Sugar Coated Sins

The
First Time Ever Published!

The
20
^th
Donut Mystery

From
New York Times
Bestselling Author

Jessica Beck

SUGAR COATED SINS

Donut Mystery #20, SUGAR COATED SINS,

From
New York
Times
Bestselling Author Jessica Beck

When a time capsule is accidentally
unearthed on the town square, a murder confession is discovered, leading
Suzanne, Grace, and Jake on a hunt through time for a killer who clearly isn’t
finished yet.

Other
Books by Jessica Beck

The
Donut Mysteries

Glazed
Murder

Fatally
Frosted

Sinister
Sprinkles

Evil
Éclairs

Tragic
Toppings

Killer
Crullers

Drop
Dead Chocolate

Powdered
Peril

Illegally
Iced

Deadly
Donuts

Assault
and Batter

Sweet
Suspects

Deep
Fried Homicide

Custard
Crime

Lemon
Larceny

Bad
Bites

Old
Fashioned Crooks

Dangerous
Dough

Troubled
Treats

Sugar
Coated Sins

The
Classic Diner Mysteries

A
Chili Death

A
Deadly Beef

A
Killer Cake

A
Baked Ham

A
Bad Egg

A
Real Pickle

A
Burned Biscuit

The
Ghost Cat Cozy Mysteries

Ghost
Cat: Midnight Paws

Ghost
Cat 2: Bid for Midnight

The
Cast Iron Cooking Mysteries

Cast
Iron Will

Jessica Beck is the
New York Times
Bestselling Author of the
Donut Mysteries, the Classic Diner Mysteries, the Ghost Cat Cozy Mysteries, and
the Cast Iron Cooking Mysteries.

To
the Great and Powerful E,

You
are a rock star, kiddo.

Sugar Coated Sins by
Jessica Beck; Copyright © 2015

All rights reserved.

No part of this book
may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form
without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of
copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. This is a work of
fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the
author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons,
living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely
coincidental.

Recipes included in
this book are to be recreated at the reader’s own risk.
 
The author is not responsible for any damage,
medical or otherwise, created as a result of reproducing these recipes.
 
It is the responsibility of the reader to
ensure that none of the ingredients are detrimental to their health, and the
author will not be held liable in any way for any problems that might arise
from following the included recipes.

Chapter
1

“
Benjamin
Port did not die by accident; I poisoned him.

I’m not sorry that I did it; i really had no choice.

I didn’t count on the nightmares, though.

will they ever end, or will they haunt me for the rest of my life?
”

That note, written fifteen years
earlier, set off a chain of events that ultimately sent my world into a
tailspin.

My name is Suzanne Hart.
 
I own and run a donut shop in April Springs,
North Carolina, and when I first heard about the confession’s discovery, I
didn’t think it would have any impact whatsoever on my life.

Wow, was I ever wrong.

By the time everything was finally
over, my way of looking at things would never be the same.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The story of
how
the note was uncovered is really where it all started, so
that’s probably the best place to begin.

Chapter
2

“What was that?” Emma asked me as
we worked at closing up Donut Hearts for the day.
 
Even though it was a few minutes past eleven
in the morning, for us it was the end of a long shift.
 
Then again, we started in the middle of the
night, so who could blame us?
 
The noise
Emma had been referring to had been a loud screech of tires and then a jarring
collision.

“It sounded like a car wreck to
me,” I said as I put the money I’d been counting down on the counter.
 
Glancing out our window that opened up onto
Springs Drive, I couldn’t see any signs of an impact anywhere nearby.

“Can we go check it out?” my young
assistant asked me.

I didn’t like the thought of just
leaving all our cash spread out on the counter like that, but then again,
someone might be in need of our help.
 
Grabbing a nearby dishtowel, I quickly spread it out over the money and
then pulled off my apron.
 
“Let’s go,” I
said.

Emma took her own apron off, and
we headed for the front door.

It was already starting to heat up
to a level a little beyond my comfort zone.
 
I knew a lot of folks loved the dog days of summer, but I was more of a
winter kind of gal myself, and I couldn’t wait for the temperatures to start
dropping again.
 
