Oh Say Can You Fudge (12 page)

Chapter 12

“How’s the fireworks show planning going?” Mrs. Amerson stopped us on Market Street as we walked toward the administration building where the police offices were. The older woman was five foot nine inches tall and wore jeans, tan athletic shoes, and a white T-shirt with flowers embroidered around the scooped neckline. Her gray hair was cut short and her face clean of makeup. Her appearance was as no nonsense as her attitude.

“Hello, Mrs. Amerson,” I said as Mal sat down in front of the older woman and lifted her paw to shake.

Mrs. Amerson ignored the puppy. It was something she had to do on purpose because Mal was difficult to ignore.

“Did you talk to Rivers Productions and get the shows straightened out? We don’t have many days left and people expect the usual three shows.”

“I’ve got fireworks,” I said. “I’m still hunting down a technician to run the show.”

“We’ve been trying to get ahold of Henry Schulte,” Liz said. “You haven’t seen him, have you?”

“Who is Henry Schulte?” Mrs. Amerson narrowed her eyes.

“He’s Rodney Rivers’ business partner. He’s on Mackinac Island and contractually obligated to run the show,” I said. “That is, if I could find fireworks and I did.”

“Well, then he’d better do the shows,” Mrs. Amerson said. “Did you call him?”

“I’ve left several messages.”

Liz backed me up. “We just went over to the Hamilton where he’s staying, but he’s ignoring us.”

“Do I need to get the lawyers involved?” Mrs. Amerson asked. “Because I can.”

By this time Mal was pirouetting in front of her to catch her attention.

“Thanks, but I think we should try to track him down first. If he says no when we speak face-to-face then I’ll call the lawyers.” I tried to hide my sigh.

“See that you do.” Her expression was pinched as if she smelled something bad. “The show must go on. If I have to, I’ll find someone to light the fireworks myself.”

“I’m sure you won’t have to,” Liz said. “Schulte is contracted to do it. He’ll do it.”

“He’d better.” Mrs. Amerson glared at me. “For your sake, young lady, he’d better.” She walked off toward her shop on Market.

“Did she just threaten me?” I asked Liz.

“I believe she did.” Liz took out her notepad and made a note.

Mal tugged on the leash, her busy little nose pressed to the ground.

“We’re going,” I said with laughter in my tone. Mal liked to go to the administration building. Officer Brown and Rex were her buddies and had started to keep doggie treats behind the counter.

“Your puppy knows the way to the police station,” Liz noted. “Is somebody special there?”

I felt the heat of a blush rush up my cheeks. “No.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Seriously. I’m dating Trent. We are going sailing next week. That is, if I can find Henry Schulte and get him to do the fireworks show.”

“And yet, Mal certainly knows the way to the administration building,” Liz said again and raised one beautifully arched eyebrow as Mal trotted along at a good pace, dragging us behind her.

“Officer Brown keeps treats behind the desk,” I explained as nonchalantly as I could.

“I’m going to pretend that is true.” Liz grinned at me.

“It is true.”

“And I’ve seen the way you look at Rex.”

“Everyone knows I’m dating Trent, even Rex,” I said. “Now stop it.”

“Why?” She laughed, the sound echoing along the street. “You are so much fun to tease. You should see your face.”

I pressed my hot cheeks with my palms. “I’m not the kind of girl who gets this kind of interest. Seriously.”

“That’s why it’s so much fun,” she said.

“Who are you dating?” I asked trying to turn the subject around on her.

“I’ve lived my whole life on Mackinac. That means, at one time or another, I’ve dated about every single guy who is eligible.”

“Even Trent?” I teased.

“Yes, even Trent,” she replied.

“Really?” I drew my eyebrows together. Clearly she was prettier than me. Plus, she was a true native and thus, higher up on the social chain. “What happened?”

“It was sixth grade and when he tried to tongue kiss me, I punched him,” she said with a shrug. “He’s sort of kept his distance ever since.”

I laughed. “Well, I know he’s a smart man.”

We arrived at the admin building. I opened the door and Mal went straight to the police offices. Liz sent me a look.

“It’s the treats,” I said again and felt as if I protested just a bit too much. I bit my lip.

“How’s my favorite puppy?” Officer Charles Brown said as he got up and came around to greet Mal. She sat and lifted her paw for a shake.

He shook her paw and patted her on the head. “Come on. You know where the treats are.”

I let go of her leash so she could follow him and sent an
I-told-you-so
look to Liz. She grinned and shrugged.

“What brings you lovely ladies here?” he asked after he put Mal through her tricks and gave her a treat.

“Has Henry Schulte been in the station?” I asked. “I’ve been trying to get ahold of him.”

“He was in yesterday. Rex asked him to stay on the island for forty-eight hours in case there were more questions.”

“Is he a suspect?” Liz asked.

