Lacey Luzzi: Sliced (Lacey Luzzi Mafia Mysteries Book 13) Page 4

  “Ow!” She clamped one hand over her jaw. “The thing just about broke my tooth.”

  “I didn’t do it.” I raised my hands. “I didn’t touch those. I only bake rock cookies.”

  Meg was still massaging her jaw when the door opened to reveal a rosy-cheeked woman with blond, plaited braids falling on either side of her face. I recognized her instantly from her Facebook profile. Identification was made even easier thanks to the embroidered red-and-green Christmas apron that said Susie in script across her chest.

  “Hello,” she said, drawing out the word as she took in the scene before her. “Can I help you?”

  “I thought you were a baker.” Meg winced, tapped on her front tooth. “I just about cracked my jaw on your candy corn.”

  “Making candy corn isn’t baking...” Susie squinted at Meg, then at the prop bowl beside her door. “And those aren’t real.”

  Meg took the piece of candy corn—tooth marks and all—and tucked it gently back in its bowl. “Well, that explains a lot. You should really put a sign on it or something.”

  “I’m Lacey.” I stepped forward and stuck my hand out. “Lacey Luzzi. I’ve been hired to look into Amelia Rapport’s death. I’m so sorry for your loss.”

  “Thank you.” She still looked confused. “Are you like... the police or something?”

  “Not exactly,” I said.

  “Former police,” Meg said, pointing a finger at herself. “But, you know, that didn’t work out. For a plethora of reasons. Plethora was the word of the day on Google, in case you’re wondering. It means a lot.”

  “Are you the feds?” A hint of fear flashed through Susie’s eyes. “Why are you talking to me?”

  “More like a private investigator,” Meg said. “Like Encyclopedia Brown, but all grown up. And female. And Lacey’s services cost more than a quarter.”

  “Just like that,” I said tersely. “Just like that.”

  “Or maybe more like Nancy Drew,” Meg said. “Didn’t Nancy Drew have the hot boyfriend? Ted?”

  “Ned,” I said.

  “She’s got an Anthony,” Meg said. “He’s no Ted, but he’ll do.”

  “Ned,” I said. I took out my license and flashed it for Susie. As usual, a flash of a badge opened doors faster than most explanations. “Would it be okay if we asked you a few questions about Amelia? Again, we’re so sorry for your loss. We’re just trying to get to the bottom of it.”

  “I suppose it can’t hurt.” Sounding anything but sure, Susie retreated back from the doorway and gestured for us to step inside. “Would you like a scone? I just took a few out of the oven.”

  “Is a scone like a cookie?” Meg asked. “I’m on a diet.”

  “I suppose it’s close,” Susie said. “I mean, it’s completely different, but it’s not exactly healthy.”

  “That’ll work.” Meg nodded. “Lacey will have one, too. She can’t resist a sugar fix.”

  Susie led the way to a cutesy kitchen that smelled of ginger and allspice and cloves. It was so homey I was ready to discount Susie as a killer on scent alone. She turned to the stove and shuffled some scones from a cooling rack onto a bone china plate decorated with sunflowers.

  She nodded for us to sit at a small, café-style table and chairs underneath a window that let in tons of blinding, autumnal sunlight. She returned to the stove and poured hot water from a steaming kettle into a matching teapot.

  “She didn’t do it,” Meg whispered under her breath. “Did you see the braids? Nobody with braids like that can be a murderer.”

  “Not to mention the apron,” I whispered back. “And the baking.”

  “This is a slice of heaven.” Meg took a bite of scone. “Even if Susie is guilty, it’d be a sin to put her in jail. That’d mean she couldn’t bake for us.”

  “What’s that?” Susie looked over her shoulder. “Did you say something?”

  “This is delicious,” Meg said around a mouthful of scone. “You have a real talent.”

  “Thank you.” Once Susie had fixed us up with cream, sugar, and matching teacups, she took a seat across from me and next to Meg. “What is it you wanted to ask me?”

  “Can you start by telling us a little bit about Amelia?” I prompted. “What was she like? How did you meet her?”

