A Zest for Murder (Sky High Pies Cozy Mysteries Book 5) (6 page)

CHAPTER
15

Darby Franklin knocked on the
backdoor around one that afternoon, an apologetic grin on her face. Julia
glanced silently over her shoulder before mumbling something about people who
can’t follow the rules. I put down Nana Reed’s recipe box, hurried across the
room and invited Darby inside.

“Hi, Katie!”

“Hey, how are you?”

“So-so,” she said. “I know we’re supposed
to pickup special orders at the counter in the front, but I saw Meredith
Lancaster’s car in the parking lot.”

I waited for the inevitable
follow-up, but Darby didn’t seem like she was ready to fill me in.

“Are you guys still feuding?” Julia
called from the other side of the kitchen. She was ladling batter into the
waffle iron and scanning the two tickets that Harper had just added to the
incoming orders.

Darby cleared her throat. “
I’m
not feuding with Meredith,” she said indignantly. “But
she’s
feuding
with me.”

“Can a feud be one-sided?” I asked.

Julia laughed. “Have you met my
sister? She’s always feuding with people—including me and the rest of our
family—about things that are so meaningless.”

I smiled at the remark. It seemed
like Julia had a new story about her younger sister’s erratic mood swings every
other week. The latest tale involved a trip to Target, the last half-price
bottle of Pantene conditioner and a curvaceous woman named Krystal
Flegenheimer. Apparently, Julia’s sister and Krystal reached for the hair
product at the same time, engaged in a noisy tug-of-war and drew quite a crowd
before the store’s security guards stopped the fight.

“I’m just not in the mood to see
Meredith,” Darby said. “The baby was extra cranky last night. I barely slept
for an hour.”

“Well, you look like a million
bucks,” I said brightly. “Other than last night, how’s the little one doing?”

Darby’s effervescent smile answered
the question.

“And how’s Ted?” asked Julia. “Is
he helping with diapers and whatnot?”

“Oh, heck yeah!” Darby giggled.
“He’s an expert this time around. I trained him well with the first two.”

“Well, you’ve still got your hands
pretty full,” I said. “A three-year-old, a newborn and the birthday girl.”

“And a new puppy,” Darby said with
a heavy sigh. “I told Ted it was too soon, but he came home last week with a
furry bundle from the shelter.”

“How sweet!” Julia gushed. “Mutt or
purebred?”

Darby’s mouth formed a mischievous
grin. “Ted? Oh, he’s a mutt alright.”

“I think she meant the puppy,” I volunteered.

“Oh, I know, but…” Darby’s phone
rang in her pocket. “That’ll be my mother-in-law. She’s watching the kids while
I run errands.”

The phone continued to hum loudly,
but Darby didn’t make any attempt to answer.

“We can wait,” I said.

The playful grin expanded. “So can
she. I love the woman to death, but she calls about every sixty seconds. ‘The
baby just did the
cutest
thing!’ ‘Guess what the baby did now!’ ‘I’m the
happiest grandmother in the world!’” She snickered and the phone finally
stopped ringing. “You’d think she was also the
only
grandmother, too.
But I shouldn’t complain; she’s staying with us for a couple of weeks while Ted
and I adjust to the new reality.”

“Maybe she can come stay with me
next,” I muttered. “My new reality keeps changing minute to minute.”

Darby smirked. “Your nose just grew
an inch, Katie.”

I put one hand on my face. “Oh, my
goodness. I think you’re right!”

Harper suddenly appeared in the
pass window. She called Darby’s name and waved at her with the order pad.
“Meredith wanted me to tell you that all is forgiven,” she said.

Darby winced. “Oh, no! Did she see
me or something?”

“She did indeed,” Harper said,
taking two plates from the window. “And I heard all about the feud. Isn’t it
silly when grown adults bicker about something as small as a parking spot at
Food Town?”

I swiveled my gaze from Harper to
Darby. “Is
that
what Meredith’s upset about?”

