Murder in the Rose Garden: A Scent with Love Cozy Mystery (Scent with Love Cozy Mysteries)
Authors: Tabitha Tate
Murder
in the Rose Garden
A
Scent with Love Cozy Mystery
Tabitha
Tate
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters and
incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used
fictitiously.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be
reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, without prior written
permission from the author.
Contents
Beth Andrews
sat in the
front row of St Mary’s Church and wiped a tear from her cheek. She looked up at
the man who had taken the podium at her mother’s funeral as he fumbled with a
stack of messy, folded handwritten notes. The untidy black handwriting was riddled
with thick scribbling that gave the appearance of a poorly written mess that had
been put together the night before. She wondered what her mother had seen in
him. The woman who had written a thoughtful, moving tribute to her husband of
nearly twenty years. The woman who had read from a neatly typed stack of
notecards with a trembling, perfectly manicured hand at her own father’s
funereal five years ago had nothing in common with this bumbling fool who
couldn’t even be bothered to write a meaningful tribute.
Bernard Blackwell
was a short, tubby man in his mid-fifties, with dark hair cut short on the
sides and longer strands on top combed to the right in an attempt to cover up
his balding head. The warmth in the church had turned him into a pool of sweat.
He adjusted his glasses and wiped the glistening beads of sweat from his nose with
a worn handkerchief, lifting his arms to show off the dark blue sweat stains which
had formed on his cotton shirt. His stomach was round and bulged over the top
of his black dress pants and the bottom button of his shirt looked ready to pop
under the strain of his large stomach. He smiled, and perfectly shaped pearly
white teeth gleamed under the lights. Beth studied his mouth and decided that his
dentist had not gotten the proportions correct: the veneers were too large and
did not fit the shape of his mouth and jaw. Bernard cleared his throat
nervously and proceeded to tell everyone in the room that he had been the love
of her life, the shining light in her final years.
Wishful thinking,
Beth
thought to herself. She felt anger rising in her blood. She clenched her fists
and turned her thoughts to the events of the past week, anything to drown out
the monotonous, fanciful ramblings of the delusional madman who had been the
cause of so much tension between her and her mother.
St Mary’s Church
stood on the corner of Seventh and Main at the center of the charming little
coastal town of Bartholomew Bay. Her mother had moved to Bartholomew Bay five
years earlier with a bank account full of her father’s life insurance money and
her heart set on buying and running a quaint little flower shop. Gardening was
her passion and she was convinced that running a flower shop in a quiet coastal
town would be the perfect way for her to spend her golden years. The quiet life
her mother had imagined had never happened and she had spent the last five
years running the flower shop while Bernard lived in the lap of luxury, never
lifting a chubby finger to help her.
Bernard had
a reputation as ladies’ man, but for the life of her Beth could not understand
what women saw in him. He had a taste for the finer things in life and a
wandering eye. He was a bachelor with a long history of dating wealthy widows. Bartholomew
Bay was a firm favorite with older people who had retired or moved away from
busy city life in search of rest and relaxation; it was the perfect hunting
ground for a gold digger like Bernard. Beth had seen through all of him but her
mother had refused to see him for who he really was and it had caused them to
become estranged. Beth was filled with regret and she wished that she could
have had the opportunity to reconcile with her mother before her death.
The stone-clad
church building was full of period charm, six double rows of oak pews with a
navy blue carpet leading to the front of the building where the podium stood.
Two stained-glass windows on either side of the podium, depicting scenes from
the life of Christ, framed Bernard. Her mother had been cremated the day before
and the church hall was now filled with local residents who had come to honor
her mother’s life at an intimate memorial service. Beth scanned the room; a sea
of unfamiliar faces sat in teary-eyed silence as Bernard’s raspy voice droned
in the background. Beth found it hard to believe that any of them had known her
mother very well at all. Her mother was a hard woman who had kept to herself
and it surprised her to see such a large turnout.
