Roses and Revenge (Port Danby Cozy Mystery Book 4) Read online

  I searched for Jasper’s profile and his pictures popped up. It felt a little eerie looking at his pictures and posts, especially the selfies where he looked extremely happy and alive. Most of the pictures and posts were of friends and himself, a short narrative of his life cut way too short. My thumb rolled the next row of pictures up. I was about to move on when a familiar face caught my eye. It was Hazel. She was behind her desk located outside of Jacob’s office. She was concentrating deeply on a report. It was easy to know that she was unaware Jasper was taking the picture because the poor woman had her finger in her nose. Jasper’s comment read; Hazel showing us all how to multitask. The picture had well over two hundred thousand likes.

  I put down the phone. It felt as if all the energy drained out of me at once. I had never seen the picture, but I could only imagine how hurt and embarrassed Hazel had been. She was someone who put a great deal of importance on people liking her and thinking well of her. It must have been nothing short of devastating. It made me feel a touch less guilty about not giving Jasper enough thought. It had truly been an evil stunt.

  I hadn’t seen Hazel since Thursday. I felt bad about not having more time to spend with her. I’d even brushed her off briskly several times. I picked up the phone and texted her to see if she wanted to meet for some coffee. I had no plans to bring up the picture. I just wanted to be a more supportive friend. The picture incident happened after I’d left Georgio’s. Which was fortunate for Jasper because if I had been there I would have given him a large piece of my mind. It was disappointing to think that Jacob hadn’t stepped in to tell Jasper to delete the picture. Although, it was entirely possible Jacob didn’t even know about it. He was never big on social media, and Hazel was most likely too ashamed to bring it up to him. There I was again, working hard to defend Jacob.

  Hazel’s text came right back. “I can be there in twenty.”

  “Sounds good.” Maybe Hazel would have new updates on the investigation.

  Chapter 32

  The moment I’d finished firming up the coffee date with Hazel, I had a small rush of customers. I texted Lester and the wonderful man was kind enough to deliver two of his special cinnamon lattes.

  Lester, who rarely ever seemed to be cold, was wearing one of his signature Hawaiian shirts, a bright turquoise and yellow number that looked wholly out of place in the dead of winter but looked completely right on Lester. The only concession for the cold weather was a thin, long sleeve shirt that he’d put on beneath the summery shirt.

  I had just finished up with my last customer as he placed the two coffees on the island. “Two of my cinnamon spice lattes. I topped them with whipped cream and cinnamon candy hearts. I put them on your tab.”

  “You’re the best.”

  Lester looked around. “Don’t tell me the crow is drinking lattes now. That bird really does think he’s human.”

  “He does, but even I draw the line at letting him drink coffee. He’s snarky enough as it is without caffeine.” Kingston cawed loudly and shook his wings as if he knew we were talking about him.

  I decided not to wait for my first sip. “Hmm, so good and spicy. How’s Elsie? I haven’t seen her today.”

  Lester leaned his forearm on the counter. “Between you and me, she’s gotten herself in a bit of a bind with that ridiculous flyer and that British actor. I don’t know what she was thinking.”

  I looked sternly at him. “Uh, you don’t? Couldn’t have anything to do with that extravagant table set up you’ve got going in front of the Coffee Hutch?”

  “I bought furniture. She told the world that a famous actor was coming to have tea and cookies with them on Valentine’s Day. Now who’s going over the edge on this? My sister or me?”

  I took another sip of coffee to let him know I was staying out of the sibling table war.

  Lester laughed. “Guess that’s what they call ‘saved by the latte’. Well, I need to get back to the shop. It’s a slow afternoon, so I started the task of sanitizing all the counters. Now that I’ve started, I’ve got to finish, otherwise the un-sanitized half will contaminate the clean half and I’ll have to start from square one.”

  “Thanks for the delivery service.”

