Tragic Toppings (12 page)

“I can’t imagine it’s a coincidence,” I replied as I knocked on the door. There was no answer.

“No one’s here,” Grace said.

“I’m not giving up that easily. Come on,” I said.

As I started walking toward the back of the strip mall, Grace asked excitedly, “What are we going to do, break in? You know I’m up for it if it helps us in our investigation.”

“Stop thinking like a criminal,” I said with a laugh. “We’re just going to try to see if they’ll answer the back door. The last time we were here and ate pasta in the kitchen with Angelica and the girls, I noticed an entrance for deliveries in back.”

“But we aren’t kicking the door in,” Grace said. If I hadn’t known better, I would have said she was disappointed by the realization that we were taking a more conventional approach.

“Sorry, but it’s not going to be anything as dramatic as all that,” I replied. “I just want to be certain that no one is here.”

As we came around the back, it was difficult at first to figure out which door belonged to Napoli’s, but then I noticed a small sign that had the name of the restaurant on it. It was certainly a lower-profile entrance than the front.

I knocked with authority, waited a few seconds, and then knocked again.

“Come on, Suzanne, no one’s here,” Grace said as she started to walk away.

I gave it another shot, and this time, I called out Angelica’s name. A moment later, the outside door opened slightly.

“No deliveries,” Maria DeAngelis said without looking at us. Maria was one of Angelica’s daughters, all lovely, and all employed at the restaurant in one capacity or another.

Before she could close the door again, I said, “Maria, it’s us.”

She looked at us then, and said, “Hi, Suzanne. I’m sorry you drove all this way for a meal, but we’re closed.”

“We’re not here to eat; we want to talk. Please?” I asked. “I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t important.”

“I suppose it would be okay,” she finally said as she stepped aside.

“Thanks,” I answered. As Grace and I walked in, I saw that Maria was making homemade pasta, one of the specialties of the house.

“Who is that for?” I asked.

“Not for customers; just for the family. I had to get out of the house, so I made an excuse to come here instead.”

“How’s your mother holding up?” I asked softly.

“Momma’s fine,” she said as she looked closely at me. I knew we were friends as well, but her first loyalty was to her mother, something that didn’t surprise me at all. Every daughter openly talked about leaving Napoli’s and their mother’s domain, but I knew that it was idle talk. There was too much love there for any of them to ever go. “Why do you ask?”

It was time to lay my cards out on the table. “You’re closed, so I know Tim Leander’s murder must have hit her pretty hard.”

“Murder? He hanged himself,” Maria said, not disputing her mother’s involvement with the man at all.

I didn’t like it, but I was going to have to go into more detail. “It turns out that someone killed him, and then hoisted him up into that tree.” There was no delicate way to ask, so I took a deep breath and then added, “How long had your mother been seeing him?”

“I’m not willing to acknowledge that she was,” Maria said, her olive-toned arms folded over her chest now.

“Maria,” I said, keeping my voice as gentle as I could manage, “we’re not with the police. We’re just trying to find out what happened to Tim. I know your mother must have cared for him, and there’s no doubt she’s hurting right now, but he was our friend, too.”

Grace added, “Won’t helping us find the murderer give your mother some of the comfort she needs right now? She has to want to find the killer even more than we do.”

Maria seemed to think about that, and then said, “Excuse me for a moment. I need to make a quick call.”

She was checking with her mother, there was no doubt in my mind about that, and I couldn’t really blame her. If the roles were reversed, I would be doing the exact same thing.

Maria stepped through the kitchen into the dining room to make her call, and Grace asked, “Did I push her too much?”

“No, as a matter of fact, I think you shoved her exactly the right amount.”

“What’s Angelica going to say?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know, but I have a feeling we’re going to find out pretty quickly.”

Maria came back out a minute later and joined us.

“What did she say?” I asked.

“Momma’s sleeping, and Sophia said no one wanted to wake her.”

“So you won’t talk to us?” I asked, resigned with the answer I knew I would be getting already.

Maria appeared to think about it, and then said, “I’ll tell you what I know, but you should realize up front that this is all new to me as well.”