  “We went to the same high school,” Susie said. “We had a few classes together, but we weren’t really friends. We didn’t even meet until senior year. We had a big class. So, I knew who she was, but I didn’t know her.”

  “I see,” I said. “You didn’t run in the same friend groups?”

  “Amelia was popular,” Susie said, her already-pink cheeks turning a deeper shade of red. “Like, the seriously popular girl. I wasn’t.”

  “What do you mean?” Meg munched on her scone. “You bake like a goddess, and you’re freaking adorable.”

  “Adorable doesn’t get you very far in high school,” Susie said with a shrug. “Neither does baking. Not when everyone wants to be skinny.”

  “Skinny is overrated,” Meg said. “So is popular. But don’t let Lacey know I said that. She is both skinny and popular.”

  “I don’t think that’s true,” I interrupted.

  “She’s got a whole fan club,” Meg said. “Anthony, Bella, The Fish... I could go on.”

  “The first time Amelia ever noticed me was in home-ec during senior year,” Susie said. “We were the only two girls who took the class seriously. She was amazing at baking, even then.”

  “What about you?” Meg asked. “Were you born amazing, or did you learn amazing? And if you tell me it’s the latter, how can I learn amazing? I mean, I am amazing already, but I’d love to funnel some of that amazing into a particular baking niche for the next few days. After that, if the amazing fizzles back to regular amazing, I’m fine with it.”

  “I loved to bake, even then,” Susie said. “I don’t know that I had a natural talent like Amelia, but I experimented all the time. I loved it—still do.”

  “When did you guys begin your friendship?” I asked. “Was it in high school?”

  “Well, we got partnered together for that home-ec class I was telling you about—thank goodness—and it was easy. We were friendly. But it only lasted during class. Once the bell rang, she went back to her friends.”

  “Ouch,” Meg said. “That had to hurt. I have a few friends that like to pretend I don’t exist sometimes—cough, cough, his name is Anthony—and that rejection stings.”

  “It didn’t bother me.” Susie shrugged, but she looked down at the scones, and I didn’t entirely believe her. “She had her friends. I had my baking. I was going to go to culinary school.”

  “Did you go?”

  “Never quite made it. I’m completely self-taught.” Susie gave a limp shrug. “My grandma got sick. My mom’s... not around. So, I dropped out of school to take care of my grandma. I practiced baking at her house—watched YouTube videos, read blogs, threw a lot of failed experiments away. It’s possible to learn amazing, in case you’re wondering.” Susie nodded at Meg. “At least, to a certain extent. But greatness... that’s innate. That’s what Amelia had. Even she couldn’t deny it. It was her calling.”

  “Did you stay friends with Amelia after high school?”

  “Oh, no. We reconnected a year ago by chance,” she said. “At first, I didn’t recognize her. I’m pretty sure she had some work done because that nose was not there in high school. Her hair was dyed, she must have gotten Botox or implants or something... colored contacts maybe?”

  “Some people are so vain,” Meg said, looking at her nails.

  I stared at Meg. “Some people.”

  “Nothing wrong with being vain,” Meg said. “If you were as amazing as me, you’d be vain too.”

  “Okay,” I said, “so you barely recognized her—but did she reach out? Or did you?”

  “She recognized me in a store,” Susie said. “There’s this little specialty store I go to on Grand that has some hard-to-find ingredients. Espresso
powder, exotic bitters, flavored salts... you name it. It’s the place I go when I need inspiration, or to think, or you know, to get stuff.”

  “I’ve got one of those places,” Meg said. “It’s called the bathroom. I often get my best ideas in the shower. Lacey’s got one of those places too, and it’s a cake shop called The Sugarloaf.”

  “That was private,” I grumbled. “It’s not my spot anymore.”

  “Ah, The Sugarloaf.” Susie gave a smile. “I’m not surprised. Obviously they’re great, seeing as they’ve won the bake-off for thirty-seven years and counting.”

  Meg cracked her knuckles. “Just let me at ‘em. They won’t know what hit ‘em.”

  “Have you ever entered the bake-off?” I asked Susie.

  “Not yet,” she said. “I... well, I was supposed to this year. I was Amelia’s assistant.”

