“Or me,” agreed Vanessa.

  “The killer had to know they weren’t making it to the finals if they’re on the crew,” said Tammy. “Someone write that down!”

  Jay found a couple of Sharpies in the kitchen, and jogged back, clearly thrilled. He passed one to Sara, apparently appointing themselves as the writers. As for me, I felt like the host of a very weird game.

  “You’ve spent the most time with the contestants,” said Jaclyn to me. “What do you know about them?”

  “Uh, Robin just got divorced. Alyssa and I met her ex-husband and he seems nice. They stayed friendly,” I said. “She was in her late thirties. Oh! She was planning to travel the world.”

  “Robin. Divorced. 30’s. Travel,” said Jay, scrawling her name, then adding the words underneath.

  “Boyfriend?” asked Bridget.

  “None that anyone knows about,” said Alyssa. “The ex-husband thinks she would have told him.”

  “Isn’t it always the husband?” asked Vanessa.

  Alyssa shook her head. “I checked. He was definitely out of town.”

  “Could Robin have had a secret fling on set? A jealous lover?” asked Tammy.

  “Write it down,” I said, waving to Jay who hurried to do that, adding large question marks. “Although I don’t know who that could be! I can’t see George as her secret affair partner.”

  “Maybe someone on the crew?” suggested Jay, writing it.

  “Could Robin and Penny share a lover?” asked Tammy.

  “This isn’t one of your crazy romance novels,” said Vanessa, smacking her twin’s knee.

  “Sounds more like a thriller,” said Tammy.

  “Doesn’t sound plausible,” I decided. “Why would he kill them both? More likely they’d kill him for being a double-crossing jerk! What about Penny? She’s in her forties, I think. She was married and they have a daughter. The daughter was listed as the next of kin.”

  “That’s strange, isn’t it? Why not list her husband?” asked Ally.

  “Writing it down,” said Sara, starting a new column for Penny.

  “Penny might have been cheating,” I said and they all started gasping again and asking questions. “No, not on her husband. She started arguing with the judges when she was eliminated and she threatened Rebecca. Beth accused her of cheating in an earlier round and Declan thought she might have as well.”

  “I’m searching for Robin online,” said Ally, staring at her phone. “There’s an article here in her local newspaper about how excited she was to go on the show and eager to make it to the finals. And there’s another one about a fundraiser she baked cakes for. They raised a lot of money for an animal rescue charity. Oh, she has an Instagram… oh, wow. She had a home business making wedding cakes. They’re so pretty!”

  “Getting ideas?” asked Meredith, nudging her and Ally laughed.

  “Penny doesn’t seem to have an online presence,” said Vanessa, also engrossed in her phone screen. “But I found a gossip blog that talks about the show and someone put a post a couple days ago saying Penny cheated her way to the finals. From the level of detail, it seems credible.”

  “I didn’t find out much more than that either,” said Alyssa, adding, “And I’ve been digging. The cheating allegations must come from someone who knows Penny.”

  “That had to be someone on the crew or a disgruntled contestant,” I said. “The latter would have a motive to discredit her like that.”

  “Sour grapes?” asked Tammy.

  “Possibly, but I think we should write down cheating. There are multiple allegations against her,” I said, nodding to Sara. She wrote “cheat” under Penny’s name.

  “Surely the judges would have noticed a cheat,” said Jaclyn. “What happens if they suspect it?”

  I thought about it for a moment. “I think it depends on how the cheating happened. If it’s the presentation or the taste, they would probably notice, although humans aren’t foolproof. One of the contestants on this show swears Penny used honey in a vegan recipe, but we can’t prove that.” I thought back to when the judges huddled together as the cameras filmed their conversation. We wouldn’t find out what they said until the episode aired. “I wish we could ask the judges.”

  “Maybe you should,” said Jaclyn. “You’ve said how nice they all are. Perhaps you should ask them about Penny.”