  Lester stopped and held the door open for Hazel who swept in with far less aplomb than usual. In fact, she looked depressed with a sullen expression and a slow paced walk.

  I reached for her coffee and held it up, assuming she needed it. As I pulled back my elbow, I sent Ryder’s basket of dried sage clusters to the floor. It turned out not that many people were into the holistic properties of burning dried sage.

  “Enjoy while I scoop up the mess.” I stooped down with the basket and picked up the clusters. I stood up. Hazel was taking a long sip of the coffee. I used the time to zip over and wash my hands. Otherwise my coffee would taste like sage instead of cinnamon. Fortunately dried sage wasn’t nearly as fragrant as fresh.

  I headed back over to the stools where Hazel had perched herself with her latte. I joined her on the next stool.

  “What’s wrong? You look rather glum. Although, I’m not sure I can take another bout of bad news.”

  Hazel took another long drink from the coffee and sighed at the end of it. “No news. I guess the events of the week are finally catching up to me.” She touched her throat. “Plus, I think I’m getting Jacob’s cold.”

  “That’s awful. Feeling down and being sick on top of it.” That statement took me back to poor Jacob. What a week he was having. “You’ll need to get better fast. You’ve got big life changes happening soon.”

  Hazel’s blue eyes rounded with confusion.

  “Your new job? I guess this wasn’t the best way to end your career at Georgio’s. Do you know what your official tasks will be at Tremaine’s?”

  Rather than answer, she picked up her coffee and drank some more. Just like the move I’d made to evade Lester’s question.

  She placed the empty cup down. “Gosh, I’ve hardly given it any thought with all this craziness. I think I’ll be in accounting or marketing possibly.”

  “Those are such vastly different departments. I thought you told me you were going to be an administrative assistant, a parallel job to the one you have now. But I guess I misheard that.”

  “Yes, it seems so.”

  What it seemed was that there was nothing normal about our coffee date. Hazel was always peppy and chatty, but today, I had to pull information out of her. And I was certain I hadn’t misheard her when she first told me about her new job. The new job would be such a stark change in her otherwise very uniform life, it was hard to believe that she wasn’t thinking about it all the time. Even with the craziness.

  I wasn’t sure which way to steer the conversation, since Hazel wasn’t doing any steering on her own. “How is everyone?”

  “As well as can be expected.” Hazel unzipped her warm winter coat. She was still wearing the brightly colored sweater underneath. “We’re all waiting for permission to leave town. We’re stuck in the middle of this. From what I heard this morning, from Lydia, it won’t be long before they bring charges against Jacob. Then we can go home and wait to be called as witnesses.” She said it all so plainly as if she was just talking about a trip to the store instead of her boss of many years being arrested for murder. The entire coffee date had started to unsettle me.

  I decided to veer off the subject. “Guess what I’m doing tomorrow? I’m going on my first flight in a small plane. My neighbor is a pilot, and he’s flying me along the coast. He promised we could fly right over my house so I could get an aerial view. Of course, I’ll probably fret when I see how badly I’ve let the landscaping go during these cold winter months.”

  The topic change had helped. A more usual and perky expression returned to her face. “That would be so exciting. But a little scary.”

  “That pretty much sums up my feelings about it too. I’m somewhat apprehensive, but at the same time, it just seems like too much of an adventure to pass up.”
r />   “Your life was always filled with adventure. I envy that, Lacey. And then when you’d had enough of Georgio’s and Jacob, you just put on your walking boots and you walked right out of there. And look at this shop. It’s so wonderful.”

  “Well, you’ll be going on an adventure too. I’ll bet your parents are going to miss you terribly when you move out. I know my parents would love for me to move within walking distance or even driving distance, for that matter. But once I moved away, they started doing a lot more things, like vacations, and they have more friends now. I guess I needed to let them leave the parents’ nest.”

