A Cherry Sinister Murder: A Culinary Cozy Mystery (Slice of Paradise Cozy Mysteries Book 1) Read online

  Contents

  A Cherry Sinister Murder

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  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  RECIPE!

  Nancy McGovern

  Cyra Bruce

  Disclaimer

  A SLICE OF PARADISE COZY MYSTERY

  BOOK 1:

  A Cherry Sinister Murder

  By

  Nancy McGovern

  &

  Cyra Bruce

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  At the end of this story, there is an offer to join our mailing list for this series, through which you will receive updates, special offers & discounts on all future books in this series as well as information about joining our Street Team. Plus, you will receive a FREE BOOK from this series as a Thank You for signing up (a book you cannot get anywhere else)! If interested, the link is immediately after this story…

  Chapter 1

  “And the coconut flour,” Faith Franklin said, pouring the avalanche of white powder into her favorite mixing bowl, the one her Grandma Bessie sent all the way from Florida. It was one of those large heavy traditional ceramic bowls, creamy colored on the inside and a gorgeous shade of delicate teal on the outside. And Faith’s mom, Diana, had bought her matching wooden and teal spoons and whisks and measuring cups until the set was complete.

  Diana was sitting at the kitchen table, flicking through a manuscript she was supposed to be editing, her glasses pushed down her nose and a pencil behind her ear. “Faith, you really must make something of your baking talent. I’m sure you can make a living from it.”

  Faith blew out a stream of air and turned the brownie mix – gluten free and vegan, especially whipped up for her mom’s dietary preferences – a little too vigorously. Of course she wanted to use her passion for baking to make a living. She couldn’t imagine anything better than kneading and mixing and measuring all day, working in a room filled with the warm, sweet, comforting smell of baking. Living in her ditzy floral apron. Discovering new treats and making everyone feel warm and fuzzy inside. In fact, she’d whiled away many hours daydreaming about it, ever since she was little. At seven years old she even made a shoebox model of just how her very own bakery would look. Faith’s Special Treats, she’d called it. And she’d designed numerous menus over the years, which her mother had kept to whip out and embarrass her with on special occasions, in the most affectionate way.

  Extending the embarrassment further – and probably a factor in her breakup with Jeremy, she thought – were Polaroid pictures Faith had snapped of when she’d decorated the kitchen table with tinsel and random ornaments and made her mom sit down for a feast of poorly raised cakes and too-hard cookies. Her sandy hair was scraped back into pigtails and freckles covered her nose and cheeks. Enthusiasm shone so bright in her eyes and her gap-toothed smile dominated the shot as she held the camera. “Don’t you look so… powerful?” her ever-empowering mother always said, looking down at the album proudly, while Faith hid her head in her hands.

  Faith’s baking skills had improved vastly and the two pigtails of course were long gone, her hair now always in a long messy ponytail of wave-straight-curl-tangle that took a lot of effort and time to tame. Time Faith would much rather use creating a brand new recipe, like peanut butter chocolate gateau, or raspberry and white chocolate brioche casserole. That was always a favorite when her friends came over. Her own favorites were cupcakes, and some days she made rows and rows of them, all in different flavors. The dusting of freckles was still there too, and her love for baking, of course. But her confidence, that absolute conviction that she was going to own her own vastly successful café or bakery? That had dwindled away over the years. Now it was hanging by a thread, and could snap off at any moment. After all, what did she know about marketing or decorating or health and safety paperwork? She could bake, sure, and had a sense of the aesthetic. But what about everything else? It was much easier not to face up to the practicality. She could keep her dream just that, a dream.

  “Mom, don’t start. Please. Not now.” She snapped the lid on the jar of milled flaxseed and tried to change the subject. “How’s the book?”

  “Not bad,” Dianne said with a weary smile, putting her glasses down on the page. “It’s a passionate young writer, you can tell that much. They’ve got a good story, but they have to learn a bit about the craft. It’s not really my thing, though. It’s time travel romance.” She walked over to the fruit basket and picked up a banana.

  “Mm hmm,” Faith said, folding over the flap on the coconut flour. “Oh, don’t have too much, you’ll spoil your brownies.”

  “I won’t, mom,” Dianne shot back with a grin. “As I was saying, it’s not my thing, time travel. But I do it because it pays the bills.” She cleared her throat, leaning against the counter as she peeled her banana. “You know, in a big two bed apartment I need because of someone still living here.”

  “I know, mom, I know.” At 24, Faith knew it was The Right Time to move out of their apartment. Heck, it had probably been The Right Time an awful long time ago, but everything seemed to conspire against Faith when it came to jobs. When she had tried to join her mother in fiction editing she felt lonely and bored witless and ended up making so many mistakes she wasn’t allowed to carry on. Then working in a store as a sales assistant made her feel all pushy and salesy, and she ended up telling the clients to go across the street because there was an awesome blouse in there that was just their color. That hadn’t gone down well. Eventually she’d snagged work as a cashier in a grocery store, but the hours weren’t regular enough for her to move out. Her mom always talked about moving into a little cabin in a more rural area of Minnesota, “my writing and editing cabin by the lake,” she always said.

