Black Coffee, Biscotti & Murder Read online

  “Argh, this is awesome! I’m so proud of you, guys!”

  Russell looked so shocked and taken aback, he didn’t even react to Hunter grabbing him at first.

  After a moment, he seemed to collect himself. “Whoa there, big guy! Easy, easy!”

  “I can’t help it, I can’t help it. I’m just so happy for you, guys!”

  “I know, but you’re breaking my ribs!”

  Hunter stopped short and dropped Russell so fast, he almost fell before he regained his balance. He put a hand on Hunter’s shoulder and rubbed his side with the other, smiling at Hunter as he played up how hurt he was.

  Hunter smiled and shook his head. Now that he could see Russell wasn’t really hurt, he got ready to hug him again, but Russell backed away and shook his head.

  The girls had been laughing and enjoying the spectacle before them. Kari and Kasi both fell on the couch laughing. Maddy smiled from ear-to-ear and turned to Russell.

  “Where’s Jake?”

  “Oh, he’ll be out in a few minutes. He just ran back into the dressing room to change.”

  “I’ll have a big hug waiting for him, too, but enough of the suspense.” Hunter was practically hopping from foot to foot as he spoke. “What was the deal? Tell us everything! Spill it!”

  “Or, should we say, spit it?” Kasi grinned far more at her corny joke than it deserved.

  Russell smiled at her. He took a deep breath in, but before he could say a single word about the record label executive and the contract negotiations, the mood of the room was shattered by a loud scream.

  A woman was screaming from the dressing room.

  Chapter 10

  Kari

  “What was that?!” Kasi jumped up, her eyes wide. “Did you guys hear that?”

  “It sounded like it came from the dressing room,” Kari said. And here I was just thinking that nothing could ruin this night.

  “Isn’t Jake in there?” Maddy asked, the color draining from her face.

  “Hunter?” Kari asked, meeting his eyes.

  Hunter was already halfway to the door.

  He turned back and said, “Listen, it could be nothing, okay? I want you, guys, to all stay in here while I go check it out and make sure everything is safe.”

  When Kari, Kasi, Russell, and finally Maddy nodded, Hunter hurried to the dressing room.

  Kasi reluctantly sat back down on the couch. “Hurry back, okay?”

  Kari looked over at Maddy and saw the woman was on the verge of hysterics.

  “Maddy? Just breathe, okay? We don’t know anything yet. Someone could have slipped and fallen, or they could have just gotten bad news on their phone.” She tried to wrack her brain to come up with reasons why someone would scream like that, but Kari had a really bad feeling in the pit of her stomach.

  “Yeah, that could totally be it,” Kasi said, picking up on what her sister was trying to do. “There’s no way it’s something major. Not on a night like this!”

  “Are you…sure?” Maddy asked in a small voice. She turned to Russell, who was leaning on one of the chairs, his face grim. He could only shrug helplessly in response.

  Kari and Kasi exchanged glances. Of course they weren’t sure, especially with the way things had been going in their town lately. But neither one of them wanted Maddy to completely lose it and have a nervous breakdown.

  “We just need to all relax until we know more,” Kari told her. “Trust Hunter to do his job. He’s very good at it.”

  But he can’t do anything if someone is already dead, the nagging voice in her head said. No matter how much she tried to reassure Maddy, she couldn’t help but think that the scream had come from someone who had just encountered a dead body.

  “The girls are right,” Russell said. “We just don’t know anything until Hunter gets back and tells us what went down. No reason to stress about it until then.” He gave Maddy a smile, but there was something off about it.

  “I totally scream like that when I see a spider,” Kasi said reassuringly, though Kari knew that was absolutely untrue.

  Her sister had been dubbed The Spider Killer since they’d been kids. Not even the biggest, hairiest arachnid could frighten her, and she was the designated bug killer in their house. But she appreciated what she was trying to do to reassure Maddy.

  “And I scream that way when I see the state of Kasi’s room,” Kari said with a laugh, doing her best to lighten the mood.

