Brutal Brûlée (Lexy Baker Cozy Mystery Series Book 11) Read online

  Gloria beamed and batted her eyelashes, obviously pleased with herself and possibly even flirting with him.

  Danny nodded enthusiastically. “This’ll be great. Just great. A real great addition. It was so smart of you to include Gloria, Leonard.” Like any good assistant, Danny sucked up to his boss.

  “That’s why I make the big bucks,” Leonard said.

  Danny’s mouth flattened into a thin line. Was he jealous that Leonard made so much more than he? He’d mentioned something being ‘above his pay scale’ earlier in the day, but Lexy hadn’t paid much attention to the context. It was really none of her business, anyway.

  Lexy noticed everyone was done with their dinner. She leaned over and squeezed Jack’s hand, then whispered, “I’m going to get dessert ready.”

  She slipped out of her seat and headed to the kitchen as unobtrusively as possible. Since she knew exactly how much flame to give the crème brûlée now, it would only take a few minutes and she’d have the perfect dessert.

  She pushed the swinging door open to the empty kitchen. Well, not entirely empty. Karen was in there fumbling to disconnect a call on her cell phone, her cheeks deep crimson.

  “Oh, sorry,” Lexy said.

  Karen slipped the phone into her apron pocket and mumbled an apology. Lexy felt a twinge of sympathy for the girl. Violet probably didn’t allow personal calls during work hours and Lexy had caught her red-handed.

  “Don’t worry,” Lexy soothed. “What happens in the kitchen, stays in the kitchen.”

  Karen smiled and scurried out the door, leaving Lexy to her work. The desserts came out perfectly browned and crusted but not burned. Lexy beamed with pride as Karen and two other staff members passed them around.

  Everyone oohed and aahed over them, except the mustached man. Lexy noticed he had left even before dessert was served.

  When the last person was done dabbing their lips with the crisp white linen napkins, Leonard clapped his hands loudly.

  The room fell silent and he stood up. “Everyone, we will start promptly at seven tomorrow morning. I want you all to look lively, so early to bed is recommended.” He took a plastic amber pill bottle full to the top out of his pocket and shook it. “I have my sleeping helpers here and, since I’m feeling a little chill, I will take a hot toddy in my room in ten minutes. I suggest the rest of you wind down and retire for the evening as well.”

  A murmur floated across the room. It was only eight o’clock, but Lexy got the impression that most of the crew was probably used to Leonard’s odd schedule.

  “Now, now. No complaints. You people are lucky and I know you will want to be well-rested.” He paused and surveyed the group. “Because tomorrow I will expose the real secret of Wellington Manse and you will all be the first to know it!”

  Chapter Three

  The next morning, Lexy woke up with the taste of whiskey and lemon on her tongue. Who knew that hot toddies were made out of such vile ingredients? It turned out that Nans was some sort of hot toddy expert and Violet had called upon her to make the drink for Leonard.

  Lexy had tried one herself and ended up throwing half of it down the drain, but she still felt sluggish.

  Sprinkles, on the other hand, was as peppy as a spring daffodil. Lexy left Jack in bed, wound her brown hair into a ponytail and put the harness on the small, white shitzu-poodle mix, letting the dog drag her halfway down the hall. In front of the library, Sprinkles let out an excited “Yip!” and darted inside, ripping the leash out of Lexy’s hand before she could stop her.

  “Meow! Hiss!”

  Houdini had been napping on the couch. He leaped off, humped his back and swiped at Sprinkles.

  “Yipe!”

  Sprinkles jumped back and Houdini clawed his way across the top of the couch and up the green velvet drapes. He jumped onto the top of a bookshelf and crouched there, glaring and hissing at Sprinkles.

  “Sprinkles, cut it out. The cat does not want to play.” Lexy checked Sprinkles for damage and then, not finding any, picked up the end of the leash and shot Houdini an apologetic look.

  Lexy dragged Sprinkles out of the room and down the front stairs. Then they went through the conservatory to the grassy area outside where Sprinkles busied herself sniffing an azalea bush.

  “Hiss!”

  A black paw shot out from under the bush.

