A Murder Moist Foul: A Frosted Love Cozy Mystery (Frosted Love Mysteries Book 1) (7 page)

“Respectfully, Ms. Gladstone…when I
want your help, I’ll ask for it,” Chas assured her wryly, opening the door,
exiting and closing it firmly behind him.  Missy mechanically went through the
motions of locking the door knob and securing the deadbolts.  She didn’t know
what was wrong with Chas Beckett, and why he was treating her as an enemy
rather than an ally, particularly in light of the lovely dinner they had
shared, but she was determined to move forward in her plan to gather more
information that might just help find a killer.

Adrenalin, along with a
not-inconsiderable amount of caffeine, made Missy’s heart race as she prepared
for her first stake-out.  She wanted to look as inconspicuous as possible, so
she dressed more casually than she typically would during a workday, donning
comfy yoga pants, a thick sweatshirt and running shoes.  She didn’t know what
she might encounter, so it made sense to be comfortable.  There was a thin
crust of frost on her windshield, which was unusual this time of year in
Louisiana, and, because she didn’t own an ice-scraper, she tidied the frosty
windshield with a spatula, the cold air seeping right through the thin fabric
of her yoga pants.  Shivering a bit, she cranked the heater in the pre-dawn
morning and headed for Darryl’s Donuts.  It took her a few minutes to find a
vantage point from where she could watch the shop, unobserved.  She parked the
car and turned off the engine, snugging her hand-knitted scarf tighter around
her neck, determined to follow Strawberry Cheesecake wherever she might lead. 
Missy had arrived at 7:15, not wanting to miss the obsessed patron, and was
soon rewarded as she saw the angry woman from the cupcake shop get out of a
sleek maroon sports car in front of Darryl’s Donuts.  Her heart pounded as she
held her breath, waiting for the woman to emerge from the shop.  Fortunately,
she didn’t have to wait long, catching sight of the woman heading back to her
car, coffee in one hand, a small bag in the other.  Missy waited just long
enough to be unobtrusive, before starting the car and pulling into the lane
behind the woman at a safe distance.

Strawberry Cheesecake had a
tendency to exceed the speed limit, making it a challenge for Missy to keep up,
but keep up she did.  The Cheesecake lady pulled into an alley, parking behind the
Fleur de Lis flower shop.  Missy parked down the street, just far enough where
she could see without being seen, and watched carefully as the woman pulled
keys from her purse and unlocked the door to the flower shop.  So apparently,
the surly woman with a penchant for pastry was the proprietor of the Fleur de
Lis.  Thinking fast, Missy turned off the car, and after waiting for 15 minutes
or so to allow the woman to get settled into her morning routine, she got out
of the car, heading for the flower shop.  Small bells above the door tinkled
merrily as Missy was engulfed in the glorious scent of multitudes of domestic
and exotic blossoms.  It smelled like paradise and she was almost distracted
from her task, but was sharply reminded when the woman behind the counter
spoke.

“Oh my, you’ve found me,” she
lamented, shocking Missy profoundly.  This woman remembered her?  Could it be
because she had been watching, stalking or terrorizing her?  “Listen, I’m so
sorry,” she continued, “I know I was positively rude when I came into your
store yesterday.  My blood sugar was low, I was running late and didn’t have
enough time to stop at the place where I typically get breakfast, and my
behavior was inexcusable – I’m so sorry.  I’m not normally like that,” she
assured Missy contritely.

Missy faked a giggle.  “Oh, that’s
okay, I see people before they get their morning coffee all the time, it’s not
a pretty sight.”  She couldn’t help but wonder if this woman had been the
person lurking around her house at night.  A realization exploded into her
brain and she devised a tactic to test a new theory that had just occurred to
her.  “I actually didn’t “find” you at all,” she reassured the harried woman. 
“I happened to be in the neighborhood and I need an arrangement of flowers for
my niece – she’s in the hospital,” Missy lied smoothly, desperately hoping that
this woman didn’t know that she had no niece.  She really was not skilled in
subterfuge and was internally kicking herself for blurting out something that
could easily be discovered as a lie.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” the woman
responded with ersatz sympathy.  “Is she going to be okay?” she inquired
politely.

“She’ll be fine,” Missy continued
to lie.  “I just wanted to brighten her day.”

“What a lovely sentiment,” the cold
woman smiled, feigning interest.  “What sort of arrangement would you like?”

“Well,” Missy began, swallowing a
bit convulsively.  There was no turning back now.  She might be tipping her
hand, but she had to get to the bottom of this.

“Her favorite color is blue, what
would you suggest?” she asked, trying to sound innocent.

Flowers were clearly the remote
woman’s joy in life, her face lit up at Missy’s question, as she pondered the
wealth of possibilities.

