One Dead Cookie (12 page)

“I’d pay to see that.” Olivia checked the kitchen clock. “It’s going on noon, and
Spunky hasn’t been out today. I didn’t even bring him down to the store this morning.
Could you cover the lunch hour with Bertha and Jennifer? I need to take Spunky on
a run. Maybe I can call Stacey at the same time. I’m worried.”

*   *   *

W
hen Olivia opened the door of her apartment, Spunky leaped into her arms. The force
of his little body nearly knocked her backward. She used a foot to close the door
behind her before he realized he could escape down the stairs.

“I’m glad to see you, too, Spunks.” Olivia held him under one arm and rubbed his silky
ears as she headed down the hallway toward the kitchen. When they reached the bathroom,
Olivia poked her head inside. “I see you used your puppy pad,” she said. “Good boy.
That deserves a treat.” Spunky wriggled out of her grasp, ran into the kitchen, and
skidded on the tile. He came to a stop in front of the magical cabinet door that made
dog treats appear and disappear. Standing on his hind legs, Spunky clawed at the plastic
container as Olivia drew out two of the recently purchased bone-shaped doggie treats
that always reminded her of cutout cookies. She broke the bones in two and slid them
across the kitchen floor. While Spunky chased the
pieces and devoured them one by one, Olivia gathered his leash and a couple plastic
bags.

When he saw the leash, Spunky trotted over to his mistress. He squirmed with excitement
as she slipped his fluffy head and front legs through the harness. “Hey, don’t get
your fur in a bunch,” Olivia said as she tried to secure the leash. “There, done.
No thanks to you, you squirmy little…” Spunky gazed up at her with warm brown eyes
full of innocence and adoration. “You are such a little con artist, and I fall for
it every time.” She ruffled the long, silky hair nearly hiding his eyes.

“Okay, let’s go.” As Olivia said those hopeful words, the kitchen phone rang. She
hesitated, tempted to let it go. Most people called her cell first. Unless…Olivia
picked up her cell phone, which she’d set on the counter to charge. Only it wasn’t
plugged in. And the battery was dead. Again. Meanwhile, she had listened through her
voice mail spiel on the kitchen phone.

The message began with a deep and familiar sigh. “All right, Livie, I get the point,”
Maddie said. “I didn’t know you hated ‘Chapel of Love’ so much. Would you please turn
your cell back on? We’ve got a situation—”

Olivia grabbed the telephone receiver. “What situation?”

“Wait, you were monitoring
my
call?”

“Come on, Maddie, I wasn’t really monitoring—”

“
And
you turned off your cell to avoid me? All because you hate the Dixie Cups? You do
realize ‘Chapel of Love’ hit the top of the charts in 1964. Or are you mad at me for
some reason?”

“Maddie, I’m not mad at you. I like ‘Chapel of Love,’ I own all the Dixie Cups CDs,
my
mother
loved the Dixie Cups.
What situation
?”

“Oh right, the situation,” Maddie said. “Well, it’s Jennifer.
She disappeared again. Herbie’s aunt Len…I mean Lenora Dove, just stuck her head in
the kitchen and asked where everybody was. I ran out to the sales floor, and Jennifer
wasn’t there. Not anywhere. I checked the cookbook nook and the entryway and even
the backyard. No Jennifer. And no note. You might want to get down here right away.”

“Where was Bertha?”

“She’s helping me in the kitchen. Jennifer insisted she could handle the floor alone.”

“Could Bertha fill in on the floor for fifteen minutes? I promised Spunky a run in
the park. He hasn’t been out today.” At the sound of his name, Spunky whined and tried
to jump up Olivia’s leg.

“Um, well…it’s kind of even more complicated. Lenora brought a couple friends along,
and they’re famous or something, or one of them is famous. I never got hooked on soaps,
so…”

Olivia groaned. At Pete’s Diner that morning, her own mother had arranged for Allan
to drive Lenora to the airport to pick up a couple of Hollywood friends. Lenora must
have brought them to the store to show them off.

“Anyway,” Maddie said, “a customer recognized Lenora’s friend, the famous one. She
ran out into the park and started telling everyone that he—whose name I can’t remember,
but I’ll admit he’s hunky. Although nothing compared to Lucas…What was I saying? Oh
yeah, the customer was Polly Franz, and you know she can get out about a million words
a minute. So The Gingerbread House is filling up really fast. I’m thinking of calling
Del for crowd control.”

