Sweet Somethings (Samantha Sweet Mysteries)

Chapter
1

This festival will be the death of me yet
, thought Samantha Sweet
as she wrung the neck of a pastry bag full of chocolate icing. When she’d first
heard of Taos’s Sweet Somethings chocolate festival she envisioned a lovely
park-like atmosphere, with colorful booths displaying masses of delectable
chocolates, maybe Willie Wonka music setting the tone—something no one from
three counties would be able to resist. What she’d gotten was last-minute
responsibility for a committee that was operating weeks behind schedule.

An acquaintance of Sam’s had
recommended that she become involved and Sarah Williams, the poor lady who’d
let everything fall behind, had leaped at the suggestion with all the gusto a
four-foot tall-woman with a bad hip could manage. Sarah was a dear older lady
and they had become friends during the past few weeks—she was just not much of
an organizer. When she practically begged Sam to take over, it hadn’t been the
lure of the festival that persuaded Sam to do it; the real reason was something
else entirely, Sarah’s connection to an old woman Sam had met only once and a
carved wooden box with mystical powers. Sam had been trying for a long time to
learn more.

Now, with each tinkle of the front
door bells in her bakery showroom, Sam could hear the volume of voices increase
as her committee members arrived. Six p.m. but her day was far from finished.
She cleared the last of her tools from the worktable and picked up the thick
folder of notes from her desk. The folder flopped open and Sam scrambled to
retrieve a half-dozen small scraps of paper that drifted to the floor, the
tidbits that held the event together at this point. She shoved the notes back
into the folder and fought back a wave of panic.

How did I let myself get talked into this, especially on such short
notice?
She pushed through the curtain separating the kitchen from the
showroom and willed the corners of her mouth upward.

“Sam! Thank you. Can we get the
meeting underway now?” Carinda Carter pushed forward through the group and met
Sam with a challenge in her stare. It was the way Carinda approached
everything, Sam had discovered—long on assertiveness and short on tact. ‘Thank
you’ coming from Carinda implied ‘thank you for finally showing up.’

“Is everyone here?” Sam scanned the
faces in the room. In addition to herself, Carinda and Sarah, the committee
consisted of Harvey Byron who owned a boutique ice cream shop on the Taos Plaza
and two of Sam’s trusted friends, Rupert Penrick and Erica Davis-Jones. Riki,
as she was known, owned the dog grooming business next door. Sam’s daughter, Kelly,
worked for Riki and often pitched in with the committee work as well. Sam
spotted Riki and Kelly through the front windows so she called the meeting to
order.

“Okay—reports,” she said. “Rupert?”

“The venue is set—
finally
got the signed contract for the
Bella Vista Hotel. I tell you, girl, it was a challenge to get the manager to
sit down for two seconds.” He handed a few pages to Sam.

She knew she would get an earful of
details later but, truthfully, she didn’t care. The original plan to hold the
chocolate festival at Kit Carson Park had fallen through, then the weather
forecast called for temperatures in the nineties and it turned out the
convention center was already booked. She’d pulled in every contact she could
think of to find a place with the right ambiance and location. The Bella Vista Hotel
was actually outside of town—located in a bucolic spot with the Rio Fernando running
beside it—but at least it had a ballroom large enough to accommodate most of
the vendors. The park-like setting could provide additional places for outdoor
booths where non-meltable products might go. Now to entice the crowds to this
somewhat out-of-the-way place.

Carinda Carter was twitching in
her seat at one of Sam’s bistro tables and had her hand in the air.

“Yes, Carinda? Can you fill us in
on how the designs are coming along?”

The rail-thin woman stood up, sent
Rupert a long look—as if the delay in securing the venue were all his fault—gave
a toss of her chin-length auburn hair, and picked up a poster-sized sheet of
paper. She held it up for all to admire.