“You didn’t know that your mother was seeing someone?” Grace asked.

Maria frowned, crinkling her nose slightly. “We knew there was someone, but up until yesterday, we didn’t realize who it was.”

“And none of you ever asked?” I said.

Maria smiled sadly at me. “Let me ask you, Suzanne, if your mother decided to keep a relationship secret from you, would you push her about it if you knew you weren’t going to accomplish anything but make her upset and angry with you?”

I thought about it, and then nodded. “You’re right. Sorry about that, I should have known better than to ask.”

Maria smiled. “You’re forgiven. Momma’s been happier lately than I’ve seen her in years. None of us were about to question it. I heard that Tim died, and he came here sometimes so we all knew him. I thought it was important to tell everyone what happened.” She grimaced, no doubt at the memory. “Momma collapsed when she heard the news, and it took all three of us to get her to a chair. The story came out in bits and pieces, and she told us that she’d been dating Tim for just a month, but that they’d gotten serious in that time, and there was talk of making their relationship permanent.”

“That was going to be hard with two other women in the wings.”

“Well, Momma didn’t know that at the time. She took his death hard, but it got even worse when she found out she wasn’t the only woman in his life.”

“How did she happen to discover that?” Grace asked.

“She was at the florist ordering flowers for the funeral when a woman named Betsy Hanks came in to do the same thing. As soon as both women realized why they were there, there was pandemonium, from what I heard.”

“Do you know anything about Betsy?” I asked.

“Just that she works at Harper’s over in Jackson Ridge.”

Maria was about to add something else when the phone rang. She took it, and after a quick conversation, she hung up and said, “Momma’s awake, and she needs me back home.”

“How did she sound?” I asked.

“Better,” Maria said with a smile. “She wanted to know where I was, and when Sophia told her I was here making pasta, she insisted I come home with it immediately. Anyway, that’s all I really know.”

I had a question to ask, but I wasn’t sure I had the nerve to voice it, even though I didn’t really have any choice. “Do you think she’d talk with us about Tim?”

“Not today,” Maria said, “and most likely not tomorrow. I don’t know, Suzanne, Momma likes you, but she’s in some real pain right now.”

“Tell her that we’re sorry for her loss,” I said.

“I will,” she answered, and then Grace and I left her to finish her pasta. I knew from firsthand experience how great that pasta was going to be. If it gave Angelica some kind of comfort, then that was all the better.

“Where should we go now?” Grace asked.

I glanced at my watch. “If you don’t mind, we’d better get back to April Springs. I’ve got a date with Jake, and I don’t want to miss a minute of it. Life is short, you know?”

She finished our old saying, I’m sure without realizing it. “And then you die.”

There was an unsettling creepiness to it this time, and I wasn’t certain I’d ever be able to say it again without thinking of Tim.

But for now, it was time to focus on the living.

I had a date, and I knew that Jake wouldn’t disappoint me.

CHAPTER 8

“Hey, Suzanne,” Jake said as I picked up my telephone around five. I’d just dropped Grace off and wasn’t even back to the cottage yet.

“Are you at the house already? I’m so sorry I’m late. Hang on, I’ll be there in two minutes.”

“I’m not in April Springs,” he said, and I felt my enthusiasm suddenly die.

“That’s too bad,” I said, knowing that with the nature of his work, he could be called away at any time. “I was hoping we could have dinner together.”

“Don’t give up on me just yet. We still can,” Jake said. “I’m just a little behind schedule. I’ve got a great idea. Why don’t we meet at Napoli’s? I can catch you up with what’s been going on with me, and you can tell me what you’ve been up to while we eat.”

“I’m sorry, but we can’t do that,” I said.

He hesitated, and then said, “Come on, Suzanne, I don’t have to pick you up every time we go out, do I? Ordinarily you know I wouldn’t mind one bit, but I’m coming back from Dillsboro, and Napoli’s is on the way.” He paused a second, and then added, “Think of it this way. If you start driving right now, we’ll both get to Union Square at about the same time.”

“I’d be happy to meet you there, but that’s not the problem,” I said. “Napoli’s is closed.”

