A Suspicion of Strawberries (Scents of Murder Book 1) Read online

  Spyglass Lane Mysteries presents:

  The Scents of Murder Mystery Series

  Book One

  A Suspicion of Strawberries

  By

  Lynette Sowell

  Copyright 2015

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 Biblica. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

  Chapter One

  Mornings can be murder, especially when they start with a broken coffeepot. In a hurry, in a lack-of-caffeine haze, I pulled up at the Higher Grounds pickup window to grab a venti double-shot caramel caffé mocha. No matter that it was early June and the hot coffee would make me melt. This Saturday morning, my body definitely needed the caffeine jolt before bride-to-be Charla Thacker and her gaggle of bridesmaids descended on Tennessee River Soaps.

  The upcoming wedding a week from today had to be the biggest summer event in Greenburg, Tennessee, population 9,973. I’m sure most of the business owners involved could recite the details.

  As for my little part in the prewedding festivities, Charla had taken forever to decide on Cherries Jubilee facial scrub for her and her bridesmaids. In that space of time, I had learned about the five-figure price tag of her diamond, the house everyone already knew about on the riverfront, and the planned honeymoon to the Grand Caymans.

  I even had to look that one up on the map. Most of the time the locals enjoyed vacations to Florida or perhaps California or a cruise, but of course Charla had to be different. Which leads me to her plans for a “spa day” for her bridesmaids.

  Now Greenburg isn’t exactly the sticks, but it doesn’t really have anything resembling a spa. So after a bit of exfoliation at my store that morning, the young women planned to pile back into someone’s car and head to the next stop—probably The Gazebo—for massages and pedicures. Then, the grand finale at the Venetian Tea Room down the road—a special “cleansing” lunch. Instead of a progressive dinner, Charla was treating her best friends to a progressive total spa package. I’m surprised she didn’t take out an ad in the paper announcing each phase of the journey.

  Charla’s flair for the dramatic included stunts like cruising down Main Street one Saturday night with her upper torso stuck through the top of her friend’s sunroof, waving her arms and hollering at anyone who’d notice. And that was just the night she and Robert Robertson got engaged. We all thought she’d won the lottery or something. Not that she needed the money.

  I flashed by a string of small storefronts and pulled up in front of a neat little cottage shop, white with Wedgwood blue trim. Mine. Well, mine for the modest rent payment I dropped off at the leasing company every month.

  My fingers still burned from signing the paperwork. Six months later, the business floated like Ivory soap, but barely. The place is my baby, a combination of in-store soap sales and Internet orders. Hey, if the rest of the world can sell on the Web, so can I—right here in Greenburg. I drove around to the side of the building where I usually parked.

  Then I saw the side door. Splintered wood surrounded a jimmied lock, the door ajar. I hit the brakes so hard my coffee sloshed through the opening in its lid. The cup tipped over the edge of the cup holder and poured onto the passenger side floor mat.

  Not a breakin. Please, Lord, not at Tennessee River Soaps. Not to me. Greenburg in the summer means kids out of school with little to do. Without many job prospects, what can you expect? Jerry at the Greenburg PD had his hands full. Now I’d have to call him to come down, my business another statistic like other businesses in town that summer.

  I found my cell phone at the bottom of my hobo bag, among the old receipts and empty gum wrappers, and called the station. “This is Andi—er, Andromeda Clark at Tennessee River Soaps on Main Street. I’d like to report a breakin.” As expected, I spelled my name, just as I had countless other times in my life. Thanks, Dad. An armchair space buff, he made up for never becoming an astronaut by naming me after a constellation.

  Once I finished the call with the dispatcher, assuring her it wasn’t an emergency but to hurry, I waited in the Jeep. After twenty minutes of listening to the radio and watching the pine trees sway in the June breeze, I debated going inside the store anyway.

  Still no Jerry or one of his men. Maybe if I used the end of my shirt, or bumped the door open with my hip, I could get inside the building without messing up any incriminating fingerprints. But the dispatcher had told me to wait outside until an officer arrived.

