Sugar Cookie Slaughter Page 2

  “Don’t you great me, Lottie Lemon.” Carlotta wags a crooked finger at me. “This is all your fault for letting Nell’s old place fall to poop.”

  “What?” I shoot Keelie a look of disbelief and she shrugs over at me. “Carlotta—Bear said he’d get back to me soon with an estimate on repairs. I had no clue Nell’s house would need anything done to it. In fact, it was so not poop until you started hosting parties with the Canelli girls and turned the living room into a swimming pool.” It’s true. Last month Carlotta was harboring two Canelli con women in Nell’s old house.

  I found out about a year ago that Nell Sawyer was my grandmother. Up until Nell died, she was the only one who knew about my supersensual secret. Of course, for a very long time I wasn’t even sure what my abilities were called. And when Nell passed away, she left me almost half of Honey Hollow and then some. Let’s just say not all of the Sawyers were thrilled with the news, but that’s all in the past now. Nevertheless, she left me her old home as well. The very home I’m about to repair, no thanks to Carlotta’s costly shenanigans.

  Carlotta waves me off and shoves a cookie into her own mouth.

  I take another bite of the heart-shaped sugar cookie in my hand and moan without meaning to. “Wow, these really are delicious.”

  Speaking of delicious—the sea of people parts before me and I spot a deadly handsome, equally wonderful homicide detective with a deep, dimpled grin and eyes the color of the richest evergreen that the great state of Vermont has to offer.

  “Noah Corbin Fox.” I wrap my arms around him and he gives me a spin before dotting a kiss to my lips. Noah’s dark hair is slicked back, his evergreen eyes are pinned heavily on me—and as soon as his dimples depress, every ovary in the room explodes in their honor. Much like Everett, Noah has a way of garnering the attention of every estrogen card-carrying member in the vicinity.

  “You look beautiful, Lot.” He leans back and inspects me in my fluffy pink sweater, my skintight jeans, and my work boots, which allow me to traipse in and out of the snow without breaking my neck. “Every last inch of you looks delicious.” Noah’s lids hood as if he were eyeing his favorite meal, and lucky for me I happen to be just that.

  “I don’t know how I’ll ever thank you for helping Carlotta move.” I make a face as if I were about to be sick. It’s true. I’m not exactly looking forward to having Carlotta as a roommate for the foreseeable future. But with Noah across the street and Everett right next door, that does seem to make things a bit better.

  Noah’s chest rumbles with a dark laugh. “I have a few ways you can thank me.” His brows bounce. “And it was my pleasure. Carlotta surprisingly didn’t have many things to move. And we would have gotten it all, but she said she’d do the rest on her own. She didn’t want to miss the event here tonight. She wanted to see what you brought to offer for Vermont’s Best Baker and so did I.”

  “Sounds like she got hungry.”

  “That she did.” He glances down at the half-eaten conversation heart cookie in my hand. “That looks amazing.”

  “That’s because it is,” says a woman cropping up next to us in a long red dress with her strawberry blonde hair pulled back into a sleek chignon. She’s classically pretty with just a simple swath of pink lipstick on her face. It’s Whitney Shields, the owner of the Upper Crust Bake Shop, and she’s every bit the uppity socialite the name of her bakery suggests.

  “Oh, Lottie”—she waves me off with a giggle—“you don’t know how much it pleases me to see you eating my cookies.” She quickly snatches one up and hands it to Noah. “Go ahead and take a bite. I guarantee you’ll fall in love. Just the way you fell in love with Cormack back in high school.”

  My mouth falls open, but before I can say something, Everett comes back and lands a few platters of my own cookies down on the table.

  “Essex.” Whitney’s arms find a home around him. “How I’ve missed you.” She lands a kiss to his cheek, and suddenly I’m motivated to maim, or kill.

  Before Everett can chip her off his side, Cormack Featherby, the aforementioned not-so sweet tart that entranced both Noah and Everett back in high school, pops up like the ghost of girlfriends past. Her shoulder-length blonde hair looks as if she just got a blowout, and her celadon green eyes glow against her porcelain skin. She’s wearing a white ruched dress reminiscent of the one I’ve seen one too many times on the ghost of my good friend, Greer Giles. In fact, it was just a year ago on Valentine’s Day that Greer Giles was gunned down. Another far more sinister thought comes to me. Good Lord, she was gunned down right here at the community center.

