5. Emmie
5
EMMIE
“ B ack in business.” I sighed.
I’d cleaned up the café and assured the cats that everything was back to normal, and no, Moose wasn’t going to stay and eat the food, but they did need to be nice and let him use the litter box, considering his cat daddy had saved us all.
I snuck a glance at Marius.
The tall man was leaning against the counter, arms crossed like those hot lawyers in the sitcoms on cable TV Gran liked to watch. He had that self-assured carelessness well-to-do men had.
Moose leaped up to Marius’s massive shoulders while he typed on his phone with one hand, sipping a coffee held in the other.
Someone had posted that the Santa Claws Café was open for business again, and the customers were starting to stream in, though there was a lot more gawking than buying.
“Cat daddy is right.”
“Shhh!” I hissed at Zoe as I packaged up the cakes for Girl Meets Fig.
“He clearly likes you a little bit, or he’d have gone off to sign things, yell at people, or whatever it is lawyers do when they aren’t in court, not stand guard in your shop.”
The police chief stuck his head inside, Theo hot on his heels.
“This café cannot be allowed to be in business.” Theo was steaming. “It’s a site of a horrific crime against humanity.”
The police chief walked up to Marius.
Marius gave him a coldly professional smile. “As I informed the last two officers who came in here to harass my client, the City of Harrogate cannot legally keep this café closed indefinitely. There were no health department violations logged, and Ms. Dawson has paid her taxes and licensing fees. She has gone over and above to cooperate with the investigation of the death of Brooks Dawson. However, now it has become egregious. She will not be cooperating any further in what is turning into a witch hunt to cover up shoddy police work.”
The police chief just sighed loudly and shook his head while Theo sputtered.
“Don’t just let him steamroll you.”
“I did clerk with one of the current Supreme Court justices, and I am prepared to take this case all the way to the top if need be,” Marius added.
“Threats! I will get a warrant for Emmie’s arrest. Murderer!” Theo yelled at me.
“Slander! We’re suing, right, Marius?” Zoe shouted.
Marius ignored my friend.
“Fine. Fuck it.” Zoe rolled up her sleeves.
Theo took an apprehensive step backward.
“I’ll beat your ass in the middle of Main Street, boy.”
“You don’t work for the city, Theo. You’re not the DA,” Marius said in a clipped tone. The words were professional, but the tone said fuck off . “You’re not getting a warrant. Now, I must ask you to leave. Ms. Dawson does not consent to you being on her property, and any further trespassing will be considered unlawful, and I will formally lodge a complaint.”
I had to hold Zoe back.
Marius watched like a predator as my deceased husband’s best friend and the annoyed police chief left. Then he settled and went back to his phone, still keeping one watchful eye on the door.
“He’s like a dressed-up high-end guard dog,” Zoe marveled.
“Ms. Dawson does not have any comments about recent events!” he barked before Abbott could race up to me, microphone out for a statement. “Purchase something, or get out.”
Abbott looked apprehensively at the cupcakes behind the glass case.
Zoe took a big bite. “Yum! Tastes amazing.”
“I guess I’ll take two.”
After I packaged up his purchase, Gran hustled out of the kitchen, where she and several of her friends were helping me restock my cupcake supplies. The cupcake advent calendar was a day behind, and I needed a thousand peppermint-bark cupcakes yesterday.
“You need to give that man a blowjob. We’re about to go on break,” she hissed at me too loudly. I saw the muscle in Marius’s cheek twitch. “Just take him to the storeroom. You’re almost out of flour, by the way.”
I turned my back to Marius. “I’m not—no!”
“He’s doing all sorts of free labor for you,” Gran argued. “He’s done more for you in twenty-four hours than Brooks ever did, and you were shackled to that walking prolapsed anus for seven years.”
I gave Marius a guilty glance. He was doing a lot. Just heading off the prying questions and dissuading the police from shutting down my shop was keeping my mental state from driving off a cliff.
I went into the kitchen, dodging seniors running around with vats of batter and huge bags of frosting, and put together a selection of snacks for him. Plate and fresh cup of coffee in hand, I approached Marius.