“For good? I can’t believe that.” He sounded devastated, and I didn’t blame him. If Angelica ever decided to shut down, I’d go into mourning for a year. The pasta was just that good, not to mention the friendships I’d lose with Angelica and her daughters if I couldn’t visit with them.

“It’s just for a few days. It turns out Angelica was one of the women Tim Leander was dating, and she’s not taking it very well.”

“Yes, I heard about him from one of my friends,” Jake said. “To be honest with you, I was kind of surprised you haven’t brought it up yourself yet.”

I grinned as I asked, “Jake, you don’t have anybody spying on me in April Springs, do you?”

He laughed, and I knew he heard the humor in my voice. “Are you kidding me? I’m not that crazy. There’s no way that I would risk it. That’s hazard pay if I ever heard of it. No, one of the guys on my posse is dating a girl from Hickory, and she heard about it from her cousin, who just happens to live in April Springs. It’s a small world, isn’t it?”

“Not that small,” I said. “Seriously, though, I know I should have told you about it myself last night, but it was so nice talking to you, and I didn’t want to spoil the way I felt. If you want to scold me for not telling you about it then, you have my blessing.”

“You found the body,” Jake said gently. “I figure that was hard enough on you without me piling it on. That’s a real shame about Tim. I only met him once, but he seemed like a really nice guy.”

“He was,” I agreed. I took a deep breath, and then decided to tell him the rest of it since I was confessing everything. “Emily Hargraves was close to Tim, and she’s asked me to look into what happened to him as a personal favor. She disappeared for a while herself, but at least we found her safe and sound, though I admit it had us all scared there for a while.”

“Where did she go?” Jake asked innocently enough.

Why did I have to bring that up? Now I was going to have to get into the whole situation, and the part Max had played in it. My boyfriend was not a big fan of my ex-husband, not that I could blame him. “She left her shop to go to Max’s place and forgot to tell anybody. Folks got real concerned when they learned that she took off so quickly she forgot to lock up her store.”

Jake didn’t seem all that surprised to hear that my ex-husband was involved. “Whenever there’s trouble with women in your town, Max is usually not that far away.”

“Not this time.” I had to end this tense situation before things got suddenly worse. “If you can believe it, Tim Leander was dating three women in the area, apparently none of them knew about the others, and to add to it, he had two men who were enemies as well.”

“You’ve been busy,” he said simply.

When another question didn’t immediately follow, I asked, “Jake, are you going to tell me not to snoop into his murder?”

There was a long moment’s pause, and then he said, “No, I understand why you’re doing it. I know you’ve got your reasons.”

That was a nice change of pace. Maybe Jake was starting to come around. “Is there any chance your boss will assign you to the case?” I would love to have Jake’s presence in April Springs, and not just because of a murder investigation. I felt fine when he was gone, but the sun seemed to shine a little brighter whenever he was around, as sappy as that might have sounded.

“No chance at all. I’m taking a few days off, and I thought I’d spend them with you, if you were interested.”

I couldn’t believe my good luck. “Are you serious?”

“As I can be. I’m really excited to see you.”

I’d learned long ago that if something seemed too good to be true, it probably was. I had a hunch his decision to take some time off wasn’t entirely because of me. “There’s something you’re not telling me, isn’t there?” I asked.

He sighed, and then said, “I won’t lie to you, my vacation is not by choice. According to my boss, I might have used a tad too much force apprehending one of our suspects, but the idiot we were arresting took a swing at a deputy, and he connected before we could stop him.”

Jake was big on loyalty, to me and to his fellow officers. It was a trait I admired in him, but I knew that it could also get him into trouble sometimes.

“I’ve got an idea,” I said.

“There’s no chance we can take a trip, is there?”

“Sorry, I can’t leave the shop on such short notice. You could always help me,” I said, trying to jolly him out of the darkness that had just crept into our conversation.

“At the donut shop, or on your impromptu investigation?” he asked.

“Why not both?”

He laughed. “Why don’t I stick with what I’m good at? You and Emma make the donuts, and I’ll help you and your crew dig around a little into Tim Leander’s murder.”

“You’re not going to get into any trouble with your boss or Chief Martin, are you?”