Red, White and Blueberry Murder: A Donut Hole Cozy Mystery - Book 7 Read online

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  Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Copyright 2016 by Guardian Publishing Group - All rights reserved.

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  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Prologue

  Heather woke up, wrapped in the sheets and sweating her little old head off.

  Dave was curled up at the end of the bed, his injuries finally healed.

  The nightmare had been particularly disturbing this time. It’d been Christmas, she’d laid out a bunch of donuts and Ryan had eaten one and fallen over. They’d arrested her and slammed her in jail for good.

  Heather sucked in air and exhaled. “Don’t be silly,” she said, lecturing herself, “it was just a dream. It’s pre-wedding stress.”

  Ever since they’d decided not to have the wedding at Christmas and delay it by at least half a year, Heather had been on edge. Was Ryan having second thoughts?

  “No,” she said, and Dave scrabbled up right with a bark. “Oh relax, Dave, I’m just talking to myself.”

  They’d been unable to host the wedding because of their schedules, it had nothing to do with cold feet for either party. Besides, this way she had more time to plan, and oh boy did she have plans.

  Heather checked her alarm clock and groaned. “It’s four in the morning, old buddy,” she said. Dave snuffled at the side of her bed. “Ah well, we’re up now. Let’s head in to Donut Delights and see what the day has in store.”

  Dave barked his agreement.

  Another day in Hillside paradise. Hopefully, it’d be a murder-free one.

  Chapter 1

  Heather rubbed her hands together and smiled at the street outside. It was almost Memorial Day and her spirits couldn’t have been higher.

  “Are you ready?” Jung asked, beside her. He had his apron on and a grin which was broader than hers.

  Everyone in Hillside was happier at this time of year. She glanced around at the Parisian-styled interior of her donut store and sighed. Coffee cups steamed, people chatted and munched on delicious treats.

  Now, this was her kind of atmosphere.

  “I’m ready,” she replied.

  Jung wiggled his eyebrows at her and she chuckled.

  “Well? Hurry it up, boss. We’ve got donuts to create… and eat.”

  “Definitely eat,” Heather replied.

  “Save for me,” Angelica called out from behind the register. She had notoriously good hearing when it came to sweets. She zipped up her cheeky grin and served a customer with a kind one instead.

  “All right,” Heather said, and clapped once. Dave, her daring doggy survivor, sat up straighter. He’d been a little jumpy after the accident, but had resumed his usual inquisitive and cute dog behavior. Thank goodness for that.

  Heather walked towards the office, tailed by Dave and Jung. She opened the office door, let Dave through to his doggy bed, then closed up again and strode into her bakery’s kitchen.

  “So, what’s today’s special?”

  “It’s going to blow your mind, Jung. And your taste buds.”

  “I’m supposed to be on a diet.”

  Heather rolled her eyes at him. “You work in a donut shop. Your diet has officially become glaze and sugar.” She tied on her apron, in a double bow at the front so it would stay in place, then bent to get a silver bowl. “Besides, you are what you eat. I am ninety-eight percent sure I am an entirely sugar-based lifeform. Throw in a few sprinkles.”

  Jung fetched the flour and brought it to her. He was used to the procedure by now.

  “Speaking of sprinkles,” Heather said, tapping her chin, she paused, then clicked her fingers. “I’ve got it! The perfect donut for Memorial Day.”

  “And the wedding season,” Ken said, busting through the doors. He was the newest addition at Donut Delights.

  “Shush you, I can’t concentrate on that now,” she replied. She really couldn’t. Every time she thought of tying the knot to the most eligible and handsome detective in Hillside, her stomach tied knots of its own.

  She fanned her face and puffed her cheeks out. She had to get it together. Not every marriage was doomed to end in divorce. Just because her first had failed didn’t mean this one would.

  She clapped again, to enthuse herself this time. “Bring me the sprinkles, please. That big tub of them over there.”

  “What are we making?” Jung asked, cocking his head to the side.

  “American Dream Donuts. Perfectly baked donuts, cakey and divine, double dipped in snowy white glaze with bright red stripes and stars right across ‘em.”

  “Wow,” Ken and Jung said, in unison.

  “Please, call me Heather,” she quipped.

  Ken rubbed his hands and stepped closer. “Heather, I’m sorry I’m late. I had a few errands to run for my, uh, for my grandmother and –”

  Heather waved away his excuse. “It’s really fine. We have Angelica at the front, and Maricela working the coffee machine. Just call ahead next time, if you can.” Heather had never been in the business of bossing her employees around, even though she was the ‘boss’.

  Still Ken gave her another sheepish smile. His cheeks had colored, as well.

  “Where were we?” Heather asked, then spied the tub of sprinkles. “Ah!” She snatched it up and rattled it at her two assistants. “These are going to add a fireworks effect. A true celebration in the mouth.”

  “We could do red, white and blue sprinkles for some of them,” Ken suggested. “That would make them even more appropriate.”