  “I will,” I decided, “Leo and Jack have been great, but I did hear Penny and Rebecca having an argument after the elimination. We’re still left with the problem of why anyone would choose those two women to kill. Neither were going to win so it wasn’t to remove them from the competition.”

  “I’ll ask Jack later,” said Ally, “and I’ll call you if there’s anything pertinent.”

  “They’re both women,” suggested Jay. “I don’t think we should discount that.”

  I shivered. “No one killed Beth or me,” I pointed out. “Plus, there are women on the crew, and Rebecca too.”

  “Could be a crime of opportunity,” persisted Jay. “The women were both alone, right?”

  “Correct,” I agreed.

  “Someone on the message board I’m reading says they went to high school with Penny in Bangor, Maine. They said she always wanted to be a chef and she went to catering school after they graduated,” said Vanessa. “They say she was a good cook and used to coordinate the canned food drive for a homeless shelter on behalf of their school.”

  “That’s nice,” murmured Tammy. “Doesn’t Rebecca come from Maine?”

  “She does. I read in Best Bakes about her moving away to Pennsylvania when she was in high school but driving back to Maine every summer to visit her family,” I said, reaching for the magazine where I’d left it on the coffee table. I thumbed to the interview and passed it to Tammy.

  “That’s a tenuous connection from Penny to someone on the show,” said Jay. He drew a line from Penny to Rebecca.

  “But is it enough? Both Penny and Robin live in this state and that connects them to all the contestants,” I said.

  “What about that argument you heard?” asked Jaclyn.

  “Penny sounded like she was threatening her,” I said.

  “Oooh,” said Jay, adding the word “threatened” to the connecting line. “What about Robin? Did you ever see her arguing with anyone?”

  “I don’t know that Robin and Rebecca even spoke off set, but Robin was wearing Rebecca’s jacket when she was killed.”

  Sara’s eyes widened and she quickly drew another line connecting Robin and Rebecca.

  “I just searched for Penny in connection with Bangor in case she and Rebecca went to the same school or something because I figured they’re not too far apart in age but all I found was a memorial page. Penny’s best friend was killed in a hit and run during their senior year. The driver never came forward. That’s so sad!” sighed Tammy. “Oh, and here’s a wedding photo with her husband. Look at that veil and those ruffles!” She turned the phone for us to see.

  “You know, when I think about Penny being accused of cheating, I can’t help thinking about Robin. It was suggested she might have been sneaking a taste of the recipes we abandoned when the generator failed,” I said. “Does that count as cheating?”

  “I don’t know,” mused Alyssa. “But since the knowledge would have given Robin the opportunity to change her recipe if she thought something was better than hers… yeah, I guess it does. She could have switched recipes at the last minute to gain a competitive edge. None of the rest of you would have had that advantage.”

  “Maybe that’s the connection,” said Sara as Jay added “cheat” to his column. Sara drew a line between “Penny,” “Robin” and “cheating.” Then she said, “Perhaps the cheating seriously enraged someone and they wanted to get rid of them once and for all!”

  “Maybe, but getting them out of the way would only benefit the competitors,” I decided. “It couldn’t have been Declan since he didn’t even know he’d get a chance to be on the show, although he was in town when Robin was killed.”

  “Maybe he killed Robin to get on the show, and then killed Penny when he realized she was cheating?” said Jaclyn. “Maybe he wanted to make sure she couldn’t complain and force the show to refilm!”

  “We shouldn’t rule him out,” added Alyssa. “Although if we can get a look at the sign-in sheet for the set on the day Robin was killed, that should confirm whether he had the opportunity or not. If he weren’t on the set, there was no way he could have done it.”

  “The gate guard or Noah would have the information but I’m not sure they would let me see it,” I said.

  Alyssa nodded. “Leave it with me.”

  “Who else was voted out?” asked Sara. “I hate to spoil the surprise by asking but I think it could be important.”