  “Oh, stop it!” Kasi said, punching her in the shoulder. “My room is not that bad. I totally know where everything is.”

  “Yep, I do, too.” Kari smirked. “On the floor.”

  “That’s the easiest place to find it!”

  Their banter, which had been meant to distract Maddy and lighten the mood, failed miserably. The woman was squirming in her seat, a look of terror on her face.

  “Maddy, please,” Kari said, her voice turning from joking to gentle. “Take some deep breaths. It will all be okay.”

  “I can’t take it! I have to know!” Maddy suddenly jumped up, and, before either of the girls could react, sprinted toward the dressing room.

  “Whoa, that girl can really move on those heels!” Kasi said with admiration. She’d only made it halfway to a standing position before Maddy disappeared out of sight. “Now, what?”

  “We should probably go after her,” Russell said. “I mean, to keep her safe and all? In case…someone dangerous is lingering?” He shook his head in wonder. “Whoa, that would make a good song. Someone Dangerous is Lingering. What you girls think?”

  He looked completely clueless, and Kari wondered if he was in shock. “The cops are back there,” she reassured him. “They can keep her a lot safer than we can.”

  “And, yes, that would make a good song,” Kasi confirmed, then gave her sister an Is this guy for real? look.

  The three of them sat in silence for a few moments, each lost in their own thoughts. Finally, Kasi slapped the arm of the couch and stood up.

  “That’s it. I’m no good at this sitting around thing. We’re the Sweet Sleuths, right?” She turned to her sister. “That’s what Maddy called us. So, let’s prove we earned that name!”

  Kari and Russell followed Kasi out of the backstage area, all of them on high alert. Well, the two girls were on high alert; Russell still seemed to be in his own little world. When they reached the dressing room, they saw Maddy outside the door, trying to peer in.

  “Did you find anything out?” Kasi whispered to her.

  Maddy turned, her face white. “Nothing! I can’t hear or see a thing!”

  Just then, Kari glimpsed two janitors near the door. She leaned closer to the doorway and heard one of them mutter, “Yep, someone’s dead. Had to happen on our shift, didn’t it?”

  “What??” Maddy shrieked. She’d obviously overheard the comment, too. “Who? Who’s dead?”

  Kari’s heart sunk at the words. Though her intuition had told her that they were once again dealing with a dead body, she’d hoped against hope that, this one time, her gut would be wrong.

  She moved to put an arm around the woman’s shoulders. “You need to calm down, Maddy. It could be anyone, and the odds are overwhelming that it’s no one we know. Maybe one of the janitors had a heart attack or something. It’s awful, but we need to stay calm.”

  At that moment, Hunter stepped into the hall with two cops Kari didn’t recognize. He was immediately mobbed by people that Kari didn’t even realize were gathering behind them in the hallway. It seemed that a good portion of the people in the theatre had heard the scream, and they were all clamoring for more information.

  “I’ll try to find out what happened,” Kari told the others, squeezing through the crowd so she could get to Hunter.

  When she finally made it to him, she saw that he was deep in conversation with one of the other officers and that the view into the dressing room was clear.

  What she saw made her blood freeze in her veins. Jake was lying on the floor, a microphone cor
d wrapped around his neck. Based on his blue face and protruding tongue, he was very, very dead.

  She turned to look for Hunter, needing to see his face and have him put his arms around her. Then she realized how selfish she was being.

  While she’d known and liked Jake, he was one of Hunter’s good friends. How was he going to take this?

  When she spotted him, she saw he was still talking with the other cops, though now she noticed his drawn features. He knew who the dead body was, and he was doing his best to keep his composure. She couldn’t imagine how hard that must be.

  On shaking legs, she made her way back through the crowd. What am I going to tell Russell? She wondered. Oh my gosh, what am I going to tell MADDY?

  She felt her knees start to go a little wobbly. No no no, she thought. Not this again. Not another murder in Mills Township. And this time, it’s someone I considered a friend…

  When she made it back to her group, she realized that she would only have to worry about breaking the news to one of Jake’s closest companions. While Maddy was huddled with Kasi, tears sliding down her cheeks, Russell was nowhere to be found.

