Black Bottom Murder: A Frosted Love Cozy Mystery Book 6 (Frosted Love Mysteries) (6 page)

“I’m
going to tell Echo that you were rude to me,” she threatened on her way out.

“You
do that, darlin.’ You do that.” Missy nodded, fed up. By the time she turned
back around, Chris had cleaned the glass counters and taken the register drawer
to Ben, who would count the proceeds in the business office, per the new
protocol. It added to Ben’s responsibilities, but it was the only way that
Missy could think of to prevent robberies for now.

When
she walked into the employee break room for a bottle of water, she saw Chris
putting on his jacket, getting ready to leave.

“I’m
really sorry about that, Ms. G., I finished all of my tasks for today. Am I
fired?” he asked, shoving his hands in his pockets and keeping his head down.

“No,
Chris, you’re not fired, but you might want to take a good hard look at the
company you keep,” she advised.

“Yes
ma’am,” he replied, heading for the door. “Have a good evening.”

“You
too, Chris.”

Missy
hadn’t been back to visit with Echo since she had given her little sister a
piece of her mind, and didn’t know how she’d be received, but crossed the
street anyway, determined to talk things out. She was relieved when she walked
in and saw that Echo was behind the counter and that there was no one else in
the store.

“Hey
stranger!” her friend called out with a smile.

“Hey
yourself,” Missy answered, glad to discover that Echo was indeed still speaking
to her.

“I’ve
missed you – what have you been up to?” Echo asked, fixing a Vanilla Bean
sundae without bothering to ask. She fixed one for herself as well, and joined
Missy at one of the tables in the seating area.

“Well,
let’s see…aside from working myself into an early grave, I’ve made up with Mr.
Wonderful, bought a new red dress, and dealt with being robbed as of
yesterday,” she summed up.

“Oh
my gosh! You were robbed? Holy cow, what happened?” her friend exclaimed, the
words muffled by a delicious bite of ice cream.

Missy
related what had happened, leaving her encounter with Safflower out of the
story.

“Wow,
crazy,” Echo said, shaking her head and licking her spoon. “Who do you think
could have done it?”

“I
have my suspicions,” Missy said gravely. “But I don’t want to say anything
until I can find something more concrete than a gut feeling to go on.”

“That’s
understandable,” Echo nodded. “Can’t be too careful these days.”

Missy
decided to bite the bullet and bring up her encounter with Safflower, glad she
could share her side of the story before the contrary little creature massaged
the truth to suit her needs. Hearing of her sister’s antics, Echo shook her
head sadly.

“She’s
always been difficult, I’ve never understood it. My parents raised us to be
free-thinkers and express ourselves, and she and I have always done that in
very different ways. I learned early on that when you treat people with
kindness and respect, you get kindness and respect in return. Safflower used
her freedom to learn how to manipulate people into bending to her will and
meeting her every need and whim. She’s never held a job for longer than a few
months, and probably never will because Mom and Dad supply her with everything
she needs. I feel sorry for her, really. She may never know the fulfillment
that comes through working hard and accomplishing something worthwhile,” Echo
lamented.

“That’s
sad,” Missy nodded, understanding. “But it certainly explains a lot.”

The
conversation moved to other, lighter topics, and the two friends never even
noticed the shadow that slipped silently away from behind the doorway to the
kitchen.

Missy
was at her LaChance shop, helping Grayson box up a massive order for a church
social, when her phone rang. Pulling it out of her pocket, she saw Echo’s
number and answered the call. Her friend was in a state of panic, and Missy
couldn’t seem to calm her down enough to get a coherent picture of what was
upsetting her, other than that something had apparently happened at Sweet Love.

“Do
you need me to come over?” she asked, interrupting an endless bout of teary
explanation.

“Yes,
please,” Echo replied.

Missy
made sure that Grayson could handle the rest of packing and delivery for the
church, and headed for Dellville, parking at Crème de la Cupcake and walking
quickly across the street to Sweet Love. She was horrified at the sight that
met her eyes when she opened the front door. The entire room was filled with
colorful puddles of melted frozen treats. Echo was sitting at one of the
tables, sobbing, and her clothes covered in goo. From what Missy could deduce,
given the footprints and streaks on the floor, coupled with the mess on her
friend’s clothing, Echo had walked into the mess, skidded in the sloppy goop,
and fallen. The table as which she sat, crying, was the only one that hadn’t
been upended into the mess. Chairs were scattered about, and round cardboard
containers that had once held the now liquefied treats rolled on their sides in
various places around the seating area.