“Well, we have some lovely irises
that are a bluish-purple, and we could put some white roses in for an elegant
touch, and fill out the rest of the arrangement with hydrangeas, I have a new
shipment in that is the most beautiful blue you’ve ever seen!” she finished
enthusiastically.  Bingo.  That was the information that Missy was looking for.

“You have hydrangeas? I just love
hydrangeas! I think the arrangement sounds perfect, when can I pick it up?”
Missy asked, excited at the realization that her ruse had worked.  She had just
put together that Strawberry Cheesecake and the flower giver might just be the
same person.

“Absolutely,” the woman gushed, “my
shop is the only one in the area that carries hydrangeas. I’ll have my
assistant, Andrew, start on your arrangement as soon as he gets in and it
should be ready for pick-up around noon, sound good?”

“Perfect,” Missy responded slyly,
pleased with herself and exhilarated to think that she might have made a
breakthrough in the case.  She paid in advance, with cash, for the arrangement
that she had no intention of picking up, not wanting this woman to have any of
her information.  It dawned on Missy that her life might be in danger now more
than ever, but she was determined to proceed.  Besides, if Strawberry
Cheesecake knew that Missy was suspicious, it might make her more cautious,
buying her and Detective Beckett more time to solve the case.  She knew that
she should be sharing her findings with the now entirely-professional, and
clearly romantically-uninterested detective, but she wasn’t ready just yet, she
had one more stake-out to conduct.

Missy left the shop and went
through the rest of her day in somewhat of a haze, focused exclusively upon the
resolution that her plan for the next day might bring.  She felt absolutely
certain that, one way or another, the truth would be revealed, sooner rather
than later, and if she was the only one with the tenacity to see it through, so
be it.

Sitting at the vanity, brushing her
blonde curls carefully while mulling over the day’s events, Missy was utterly
lost in thought when her phone buzzed insistently.  Startled from her reverie,
she snatched up the noisy instrument and answered it immediately when she saw
Ben’s number on the screen.

“Hi Ben!” she sang out cheerfully;
always glad to hear from her faithful assistant.

“Hey Ms. G,” Ben returned dully,
sounded tired and depressed.

“What’s wrong, Ben?” Missy asked,
worried.  Her loyal sidekick hadn’t been quite his normal upbeat self since the
death of his cat and she was concerned that he might be slipping into a
depression.

“I found out something pretty
disturbing tonight,” the young man began, haltingly.

“Disturbing?” Missy was really
worried now.  “What is it, Ben, what happened?”

The young man continued softly,
“the lab tests that they did, when, you know…” he trailed off, referring to the
death of his cat.  “The tests came back and they indicated that it actually was
poison that killed Rocky...rat poison.”

Missy expressed her horror and
sympathy, trying her best to support the emotionally wounded youth, while
questions raced through her mind.  Rat poison killed Darryl Davis, and now it
had killed Ben’s cat.  Another “mysterious coincidence” that she couldn’t
ignore.  She had seen the large box of rat poison in Andretti’s bakery, but he
had a solid alibi, so while it seemed more likely that a man with ties to the
mob might be responsible for the death of a competitor and an innocent animal,
the intelligence that Missy had managed to gather seemed to point to a cranky
florist with a sweet tooth. She was more determined than ever to execute her
last covert mission under the cover of early morning darkness, and after a
virtually sleepless night of tossing and turning, she once again pulled on her
yoga pants, paired with a black turtleneck sweater this time, and tucked her
blonde curls into a soft black beanie cap.  She couldn’t allow herself to be
discovered by a potentially dangerous human being, and would take every
precaution for her safety.   Missy felt a bit silly in her all-black garb, but
loaded up a bag with a snack, a flashlight, and a first-aid kit (just in case),
and headed for her car.  She had parked in a remote corner of the parking
garage because all of the good spots were taken by the time she arrived home
after closing the shop the night before.  She played out the strategy of her
plan over and over again, trying to prepare for whatever scenario might arise. 
She was going to park down the block, behind Darryl Davis’ house and watch for
his daily hydrangea delivery in the pitch dark of pre-dawn.  When the
mysterious person (whom she now assumed was the Cheesecake lady), delivered the
blue blossom, she would maintain a safe distance and follow with her lights off
so that she could either verify that it was indeed Strawberry Cheesecake, or
not.  If the flower deliverer and the Cheesecake lady were one and the same, it
didn’t seem too far of a stretch (at least in Missy’s fevered imagination), to
assume that she was the killer.  What Missy couldn’t figure out was why the
unpleasant woman would target her.  As far as she knew, she had never met the
woman, aside from their encounter in the cupcake shop.  She shrugged off her
doubts, firmly believing that if she could just provide Chas Beckett with the
killer, he’d be able to dig up enough information to prove her guilt, so she set
out to do exactly that.  So engrossed was she in thinking through the details
of her plan, that she failed to notice the dark shadow occupying the back seat
of her tiny blue car.

