Plum dead, p.1
Plum Dead, page 1
part #8 of Freshly Baked Series
Plum Dead
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery
by
Kathleen Suzette
Copyright © 2020 by Kathleen Suzette. All rights reserved. This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination, or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronically or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author or publisher.
Books by Kathleen Suzette:
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery Series
Clam Chowder and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 1
A Short Stack and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 2
Cherry Pie and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 3
Barbecue and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 4
Birthday Cake and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 5
Hot Cider and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 6
Roast Turkey and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 7
Gingerbread and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 8
Fish Fry and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 9
Cupcakes and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 10
Lemon Pie and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 11
Pasta and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 12
Chocolate Cake and a Murder
A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 13
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery Series
Candy Coated Murder
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 1
Murderously Sweet
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 2
Chocolate Covered Murder
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 3
Death and Sweets
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 4
Sugared Demise
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 5
Confectionately Dead
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 6
Hard Candy and a Killer
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 7
Candy Kisses and a Killer
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 8
Terminal Taffy
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 9
Fudgy Fatality
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 10
Truffled Murder
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 11
Caramel Murder
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 12
Peppermint Fudge Killer
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 13
Chocolate Heart Killer
A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 14
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery Series
Apple Pie A La Murder,
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 1
Trick or Treat and Murder,
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 2
Thankfully Dead
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 3
Candy Cane Killer
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 4
Ice Cold Murder
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 5
Love is Murder
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 6
Strawberry Surprise Killer
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 7
Plum Dead
A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, book 8
A Gracie Williams Mystery Series
Pushing Up Daisies in Arizona,
A Gracie Williams Mystery, Book 1
Kicked the Bucket in Arizona,
A Gracie Williams Mystery, Book 2
A Home Economics Mystery Series
Appliqued to Death
A Home Economics Mystery, book 1
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Sneak Peek
Chapter One
“I can hardly believe it,” Lucy said. She was looking up at the brilliant blue sky, her floppy straw hat tipped back on her head. Her short blond hair poked out beneath the hat.
“Can’t believe what?” I asked as I grabbed the beach umbrella from the backseat. It had a telescoping pole and was a perfect fit for my car. I slammed the back door and turned to her.
“The sky is such a beautiful blue,” she said, looking at me and nodding. “This is the perfect day to go to the beach. You had a great idea.”
“I told you the rain wouldn’t last forever,” I said and popped my trunk open. Lucy Gray was my best friend. We had been talking about a beach trip for days, and now that the weather had cleared, we were finally getting the chance to go.
“Oh Allie,” she said, coming to stand beside me and peering into the trunk. “It looks like you packed everything but the kitchen sink.”
I chuckled and picked up a beach tote and handed it to her. “I may have. I brought a sweet beach romance novel, a scrumptious lunch for both of us, and lots of sunscreen, so there’s no need to hurry home today.”
“You brought lunch?” she asked, reaching into the trunk to pick up another tote.
“Sure did. I made us roast beef sandwiches, potato salad, fruit salad, and apple pie for dessert. How does that sound?”
She grinned. “That sounds wonderful,” she said. “You really know how to make a girl happy.”
I picked up the small ice chest and slammed the trunk lid. We headed for the sand as a seagull called and swooped down near my head. “Wow,” I said. “It must have heard me say roast beef sandwich.”
“No, it’s the apple pie they heard,” she said and chuckled.
We made our way across the beach, our feet sinking into the warm sand. “I love summer. It never lasts long enough for me.”
She nodded. “Not around here, it doesn’t. The snow will be back before we know it.”
In Sandy Harbor, Maine, we had more than our fair share of snow for a large part of the year. And while I loved the snow, as beautiful as it was, there’s nothing like a Maine summer. The blue skies and the warm sun were absolutely perfect. It got hot during the summers, but not blazingly hot like in some parts of the country, and for that I was thankful.
We had decided to get an early start, and I was glad of it. This time of the morning, the beach was beautiful, pristine, and not overly crowded. We would probably stay long enough to eat lunch and then leave when the beach got crowded.
I was a runner, but the sand was giving my legs a workout. Running in the sand used to be a part of my routine, but I hadn’t done it in some time. I needed to get back to it. “Where do you want to sit?”
