Chapter 4 Lottie
LOTTIE
Ascream rips from me, so loud and harsh it feels as if my own soul is about to vacate the premises.
It’s one of those screams that starts somewhere deep in your chest and claws its way out before your brain has fully processed what your eyes are seeing.
And what I’m seeing right now is Vivienne Pemberton-Clarke face-down on her cream and gold Persian rug like a discarded marionette, and the small pool of crimson beneath her head is making my stomach lurch sideways.
The late afternoon sun slants through the sunroom windows, painting everything in a golden light that feels obscenely cheerful given the circumstances.
Vanilla-scented candles flicker on the mantle, their sweet fragrance mixing with a sharp copper tang, and well, the sweetness of the scattered banana pudding.
My banana pudding.
It may not be prize-winning, or blue-ribbon-worthy, but apparently, it’s a cursed banana pudding because it just so happens to be splattered across the rug in abstract swoops and dollops, complete with vanilla wafer shrapnel and a whipped cream tower that’s already starting to deflate.
A cast-iron skillet lies a few feet from Vivienne’s head, glossed with a dark slick that I really hope is just pudding residue but definitely isn’t.
Near the velvet sofa, a butcher knife gleams against the hardwood floor. Professional-grade. The kind you use to break down a whole chicken or, apparently, commit murder at a 1950s reenactment. Although I don’t see any stab wounds on the poor woman, or any blood on the knife. So odd.
The sound of thundering footsteps snaps me out of my screaming spiral half a second before Noah bursts through the door with his weapon drawn. His suit jacket is skewed sideways, and his dark hair is slightly mussed from the jaunt over.
“Geez,” he says, lowering his gun when he sees it’s just me and a corpse.
It’s not exactly a unique sight.
I really should have stayed home and baked cookies instead.
Everett appears half a second behind him, the sleeves of his charcoal dress shirt rolled up over his forearms in that way that shouldn’t be attractive during a murder investigation but somehow totally is.
His jaw is tight, his eyes are already scanning the room with an intensity that could make a criminal confess and makes me feel things I probably shouldn’t be feeling right about now.
I’m about to say something when Carlotta bops into the room and surveys the scene with the ease of a woman who’s seen way too many dead bodies, and sighs.
“Well, it’s just another day of the week for you, isn’t it, Lot?
You do realize most people give it a rest on the Lord’s Day.
But I guess there’s no time like the present when it comes to teaching someone a permanent lesson.
” She sniffs at the poor woman on the floor. “So how’d you do it this time?”
“Carlotta,” I hiss as Noah quickly drops to one knee beside Vivienne with an efficiency that comes from years of being first at the scene of a crime—and well, from hanging out with me. He tucks two fingers to her neck, pressing for a pulse he already knows he won’t find.
His face tells me everything before his mouth does.
“She’s gone.”
Everett pulls me close, and I can feel his heart hammering against mine—the only indication that he’s not as composed as he looks.
“Lemon.” His voice is low, controlled, steady. “What happened?”
“I just walked in, and she was already—” I gesture vaguely at everything because words feel insufficient to describe the scene currently occupying poor Vivienne’s sunroom. “I didn’t touch anything.”
“Okay.” He presses a kiss to my temple. “Noah’s got this.”
I can’t help but wrinkle my nose at the thought.
I know Everett’s intention is to keep me safe.
But there hasn’t been a single homicide in recent years that Noah Fox didn’t need my help with.
Not that he ever asks for my help, or wants it.
But let’s call a spade a spade, I’m the one who catches the killers around here.
I guess you can say, the proof is in the pudding.
Noah whips out his phone and quickly calls it in.
“This is Detective Fox. I need units and the ME at Lakeshore Drive. Vivienne Pemberton-Clarke’s residence.
Homicide. Female victim, blunt force trauma.
..” He rattles off details with the kind of calm that makes me feel slightly hysterical by comparison.
Everett pulls back a notch and locks those cobalt blue eyes of his onto mine. “I’m going to check the property for anyone suspicious. Do not leave Noah’s side.”
It’s not a question or a request. It’s a statement delivered in that tone that makes defense attorneys reconsider their next breath.
He takes off with a start, and I try not to focus on how his presence made the room feel safer and how his absence makes everything feel colder.
“Lottie!”
I barely have time to brace myself before my mother barrels into the sunroom, takes one look at Vivi’s prone position, and belts out a scream.
“Is she—?”
Noah offers a grim nod. “I’m so sorry, Miranda. She’s gone.”