  Faith really wanted her mom’s dream to come true – they got on so well and, if a little unorthodox, her mother had always been super supportive. But it looked like her mom’s dream was in Faith’s uncertain and slightly fearful hands. “As soon as your brownies are in the oven I’ll go look for jobs on the iPad,” Faith said. “I’ll just get anything, not even baking related.” She felt her heart sink, but put on a brave smile. “Anything will do, as long as it has better hours than where I’m working now.” Faith pretended to herself she was one of those people who could handle working in a dead end 9 to 5 she hated with a passion. But she knew she wasn’t.

  It seemed her mother knew that, too. She sighed when she smiled. “All right. But look into baking first.” The phone started ringing. “A job you hate can feel like a noose around your neck at times,” she said as she walked into the hall to pick it up. “I remember when I first came—” She interrupted herself by picking up the phone. “Hello?... Oh, mom, hi.”

  It was Grandma Bessie. Faith rushed to the hallway and took the phone – Grandma Bessie always asked to speak to her. Though Bessie was somewhat finicky and difficult to please, she had a good heart, and their shared love of baking held them together.

  “Hey, Grandma,” Faith sa
id, taking the phone into her bedroom and collapsing onto her bed. “How are you? I’ve just been making a gluten free vegan brownie for mom.”

  “Gluten free what? These new fangled things,” Grandma Bessie said, impatient. “Anyway, I see you’re still living at home. The job and apartment plan gone down the tubes?”

  Faith picked at the lace on the edging of her bedcover – she liked everything super beautiful, with soft colors and lace and pearls and trimmings. “Old lady style,” her mother teased her. “It’s shabby chic!” Faith always protested.

  “Yeah,” Faith said, dejected. “I’m finding it hard to find work up here. It’s a small town, not much going on. I’m working at a corner store but the hours are like, nonexistent.”

  “Good to hear,” Grandma Bessie said.

  Faith frowned, rolling over on her back to stare at the white Christmas lights strung up on her ceiling. “Huh?” She wondered if Grandma Bessie’s hearing was going. “No, Grandma, I said—”

  “I heard what you said,” Grandma Bessie snapped. “I think you would do well with a new start.”

  Faith gazed out the window, where the creamy blue sky heralded the beginning of summer. It was too cold in Minnesota, she’d always thought. She remembered catching a commercial about Jamaica when she was little, and had begged and begged her mom with pleas and long lists about why visiting there would be a great thing to do. She’d even taken her small self into the travel agents and picked up a brochure, then spent hours designing their ideal itinerary in her room. Of course they didn’t have the money to go, and Faith soon gave up on it. She wondered about where she might have A New Start, dreaming of beaches and green palms swaying in the breeze, but she already knew it was just another dream.

  “Yeah, it would be nice.”

  “Come to Florida,” Grandma Bessie said. “Look after the tea room for me.”

  Faith sat bolt upright. “Huh? What?”

  “Don’t make me repeat myself, young lady. I’m getting too… Well, this modern generation wants everything quick quick quick. I haven’t got the time to be running after them, I want this coffee and that coffee and this tea and this pastry, all within a minute while talking on their Blueberries and their E-Phones and not observing common decency.”

  Faith was too stunned to laugh or correct her. “You mean, you want me to come and run it? Me?”

  “No,” Grandma Bessie said. “The cat’s mother.” She even tittered at that, and it took a lot to make Grandma Bessie laugh.

  “Me? Are you… are you sure?” Faith said.

  Her dream hurtled toward her, and already her mind was ticking over with just how beautiful it would look, and the creations she would serve up, and the specials blackboard she’d place out the front. The last time they’d visited her tea room had been five years before – Faith’s mom didn’t like to travel much – and Faith had redesigned it all in her mind then, too. It had been dated, in all truth, and the regulars were mostly elderly people who had been coming there for “donkey’s years” as her mother said – slang she’d picked up from her student days in England, that meant ‘forever’. And the place was too dark and dingy. Grandma Bessie was proud for sure, and she’d never even allowed Faith to so much as look at a baking utensil on their last visit, so this was a shock for sure. In fact, when Diana had suggested Faith come to apprentice with Grandma, Bessie had looked like someone had just killed her cat, and Faith had quickly changed the subject.

  Gazing far beyond her little box room, Faith’s imagination ran away with her – lovely duck egg blue colored shutters they’d open to let the sunlight in, and cream and beige upholstery with stripes and matching duck egg blue flowers imprinted on it. Glass tables, perhaps, or white wood with lace stenciled designs all over. And vintage tea cups with saucers, to hold the sugar sachets. And the most beautiful range of cakes lined up inside the counter, so beautiful that people would always say, “Ooh, I don’t know which to choose.”

  Grandma Bessie sounded cantankerous. “You think I would ring up this long distance call if I wasn’t sure? Do you want to come or not?”

  It finally sank in for Faith.

  “Yes, yes! Of course I want to. Thank you so much, Grandma. I’ll make you proud. I promise. I’ll tell mom and get a flight down as soon as I can.”

  Grandma Bessie went quiet for a moment, and when she spoke it sounded like tears were welling up in her blue eyes. “All right. See you soon, kiddo.”