“I will
never be able to forgive myself for not knowing that you were going through. I
failed to see through the smiling mask you wore to hide your inner pain…”
A sickening
feeling rose in her chest. Bernard was speaking as if he actually believed that
her mother had taken her own life. Beth wanted to scream. She wanted to scream
out loud for all the world to hear, “My mother would never have taken her own
life. She was a fighter, not a coward!”
Beth wondered
if Bernard had anything to do with her mother’s death. It wouldn’t have surprised
her if he knew more than he was letting on.
Mary-Ellen
Andrews had spent her younger years performing on Broadway. She had never been
a big star but she had made a career out of performing in smaller supporting
roles. She was flamboyant, a true actress. If she really had chosen to end her
own life, she would have done it with a little more imagination, a little more
showmanship. She might have waded into the ocean hoping to be swept out to sea,
leaving everyone to wonder about her for eternity or perhaps she would have jumped
from the top of the tallest building in town, clasping the black-and-white
photo taken the day she married Beth’s father in Vegas. She would not have
chosen to die on bended knee in her rose garden, covered in mud, wearing her
worn gardening clothes and a pair of navy blue wellies.
The call
from Bernard last Sunday had been devastating. “She died doing what she loved,
Elizabeth…your mother drank a glass of wine laced with deadly nightshade and
went out into the garden to spend her final moments doing what she loved most—pruning
her roses.”
Beth knew
her mother better than anyone else. She loved her roses but she hated gardening
attire and she would not have wanted anyone to find her in such an un-glamorous
state. Her mother also loved wine—she fancied herself a bit of a connoisseur—and
Beth could not imagine her ruining a full-bodied Merlot with poison.
None of it
made sense. Beth needed to find her mother’s murderer not only to preserve her
mother’s dignity but also to ensure that she would receive the life insurance
money she so desperately needed to pay off her mother’s debts and save the
flower shop.
Standing
outside in the church gardens after the service, she looked out at the rose
garden that reminded her so much of her mother. The garden was in full bloom, row
upon row of colorful petals, white Long John Silver roses and bright pink
Excelsa
blossoms, nestled among Golden Arctic bushes in full bloom. A glorious mixture
of rose perfume filled the air. Beth brushed a tear from her cheek and put on a
smile for the crowd that had gathered on the church lawn. She smiled until her
cheeks were sore and made small talk with those who came to offer their
condolences. A short woman with brown curly hair and a rather large waist
smiled and reached out to her at the front of the rose garden. Allison Landon was
the owner of the diner downtown. The sight of black streaks of mascara below
her swollen red eyes led Beth to assume that she had been the person sobbing
uncontrollably in the back row during the service.
“So sorry
for your loss, my dear. I will miss her dearly. She was my best customer, loved
my peach cobbler. I just don’t know what we are going to do without her; she
was a great help to my Johnny during his illness. I don’t know how we will
manage his pain now that she is gone.”
Beth nodded and
held out the basket of freshly cut roses from her mother’s prized rose garden,
the garden in which she had spent her final moments.
“Thank you,
Allison, please take a rose from Mom’s garden.”
What had she
meant about not being able to manage her husband’s pain? How was her mom
involved in all of this? It appeared as if there were a lot of things she did
not know about her mother.
Bernard
walked over and stood beside her, not daring to look her in the eye.
“Your mother
was a great woman, Elizabeth, I will miss her dearly.” Beth thought of the
meeting with her mother’s lawyer, Jack Reynolds, late the previous evening, and
anger bubbled in her veins.
“Will you
miss her or her money most?” she replied sharply, her eyes focused firmly on
his face, trying to read his reaction.
He kept his
composure and replied, “I don’t know why you dislike me so much. I was never
after your mother’s money. I am not sure how much she shared with you but
things have not been easy the last few years, times have been tough. The recession
hit her hard.” Beth had to bite her tongue. Her mother had fallen on hard times
but according to her Aunt Genie, this had more to do with Bernard’s gambling
habits than the financial recession. “I don’t know why you insist on staying at
Millie’s guest house; you should be staying at the cottage,” Bernard continued.