  “Did you talk to him?” Kasi demanded. “What happened?”

  Kari found herself speechless. She had no idea how to relate the scene she had just observed in the dressing room. It was, by far, the most horrible image she’d ever encountered.

  The choice was taken away from her when they heard a guttural bellow that could have only come from Russell ‘Intricate’ Turner.

  “Jake! My God, NOOOOO!”

  Chapter 11

  Kari

  Kari breathed a heavy sigh. This was not what she wanted to be doing, right now. She looked at her sister. “Okay, so we’ll bring your carrots and you can make dessert. What were you thinking?”

  Kasi rolled her eyes at her sister. “I don’t know. Cherry something, I guess.”

  “Jeez, thanks. Could you be a little less specific, sis?”

  Kasi was sitting on the living room couch with her legs crossed and her laptop in her lap. She didn’t even look up at her sister when she replied. “Christmas Eve is still two weeks away. Do we have to do this now?”

  Kari was sitting at the dining room table with a legal pad in front of her. She exercised patience with her sister. Kasi had a habit of getting buried in a situation, in order to avoid dealing with it emotionally. Not that anyone would take what happened lightly. Kari, on the other hand buried herself in literally anything and everything else. She would seek out busy-work to keep her mind off it. “No, but I don’t want to keep putting it off. If we can just go through the details now, everyone will be on the same page, and we won’t have any mad dash to the store the night before Christmas, like last year.” The excuse sounded hollow in her own ears. She knew there was only so much that she could delay before her curiosity and devotion to justice took hold and she was compelled to investigate.

  Kasi continued to ignore her sister, so Kari continued. “And the year before that, and the year before that, and the year…”

  “Okay fine. Sheesh!” She opened up a new tab on her web browser, tapped some keys, and waited for the results. “Huh. I could make a…uh…cherry-spice cake trifle. Does that work?”

  “Ooh, that sounds delish! Have Mom and Dad had that yet?”

  “I don’t know. No? I don’t think so.” She finally looked up from the laptop, and stared daggers at her sister. “I’m sorry, but is this really what we should be discussing right now? Someone died last night!”

  Kari heaved a heavy sigh. “I know. You’re right. I just...” She stared off into the distance, not really knowing how to continue. “I just don’t think I am ever going to get used to seeing a dead body.”

  It was Kasi’s turn to sigh now. “No, you’re right. It’s good to just keep busy. And, I don’t think I am ever going to get used to seeing one, either.” She shivered. “Yeah, maybe a break is just what we need right now. Anything to get your mind off it, right? I’ll take a welcome excuse to stop looking at this stuff.” She put the laptop down, and Kari could see that she had several tabs open displaying posts on various social media sites about the Fire Spitters, along with a video player showing the concert from the night before.

  “What are you looking at?”

  “The word is out on the social media sites. There are people posting about Fire Spitters everywhere.”

  “No, what is that?” Kari pointed at the video player.

  “Oh,” Kasi said. She started to tear up as she hit the play button. “I had taken some video at the concert.”

  Kari saw Dragon and Intricate come out on the stage and start the routine that she had just watched them perform. She could feel tears welling up in her eyes as well, as she watched Jake walk out on the stage and greet his friend. It was truly a shame to see him robbed of so much, when his life was just starting to work out for him. Not that he wasn’t doing well before hand but being signed by a record label was every performing artist’s dream.

  She couldn’t help but feel bad for Jake. Not to mention Russel and Maddy, too. Oh, Maddy! She lost everything! Kari didn’t have a boyfriend, but she would be inconsolable if she lost someone she was really close with. Like, her sister, or her parents. Or Hunter. She couldn’t even imagine what Maddy was going through. And Russel lost half of his band, his best friend, his co-worker, and his future all in one shot!

  “We should stop by and check on Maddy tomorrow. And Russel.”