  “Yipe!”

  Sprinkles jumped back and a black ball of fur shot out of the bush, hurtling around the side of the house out of sight.

  “Was that Houdini? How did he get out here so fast?”

  Sprinkles whined her answer and Lexy squatted down to inspect the dog again. This time, she had one little scratch. By the way the dog was carrying on, you’d think she’d been mortally wounded, but it was merely a surface scratch.

  “You’re okay.” Lexy patted her between the ears. “You want a treat?”

  That perked the dog up and she happily trotted behind Lexy to the terrace where Nans, Ruth, Ida and Helen were seated at a white, wrought-iron table.

  “Look who decided to get up.” Nans leaned down to scratch Sprinkles behind the ears, then squinted back up at Lexy. “Was that half a hot toddy too much for you?”

  Ida snickered, then covered her mouth.

  “I guess so.” Lexy shot Ida a look. “What time is it?”

  “It’s seven-thirty,” Ruth answered.

  “It is?” Lexy could see most of the production crew sitting around the terrace at the tables. Danny Manning paced rapidly back and forth. “What is everyone doing out here? I thought filming started at seven.”

  “I know, but Leonard hasn’t come down yet and everyone is dying to find out the secret,” Helen said. Leonard had refused to expound on his announcement the night before despite everyone’s begging.

  “That’s right,” Ruth added without looking up from her iPad.

  Lexy craned her neck to see what was on the screen. It looked like some kind of plant.

  Ruth, who had recently been studying formal gardening, caught her looking. “I’m gathering data on some of the plants in the gardens. They’re rather overgrown right now, but Violet plans to set them right. There are some rare varieties here. I’m looking them up on the internet and cataloguing them for her.”

  “That sounds like fun,” Lexy said as Ida rolled her eyes. Gardening wasn’t exciting enough for Ida.

  “I say we go wake Leonard up,” Joy said loudly.

  “I agree. We have to get started,” a navy T-shirted man from the production crew replied. “Come on, Danny, let’s go roust him.”

  The two of them took off inside and Joy got up from her table, her hand wrapped around a thick mug of coffee. “I’ll start getting set up.”

  “Let’s go in and watch,” Nans suggested. “I want to find out what his big secret is.”

  “Oh, good. These chairs hurt my tush,” Helen said.

  The terrace was filled with the sound of wrought-iron scraping cement as everyone got up and traipsed inside. Lexy was careful to cinch up Sprinkles' leash so as to avoid another altercation with Houdini.

  Lexy could hear them knocking on Leonard’s bedroom door upstairs.

  “Leo. Come on, get up.”

  “Leo!”

  Joy appeared beside Lexy, shuffling uneasily on her feet. “I’ve never known Leonard to be late.” Her voice carried an ominous timber.

  Louder knocking came from upstairs. The group had gathered at the bottom of the stairs and a few of them started walking up.

  “Just open the door,” Danny said.

  The sounds of the brass doorknob rattling drifted down the stairs. “It’s locked.”

  “Leo!”

  No answer.

  By now, the group was at the top of the stairs. They could see Danny and the navy-shirted crew member huddled in front of Leonard’s door.

  Danny’s fingers drummed the side of the door nervously. He turned to face the crowd. “Who has a key?”

  Everyone turned to look at Violet, wh
o shook her head. “I don’t have any of the keys to this place. They said they’d been lost long ago.”

  “We’re going to have to break in. He could be hurt in there,” someone said.

  Navy Shirt frowned at the speaker. “What? No, you can’t break the door down. It’s solid oak.”

  Jack had been roused by the commotion and stepped forward to inspect the door. He shrugged. “You might be able to crack it loose from the door frame with enough force.”

  “Leonard. We’re all waiting!” Danny yelled.

  No answer.

  Danny and Navy Shirt looked at each other. “Okay, everyone stand back. We’ll have a run at it.”

  Everyone shuffled back a step, and Danny and the other man rammed their shoulders against the door. Lexy heard the sound of splitting wood but the door didn’t cave in.

  “Again!” More splitting wood. Lexy could see the fresh wood along the door frame, but not enough for the door to open.