  Visions of a demolished store taunted my mind. I wanted to burst through the door of the shop, grab some disinfectant spray, and start cleaning. Another thought grabbed me. Should I call Charla Thacker and cancel her appointment? I can’t believe this happened.

  Jerry arrived before I dialed the station again. He left the squad car and ambled over to the side door. Hartley men don’t hurry. I should know this. His brother, Ben, my boyfriend, only rushes on the first weekend of hunting season.

  Today, Ben was probably somewhere in his tractor-trailer rig between Jackson and Cleveland. The two brothers rattled around in a big house that used to belong to their parents. I longed to play matchmaker for Jerry, but I couldn’t bear to think of the disaster after my last attempt.

  Of course, most of Greenburg probably wondered when Ben and I would eventually tie the knot. I didn’t know which made me antsier: the thought of a wedding or the unknown that waited for me inside the store.

  Jerry shook his head and perspiration dripped from his forehead and sandy hair. It just wasn’t legal for a man to have hair that nice. Ben did, too, but shaved his curly locks close in a buzz.

  “Looks like your place was next in the series of breakins this summer. Number three this month.”

  I left the Jeep and joined him at the door. “I didn’t touch anything or go in yet.”

  “We’ll have a look around.” Jerry slipped his gun from his holster, nudged the door with his shoulder, and went into the workroom. After a few seconds, he emerged, sticking the gun back in its place. “Can’t be too careful. Looks clear.”

  Good old Jerry, telling me what I already knew. Of course they had to be long gone. It wasn’t like I had anything worth stealing. “Listen, Jer.” I craned my neck to look around him. “Charla Thacker’s bridal party invades in about an hour, and I haven’t had my coffee.”

  “All right, go on in.”

  I pushed past him and into the back room where I prepared my concoctions. The surface of the stainless steel worktable gleamed, just like I’d left it last night. I expelled a pent-up sigh when I saw the undisturbed bowls of cherry facial scrub I’d mixed especially for Charla’s party, and the big, covered vat of cherry scrub I’d planned to package for sale afterward. All of the other products looked untouched, as well.

  Jerry entered the room behind me. “You were one of the fortunate victims. Millie over at Rags Fifth Avenue had to get new carpet installed after the thieves got through with her store. Good thing no one vandalized your shop and dumped those pretty little soaps all over the place.”

  Pretty little soaps. I tried not to grimace. In happier circumstances, the phrase would have made me smile. Most guys didn’t get it. Give ’em a bar of soap from The Dollar Shoppe and they’re happy.

  The spring and summer stock looked fine, from Peachy Keen to June Breeze to Cherries Jubilee, their p
ackaging intact. Thankful for that, I entered the salesroom. The cash register was open, its drawer a yawning chasm of plastic. Evidently these guys knew what they wanted when they came in.

  “They got my starting cash, fifty dollars.” I pointed at the empty drawer, and Jerry jotted something down. “But it doesn’t look like anything else is missing.” After I glanced around at the soap displays, I looked at the clock. No time to clean anything, but I didn’t like the idea that someone had been in my store without my permission.

  Jerry touched my arm. “I’m sorry this happened. From what Ben said, sales were picking up for you.”

  “Yes, I’ve been doing pretty well.” And with today’s good publicity, thanks to Charla and her friends, hopefully business would pick up a lot. “And I’m sure you’ll catch whoever did this.”

  Jerry scanned my workroom. “I’ll get Margaret to come down here with her print kit and dust. See what we can find.”

  That’s all I needed. Sure, I wanted to get whoever did this, but I didn’t want cops underfoot while Charla and her group were here. What if Charla turned up her nose and walked out at the disruption?

  “Could she wait, until maybe noonish? I promise I won’t touch the register. I’ll even cover it with a bag if you want.”

  Jerry grunted. “I guess…”

  “Everything I need is already out on sales-floor tables, and no one else has to go in the back room.”

