Connie Shelton - Sweet's Sweets - The Second Samantha Sweet Mystery

When her bedside phone rang at eight o’clock, she sat up and rubbed at her eyes. Clearing her throat she picked up the receiver.

“Samantha Sweet,” she answered, hoping she didn’t sound as sleepy as she felt.

“I’m at my wits end,” the female voice said. “My niece’s birthday party is at four o’clock and I completely forgot that I was the one who volunteered to bring the cake.”

Groping for pen and paper, Sam privately wondered why the lady didn’t simply grab a generic cake at the grocery store.

“. . . princess theme and the cake has to be shaped like a castle.”

“A castle?” On less than a day’s notice?

“Pink. With lavender flowers and a pony in front of it.”

Sam opened her mouth to protest that she didn’t just happen to have a pony waiting around to grace this particular cake. But the woman uttered the magic words: “I’ll pay extra.”

Damn straight, you will.

“Give me just a second here,” Sam said, jotting instructions as fast as she could, taking information about how many guests there would be and trying to wrap her head around the logistics of putting this thing together on such short notice. As she calculated the number of layers and the amount of trimming she’d have to do, her call waiting signal came through. She excused herself to the distraught woman and clicked over to the other call.

“Ms. Sweet, it’s Maria at Signs R Us. Just wanted to let you know that your van will be ready to pick up anytime after noon today.”

Sam jotted a note on her hand. By noon it looked like she would be up to her elbows in pink frosting and cake crumbs.

Back to the lady with the emergency castle order. Sam thought of the most she’d ever charged for a special-shape cake and doubled it, half hoping the woman would call her crazy and hang up. But, no. She accepted without a second’s hesitation and gave the address where she wanted this miracle cake delivered.

“Be sure to be there by three-thirty,” she said.

“I’ll do my best, ma’am.” Sam bit back what she really wanted to say, glad she had doubled the price.

All this before I’ve even been to the bathroom, she thought, grabbing up some jeans and a clean work shirt. Thirty minutes later the first two cake pans were in the oven and she’d gathered ingredients for sponge cupcakes. Stacking them was the easiest way she could think of to create turrets. Rummaging through an upper cabinet in search of pink lace to line the cake board, she’d come across a plastic unicorn that she’d once ordered from her supplier, thinking it was cute.

The oven timer pinged, the layers came out, cupcakes went in. And Sam began piping a host of lavender and pink roses, setting them aside in the fridge to firm up before they could be placed on the cake. She stuck the cakes into the fridge, as well, pushing desperately to cool them a little faster.

Her cell phone vibrated on the kitchen table and then chirped out a couple of final tones. Beau. She picked it up and balanced it against her cheek while she scooped colored icing into a pastry bag.

“Hey there,” he said. “How’s things going?”

“No time whatsoever for conversation. Sorry, that was rude. I didn’t mean . . . ”

“No, it’s okay. I don’t have much time either. Thought you might want to know that the preliminary blood test from that coat shows it to be male. So, it’s not your lady homeowner. But it’ll take awhile longer to get specific DNA.”

Sam felt a degree of relief that Cheryl Adams wasn’t the victim of whatever had happened. Still, Sam wondered . . . maybe one of the men in Cheryl’s life had pushed her too far.

“I’m working on a few leads that might tell us where Ms. Adams went when she left Taos,” Beau was saying. “She has relatives in Colorado, but I haven’t been able to make contact yet. And I won’t get to it today. Just got a call that Search and Rescue is recovering a body from the bottom of the gorge. Probably some bridge-jumper but I’m going to have to investigate. I was hoping to see you tonight, but . . .”

“It’s all right, really. Things are stacking up on me too. The shop—”

He was already saying goodbye and she let it go at that.

Thinking of her store reminded her that she intended to call the fixture manufacturer in Albuquerque very first thing this morning and had become sidetracked. She set aside the filled pastry bag and looked up their number.

“I’ve got four orders bigger than yours, lady,” the guy told her.

“My stuff was promised for this week, and it’s already Thursday.”

“Yeah, well, sometimes we just don’t get what we wish for. I’ll try for Monday.”

Sam felt her blood pressure rising and bit back a sharp retort. She hung up abruptly. No sense in pissing the guy off further; he already had enough issues and she certainly wouldn’t get her equipment faster by making him mad. She tossed the cell phone back onto the table and blew out a sharp breath.

The kitchen phone rang before she’d had the chance to turn around, and the timer on the cupcakes went off at the same instant. Sam reached for the phone with one hand, saying, “Please hold one moment” as she grabbed an oven mitt and pulled the door open with the other hand.

“Thank you for holding,” she said in the most businesslike tone she could muster.

“Mom? Busy day?”

“I can’t even describe—” The call-waiting beep came through again. “Can I put you on hold a second, Kelly?”

“I’ll let you go. Just wanted to say that I won’t be home for dinner. Fill you in later. Bye.”

I have to get some help with this , Sam thought as she clicked through to the other call.

“Is this the Sweet’s Sweets bakery?”

“Yes, ma’am, it certainly is.” Cool—the new call-forwarding is working and word is getting out!

“Can you handle a rather large order?”

Oh, god, not today. “What can we do for you?”

“My name is Elena Tafoya and my husband is running for governor. Perhaps you’ve heard of him, Carlos Tafoya?”

Son of the crotchety landlord, Victor Tafoya. Oh yeah, she’d heard of him.

The woman went on. “We’ll be needing a large victory cake. Maybe several. I don’t know how to figure out that kind of thing.”

Sam sat down with her order pad and took a deep breath. Hand-holding was something she did all the time. “How many guests do you expect at the, uh, victory party?”

Elena Tafoya chuckled lightly. “Oh, you mean, what if Carlos doesn’t win? What if it’s not a victory after all?”

“I didn’t want to say that, but I guess one never knows really.”

“Well, that’s true. But there will be a party, either way. Something to thank the volunteers and everyone.”

Sam went into an explanation about how many people could be served from a tiered cake, a sheet cake, a half-sheet and so forth. “If you think the amount you order isn’t quite enough, I can always bake a second cake that day, as long as it’s a simple design.”

“Oh, I like that idea. Maybe we could do a main cake that’s two or three tiers high. And if we need more, just some regular sheet cakes to feed the extra people?”

Sam assured her that would work easily and proceeded to take the information about colors and style. “Thanks” seemed to be an appropriate message to put on the cake, win or lose. She was beginning to enjoy the conversation with Elena Tafoya when the clock in the living room chimed noon, reminding her that she had to figure out how to retrieve her van from the paint shop and finish the complicated castle cake in the next three hours.

She put on her most cordial voice as she said goodbye and assured the politician’s wife that she could meet their requirements. As she was quickly learning from Beau, politics in this county carried a lot of weight, and her fledgling business could use all the connections she could muster.