  I scowl over at that white dress Cormack has slinked into as if it were a bad omen of things to come. And considering the girl in the dress, it most certainly is.

  “Oh, stop it, Layal,” Cormack croaks my way. For reasons unbeknownst to me, Cormack never can get my name straight. “It’s all your fault I’m here schlepping gruel instead of dancing with my man.” She latches onto Noah like a white dress on rice.

  “First”—I carefully peel her off him—“Noah is not your man. He’s mine. Noah and I are giving it another shot to see where things end up. Second, it’s entirely your fault that you’re here whittling down your community service hours. And I highly doubt anyone has you schlepping gruel. But if you need a reminder as to why you’re working the room in an entirely blue-collar manner—last month you cat-napped my sweet kitty, Pancake, in an effort to use him as a part of some scheme to break Noah and me up for good.”

  “And believe me, that breakup is coming.” Cormack slaps her palms together in haste as if to say her work here is done.

  Right.

  Far from it, sister.

  “And don’t forget Essex.” Cormack reaches over and gives the scruff on his cheeks a hasty scratch. “He won’t be yours for long either.”

  “You wish.” Keelie leans in as if she’s ready to charge.

  “Oh, I don’t have to wish, Keelie,” Cormack is quick to assure her—and with the right moniker. “Once Serena Digby casts a spell on someone, things start to happen. Very bad, bad things.”

  I can’t help but scoff. “Yeah, like money starts to leave your pocket. Newsflash, Cormack: you wasted your time and your spare change.”

  It’s true. Cormack and her featherheaded sidekick, Cressida Bentley, paid some fake enchantress to cast a pox on me. Although I’ll admit, for some reason I haven’t been able to get Serena’s putrid words out of my mind ever since.

  You will rue the day you trampled on the hearts of these girls. Everything you love, everything you desire, everything you hope for and dream of will turn to ashes and soot. May nothing go your way. May the shadow replace the sun. May the winds of fortune hide their face from you. May darkness descend on you this hour, and may it never leave until you surrender all that you stole from my sisters.

  A shiver runs through me at the thought. “Cormack, in case anyone’s never told you—you’re nothing but trouble.”

  Cormack gags and chokes on her next words.

  I never stole Noah or Everett from Cormack and Cressida. They’re just too smart to want anything to do with those dimwits.

  Whitney holds up a hand. “Noah, please call off your girlfriend. She’s starting to upset Mack-Mack.” She pulls her blonde friend close, and just as she’s about to comfort her, she does a double take at something to my right. “Well, if it isn’t Pesky Patricia and the Funky Bakery Bunch.”

  Cormack titters. “Whitney has never cared for Patricia or her friends.” She drifts over a few feet before screaming and air kissing a dark-haired woman about the same age before pulling her over. “Everyone, this is Patricia Engel. She owns and runs Patricia’s Pastries over in Hollyhock.”

  “Patricia’s Pastries?” Noah inches back. “My mother used to buy all of our birthday cakes from your place.”

  I can’t help but scowl at Noah for a moment with a look that says traitor. I know for a fact Patricia’s bakery will be my fiercest competition as far as th
e bake-off goes.

  Patricia shrugs it off. Her eyes are heavily drawn in and she’s wearing so much foundation it sinks into her laugh lines and the crow’s feet starting around her eyes.

  “That was my mother’s place,” she says. “I renamed the bakery when I took over. It’s called Sweet Sin now.”

  Whitney gives a husky chortle. “That’s just like you, Patricia. Keeping it classy.”

  Patricia’s lips knot up. “I was keeping it classy right up until you started ripping me off. How dare you flaunt your conversation heart cookies here tonight. You and I both know those cookies are what put me on the map.” She turns my way. “I make them year-round and pepper them with fun little political messages. Some of my cookies have been liked and shared thousands of times on social media—by world dignitaries and freedom fighters alike.”

