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“What the hell kind of a name is Pepper? That name should be reserved for dogs and strippers.” Kyle tossed herself on the couch next to where Blake sat with her legs crisscrossed and her black cat, Ninja, curled up in her lap. “And I can’t believe Bree told you all of this stuff first before she called me back.”
Ninja poked his head up at Kyle’s bounce and gave a soft little purr-growl of derision before he snuggled his head back against Blake’s leg.
Blake ran her hand through Ninja’s soft fur. “What can I say? I have coffee and pumpkin bread. I’m always going to win.”
Kyle stuck out her tongue but couldn’t hide her grin. “You are so lucky you got Mom’s baking gene. I tried to make mac and cheese last night, and it turned out all congealed and black on the bottom.”
“Black?” Blake giggled. “How do you burn mac and cheese?”
Kyle picked up the bottle of wine she’d set on the table and poured some into two glasses. “I blame the stove. Totally not my fault.” She picked up a glass and curled her legs under her. Her blue eyes sparkled, and Blake wasn’t sure if it was from the wine or something else.
Either way, she decided to take advantage of her sister’s good mood and steer the conversation in the direction of the case. “Sooo... you’re not going to get on my case for talking to them.”
Her sister’s smiled faded, and she sighed. “I just don’t want you do anything dangerous. Do I still think you should mind your own business? Yes. But it’s not like I can bust your chops for talking to people who come into the café.”
Whew! That was relief. “Then we’re on the same page. Did you go talk to Pepper after Bree filled you in?”
Kyle’s eyes narrowed over the rim of her wine glass. “Not yet. Crossbones was closed today, remember? And since she hasn’t moved in to the apartment over Sliced, she’s still at her old place, which is about forty-five minutes from here. I’ll head over to Crossbones when they open tomorrow around lunchtime.”
“Ooh, I could go for a cheeseburger at Crossbones.”
Kyle’s wine glass clinked against the coffee table as she set it down. “Don’t push it, sister.”
Ninja purred as Blake absently stroked his fur. “Fine. So she hasn’t moved into the apartment yet. But I wonder if she’s been there.”
Kyle set her wine down and picked up a chocolate-marshmallow crinkle. “What are you getting at?” Her eyes widened as she bit into the cookie. “Oh, holy crap! These are good!”
A grin tugged at Blake’s lips. “Marshmallow is my winner for next month’s Mystery Cup ingredient. Thumbs-up?”
“Omigod, way up!” Kyle popped the rest of the cookie in her mouth and reached for another one.
“What I was getting at with the apartment was that it was decorated, remember? I guess I thought whoever rented it was in the process of moving in.”
Kyle shook her head and swallowed. “Bree said all the apartments come decorated and sparsely furnished. Pepper’s not supposed to move in for a couple of weeks.”
Clues and possibilities started to run through Blake’s mind. She needed to find out if Pepper had been in that apartment. “So if Pepper hasn’t moved in, then why was there a matchbook from Crossbones in the bathroom?” After talking to Bree, she had assumed the matchbook came from Pepper. But if it hadn’t, maybe it had come from the killer. Or maybe Pepper was the killer. She was tall and thin. Closing her eyes, Blake tried to think back and remember how tall the clown had been.
“I can hear the wheels turning, Blake. Calm down. If Pepper has been in that apartment, she could have easily dropped a matchbook. But I will find out. I don’t have to tell you to stay away from her, do I?”
“Of course not.” Because it wouldn’t really do any good anyway, considering Blake was craving a cheeseburger from Crossbones. And if she happened to talk to Pepper when she was there... well, that wasn’t against the law.
“Good. Now, enough talk about this. You said you were going trick-or-treating with the twins on Saturday?”
She nodded, excited about spending Halloween with her energetic niece and nephew, although she was a little worried about the thought of Emma on sugar overload. “Ryan’s on call on Saturday night, and Rachel didn’t really want to take the kids trick-or-treating by herself. Their neighborhood’s so crowded on Halloween, she’s afraid of one of them taking off and getting lost in the crowd. That’s where I come in. I’m on Aiden duty.”
“Divide and conquer.” Kyle reached for another cookie. “Cheers to that. Plus, I’m sure you’re happy that you get to dress up again. Coffee Goddess?”
“Nah.” She shoved down the disappointment that rose. Sean had complimented her on her costume, and he’d seemed to enjoy running his fingers through the white feathers around her neck, but it hadn’t gotten him any closer to making a move. “I might do something simple. I haven’t decided what yet, though. Are you working?”
“Oh, yeah.” Kyle reached over to ruffle Ninja’s head, but he pulled back and sniffed her hand before leaning forward once he’d deemed her worthy of petting him. “It’s all hands on deck on Halloween every year. You know, this time of year always attracts the tourists who have a real taste for the macabre. Mr. Manson said the hotel’s been booked solid for months. Just one more reason I want to get this case wrapped up ASAP. The last thing we need is someone with ill intentions running around when we have an increase in tourists.”