  Kasi nodded. “Yeah, that’s a good idea.” Even though she was still a bit teary eyed, she was bopping her head to the rhythm, and started singing Jake’s parts to the song. “Mills is where I paid my bills, Mills is where I honed my skills.” Kasi looked up and saw her sister smiling at her. “What? It’s a crazy-catchy song!” She turned to the computer again and continued to bop her head to the music.

  “Oh, I’m not judging.” Kari decided to change the subject. “We can run over to the hotel at lunch and see Maddy.”

  “Ugh! Yes. Hopefully this will be one of the last times that we have to close up shop just to take a lunch break.” Kasi turns and looks at her sister. “What is the deal with the applicants?”

  “That’s actually something that I wanted to talk to you about.” Kari flips back a few pages of her legal pad. It wasn’t that she was not well versed in how to use a computer. Well, she wasn’t as handy as Kasi was, that’s for sure, but she knew her way around them. Still, she always seemed to go back to her trusty legal pad for her day-to-day stuff, or for making lists. Or for organizing her thoughts. Or for pretty much anything, now that she thought of it. She found the page with her notes on it about the applicants. “Ok. We should schedule the final round of interviews.”

  Kasi put the computer down and turned to her sister. “Right. So, what do you think?”

  “I think we are awesome at coffee, we are awesome at running our business, and we are going to be awesome managers! It’s going to be…”

  “Let me guess: awesome?” Kasi gave her sister a sly grin.

  “Yes, Miss Smart-aleck.”

  “Oh thank you, Miss Awesome. You still want to try to see them all tomorrow?”

  Kari frowned as she thought. “Yes, I think we should. But I wanted to discuss the order of the interviews with you, first.”

  “Knowing you, I bet you have an idea on how you would like to do that, too.” Kasi crossed her arms in front of her and waited for her sister to respond.

  Kari matched her sister’s smug expression with one of her own. “As a matter of fact, yes I do.” She shuffled her papers in front of her to build the suspense and make it seem more important, though the list was on the top page and she knew it by heart anyway. “I think we should see …

  “What does the order even matter?” Kasi said, interrupting her sister.

  “I guess it really doesn’t. I just think that we are going to talk to one of them, and they are going to bring up points that we’d want to discuss or ask the other applicants about. Or, t
hey are going to have qualities that we will want to measure in the other applicants. I don’t know, something like that.” Kari was just winging it with this, but it was helping to keep her mind off the evening’s events.

  “Ok, so spill it.”

  Kari took a deep breath before answering. “Ok, I think that we should see Felicia first, Janice second, and Bubba last.”

  “Sounds good. So, what are we looking for in each?”

  “Well, we know that Felicia would probably be the best with the customers, but I want to see her work her magic with the espresso machine, and I want her to try a cappuccino. And, we want to make sure that that bubbly personality is not going to cause conflicts later, when she starts making friends. We know that Janice is going to make us an awesome cappuccino, but I want to grill her a little bit on her people skills, put her through the paces, and do some mock customer interactions with her, see where she lands.”

  “Wow, sis, you have really put a lot into this. Ok, and last but not least…”

  “Bubba. Yes, I want him last, but he’s definitely not the least. We know that he can work his magic behind the counter, but I want to make sure that he’s also good with customers. We get a lot of the guys from Mills FD in here. I don’t mean to be insensitive, but I want to make sure that he is really good with it. Plus, the way that he had us both cracking up during the interviews already, I think we have to make sure that we are really going to get some work done.”

  “Haha, I hear that, sis. Ok, I’m gonna keep an open mind tomorrow, but I think that I have an idea of who I am leaning toward already. I want to know who you are thinking?”

  Before Kari could continue, her cell phone rang. Her pulse quickened when she saw that it was Hunter calling. “Hello.”

  “Hey.” He sounded horrible. “I just wanted to check in on you guys, and make sure that you were ok.”

  “Don’t worry about us. We’re ok. We’re probably just going to sleep it off. How’re you doing?”

  “I’m doing.” He said, and Kari’s heart bled for him. She couldn’t imagine what it must feel like to investigate the murder of someone so close to you. She and Kasi had already investigated a few murders of people that they knew, but no one they were this close to.