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Authors: Melanie Jackson

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Murder on Parade (3 page)

BOOK: Murder on Parade
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And I couldn’t face it. All I felt up to was soothing my sharpened appetite, which had come on with a vengeance when I started browning meat and onions. I chose not to answer the phone. My cup of woe had already overflowed for the day. I told myself that the greater good would be served by not answering and therefore not yelling at my cousin three days before the wedding.

“Chocolate?” Alex asked, bringing a gold candy box into the kitchen. He didn’t pick up the phone either. We had checked with Dad on the way back from the hospital and the animals were all safely moved and Mom and Aunt Dot were home from the parade. Aunt Dot had snuck out when Althea wasn’t looking. Alex’s aunt, Mary Elizabeth, was in Seattle with friends so we didn’t worry about her.

I took one of the glossy brown balls and enjoyed every guilty mouthful of chocolate and cherry. Dad was drowning in chocolate cherry cordials. They were available from the Kandy Kounter only at Christmas and his addiction to them was an open scandal. Friends slipped him boxes on the sly so my mom wouldn’t know that they were contributing to his gastronomic delinquency. Some of those boxes were passed along to me. I kept them hidden in case Mom stopped by but Alex had ferreted them out his first day at the house. The man is a bloodhound when it comes to sweets.

Alex hadn’t asked why I had them hidden. He is fairly smart and he has been around my family enough to understand the dynamic. Mom has high cholesterol and high blood pressure. Dad and I do not. Mom and Dad are separated and I live on my own, but as far as Mom is concerned we are still family and this doesn’t excuse us from following the same high fiber, low fat, no fun diet she does. Alex, until such time as he actually married me, was exempt from criticism but he tried not to flaunt his chocolate addiction in front of her.

I was just glad that I had hidden the chocolates in the coffee table drawer instead of where I usually stash small things. I’d had Grandpa’s violin restrung for Alex for Christmas and it was waiting for a big red bow in the back of my closet. He would love it. The thought made me smile for the first time in an hour.

Alex poured us some wine which I had planned to mull, but which was lovely right out of the bottle. I put down some spaghetti for Aphrodite (plain) and for Blue (with sauce), but none for Apollo since he doesn’t like pasta. Blue woofled appreciatively and dove right in.

“Chloe,” Alex asked as we took our places at the table. “You don’t think that there was anything funny about Marshall Dillon’s death, do you?”

By ‘funny’ he meant suspicious, not ha-ha that was so amusing.

“I… don’t know. There’s nothing obvious that makes me think of murder.”

He relaxed when I said this. Alex solves cyber crimes and is very good at it, but he had also been dragged into some violent crime cases since he had started dating me. Alex didn’t care for violence, especially if got anywhere near me.

“Good. We can forget all about it then. And you can teach me to make gingerbread,” he said, brightening further.

I nodded, but there was something weird about the Grand Marshall’s death and I couldn’t entirely shake off the feeling that there would be consequences if I didn’t figure things out and quickly. I hoped I was wrong and that the only outcome would be another dreadful poem from Althea, but my subconscious had logged the problem of the missing coat and gardenia perfume and it kept chewing on it even as I ate my delicious dinner.

Chapter 4

We didn’t do any baking the night of the parade, though I did put some raisins in a jar to soak in rum. The key to great gingerbread is rum-soaked raisins and candied ginger minced super fine. Lots of people only use ginger powder and it makes for anemic gingerbread.

The next morning’s weather reassured me that I wouldn’t be needed at work— the snow had fallen all night long and there was at least a foot and half on the ground. It was the perfect morning for enjoying omelets and coffee and for me to teach Alex some of my favorite cookie recipes. If you don’t care for baking, you might want to move on to Chapter 5.

I loaded the CD player with Johnny Mathis and Perry Como and began setting out ingredients. I also had a stern talk with the stove. It is old and cantankerous. Being gas rather than electric it often hisses and sputters and sometimes refuses to light until someone is dumb enough to lean down and look through the glass window where they can be startled by a flying fireball. That morning it was feeling cooperative and started without protest. Perhaps it knew that it was being used for the highest of purposes: Christmas baking.

