Banana Split and Bodies Read online

  Banana Split and Bodies

  Sticky Sweet Cozy Mysteries, Book 5

  Alyssa Mirry

  Summer Prescott Books Publishing

  Copyright 2019 Summer Prescott Books

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication nor any of the information herein may be quoted from, nor reproduced, in any form, including but not limited to: printing, scanning, photocopying, or any other printed, digital, or audio formats, without prior express written consent of the copyright holder.

  **This book is a work of fiction. Any similarities to persons, living or dead, places of business, or situations past or present, is completely unintentional.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  1. Hiring Hubris

  2. Amber’s Anger

  3. Dinner and a Designer Discussion

  4. Suzanne and Sharing Secrets

  5. Another Accusation

  6. No Comment

  7. Request for Information

  8. The Medical Examiner’s Office

  9. Some Difficult Conversations

  10. Lies and the Library

  11. The Code

  12. Pointing Fingers

  13. The Mayor’s Office

  14. The Full Scoop

  15. Motives

  16. The Rescue

  Epilogue

  Also by Alyssa Mirry

  Author’s Note

  Contact Summer Prescott Books Publishing

  1

  Hiring Hubris

  “I’ll take as much taffy as four dollars and twenty-three cents will buy.”

  “Mona, is everything all right?” Lydia asked.

  They were standing in the center of Lydia’s boardwalk shop, Doherty’s Taffy and Trinkets, but Lydia had never seen anyone look so miserable buying her salt water taffy before. The young woman’s eyes were red behind her glasses as if she had been crying and an air of hopelessness clung to her.

  Lydia had met Mona when she had been drawn into investigating a case involving a psychic who had been murdered in their beach town. She had briefly considered Mona a suspect, but now the rightful killer was behind bars thanks to Lydia’s quick-thinking. However, Lydia couldn’t tell now what was upsetting the young woman.

  “Your taffy is delicious, and it really helped me feel better the last time I was feeling down because of what happened to my boss. And I’m feeling pretty terrible right now too. And all the cash I have on me is four dollars and twenty-three cents.”

  “You know, I’ve been looking for somebody to try out my newest flavor and let me know if it’s up to par,” Lydia said kindly. “Do you think you could do that for me? It would be free because you’re doing me a favor.”

  “All right,” Mona said. “I just hope it won’t be something weird like liver and onions taffy.”

  “Well, this might sound a little strange in taffy form, but I think it’s something you’ll find to be sweet.”

  Lydia led Mona back to her office where she kept the candy that she had been experimenting with to put her own spin on. Mona accepted a seat once they were in the room, and Lydia took out a seashell-shaped candy dish that held the colorful taffy.

  Lydia was about to explain what the candy was, but Mona was too quick. She grabbed a piece of taffy and stuffed it in her mouth before Lydia had the chance to name it. Intrigued, Lydia waited to see if she would be able to identify the taste that she was going for.

  “It’s not liver,” Mona said with a smile. “It reminds me of an ice cream sundae. But I think I also taste banana.”

  “You have a discerning palate,” said Lydia. “That’s what I was going for. This is banana split taffy.”

  “It’s fantastic.”

  “Thank you for being my taste tester. Please, take as many as you’d like.”

  Mona took this offer to heart and grabbed two handfuls of the taffy. There was barely any left from Lydia’s test batch in the dish, but Lydia didn’t mind. She took one of the remaining treats for herself and waited to see if Mona would tell her what was wrong.

  “Thank you for being nice to me,” Mona said. “You’ve always been nice to me - even when you were breaking bad news to me, or we stumbled across a dead body. And I really appreciate it. I’m having a bad day.”

  “Why don’t you tell me what’s the matter,” Lydia suggested. “Talking might make you feel even better than the taffy does.”

  “No. Because talking won’t fix the problem. I moved here for a job, but with the death of my employer, I don’t have it anymore. I signed a lease for a year on my apartment, thinking I’d have something to do in Ocean Point for a year. And I just talked to my landlady, and she won’t let me break the lease without paying fees. And I don’t really have the money for fees or rent. I barely have money for taffy.”

  “It sounds to me like you need a job in town,” Lydia said, playing with her piece of taffy.