  *****

  Chapter 2

  “Aw, mom, you said you weren’t going to cry,” Faith said, sitting on the couch in the living room, trying not to cry herself.

  Even though she knew she was long overdue to move out, it was still an emotional experience to actually do it. She’d lived with her mom in their little apartment ever since she could remember.

  Diana wiped her eyes and gave Faith a brave smile.

  “Oh, take no notice. I’m so so glad you’re getting out there and making your own life.” A sneeze interrupted her, building and building, then atchoo! “Sorry. And as you know, I’ve been bugging you about it non-stop for ages, but now—”

  “Yes, I do know, thank you very much,” Faith said, giggling, then stuck her tongue out at her mom as they sometimes did playfully. “But now you’re going to wrap your apron strings around me and wail.”

  “Ha!” Diana stood up tall. “Well, you’ve snapped me out of that one. What a horrid image. Like some parasite mommy, clinging to her kids for her benefit more than theirs. No, no, no way.”

  Faith laughed. “No chance. You’re ice woman.”

  “Hey!” Diana said. “Well, let’s see if you think that after this. One sec.”

  She disappeared into the hallway and Faith started looking around the living room, wondering just how much she was going to miss it. She remembered going to summer camp when she was a little girl and her mom wanted to go on a writers’ and editors’ workshop in NYC. For the first couple of days, Faith had spent her time glued to the phone crying buckets into her mom’s answering machine, but soon she’d gotten over it and was out white water rafting, fencing, and mountain hiking, wishing and wishing that the summer would never end.

  “You’d better appreciate this,” Diana said, bringing a large cardboard box with a handle in. “It’s been a devil keeping them a secret since yesterday when I picked them up. That was the real reason why I’ve been playing Celine Dion non stop, to drown out any noise they make.”

  Faith laughed. “I thought your excuse about just feeling like a Dion binge was a bit flimsy. Although, who doesn’t love a Dion binge? Anyway, what’s in there?”

  Diana sneezed again, then set the box on the blue living room carpet. “Something you’ve always wanted but I’ve always said no.”

  “I don’t think a Volkswagen Beetle would fit in that box.”

  “Ha, you should be so lucky.” Diana reached forward and unhooked one side of the box.

  It was facing toward her mom, so Faith couldn’t see anything. “Yay, you bought me a cardboard box. Thanks, mom! I’ve always wanted one.”

  “Oh, you and your smart mouth.”

  A tiny little kitten face appeared, peeping around the edge of the box with fearful eyes.

  “Oh, my gosh!” Faith whispered, grinning from ear to ear, her heart feeling soft and warm. “Mom!”

  Diana sneezed again. “We need to get these darn things out of here, before they kill me.”

  The kitten looked at her, then darted back into the box.

  “Hey, you scared him!” Faith said. “Wait a minute, things? You mean there’s more than one?”

  Diana took a tissue from her sleeve and pressed it against her nose. “I didn’t think it would be fair to get just one. It would be lonely, going all the way to Florida without a friend. Actually, they’re brothers.”

  Faith leapt out of her chair and over to her mother. She wrapped her arms around her neck and squeezed. “Thank you so much.” She’d wanted her own kittens since forever, but her mom�
�s allergies and the apartment regulations both made it impossible. Then she knelt down by the box and peered in. Speaking in the softest voice she could muster in all her excitement, she said, “Come out, guys. You don’t need to be scared.” She turned to her mom, her eyes bright. “They look like fluffy little rainclouds, don’t they?”

  One of the kittens was sitting at the back of the box, watching her with the cutest suspicious expression, like he was determined not to move or trust anyone. It made her heart melt. The other was a bit braver, placing one tiny paw in front of the other, carefully watching her and sometimes pausing to look her up and down. Faith had an urge to giggle at the utter cuteness but managed to keep it inside. She didn’t want to scare the brave little guy.

  “You should call them Cirrus… and… Nimbus!” Diana said, still dabbing her nose with the tissue. “Those are types of clouds.”

  Faith turned to her mom again. She had been looking forward to naming them herself, but she loved her mother’s suggestions. They really did look like fluffy little rainclouds, so the names suited them perfectly. Plus, it would make her feel a connection with her mom when she’d left home. “I love it,” she said. “Cirrus is the brave one, and the shy one is Nimbus. They’re very educated names, mom.” She laughed. “I was thinking more like Gray and Fluffy. Oh, look, Nimbus is coming out!”

  “Oh, but these look like very educated cats.” Diana laughed and sneezed both at the same time. “Cats that are going to be the death of me!” She got up and went into the kitchen. “I’ve had them out of the box prowling about in my room since I got them. I think I’ll have to clean every single thing in my room now!”

  “Aww,” Faith said, touched her mom went to so much trouble. “Thank you, mom.”

  “Now I can say I’m glad you’re leaving,” Diana said with a grin, then sneezed. “They’ll travel in a special carrier case. I checked everything out with the airline – they’ll be totally safe.”

  Faith rested her chin on her folded hands, watching the two little balls of fluff as they got braver and braver, and even began to look at her with curiosity instead of fear. “Thank you so much, mom. They’re the best going away present ever.”