  “Wow, that’s impressive,” I say the words apprehensively.

  I may not care for Whitney, but I doubt her conversation cookies are anything to write home about—pardon the pun. Not to mention that the fact it was my sister, Lainey, who gave Whitney the idea to make them in the first place. I should know. I was standing right there. And I cringe just a little because I just so happened to have brought my own conversation heart cookies to the ceremony today.

  I clear my throat. “You know, Patricia, Valentine’s Day is just around the corner and I’m sure you’ll see cookies like yours popping up all over the place.” Like on those platters I just set down behind her, but I leave that part out.

  Patricia rolls her eyes. “But will they say things like this?” She reaches over and swipes up a handful of Whitney’s scrumptious cookies—and how I hate that I immediately thought of them as scrumptious—before holding them out for us to read.

  Freedom for everyone, this planet is our home, and justice for all.

  Patricia can hardly catch her breath she’s so angry. “These were written on my cookies first. I just love when I give other people good ideas.”

  Whitney quickly snatches them up. “Don’t you dare accuse me of ripping you off. I thought of those slogans all on my own.” She quickly stalks off.

  Patricia scoffs. “I bet that’s right after she saw me posting them to all of my social media sights.” She whips out her phone and quickly flashes a picture of one of her posts with cookies that say the exact same thing, written in the same fancy script manner.

  Carlotta scuttles over and takes a gander. “I think you’ve got a case, kid. Have you thought of suing?”

  Leave it to Carlotta to invite the legal sharks to the party.

  “Nope.” Patricia stuffs her phone back into her pocket. “I’ve thought of murder.” She takes off into the crowd herself, and Cormack follows after them.

  Carlotta nudges me in the ribs as she snaps up more of Whitney’s delectable delights. “I’d keep an eye out for a body if I were you.”

  “Not funny,” I say as Carlotta shuffles her way down the inadvertent bakery aisle we’ve transformed this place into.

  I’m about to say something else when a long glimmer of light glides between the cookie platters like a thick pink and white spotted ribbon of some sort. I lean in, only to have it jump up and nearly bite me on the hand.

  A shrill scream evicts from my throat, the kind that’s usually reserved for dead bodies—and both Noah and Everett pull me back in an effort to save me.

  “What is it, Lemon?”

  “Lottie, are you okay?” Noah wraps me in his arms, and yet I only feel a smidge safer.

  “There’s a snake,” I say, pointing right at the beast as it slithers its way down the side of the table before looking right up at me with its dark crimson-colored eyes. It’s at least four menacing feet long, and the fact it has playful pink patches all over it doesn’t do a lot to comfort me.

  “A what?” Everett squints to where I’m pointing. “Noah, do you see anything?”

  “No, Everett”—he’s slow to answer—“I don’t.”

  “Oh no,” I groan.

  Noah blows out a breath. “That can only mean one thing.”

  “Someone is going to die,” I whisper. And just like that, the snake up and disappears.

  Love might be in the air, but so is murder.

  Noah leans in. “Lottie, do you have Ethel with you?” He nods secretly my way. Ethel is the name I gave the gun Noah and Everett teamed up to buy me a few months back. They’ve both been adamant I keep her with me at all times. And I’ve mostly complied, with the exception of the bakery. I just hate the thought of bringing something so potentially violent into my sweet, innocent bakeshop.

  But the truth is, I don’t have Ethel tonight—partly because the day started off at the bakery and will be ending up there as well. And partly because I knew I would have Noah and Everett with me here tonight.

  I feel perfectly safe.

  Sort of.

  I glance to the entry as if anticipating a killer to walk right through it. Instead, I spot an older version of the man who’s holding me.

  “Oh, Noah,” I moan softly. “I think you should take a look at who just walked in.”

  Both Noah and Everett turn that way and groan in unison at the sight.

  It’s not the killer, I hope.

  It’s Noah’s father.

  Chapter 2

  The community center is thick with bodies, but that doesn’t stop Noah, Everett, and me from navigating our way toward the door that Noah’s father just walked through. The very same father he believed was dead up until a week ago.