Lucy put one hand to her forehead to shield her eyes from the sun and glanced around. “What about over there,” she said pointing to an area not far from where we were. There weren’t any other beachgoers there, and I thought it would be perfect.
“Looks good,” I said.
Within a few minutes, we made it to the spot she had picked out, and I set the cooler down and planted the umbrella in the sand to block out much of the sun.
Lucy began spreading the two towels out, and then she sat down on one of them. “I brought a cozy mystery to read. I’ve been intending to buy this book for weeks, but it seemed like something came up every time I tried to go to the book store, and then it was sold out. They got a copy of it in yesterday, just in time.”
“I feel like I never get enough reading done,” I said and sat down. I removed my beach cover-up and dug my book out of my bag.
Lucy eyed me. “A bikini?”
I glanced at her, still covered up. “Yes, a bikini. I’m not that old. Well, I guess maybe some people would think so, but thankfully, running keeps me in decent condition.” I was forty-something, and my bikini days weren’t quite behind me yet. My red hair had gotten longer over the spring, so I wound it up and clipped it to the top of my head so it wouldn’t blow wildly in the breeze.
She chuckled and lay back on her towel. “I don’t blame you. I wish I had kept up with the running when I tried it last year, but you know how I am. I can’t seem to stick to anything.”
I smiled and began applying sunscreen. “Once you get into the habit, it’s not so bad. It’s getting into the habit that’s the hard part.”
“So what’s Alec doing today?” she asked.
“I think he has a job with the police department. Something about a break-in down at the grocery store.”
My fiancé, Alec Blanchard, had been a detective with the local police department, but at the beginning of the year, he had retired and become a private investigator. I preferred his role as a private investigator. The police chief always looked at me askance when I showed up to help Alec out on his cases. Not that I had a
“There was a break-in at the grocery store? I hope they didn’t get much.”
I shook my head and put my sunglasses back on. “I don’t think so. The alarms sounded and scared the burglars off, but they did some damage to one of the back doors.”
“Is he getting much work with the police department these days?”
“It comes and goes,” I said. “Sometimes they give him quite a bit, and then sometimes he doesn’t hear from them for weeks.” Alec would have preferred to get cases on his own, but the police work paid well, so he didn’t complain.
“I guess in a way that’s good, that means Sandy Harbor is safe from crime.”
I chuckled. “That or people are just getting sneakier and getting away with it.” My bet was on the latter.
“I guess that’s a possibility,” she agreed. She reached for the sunscreen and began applying it to her face and neck.
Lucy and I had been friends since I had moved to Maine from Alabama. I’d married Thaddeus McSwain fresh out of college, and we moved here to his hometown. But Thaddeus had been killed by a drunk driver eight years ago. I had written a blog on grief for years after his passing, but last year it struck me that it seemed almost as if constantly writing about grief kept me stuck there somehow. Meeting and falling in love with Alec had given me the courage to finally end the blog. I still checked on it from time to time, and there was still some traffic going to it, but it had been months since I had published anything new and the visitors were dwindling. It made me sad, but at the same time, it felt like that was the way it was supposed to be. I had grieved, probably longer than was necessary, and it was time to move on. I hoped the people I had helped were also moving on. And the new people that needed help with grieving? I hoped they would find someone to help them through it.
I lay back on the towel and opened my book. Two children laughed and screamed as they chased one another in the surf down the beach a ways, and I glanced over at them. My own children, Jennifer and Thad, had loved the beach. For a moment I felt a twinge of something bittersweet as I watched the girl and boy play. Thaddeus had loved the beach as well, and we spent nearly every weekend during the summers here when the kids were little. But Thad had grown up and was in college in Wisconsin, and Jennifer was at a college an hour away from here. Being a homebody, she made frequent trips home. But because Thad was so far away, I didn’t get to see him nearly as much.
Lucy yawned. “Excuse me,” she said with a chuckle. “The sun feels so good I could just about take a nap.”
“It’s wonderful,” I said and glanced again at the two children playing. Alec didn’t have any children, and he seemed content in that. He’d had a failed marriage years ago and said he had never met anyone that he wanted to be with until he met me. It was sweet, but I wondered if deep down he missed not having a family.
Lucy scooted around on her towel.
“What are you doing?” I asked, looking over at her.
“I can’t get comfortable,” she said. “I should have smoothed out the sand before I laid the towel on top of it.”
