Chapter Four
Addie’s head pounded as morning light streamed through her shop’s windows. Her stomach pitched. Even the faint pungent odor wafting off the recently varnished countertop seemed sharper today. A spasm of pain shot through her temple. She cringed and downed a couple of painkillers in hopes that this would all subside before any customers wandered in.
Serena informed her last night that the scotch she had consumed like water was a very rare old blend. Although smooth, it had a real kick to it. So today, she had no one to blame but herself and her own stupidity.
Despite her foolishness, it had been a good night. They had chatted until late, starting to develop a real friendship. Addie smiled. It had been a long time since she had a close female friend, and she missed that camaraderie. In the working world, she found many of her woman colleagues to be so professionally driven that they ignored any overtures of friendship. Even Sheila, whom Addie vaguely remembered this morning having told Serena about last night and who was the junior curator she had worked with side by side five days a week at the British Museum, had shown little interest in developing a friendship until it was too late and was time for Addie to return to Boston.
The door chimes rang. Addie squeezed her eyes shut and pasted a smile on her face.
“Hi.” A mound of tousled red hair appeared around the corner of a bookshelf.
Addie let out a deep breath. “Thank God, it’s only you.”
“Only me?” Serena stepped forward, a sardonic twinkle in her eye. “Thanks. That makes me feel great
.”
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
“I know. I figured you could use a cup of this, and I see I wasn’t wrong.” She grinned and waved a steaming paper cup under Addie’s nose. “An old family remedy for what ails you.”
“Mmm, smells like . . . I’m not sure. What is it?”
“Family secret,” she whispered. “If I told you, I’d have to—never mind. I wasn’t thinking.”
“It’s okay, Serena.” She smiled over her cup and took a sip. “Mmm, this is good, and exactly what I needed.”
“I thought so. Just remember the next time that I have the cure so you won’t have to suffer. I’d better run. I see a woman pacing the sidewalk in front of my store.” Serena called over her shoulder, “Cheers, till later.”
“Cheers.”
The morning flew by, and come lunchtime, when her stomach growled, she knew she needed something to eat, so she went off in search of food and to distribute her advertising flyers to some of the area merchants.
Addie hadn’t been back in the shop for two minutes when Serena bounced through the door. She took one look at Addie’s sandwich sitting on the counter, and her face dropped. “Oh, I see you have lunch already. I just picked these up from Martha’s. I thought we could eat together.”
“We still can,” smiled Addie, eyeing Serena’s sandwich wrapper. “I’m surprised you bought something from her now that you know she’s selling lunches. Doesn’t that conflict with your shop?”
“No, I only sell a few organic-made and gluten-free rolls and pastries. She doesn’t . . . at least not yet. Her food is typical bakery stuff, but I’m sure the new restaurant and coffee shop won’t be too happy with her. There’s kind of an unwritten noncompetition clause we all follow. You know, ’cause it’s not a big town.”
“I see. I’ll have to keep that in mind. I wouldn’t want to step on any toes. Come on, let’s go over there, sit in the reading chairs, and relax. I don’t know about you, but my feet are killing me.”
Serena stuffed one of the sandwiches into her large hobo bag and followed Addie to the chairs by the window. “It was crazy busy this morning. I think everyone was out and about. Speaking of crazy”—she swallowed a bite of her bun—“I had the weirdest customer this morning.”
“How so?” Addie covered her mouth. “Sorry, don’t mean to be rude, but I’m starving.”
“Remember the lady pacing, waiting for me to open? Well, she wanted something to put her husband to sleep with. At least, she said it was for her husband, who hadn’t slept well lately and needed some ‘knockout’
tea, but she said it had to be odorless and tasteless.”
“What?”
“I know! Well, my mouth must have dropped open, because she jumped in quick and said he’d tried some herbal mixes that were all flowery or tasted like dirt and hated them, so he wanted something that tasted like water.”
“Is there such a thing?”
She shook her head. “Not in my business—at least nothing that’s legal.”
“What did you tell her?”
“I told her I blend tea. That I don’t concoct potions, and if that’s what she was looking for, she should try an herbalist or a naturopathic doctor, or even a witch, but not a tea merchant.”
“You didn’t tell her to consult a witch. You’re joking, right?”
“No kidding, I did. I have a mind to call Marc and report her. I got a really weird vibe from her. You know, kind of snooty and hoity-toity. I wouldn’t put it past her to be trying to knock off her husband or someone else.”
“Wow. That is strange. Have you ever seen her around town before?”
“No, and I know most people living here. She would have to be an outsider, because everyone knows I don’t practice herbology or do magic hocus-pocus potions—just teas.” She got up, putting her sandwich wrapper in the garbage can by the counter. “That’s that, I guess. Lunch break over. I’ll let you know if she comes back so you can come in and check her out and tell me if I’m nuts or if there’s really something off with the woman.”