  Hazel laughed but even her laugh seemed off. It seemed she just wasn’t herself. Everybody had days like that. I was somewhat relieved when two customers came in. Our coffee date felt clumsy and forced. I’d caught Hazel on an off day. I couldn’t blame her for having one. The week had started with a stunning tragedy and had gotten progressively worse. I was sure it was just that the initial shock had worn off and the grim reality had taken hold. It was a normal sequence of emotions for such a catastrophic series of events.

  This time I didn’t need to hint that I needed to get back to work and that our chat time was over.

  Hazel stepped down from the stool. “Thanks so much for the coffee, Lacey. Have fun tomorrow. I hope we can see each other at least once more before we leave town.”

  “Let’s make a point of it, Hazel.”

  Chapter 33

  My fingers gripped the edges of the seat. I felt like a kid again on my first real roller coaster ride. It was that mix of thrill, terror and queasiness that made fast rides so much fun. The small plane rattled and wobbled as its tires raced along the runway making the heavy earphones on my head slip forward. I pushed them back. The entire adventure might have been a touch less glamorous than it had been in my imagination, but it was still fun to watch a serious faced Dash, with his official looking black sunglasses and pilot’s headset, as he lifted the plane up into the air.

  “Whoo!” I said involuntarily, like a sneeze or a cough.

  Dash glanced over for a second, then returned his attention to the wide blue stretch of sky in front of us. “Are you all right?” His voice sounded tinny as it came through the earphones. I’d forgotten that I had a microphone sitting in front of my mouth.

  “Yep, I’m good.”

  I could see the tiniest grin form behind his microphone. “It’ll be more fun when you finally release your death grip on the seat.”

  “Yep,” I repeated and squeezed the seat edge tighter. The round roofed hangars at the tiny municipal airport fell away along with the rooftops, trees and fields of the town. It was early and the sun was mostly behind us, but the royal blue ocean sparkled with tiny sapphires as the morning light reflected off of it.

  I took a few breaths and peeled my fingers off the seat. Just then, the wing on my side dipped down and the plane tilted, sending my hands back to the seat edge. A low, deep laugh rumbled through the headphones. I looked at my pilot.

  Dash smiled while staring straight ahead. “Sometimes it takes a few minutes to relax.”

  The plane leveled out. We buzzed along the coast, and I released my death grip on the seat. It was sort of comical to think that holding tightly to the seat would somehow save me in the unfortunate event that the plane nosedived toward earth. That line of reasoning helped me place my hands in my lap.

  I gazed out the window. The scenery didn’t blur by, like in a fast moving car. Rather, it meandered past, allowing me to see more details from a decidedly different angle than usual. The nose of the plane was pointing north, inland from the ocean. The land below looked like a giant patchwork quilt of varying shades of green and brown. The trees were still lacking foliage, giving me an even clearer view of the neighborhoods and shops below.

  I moved the microphone closer to my mouth. “I can’t believe how much detail I can see. In a jet, everything fades away into one gray mass.”

  “We’re cruising at about half the altitude of a commercial jet. Hold on.”

  It took me a second to comprehend his last comment. I grabbed the seat again as the plane dipped down on my side, and we circled out toward the ocean. I could see the white caps on the waves. Farther from shore, where there was less agitation in the tide, I could see through the emerald glass water to dark shadows swimming beneath the surface.

  “Are those sharks?” I asked.

  “No, that water’s too cold. Dolphins, I think.”

  I found myself captivated by the sea below. I had never seen it from above. It looked incredibly vast and endless. “It’s like an entirely different world down there.”

  Dash pointed ahead through the front windshield. In the distance, sitting in the midst of a few light clouds, was the spire of the Pickford Lighthouse.

  “It’s looks tall and majestic from this vantage point. A tall, proud symbol of Port Danby’s past.” I smiled over at him. “Thank you for inviting me along this morning.”

  “Thank you for joining me. I feel like I’m seeing everything through a new pair of eyes. Yours. And they are beautiful, I might add.”

