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

Sweet’s Sweets

The Second Samantha Sweet Mystery

Connie Shelton

Secret Staircase Books

© 2010 Connie Shelton. All rights reserved.

Author’s Note

Readers who might be familiar with the Taos County Sheriff’s Department will undoubtedly notice that the department described in my series is quite a bit smaller than the actual. For story purposes, I’ve given them fewer deputies and other personnel. I’ve also moved the location of the offices. No need to write and inform me of my ‘mistakes.’ It’s been done on purpose. I hope you’ll simply enjoy the story for what it is, including the ‘magic’ parts!

Once again I extend my thanks to Susan Slater, for your editorial suggestions and for all the good catches you make in reading my work. And to my readers, my thanks for your loyalty and for recommending my books to others; you make it all worthwhile. You are the best!

For Dan. It’s amazing how twenty years have just flown by!

Thanks for being such a wonderful partner.

Prologue

The woman tensed. Were those footsteps behind her on the dark street? She couldn’t be sure. She spun to check—saw nothing.

Catching a whiff of cologne—or was it someone’s garden?—she picked up her pace. Where were the crowds? The people who normally jammed the plaza and surrounding streets on these early-autumn evenings were gone. Was it really that late?

She must have lingered in her lover’s bed far too many hours. She raised the collar of her light jacket, sniffed it. Did she smell of him? Despite a shower, she feared that she might carry his scent home.

There was always danger in these matters, the constant fear of being caught, the continual deception, even with her closest friends. The stress of keeping up appearances . . . it was all becoming too much.

But he loved her—didn’t he? She loved him, she felt certain of that. Nearly certain. And yet she couldn’t break the news to her husband. Wouldn’t rip the bandage off and get it over with cleanly. Couldn’t seem to leave the miserable, sham marriage behind and start a new life. The time wasn’t right, not yet

A scuff on the sidewalk behind her. She froze. Dared a glance. A shadow moved but she couldn’t be certain—a man, or merely a tree branch? For a moment she nearly let her guard down, almost didn’t care what happened to her.

But self-preservation prevailed.

She ran blindly up a side street, then spotted an alleyway just ahead. On a nano-second’s impulse she ducked into it. The stupid high heels were killing her feet; she’d never be able to outrun the stalker. What did she have for a weapon?

She fumbled her purse open, felt blindly for anything she might use to defend herself.

The footfalls resumed. Closer.

She held her breath.

Someone was there, mere feet from the alley. Her fingers touched her wallet, a lipstick, her car keys. They closed around a small knife she’d forgotten about, a pen knife her husband had left in the car. She’d intended to take it in the house. A four inch blade—silly, really, for self defense—but it might dissuade an attacker.

The footsteps, again. He seemed to pause and consider the alley. Ahead, as she remembered, the road curved to the north. For all he knew, she might have kept running, beyond his sight. She took his hesitation as uncertainty. She thumbed the blade of the knife open, pressing her back against the block wall.

What if it turned out to be her husband? Possibly the perfect opportunity to rid herself of him forever, to be with the man she really wanted. The thought flitted through her head in an instant, shocking her. But would she have the nerve?

A silhouette filled the alley. Oh god, she thought.

He stepped toward her. She edged away, two steps, bumped into something. He came forward. Instinct kicked in and her right hand slashed toward his face. The knife blade connected—she couldn’t tell where. But at once there was blood. A lot of it.

The man grabbed at his neck and crumpled to the ground. She leaped past his flailing legs. As he rolled to his back she caught a glimpse of his face. A stranger.

Chapter 1

October light filtered through a layer of grime on wide storefront windows, playing up the air of abandonment. Samantha Sweet viewed the challenge ahead of her as she scrawled her signature on the lease. Cleaning up a mess was nothing new to her. She relished the task ahead—refinishing the old wood-framed display cases, throwing out piles of old junk, making those front windows sparkle so that her scrumptious pastries could beckon the world to her door.

Sweet’s Sweets. Her own bake shop. Her dream.

She watched as Victor Tafoya, her new landlord, countersigned the papers. The seventy-five year old man reminded her of the Grinch, minus the green. Skinny, wizened, with a shock of sparse white hair which he usually covered with a battered straw hat, no matter the season—Tafoya was known around town for being miserly and grumpy but generally fair. However, Sam would rather deal with him than his son Carlos, who fancied himself something of a monarch here in Taos. Two terms as mayor, now running for governor of New Mexico, Carlos was reputed to share his father’s stingy ways, without the fairness. Sam dreaded the day he would take over the elder Tafoya’s rental properties.

She sighed and took the signed pages and key Victor Tafoya handed her. The old man grumbled something about how her check better clear the bank or he’d be back, then he walked out without another word.

Sam let a smile spread over her features as she turned and surveyed her little domain. As long as she paid her rent on time and was able to perform repairs herself, she shouldn’t need to deal with either of the Tafoyas for a long time. She loved her vision for this spot—and the location was perfect.

“Knocking, knocking . . .”

Ivan Petrenko, owner of Mysterious Happenings the bookshop next door, peered around the edge of the door. A longtime customer for her pastries, Ivan was an endearing little man whose curious mixture of Russian and French usually kept Sam guessing. Rumor had it that he had defected from Russia to Paris with his wife’s ballet troupe, but there had been no evidence of a wife here in Taos. She must have found Paris more alluring, at whatever point in time Ivan decided to move on to America.

“We are the neighbors now, eh?” He stepped into the room and surveyed the mess the former tenant had left behind.

“It’s going to need some cleanup, isn’t it?” Sam said.

“ Oui , but Miss Samantha is how do you say, up to the task?”

Sam laughed. “Yes, indeed. I am. I hope to have the shop open in a week or so.”

Another tap at the door interrupted.

“Samantha . . . it’s official, then?” The newcomer was her other neighbor, Erika Davis-Jones—Riki D-J to everyone—who owned a dog-grooming shop to the south. They’d met through the book group at Mysterious Happenings, and Sam immediately took a liking to the petite British-born young woman who wasn’t a whole lot older than her own daughter.

Sam held up the pages of the lease. “Yep. Here I am.”

Riki squealed and danced around. “I’m so happy for you, Sam.”

Sam showed them around, pointing out the changes she planned to make. Her daughter, Kelly, had designed a logo for the shop in Sam’s favorite shades of purple, and Sam would use those same colors, along with gold trim, in the scheme throughout the store. A wall already divided the space roughly in half, and Sam had a bake oven, walk-in refrigerator, and all the best in equipment on order from a bakery supply house. She’d not revealed to most people where the money came from for her new venture, but there was sufficient cash to do it right and that’s just what she intended to do.