  “Again!” This time the door burst open. Lexy could see someone lying in the bed. Danny ran to the bed. “Leo!” Danny shook the figure.

  An amber bottle rolled out of Leo’s hand and clattered to the floor, then rolled under the bed.

  Mrs. Pendrake pushed her way inside the room, waddled to the bed and leaned over. She let out a shriek. “Someone call 911!”

  Everyone scrambled for their cell phones as Danny turned a ghostly pale face toward the crowd.

  “It’s too late. He’s already dead.”

  Chapter Four

  “Wait a minute.” Jack pushed through to the side of the bed. “I’m a homicide detective. Let me take a look.”

  “Homicide!” Mrs. Pendrake gasped. “But surely, you don’t ...”

  “I don’t think this is homicide.” Jack put his fingertips to Leonard’s neck, then pried open an eyelid. “Yep, he’s dead. Sorry.”

  “We still have to call 911,” Ida said.

  Lexy noticed that Nans had made her way into the room and was looking things over as if it were a crime scene, which Lexy was sure it wasn’t–Leonard was an old man and his heart had probably just given out.

  Nans studied the way he was positioned in the bed then her eyes swept the room, coming to rest on the hot toddy glass on his nightstand. She bent down, putting her nose near the glass, then straightened. Finally, she bent down to get a closer look at the empty pill bottle under the bed, then came back out to stand with the rest of them in the hall.

  Violet had gotten busy on the house phone that sat in a niche a few feet down the hall and was telling the police one of her guests had regrettably ‘expired’ in his sleep.

  “Well, that’s a fine how do you do,” Ida said. “I guess we’ll never know what the big secret was now.”

  “I’m sure somebody on the film crew knows what it was.” Ruth turned to look at the crowd. “Right?”

  Everyone shook their heads.

  “Leonard liked to keep some of the details of the documentaries under wraps so that the competitors wouldn’t find out and scoop us,” Joy said.

  “Really?” Helen’s brows ticked up. “The competition is that fierce?”

  Joy nodded and Lexy saw Helen, Nans, Ruth and Ida exchange a look.

  “Okay, nobody touch anything. Everybody out of the room while we wait for the police to come.” Jack’s police training kicked in and he secured the area, even though Lexy was sure it wasn’t a crime scene—thus no securing was necessary.

  The police arrived in record time. Inspector Garrity was a short, stocky man in his mid-50s with a day’s worth of salt-and-pepper stubble on his chin and a full head of matching hair. He wore a brown suit, his shiny police badge clipped to his belt.

  He spent some time looking at the body and then turned to Jack.

  “Who found him?”

  “We all did.”

  Garrity’s brows ticked up. “You all did?”

  “He was late to start production this morning so we came up to get him,” Danny said.

  “Production?”

  “We’re filming a documentary. Leo was the executive producer,” Danny said.

  “And you are?”

  “Assistant producer.”

  Garrity nodded slowly, sizing Danny up. The sizing up seemed to make Danny more nervous than ever and his lip twitched while his foot tapped spastically.

  “Did anyone touch anything?” Garrity asked Jack.

  “Just the body and the bed.”

  Garrity walked to the door and looked at the splintered wood frame. The brass chain lock was still attached. One side had been ripped from the door when they broke in.

  “You broke the door down or was it like that?”

  “We had to break it down, it was locked. Leo wouldn’t answer and we had no other way of getting in,” Navy Shirt volunteered.

  “There are no keys in this place?” Garrity asked.

  Violet spoke up. “No. I don’t have keys to the doors, I’m afraid.”

  Garrity gave one of his slow nods again. “And who was the last person to see the deceased?”

  Gloria appeared, floating down the hallway behind them, hugging the wall on the same side as Leonard’s room as if she might collapse without its support. She drifted toward them dramatically in her flowing, blue silk bathrobe. She had an embroidered hanky in her hand which she used to dab the corners of her eyes with while she tearfully said, “I think we were all last to see him. He pronounced right after dinner that we should all go to bed early and then left for his room.”