I chuckled. “Sand is sneaky that way. You better keep an eye on it or it will end up in your swimsuit.”
She moved the towel over and began smoothing out the sand again and then laid the towel back down on it. “Now then, that should do it.”
“You should do that for me, too,” I said as I scrunched down on my towel, trying to force the sand to move beneath me.
“Before we leave I want to stop by the candy store. I want saltwater taffy.”
“A trip to the beach isn’t complete without a trip to the candy store,” I agreed and turned the page of my book. “I wouldn’t mind getting some of those big bonbons that Bing’s has.” I had a candy addiction, and for the most part I kept it out of the house, but a trip to the beach meant a trip to the candy store.
“Do you know what you should do? You should make candy,” she said, looking over at me. “Think about it. It would give your business a whole new avenue for sales.”
I chuckled. “That’s a no on that one. I’ve made candy from time to time, and it’s a lot of work. Very exacting work.” When I’d closed down the blog, I’d begun baking desserts for a local restaurant, Henry’s Home Cooking Restaurant. I enjoyed doing it, but as soon as I got started, a fancy French restaurant opened up in town, selling French pastries. It put a dent in my sales. But I started a baking blog to add to my income, and I had the insurance money from when Thaddeus had died, so I was okay financially. I did a lot of baking every day for the restaurant, and things were finally beginning to pick up again. I hoped it continued.
Lucy got up again and tried smoothing out the sand.
“What are you doing?” I asked, eyeing her.
She shook her head and looked at me, exasperated. “I don’t know why I’m having trouble with the sand today. It’s so uncomfortable. I must be getting old.”
I chuckled. “You’re not getting old. You’re a spring chicken.”
She laughed and shook her head. “And you’re a liar.”
I laughed again. Lucy was six years older than me, and that put her in her early fifties. And since I would be approaching my fifties in a few years, I knew that fifty wasn’t old.
She straightened out the towel and laid it down again. Then she sat down and sighed, her eyes moving across the beach. She squinted for a minute. “Allie, what’s that over there.”
I put my book down and looked in the direction she was pointing. There was something large covered in seaweed on the beach. “I don’t know, I didn’t notice it when we first got here.”
“I don’t know how we missed it,” she said. “Do you think it’s a seal?”
“Probably so,” I said, turning back to my book. Occasionally a seal that had died out at sea would wash up on the shore. I went back to reading my book, and Lucy was quiet for a minute.
“You know Allie, I don’t know that’s a seal out there.”
I put my book down and looked in that direction again. She was right. It wasn’t shaped like a seal. It didn’t appear to be as big around as a seal would be and it was longer. “I don’t what that is.”
“Well, I can’t get comfortable here. You want to go take a look?”
I glanced at her. The last thing I want to do was go take a look at something dead that had washed up on the beach, but we had all day if we wanted, so I put my book down and sat up. “All right. Let’s go take a look.”
We got to our feet and headed in that direction. It wasn’t until we were a few feet away that I realized what it was. It was a body.
Chapter Two
“Oh. Oh. Oh.”
“Oh is right,” I said as we stared into the face of Suzanna Monreal. The very dead face of Suzanna Monreal.
“Oh,” Lucy said again and took a step back. “Oh, no.”
I glanced at her. Her face had turned pale and her eyes were large.
“I’m going to go back and get my phone and call Alec.”
She looked at me, her mouth dropping open. “What? What do you mean you’re going to go back and get your phone?”
“I’m going to go back and get my phone,” I repeated and turned around. “We have to call someone.”
“But you’re not leaving me here. Right?” She stepped closer to me.
“Stay here so those kids don’t come over here and see her. You don’t want them to see her, do you? It would be the fright of their lives.”
“Well, I don’t want to see her, either,” she said and took two more steps toward me.
“Lucy, please. Can you imagine how traumatized those children will be if they see this?”
“Can you imagine how traumatized I already am?” she asked.
“Okay then, you run back to our stuff and get my phone for me. I’ll stay here.” I turned back toward Suzanna. Her eyes were staring sightlessly up at the sky. I looked away.
Lucy nodded and turned and ran as quickly as she could through the sand as it sucked at her feet. I looked at Suzanna again. Suzanna was a French native and she and her husband owned the French restaurant that had hurt my business when I first started it. She was the reason I’d had trouble selling my baked goods.