“Well, yes.” Darby looked at the
floor. “I’m embarrassed to admit it, but I saw her turn signal blinking. And I
knew she wanted the spot. But she was blabbing to her passenger and not making
any attempt to turn in and park. So I figured…” She shrugged and her phone
started buzzing again. “See! I told you; every sixty seconds, another call from
my mother-in-law.”

She reached into the purse and came
out with her wallet. “I should pay for the cupcakes and get out of your hair.”

I walked over to the wire rack
where special orders were stored. I lifted the boxes marked
DARBY FRANKLIN
from the middle shelf, carried them to where she waited and placed them
carefully on the counter.

“Ted’s going to be so surprised!”
she said, handing me three twenty dollar bills.

“Let me go out front and get your
change,” I said.

She shook her head. “That’s fine.
Maybe you could put it in the jar by the register for the St. Mary’s food
pantry.”

“How thoughtful!” I slipped the
money into my back pocket. “Thank you, Darby. Can I help you carry those to the
car?”

“I can manage, Katie.”

I picked up the boxes anyway and
moved toward the door. “I can use a little fresh air,” I said. “And I can also
run interference if Meredith ambushes you outside.”

She giggled as we stepped through
the door. “Well, it sounds like that’s all finished now. I’ll give her a call
as soon as I get home. Maybe invite her over for coffee next week.”

“That’d be a nice gesture. You
could put the feud to rest once and for all.”

She narrowed her gaze. “It wasn’t a
feud, Katie. It was a…well, it was a misunderstanding.”

As we walked down the row of cars,
I asked Darby if she’d heard the news about Tipper Hedge.

“No, I’ve had my hands full at
home. What happened?”

I gave her a quick recap, leaving
out some of the details about the woman I’d found on the kitchen floor. When I
finished, her eyes were locked on mine and her face had gone pale.

“That’s the most awful thing I’ve
ever heard,” she said. “And I just saw Tipper last Friday. She came by to see
the baby and have lunch.”

“I saw her night before last,” I
said. “In fact, she and her new boyfriend were supposed to come over to
Blanche’s for dinner. But they didn’t make it.”

“Well, I don’t know what to say.
I’m just…you know? I mean, we see things like that on TV all the time, but they
happen to other people.”

I nodded, feeling the knot of dread
in my stomach again. “I know. Other people in other places. But sometimes…” A
tear slipped down Darby’s cheek. “Oh, sweetheart! Come here.”

I shifted the boxes and wrapped her
in a sideways embrace as she began to cry. We stood in the chilly air for a few
seconds before she pushed out of the hug.

“Sorry about that,” she said. “It’s
hormones. And the lack of sleep.”

“Understandable. I should let you
go so you can get out of this cold and back home with that new little one.”

Her car was a few spaces away, so
we walked to the trunk. I waited while Darby opened it, and then put the
cupcakes inside.

“Thanks again, Katie!”

“You’re so welcome,” I said. “Enjoy
the goodies. And say hello to everyone at your house, okay?”

She opened her car door and then
stopped. “Didn’t something bad happen there a few years before Tipper bought
the house?”

The question was out of left field,
so I smiled and asked Darby to refresh my memory.

“It was, like, eight or nine years
ago,” she said. “You were in Chicago. Your mom and dad were running Sky High.
And the house was owned by…oh, shoot! What was their last name?”

“Oh, that’s right! The Flanagans
lived there for the longest time.”

Darby nodded. “Yes! The father
worked for First Regional Bank until he quit to open some kind of tourism
business. And the mother…I think her name was Hannah. Does that sound right?”

Hearing the name triggered a deep
memory from the past. My mother and Hannah Flanagan were good friends when I
was younger; playing bridge once a month, talking on the phone most evenings to
trade local gossip and taking art classes at the community center on Saturday
afternoons.

“Yes, it was Hannah Flanagan,” I
said. “And her husband was Dell.”

“That’s it! And they had two boys…”
Darby nodded as she tried to remember their names. “Daniel, maybe? And the
other one was…”

“Dermot,” I said. “They were a few
years older than us.”