Beth had to
bite her tongue.
Stay at the cottage, over my dead body,
she thought.
Beth had sat
on the leather chesterfield sofa in Jack Reynolds’ office the previous day,
calmly sipping her cup of honey tea. The well-worn leather seat squeaked
awkwardly beneath her knitted bottle green pencil skirt. She was smartly
dressed in a white button-down shirt paired with the knitted skirt and a
matching knitted jacket. Her calm demeanor hid the explosive thoughts in her
mind as she carefully considered her options.
Jack had
tried to break the news gently; the nervous chatter and tapping of fingers on
the expensive mahogany table when she first sat down had alerted her to the bad
news which was about to come.
“I am sorry,
Beth, your mother had fallen on some difficult times. I tried to manage her
financial affairs as well as possible under the circumstances but things got a
little out of control.”
Beth raised
a perfectly shaped black eyebrow questioningly. “What circumstances?”
Jack
stammered and placed his blue-and-white patterned teacup on its matching saucer.
“Surely you knew about her cancer?”
“Oh yes, the
cancer,” she lied.
Cancer! Her
mother had never mentioned a word about it and if Bernard knew he was pretty
good at keeping a secret.
“Well, her
medical expenses placed quite a strain on her savings. Chemo doesn’t come
cheap.” Jack lifted his teacup, placed the rim to his thin, red pursed lips and
slurped in delight as the warm honey tea warmed his throat. A man slurping tea
was not one of her favorite sounds in the world but the sight and sound of this
man, Jack Reynolds, slurping from the dainty china cup disgusted her.
Beth placed
her own cup down on the mahogany coffee table. A tiny clink, sounded in the
room as the delicate flowery china cup landed on the matching saucer.
“Well, Jack,
where do I stand? What instructions did my mother leave in her will?”
“Your mother’s
instructions were very clear; she updated her will less than a month before her
death. She left the cottage to Bernard and she left you her flower shop on the main
road: Scent with Love
.
”
Beth almost
choked on her tea. A flower shop? She didn’t know a thing about the flower
business and she had no intention of staying in the Bay. She had a bookkeeping
job to get back to at Anderson & Cole, a small law firm back in Boston.
Jack cleared
his throat, removed a thick black ledger from the top drawer of his desk,
walked over and handed it to her.
“These are
the books detailing the financial affairs of your mother’s
flower shop
.
I must warn you, the business is in
serious trouble and since your
mother’s death was ruled a suicide, there is no life insurance money to rely on
for all the payments due to the long list of creditors. I am not sure of your
current financial standing but if I was in your position I would consider
selling up as soon as possible. Should you be interested in pursuing this
option, I would suggest you contact Joey Dunn, the local realtor, who deals
with all property sales in the Bay area and surrounds.”
Beth took
the ledger and placed it in her smart black leather handbag. She got up to
shake Jack Reynolds’ hand. Her own hand was trembling.
“Thank you,
Mr. Reynolds. I will need a few days to handle my mother’s affairs and in that
time I will make a decision regarding the flower shop.”
Beth hurried
out of Jack’s office, her black leather heels clicking noisily as she went down
the steep staircase that led to the entrance on the street. The ledger in her
bag was heavy and the strap of her leather bag dug into her shoulder but she
barely noticed. Her head was swimming. Her mother had had cancer and hadn’t
mentioned a word about it. She was now the proud owner of a struggling flower
shop and she had never been able to keep a potted plant alive for longer than a
week.
Beth’s
thoughts returned to the church rose garden and she looked up to see the last
people leaving after the service. Bernard had wandered over to talk to Allison
Landon; it looked as if they were arguing which didn’t surprise Beth. Bernard
was naturally argumentative and only ever saw things from his point of view.
She looked at him waving his hands about frantically as Allison tried to calm
him down and wondered what could be so terribly important so as to elicit such
a heated discussion at her mother’s memorial service. Beth needed answers. She
would have to go and see him, she told herself, and her heart sank at the
thought of having to set foot in her mother’s cottage.