  “How did that happen?” I asked. “How did you and Amelia reconnect?”

  “Like I was saying, I was at this store on Grand and ran into Amelia there. I was trying to get ideas for this year’s competition—”

  “A year ago?” I interrupted. “You plan that far in advance?”

  “I was stressing,” Susie said. “I was actually running late. By the time people complete one contest, they’re usually already deep into their plans for the next. One year is not that much time to perfect a recipe, and each year, we need to submit brand new ideas. No repeats.”

  “So we’ve heard,” I said.

  Susie bobbed her head, remembering. “Well, anyway, I was on the verge of an epiphany in front of the raw honey shelf when I felt a tap on my shoulder.”

  “Who was it?” Meg asked.

  “Amelia,” Susie said, looking at her with confusion. “That’s who we’re talking about. It was Amelia—but I didn’t know it at the time.’

  “Because she looked so different?” I asked.

  “Exactly.” Susie looked down at the table, her eyes unseeing as if she was living in a memory. “She said my name, and it took me forever to place her. I think she might have even had to say her name first, like, to prompt me into remembering her.”

  “Did she want something?” I asked. “Or was she just saying hi?”

  “We always said it was fate.” Susie gave a fond little smile. “Her running into me that day. We both were looking for the same thing. Rose petals.”

  “Romantic,” Meg quipped.

  “There was only one jar left. It was like a romantic comedy... but not romantic. Just a friendly meet-cute. Anyway, she let me have the jar of petals, so I offered to buy her a slice of cake at the bakery next door.”

  “I can’t believe you guys go to bakeries when you have stuff like this in your own home.” Meg poked a fork at her scone. “That’s like going to McDonald’s for a burger when your husband’s got meat on the grill.”

  “We had some tea—coffee for her, tea for me,” Susie said. “We caught up, and this time, she was really nice. I was wary about her for a long time, wondering if she wanted something from me. But she didn’t; people really can change. I am so glad I trusted my gut and gave us a second chance to be friends after she apologized.”

  “She apologized?” I asked. “For what?”

  “How she treated me in high school,” Susie said. “I sort of mentioned that I thought it was weird how she remembered me at all since she didn’t really talk to me back then. I felt bad for saying anything—Amelia seemed so embarrassed. She apologized up and down, and even ended up picking up the check for the meal as a peace offering.”

  “Huh,” Meg said. “Almost seems too good to be true.”

  “I thought so, too,” Susie said. “But it wasn’t. We exchanged phone numbers, and she texted me the next day asking if I wanted to hang out again.”

  “You said yes, I’m guessing?” I prompted. “Is that when your partnership began?”

  “Pretty much,” Susie said. “I invited her over. We had some more tea, some cookies. We talked about our careers. She was working in a bakery and hoping to branch out.”

  “Had you kept tabs on her after high school?”

  “That’s the weird thing,” Susie said. “She sort of fell off the face of the earth. She didn’t have social media, nothing. I—uh, well, I looked her up a couple of times.”

  “Did she ever say what she did in between high school and... until you ran into her in the store?”

  “No. She didn’t talk about that part of her life much,” Susie said. “She went to some baking school in France right after high school. Did a stint in Italy. I think she spent some time in Asia as well. She only moved back a few months before I saw her. I think she had to ‘find herself’.” Susie added quotes for emphasis. “I guess it worked because whoever she found was much nicer than her original self.”

  “That’s lucky she found the nice part of herself,” Meg said. “How awful if she’d found her evil side after all that work.”

  “Did you have any issues with her once you became friends?” I asked. “How’d you start working together?”

  “Well, we had a few baking and movie night type get-togethers,” Susie said. “Eventually, she confided in me that she had a big, knock-your-socks-off idea for the bake-off.”

  “Did she tell you what it was?”

  “Not right away. Of course not,” Susie said. “I still didn’t have an idea for my own work, and these recipes are highly guarded secrets.”

  “I thought you said you were on the verge of an epiphany in front of the raw honey,” Meg said. “Isn’t that sort of like a knock-your-socks-off idea?”

  “I lost it,” Susie said sadly. “All my ideas were boring. Old. Over-done. I told Amelia that.”