Tossing her bag in the passenger
seat and settling in behind the wheel, Missy didn’t even have time to scream as
a small but strong hand clamped over her mouth, while a cylinder of cold steel
bumped roughly against her temple.  Shaking violently, she heard a distinctive
click as the gun was cocked, letting her know that her assailant meant
business. 

“Don’t say a word,” a voice that
sounded vaguely masculine hissed in her ear.  “Don’t scream, don’t even
breathe, or you won’t live to regret it, Nancy Drew,” the somewhat lispy voice
warned her mockingly.  Missy’s heart pounded in her chest.  She’d never had any
experience with violence or criminals and was at a complete loss as to what to
do.  She instinctively sensed that her best bet for survival was to do as she
was told.

“Slowly take your hands off the
steering wheel, and put them behind your head,” the sinister voice demanded,
still holding the gun to her temple.  Missy complied, curbing the impulse to
try to knock the gun out of the attacker’s hand.  “Don’t move,” the intruder
instructed, and Missy heard the familiar rasping sound of duct tape being
pulled from a roll.  The assailant brought her wrists together roughly and
wrapped tape around and between them, even covering her hands, palms together,
in layers of the strong, sticky tape.  Silent tears slipped down Missy’s face,
she’d never been more afraid in her entire life.  After blindfolding the
terrified woman, stuffing a washcloth in her mouth and securing it with more
duct tape, the attacker ordered Missy to move to the passenger seat, and then
forced her down into the footwell, where she was instructed to stay. The
attacker then climbed into the driver’s seat, placed a cloth briefly over
Missy’s nose, causing her to faint and stay in a drugged slumber.  Missy’s last
thought as she drifted into unconsciousness was that she hoped she would live
to see another day.

Missy’s head throbbed miserably. 
The washcloth had been removed from her mouth at some point, but her throat was
so dry that it might as well have been left in place.  She tried weakly to
swallow and her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth at the effort.  She was
still blindfolded, and even turning her head to the side caused her to feel as
though the entire room was rocking, so she stayed as still as possible,
listening as intently as her fuzzy head would allow, to try and determine where
she was and if she was alone.  She was lying on some sort of cold, hard
surface, and seemed to be restrained by straps criss-crossing her body.  Her
hands were still taped together, and her ankles had been secured as well.  She
attempted to swallow again, wincing at the pain in her throat.

“Trust me honey, this will be much
better for you if you just go back to sleep,” an effeminate voice dripping with
contempt drawled from a bit of a distance.  Missy heard the scrape of a chair
being pulled back and footsteps moving toward her.

“Thirsty?” the stranger laughed
darkly before splashing a vile liquid into Missy’s unsuspecting mouth.  The
moonshine burned, and startled, Missy swallowed reflexively, leading to a
hoarse spasm of coughing which burned her lungs and seared her throat.  The
tears began anew as she sputtered against the harshness of the alcohol,
wondering how long this crazed stranger would let her live.

“Who are you?  Why are you doing
this?” Missy croaked, feeling that she had nothing to lose at this point.

The kidnapper chuckled, an eerie
sound that chilled Missy to the bone.  Her body was wracked with another bout
of shaking as she tried to engage her attacker.  “I could ask you the same,”
the stranger snarled in response.  “Everything would have worked out just fine
if you hadn’t been quite so good at sticking your nose where it didn’t belong,
Little Miss Cupcakes,” the attacker sneered.  Missy tried hard to focus on the
voice, but she couldn’t place it, couldn’t even tell whether the person was
male or female.  She had been quite sure last night that the killer was
Strawberry Cheesecake, but now her confidence was rattled.  She had no idea how
long she’d been unconscious, and wondered if Ben had noticed that she was
missing yet.  It could take a while, because she often ran errands in the
morning while Ben ran the shop.  She didn’t know if it was even still morning,
or the same day.  The potential hopelessness of her situation struck her
profoundly and her tears flowed freely, despite her dehydration.

“Crying will get you nowhere,” the
merciless, disembodied voice assured her.  “You can cry, scream, throw a
tantrum, it doesn’t matter.  No one can hear you, and more importantly, no one
cares,” her tormentor taunted.  Missy’s stomach rolled at the sheer ugliness in
both the statement and the tone, but she couldn’t allow herself the indulgence
of self-pity, she had to think, and fast, of a plan to escape her current
predicament.