“Sounds good.” Addie wiped her mouth with a napkin. “Yes, I guess that was lunch. See ya.” She waved.
Her brow furrowed. She thought about Serena’s customer and her odd request, and then decided Serena probably had an even more vivid imagination than she did. After all, Serena had mentioned she loved to read murder mysteries, and Agatha Christie’s trademark was—Addie bit on her lip—murder by poison.
* * *
As Addie pulled her newer red Mini Cooper into her driveway, her thoughts were focused on her evening ahead. Tonight she had dinner to make and a couple of hours of sorting through boxes ahead of her. Fifteen minutes later, the spaghetti sauce was simmering on the stove, and fresh coffee was steaming in her cup. She slipped into the living room to check her emails on her laptop, which she’d forgotten in her rush out the door this morning. She sat on the sofa, her legs drawn up, her laptop across her knees, sipping her coffee—but one look at her empty inbox, and her heart sank. It had been over three weeks since she sent some of the books she’d discovered in the attic to the library in Boston, for Jeremy to appraise.
She gnawed on her bottom lip and scrolled through all her past messages in case there was one she’d missed, but found nothing from him. She snapped her laptop closed and set it on the coffee table, shook her head, and got up to close the curtains, but stopped short when she reached the window. A car with its lights off sat parked at the dead-end loop that led into her driveway. There was no reason for anyone to stop there, as the loop only led down to her house. She squinted in the dim light, but couldn’t work out the make or model, only that it appeared to be a dark color. She reached for her cell phone in her jacket pocket and tried to enter her pass code, but only got a black screen before realizing the phone was dead.
She wished now she’d had the landline connected. She chewed on her bottom lip, trying to think what to do. Her charger was upstairs in her bedroom. Dashing up the steps, she snatched the charger and stumbled back down the stairs, charger dangling by its cord. Breathless, she plugged it in and laid her hand over her heart, which was drumming an erratic rhythm. She glanced up repeatedly to keep an eye on the car and to scan the dusky yard for signs of an intruder.
An alarm screamed. She jumped. “Shoot.” She’d forgotten about the sauce cooking on the stove. She ran through the smoky hallway to the kitchen, seized a towel from the rack, wrapped it around her hand, grabbed the red, hot handle and tossed the blackened, smoking pot into the sink. She waved the towel under the smoke detector, but it wouldn’t turn off. Frantic, she tossed the towel on the counter, grabbed a chair, climbed up and pulled the cover off the smoke alarm to yank the battery out, only to discover there wasn’t one. It was hardwired in and there was no off button.
The kitchen filled with heavy black smoke, she glanced at the pot still smoldering in the sink and saw the towel she’d tossed aside had landed on the hot burner and was consumed in flames. She jumped off the chair, grabbed a knife from the counter top and pushed what was left of the towel into the sink dousing it with water. Against her better judgment, she forced open a window. Aware that at any time the trespasser from the car might be out there waiting for just this opportunity to get in, but she knew there wasn’t a choice. It was either face the intruder in the house or be struck down by toxic fumes and smoke. Besides, maybe a neighbor would hear the incessant screeching and call the fire department.
Sirens wailed in the distance. They grew louder, and she dashed back to the living room window just in time to see two fire trucks barrel down her driveway.
To her relief, the dark car was gone, and she was grateful to her small-town neighbors.
The firefighters stormed the house and told her to go outside and wait. Addie stood shivering in the cool fall evening. Her eyes focused on the commotion she could see through the open front door as firefighters made their way from room to room, checking for signs of a blaze. Someone placed a jacket across her shoulders. She snuggled into its warmth.
“You do know how to cause a commotion, don’t you?” Marc looked down at her, an amused glint in his eye.
“I guess I do.” She shook her head and laughed. “I tried to tell them there’s no house fire—it was just my dinner and a kitchen towel cooking.”
“Is this a testament to your cooking skills?”
“Not usually.” She frowned, then chuckled. “I’m a very good cook when I’m not busy trying to figure out why a car is parked at the top of my driveway and my cell phone’s dead and I can’t call for help.”
“A car?”
“Yes, a dark-colored one, as far as I could tell.”
“Hum, anything else you noticed about it? Make, model, license pl—”
“No, the light wasn’t good enough.”
Marc withdrew a notepad from his jacket’s inside chest pocket and began making notes. He asked a few more questions, then went to his car. He returned moments later, his face grim.
“What is it?”
“It appears an alarm just came through from your shop. My men are on their way there now.”
Addie’s heart dropped to the pit of her stomach like a rock.