“I know this isn’t a drop in the bucket to repay you,” I said, “but I thought you might need some sustenance.”
He peered down his nose at the plate.
“Murder cupcakes? No, thank you.”
I slammed the plate down on the counter next to him. “Fine,” I spat. “Do you want a blow job instead?”
“No man wants to get involved with a sheltered small-town widow—married young to a piss-poor excuse for a man, too stupid to move out of town, and too useless to get a real job,” he drawled. “Now, if you were a divorcée, I’d know that at least the sex would be wild before you eventually offed me for the money.”
“You think I’m dumb?” I couldn’t stop the tears. Fuck him.
“Please stop crying. You know it’s true. You married Brooks, after all. I’m sure all of your friends told you not to.”
I cried harder because they had. Zoe had staged an intervention.
But I had been in love .
“I know I should never have married him, but I didn’t kill him.” I wiped my face, trying to get ahold of myself. “We need to solve the mystery.”
“ You need to,” he corrected. “Otherwise, you’re going to prison.”
“You’re not helping?”
“This isn’t the movies; lawyers don’t investigate crimes. We make sure that the proper legal proceedings have been followed. Come Christmas, I’m out of here,” he warned.
“I know. I’m working on it. I have a suspect.”
“You have half a suspect.” He nodded as Charles came in, irate. “Now, him? That’s a suspect. Could he have murdered Brooks and now, succumbing to guilt, returned to the scene of the crime?”
“Marius, don’t.” I grabbed his arm, which was surprisingly muscular under the suit. Probably all he did was work out and act like an asshole to people.
Too late. Charles had heard Marius, and his anger had ratcheted up to fury.
“Well, well, well. If it isn’t a Christmas miracle. Santa’s little cupcake shop of horrors open for business,” Charles sneered.
Outside, Gertrude, Alice, and several other members of the feral-cat committee were gearing up for a protest. It was shaping up to be a headache-inducing day.
Ducking behind the counter, I ate a chocolate cherry cupcake with red-star sprinkles.
“You do all realize,” Charles said loudly to my customers, “that you are consuming cupcakes laced with poison.”
I stood up, almost banging my head on the underside of the counter, and wiped crumbs off my mouth. “Aren’t you going to sure him for slander?” I asked Marius.
“It’s not slander if it’s true!” Charles thundered. “You’re a mean one, Emmie. You’re stealing business from me. Your cats are a menace to Main Street. My sales are down thirty percent because of you. You ruin lives for profit. You are more than capable of killing your husband.”
“You could have easily killed him yourself,” Zoe shot back. “You never liked Emmie’s shop. I bet you killed him to frame her. Murderer!”
Abbott scribbled the accusations furiously on his notepad.
“You give me that!” Charles raged, chasing him out of the shop, almost bowling over Cora, who walked in confused.
“I have a delivery for…” Cora looked around, frowning. “Marius? This is awkward.”
“Thank you. I’ll take that.” Marius accepted the food from Cora and handed her a crisp twenty.
“ You’re buying food from next door? ” I screeched as he unwrapped the sandwich.
He nodded silently toward the feral-cat committee, who chanted, “Cats and murder go hand in hand, like Christmas in summer or snow in the sand!”
“You need to get a restraining order,” Zoe said as she headed to the door with her boxes for Girl Meets Fig.
“Here’s your mail, Emmie,” Cora said sheepishly.
Muttering “Thanks,” I took the mail back to the kitchen storeroom, away from the nosy customers, the well-meaning seniors, the accusations of murder, and Marius and his stupid handsome face.
“Asshole,” I cursed then ripped open my advent calendar, stuffed the last two days’ worth of chocolate into my mouth, and chewed furiously. Then I tore open the rest of the doors.
I hadn’t slept the night before, just tossed and turned on the couch.
I sank down onto the cold tile floor, trying not to hyperventilate.
I was going to be fine. The shop was going to be fine. Everything would be fine .
I peered at something sparkling under the shelf. After tossing aside the half-empty advent calendar, I reached under and scooped with my pen until I dragged out a thin sparkling silver bracelet—simple and elegant with a stunning emerald and ruby.
A clue.
This was what the suspect had been looking for last night. I was sure of it.