Looking down the road
toward the sound of the impact, I could see a crowd already starting to form a
hundred yards away.
 
They were all
gathering near our town hall, and it appeared that an older car had found its
way over the curb.
 
As we hurried toward
the scene, I could see our town clock lying on its side, the pole snapped off a
few feet above the ground from the collision.
 
The car had to be at least fifty years old, made back when steel had been
used instead of plastic, and it had taken its toll on the heavy pole.
 
Sixteen-year-old Jeremy Hall was out of the
car, leaning against it with a look of sheer panic on his face.
 
No wonder.
 
He’d just been in the donut shop that morning bragging about his brand
new driver’s license, and the car he’d just crashed belonged to his
grandmother, Granny Gail, host of our local gardening show on the radio.
 
Her real name was Gail Fortunata, but
everyone just called her by her professional name.
 
“Granny’s going to kill me,” he kept
repeating, even as a pair of paramedics started to check him out.
 
“Did I completely wreck her car?”

“No, but the clock’s in pretty
rough shape,” portly Charlie Clark said as he took Jeremy’s blood
pressure.
 
I saw him frown after he
finished taking the reading, and I couldn’t help myself.

“Is there something wrong with
him?”

“The kid’s pulse is a little fast,
but his pressure’s just fine, even after what just happened.
 
He’s got an engine like a racehorse.”

I looked up to see my husband, the
acting sheriff, hurry toward us.
 
It was
still odd seeing him dressed in uniform, but I personally liked the image.
 
When Jake had left the state police, he’d
worn plain clothes, so it was still taking some getting used to seeing him in
khakis, no matter how good he looked in them.

“What happened here?” he asked,
and after Jeremy explained that his foot had slipped off the brake and had hit
the gas pedal instead, Jake nodded and then looked directly into Jeremy’s
eyes.
 
“First things first; are you
okay?”

“He’s fine,” Charlie said as he
put his blood pressure cuff away.

“Thanks, but I was talking to
him,” Jake said softly.

“I’m fine,” Jeremy insisted.
 
“Sheriff, am I going to get a ticket for
this?”

Jake nodded as he took in the
scene.
 
“I would have to say yes, based
on what I know.
 
Sorry.
 
I don’t have much choice in the matter.”

“Come on.
 
You were young once yourself.
 
Why don’t you take it easy on the kid, Jake?”
Nick Williams said from the crowd.

“Yeah, it’s clear to see that it
was just an accident.
 
It could have
happened to anybody,” Pete Evans added.

Jake frowned at the crowd.
 
“Folks, this is official police business, and
besides, there’s nothing to see here.
 
I
need you all to move on now and go about your business.”

There were a few grumbles, but
people began to do as he’d instructed, and they started breaking up.
 
Emma tugged on my arm and said, “Suzanne, why
don’t we head back to the donut shop and finish up ourselves?”

“You go on without me.
 
I’ll be right with you,” I said.

“Are you really staying?
 
You heard what Jake just said.”

“I just want to have a word with
my husband for a second, and besides, I’m not exactly a casual bystander.
 
Go on.
 
I’ll be there soon.
 
When you
finish your chores, feel free to take off if I’m not back in time.”

That was clearly what she’d been
waiting for.
 
I knew that my assistant
had class that afternoon, and she was eager to get started.
 
“Thanks.
 
See you tomorrow.”

After Emma and most of the rest of
the crowd left, I started to ask Jake something when he lifted one finger in my
direction and asked, “Give me a second, okay?”

“I’m not in any rush,” I
said.
 
“Take your time.”

Jake nodded, and then he turned
back to Jeremy.

“May I have the keys, son?” he
asked the shaken young man.

“They’re still in the car,” he
replied.
 
“How bad is it?”

Jake studied the front bumper for
a second, and then he smiled broadly at Jeremy.
 
“The bumper is barely dented in.
 
I can’t imagine that there’s any real damage to the car at all besides
that.
 
I didn’t realize that you were
driving solo already.”

“I just got my license today,” he
confessed.

Jake put a hand on the boy’s
shoulder.
 
“Don’t worry.
 
I know it doesn’t feel like it right now, but
this isn’t the worst day you’re ever going to have in your life.”

