Murder Has a Sweet Tooth Read online

  It was Eve. I didn’t bother to point out that since Celia was in one car and Eve was calling from another, she didn’t have to whisper. “I’m outside Celia’s house,” Eve said. “She’s leaving.”

  “So’s Beth.” I whispered, too. A natural response, and I told myself to cut it out.

  “She’s heading down the street toward the first stop sign,” Eve said. “She’s turning right. She’s driving past a house with the prettiest rose garden. Oh, I bet it’s just spectacular in the summer. She’s stopping at another stop sign. She’s—”

  “That’s terrific. Really.” I couldn’t take the chance of offending my Watson so I did my best to be diplomatic. “But I don’t need to know every turn Celia makes.”

  “Oh, but you said—”

  “Each move she makes. Yeah.” I remembered our talk back at Bellywasher’s and realized my mistake. Eve could be completely obtuse at times, and totally literal at others. The trick was that I was never sure which time was which. I scrambled to redeem myself. “What I meant is that you should call me to tell me where she ends up.”

  “Well, really, Annie!” Eve tsk-tsked as only Eve can. “Detective work is an analytical thing. Like a science. You need to be a little clearer when you give instructions.”

  “I do. I will. From now on. I promise.” I was sincere, but distracted. I’d been driving three car lengths behind Beth since she left her house, and now she got on the George Washington Memorial Parkway heading east and I eased into traffic behind her. That, of course, sounds easier than it was in practice. Drivers in the D.C. metro area are notoriously competitive. If there’s an inch of free space, they want it for their own. Rather than lose my concentration and risk a little too-close-for-comfort bumper-to-bumper, I told Eve we’d talk later, clamped both hands on the wheel, and kept my eyes on the road—and on Beth’s SUV.

  When she merged onto Arlington Boulevard, I did, too. I was glad to be off the highway when my phone rang again. It was Norman.

  “We’re in Arlington,” he said, referring, of course, to himself and Glynis. “We’re headed toward Ballston.”

  The call-waiting feature on my phone beeped. I switched over to the other call. It was Eve. “We’re in Arlington,” she said. “Near Crystal City.”

  And me? I wasn’t all that far away from either of them.

  That may sound odd, but here’s the thing about Arlington: It’s not a city, like most people think. Arlington is a county. In fact, since I’m a numbers sort of person, I remember from back in my high school days when I learned that, at twenty-six square miles, it’s the smallest self-governing county in the country. There are no cities in the county, but there are neighborhoods, like Clarendon, where Très Bonne Cuisine is located, and Ballston, where Glynis was headed, and Crystal City, which was apparently Celia’s destination.

  As for Beth, she was driving in the direction of Rosslyn, the area just north of Arlington National Cemetery. With the way traffic was moving faster than the posted speed limit and drivers doing their best to outpace each other, I really had to concentrate to keep an eye on her SUV. Up ahead, she slowed down and I did, too. The car behind her turned left. So did the car behind that one. Like it or not, at the next red light, I found myself right behind her.

  I wasn’t about to take any chances, not after getting this far. I slunk down in my seat and propped one elbow on the steering wheel so I could use my hand to partially cover my face. “I’m in Arlington, too,” I told Eve, keeping my voice down in spite of the fact that I knew I didn’t have to. “This is just weird.”

  “Do you suppose they’re all going to meet somewhere?” she asked.

  And honestly, I couldn’t say. The light turned green and we started up again, and when a pushy driver wedged his pricey sports car between Beth’s SUV and my sensible sedan, I was grateful. I eased back a bit, but I never took my eyes off Beth’s car.

  A couple quick turns and I saw her brake lights flash on. She turned into the parking lot of a place called Preston’s Colonial House. I still had my cell phone to my ear, and I was about to report this turn of events to Eve when she said, “Fergie’s.”

  “Huh?” I couldn’t follow Beth into the parking lot without her seeing me, so I hung back, pretending I was waiting for a parking place to open up on the street. “What do you mean, Fergie’s? Beth just went into—”

  “Celia just walked into a place called Fergie’s,” Eve reported. “It looks nice. Upscale. Well-dressed people coming and going. It’s a bar.”