  “That’s right. He was going up to his room and he wanted a hot toddy.” Danny was still beside the bed, his leg tapping to some beat only he could hear.

  “And his sleeping pills,” Nans added, pointing to the bottle under the bed.

  Garrity bent down to look, then motioned to a latex-gloved crime scene investigator, who retrieved and bagged the bottle.

  “He had these at dinner?” Garrity pointed to the bottle.

  “Yes. He always took them to help him sleep,” Joy said.

  “How full was the bottle?” Garrity asked.

  “It was very full,” Nans answered.

  “The bottle fell out of his hand onto the floor when Danny tried to wake him,” Ida added.

  Garrity eyed Nans and Ida as if wondering how reliable their old memories were. He looked around the bed table and bedding, then addressed the CSIs. “Search the room for pills. They must have fallen somewhere.” He turned to the crowd. “So he went straight to his room and locked himself in and no one else saw him after that.”

  "That’s right,” Violet said. “Wait. Not quite. Karen delivered the hot toddy to him.”

  Garrity addressed the crowd. “Which one of you is Karen?”

  “She’s not here. She’s one of my helpers,” Violet said. “She should be down in the kitchen. Do you want me to get her?”

  “No, there’s no need. This seems pretty cut and dried.” Garrity squinted at Violet. “So, you’re the owner, Ma’am?”

  “Yes.”

  Garrity turned to Jack. “And who might you be?”

  Jack stuck out his hand. “Homicide Detective Jack Perillo from Brook Ridge Falls, at your service.”

  Garrity shook Jack’s hand. “Thanks, but I hardly think I’ll need a homicide detective. This looks like an overdose, probably an accident ... or on purpose.”

  Nans pressed her lips together. “I think you might want to take a closer look at the drink glass.”

  Garrity spun slowly to look at her. “Who are you? Miss Marple?”

  A twitter ruffled through the crowd, but Nans just raised her left brow and patiently watched the inspector who did, indeed, go over to the glass. He bent down and looked into it from the side, then went over to the other side, then looked down from above. Finally, he nodded to one of the many crime scene techs who had invaded the room, and the glass was put in a plastic bag.

  Nans remained silent, but her lips ticked up in a satisfied smile.

  Garrity threw his arms
up in the air. “Okay, everyone out. We need to process the scene. There’s nothing to worry about. It looks like this was just a terrible accident, but police procedure dictates that you all stick around and give a statement. I wish these older folks would learn how dangerous it is to mix pills with alcohol.” This last sentence he muttered under his breath, then made shooing motions with his hands.

  The other police personnel helped push people out of the room and down the hall.

  Everyone congregated in the dining room where Violet brought trays of pastries and scones from the kitchen. Two police detectives circulated the room, taking statements from the crew.

  Lexy put Sprinkles in their room, then came down and sat with Jack, Nans, Ruth, Ida and Helen. The older women had sparkles in their eyes as they talked about the morning’s events.

  “I saw you over by that glass, Mona. What do you think was in there?” Ruth asked.

  “I don’t know. It smelled a little funny, but I’d hate to jump to conclusions.”

  Jack frowned at Nans. “What do you mean funny? You think someone tampered with the drink?”

  Nans shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “I certainly hope not,” Ida said. “Because you’re the one who made the drink, so you’d be suspect number one.”

  Karen appeared at Lexy’s elbow with a coffee carafe. Lexy watched the shaky stream of brown liquid fill her cup, then splash onto the saucer.

  “You seem awfully upset, dear.” Ida looked up at Karen.

  “It’s very upsetting, what happened to Mr. Bottaccio. Was it a heart attack?”

  Nans patted her lip with a napkin. “Oh, I should say not. He had his sleeping pills in his hand but the bottle appeared to be empty.”

  “I distinctly remember that bottle was full last night.” Helen unfolded her napkin and put a scone in the middle.

  “That’s right,” Ruth agreed without looking up from her iPad.

  “You think he killed himself?” Karen asked incredulously. “He seemed so happy and full of life.”

  Helen folded the napkin over the scone like a package and shoved it into her giant, tan patent-leather purse. “He may have taken too many pills by accident.”