A Taste of Magic (A Sugarcomb Lake Cozy Mystery Book 1) (17 page)

“No.  If anyone can figure this out, it’s you,” Parker declared with certainty.  “You have a good eye for this stuff…good instincts.  You pay attention to detail and you think things through.  I have faith you’re going to get to the bottom of this.”

Clarissa gave him a wan smile.  “Thanks for saying that.  I wish I agreed.”  She hated that she sounded so defeated, but she didn’t have the energy to fake confidence.  She’d had high hopes for her meeting with Adam.  When it hadn’t gone as planned, she had felt the wind go right out of her sails. 

“There was one other thing at the murder scene, but I don’t know what it means,” Parker said.

There was a flicker of hope in Clarissa’s eyes.  “What was it?”

“It was a ring,” Parker replied.  “I wish I had taken a picture of it.  It looked like…”  He trailed off as he considered how best to describe it.  Then he grabbed a paper napkin from the dispenser on the table.  “Got a pen?”

Clarissa rummaged around in her purse and then handed over her favorite ballpoint.  Then she watched intently as Parker began to slowly, carefully draw.

The first thing Clarissa noticed was that Parker Tweed was a terrible artist.  He was the sort of guy who could somehow manage to butcher even a simple stick figure.  That gave her a strange sense of satisfaction.  Mr. Perfect had a fault after all – ha!

The second thing that popped into her head was that she recognized the symbol.  It took a moment, as Parker’s rendition of it was pretty horrible.  But then it clicked.  It was Sugarcomb Lake High’s mascot.

“Prince Poindexter!” Clarissa blurted out.

Parker paused and looked up at her in confusion.  “Huh?”

“Prince Poindexter the Pig!” she said, pointing at Parker’s rudimentary drawing. 

“Oh, for a second there I thought you had lost your marbles.  What’s this about a pig?”

“It’s the high school’s mascot,” she explained.

“Ah, I see.  That’s a terrible name for a mascot.”  Parker raised an eyebrow.  “Does that mean a high school student was in the cabin the night of Jed’s murder?” he wondered aloud.  “Maybe someone broke in, was caught red-handed when Jed came in and there was a struggle…”

“That’s an interesting theory, but I’m not sure we can deduce that much from the ring,” Clarissa cautioned.  “Everyone who went to Sugarcomb Lake High has one of those rings. 
I
have one of those rings.”

“So you’re the killer?” Parker asked without missing a beat.

“Yes,” she said dryly.  “And if you’re not careful, you could be next.”

Parker laughed and said something else, but Clarissa was no longer listening. 

A group of young women had sat down in the booth behind her shortly after her arrival at the coffee shop.  She had been tuning out their giggles and chit chat until then, but then something captured her attention.

“Let’s take a selfie for Chase to show him what he’s missing!” one of the girls trilled.

There was a kerfuffle of activity in the booth behind Clarissa as the young women scrambled to position themselves. She didn’t turn around to look.  She didn’t have to.  She knew exactly what was happening:  duck faces and heart fingers.  Wasn’t that what always happened when a group of giggly teenagers or twenty-somethings got together?

“So he’s like, at the airport
right now
?” a second young woman asked.

“Yep, his flight leaves sometime this afternoon, I think.”

“He seriously won’t be around for the next year?” a third girl piped up.  “But who will we party with?  Who will buy us booze?  Since when is Chase interested in Europe, anyway?  I can’t believe he didn’t even say goodbye.”

Clarissa glanced out the window of the coffee shop. 

She saw Nora out on the sidewalk, panhandling like always.  As usual the eccentric, wild-haired woman was wearing at least half a dozen different colored dresses.  Today she was banging on a drum while wailing tunelessly at the top of her lungs.  She really was a strange one.

“Chase is totally running away,” one of the girls behind Clarissa said with an air of self-importance.  “His life was like, completely ruined after he got fired.  He’ll never work in politics again or something dumb like that.”

“Politicians do worse things than flash cameras at frat parties
all the time
.  Come
on
.  There’s always a scandal of some sort in the news.  The mayor’s office totally overreacted if you ask me.  And it sounds like Chase is overreacting too.  I really doubt his career is over.”