  “So’s the Colonial House.” I didn’t have time to consider what this meant. My phone beeped and Norman got on the line with his report.

  “The Purple Tiger,” he said. “It’s a bar. Looks like a younger crowd. Hip and trendy. You know the type.”

  I didn’t want to burst his bubble and tell him I wouldn’t know hip and trendy if it walked up and introduced itself. Instead, I got lucky and a parking place on the street opened up. I slid the Saturn into it, then grabbed my clipboard and took notes.

  Under the column that said Celia in bold, black letters, I wrote Fergie’s in Crystal City along with the time. I did the same for Beth and Glynis, listing the names of the bars they’d gone to, the time they entered, and—

  “Now we wait,” I told Norman, though since I heard his car door slam, I didn’t think he was listening.

  “No worries,” he said, sounding as carefree as he did on his TV show when he was combining what sounded like impossible-to-go-together ingredients into what always turned out to be an incredible meal. “She doesn’t know me. It’s perfect, Annie. I can keep an eye on Glynis. You know, up close and personal.”

  “Not too up close and personal,” I warned him, at the same time I clicked back over to Eve. “Not too—,” I’d just said when I heard her car door slam, too.

  That left me, and I couldn’t go inside, because Beth would recognize me in an instant. I groaned and reminded myself that even one Holmes couldn’t follow three suspicious characters. I was lucky to have my Watsons, and I’d be luckier still if they didn’t get spotted and blow the operation.

  As for me, I snapped my cell phone shut, pulled the clipboard onto my lap, and waited to see when Beth would come out of Preston’s.

  I did something else, too.

  I wondered why each of these women had gone into a different bar, what were they doing there, and what it all had to do with Vickie’s murder.

  Ten

  BY THE FOLLOWING FRIDAY, I STILL DIDN’T HAVE THE answers to my questions, but I knew where I had to look to find them. I would, too. As soon as I got over the shock and awe of getting my first up-close-and-personal gander at Celia’s house.

  Beth’s home was a modern wonder of sleek lines and serene colors. Celia’s was anything but. No stylish angles or two-story panes of glass here. With its hand-hewn stone walls, its slate roof, and the little half-circle windows that peeked from gables, Celia and Scott’s house looked as if it had been plucked from the English countryside. In fact, the only thing it had in common with Beth and Michael’s palatial home was the too cute Welcome Friends sign near the front door. Yeah, the one with the smiling, waving bear and moose on it.

  Bear and moose aside, I tried not to look too impressed when I stepped through a charming swinging gate that led up an equally charming stone walk lined with an array of early blooming (and not incidently, very charming) wildflowers.

  I actually might have been caught in the fairy-tale wonder of it all if the door didn’t open even before I rang the bell.

  And if Edward Monroe wasn’t standing there.

  Before I could make a move, he stepped outside and closed the door behind him. “I heard you’d be here,” he said. He looked beyond me to Norman’s Jag parked on the other side of the street. “I’m surprised you didn’t walk. It’s such a beautiful evening.”

  “I was running late. And with so much to carry . . .” I had a tote bag with me, and I hoisted it in both hands just to demonstrate. “I hope Celia isn’
t waiting for me before she puts the food out. I wouldn’t want to hold up the festivities.”

  Edward’s expression never changed. “Oh, the girls are a little busy,” he said. “Beth’s in a real tizzy. You know how she can get.”

  I didn’t, since I didn’t know Beth well enough to know if she was tizzy-prone. I nodded like I did, anyway. “She’s upset? About . . . ?”

  Edward didn’t answer. In fact, all he did was stare. So hard and so long, it made me uncomfortable. I shifted my tote bag from my right hand to my left, then back to my right. “If there’s anything I can do to help . . .” I finally said, making a move toward the door.

  Edward blocked my path. “I suppose the only thing anybody can do to help is to find that money for her.”