  “I know. But I haven’t had much luck with that. I went to the oddities shop, and they said I was too much of an oddball to work there. And I don’t have any family that I could ask to borrow from. That’s why I first got involved with someone who claimed they could talk to the dead because I really wanted to speak to my dad again. Though not to ask for money. I thought I had things under control, but it seems like I don’t at all.”

  Lydia reached a decision inwardly and then asked, “Mona, how do you feel about taffy?”

  “I love it, but I don’t think it’s going to solve my problems either.”

  Mona paused as she wondered if Lydia was implying what she thought she was. Lydia nodded.

  “How would you like to work here? I’ve been thinking that I could use another hand as summer business starts to pick up, and I need to spend some time away from the shop trying to sell my family house.”

  “I’d absolutely love to work here,” Mona said. “And I’d promise just to talk about yummy taffy and not ghosts or ghouls.”

  “Come on,” Lydia said, standing up. “I’ll introduce you to the rest of the team.”

  She led Mona out of the office, though Mona did stop to return half of the banana split taffy that she had taken back to the candy dish. They walked back to the main section of the shop where two of her employees, Jeff and Kelsey, were joking with one another as they tidied the candy display.

  “Mona, this is Kelsey and Jeff. They were the first employees I hired, and they’ve done nothing but make me proud. And I think you will make a great addition to the shop.”

  “Does she know that it’s difficult to refuse eating the candy if she’s surrounded by sweet salt water taffy all day?” asked Jeff.

  “And does she know that working here means she’ll occasionally have to help find clues?” asked Kelsey.

  “I’m fine with both of those things,” said Mona. “Excited, even.”

  “Then, welcome aboard!” Kelsey said cheerfully.

  Lydia smiled. She asked Mona when she wanted to start, and Mona answered that she could immediately. Lydia thought that this would be a great afternoon to teach everyone that was working how to make her newest creation. The banana split taffy was made by combining different flavors of taffy and twisting them together. She wanted to blend vanilla ice cream with hot fudge, banana, and a cherry. All the parts were made separately and then joined together. It would be a great flavor to show Mona all the steps of the candy making from heating the ingredients to using the taffy pulling machine.

  Kelsey and Jeff assured Mona that once she knew what she was doing that the candy making was easy and fun. Lydia couldn’t be prouder of the way they welcomed the new girl into the fold.

  She was so happy with the staff that she had assembled. Kelsey was actually someone that Lydia had babysat when
she was younger. She was in high school now and had grown up into someone loyal and hardworking with a love for the theater. Jeff was strong and diligent. He was a surfer and had actually saved Lydia from drowning before when she had to swim to escape from a killer’s grasp. They had both stood by her through some difficult times and were always eager to help her figure out problems – shop related or more murderous.

  She also had two employees who were not working that afternoon. Annette was an older woman who crocheted creations for the shop, and Quinn was quiet but kind. Lydia thought that Mona would fit in well. After dealing with her through the course of an investigation, she knew that her heart was in the right place. All in all, Lydia thought that she couldn’t ask for a more perfect team.

  She was about to begin demonstrating the new flavor when the shop door opened. She turned, ready to greet a customer or possibly the handsome lifeguard that had recently started bringing her coffee.

  However, she did not expect to see the person who stood in the doorway. It was the woman who ran the ice cream shop on the boardwalk and who had decided that she and Lydia should be mortal enemies because they both sold sweets. She was shooting daggers at Lydia with her eyes as she walked inside.

  “I bet you’re pretty happy with yourself,” Amber Allen said.

  Lydia didn’t know what she had done, but she could see the hatred on the other woman’s face.

  2

  Amber’s Anger

  Lydia felt tempted to duck behind the candy counter and hide, but she thought this would send the wrong impression to her new employee. Instead, she took a few steps closer to Amber and tried to give her a friendly greeting.

  “Good afternoon, Amber. How’s business?”

  “Business is not good, and neither is this afternoon,” Amber said.

  Lydia had always felt a little intimidated by the other woman because of her gorgeous looks and her blatant dislike of her just because she owned a taffy shop. However, today, the glares that Amber was giving her brought the intimidation to a new level. She had always tried to be civil with Amber despite the ice cream shop owner’s cattiness.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Lydia said.

  “Are you?” Amber asked accusingly. “Because you’re the one responsible for it. I had to open several hours late today because one of my machines was left on all night dispensing swirl ice cream. We had to clean up the mess and get rid of the smell before we could have any customers.”