Polly Franz ran the Chatterley Heights food shelf and was well known for her ability
to talk nonstop without pausing for breath. “Don’t bother Del about this,” Olivia
said. “I’ll be right down. I’m sure the excitement will wane
eventually, and maybe we’ll get a few sales out of it.” After she hung up, Olivia
removed Spunky’s leash. “I’m so sorry, Spunks. Our run will have to wait for a while.
I’d take you downstairs with me, but apparently the entire town of Chatterley Heights
is currently occupying the store. I know crowds make you nervous, plus there’s that
little escape trick you like to pull. You’ll have to stay up here for now. I promise
to come back once everything returns to normal, or what passes for normal in this
town.”

Spunky whimpered, whined, and begged. As Olivia returned his leash to its hook, the
poor pup sank to the floor as if he’d given up on life.

“Nice try.” Olivia bent over and rubbed his ears. “You must be exhausted after all
that work. Take a nap.”

Olivia plugged in her dead cell phone and headed toward the living room. Before leaving
her apartment, she glanced out her front window, which looked down on the town square.
She saw a thin but steady stream of Chatterley Heights citizens funneling in the general
direction of The Gingerbread House.

With a sudden sense of urgency, Olivia locked the front door behind her and hurried
down the stairs. When she unlocked the door at the bottom of the staircase, she found
three people in the foyer. She locked the staircase door and followed them into the
store.

Bertha was the first to spot her. “Oh, Livie, I’m so relieved you’re back. Maddie
is usually good at handling swarms of people, but she’s upset about something. I’m
not sure what.”

“Maybe she’s upset about Jennifer disappearing again?” Olivia scanned the crowd, which
was no worse than the biggest event they’d ever hosted. She noticed there were even
a few men. The Gingerbread House rarely attracted men, though special store events
sometimes brought in
more. They might show up for the cookies and coffee, then slip out. Olivia didn’t
see either enticement on hand. Nor did she see her friend and business partner.

“Speaking of Maddie, where is she?” Olivia asked.

“I think she’s in the kitchen.” Bertha was about the same height as Olivia, five foot
seven, so both were able to see over many of the visitors’ heads. Maddie was not in
sight, but Lenora Tucker and her two Hollywood friends stood together in the warm
sunshine that radiated through the large window facing the park. Olivia was quite
sure their location was not accidental. They couldn’t have chosen a better spot to
see and be seen. Tiny Lenora Tucker (stage name: Lenora Dove) stood between two men,
her arms interlinked with theirs. The men, one tall and the other a couple inches
shorter, faced away from Lenora as if they wanted to escape but couldn’t break the
iron grip of a ninety-pound woman who was well beyond fifty, though she would never
admit her age.

“How have sales been since these folks appeared?” Olivia asked.

Bertha crossed her arms over her stomach, which had slowly shrunk since she and Mr.
Willard had found each other. “Dreadful,” she said. “Worse than the Tuesday last winter
when we had that awful blizzard.”

“Nobody came to the store that day,” Olivia said. “As I remember, we sold one cookie
cutter, and you were the customer who bought it. You wouldn’t even take your employee
discount.”

“I felt terrible when you sent me home early and insisted on paying me for a full
day. And you call yourself a hardheaded businesswoman.” Bertha’s stern tone came from
many years spent raising two boisterous and rather spoiled boys who were not her own.

As several more gawkers crowded into the store, Olivia decided it was time to take
action. “Let’s have a little talk with these Hollywood folks…assuming we can crawl
close enough to make ourselves heard.”

“Let me go first,” Bertha said. “I’m bigger.”

With a firm smile and relentless pressure, Bertha cleared a path toward the three
celebrities—if they counted Lenora, which Olivia supposed they ought to do—who were
holding court by the window. Nearby, Olivia saw the flash of a camera. Sure enough,
Binnie Sloan and her niece, Ned, were slithering through the throng, gathering twistable
quotes and embarrassing photos for
The Weekly Chatter
and the evil blog it had spawned.

Finally, Olivia got a good look at the taller of the two men standing with Lenora.
If Olivia thought she was too mature to do a double take at the sight of an attractive
man, she was wrong. She assumed he must be Trevor Lane, star of
Midnights in Manhattan.
Broad shouldered and lean, he was the type of man who looked great in…well, just
about anything. He wore a tan cashmere sweater, sleeves pushed up to emphasize elegant
hands and nicely shaped wrists. His forearms were firm without the bulge of excessive
muscle, as if he exercised just enough and no more.