  He nodded and chucked me on the arm. “We’ll do our best to find out who did this.” Then he clapped his notepad shut on his hip. “If we get any leads, I’ll let you know. Oh. Ben called late last night. He should be arriving in time for church tomorrow.”

  I smiled at that, and my heart sang. “That’s the best news I’ve heard all morning.”

  “See you around.” With that, Jerry nodded and left the store the way he came in.

  But what I wished for was Ben here right now. The man was as immovable as the Rock of Gibraltar. He had a way of staying cool under pressure. I envied that. When my stress level escalated, I felt like Momma’s old pressure cooker, ready to burst.

  I left the empty cash drawer alone and saw to making coffee. Of course, I’d lost my gourmet cup of coffee to the Jeep’s floor. All I could do was dash out the back door and cover the mess in the Jeep with generous layers of paper towels. Already I felt the twinges of a caffeine headache at my temples.

  Once the two-cup coffeepot gurgled from its spot on my desk in the office nook, I went back to the Cherries Jubilee scrub on my worktable in the back room. The small bowls of scrub, no larger than cereal bowls, didn’t look full enough. Not wanting to have Charla accuse me of being stingy with the product, I dumped another scoopful of the flakes from the large storage vat into each bowl. Then I replaced the clear plastic lids and shook the covered bowls.

  The demonstration table waited in the main salesroom. At each guest’s place there was a small make-up mirror, a cherry red placemat, and a few samples of other products along with my business card and coupons. I smiled for the first time since discovering the breakin. Momma would say I needed to thank God I’d only lost fifty dollars, and so I did. Last thing, I grabbed a pitcher, filled it with water, and set it on the table.

  Only thirty minutes to—

  “Showtime!” Charla Thacker breezed into the shop. A rush of laughter followed her. Even the bell on the door clanged with joy. Twenty-five and at the height of her young femininity, the room seemed brighter when Charla entered. Maybe it was the summer sun shining at her back that ignited her blond hair’s strawberry highlights. But she couldn’t have planned that effect. Could she?

  At ten years her senior, I caught a glimpse of what my mother once said about youth being wasted on the young. Charla’s sister, Melinda, trailed closely behind, beautiful in her own right but possessing a more ethereal beauty like Romeo’s Juliet instead of someone off the red carpet at the Oscars. Melinda’s fair skin needed no exfoliating, and her hair glowed a rich shade of walnut in the sunlight. The other bridesmaids flowed into the room—Emily, Tess, and Mitchalene, I soon found out.

  With my best “I’m-a-homespun-business-owner”smile on my face, I smoothed an imaginary wrinkle from my freshly-starched Tennessee River Soaps apron. “Good morning! I’m so glad you’re here.” I gestured to the round table in the center of the shop.

  “Can we sit anywhere?” asked Melinda.

  “This seat,” I touched a chair festooned with cherry red crepe paper flowers, “is for the bride, of course. But y’all may sit anywhere else.”

  Charla waited by the chair, stared at it, then back to me. Oh, please, she wasn’t waiting for me to pull the chair out for her.

  I gritted my teeth and smiled, hoping I didn’t look too much like a piranha. “Here you are.” I slid the chair away from the table. Melinda rolled her eyes. Emily giggled. The movie screen in my brain projected a flashback to seventh grade in the lunchroom, when the queen bee of the grade made us tremble to do her bidding, except me. I’d ended up at a table by myself and more than once my carton of milk had gotten poured over my tray of food. Sometimes picking your battles wasn’t easy. Greenburg had a social hierarchy that I both loathed and feared. How much to play along and be accepted? My cheeks hurt from smiling.

  Charla settled herself onto the seat as if she were preparing to answer interview questions at a pageant. “Thank you. Now, Andromeda—”

  I gritted my teeth again.

  “Tell us about this product of yours.” Charla pointed at the bowls.