“How do you know that?” Jeremy
asked him.

“Trust me.
 
Things are going to come up in your future
that are going to be much worse than this.”

“I don’t know if that helps or
not.”
 
The man and the boy both smiled,
and it was clear that Jeremy was beginning to feel a little better.

Until he saw his grandmother heading
toward him, anyway.

“I’m so sorry for what happened,”
Jeremy said as she approached him.
 
“Please don’t be mad, Granny.”

Instead of scolding him, Gail
wrapped her arms around him and hugged him tightly.
 
“Are you okay, Jeremy?”

“I’m fine,” he said, his voice
muffled from his head being pressed into her ample chest.
 
“I can’t breathe at the moment, though.”

She pulled away.
 
“From the accident?”

“No, from your hug,” he said as he
caught his breath.
 
“I can’t believe that
I wrecked your car.”

She shook her head.
 
“None of that matters.”

“I’ll just pull it off the
sidewalk so you can drive it home,” Jake offered as I opened the driver’s side
door.

“Not me.
 
I’m never driving again,” Jeremy said.

“Nonsense,” Gail said.
 
“Young man, you’re chauffeuring me back to
the radio station this very minute.
 
I
left in the middle of my show when I heard the news.”
 
She turned to Jake.
 
“Is that okay with you, Sheriff?”

“I think it’s a great idea.
 
We’ll deal with the citation later.”
 
Jake got into the car and backed it off the
curb.
 
Once he had it parked legally, he
handed Jeremy the keys.
 
“Be careful, and
you’ll be okay.
 
Take a deep breath, be
aware of your surroundings, and I’m sure that you’ll do fine.”

“Thanks, Sheriff,” he said, and
then he turned to his grandmother.
 
“Granny, are you sure about this?”

“I’m absolutely positive.
 
Now remember, just because we need to get
back to the radio station quickly, I don’t want you rushing on my account,
understand?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Excellent.
 
Then let’s get going,” she said, and a minute
later, the two of them drove off.

“So goes the life of a small-town
sheriff,” I told Jake.

He nodded as he surveyed the
downed clock.
 
“The truth is, it’s the
most excitement I’ve had since I took over.
 
Not much has happened around here lately.”

“Why do you sound a little sad
when you say that?”

He shrugged.
 
“I don’t know.
 
Do I?
 
I’m not sure bringing me in to supervise Stephen Grant was needed after
all.”
 
Grant was young, and the job of
interim sheriff had been a lot for him to handle, so Jake had offered to step
in on a temporary basis only.

A crew from the town maintenance
department showed up in their truck, and as they approached us, Jake said, “I
can tell you one thing without any doubt:
 
we’re going to need a new pole for that clock.”

I glanced down at the base and
noticed that the concrete it had been set in had been pulled up as well.
 
Was there something buried under the
pole?
 
“What’s that?” I asked as I pointed
to the stainless steel lip of a canister just under the rubble.

“It’s the time capsule,” one of
the older workers said knowingly.
 
“I
poured the concrete myself fifteen years ago when we buried the thing.
 
We weren’t supposed to dig it up for another
eighty-five years.”

“Well, it looks as though we’re a
little early,” Jake said.
 
He bent down
and studied the canister’s edge a little more closely.
 
“We’re going to have to replace that as
well.
 
It looks like it got dinged in the
accident.
 
Who should I get in touch with
about doing that?”

“Why don’t you call Phillip?” I
suggested.
 
“You know how much he’s into
local history now.
 
He’ll know what to
do.”

“That’s an excellent suggestion,”
Jake said as he pulled out his phone.
 
Before he placed the call, though, he looked at me and asked me with a
grin, “What are you still doing hanging around here?
 
Don’t you have a donut shop to run?”

“We’re closing for the day, as a
matter of fact.
 
Any interest in having
lunch with me?”

“I don’t know if I’ll be able to
make it with all of this excitement going on,” he said with a grin.
 
“Check with me again in half an hour.”

“I’ll give you a call,” I said,
and then I made my way back to Donut Hearts.
 
It wasn’t exactly a typical day in my life, but at that point, I had no
idea how unusual it was about to become.