  “What’d she say?” I asked.

  “She offered to work together. She said I could come aboard. Together, we’d be the dream team.”

  “But you’re listed as the assistant,” Meg said. “That’s not exactly an equal partnership.”

  “We were a team. It was Amelia’s idea, and therefore she deserved to have her name on it. If I’d come up with the idea, it would have been my name on it.”

  “Whose name is on it now?” I asked. “Since Amelia’s gone?”

  Susie’s teacup rattled against her plate. “I see where you’re going with this. Don’t be ridiculous—Amelia was my friend. I would never have hurt her.”

  “Will you be continuing in the bake-off without her?”

  “It’s what she would have wanted.” Susie pushed back her chair and stood. “I think it’s time for you to leave. I’ve answered plenty of your questions.”

  “But I was hoping for another scone,” Meg said. “They really are to die for.”

  “Meg,” I said.

  “Sorry,” she said. “I can’t seem to stop doing that. I’m too witty for my own good.”

  Susie wasn’t amused. “You are barking up the wrong tree. I loved Amelia like a sister. We might have had a rocky start, but second chances are real. We were best friends. I wouldn’t have killed her over a stupid baking competition.”

  “It’s not stupid,” Meg said. “It’s very prestigious.”

  “I hope you find who killed Amelia.” Susie led the way to her front door. She opened it and met our gazes dead-on. “It wasn’t me. You should probably look into her psycho ex if you’re worried about who killed her.”

  “Her psycho ex?” I asked.

  “I thought you were a detective,” Susie said. “You figure it out.”

  The door slammed in our faces.

  “That wasn’t very festive,” Meg said. “Gall-darn, I’m sure sad we made an enemy out of her. I really liked her baking.”

  “She is talented.”

  “Lucky thing I snatched a few for the road.”

  I studied Meg. Upon closer inspection, the pockets on her camo vest were significantly puffier than when she’d gone into the house.

  “Don’t judge me,” Meg said. “Consider it her insurance payment for my chipped tooth thanks to that stupid candy corn.�
��

  “For a minute there, I didn’t think she had it in her.” We made to the car. “But having spent a little time with Susie, I think underneath that cute exterior, there are more layers than we bargained for.”

  “Tell me about it,” Meg said. “At least three layers. There was the apron, her sweater, her turtleneck...”

  “It all just seems too convenient,” I said. “She re-meets Amelia one year ago and gives her a second chance? Despite being treated like crap in high school? And just in time for the baking competition...”

  Meg nodded. “Then Susie magically doesn’t have any of her own ideas and tells Amelia that right after Amelia tells her that she’s got a bomb.com idea.”

  “Then Amelia dies, and if that bomb.com idea wins,” I said, “Susie will get all the credit.”

  “Suspicious.”

  We slid into the car. I cranked the heat to high. Meg unstuffed her pockets and scattered scones across the dashboard.

  “Better savor these,” Meg said, “just in case she’s going to prison. These are the best scones I’ve ever had.”

  “If she murdered her best friend,” I said, “those prisoners are all going to gain about fifty pounds.”

  “Are murderers allowed to bake in jail?” Meg asked. “They should have documentaries on these things. I don’t know anything about prison life.”

  “I don’t know,” I said, “but if Susie is guilty, we’ll find out. In the meantime, I do think we need to look into Amelia’s love life.”

  “This would be easier if Amelia wasn’t so popular with the dudes.”

  “I agree,” I said. “I don’t even know who Susie meant with her comment about the psycho ex. It could be Hunter or Frankie, or even someone we haven’t discovered yet. Which would you like to start with?”

  “Who lives the closest to a 7-Eleven?” Meg asked. “I bet you need a sugar bomb to wash down these scones.”

  “I think you’re right,” I said. “Hunter it is.”

  Chapter 7

  After refueling mentally and physically with a gigantic sugar bomb—a concoction made of precisely eighty percent sickly sweet steamed milk, fourteen percent tiny, probably-expired marshmallows, and six percent a slightly burnt variety of coffee, I was feeling reenergized. And a little nauseous.