“I still can’t believe he lost his job over a few stupid pictures.  Talk about an overreaction!”

“Remember the night we played beer pong?” the first girl asked suddenly.

All of the young women collapsed in a fit of giggles.

Clarissa abruptly jumped to her feet.

Parker, who had still been talking, fell silent.  He looked up at her in confusion.  “What?”

“I have to go,” Clarissa said quietly, nodding discreetly toward the girls in the next booth.

The charismatic heir to The Green City Chronicle stood up too, and leaned in close so only she could hear him.  “They probably don’t even realize how disruptive they’re being,” he pointed out in a low voice.  “But we can move to a quieter table if they’re getting on your nerves.”

“It’s not that,” Clarissa said, rushing to gather up her things.  “I have to go!”

Parker must have sensed the urgency in her actions, because he grabbed his coat. 

“I’m coming with you,” he announced.

She didn’t argue.  There wasn’t time.

“Where are we going?” Parker demanded as he got into the passenger seat of Clarissa’s old clunker of a car.  “What’s going on?”

“Green City Airport,” Clarissa told him as she stuck the key in the ignition and put her foot on the gas pedal.  It was a good thing she was an aggressive driver by nature because there wasn’t much time to spare.  “Hang on,” she cautioned before speeding toward the highway. 

“What’s going on?” Parker asked again.  “Slow down!”

“There’s no time to slow down,” Clarissa said through gritted teeth, her eyes on the road.  “Now let me concentrate.  And keep an eye out for cops,” she added, realizing how inconvenient it would be to get pulled over for speeding.

To his credit, Parker shut his mouth and did as he was told.  By the time they made it to Green City his face was as white as a sheet.  He looked rather traumatized by Clarissa’s crazy driving.  But like a trooper, he jumped out of the car and followed her into the airport.

It was a good thing Green City Airport was relatively small, because there wasn’t a second to spare.  Clarissa raced through the building with Parker on her heels.  When she saw Chase standing in line about to check his luggage, she gave a sigh of relief.

They weren’t too late.

She approached him quickly.  She hadn’t had an opportunity to actually think about what she would do or say.  All she knew was that she had to move fast.  Otherwise Chase would be halfway across the world and an innocent woman would be convicted of a murder she hadn’t committed.

“Chase,” Clarissa called out.

He turned when he saw her.  He looked confused for an instant but then he smiled broadly.  “Oh, hey,” he greeted her.  “Are you headed on a trip too?” he asked politely.  Then he glanced down and furrowed his brow.  “Where’s your luggage?”

“I’m not going anywhere.  But you are.”

“Well yeah…I’m going to Europe.”

“No, you’re going back to Sugarcomb Lake to face what you did,” Clarissa informed him.

Chase looked from her to Parker and back again in utter astonishment.  Then, without warning, he bolted out of the line and ran for the airport exit. 

“Don’t let him get away!” Clarissa hollered as she gave chase.

As she ran through the airport, Clarissa made a mental note to work out more.  Running shouldn’t be so difficult, should it?  Her poor legs were going to be unbearably sore and stiff in the morning!  Ugh, she hated running. 

But on the bright side, imagine the calories she was burning.  She’d be able to eat an entire box of chocolate chip cookies guilt-free!  Well, mostly guilt-free.

Chase was faster than Clarissa. 

But he wasn’t faster than Parker.

Before Clarissa could even comprehend what was happening, Parker had caught up to Chase and put him in a headlock.  It was pretty impressive, she had to admit.

“Let me go!” Chase bellowed.

“No.  You killed Jed Black,” Clarissa announced once she caught up to the two men.  “You can’t run away from that,” she added as she struggled to pretend she wasn’t out of breath. 

Parker’s eyes widened at her words.  She felt a bit bad for leaving him out of the loop, but everything had fallen into place so fast that there simply hadn’t been time to fill him in.  Thankfully, he seemed to trust her judgment…or maybe he just really liked putting random people in headlocks.

Clarissa’s words had a profound effect on Chase:  they made him more desperate.  His desperation must have given him a surge of adrenaline, because he suddenly brought his arm forward and elbowed Parker hard in the stomach.

“Ugh!” Parker grunted.  He doubled over in pain, releasing his grip on the younger man.

