

‘And caught the killer!’ Millie added.

Meow!

Meroo?

‘Yes, we know you guys helped too,’ Millie said to Nero and Marlowe who appeared offended at the lack of credit. They twitched their whiskers and sauntered off toward the hallway, apparently appeased by Millie’s praise.

‘Who would have figured it was Barbara?’ Mom said. ‘I mean, I knew she was went overboard tending to the lousewort but I never thought she’d planted it herself. I would have suspected Ava before Barbara, but I was hoping it was Stella.’

‘Me too,’ I said.

Millie turned around to look at us. ‘Ava? Why would you suspect her?’

‘She knew Charles from before, she was the one who told us about Tina, she was here at the guesthouse… it sort of seemed like she turned up everywhere,’ I said. ‘I just hope she isn’t going to do some big column in the paper about it. It sounded like she needed something exciting to bring in readers.’

‘Don’t worry, she isn’t writing a column.’ Millie glanced out into the hallway to make sure we couldn’t be overheard. By whom I had no idea. We were the only ones in the guesthouse. ‘She’s writing a book about it.’

‘Oh.’ Was that better than a column? Probably. Maybe they’d make it into a movie and people would flock here to see where it happened.

‘I’m just glad all’s well that ends well,’ Mom said. ‘Barbara would have done anything to protect herself, so it’s a good thing you guys were able to outwit her.’

‘I can’t believe she would have burned down the guesthouse,’ Millie shuddered as she cracked eggs into a bowl.

‘Yeah that could have been a problem, especially with the town’s 250th celebration and all the descendants of Jedediah Biddeford coming to stay here in two weeks.’ Though the guesthouse had been added to over the years, it had started out as a smaller mansion way before Millie’s people even owned it. The main part of the mansion that was now the West wing had been originally built by Jedediah Biddeford, and seeing as he’d lived here 250 years ago, apparently his descendants felt the town celebration was a great time to have a family reunion right in the house that started it all.

A family reunion was nice and all, but I was really thrilled because all five of the rooms which had been renovated to this point had been booked by Biddefords. If only I’d kept Mike on, I might have been able to squeak out a few more rooms, but it was just as well that he wouldn’t be around. I was getting too comfortable with him. And while Ed O’Hara was a bit slow, he did good work and I was happy to supplement his Social Security income.