  “Mia, but she’s so sweet. She wasn’t on the set when Penny was killed. And neither was George who was voted out second,” I told them. When Alyssa opened her mouth, I added, “but I’ll check that too. That leaves me and Declan. Oh!”

  “What?” asked Vanessa. “I’m sure we all promise not to tell anyone about the eliminations.”

  “It’s not that, but I’d appreciate it. I just realized that leaves me. I was on set for both murders.” I winced as I said it only to be quickly drowned out by my friends’ reactions discounting any crazy theory that I could possibly be involved. When they calmed down, I continued, “I know I didn’t but I can’t see why Sam wouldn’t come up with the same conclusion. That’s why I need to talk to Mia and George, and then I should talk to Noah. He knows everyone! I’m sure he’ll be at the hotel with the crew and contestants by now.”

  “I’ll come,” everyone started to say, leaping to their feet but I waved them back down.

  “We can’t all go,” I said. “We’ll look like a crazy mob, braying for blood.”

  “It should be just you and me,” said Alyssa. “I’m only going to question them and that way, we can both talk to them at the same time.”

  “And they’ll actually talk to Candice,” snorted Jay.

  “She’s right,” I said when Alyssa shot him a dirty look. “I’ve spent the last few days with them but you know how to question people. Let’s go to The Maple Tree Hotel.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  The Maple Tree Hotel was teeming with people and I recognized many of the crew from the camera operators to the guy who held the boom mic. Some still wore their All Star Bakers shirts, while others had changed into fresh outfits for their downtime. But etched on all their faces was tense worry and I couldn’t help feeling concerned for them. They had to be as worried as I was… and just as suspicious.

  Even Olivia, who usually looked like she had everything under control, was pacing back and forth in the lobby, her phone pressed to her ear, a frown set deep into her forehead.

  Of the three people I wanted to see most, Mia, George, and Beth, none were present in the lobby. Well, I mostly just wanted to see two people, but I did want to speak to Beth too even though she was scary and volatile.

  Alyssa had the disadvantage in that she wasn’t totally certain of what my competitors looked like since she wasn’t a fan of the show and also didn’t have access to the set. However, she did tell me on the way over they’d given her a press pass for the finale’s filming. They also allocated a few minutes for her to be in front of the judges to get their comments, alongside other reporters.

  “I thought I’d get a couple of puff pieces out of the interviews, maybe even a fluffy feel-good headline,” she told me as we walked through the lobby, “but murder is the kind of head-turner that really sells papers.”

  “That’s a cynical way of looking at things.”

  “The Calendar Times pays me to get the stories,” Alyssa said with a small shrug. “Local people want their local news as it happens.”

  “Why don’t you go to the big newspapers with a story like this? You’re a good reporter. Why do you stay in this small town?” I asked as we passed through the lobby and into the restaurant.

  “Maybe I like it here,” she said, a touch defensively.

  “There’s Mia,” I said, pointing to the terrace where the youngest of my competitors sat on a wicker chair overlooking the gardens. She sipped from a tall glass and a book rested by her side. “Let’s talk to her first. She’s nice.”

  “Lots of people think murderers are nice. That’s why so many of them get away with it.”

  “I don’t think Mia is a murderer,” I said with a roll of my eyes.

  Mia turned to place her glass on the adjacent table, spotting me as we stepped out of the sun room adjacent to the restaurant, and waved. “Hi,” she said, when we walked over, standing up to offer me a hug. “I’m so relieved to see you’re okay. Congratulations,” she added in a whisper. “It’s kind of an open secret around here about how everyone is doing. I’m so pleased for you. And isn’t it amazing how far Declan got especially since he wasn’t even supposed to be on the show? I can’t wait to find out what his final showstopper bake will be. I’m dying to quiz him.” Then she winced and said, “Maybe dying is the wrong word to use.”

  “You haven’t seen him yet?” I asked.