Bertha pushed to the front of the crowd, and Olivia scurried to catch up with her.
Finally, Olivia was able to get a clear look at Trevor’s face. He had classic features,
almost too perfect, with a strong jaw and cheekbones. His dark brown hair looked thick
and natural. The overhead lighting revealed emerald green eyes, although Olivia suspected
they owed their intensity, and perhaps their color, to contact lenses. She guessed
Trevor’s age to be early thirties, given the length of his career. So far, the years
had been kind to him, adding definition to his features. Trevor Lane
was, Olivia admitted, the most gorgeous man she had ever encountered. Either he was
very lucky, or he’d found a supremely skilled plastic surgeon.

Olivia’s mother materialized at her side. “Hello, dear,” Ellie said. “I saw you working
your way through the adoring crowd. Although you did stop and stare for such a long
time, I wondered if you had suddenly frozen, like Snow White.”

If Olivia possessed a skin tone inclined to blush, she would have. “Snow White ate
a poisoned apple, Mom. She didn’t freeze.”

“You were always so precise about details.” Ellie looked especially petite and graceful
in a silky, pale pink skirt that wrapped around her slender hips and tied with a thin
ribbon. A matching top with loose sleeves tied at her waist. Underneath she wore a
black leotard and tights.

Olivia glanced at her mother’s feet. “You aren’t wearing your tap shoes.”

“How observant, dear. My enthusiasm for tap dance has not waned, if that’s worrying
you. As it happens, I’d just finished my ballet lesson when word reached me about
the population movement toward The Gingerbread House.”

Word always seemed to reach Ellie, usually without any effort on her part. Olivia
had given up trying to figure out how she did it.

“Would you like to meet Trevor and Dougie?” Ellie asked. “I see Trevor is putting
his pen away, so I assume he is signaling the end of his appearance. He and his friend
intend to stay in town for a week or so. There will be plenty of time to satisfy everyone’s
craving for a Trevor Lane autograph. I’m sure he would be willing to sign for you
right now, though.”

“I couldn’t care less about autographs,” Olivia said.

“Of course not, dear. Only it would mean a great deal to Lenora. She is so thrilled
that Trevor and Dougie have
come to visit her. She misses the excitement of her former life. And, of course, she
misses her husband. Lenora and Bernie Bouchenbein were truly a love match, no matter
what anyone says.”

The audience dispersed quickly as Lenora guided the two men toward the store kitchen.
Olivia hadn’t seen Maddie in the adoring crowd. Bertha was no longer in front of her
and hadn’t gone back behind the cash register, which wasn’t like her…though no customers
were lined up to pay for purchases, so it didn’t matter. “Mom, have you seen Maddie
or Bertha?”

“Bertha headed toward the cookbook nook with a customer, and I believe Maddie stayed
in the kitchen to work on cookies. I’m afraid she was rather miffed at Lenora for
demanding refreshments. I do enjoy Lenora,” Ellie said, “but she can be exasperating
at times.”

“We should probably make sure no fights break out in the kitchen,” Olivia said. “Bertha
will send an SOS if any actual customers show up.”

“Lucas is in the kitchen.” Ellie paused at the sales counter to adjust her wraparound
skirt. “His presence will keep Maddie calm. The faucet was dripping or something like
that, so he dropped by to fix it.” She hooked her arm around Olivia’s elbow. “Come
on, I’ll introduce you.”

“I hate to admit this, but I barely noticed Trevor’s companion,” Olivia said.

“I’m sure Dougie is used to that, dear.”

As they entered the kitchen, Olivia could feel the tension in the air. One look at
Maddie’s face told her the source. Lenora was busy appropriating decorated cookies,
meant for the engagement party, and arranging them on a plate. She glanced up briefly
and said, “Do brew us a fresh pot of coffee, Maddie. There’s a dear.”

Maddie’s pale, freckled cheeks reddened. She crossed her arms and glared at Lenora’s
back, but she said nothing. Nor did she pour the existing coffee, a nearly full pot,
into the kitchen sink, where her fiancé, Lucas Ashford, wrench in hand, was listening
to the rhythmic drip from the faucet. Olivia suspected her best friend since age ten
of angling for a fight.