  Suffice it to say, Noah’s father has terrible timing, considering he’s a walking, talking, older version of the man I love, ball of trouble.

  Wiley Fox has officially arrived at the community center—yes, Wiley.

  Everett says that never before has there been a more aptly named individual and Noah agrees with him. Wiley strolled into Honey Hollow and straight into my bakery about a week ago and Noah greeted him by way of gifting him a fist to the eye. Wiley was knocked out cold and bleeding. He even spent a couple of days at Honey Hollow General Hospital, but that was the last we heard of him. Noah was hoping it would stay that way forever. But, judging by that suit he’s donned and that dimpled grin he’s shooting the masses, it looks as if Wiley Fox is looking to get comfortable right here in Honey Hollow.

  Just as Everett, Noah, and I head on over, I happen to catch a glimpse of Whitney near the kitchen in what looks to be a full-blown argument with a shorter redhead. But the crowd funnels between us, and I miss the socialite sponsored fireworks.

  That’s too bad. I would have loved to see someone ripping into Whitney. Her entitled attitude, especially when it comes to Essex, has really pressed on my very last nerve.

  Just before the three of us can get to him, both Carlotta and my mother accost Wiley—and I can’t help but note the way my mother is quick to take up his hand and pet it while starting off a conversation with him.

  A hard groan comes from me.

  Miranda Lemon. Yes, she’s the saint that adopted me as an infant. Yes, she had a hard time after my father died and sent her three daughters off to college all on her own. But she’s also the same woman who happened to become a bit boy crazy in her golden years.

  “Mother,” I hiss as we come upon them. I make a face at their conjoined hands and she pats him before letting go.

  “Hello, gentlemen.” Mom offers Noah and Everett a nod.

  Carlotta clears her throat. “Wiley here was just telling us that he’s got no place to stay.” She sniffs over at me as if she wanted me to pipe up with an offer.

  Both Carlotta and my mother were with us the day of the big TKO Noah pulled off last week. And rumor has it, my mother visited Wiley in the hospital each day while he was convalescing.

  The doctors did every scan under the Vermont sun to make sure he didn’t suffer any permanent damage from the fall. Noah was certain that his father would sue him. I can’t imagine having a relationship like that with my parents.

  I shake my head
over at Carlotta. “I can’t help him. There’s no more room at the inn.”

  Mom’s mouth rounds out as she comes to what I’m sure will be a catastrophic epiphany, and I know so because I can feel it coming a Honey Hollow mile away.

  “Wiley, I have an idea.” Mom shakes out her blonde curls. Mom has gorgeous vanilla locks and a face that acts as if it has never heard of the term wrinkles. She’s sassy and a bit too flirtatious for her own good. “I happen to own and operate the Honey Hollow Bed and Breakfast—and I—”

  “No,” both Noah and Everett bark it out in unison.

  Noah holds up a hand. “There’s no way, no how. That’s very kind of you, Miranda, but my father will find some other place to lay his twisted head at night.”

  Noah might be right about that twisted thing since his father has essentially returned from the dead.

  We don’t know exactly what happened to sponsor this resurrection, but both Noah and Everett agreed they don’t care about the details. Noah wants to push his father into the proverbial grave again, and Everett wants to see the man behind bars.

  I guess Noah’s father was presumed dead about eight years ago when his boat was found floating in the Pacific without him. I think I kind of get why he would want to disappear. The man has a very dark history with women. He’s a classic con artist as far as relationships go. For a brief yet disastrous moment in time, Wiley was married to Everett’s mother, Eliza. He bilked her out of some of her fortune before dashing out the door one day and never coming back. And—during that infamous interim, Noah thought it would be a good idea to steal Everett’s then-girlfriend Cormack Featherheaded Featherby. Okay, so I threw in that Featherheaded part myself. Nevertheless, suffice it to say, things have never been the same between these two former stepbrothers.

  Wiley takes a full breath as he glances to the two men who look prepared to kill him.

  “Gentlemen.” He nods to Everett first. “How is your mother?”

  The muscles in Everett’s jaw pop. “Don’t you even think about my mother. You don’t say her name. You don’t call, visit, or so much as breathe in her direction.”