  “Cherries Jubilee is a new product I’ve come up with, and y’all are the first ones to sample it today. I’ve developed scented bath salts, hand soaps, and glycerin soaps, but now I’ve combined hot-processed soap with a moisturizer and sugar base into these dry flakes to make a scrub.” I removed the lid from my own bowl and let the flakes run through my fingers. “What’s nice about this is, you just add water, and you have a wonderfully gentle exfoliant. Plus, it smells like cherry pie, thanks to the essential oils added in the soap-making process.” I grinned.

  “Ooh, I can’t wait.” Charla rubbed her hands together. “This is so luxurious. I tried it once before, when Andromeda was making her first batch. She let me be her guinea pig.”

  My teeth were getting sore. “Right. She sure was.” And she’d taken her sweet time making up her mind what scent she wanted. Strawberries were out. Allergic, she said, and she didn’t want to risk a breakout before the wedding. Peach was too “nasty,” she claimed. I wouldn’t repeat what she said about cucumber melon.

  Melinda snorted. “C’mon, Charla, you’re getting on Ms. Clark’s nerves.” She made me sound like crotchety old Doris Flanders who used to chase kids from her watermelon patch with her shotgun.

  “Don’t worry about it.” My face had frozen. I just knew it. “I’ll demonstrate for you.”

  I poured a bit of water into my own bowl and continued. “You’ll need to add a few tablespoons of water to the flakes and make a paste. Then take your wooden spatula like this, and stir well. You don’t use your fingers, because the moisturizer starts acting immediately, and we want that process to happen on your face.”

  I can’t believe I’m doing this. I, who was a flop at selling Vonna Cosmetics, demonstrating a beauty product to the elite of Greenburg. Who’d have thunk it? I started spreading the scrub on my face with the spatula, and finally moved the scrub in a circular motion on my cheeks. At least I had good skin from skipping the tanning beds.

  The young women removed the plastic covers from their bowls and mimicked my actions. Emily and Melinda had me check their mixes to make sure they’d added the correct amount of water to their flakes.

  Charla dipped her wooden spatula into the scrub and swirled the mixture with vigor. “This smells heavenly.” She smiled with her whitened teeth at her bridesmaids and swiped the first generous blob of scrub onto her cheeks. Then she grinned at herself in the small mirror propped up in front of her. She dolloped more scrub on her face.

&nb
sp; The women chatted and giggled for a few minutes, and I encouraged them to gently rub the mixture in a circular motion on their skin while the moisturizer worked. Someone took a picture of Charla, her face all goopy.

  “Ladies, I’ll be right back.” I smiled at the quintet whose main focus was themselves. “I’ll get some damp rags so you can wipe the scrub from your faces in a few minutes.” Melinda and Tess nodded.

  I moved to the small sink in the corner where customers could try soap for themselves and ran a few washcloths under the water. When I returned, I noticed Charla rubbing her neck.

  “Remember, your neck skin is a bit sensitive.” I put a fresh smile on.

  Charla coughed, then cleared her throat. She frowned and the room seemed to darken. “Oh.” She slathered gobs of the scrub on her cheeks and forehead. “This doesn’t feel right—”

  What happened next moved in slow motion, like the time Ben and I went to the drive-in to watch a movie and the film got stuck and dragged, frame by frame.

  I viewed each detail around the table as if posed and captured by the photographer in my head.

  Charla, knocking the bowl away from her. Cherry scrub, splattering across the table.

  Charla, grabbing her face, scratching at swelling cheeks.

  Oblivious laughter from Emily and Tess. Mitchalene scrubbing her own face for all she was worth.

  Then everything shot into fast-forward mode. Melinda leaped to her feet.

  “Charla!” She fell to her knees and scrambled on the floor for Charla’s purse. “She’s having an allergic reaction!” All laughter stopped.

  “What?” I grabbed a damp cloth and soaked it in the pitcher of water, then started wiping scrub from Charla’s face. I could barely see her eyes for the swelling. Jesus, help us!

  Melinda dumped the contents of Charla’s purse onto the table. “Where’s her EpiPen? It’s not here. She’s always leaving it at home. Oh, c’mon, Charla, how could you?” The other girls stared with mouths agape.

  “Someone call 911—”