Diane Davidson - Dying for Chocolate

Five-Star Praise for DYING FOR CHOCOLATE and the

Nationally Bestselling Mysteries of Diane Mott Davidson

“A CLASSIC WHODUNITthat’s the PERFECT BOOKfor food lovers.”

— Daily News, NY

“VERY ENTERTAINING.”

—Cosmopolitan

“A CROSS BETWEEN MARY HIGGINS CLARK AND BETTY CROCKER.”

—The Sun, Baltimore

“Diane Mott Davidson’s CULINARY MYSTERIES CAN BE HAZARDOUS TO YOUR WAISTLINE.”

—People

“THE JULIA CHILD OF MYSTERY WRITERS.”

—Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph

“DAVIDSON HAS FOUND THE RECIPE FOR BESTSELLERS.”

—The Atlanta Constitution

“MOUTHWATERING.”

—The Denver Post

“DELICIOUS . . . SURE TO SATISFY!”

—Sue Grafton

“If devouring Diane Mott Davidson’s newest whodunit in a single sitting is any reliable indicator, then this was A DELICIOUS HIT.”

—Los Angeles Times

“You don’t have to be a cook or a mystery fan to love Diane Mott Davidson’s books. But if you’re either—or both—her tempting recipes AND ELABORATE PLOTS ADD UP TO A LITERARY FEAST!”

—The San Diego Union-Tribune

“Mixes recipes and mayhem to PERFECTION.”

—The Sunday Denver Post

“Davidson is one of the few authors who have been able to seamlessly stir in culinary scenes without losing the focus of the mystery. . . . [SHE] HAS MADE THE CULINARY MYSTERY MORE THAN JUST A PASSING PHASE.”

—Sun-Sentinel, Fort Lauderdale

“Goldy and her collection of friends and family CONTINUE TO MIX UP DANDY MYSTERIES AND ADD TEMPTING RECIPESto the readers’ cookbooks at the same time.”

—The Dallas Morning News

ALSO BY DIANE MOTT DAVIDSON

Chopping Spree

Catering to Nobody

The Cereal Murders

The Last Suppers

Killer Pancake

The Main Corpse

The Grilling Season

Prime Cut

Tough Cookie

Sticks & Scones

Available from Bantam Books

To my parents,

Admiral and Mrs. William Mott

“I wouldn’t ask too much of her,” I ventured. “You can’t repeat the past.”

“Can’t repeat the past?” he cried incredulously. “Why of course you can!”

—F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

Acknowledgments

The author wishes to acknowledge the assistance of the following people: Jim Davidson; Jeffrey Davidson; J. Z. Davidson; Joey Davidson; Sandra Dijkstra; Katherine Goodwin; Kate Miciak; Karen Johnson and John William Schenk, J. William’s Catering, Bergen Park, Colorado; Rob Esterbrook, Respond Security, Denver; the staff of the Evergreen branch of the Jefferson County Public Library; Ted Ning, M.D.; Thomas P. Campbell, M.D.; John Alston, Ph.D.; Heather Pashley; Melinda Thompson; Emerson Harvey, M.D.; Richard Drake, Ph.D., Department of History, University of Montana, Missoula, Montana; Deidre Elliott, Karen Sbrockey, and Elizabeth Green; the Reverend Connie Delzell; Lee Karr and the group that assembled at her home; Triena Harper, assistant deputy coroner, Jefferson County, and Investigator Richard Millsapps, Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department, Golden, Colorado.

Prayer book quotations are from The Book of Common Prayer, published by The Church Pension Fund.

Elk Park Preparatory School Elk Park, Colorado

June Alumni-Alumnae Brunch

CHAMPAGNE

FRUIT SALAD OF CANTALOUPE,

STRAWBERRIES, KIWI

ENGLISH CHEDDAR STRATA

RASHERS OF BACON

SALLY LUNN BREAD, SAUSAGE CAKE

MACADAMIA-NUT COFFEE CAKE, BLUEBERRY MUFFINS

PRESERVES AND HONEY

COFFEE, TEA

1.

Brunch is a killer. I hate it, and among food people I’m in good company. James Beard found the idea of a heavy meal between meals idiotic. He said, “You don’t have something called lunny-dinny, do you?”

Actually, the reason professional caterers dislike brunch is that it means getting up at an ungodly hour. As I lay in bed at 4:45 the morning of June 3, I realized that in a little over four hours I had sixty people to feed. There were mountains of fruit to slice. Muffins and breads to bake fresh. Thick-sliced bacon to bring to sizzling. Egg strata to cook slowly until layers of hot cheddar melted over warm custard. And finally, there was coffee to grind and brew. In this case, lots and lots of coffee that I would have preferred to have been drowning in.

With eyes closed, I imagined floating in a warm lake of cappuccino. The cocoon of pima cotton sheets and down comforter begged me to stay, to ignore the upcoming meal.

But no. The lake of predawn consciousness yielded a few troublesome bubbles. The Elk Park Prep brunch was a popular annual gathering to which my ex-husband, Dr. John Richard Korman, might wangle a ticket. This would not be fun for anyone.

Without thinking I touched my right thumb, the one he had broken in three places with a hammer a month before we finally divorced, four years ago. Anyone else would have said, Four years without abuse? You must feel safe now.

But I never felt safe. Especially now.

Here’s why. In the last month John Richard had started acting strange. Or rather, stranger than usual. In the evenings he had taken to driving slowly past my house off Main Street in Aspen Meadow. He called repeatedly, then hung up. One afternoon his lawyer phoned and threatened a reduction in child support for our eleven-year-old son Arch. That night, John Richard drove more slowly than ever past the house.

Given John Richard’s violent temperament, I’d decided that Arch and I should vacate the house for a while. I’d accepted a summer job. General Bo and Adele Farquhar had just moved from the suburbs of Washington, D.C., to the Aspen Meadow Country Club area. They’d built a Victorian-style mansion on land Adele had owned for years. This was where I was now, between sheets I’d only seen in ads, under a comforter I’d only dreamed about. Arch and I occupied two bedrooms on the top level of the enormous (three floors plus basement) gingerbread-trimmed residence. I didn’t know why the Farquhars, wealthy, childless, and in their early fifties, needed such a huge place. But that was not my concern. What was my concern was that they both hated to cook.

Adele had said they needed someone to take charge of the mammoth kitchen with its state-of-the-art gadgets and appliances. Lucky for me, their kitchen had passed the eagle eye of the county health inspector. So I had jumped at the chance to become a temporary live-in cook in exchange for a haven. During the summer, this was also the center for my business, Goldilocks’ Catering, Where Everything Is Just Right! Also lucky for me, the income from the job and the business was enough to send Arch to the summer session at Elk Park Prep, where I was catering this morning.

Best of all, the Farquhars’ house had more alarms than the Denver Mint.

I opened my eyes and studied the sloped ceiling of my new bedroom. The gray light of five A.M. seeped through Belgian lace curtains and licked the edges of the room. There was no movement on the floor below; Adele and the general were still asleep.