Mom sucks in a never-ending breath. “Lottie Lemon!” She whirls my way. “How could you?! We are GUESTS in her home!”
“Mother! I didn’t—”
“Miranda.” Noah steps between us, gently pulling my mother back with one hand. His voice drops into that authoritative register, the one that makes drunk frat boys sit down and pay attention. “Lottie didn’t do this.”
Mom deflates slightly, but her glare remains aimed my way, which I’m pretty sure violates some kind of maternal support code.
“Come on, Randy Mirandy.” Carlotta steps up to offer my mother unsolicited assistance and a quasi-inappropriate nickname. “If Lot Lot was going to murder someone, she’d use one of her poison pies. It’d be much tidier and much more her style.”
“I’m not murdering anyone,” I say, bewildered as to why I have to keep repeating myself. I might stumble upon a corpse on the regular, but still.
“Not with that attitude, you’re not,” Carlotta crows.
Before I can strangle my own biological mother—which would really validate my real mother’s concerns—Noah’s mother barrels through the doorway like a freight train in a navy blazer.
Suze Fox is stocky, practical, and perpetually looks like she’s mentally calculating whether she can get you to switch to the generic brand. I should know, she happens to work for me down at the bakery.
Her short blonde hair is streaked with gray and sweeps across her eyes, giving off that boy band of yesteryear appeal, and her sensible shoes squeak against the hardwood as she steps in deeper into the room to take in the scene.
“Noah, what happened?” Her eyes land on poor Vivienne.
“Oh, for Pete’s sake, Lottie, you’ve gone and done it again.
Can’t you find a way to control those homicidal urges?
” She offers my mother a look, and it’s the kind of solidarity only two women who find me exhausting can share.
“You really should consider locking her up for the safety of the general public.”
Mom gives an aggressive nod as if she’s genuinely interested in the logistics. “Believe me, I’m considering it.”
“Mother.” The word comes out somewhere between a hiss and a growl, and I definitely meant it, too.
Suze crosses her arms, and her blazer, which I’m ninety percent sure is a man’s blazer she probably ripped off a corpse herself, bunches at the shoulders. “I’m just saying, every time there’s a body in this town—”
“The only people who are safe are Lot Lot’s men!” Carlotta interrupts with an enthusiasm usually reserved for bingo wins or surprise male strippers. “The rest of Honey Hollow should sleep with one eye open! That includes you, Randy Mirandy, and you, too, Suzie Q.”
Both women jump as if Carlotta just announced she’s hiding a bomb in her bra—which, given Carlotta’s history, isn’t entirely outside the realm of possibility.
As if on cue, her bra rings, and the entire lot of us jumps.
Mom clutches her chest. “Carlotta!”
Suze sputters, “Now you listen here—”
“It’s true.” Carlotta doubles down on her matricide fantasies.
“You’ll both be on the chopping block next if you don’t play nice with the princess of pies here.
In fact, it might be prudent for each of you to deposit ten grand into my savings account by midnight.
I have my ways of pointing her Grim Reaper tendencies in other directions. ”
I swat Carlotta’s arm. “Would you stop?”
“What?” she shrinks back. “I’m being supportive!”
The sharp click of heels against hardwood silences both of us, and we turn to find Ivy Fairbanks striding into the room as if she’s walking a runway instead of a crime scene.
Noah’s partner in crime is all legs and attitude, her auburn hair scraped back into a bun tight enough to give me a sympathy headache.
Her narrow green eyes sweep the room as she takes in the deceased, the evidence, the witnesses, and me in under three seconds.
Her tailored blazer looks sensible yet expensive, and somehow she makes a murder scene look like a business meeting.
She nods my way. “Adding to the body count, I see.” Her voice is dry as October leaves. “And at such a sacred event. How very on-brand for you.”
“Ivy, I didn’t—”
Everett materializes in the doorway behind her, and I’ve never been more grateful for his impeccable timing.
“Detective Fairbanks.” His voice could freeze vodka. “My wife found the body. She’s a witness, not a suspect.”
Ivy offers a short-lived smile, so very short-lived. “Funny how often those two categories overlap in her case.”
Everett’s jaw tightens. “Lemon, I suggest we retrieve the children and leave. Now.” His words are slightly laced with a threat, but only because he knows I’m slow to leave a decent crime scene.
“My mother can handle the kids,” I say, even though Mom is currently glaring at me as if I’ve personally ruined her friendship with a corpse. “There’s a killer running loose on the grounds, and—”