  I was pretty sure my blank expression was all the response Edward would need. But he apparently was not so convinced. He cocked his head and raised his voice just enough to make it clear that perhaps I hadn’t heard him right the first time, and if only I’d listen a little closer, maybe I’d get things straight. “The Girl Scout cookie money,” he said, slowly, each word pronounced distinctly. “There’s five hundred dollars of Girl Scout cookie money missing and Beth’s worried sick about it. She doesn’t want Michael to find out, so don’t say a thing once you’re inside. She probably wouldn’t have mentioned it to me except . . . well . . .” He twitched his shoulders as if the thought made him uncomfortable. “She apparently thought I could help her out, though how I can, I’m not sure. But then, maybe she’s not thinking straight. She’s terribly upset.”

  “I can certainly understand that.” My own stomach did flip-flops at the very thought, and it wasn’t even my cookie money. “Maybe she’s just misplaced it. That kind of thing happens a lot. We put something down in one place, and we’re convinced we put it someplace else. We make ourselves sick with worry when all we have to do is stop and think things through.”

  “Maybe.” Edward wasn’t convinced. I could tell because he crossed his arms over his chest.

  I managed a smile. “Maybe she needs to re-create the incident. You know, go over the details in her head. When was the last time she saw the money?”

  “She says it was at her house. Last Friday. You know, the day you came over for the wine tasting.”

  Yes, of course I knew that. I didn’t point it out. “And where was the last place she saw it?”

  Edward’s eagle-eyed gaze never wavered. “She thinks it was in the kitchen. There’s a desk in there where she and Michael take care of bills and such. She’s sure that’s where she left the envelope with the money in it. You may have seen it, Annie. You were in the kitchen. Alone.”

  OK, call me slow. Call me dense, to boot. It took a while for what he was saying to sink it, and even after it had, I was pretty sure I was imagining things.

  I swallowed hard. “You’re not saying—”

  His eyes opened wide in feigned surprise, Edward took a step back. “I’d never accuse anyone of something like that. Not until I had some proof, anyway.”

  That was a relief. I reminded myself that suspicious looks and veiled accusations weren’t enough proof for anyone and reached around Edward to press the front bell. Pretending I’d just arrived was the perfect excuse for me to get away from him. “Maybe I can help Beth figure out what happened,” I said, a smile on my face. “I’m pretty good when it comes to getting down to the bottom of mysteries.”

  I don’t know how he might have responded, because Celia showed up at the oak door, which was twice as tall as me, and led me into a foyer complete with a suit of armor, ancestral pictures on the walls (they didn’t look like the forebears of either Celia or Scott), and a flagstone floor that I had no doubt was a pain to keep clean.

  In a lightweight tweedy sweater and neatly tailored pants, Celia fit right in. She looked like the lady of the manor.

  In my black pants and one of the spring tops I’d bought back when I worked at the bank, I looked like exactly what I was: a poser.

  Fortunately, no one seemed to hold it against me. Glynis and Beth came out of the kitchen to greet me, as friendly as ever in spite of the cookie money drama, and eager to make me feel right at home. I might have relaxed if I didn’t look back into the foyer just in time to see Edward walk back in.

  I stopped for a moment and studied him as closely as he was looking at me.

  I thought Edward Monroe was a murderer, and that gave me every right to be suspicious, right? But suspicious or not, I wasn’t prepared for what had just happened.

  Because I’d just found out that Edward was suspicious, too. There was money missing from Beth’s. And without coming right out and saying it, Edward had delivered a clear message:

  He thought I was the one who’d taken it.

  FORTUNATELY, MY NEWEST BEST FRIENDS APPARENTLY either hadn’t heard Edward’s take on the missing money or didn’t buy into it. I followed them into the kitchen and, back in my element (No, not that element! Not the kitchen, investigating!), I knew I had the upper hand. Ever since the previous Tuesday, when Norman, Eve, and I did our James Bond thing and found out that there was more to these ladies than I’d imagined, I’d been planning for this meeting. I was as pleased as punch to see that the evening was materializing into exactly the showdown I was hoping for. I stood back, watched, and waited as Celia pulled a heart-shaped red porcelain casserole dish out of the oven.