“If you are referring to the Rodney Rivers murder case, there are no suspects yet. That’s the official statement.” Charles gave a short nod, his brown gaze sincere.

“There is reason to believe that Henry may be in danger,” I said.

“Really?” Charles tilted his head. “Why?”

“We know that Rodney Rivers was being threatened,” Liz said. “He had e-mails and phone messages that said he wasn’t paying his bills and some pretty shady characters were threatening him.”

“Where did you get that information?” Charles put his hands on his hips.

“I can’t reveal my sources, but if Rodney was being threatened and is now dead, his partner Henry could be in grave danger.”

“As far as I can tell, you were the last ones to see him,” I said. “Mrs. Hamilton at the Hamilton B & B said no one has seen him there in a couple of days.”

Charles drew his eyebrows into a scowl. “He could have left the island, but that would be against the request of the investigating officer.”

“If he did leave the island, he had to take a ferry or an airplane,” I thought aloud.

“Unless he had a boat,” Liz pointed out.

“I’ll need to inform Rex.” Charles went around the desk and picked up the phone.

I pulled Liz aside. “If he was here yesterday, then he could be just hiding out in his room.”

“Or he could be dead in his room,” she insisted. “I need to find out if he left on the ferries.”

“I’ll get Jenn to ask around and see if anyone has seen him. I really need him to be alive. I need to have someone do the fireworks shows.”

“I’d be calling the town lawyer if I were you,” Liz said. “If Henry Schulte isn’t dead, he’s either going to help you or he’s going to wish he were dead.”

“Come on, Mal.” I made a kissy noise and my puppy ran to me from behind the desk. I grabbed her leash. “Please have Rex call me,” I said to Charles. “I need to see Henry as soon as possible.”

“From the sound of things, you aren’t the only one.” Liz nudged her head in the direction of Officer Brown.

He was on the phone with Charlene the island dispatcher. “That’s right. Apparently Henry Schulte has not been seen since he left the police station early yesterday.” He waved good-bye to us as we headed out the door. “Rex asked him to stay on the island. If he skipped town, we need to know about it as soon as possible.”

Chapter 13

“Hey beautiful.” Trent came into the McMurphy at ten the next morning and smiled at me as I worked behind the counter of the fudge shop. He wore a light-pink dress shirt with the collar open and the sleeves rolled up to three-quarter length. He had on dark-wash blue jeans and cowboy boots. His skin was tan and his dark hair perfect.

“Hi.” I couldn’t help the smile that crossed my face at the sight of him. “What brings you in?”

“The fudge.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “I hear you have a lemon meringue.”

“Oh. Yes, I do.” I tried not to let my disappointment show.

He laughed and it echoed around the room, drawing Mal over with a run and a slide. “A kiss for the beautiful woman first.” He leaned over the counter and gave me a sweet kiss that left me wanting more. We were early in our dating and things were at that stage where I wanted, but was afraid to really let him know how much I wanted to be with him. It didn’t do to give up my power too early.

Good relationships took time and space. I pulled him back for one more quick kiss over the counter and then let him go and took a step back. “Mal wants attention,” I teased.

My puppy was bouncing on her back legs, begging with her black button eyes.

Trent leaned down and scratched behind her ears. “How’s my second favorite girl?”

“She is excited for the Fourth of July celebrations,” I said.

He glanced up at me. “Does she do okay with fireworks?”

“I imagine so. She seems to be fine with the cannon.” As if on cue, the cannon boomed in the background. The fort reenactors fired it on the hour during the season. “How much of the lemon meringue fudge do you want?”

“I’ll take a quarter pound, but that’s not really why I came.”

I grabbed a tissue paper and pulled the tray of lemon meringue fudge from the glass container and expertly estimated a quarter pound. I set it on the scale and was dead on. “So the fudge was a ruse to see me.”

The guests leaving for the day had begun to come down with their suitcases in tow.

“I have good news for you,” he said.

I wrapped up his fudge, put it in a pink and white striped bag with the McMurphy logo on it, and folded the top. “I like good news.” I smiled at him and handed him his bag.

“I have the name of a guy who is free to do your fireworks show.”

“Oh!” I got so excited by the news that I came around the counter and gave him a big hug.

Not to be out done, Mal leapt up and pawed at my pants leg.

“Thank-you! We are only days away and I can’t find Henry Schulte. I didn’t know what I was going to do.”

Trent held me close and I reveled in the feel of him from knees to shoulders. He was tall and broad and solid. I knew that he ran daily and, even though he was the owner of the stables, he was not above mucking them out when he had to. Plus, I had spotted him handling one of the big carriage horses. The man had muscle to spare and I wanted it to all be mine.

“Wow, I need to make you happy more often.” Without letting go of me, he freed one arm and pulled a business card out of his shirt pocket. “Here’s the guy’s card. He said for you to call him to work out the final details.”