Chase looked around wildly like a caged animal.  He was looking for a way out. 

But Clarissa wasn’t about to let him escape. 

She looked down and realized she was still holding her coffee thermos.  She hadn’t even realized until then that she was carrying it.  In her haste to bring Chase to justice she must have absentmindedly grabbed it out of her car. 

She unscrewed the cap as she recalled what she had read in the potion book.  If she drank the vile concoction – and managed to keep it down – she would be safe from harm for precisely thirty seconds.

Instead, she threw the caustic mixture in Chase’s face.  That seemed like a far safer bet.

“Ah, it burns!” he howled, falling to his knees.  “You witch!”

Clarissa smirked at that.  He didn’t know how accurate his words really were.

Her smirk faltered, however, when airport security caught up with them.  In fact, several stone-faced people in uniform were rapidly marching over and they were all looking right at her.  Clarissa glanced down at the empty thermos she still held in her hand and gulped.

“Ma’am,” a gigantic, terrifying woman in uniform said gruffly.  “You need to come with me.”

***

“Are you ready to go?” Parker asked hours later as Clarissa emerged from the Sugarcomb Lake police station.  He was leaning against a tree waiting for her.  He somehow managed to look flawless despite getting into a brawl at the airport and being loaded into the back of a police cruiser.  Not a single hair on his head was out of place.

Clarissa was sure she wasn’t so lucky.

She nodded wearily.  It had been quite the day and she was exhausted.  But she was also filled with adrenaline.  Once she got a few (bags of) chocolate chip cookies in her, she was sure her energy would return and she would be ready to tackle anything.

“How’s your stomach?” Clarissa asked.

“A little sore, but I’ll be fine,” Parker assured her.  “Come on.”

He wordlessly walked her over to his car, which he must have retrieved from outside the coffee shop while she was being interrogated.  When he unlocked it and opened the front passenger door for her, Clarissa didn’t protest. 

Her car was still in Green City. 

She had been “escorted” to Sugarcomb Lake in the back of a police cruiser!  Well, first she had been arrested by airport security.  Next the Green City police had turned up.  Then, after a lot of explaining, two officers from Sugarcomb Lake had arrived.  And that was how Clarissa had found herself handcuffed in the back of a cop car en route to her sleepy hometown.

Oh, what a day it had been!

“How did it go?” Parker asked as he got behind the wheel.

“Everything is finally cleared up,” Clarissa said, offering a small smile.  “Thanks for that.”

“I didn’t do much,” he protested modestly.  “I just pulled a few strings.”

“Is that what you call threatening the local police?” she snickered.

“Threatening?  No, no, no.  I simply pointed out that you were in no way guilty of anything and that should they decide otherwise, The Green City Chronicle would be more than a little interested in covering the story. 
Extensively
covering the story, I may have said.”

Clarissa grinned.  “You’re awesome.  Seriously, thank you for doing that for me.  You didn’t have to stick your neck out for me like that, especially after the way I’ve treated you,” she told him sheepishly. 

“What are you talking about?” Parker deadpanned.  “You’re a joy.”

“Ha!  I’m sorry.”

“No hard feelings,” he assured her.  “What happened to the Gazette was awful.  I’m the son of the Gazette’s owner – I get why you were so hard on me, believe me.  I just hope you know my father didn’t personally make the decision to put you out of a job.  He simply –”

“He delegated to the wrong people,” Clarissa finished the sentence for him.  “I know.  I remember you saying so.”  At first she hadn’t been sure whether to believe Parker, but now she was leaning toward trusting him.

“So what happened in there?” Parker asked.

It was tempting to keep the details to herself so she could be the first to report on it, but that didn’t seem right.  Parker had, after all, gone to great lengths to help her.  So she told him the truth, sparing no detail.  She felt that was the honorable thing to do.

“Chase gave a full confession.  He went to Jed’s cabin the night of the murder to confront him.  Chase had worked for the mayor’s office, but was fired when photos of him acting drunk and disorderly at a frat party surfaced online.  He felt Jed had destroyed his career in politics.”

“Wow!  So he didn’t go there planning to kill Jed?”

