“Oh!” Lauren took a sip of her coffee, then got up and bustled over to her recipe book, the zombie dilemma already forgotten. She paged through the book, tilting her head this way and that as she considered her options. “Ah,” she said. “This looks great. Stuffed mushrooms for the start, and then we’ll do something hearty to comfort he soul. A lasagna.” She removed the key to the Shroom Shed—her pride and joy that had only just started recovering from a serious case of theft—and handed it over. “Brown mushrooms, please, Charlie. A dozen.”
“Sure.” Anything to get away from the zombie theories and settle my thoughts about what had happened.
I left the kitchen and moved down the quaint gravel pathway that encircled the inn. The greenhouse to my right drew the eye, as well as the shape of Brian moving around inside it. Thankfully, Lauren didn’t need any fresh ingredients from there today. I didn’t want to face Brian and here his disapproval about our interest in the case.
Things had been strained lately. I blamed it on having to be around each other nonstop for thirty days straight.
Still, that’s not a good sign.
I shook my head, pushing worries about my relationship to the back of my mind.
Someone, it had to be the murderer, had stolen Jordan’s corpse from the medical examiner’s office. It had to be someone who was skilled and understood the investigative process. A dirty cop? Or, simply, my ex-husband?
But why would he kill Jordan? He had no reason to, and if he’d been able to get into the inn to attack Jordan, why not just come straight to me and finish the job he’d started?
I found the basement doors set against the side of the inn and smiled at the luminous pictures of mushrooms painted across it. I unlocked the thick lock, swung the doors open, and descended into the space underneath the inn.
The Shroom Shed was off to my right, but my thoughts went to my grandmother’s secret armory, which was hidden behind an obstacle course of furniture and a thick door at the back of this section of the basement.
If only we could use her equipment.
I dismissed the rueful thought and gathered the allotted number of mushrooms in the dark, moist interior of the shed.
Afterward, I locked up after myself and started down the side path around the inn.
The cold barrel of a gun pressed against the side of my neck.
My training kicked in, and I dropped into a crouch, swinging my leg out to connect with the backs of my attacker’s legs. They side-stepped my attempt with ease, crunching the gravel under neat, cream high heels.
“Just checking you’re still limber, Charlotte.” My grandmother smiled down at me, holding a hairbrush that had a cylindrical metal handle. “Though, I’d expect you to know the difference between a gun and brush.”
“Better to be safe than sorry.” My pulse had clipped upward, but I forced myself to breathe and straightened. I’d kept my hold on the basket of mushrooms in the altercation. “Did Jessie bother you so much that you need to take your temper out on me? It’s the first time you’ve ever tested my reflexes, Georgina.”
“It’s the first time I’ve had to.” Because we’d been protected before.
“I’ve got news,” I said, choosing not to take offense to her test.
I told her about the theft of Jordan’s corpse from the medical examiner’s office.
“Ah,” Gamma said. “That changes things. Makes them even more urgent.”
“I agree.”
“Charlotte, go give Lauren the mushrooms and tell her I need your help. You’ll be back in twenty minutes.”
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“The crime scene.”
7
“How are we going to do this?” I asked, standing next to my grandmother at the back of the inn. We were outside the kitten foster center, standing at the base of the steps that led up to the shaded porch.
“The old-fashioned way,” Gamma said, and stretched her arms and legs. She’d changed out of her heels and into a pair of white tennis shoes. “Follow me, Charlotte.”
My grandmother strode over to the trellis against the side of the inn, hooked her foot onto it, and started scaling the wall. Once she’d reached the top of it, she braced her feet against the brick wall, and leaped nimbly from the trellis onto the porch’s roof. She rose and beckoned for me to follow her.
Let’s hope that trellis doesn’t give way. I’ve been a little liberal with my cupcake eating lately.
I performed the same maneuvers as my Gamma, only pausing when the trellis creaked or trembled underneath my weight and joined her on the roof.
“You made that look easy,” I whispered.
“Everything’s easy with practice.”
Truer words had never been spoken.
“Now what?” I asked. “The library’s on the other side of the inn.”
“We’ll go over the roof and through the attic window,” my grandmother said. “Bottom floor window is still bolted shut. Ready? Let’s move. Quiet and quickly, now. It’s broad daylight and we have eighteen minutes before Lauren will expect you back in the kitchen.”
I followed Gamma over the roof of the inn, careful not to kick free any of the tiles. On the right side of the inn, my grandmother lowered herself off the edge by her fingertips and found the attic window. She disappeared from sight a second later, and for one heart-rending moment, I was sure she’d fallen into the flowerbeds far below.
A soft whistle came—the signal for me to follow her—and I dropped over the edge and swung my legs through the attic’s open window. I dropped onto one knee, bracing my landing with a palm.
“Simple,” Gamma said, with a triumphant smile. “Not as fun as the grapple gun, but still.”
“If only Jessi could see you in action, she’d keep a more respectful tongue in her head.”
“Don’t mention that woman’s name under my roof.” Gamma raised a palm.
We fell silent, both scanning the attic for any clues that the police might’ve missed. The area where