I took the card and gave Trent a kiss on the cheek. “You are the best boyfriend ever.” My eyes grew big as I realized what I’d called him. I glanced at him sheepishly. After all, it had only been three dates.

His face lit up. “I like it that you call me your boyfriend. What are you doing on the Fourth?”

“Well, I guess I’ll be busy seeing that the firework shows go off without a hitch.”

“Right.” He chuckled. “Will you have time to go for a picnic? I know this nice little place where we can see the show without the crowds.”

“I’d like that.”

“Great. I’ll come by at two o’clock if that’s okay?”

“Do you want me to pack my picnic basket?”

“No, I’ve got it.” He lifted his bag of fudge. “How much do I owe you?”

“That one’s on the house.”

He sent me a confused look.

“In exchange for the help with the fireworks.” I tapped the card.

“Wow, a beautiful woman in my arms and free fudge. I need to do good deeds more often.”

“That said, I’ve got to get back to work. I’ve got another fudge demonstration in forty minutes.”

“How’re sales?” he asked and let me go.

“Pretty good. That reality show I taped last month is showing and people are starting to come in and mention they saw me on television.”

“A celebrity in the making,” he teased. “What can’t you do?”

“Get rid of my Fudgie status on the island.” I pulled down the ingredients for the red, white, and blue fudge recipe I was working on. The contest winner was red velvet for the red, and I was making cream cheese for the white. The blue was blueberry. Blueberries were in season and grow in Michigan so I thought it was a good choice even if it was a bit expected.

“I’ll call you later,” he promised and patted Mal on the head. “I bet you need a treat, don’t you?” He took her over to the reception desk and dug out a doggie treat from the jar on the desk.

I heard Frances tell him to make Mal do her tricks as I poured fresh blueberries into a bowl and mashed them. I’d tried using a juicer and only use the blueberry juice in the fudge, but I found that having a few actual berry pieces enhanced the flavor.

“Hey.” Trent stuck his head into the fudge shop area. “What ever happened to the cat?”

“It’s been hanging out on my fire escape. No one has come to claim it.”

“You fed it, didn’t you?” His eyes twinkled.

“Yes,” I said defiantly. “I know that means it has now adopted me, but I couldn’t see the poor baby starve.”

Trent laughed. “I can take it back to the stables with me. We like having a barn cat or two around to keep the rodents down.”

I made a face. “It’s too pretty to be a barn cat.”

“It’s better than being an alley cat,” he pointed out.

I took a deep breath and let it out slow. “I suppose you are right. I want to catch it first and take it to the vet in St. Ignace. That way, I’ll know it has all its shots and is spayed or neutered.”

“I’ll catch it for you the next time I come by,” he offered.

“You are a true gentleman.” I smiled.

“I try,” he replied, his eyes twinkling. “I do try.”

 

 

“Okay. I’ve got some news,” Jenn said later that afternoon when I went upstairs to change.

“Good news or bad news?” I asked as I tossed my chef coat and black slacks into the dirty clothes pile and put on a summer dress. I was going to call the number Trent had given me and then go to see Mrs. Amerson and Mrs. Jones to report that the firework shows were good to go.

“Well, that depends,” Jenn said as she leaned against the door jamb and watched me rummage through my closet. “Why are you changing? Do you have a hot date?”

“I’m meeting with Mrs. Amerson and Mrs. Jones. That is, if the phone call I need to make goes well.”

“You got Henry Schulte to agree to do the fireworks shows?”

“No.” I pulled out a short cream-colored dress with sprigs of pink flowers on it. It was a fit and flare style with short sleeves and was at once comfortable and lady-like. “Trent got me the name of another guy. Henry Schulte seems to be missing. Either he skipped the island or is in the same state of hurt as Rodney. Remember, you told us that Rodney was having money troubles and had several threats. Well, Liz said the same thing. She thought maybe Henry was in the same kind of trouble as Rodney and might even be dead.”

“Well, that’s where things get interesting,” Jenn said. “Did she tell you that Henry Schulte will get a ten million dollar life insurance payment because Rodney died?”

“What? How?”

“They had a life insurance plan on Rodney to cover the company because he was the technician. If anything happened to him, the company would go belly up.”

“So Henry had motive,” I said as I tossed the dress over my head and zipped up the side. “I bet he skipped the island.

“You know what? I’m going to call this guy to do the show and then I’m calling the lawyer. If Henry has the ten million dollars, he can pay this guy’s fee to do the shows. We have a contract that covers more than the loss of the fireworks.”

“The fireworks are here, by the way,” Jenn said as I brushed out my hair and applied lip gloss. “They are in two trailers with strong locks and are sitting in a safe place in St. Ignace.”

“Good. Let’s not take the chance of them exploding on the island again.”