“The logo, as you can see, places
whimsical hearts and swirls against a rich background of purple. I’ve shaded
the lettering to represent all varieties of chocolate, from a creamy white to a
deep brown. Details—here you see Sweet Somethings in large type.” She ran a
finger across the face of the poster, like one of those super models who point
out the prizes on TV game shows. “The dates—nice and large, just here. All I
was waiting on was the name of the venue—” Another glare toward Rupert. “I will
fill that in and get it to the printer in Santa Fe as soon as I can. Of course
the tickets, the programs, banners and vendor ID badges will all follow the
same theme. I only hope that our printer hasn’t booked so much other work that
he can’t get to ours now that we’re running so late.”

Carinda faced Rupert again and
opened her mouth, but the large man was not known for taking guff from anyone.
He met her challenge with a steely gaze.

Sam swallowed a retort. “I’m sure
there are many printers. We’ll find someone.” She cleared her throat and turned
to Kelly. “How about the radio ads?”

Kelly consulted a list. “We’ve
booked five days of spots with KVSN during their ‘Taste of Taos’ show and their
‘Visions’ program. Since the festival benefits charity, I got them to double
the number of ads at no additional cost. We’ll be running these the two days
leading up to the festival and the three days during. And we’ve got Riki lined
up to do interviews with stations in Santa Fe and Albuquerque.”

Although Riki wasn’t directly
involved as a vendor or participant, the British transplant had such a charming
accent that people always listened. She would be excellent as the voice of the
festival.

“Good job.” Sam preened a little
on her daughter’s behalf. “Rupert, I believe you have something else for us?”

Never one to shy away from the
limelight, the six-foot man in the purple tunic and soft beret stood up and
sent another glare toward Carinda.

“I do have some exciting news.
Early this morning I received the letter of agreement—and, I might add, a
check—from
Qualitätsschokolade
, the
famed Swiss chocolate manufacturer, as the official sponsor of our festival,
and the provider of prize money!”

A murmur went through the group.

“With what they sent we will be
able to award two thousand dollars …”

A ripple of wows.

“… for third place. Three thousand
for second place. And a stunning five thousand dollars for first place!”

A collective gasp. Kelly, Riki and
Carinda were scribbling notes.

“Additionally, I pulled in a favor
from the editor of the summer tour guide to do a cover spread and feature story
on the winner of the People’s Choice award.”

Carinda almost came out of her seat.
“We never talked about—”

Sam held up a hand. “It was an
idea Rupert came up with after our last meeting. Letting the crowds vote on a
favorite item—it encourages their participation. The magazine story—wow—an
excellent prize.”

Carinda gave a semi-gracious smile
and leaned back in her chair.

Rupert wasn’t finished. “I have
also contacted the bestselling novelist Victoria DeVane, who has graciously
consented to provide medals of gold, silver and bronze to go along with the
prize money.
And
she says we may hold
a raffle, with the prize winner’s name to be used in Victoria’s next book.” He
sent a smug look toward Carinda. “
That
should
bring in some extra money.”

Sam covered her own smile by
looking down at her folder of notes. She was the only one who knew that Rupert
himself was the famed writer. It didn’t matter; the important thing was that
finally it looked as if the festival really would come together and it would be
a prestigious one at that.

Harvey Byron spoke up. “Will the
prizes be limited to candy or pastries?”

“Any item containing
Qualitätsschokolade
products will
qualify.”

Harvey’s wheels seemed to be
turning. Sam imagined that his popular brownie nugget dark chocolate supreme
ice cream would soon—if it didn’t already—contain chunks of the Swiss maker’s
own delectable cacao bars. An award, especially if it came with a magazine
write-up, might be the thing to launch Harv’s dream of expanding his ice cream
shops statewide and eventually nationwide. The tall, slender man had confided
this in his reticent manner once when Sam had stopped by Ice Cream Social for a
cone. He was a nice guy, she’d decided, with soft brown eyes and sandy hair;
she just didn’t see the hard-driving personality that would propel his business
to the national level.

Rupert hadn’t sat down yet.
“Carinda, you’ll need to add the prize information to the poster. Oh, and
change that background to royal blue, the sponsor’s color.”

Carinda sputtered and put on her
martyr face, making it clear that she felt saddled with the burden of
last-minute changes. No one but Sam seemed to notice.

