a match. So, a guy is bleeding out, but his coat manages to get hung up in a closet on the south side of town, while he’s standing on the gorge bridge on the northwest side of town.”
“He was wearing the coat when he got this fatal cut?”
“Almost certainly. It’s a lot of blood. But he didn’t have the coat on when he hit the bottom of the gorge. Obviously.”
“So there was someone else with him? Who?”
“That, darlin, is the sixty-four thousand dollar question.”
Chapter 10
Sam took up her fork again and picked at her food. Suddenly, her appetite seemed to have waned.
“I went through the Adams house pretty thoroughly this afternoon. Didn’t find anything with Bram Fenton’s name on it, no papers referring to an investigator or a legal case or anything. How would his coat end up at her house if they had no ties whatsoever?”
“We don’t know that they didn’t,” Beau said. His own appetite seemed fine, Sam noticed. He was more than halfway through his meal. “They might have been friends or one-time neighbors . . . people can know each other in the most obscure ways.”
She gave that some thought. “Lovers, maybe? Remember, there were other items of male clothing in the house too.”
“And love relationships gone bad are always good motive for murder.”
“True.” Thinking of the many ways in which people who profess to love each other end up doing harm, she wondered if that was just one more reason she’d avoided falling in love, all these years.
Beau glanced at his watch. “Well, my unofficial dinner break has to come to an end. I don’t dare take the chance that Mama would try to get out of her wheelchair alone.”
“Me too. I’ve got a kitchen full of baked goods that have to be packed up and ready to arrive at the shop by six in the morning. And I have a feeling that our first day will reveal all the glitches and little forgotten items.”
“Anything I can do to help?”
“Come by for a cup of our signature coffee in the morning and have a pastry. It’ll look good to have some cars out front.”
“Even if it’s a sheriff’s department cruiser?”
“I think we can handle that.” In a town this size it had to be pretty common news that the baker was dating the deputy sheriff. And whoever didn’t know about it already would be in on the secret after the bakery had been open a week.
They walked out to the parking lot together and indulged in kisses that became longer and more intense by the minute. Just short of a full make-out session, and saying to hell with their other responsibilities, they came up for air.
“I
“Maybe I could call you later? At this point even phone sex probably wouldn’t be half bad.”
She laughed and ran her hands down his chest. “Nope. I’m going to be sound asleep by the time it’s dark.”
Beau’s Explorer turned left and Sam watched him round the curve in the road in her rearview mirror. Darnit. He’d stirred up her hormones again.
A five o’clock alarm is an awful thing. Sam sat up in the dark and hit the button, going against every instinct in her body. What on earth was she thinking, getting into a business that required such ungodly hours?
Her feet dragged her toward the bathroom where she took the chilliest shower she could tolerate and then swished her mouth with the strongest mouthwash in the house. If that didn’t wake her up she didn’t know what would.
She began toting boxes of cookies and cheesecakes out to the van while coffee brewed. The new, fancy coffee machine at the bakery had not even been put through a trial run yet but she needed her vital first caffeine of the day, right now.
With the van loaded and a travel mug filled with French roast, Sam drove the few blocks and parked her traveling billboard right in front of the shop. Until her regular signage was installed this was the best way to attract attention. Within five minutes Jennifer arrived and the two women began carrying everything inside.
“Look in the back room,” Sam said as she began arranging pastries onto trays on the wire shelves inside her display cases. “I have some generic Grand Opening banners that we can put in the windows to replace those paper ones that say Coming Soon.”
Jen was back in two minutes and began switching the signs. Sam was glad to see her new assistant take the initiative, without further instruction. She started the coffee maker and set up more filters and beans for subsequent batches. Meanwhile, Sam cut a couple of slices of each cheesecake flavor into small sample-sized pieces and arranged them on a plate near the register. At seven, sharp, they were ready to turn on all the lights and open the doors.
Jen had no sooner hit the light switch than a woman appeared at the door. “Are you open for business yet?” she asked.
Sam and Jen exchanged smiles. “Absolutely!”
The lady came in and immediately asked for some of that heavenly coffee that she said she could smell from the street. While she browsed the muffins, Sam noticed that Beau had pulled up out front in his Department SUV. The woman took her coffee and a cranberry muffin to one of the tables, pulling out the morning newspaper and settling in.
Beau gave Sam a discreet thumbs-up when he saw that he wasn’t the first customer. He made a lot of noise over the cheesecakes, and another customer who’d just stepped inside immediately ordered a slice of each flavor, to go. While Jen boxed them up, Sam signaled Beau to step into the kitchen.
“So far, so good,” he said.
“Exciting! I hope it keeps up like this for awhile. Jen’s doing a great job at handling the counter and I need to start on the plans for the gala opening party on Saturday. You’ll be here?”
He nodded and reached out to squeeze her hand.
“And bring Iris.”
“Absolutely. She’s your biggest cookie fan out there.”
“Hang around awhile if you’d like,” she said. “Get some coffee—”
“I wish I could stay awhile, but duty calls.”
“Hey, take a box of those mini-muffins for the office. My treat. Just tell everyone where you got them.”
“Deal.”
They walked back into the shop and Sam loaded a box with muffins and cookies. Cheapest form of advertising, she thought, remembering that she still needed to give the ad rep at the radio station a call today. By the time Beau left, six more customers had come and gone, according to Jen. A muffin here, a croissant there—it was beginning to add up.
At nine, when Mysterious Happenings opened, Sam had made up a plate of cookie samples and taken them over to Ivan to hand out to his customers throughout the day. And she took another plate to Riki at Puppy Chic. “Just tell everyone where you got them,” she repeated to each of them.
By midmorning things settled a little out front and Sam went into the back room to make some follow-up calls. First to the fixture company where the man answering the phone assured her that his crew was on the way to Taos and should be arriving anytime. Fuming a little, Sam had no choice but to hope that was true. Her next call was to the radio station’s ad representative. He played the first take of her ad over the phone and she was pleased with the way it sounded. One small change of wording and she okayed it to begin running on Thursday before the Saturday gala.
She was jotting down names for a guest list when she heard a large truck drive up behind the building. At last!
Two hours and a few swear words later, after dealing with all the joys of installing modern appliances in an older building, the delivery men left. Now it was up to Darryl and his crew to plumb the water lines for the sinks and