“I know the business owners have been enjoying the extra traffic. Sean sold all of the first edition Agatha Christie books he had, and those were expensive! Mrs. Russell has a huge display set up with pictures and news clippings from the Red Rose Murders, and Mr. Jeffries has his ghost tour bus packed full every night, going up and down Main Street.”
Kyle snorted. “Yeah, I took his tour just out of curiosity. You know he totally plays up the fact that there was a murder in your café last spring, right?”
Blake’s stomach dropped. “He does not.”
“Sis, haven’t you wondered why you have tourists coming out of the woodwork?”
“Well, crap. I thought it was because I had the best coffee in the Midwest. Or maybe it’s the cookies.” Although the ghost-murder tour would explain why Mystery Cup had been so busy lately. Halloween was nearly the busiest time of year anyway due to all the tourists coming to town with their Red Rose Murder curiosity. The ghost tour would push even more her way.
“You know you could make him stop. You could file an injunction. But I have a feeling you don’t want to lose the increase in business, right?”
Blake rested her head back against the sofa. “Crap. It’s a blessing and a curse.”
Laughing, Kyle stood and picked up the empty plate. “I’m going to get more, and then we’re starting the movie. I was promised Hitchcock, remember? When I get back, no more talk. All I want is wine, cookies, and Janet Leigh screaming in the shower. I’m out of town for weapons training for a few days, and this is the last chance I have to relax before I have to leave tomorrow afternoon.”
She padded off to the kitchen as Blake looked down at the cat purring in her lap. “Today’s been full of clues, Ninja. But I still don’t know who the heck was in that apartment. Do you think I can get any information out of Pepper Wright?”
Ninja blinked up at her with big green eyes and flicked his long tail.
“You’re right.” Blake lifted him enough so she could drop a kiss on his head. “There’s only one way to find out.”
***
TREPIDATION RAN THROUGH Blake as she sat in her Honda Civic outside of Crossbones. The big blue building looked like any bar and grill from the outside. Large tinted windows didn’t give anything away. Big posters advertising Bud Light were tacked on the painted-brick walls, and an unlit Open sign hung by the front door. The place didn’t open for another twenty minutes, but Blake had already watched a slew of employees go in. Still, she had yet to see Pepper Wright.
Kyle had been ordered by Chief Raimy to leave that morning for shooter training or whatever in St. Louis—earlier than expected—so she wouldn’t get the chance to interview Pepper until she returned at the end of the week. But Blake couldn’t wait that long. If there was a killer on the loose, they could strike again. She didn’t want to take the chance of that happening if she could uncover information that could lead them to the killer.
She leaned back in her seat and admired the orange and yellow leaves on the trees that swayed in the fall breeze. A lone orange leaf broke free of its branch and floated down, landing on the hood of Blake’s car. She was so lost in her own world, thinking about fall, that she almost missed the thin girl with the cotton-candy-colored hair swinging through the door of Crossbones.
That’s her. Blake smoothed back the dark-blond hair that had slipped out of her ponytail. It’s now or never. She stepped out of her car into the cool midmorning fall air and closed the door. The crisp air was tinged with the smell of grease from the bar and grill’s lunch preparations. Blake pulled her jacket tighter around herself and made her way across the lot and through the door, grateful that none of the waitstaff had decided to lock it behind them.
When she walked in, she stepped up to the bar, where a dark-haired man had his back to her. Pepper flipped up a section of the counter, walked behind the big circular bar, and hung her keys on a hook above a shelf of what looked like flavored vodkas. The dark-haired man turned and snagged Pepper’s belt loop. The girl giggled as the man yanked her close to him and kissed her deeply.
Whoa. Uh, okay. If that’s how you greet your employees these days, my management skills are seriously lacking.
When the kiss ended, Pepper pulled back from the man and spotted Blake. Her face immediately tightened. “What are you doing here? We’re not open yet. You shouldn’t be in here.”
The dark-haired man turned around, and a wave of hair fell over his forehead as his face lit up in a smile. “Blake Harper. That’s your name, right? You own the coffee shop, the good one. I’m Whit, remember? We met at your party.”
On the night of the party, their meeting had been brief, so she hadn’t received the full power of that smile. She also hadn’t noticed just how much Whit looked like his father with his kind gray eyes and dark hair, except his wasn’t peppered with silver like his dad’s. “Oh yeah, Mr. Hamilton’s son. I didn’t realize you worked here. I thought your dad said something about you offering Wilton your business expertise?”
Pepper sniffed as she walked up to stand across the bar from Blake. “He doesn’t just work here. He bought the place. Like I said, we’re closed. Come back later.”
As Blake looked at the sneer on Pepper’s face, she remembered what her mother used to tell her when she’d made that face as a teen. “Blake Mildred, you’d better fix your face, or I’ll fix it for you.” She had to bite her tongue from saying the same thing to Pepper.
Whit frowned. “There’s no need to be rude, Ms. Wright. Blake’s a friend. She’s welcome to hang out until we open.”
Ms. Wright? Interesting that he’s acting as though he didn’t just have his tongue halfway down Pepper’s throat.