  “That’s a fantastic idea,” Heather said. “Let’s start with the multicolored for now, though. The sprinkles will go in the batter and on the glaze after the donuts have been dipped, as well.”

  Heather’s phone rang in her pocket, and she patted her apron down, cursing the double bow.

  “You two make a basic donut dough recipe with the sprinkles in it. I’ll be right back.” Heather hurried out of the kitchen and into her office, ripping at the apron and succeeding in tangling the knots even more.

  Dave sat up and yawned.

  She ripped her apron off at last and threw it into the corner. It flopped onto Dave’s head and he wriggled it off.

  Heather whipped out her phone and answered without looking at the caller ID.

  “That took a while,” Ryan said. Even now, his deep voice gave her butter
flies.

  Goodness, she was over forty. She wasn’t accustomed to this teenage lovey feeling in her gut.

  “What can I do for you?” Heather asked, straightening her silk blouse.

  “You sound busy,” Ryan replied.

  “Oh, you could say that. You know, the usual, creating in the –”

  “I’m going to tell you something, Heather, because I respect and love you. I want you to hear what I have to say without flipping out, okay?”

  “Whoa, okay. What’s this about? You’re not leaving me, are you? Because that would suck. I’ve already created a series of donuts for the reception. Something Old, Something Borrowed, you get the idea.” That was a total babble fest. Her nerves had forced her brain to the back, and had taken her mouth hostage.

  “It’s about Eva,” Ryan said, clearing his throat.

  “Eva?” Heather frowned. Eva hadn’t been in yet this morning, which was strange for her. “What about her?”

  “She’s in Hillside Regional hospital,” Ryan said, delivering another snippet. Did he think breaking up the news would make it easier to handle?

  “Why?”

  “Eva Schneider was found this morning outside her home. She’d been hit over the head with a blunt object,” he said, as if reading from a police report.

  Heather hung up and hurried to the door, clicking her fingers for Dave to follow.

  Chapter 2

  Heather rested her hand on Eva’s forearm, stroking her soft skin with her thumb. The old lady was in a coma, breathing slowly, with tubes trailing in and out of her. Machines beeped in the background, the IV bag was half full.

  “Well,” Heather murmured, “this is not how I expected my day to turn out.” Dave sat on the floor beside her chair, behaving himself best he could. The nurses had allowed him to come in with her, even though it was supposed to be strictly forbidden.

  A lot of the residents in Hillside had heard about what she’d done for Verna Dixon and respected her for it.

  Amy barged into the private room, hair ruffled, with a pair of pumps hanging from her fingers. She slipped around on the polished linoleum, her stockings giving her about as much grip as a slug in a mud slide.

  “I came as soon as I heard,” she said, and dropped the pumps to the floor. She slipped into them and walked over. “I can’t believe it. Eva.”

  “The doctors say they have no idea when she’ll come out of the coma.” Heather sighed.

  “How did this even happen? I don’t get it. Who would want to hurt Eva? I mean, it’s Eva for heaven’s sakes. She’s a total angel.”

  “I know right?” Heather let go of her longtime customer and friend, and rose to speak with Amy. “I don’t know who or why but –”

  “But you intend on finding out,” Amy finished.

  “Precisely. I’m just glad she’s alive, that the killer, attacker, whatever, didn’t manage to finish the job.” Ack, the ‘job’ was a pretty crass term to use.

  “Have you spoken to Ryan, yet?”

  “No, and I don’t plan to. I know what he’ll say if he finds out I want to investigate this,” Heather replied. “And I don’t want him to know I’m doing it until I have all the evidence to present to him.” She smoothed her hair and squared her shoulders. “I have to take this on myself.”

  “But –”

  “If it were anyone else, I’d let it go. Ryan said that I shouldn’t get involved in this kind of stuff from now on.” Heather glanced around at the warm walls and the painting of a sunflower hanging from one of them. “But this isn’t just anyone. This is Eva, for heaven’s sakes.”

  “I’ll help in whatever way I can,” Amy replied. “But where do you even start?”

  Heather wrinkled her nose. That was, truly, a dilemma. No one hated Eva. She was a harmless old lady with a penchant for sugary sweet donuts and bitter coffee.

  “I’ll have to check out Eva’s home and Hillside Manor. I know she was supposed to visit Soupy there yesterday.”

  “Soupy? Sounds like a character out of a kid’s show.” Amy put up a goofy smile. “Well, hello thar keeds,” she said.

  Heather chuckled softly. Amy always knew how to cheer her up. “Soupy was one of Eva’s old friends. An elderly gentleman, she called him. She didn’t give me much detail other than that.”

  “Ooooo, mysterious,” Amy said. “I think you and I should get together at Dos Chicos to talk about this.”

  “I agree,” Heather said. “I guess there’s nothing more I can do here. I just wanted Eva to know she was loved.”

  “I thought I’d find you here,” Ryan said, striding through the door, professional in his uniform. He didn’t reach over and grab Heather for a hug. Instead, he took out his notepad.

  “I’ll see you tonight,” Amy said, with a wave, then moseyed out of the hospital room, making eyes at the back of the detective’s head.