“Oh
my,” Missy shook her head, gazing at her friend with sorrow. “This is awful.”

“Why?”
Echo moaned, miserable. “Why would someone do this? So many hours of work, so
much revenue, melted into nothing…” she laid her head down on her arms,
defeated.

Missy
hadn’t even noticed Safflower standing in the doorway that led to the kitchen,
surveying the mess, until she spoke. “Wow, sucks to be you, sis. It’s going to
take hours to get this cleaned up. Have fun with that,” she tossed over her
shoulder as she flounced from the room.

Missy
gasped aloud at the selfish girl’s callous disregard for her sister. “Echo, I
don’t know how you put up with that girl. She needs to learn how to mind her
manners.”

Her
friend didn’t even raise her head from the table. “I don’t need your judgment
right now, Missy. I have enough to deal with, thanks,” she muttered.

“Honey,
I’m not being judgmental, that girl treats you horribly…and you let her get
away with it.” Missy was outraged on her friend’s behalf and said more than she
should when her emotions got the best of her. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she
was behind all of this,” she remarked, sorry immediately when the words left
her mouth.

Echo
sat bolt upright, a look of fierce protectiveness on her face like none Missy
had ever seen before. “Now you listen to me, Missy Gladstone. I know you’re
trying to be my friend, but no one comes between me and my family, do you
understand? My sister may not be an angel, but she’s my sister, and she would
never do something like this to me. You know what – I’m sorry that I called you
this morning. I thought you’d encourage me and lend a helping hand like you’ve
always done, but instead you came in spewing negativity. I don’t need this
right now, Missy, I really don’t. You can just take your opinions and
suspicions and go right back across the street,” she glared, breathing heavily.

“Echo…I…”
Missy began.

“Just
go,” Echo said wearily, waving her off and putting her head back down.

Missy
hesitated for a moment, then turned toward the door.

Chas
Beckett frowned, not wanting to contradict his girlfriend, but unwilling to let
her follow a path that would only bring her unhappiness. “Missy, sweetie, let’s
think about this for a moment. Safflower is Echo’s sister. Why would she come
all the way out to Louisiana to ruin her sister’s life and friendship? It just
doesn’t make sense,” he finished gently.

Missy
sighed. “Chas, the police have come up with nothing. I’ve had my tires
deflated, my shop destroyed, a day’s proceeds stolen, and Echo has now had her
shop destroyed. Doesn’t that seem a little coincidental to you? Who else would
do such horrible things to a couple of honest business people?”

“I
understand your frustration, but it seems a little too convenient to local law
enforcement that these things are happening to two honest business people who
are suspected of murder.”

“Do
you mean to tell me that, after all of this, Echo and I are still suspects?”
she was aghast.

“Well,
persons of interest, technically, but yes. Since they can’t seem to find any
evidence to support their suspicion of Roger Bowden, by default, they’re
looking more closely at you and Echo. The damages and theft are being
considered a potential smoke-screen attempt to throw them off,” the handsome
detective explained. “I’m doing everything that I can to chase down information
on this, Missy. I not only want to clear your name and Echo’s, I want to find
out who murdered two innocent people.”

“What
if….” she hesitated to finish her sentence, knowing how terribly it was going
to sound.

“What
if what?” Chas prompted.

“I
hate to even say this, but…what if Safflower is the murderer?”

“You
can’t be serious,” he raised an eyebrow in astonishment.

“Well,
I mean…she’s a really selfish and negative person…” she trailed off lamely.

“Missy,
honey, take my advice. Stop pursuing that line of thought. It’s going to lead
nowhere, and will most certainly cost you a valuable friendship, if it hasn’t
already,” he advised.

“Maybe
you’re right,” she murmured, fervently believing that he wasn’t.

Chas
Beckett had been in the business a long time, and he knew that Missy was less
than convinced, but didn’t want to see her ruin a friendship by barking up the
wrong tree. “Look,” he said, taking her hands in his. “If you feel that
strongly about this, let me do some checking around. I can run her name through
the database, look through the evidence for any possible matches – but please,
promise me you’ll leave this alone for now. Safflower may have done the
mischief at the shops, but to think that she’s capable of murder is quite a
leap from spilling some ice cream and cupcakes. Let’s leave this one to the
pros, okay?” Missy nodded, but he could tell by the determined look in her eyes
that this was far from over for her. He sighed, shook his head and kissed her
lightly. “I’m going to get back to work. You stay safe – I’ll update you
whenever I find something.”