  “Reuben dip.” She beamed. “Scott loves Reubens and this is easier than making sandwiches. And you know, they say the recipe from Sonny’s cooking school is the best ever.” She set the cast-iron casserole on the granite island in the center of the kitchen, where Glynis was arranging her appetizer on a glorious Waterford crystal serving tray.

  “Pita wedges,” Glynis said. “They’re topped with pepperoni and slices of provolone, and only Sonny knows the secret of how to keep them crispy, even though there’s olive oil and butter, too, in the recipe.” She giggled. “Sonny only shares his secrets with his students.”

  All the while, Beth fiddled with a ceramic platter shaped like an octagon and decorated in a berry pattern. I’d seen the same platter on sale at Très Bonne Cuisine for more than two hundred bucks. I’d seen porcelain cookware like Celia’s, too, and I knew it cost a pretty penny, even on special. I’d never seen the Waterford on sale anywhere. But then, Target doesn’t have a Waterford department.

  “Blue cheese herb dip,” Beth said, smiling down at the concoction as if it were a favorite child. “It’s one of Sonny’s specialties.”

  Celia stepped back and looked over the arrangement of serving dishes, gleaming silver, and sprucely pressed linen napkins. “Perfect,” she said with a satisfied sigh. “And what did you bring, Annie? We’ll make room for whatever it is.”

  I thought she’d never ask.

  I reached inside the tote bag I was carrying and, one by one, drew out my contributions to the night’s festivities. I’d brought three items, each in the little plastic grocery store container I’d bought it in.

  I popped open the first container. “Reuben dip,” I said, setting it down next to Celia’s creation. “We might want to heat it in the microwave eventually. But we should probably wait until yours is all gone. No use having two of them going at the same time.”

  Apparently oblivious to the stifled gasps behind me, I stripped the plastic band from around the cover of the second container and plunked it on the island next to Glynis’s gleaming crystal dish. “Pita wedges,” I said. “I tried a sample over at Whole Foods and they may not be as crispy as Sonny’s, but they’re really good.” I was sure to keep my smile firmly in place when I delivered the pièce de résistance along with my last appetizer. “Blue cheese herb dip,” I said, taking the plastic lid off the container. “It might not be as good as Sonny’s but . . .” I looked from one woman to the other. “Anyone care for a sample?”

  Just as I expected, my offer—and my offerings—were met with open-mouthed wonder.

  “How did you . . .” Celia stuttered
.

  “How could you . . .” Glynis stammered.

  Beth didn’t do anything but drop her jaw and snap it shut again. Like a fish that had been hooked and dragged out of the water.

  And me? Satisfied that I’d gotten the reaction I expected, I crossed my arms over my chest. “Anyone want to explain? Or would you like me to start throwing out theories and we’ll see which one sticks?” I gave each of them a measured look.

  Beth turned as pale as a ghost.

  Color shot into Glynis’s cheeks.

  With one hand, Celia clutched the corner of the island so hard, her knuckles turned white.

  She shot a look over her shoulder toward the great room, where we could hear the men chatting. “We can’t talk,” she said. “Not here.”

  “Then where?”

  “We could talk . . .” Beth looked toward the great room, too. Inside her jumper decorated with cute embroidered teddy bears, her chest heaved. “Another time, maybe.”

  Glynis jumped right in. “Another place. You could bring the girls to the playground tomorrow and—”

  I stopped them with a no-nonsense shake of my head. “Here,” I said. “Now.”

  Celia swallowed hard. She nodded. “Now. But not here.” She grabbed my arm and dragged me toward the sliding doors that led outside and all four of us stumbled out onto a flagstone patio where a fuzzy layer of moss grew between each paver, as pretty as a picture. We made our way around a thick border of hyacinths and tulips and past a trickling fountain and an outdoor fire-place, and we finally pushed through another gate, the twin of the one out front. Ahead of us was another acre or so of flagstones and at the center of it, a swimming pool as big as the one at my old high school. We stopped there, but not for long. One glance and I knew why. The great room also overlooked the swimming pool and the patio.

  As one, each of the women waved to her husband.