“Like, five or six,” Darby said.
“They would’ve been in high school when I moved here.”

“And you said something happened?”
I asked. “Something bad?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Yes, I never
heard the whole story. But it involved the younger brother.”

“Dermot?” I said. “Wasn’t he the
youngest?”

“Yep. But…I can’t remember…” She
nibbled on one thumbnail while trying to recall details about the incident at
the Flanagan’s house. “Was it an argument?” she continued after a few moments.
“Like, maybe a fight between Dermot and his dad that involved a gun? It’s all
so long ago...”

“You know what, Darby? You need to
get home to your new baby. And I’ve got four special orders to finish by the
end of the day. I’m going to call my mom later and get the scoop from her. I
know she’ll remember. Now that we’re talking about it, I’m really curious to
find out what it was.”

“Especially considering what just
happened there,” Darby said, getting into her car. “Will you call me if there’s
news about Tipper?”

“You can count on it,” I said. “And
give that baby a big kiss for me!”

CHAPTER
16

When my mother answered the phone
later that afternoon, she was humming an old song by the Beach Boys.

“Hey, mom!”

“Hi, sweetie,” she said cheerfully.
“Can you name that tune?”

“Yep.”

“Can you solve the riddle with just
one guess?”

“Um…Brian Wilson is coming for
dinner later?”

She moaned. “Wow, Katie! Your
deductive skills are fading fast.”

“What can I say? I spend all day in
a kitchen, making pies and cakes. Then I spend half of most nights on the
bookkeeping.”

“Why don’t you just hire someone to
do that for you, sweetheart? Maybe a retired accountant who wouldn’t mind
working a part-time job? I’d be happy to make some calls and see if—”

“I’m fine, mother! I’ve got this.”

The silence that followed was heavy
and flat, something that I knew all too well from our occasional disagreements.

“You still there?” I asked finally.

My mother sighed on the other end.

“Mom?”

She answered with another agitated
grumble.

“Okay, so I can sit here and carry
on both sides of the conversation if you’d like,” I offered. “But I would much
rather—”

“If you don’t want my help, just
say so.”

I smiled. “Some things never
change, mother.”

“Like your bad attitude?”

My smile became a hearty laugh. “If
I have a bad attitude,” I said, “which I don’t believe that I do, where do you
think it comes from?”

“How should I know?”

“My DNA, mom. I learned everything
I know from you.”

She scoffed. “And your father.”

“Right,” I said. “And him, too. But
I don’t have a bad attitude. I really appreciate the suggestion about hiring a
part-time bookkeeper, but I want to…” I caught myself and took a deep breath
before continuing. “No, I
need
to do things my own way. It’s one of the
first lessons I learned from you when I was a little girl.”

“How to be difficult?” she groused.
“I hardly think so.”

I took another breath and counted
to ten. “Should we maybe talk another time? It sounds like you’re having a
grumpy day.”

She muttered something about my
father.

“What was that?”

“Your father and I are having an
argument,” she said. “He thinks our trip to California should be postponed
because there’s a bocce ball tournament in Rosemary Beach.”

“I didn’t know dad played bocce ball.”

“He doesn’t. And that’s actually
the entire point of the thing. He suddenly announced one morning at breakfast
that he’s
thinking about
learning the game. And I told him that reminded
me of the time a few years ago when he was
thinking about
taking up
skeet shooting.”

“Didn’t he take out the neighbor’s
kitchen window the day he bought his equipment?”

She chuckled at the memory. “My
point entirely. Not to mention that we’ve already booked the plane tickets.”

“I didn’t know you guys were going
to California.”

“I planned to tell you kids,” my
mother said. “But then your father started going on about bocce ball and
Rosemary Beach and how I’m denying him the opportunity to learn something new
at his age.”

“He’s not that old.”

“You’re preaching to the choir
there, Katie. I tell him the same thing every morning when he’s drinking his
laxative and taking his baby aspirin and—”

“Mom?”