Missy
was frustrated that she was a suspect, frustrated that Chas, of all people,
didn’t believe in her ideas, and frustrated that Echo was so blind to her
sister’s antics that she might just be enabling her to literally get away with
murder. She knew that she was onto something that no one else could see, and
that being the case, she was going to have to be the one to do something about
it.

Missy
parked in the alley behind Crème de la Cupcake a couple of hours past closing
time and practically flew from her car when she saw Safflower coming out of the
back of her shop with a large box in her hands.

“What’s
in that box, young lady?” she demanded confronting Echo’s sister, hands on
hips.

“I
dunno…your brain maybe?” Safflower replied, sounding bored.

Missy
moved closer and peered through the plastic window on top of the box, seeing a
batch of cupcakes. “I knew it!” she exclaimed. “You little thief, you’re going
to put those back right now,” she shook her finger in the girl’s face.

“Thief?
Puhleeeze. Even if I were a thief, I certainly wouldn’t steal this trash that
you try to pass off as food,” she scoffed.

Missy
made a chilling realization. “You poisoned them, didn’t you? Just like you
poisoned the sundae at Echo’s store, and the cupcake!”

Safflower’s
eyes narrowed into a hateful glare, her entire countenance changing in an
instant, before she replaced her mask of indifference. “Is that what you think,
you ignorant hick?” she taunted, and before Missy could even move to stop her,
she dumped the entire box of cupcakes upside down. Different varieties of
cupcake landed in colorful splats on the pavement. Missy was furious, but, as
she opened her mouth to speak, Chris came bounding out the back door with an
identical box in his hands, stopping dead in his tracks at the sight of the
destroyed cupcakes.

“Oh
no!” he exclaimed, surveying the mess. “We needed every single one of those for
April Mathews’ bridal shower. What the heck happened, Saff?”

“I
tripped,” she replied snottily, her gaze never leaving Missy’s.

“Bridal
shower?” Missy said, suddenly remembering. “Oh my goodness, that was tonight?”

“Yeah,
I’m supposed to have all of these cupcakes over there in half an hour.
Safflower was helping me carry them,” he admitted, blushing a bit.

“Did
she have access to them at any point when you were out of the room?” Missy
demanded, staring the girl down.

“No.
Yeah. Maybe…I don’t know. Why?” Chris was more than confused.

Safflower
finally broke eye contact with Missy and turned to Chris. “Have fun with your
crazy paranoid boss, I’m out of here,” she said, walking away.

Chris
stared after her for a moment, shocked by her appalling lack of manners and
turned back to Missy. “I’m really sorry Ms. G., I figured if she helped me, I
might get done fast enough to take her to a movie.”

Missy
seemed terribly preoccupied. “Let’s not worry about that right now. Load up the
box that you’re carrying in my car, then we’ll stop by the LaChance store to
get the extras that are needed and we should still be able to deliver them on
time if we hustle. I’ll have to come in early in the morning to bake enough to
make up the difference in our inventory for tomorrow. After we get back from
this delivery, you and I are going to have a nice long chat.”

“Yes
ma’am,” Chris replied glumly, moving toward Missy’s car.

While
he was loading the cupcakes, Missy called Chas and had a brief chat out of
earshot. “I need you to help me with something…”

Detective
Richard Keller was not happy about being called at home after 8:00 in the
evening to discuss a case, but he and Chas Beckett were friends, so he
begrudgingly made an exception.

“This
had better be important,” the Dellville detective grumbled as he slid into a
booth at the House of the Rising Bread café, which was located halfway between
Dellville and LaChance.

“It
is,” Chas assured him. “Thanks again for meeting me – there’s a piece of
Mavis’s pie in it for you,” he offered magnanimously.

“She’d
better have peach or heads will roll,” he muttered, easing up a bit.

“Take
it easy, tough guy,” their stocky, no-nonsense server instructed. “You know
Mavis always has a slice or two of peach pie in reserve for her favorite boy in
blue,” she teased, setting the pie down in front of Keller. “Coffee?” she
raised the pot.