He turned his warm brown eyes on her. “The kitchen’s not open yet, though, but I can get you a cup of coffee or something.” The way he leaned forward as he spoke to her made her wonder if he treated all the customers that way or if he was just a classic flirt. Either way, his smile didn’t make her insides go all melty like Sean’s or Adam’s.
Pepper pinched her lips in a firm line and crossed her arms over her medically enhanced chest as she glared at Blake. It was understandable that people described her as having a less-than-stellar attitude.
“Uh, no, thanks, I’ve probably had enough coffee for one morning.” She smiled at Whit. “I actually came in to talk to Pepper.”
He raised an eyebrow as he turned his curious gaze to the girl next to him.
The girl flicked her pink hair over her shoulder. “Me? About what? I don’t have anything to talk to you about.”
“Well, I was just talking to Bree Nelson yesterday, and she tells me you rented the apartment above Sliced.”
Pepper narrowed her eyes. “Yeah,” she said slowly, “So?”
It was not going well. Blake needed to think of something quickly to get the girl to warm up to her, or she wasn’t going to find out any useful information. “I came to welcome you to the neighborhood, and uh”—she opened her purse and dug through it until she found a coupon then slapped it on the bar—“offer you a coupon for a free handcrafted beverage. Come on over anytime.”
The bartender’s eyes flicked back and forth between Blake and the coupon then back to Blake. “You came all the way down here to give me a coupon for free coffee?” She put her manicured fingers on the coupon and slid it back across the bar toward Blake. “I’m not stupid, Blake. I hear the rumors around town, even the crazy one about you thinking you witnessed a murder in my apartment by a guy dressed as Ghost Face or something. Thanks for that bit of gossip, by the way. The last thing I need is to be a stop on Mr. Jeffries’s ghost tour.”
Welcome to the club. “It’s not gossip,” Blake argued, although she knew how fast rumors spread through the grapevine in small towns. It didn’t surprise her a bit that word had gotten around.
Whit stopped drying the glass he’d been rubbing with a dishcloth as he watched their exchange. “Wait a second. What? You witnessed a murder?”
“No, she didn’t,” Pepper answered. “I heard she’s losing it, that she’s cracked up after she got attacked by a killer last spring.”
Blake clenched her jaw, telling herself not to lose her cool. “I just wanted to ask if you’ve been to the apartment yet. Maybe you came in to decorate or something?”
Pepper shook her head. “Not that it’s any of your business, but no. I’ve only seen the plans. I picked up the keys a couple of days ago, but I don’t have my walk-through for a few days.”
That didn’t make a whole lot of sense. No one rented a place sight unseen. Luckily, she didn’t have to ask that question because Whit’s curiosity had been piqued.
“You rented a place you’ve never even seen?” he asked Pepper. “Do you really think that’s a good idea?”
Pepper rolled her eyes and uncrossed her arms to perch her hands on her pointy hips. “I’ve seen the blueprints. The lofts were starting to go, and I wanted to grab one before they were gone. Most of them are all open with exposed brick, but I liked the one above Sliced because it had so much storage space. I have a lot of stuff, you know.”
“Storage space?” Now Blake was confused. Maybe Pepper was lying to try to throw her off. “I’m sorry, Pepper, but I don’t understand. I’ve been in the apartment. There’s no storage space in there. It just has the one closet.”
“And the attic. Duh,” Pepper exclaimed, looking at Blake as if she were a moron.
“Attic?” Whit set the glass on the bar, and his brows drew together. “I was thinking of renting one of the lofts. The one I looked at didn’t have an attic.”
“Yeah, that’s why I chose the one above Sliced. Todd pointed me in that direction when I went into Ozark Management to meet with a real estate agent.”
Red flags shot up in Blake’s head so fast that she nearly jolted in her seat. “Todd? Todd Lang? Sabrina’s husband? I mean ex-husband?”
“Yeah, I ran into him the day I went in. He was on his way out, and we talked for a little bit. When I told him I was looking for storage space, he said the apartment over Sliced was the only one with an attic, so I snatched it up. I haven’t seen the attic, but I know you get to it in the closet. There’s supposed to be pull-down stairs.”
Blake’s mind raced to try to fit Todd into the existing puzzle. “How would Todd have known that? And what was he doing at Ozark Management?” And how the actual crap did I miss seeing a freaking attic?
“Who cares? Look, are we done? I’m not your Ghost Face. I haven’t even dropped off my first month’s deposit yet. And I have work to do.” Before waiting for Blake to respond, Pepper lifted a section of the wooden bar top so she could get out from behind the bar and stalked off, sashaying her skinny hips. She could give Sabrina a run for her money.
“Sorry about that,” Whit said. “We’ve been having some issues with Pepper’s attitude. She needs to be friendlier with the customers. I’m not sure how to get that through to her.” He picked his dish towel back up and began to wipe down the bar. “Was someone really killed in that apartment?”
“Well, that’s what I’m trying to find out.”
Whit gave her a disarming smile. “I heard you were kind of an amateur sleuth. Let me know if I can help. I love a good mystery.”
Blake returned his smile. “Thanks, but right now, I think I need to pay a visit to Todd Lang.” But her curiosity couldn’t hold out that long. First, she had to get a look at that attic.