“Yes, dear?”

“Can I ask you a question about
something?”

“Does it involve bocce ball?”

I laughed. “No, I wanted to ask you
about the Flanagans. They’re the family that used to live in that house on
Hanover that my friend Tipper bought about three years ago.”

“Dell and Hannah?”

“Yes,” I said. “And they had two
boys, right?”

“Well, I’d say one boy and one
hellion. That Dermot was always getting into trouble—at school, at church,
during summer camp. I remember one time when you were maybe eight or nine; it
was the year that your sister broke her leg ice skating. Anyway, Dermot took a
can of lighter fluid and a box of matches out to the shed in their backyard. He
threatened to burn it down if his parents didn’t buy him a new skateboard like
his best friend had.”

“What happened?”

My mother snickered. “What do you
think happened? He was grounded for a week.”

“So…no skateboard?”

She laughed again. “Not until he
stole one from Anderson’s.”

“He really was a hellion,” I said.

“Still is, according to Hannah’s
last email. He’s been living in Albuquerque, shacked up with some girl and
barely holding down a job for more than a couple of weeks. His brother had to
fly in from Boston to bail Dermot out of jail about three months ago.”

“For what?”

“Assault and disturbing the peace,”
my mother said. “He ate forty-two dollars worth of food at a diner and then
left without paying the bill. When the manager followed him into the parking
lot, Dermot took a swing and knocked out the poor guy’s front teeth.”

“That’s horrible,” I said.

“I agree. And who knew that one
person could eat forty-two dollars worth of anything at a diner?”

“You’d be surprised, mother. A
truck driver came into Sky High a couple of days ago and ate four omelets, two
muffins and a slice of Nana Reed’s Perfectly Peachy Blueberry Pie.”

“Oh, was it Tuck Bradshaw?”

“Yep. You remember him?”

She cooed warmly again. “He was one
of my favorite customers, Katie. Sweet and funny; always telling nice stories
about his wife.”

“Ex-wife now,” I said. “And the
stories aren’t so nice anymore.”

My mother sighed. “All things must
pass. I’m sorry to hear that Tuck’s a single guy again.”

I laughed. “He’s not single, mom.
They’re still together. It’s just that Jeannie decided she—”

“Hang on, Katie! Your father’s
hollering from the other room.”

While I waited for my mother to
return, I checked my list. I still needed to go to the bank, buy noisemakers
for a retirement party we were catering and check in with Trent to get the
latest on Tipper.

“Sorry about that, honey,” my
mother said as she came back on the line. “I’ve got to hang up now. Your father
decided we’re going to the Olive Garden to negotiate the final decision on our
trip to California.”

“Well, good luck with that,” I
said. “Tell him I say hi, okay?”

“Of course, Katie. And I’ll also
tell him that you think we should leave our plans alone. The bocce ball thing
is an annual event; he can go next year.”

I didn’t want to engage my mother
in a discussion about using deception to get her way. We’d been down that road
enough times in the past for me to know it was a lose-lose situation.

“Okay, then,” I said. “Have a
good—oh, shoot! Mom? I wanted to ask you if Dell and Hannah were still in the
area.”

“What?”

I repeated the question. “Well, of
course,” she said. “They sold the house on Hanover and bought a cute little
townhouse on University Place. It’s right over there by the tennis courts that
the mayor wanted to turn into a parking lot.”

“Okay, thanks!” I said. “I could’ve
found out by asking Blanche Speltzer, but I thought it would be more fun to
call you.”

“That’s sweet,” my mother said.
“Why’d you want to know if the Flanagans were still in Crescent Creek?”

“It’s a long story. Probably best
to tell you another time. I don’t want to keep you and dad from the unlimited
breadsticks.”

She giggled. “Good point,
sweetheart. I’m so glad we had a chance to talk, even if it was only for a
moment.”

“Me, too. I love you, mom.”

“I love you more,” she said. “Now,
forever and always!”