  “No, not yet but I heard what happened today. The crew haven’t stopped talking about it. Why would anyone want to kill Penny?” Mia waved to the vacant chairs next to her as she dropped into her own and leaned forwards, shaking her head.

  “That’s what we want to find out,” I said. “Did you talk to Penny much off set?”

  “Not really. I hardly got time to talk to any of you, especially with everything that happened before I was eliminated. Poor Robin! I still can’t believe it! I don’t know what I can tell you. For as pleasant as Penny was on set, she ignored me here at the hotel. I barely knew her.”

  “Tell her about the cheating,” said Alyssa, nudging me.

  “Who’re you?” asked Mia, clearly affronted by the abrupt question.

  “This is Alyssa, she’s a reporter with The Calendar Times and she might be able to help us find out what’s going on. She’s promised anything she reports will be anonymous,” I added with a stern glance to remind Alyssa of our deal. “There’s a rumor that Penny cheated in the heats and again before she was eliminated. Did you see anything to confirm that?”

  Mia relaxed. “No, but I’m not sure I would. I was so focused on what I was doing. Penny was on the other side of the filming tent from me.” She frowned and continued, “Do you think she was the one who switched my butter?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, “but it seems like she might have been giving herself advantages more than giving anyone else disadvantages.”

  “I know it might have just been an accident but it doesn’t feel fair that I got voted off,” said Mia. “I’ve been pretty sour about it.”

  “Did you talk to Penny in between filming?” asked Alyssa, guiding us back to our purpose.

  “Not really, nothing beyond the usual small talk. All I know is she was very confident going into the show. She wasn’t nervous at all, unlike me. Do you know if the show is going ahead?” asked Mia, looking thoughtful. “I can’t see how they can stop filming since both you and Declan are in the finals, but it would be understandable if they did. I was so looking forward to watching from the audience. It’s the only reason I stayed, although I’m tempted to leave now that Penny’s dead. It doesn’t seem a good idea to stick around!”

  “We’ll find out later. Noah’s going to call.” I was having a hard time not checking my phone every few minutes, despite it not even vibrating an alert, just to see if he’d called or left a message. However, I wasn’t sure I even wanted to know. Axing the show would leave me full of disappointment. Yet, getting the go ahead could be scary!

  “I hope they do. I know that’s weird but there’s only one show left to film. I’m really proud I made it as far as I did and I want to see all our episodes on TV,” Mia continued.

  “Were you on set earlier?” asked Alyssa.

  “Today?” Mia shook her head quickly. “I see why you’re asking, but no, I wasn’t. As a matter of fact, something great happened that makes up for my elimination! The catering service firm here are actually based in LA and they think there might be an opening for me there with them. They got me a video call with their hiring executives this afternoon and I have a formal interview next week! I could work behind the scenes on all kinds of exciting shows.”

  “I’m so pleased for you,” I told her, listening as she mentioned a few particulars of the job and how much she hoped moving to LA could be a dream come true.

  “Me too,” said Alyssa, passing her a card, “and if you’re ever interested in talking about your experiences, I’d be happy to write your profile.”

  “That’s so kind of you.” Mia beamed.

  “Do you know where George and Beth are?” I asked.

  “Hmm, I think I saw George in the restaurant but I don’t know about Beth. To be perfectly honest, I usually avoid her. She’s not very nice and she’s been even worse since she got eliminated. I’m not even sure why she stuck around since all she does is complain.” Mia grimaced.

  I thanked Mia and we left her to her reading in the warm summer evening light. “I don’t think she’s the killer,” said Alyssa. “Her alibi will be easy to check since she says she was on a live video call. I can check the times to rule her out.”

  “I told you so,” I said, feeling smug. We entered the restaurant from the terrace and after a moment, I spotted George eating by himself.

  “May we join you?” I asked him, pausing by the table.

  George looked up, his fork hovering over his plate, then smiled warmly. “Of course you can, Candice. Your friend too! I was just thinking about you. I heard you had quite the day! Is it really true?”

 

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