“Is
that even a question?” Rich smiled for the first time, offering his cup.

Chas
waited impatiently through the interaction and got down to business as soon as
the waitress had moved on. “I’ve had a breakthrough in the murder cases that
you’re working on,” he began.

“You
mean the murder cases that are out of your jurisdiction that I shouldn’t even
be talking to you about?” he asked dryly, shoveling a forkful of peach pie into
his mouth.

“Yeah,
yeah, yeah…we both know all of that,” Beckett waved dismissively. “You can take
all the credit for cracking the case, I don’t care. I just want to see justice
done and make sure that my…uh…people who are important to me…stay safe,” he
said awkwardly, the heat rising beneath his collar.

“You
really do like that little spitfire, don’t you,” Rich grinned, enjoying the
typically ‘cooler-than-a-cucumber’ Beckett’s discomfort. “Alright, whatcha
got?” he continued wolfing down his pie, looking at Chas expectantly.

“Oddly
enough, strictly as a favor to Missy, I ran the name of Echo’s sister,
Safflower through some database checks, and found out that she has quite the
interesting past. She’s been charged with theft several times, but only
convicted for a couple of them.”

“Jury
finds it hard to believe such a sweet little thing could commit a crime?”
Keller asked.

“That
would be my guess from looking at some of the trial transcripts. It seems
little sister is quite the actress when she needs to be in order to stay out of
jail.” He ran his finger down a printout that he had made. “She was also
accused, and acquitted twice, of murder. Somehow, in both cases, a boyfriend
ended up taking the fall, despite a ton of circumstantial and physical evidence
that pointed to Safflower.”

Keller
shrugged, washing down his pie with a swallow of coffee. “So, could be
something, could be nothing. What else you got? Or is eating pie actually going
to be the most productive part of this meeting?” he challenged.

“I
checked out the reports and the evidence for Sid Hixon’s murder, and talked to
one of the patrons that had been in the shop when Sid came in. Apparently he
had made a pass at Safflower, and when she responded less than positively,
things got ugly between them. She was incredibly angry when she made Hixon’s
sundae,” Chas reported.

“So?
People get angry all the time. Most of ‘em don’t kill somebody just because
they’re angry,” Rich stated the obvious.

“I’m
aware,” Beckett returned dryly. “So I checked out the cell phone video that the
customer had taken when Safflower was making the sundae, and because it’s shot
from a side angle, it clearly shows her opening up a packet of something and
sprinkling it on the sundae.”

“Okay,
you have my attention,” Keller put down his fork and leaned forward.

“So
next, I checked the autopsy report for the tox screen, and wouldn’t you know,
it turns out that the poison that killed Sid Hixon is the same poison that was
used in the murders that she was acquitted for in California. What makes all of
this even more compelling is when you compare it to the autopsy for the
homeless kid who ate the cupcake.”

“Lemme
guess – same poison,” Keller supplied.

“Exactly,”
Chas nodded. “Not only that, but the fingerprints that were on the counter and
under the cash register when Missy was robbed, match Safflower’s conclusively,
as do those found after her shop was destroyed. There were footprints in the
mess when Crème de la Cupcake was turned upside down that were determined to be
a female’s size 8.5 shoe. I know for a fact that Missy wears a 6.5. so they
aren’t hers, and I’m pretty certain that if we find Safflower’s shoes, we’ll
have a match.”

“So,
this one tiny little sweet-looking girl killed a guy who had the misfortune to
make her mad while she was dishing up ice cream, as well as a homeless kid, and
destroyed both Missy and her sister’s shops, stole money from Missy, and you
have the evidence to back all of this up?” Rich summed up Chas’s story.

“There’s
a lot of evidence there already, and a bit more that we have to find. When we
get a warrant to search for Safflower’s shoes, I’m also going to be looking for
a blunt instrument of some sort,” Beckett said grimly.

“You
think she’s the one who put your girl in the hospital? Interesting how such a
small girl could pack such a wallop,” Keller mused.

“I thought
so too, until I read through some records and discovered that she’s a martial
artist. She may be small, but apparently she’s strong, stealthy and quick.”

“Good
work, Beckett,” Rich nodded approvingly. “You’re not so bad…for a LaChance
guy.” He stood to go. “Let’s go get that warrant.”

Chas
stood to join him, and his phone rang. It was Missy, needing his help.