The first two recipes are family favorites; Aunt Crystal’s Almond Crescent Cookies and my Grandpa Mac’s Prettiest Sugar Cookies. I can’t imagine Christmas without them.

Almond Crescents:

 

½ pound salted butter (use the real thing—this is no time to be health conscious)

4 T powdered sugar (make sure it is new and sift it for lumps)

1 tsp vanilla (again—use the good stuff)

1 C almonds (the fresher the better. You can substitute macadamia or pecans— both are great)

2 C flour (again, sift, it makes mixing easier)

1 T water

 

Cream butter and powdered sugar. Add water, vanilla, flour and nuts. Refrigerate at least one hour. I usually make my next cookie dough while the first is firming. Preheat over to 350* and shape dough into crescents. Bake for three minutes on bottom rack. Move to top rack and cook until golden (this will depend on your over. Mine is old and cantankerous so it takes almost ten minutes but yours may be faster. Watch closely!). Roll in powdered sugar (or cocoa powder if you feel reckless).

Alex did really well with these, though he had a slight mishap when he dropped the mixing bowl of powdered sugar and it exploded like a bomb. By the time it was cleaned up off the floor and appliances the cats and dog had tracked some into the living room. I would have to vacuum.

Feeling Alex was ready for something slightly more complicated, I put on some Celtic Thunder and pulled out more ingredients and we started the sugar cookies.

Sugar Cookies:

 

1 C butter (don’t make me repeat myself—use butter)

1 C sugar (the finest grain you can find)

1 C powdered sugar (not the stuff swept off the floor L)

1 C vegetable oil (not olive)

2 eggs

4 ¼ C flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp cream of tarter

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp vanilla

 

Cream butter, sugar and oil together in large bowl. Add eggs. Beat until smooth. Add flour, salt, cream of tarter, baking soda and vanilla. Mix well. Here you can do variations. I sometimes add lemon zest, powdered coffee, cinnamon or cocoa powder.

 

This dough needs to refrigerate over night so it is not a spur of the moment dessert (I’ll give you one of those later). Preheat oven to 375*. Form dough into balls and place on greased cookie sheet (or use parchment paper. I love parchment because clean up is super easy). Flatten cookies with the bottom of a glass dipped in 2 T sugar and 1 T nutmeg (if dough is plain—plain sugar if it is not). Bake at 375* for 8 minutes. Cool on rack (easy if you use parchment paper).

 

If you want frosting:

1 box powdered sugar

½ c softened butter

flavoring of choice (rum, chocolate, lemon, coffee—you pick what matches your cookie)

and milk until creamy.

 

If I am doing chocolate sugar cookies I often add coconut and/or pecans and go for a kind of German chocolate variation.

Alex and I split the dough into two bowls and did one with chocolate for him and one with lemon for me and Blue (dogs shouldn’t have chocolate. The cats don’t care either way because they can’t taste sweet and ignore dessert, but Blue likes her cookies).

By this time, Alex was kind of a mess and I think regretting his refusal to wear one of grandma’s embroidered aprons. Since the cookies would be a while resting in the fridge, I decided he needed some immediate chocolate dessert to keep his energy and spirits high, so I got out one of my favorite chocolate cheat recipes.

Chocolate Faux Bundt Cupcakes:

 

1 box chocolate cake mix (if you feel ambitious, use your favorite chocolate cake recipe)

1/3 C sugar

1 egg

1 tsp salt

8 oz cream cheese (not ‘lite’)

1 six oz. package chocolate chips (get good ones that aren’t all wax)

 

Preheat oven to 350*. Cream the cream cheese, sugar, egg and salt. Add chocolate chips. Mix cake mix as instructed. Fill cupcake tins 2/3 full and add a tablespoon of cream cheese mixture to each cupcake. Bake at 350* for 20 to 25 minutes. Makes approximately 40
.

The morning had crept toward noon and the air was rich with the smells of baking, which leaked into the yard when I took Blue out to answer nature’s call. Blue is fastidious and it took her a moment to find a private spot behind the privet hedge. So I wasn’t surprised when we heard a knock on the door a short time later and I found my dad on the porch, taking off his cross-country skis. Dad has a kind of sixth sense about when I am baking especially with chocolate.