“I agree. When you contact your new guy, tell him that they will have to be set off via barges like what they have done in the past. It’s the safest way.”

“I intend to. How did you find out about the insurance money anyway? That’s not something your boyfriend would know. Isn’t he all about the crime scene?”

“I found out from Missy Kastler,” Jenn said.

“Who?” I was confused. It was the first time I had heard that name. It was just like Jenn to be more with the in crowd than me.

“Missy Kastler. She called me to plan her wedding reception. She wants it on the grounds of the yacht club. Anyway, Missy heard from her fiancé’s uncle who is in the insurance business that Rodney Rivers had a ten million dollar pay out. The yacht club was all a buzz about the fact that if they catch the killer and that person is a relative or, in this case, a business partner, the insurance company doesn’t have to pay.”

“Let me guess. They are waiting to pay Henry until the investigation is done.”

“Yes.” Jenn wagged her eyebrows. “That could take years.”

“So there really isn’t a motive for Henry to kill his partner.”

“Or he was silly enough to think that he would get paid regardless of how Rodney died, unless it was suicide.”

“Have they ruled out suicide?” I asked.

“Pretty much. Shane tells me that there was a bullet in the ashes, but no gun at the scene.”

“If Rodney had killed himself, they would presume the gun would be found near the body,” I surmised. “Unless it somehow went missing from the ruins of the warehouse.” I chewed my bottom lip. “Wait. When I saw Rodney, he was covered in a string of screaming chickens. Who tangles themselves in a string of screaming chickens, lights the fuses, and then kills themselves? It doesn’t make any sense.”

“No, it doesn’t. This is the first I’ve heard of the screaming chickens.”

“It was weird. They just started to go off, but no one was in the room with him so it had to be a slow burning fuse. Do we know when Henry Schulte arrived on the island? I mean, if he was there . . .”

“Then he could have lit the fuse and caused the explosion to cover up the suicide,” Jenn finished.

“Exactly. So many people were helping put out the embers it’s impossible to tell if Henry was there or not.”

“I know, right? You would think a stranger would stand out in a crowd, but we all were worried about the explosion and the surrounding forests and the loss of the fireworks.”

“How can we find out when Henry got on the island?” I asked as I headed toward the apartment door. I was going to call Trent’s guy from the McMurphy’s office phone.

“We can ask the ferry owners to check their records of tickets purchased,” Jenn suggested.

“That shouldn’t be a problem. They are already checking to see if he purchased a ticket to get off the island. I’ll call Rex and ask him to check. While I’m at it, I’ll call Sophie and see if Henry took the airport shuttle any time.”

“I don’t know,” Jenn said as we entered the office. “Flying in and out on the Grand’s jet is expensive, especially if you aren’t staying at the Grand Hotel. Henry didn’t dress like a rich man. Besides, if he were rich, there would be no need for threats over unpaid bills.”

“I agree he didn’t look that well-off,” I said, remembering his worn athletic shoes. “But, if he thought he was coming into ten million dollars, he might take the plane.”

“But the only way he would know that he was coming into that kind of money would be if Rodney didn’t commit suicide.”

“Darn it.” I sat down in front of my desk. Jenn sat down at her desk across from mine in the center of the overcrowded room full of bookcases and file cabinets. “We’ve come full circle in our reasoning and we still don’t know if Henry Schulte is alive or even still on the island.”

“What a mess,” Jenn agreed. “Call your guy and get the fireworks shows back up and running. I sent you a list of the fireworks we were able to purchase. You can e-mail that to him and he can come up with a nice show. I’ll contact Rex and ask him if he’s seen Henry Schulte. I’ll tell him we have to know because we have a contract with the man.”

“Great!” I dialed the number on Trent’s card.

“This is Ashton Cooper,” a male voice answered.

“Hello, Mr. Cooper. This is Allie McMurphy. Trent Jessop gave me your name and number. I’m looking for a pyro technician for three fireworks shows on Mackinac Island. He said you were available.”

“Yes, that’s right. I understand your contracted guy did not follow through.”

“Yes, you could say that. There was a tragic mishap and the business partner refuses to get back to me.”

“A tragic mishap?” The man sounded concerned.

“Yes. We lost all of our original fireworks and our pyro tech in a warehouse explosion. We were able to get new fireworks for the shows—I have the list I can send you—but the business partner refuses to get back to me.”

“The guy was killed?” Ashton Cooper really didn’t sound happy. “Trent didn’t mention that part.”

“Oh, don’t worry. It wasn’t an accident. We’re pretty sure the fireworks were set off after Rodney died.”

Jenn was shaking her head and signaling me to stop talking.

“Excuse me?” he asked.

I put my hand over the receiver. “What?” I asked Jenn.

“Don’t tell him that. He’ll never work for you if he thinks he could get killed.”