  Heather ignored her bestie and focused on her fiancé instead. “Sorry I hung up. I just wanted to get here to check –”

  “That’s fine,” Ryan replied, and clicked his ballpoint. “I – uh, I need to ask you a few questions, Heather.”

  “About what? The flower arrangements? If you really want the roses we can do the roses, just as long as they’re long-stemmed and white. Otherwise it’s no deal,” she said, lowering her voice.

  She wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t like Eva would sit up and glare at her for making too much noise. Boy, that would be creepy.

  “No, not the flower arrangements,” Ryan said, blinking one, two, three times.

  They had discussed flower arrangements at length, after all.

  “Oh,” she said, then glanced at Eva.

  “It’s come to my attention that you spoke with Eva yesterday,” Ryan said.

  “Yes, I did. I speak to Eva every day. You know that, Ryan, she’s a regular at Donut Delights,” Heather said, and raised an eyebrow. Did he really think she was a suspect in this?

  “Did Eva give you any indication that something was wrong?”

  “No, not at all. She was her usual sunny self. Ryan, what’s going on here? I’m not a suspect, surely? I have an alibi. I was in plain sight in the shop the entire morning.”

  “Eva wasn’t attacked this morning,” her fiancé replied. “She was attacked last night.”

  “And you think I had something to do with it?” Heather folded her arms this time. Her own fiancé thought she was a suspect in the case. Nice.

  “I didn’t say that. Heather, you know I have to follow all my leads,” Ryan said, reaching out to grasp her hand for the first time since entering the room.

  “I have to get back to the shop,” Heather said, stepping out of reach. “I was in the middle of creating a new donut.”

  She strode past him before he could say a word, Dave trotting along at her heels. She wasn’t angry, but disappointed. Ryan had to know that she would never do anything to harm Eva.

  And if Shepherd was determined to follow the wrong leads, investigate silly avenues, then Heather would have to correct him.

  She glanced down at her dog. “Dave, consider this investigation under way.”

  Chapter 3

  Soupy’s room was decorated with photographs of his family, his son wearing a clown costume, and his wife laughing at their wedding. Cute pictures that Soupy had taken years ago.

  “My son’s a lawyer now, y’know. He’s the best lawyer in the whole state,” Soupy said, puffing out his chest with pride.

  “I’d like to meet him some day,” Heather replied, and smiled. Soupy had an easy attitude. The tufts of hair above each ear gave him a bit of comedic look.

  The old man’s expressive features crumpled. “You won’t. He never comes to visit me. Just pays the bills and carries on with his hotshot life. Wife died years ago, so I never get to see much family.”

  Heather restrained a grimace. Poor guy hardly got visitors. Good thing he had a friend like Eva to pop in and pay him a visit.

  “Soupy, I’m here to ask about –”<
br />
  “Soupy! Ha! You wanna know how I got that name?”

  She’d assumed at birth, by a pair of particularly cruel parents. Who named their kid Soupy? Seriously.

  “Do tell,” Heather said, and sat back. She crossed her legs and kept her eye on Dave.

  Ever since the accident he’d been in a particularly boisterous frame of mind. This very moment he snuffled around at the base of Soupy’s bed, snapping up the leftover crumbs of the old man’s brunch. He wiggled his doggy butt and slipped beneath it.

  “I served in a soup kitchen, long ago. It was how I met the wife. She was homeless and came in every day round about lunch time for soup. They had other stuff there too, like mash and veg, but she always came for my soup.” Soupy sighed and looked out the window at the clear skies. “Soupy, she used to say, Soupy, you’re my hero.”

  Heather chewed the inside of her cheek. She couldn’t imagine what it must’ve been like to be homeless. This man was clearly a saint.

  “Soupy, thanks for sharing that with me.”

  Dave barked underneath the bed, bounced around.

  “Stop that, Dave!”

  “Don’t mind him. I like the noise. Good to hear something other than one of them nurses talking about lunch or pills. Or dinner or pills. Or Mr. Petrakis, please sit still while we adjust the bed. Like I can’t adjust the bed myself.” Soupy harrumphed and folded his arms.

  “Soupy,” Heather began.

  “Or how about, Mr. Petrakis, get back to bed, it’s past curfew.” Soupy sat up straighter, the tufts of hair on either side of his hair, swishing from the sudden movement. He leaned to one side and yelled towards the door. “I’m a grown man! I can sleep when I wanna sleep, not when you tell me.”

  “Soupy, I –”

  “You hear me! Don’t pretend like you don’t hear me,” Soupy growled. He shook a fist, and his cheeks went red as two ripe plum tomatoes. “They ignore me, you know, but I know that they know.”

  “Soupy,” Heather said, firmly. “I wanted to ask if Eva came to see you yesterday.”

  Soupy didn’t speak for a while, but at the mention of Eva, all color drained from his cheeks. He flopped back against the cushion. “Nope. Never came to visit. Aint seen her in a week. Nope.”