“I was just checking on the animals at the fairgrounds and had to leave the van downtown. Everyone is just fine— even the chickens,” Dad said with satisfaction. I would have known his location from the wisps of straw in his hair and that all was well because he wasn’t still at the stables holding some ailing animal’s hoof or paw. And speaking of ailing hoofs, I was glad he had come on skis and not Old Luke. On his last visit, Luke had been insulted at my suggestion he wait outside while Dad and I had dinner and had chewed the top rail of my fence. “I smelled something heavenly as I turned onto your street. You’ve been making almond crescents, haven’t you? Is it too much to hope that you have some coffee and almond cookies for your father?”

“Of course not,” I said, taking his coat and hanging it on the wrought iron hooks by the door where it could drip onto a festive rubber-backed rug. “We just won’t mention it to Mom.”

“I certainly won’t,” Dad agreed and we shared a smile. He gave me a quick hug and then went to build a fire. Alex and I hadn’t needed one, being near the stove, but I didn’t mind having one. A fire is always cheerful on a cold day.

“The house looks lovely,” Dad added, giving Blue a pat and then waving at Alex who was mixing up icing with muscular zeal.

“Thanks. The cats had fun helping with the decorations. They especially love the lights.” They love anything that resembles string and drags across the floor.

Dad was right about the house. My taste does not run to plastic reindeer on the roof. Or anything on the roof since I get dizzy when I am up a ladder and don’t have a death wish. But I do like to decorate in more restrained ways. Exterior displays are a gift we give our neighbors, so I had hung a giant wreath on the door— made from greens I had collected and I still had the sap stains and holly wounds on my hands to prove it. There were flameless candles in the living room window that worked on a timer so I didn’t need to worry about them. I loved coming home just after dusk and finding them guttering on the sill. Dad had contributed some suet and seed balls hung with red bows to the bare apricot tree in the south corner which the birds were enjoying.

Inside I have a Christmas tree—a small one with plastic ornaments on the bottom and glass on the top. Really, you can hardly tell the difference between the two and this way Apollo and Aphrodite can play with the tempting eye-level balls and not damage themselves or the decorations. I haven’t traded in my little gumball lights for LEDs yet. I don’t like the cold lights even if they are more energy efficient. Someday all my bulbs will burn out and I’ll have to give in and switch, but not yet.

Dad sat cross-legged on the floor before the fire with Blue nearby, keeping a careful eye on his coffee mug on the hearth by her tail and the cookies in his hand. Alex had laid aside the icing he was mixing and poured some coffee of his own.

“A shame about Herb Dillon dying in the middle of the parade,” Dad said and then looked at me. “Strange even. He wasn’t an old man. In fact, he recently joined a gym. I’d have said he was good for another twenty years.”

“Very strange,” I agreed. “And rotten timing, though from what I hear, Mrs. Dillon won’t be all that upset. And heaven knows that it could have been worse.”

Now Alex and Dad were both looking at me. Alex had powdered sugar on his cheek.

“Worse how?” he asked, scrubbing his face when he noticed my stare.

“Well, it could have been Santa. Imagine the headlines and child trauma if Santa had croaked in the middle of the parade.”

Dad shuddered. “It’s unthinkable.”

I nodded and then, unable to help myself, I asked what was on my mind. “Dad, you’re friends with Mickey Drambacher, aren’t you?”

“Yes. You thinking about getting some insurance?”

“No. But I sure would like to know if Herb Dillon took out any new policies, or maybe changed his heir recently— just out of curiosity.”

“Do you think there was foul play?” Dad asked straightly.

“No, not definitely. But something about the incident is bothering me.”

“The perfume,” Alex muttered, scrubbing his cheek harder and making matters worse since he had green food coloring on his hand.

“Yes. He smelled like someone had spilled a whole bottle of gardenia perfume on him. How does that happen right before the parade?”  I got blank looks to this question. “It had to have been right before or he would have changed clothes.”

BOOK: Murder on Parade
12.68Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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