Kelly spoke up. “Should we put out
a call for entries, try to get more vendors?”

Sam looked toward Rupert.

“Ooh. Limited basis, okay? We’re
already pushing our limits since the Bella Vista venue is a lot smaller than
the places we originally considered.”

“I’ll do one quick advance press
release.”

Carinda faced Kelly. “Can you
handle that? I mean,
I
really have
the experience.”

“I’ll be fine.” Kelly’s voice came
through clenched teeth.

Sam looked back at Rupert again.
“So, our vendor signups are coming in?”

“Better than expected. Of course
you’ll be there, right? Sweet’s Sweets is the best bakery for a hundred miles.”

Sam had been working on a few new
recipes, herself. “Becky and Julio have been baking up a storm. We will
definitely have a booth.” Another aspect of this whole thing that she’d never
done before—setting up displays and sales staff outside of her own bakery. “But
I won’t enter the competition for the prizes. It doesn’t seem right since I
chair the committee.”

Did she only imagine a satisfied smirk
on Carinda’s face? For someone new in town, the little whippet had certainly
inserted herself quickly where she hadn’t been invited.

The discussion turned to
decorations, where Sarah Williams had agreed to take charge by forming her own
little subcommittee of older ladies who enjoyed making garlands and flower
arrangements and such. That group would also arrange for people to serve as
ticket-takers at the gate when the show opened.

When the conversation trailed off
into specifics about what colors the flowers should be, Sam tapped her pen on
the table top.

“I’m sure everyone is eager to get
home but there’s one more item for tonight.” She thought of her husband; recently,
poor Beau had prepared his own dinner more nights than she wanted to admit.

“Judges. Especially now that there
is prize money on the line, this will be important.”

She turned to Harvey, the
committee member she had assigned to the task last week, but Carinda piped up
first.

“I’ll be happy to judge,” she
said. “I was told by the chocolatier at Le Patisserie in Paris that I have an
excellent palate.”

“Thank you, Carinda, but if we can
find outsiders I think that will give the necessary impartiality.”

The woman sank back in her seat,
her mouth once more forming a straight line. Sam turned to Harvey again.

“Well, I’m still working on it,”
he said, a nervous tic working at the corner of his mouth. “So far, I’ve asked
two people but I don’t have commitments yet.”

“Can you call me when you know for
sure, Harv?” She looked up at the group as a whole. “It’s only a week, folks,
and we have a lot to do. Feel free to call me with updates, and let’s plan to
meet again on Thursday.”

Chairs scraped and feet shuffled.
Sarah Williams edged past Kelly and Riki and touched Sam’s arm.

“I’m so sorry I flaked out. This
has put a lot of work on your shoulders.”

It had, but Sam didn’t see much
point in acknowledging the fact.

“Mary Raintree told me that you
were hoping to talk with me about Bertha Martinez and I’m so sorry we haven’t
found a minute to do that yet,” Sarah said. “I apprenticed under Bertha, you
know, before I went to college and became a nurse. She was a wonderful healer
and even in my practice of Western medicine I frequently used her techniques.
Many of my older patients preferred the old ways.”

A wistful look came over her face.
“I’ve often wondered about an old box she had. She kept herbs in it. Bertha
told me the box had made a great journey.”

Sam felt a rush of excitement—
this
was the subject she’d really wanted
to discuss. She had briefly met Mary Raintree a few weeks ago in her quest to
learn more about the powers of a wooden box that had been given to her by a
local woman believed to be a witch. Mary, herself a practitioner of Wicca, had
pretty well convinced Sam that Bertha Martinez was actually a
curandera
in the old Hispanic tradition.
Now she was beginning to understand why Mary thought it would be a good idea
for her to speak with Sarah.

“I can see that you know of it,”
Sarah said.

Sam glanced sideways; the other
committee members were too near.

“We will talk about it later.” Sarah
patted Sam’s arm then turned to leave.

“Yes, I definitely want to.” Sam
watched the older woman walk out the door. Finally—she would get the answers
she had been seeking.

Chapter
2