  It was plenty cold in the cramped cockpit, but that didn’t stop the heat from rising in my cheeks at his compliment.

  “Can we fly over our houses? I want to see an aerial view of my humble little home.” Due to the ambient noise in the cockpit, I was talking louder than necessary. But I couldn’t seem to stop myself.

  “We’re heading that direction. I’ll drop down lower, so you can get a better view.”

  My stomach did the elevator lurch as the plane dropped to a lower altitude. Everything below came into much sharper view. I could see a woman on a Mayfield sidewalk walking two dogs. The woman shielded her eyes and looked up to the sky to see what was flying overhead.

  “Will she see me if I wave?”

  “You can see her way better than she can see you.” Dash pointed. “Look out your window. Hawksworth Manor is coming into view next.”

  “Great. I forgot all about the manor.” I kept my focus on the scene outside my window. Maple Hill looked different coming up from the backside. The slope was more gentle and the landscape on the back of the hill was overgrown and wild.

  The overhead view of the dilapidated Hawksworth estate was far different than it would have been just last week. The six trailers and trucks from Georgio’s Perfume were still parked in a long parade of vehicles from the front edge of the property to the rear. As I swept my eyes past the collection of work vehicles, a bright blue color caught my eye. Feeling much more at ease, I leaned closer to the window to get a better view below.

  “It’s Hazel!” I said excitedly.

  “Who?”

  “A friend. She bought a really wild blue sweater from Mod Frock. The blue caught my eye.” I kept my focus below. Hazel was unlocking a door to one of the trailers. I reviewed a quick map of the site in my head. It was Jacob’s trailer. The bright blue sweater disappeared inside. I sat back. “Interesting,” I muttered to myself, forgetting that I was connected to a microphone that was, in turn, connected to Dash.

  “What’s interesting?” he asked.

  “Oh, nothing. I just can’t believe how well I can see down to the town.” I sat up higher. “Is that my house?”

  “Yep.”

  I sat back again. “I need to position my sprinklers better. I’ve got way too many brown spots on my lawn.”

  “The snow did just melt. And spring is around the corner. It’s going to be fifteen degrees warmer today than yesterday.”

  “I’m looking forward to a rise in temperature. But I need to get my tail out to the front yard and do some serious pruning and gardening. I’m looking forward to warmer weather … and bicycle rides … and shorts with sandals.”

  “Here, here on that last one.” I couldn’t see his eyes behind the black sunglasses, but I was sure I detected a wink.

  He was darn handsome, and to go with that winning smile and charm, the man was an interminable and, I suspecte
d, an indiscriminate flirt.

  Chapter 34

  The airport where I’d met Dash for the flight was inland about fifteen miles north of Mayfield. As I headed back to Port Danby, a voice in my head told me to turn off and visit Jacob at the hotel. I had no idea if he was actually at the hotel, but it was hardly out of my way. A few questions had been swirling through my head after I saw Hazel and her sweater that was bright enough to see from space. I’m sure none of the questions were of much importance, but since I’d been left mostly out in the cold on the investigation, I decided to satisfy my own curiosity before it chewed away at the rest of my work day. It was the Saturday before Valentine’s Day and I expected it to be busy.

  I parked my car in the hotel lot. I sent Jacob a quick text. “I was hoping to talk to you. I’m at the hotel.”

  The heavy headset had left me with semi-helmet hair. I quickly brushed my hair while I waited for him to answer.

  Jacob’s text came back. “Sure. Redmond had some calls to make. I’ve got some time. Room 303.”

  I climbed out of the car and walked through the lobby to the elevator. A flurry of weekend travelers were checking in. Jacob’s room was right next to a fake fern outside the elevator. The Mayfield Hotel was nice, but in Jacob’s five star world it would be considered shabby. Maybe he’d grown less spoiled. He hadn’t even booked himself the finer room of suites on the top floor.

  Jacob opened the door before I knocked. His face had more color and his nose had less.