“Chase claimed it was an accident,” Clarissa confirmed.  “Jed didn’t want to talk to him but Chase forced his way in.  So then Jed pulled a gun on him – the gun from Bonnie’s father, which I guess he kept at the cabin.  There was a struggle and the gun went off.”

“What about the check on the floor made out to Adam Burke?” Parker asked curiously.  “Was that just a strange coincidence or what?”

“No.  Adam was there at the cabin the night of the murder.  He was there to pick up his hush money from Jed, I guess.  From what I understand, Adam arrived right around the time the gun went off.  He witnessed what happened and took off running into the woods – he likely thought he was next.”

“I am very impressed,” Parker said.

“Impressed with what?”

“You,” he replied.  “You overheard those girls talking in the coffee shop and suddenly you figured out whodunit!  How on earth did you manage that?  I heard the same thing you did but it didn’t even make me suspicious.”

“That’s because you’re not from here,” Clarissa pointed out.  “When I heard those girls talking I remembered some local gossip from a while back.  I knew the mayor had an intern who was fired for mooning a camera or something.  But I didn’t know Chase was
that
intern.  I assumed he had been hired afterwards as, you know, a replacement.”

“But then you overheard the girls talking and suddenly everything fell into place?”

“I guess you could say that.  I also remembered that when Chase turned up at Black & Burke Investors unannounced, Adam acted strange.  He was on an important call and yet he allowed Chase to interrupt.  It was almost as though he was afraid of Chase.”

“Or he was afraid that Chase might try to frame him for the murder,” Parker suggested.

“Or go after him!” Clarissa chimed in, enjoying the speculation.

“The point is I’m really impressed.  Good job.”

“I’m kicking myself for not catching on sooner,” Clarissa grumbled.

“What?  No, don’t do that.  What you managed to accomplish was remarkable.”  Parker was staring at her in total and utter amazement.  It was the way one might admire a famous celebrity.  He was staring at her with such awe that for a moment she wondered if she had somehow sprouted a second head. 

“Well you were pretty amazing yourself,” Clarissa told him.  “The way you ran after Chase?”

“I used to run track in high school,” Parker shrugged.  “So where are we headed?  Can I take you out for a bite to eat?  You know, a dinner to celebrate solving a crime
and
earning yourself a ten thousand dollar reward?”

“Wait!  Say that last part again?”

Parker grinned.  “Didn’t you hear?  One of Bonnie Black’s rich country club acquaintances was convinced she didn’t do it.  The acquaintance posted a reward for any information leading to the arrest of the
real
killer.  So you, my dear, are ten thousand dollars richer.”

Once Parker’s words sunk in, Clarissa felt all the tension melt right out of her body.  It was the lifeline she had so desperately dreamed about but had never thought would ever actually come along.  Her money troubles were over and her childhood home was safe! 

“You should get half,” Clarissa told Parker immediately.  “You played a big part in this.”

“Nonsense,” Parker replied.  “It was all you.  But I do want to take you to dinner.  I feel like that last one didn’t exactly go as planned,” he admitted sheepishly.  “I guess that was my fault for springing the job offer on you like that, huh?”

Clarissa reddened. 

“I promise this time I won’t blindside you with unwanted job offers,” Parker vowed, holding up his hand as though he was making a solemn vow.  “So where would you like to go?”

After a moment’s hesitation, Clarissa gave him an apologetic look.  “Actually, would you mind taking me home?  It’s been quite a day, I have tons to do and tomorrow I have to get someone to drive me to Green City so I can pick up my car from the airport.  I’m just really tired and –”

“Say no more.  I understand.  Maybe we can get dinner some other time…you know, on a day when we haven’t been frisked in an airport after a confrontation with a killer.  Hey, if you want to give me your keys I can drive your car into town tomorrow,” Parker offered. 

“You don’t have to do that.”

“I know.  I want to.”

Clarissa smiled and pulled her car keys from her purse.  “I owe you one.”

Parker dropped her off at her house and then drove off into the sunset.  Clarissa went inside and was immediately greeted by Cat.  After fixing her companion some dinner and devouring half a box of chocolate chip cookies, she felt ready to claw her way back to the top of her game.

She changed into a comfy pair of sweatpants, sat down at her desk and began to write.