“I managed to totally elude those
bumbling idiots at the police department after I took care of your sister, and
they didn’t have a clue as to who offed dearest Darryl and your sappy
assistant’s stupid animal,” the kidnapper bragged, much to Missy’s horror.  The
reference to her sister made a fierce nausea, coupled with a murderous rage,
rise up within her, but she suffered in silence, still unable to even turn her
head.  “But no, you and Detective “Prince Charming” were getting way too
close.  You could’ve saved yourself if you had just left well enough alone, and
gone back to baking your cupcakes, but you just had to be nosy,” the assailant
groused, escalating Missy’s fear.  She didn’t trust herself to speak, and even
if she had - she didn’t know what to say, fearing that the slightest remark
could send this clearly unbalanced individual over the edge.  Apparently the
attacker had been partaking of the moonshine that they had tried to foist upon
an unsuspecting Missy, and the harsh words were becoming a bit slurred.  A
tongue obviously loosened by the strong drink seemed to be more than willing to
divulge events that had been long kept secrets.

“I loved him,” the voice
half-sobbed.  “I loved that man for years and he wouldn’t give me the time of
day.  He kissed me once you know...I’ll never forget it,” the killer
reminisced.  Missy thought that the words would make sense coming from
Strawberry Cheesecake, if it was indeed her holding Missy captive, but the more
the attacker drank and talked, the less it sounded like the obsessed florist. 
The timbre of the voice seemed to deepen a bit, and Missy didn’t remember
Strawberry Cheesecake as having a slight lisp.  Still, she couldn’t be sure. 
She was saved the misery of having to listen to any more of the killer’s
musings when a slightly damp cloth was placed to her nostrils yet again, and
the world mercifully went black.

Melissa Gladstone was alone in a
place of complete darkness; all day long she twitched and flailed while
battling the demons of her dreams.  Dragons slain became surging hordes of
monsters, human and inhuman.  She had accepted her defeat and her body thrummed
with the drum beats that signaled her doom as suddenly she was ripped from her
slumber.  She awoke, still groggy, with a worse headache than before, to the
sound of an insistent pounding.  The sound made her head tighten as though it
was encased in a vise and she wished that whatever was causing the pounding
would stop.  Through the residual haze of having been drugged, she heard what
sounded like Detective Beckett’s voice and concluded that she must be dreaming.

“Ms. Gladstone, are you in there?”
she heard Chas say, as though from far, far away.  She smiled at the sound of
his voice, glad that her dreams had suddenly become much more pleasant. 
“Missy!  Talk to me!” the handsome detective demanded, concern coloring his
words.  The fog that held Missy’s mind in its grip parted just then, and she
realized that she wasn’t dreaming anymore.  The pounding became louder, and
Chas’ voice was real.  She tried to respond, but couldn’t manage to croak out a
response past the dryness in her throat.  She tried again and again, but
couldn’t call out. Just as she began to cry in frustration, she heard an
ear-shattering splintering that sounded like a tree had been felled, and
suddenly there were voices and sounds filling the room in which she had been
kept.

“Missy, are you okay?” she nearly
fainted with relief at hearing the detective’s voice.  She wasn’t going to
die.  Chas was here and he would rescue her.  She tried to respond and
couldn’t.

“Hang on,” he encouraged her.  “I’m
going to get you loosed from all of this tape and we’ll get you taken care
of.”  She heard him whisper something about an ambulance to someone nearby, as
he cut away the multiple straps binding her to the hard slab on which she
rested.  Taking off her blindfold, he helped her gently to a sitting position. 
As Missy’s blurred eyes slowly adjusted to being uncovered and adapted to the
lights blazing in the room, she saw what seemed to be dozens of police officers
and detectives swarming through what looked like a ramshackle cabin.  The front
door had been utterly destroyed by a battering ram, and she shivered at the
chill air seeping in through the remaining slivers of the door.  A blanket was
wrapped around her shoulders, but didn’t quell the tremors that shook her from
head to toe.  Quickly, but gingerly, Chas worked a field knife through the
layers of tape that bound Missy’s ankles, wrists and hands, rubbing the
affected limbs to increase circulation.  A uniformed officer uncapped a bottle
of water and held it lightly to Missy’s lips, so that she could drink.  She
felt remarkably better after just a few sips and was able to speak again,
though still trembling with shock.

“Where am I?  What happened?” she
murmured, confused.

“We’ll go over all of that in a
bit,” Beckett promised, still working on removing the copious amounts of tape
that the killer had used.  Missy nodded, too weak to protest.  Things got a bit
fuzzy after that, and Missy was vaguely aware of being placed on a gurney and
feeling a cold blast of air as she was spirited out of the cabin and into the
ambulance that waited, lights flashing.