  Lydia was confused. She knew that Amber thought the worst of her, but she couldn’t seriously think that she would resort to sabotage, could she? How could she blame Lydia for this fiasco? It sounded to her more like a machine malfunction than the taffy shop’s interference.

  “That sounds like an awful morning, but I don’t see how I’m responsible for it.”

  “It’s your fault because you tricked me into hiring her,” Amber said with a stomp of her foot. “You wanted me to hire Kara because you knew something like this would happen.”

  Lydia realized what she was referring to and tried not to laugh. She did feel bad that Cones and Cola had a delayed opening that day, but the reason was a little bit funny. When Lydia had started adding to her staff, she had been slightly paranoid about hiring a psychopath because of a murder that had just happened. Amber had taken advantage of this and had stolen applicants from the taffy shop. Though Lydia had decided not to hire Kara because she realized she did not have a great work ethic, she mentioned to Amber that she was considering making her an offer of employment. Amber immediately poached Kara and had her join her staff instead.

  “I’m sorry,” Lydia said. “But to be fair, you only hired Kara because you wanted to thwart me. I guess Kara brought some inadvertent karma.”

  “Don’t pretend this wasn’t your plan all along,” Amber snapped. “She’d made lots of little mistakes to annoy me before, but this is what it was building toward. Wasn’t it?”

  “I didn’t plan anything,” Lydia protested.

  The customers who were in her shop looking at the knickknacks and candy were starting to stare. She hoped that Amber’s annoyance wouldn’t dissuade them from their purchases.

  She felt a little bad that Kara’s incompetence had resulted in lost time and money and apparently a stinky smell, but this wasn’t really Lydia’s fault. It was Amber’s greed that had made her hire the girl, and it sounded like she might not have been properly trained about closing procedures.

  “I knew that we were rival shops and that it would be better if there were only one place for customers to stop for a sweet treat,” said Amber. “But I didn’t expect you to stoop so low. I’m not going to forget this, and I’m not going to forgive.”

  Lydia really didn’t want this to grow into a full-blown feud. Again, she tried to take the high road.

  “I am sorry that you had such a bad morning and that a certain employee played a part in it. I’ve always thought that our two businesses could coexist because the sweets we sell are so different. Maybe I could convince some of my customers to visit your place to get a cold drink to go with their taffy.”

  “I don’t want your charity,” Amber said.

  Lydia sighed. “Then, I’m not really sure what you want from me.”

  Amber crossed her arms but was saved from having to make a comeback by another arrival to the shop. Lydia tried not to let her annoyance show when she saw that the fight was now two-to-one. Amber’s best friend, Brie Rankin, walked up to her side.

  Brie worked for the local newspaper as a reporter. She wouldn’t print anything that was false, but she didn’t mind having a slight bias in her friend’s favor. Lydia had seen this before when her taffy shop first opened.

  “Why did you want to meet here?” Brie asked Amber while ignoring Lydia. “I thought you hated it here.”

  “I do,” Amber replied. “The smell of overly sweet taffy is so strong here that I can barely stand it. But my nose is especially sensitive because of the mess I had to clean up this morning. Lydia Doherty is trying to ruin me. I thought you might want to run a story on this.”

  “You can’t run a story because I didn’t do anything,” Lydia said. “Ultimately, Amber should have made sure that she had someone reliable checking her machinery at the end of the night.”

  “It sounds like I could write something about a feud between boardwalk owners,” Brie said. “But there’s a chance it might make both of your customers unhappy if they think they might get in the middle of something unpleasant.”

  Amber turned on her heel and headed toward the door. “Come on, Brie. We need to talk.”

  “If I do write a story, I’ll be back to ask for your comment,” Brie said before following her friend.

  Amber sent one more furious glare Lydia’s way before departing. As soon as she was gone, Kelsey, Jeff, and Mona were at Lydia’s side.

  “I’m sorry,” Kelsey said. “I wanted to back you up, but I wasn’t sure if interrupting her would be helpful or hurtful.”

  “I’m just straight up scared of that ice cream ice queen,” Jeff admitted.

  “It’s not normally so confrontational here,” Lydia assured Mona. “Normally it’s rather sweet here by the shore.”

  Mona didn’t seem scared off by Amber’s appearance, but Lydia would be lying if she said she wasn’t nervous. She had never seen her rival so upset before, and she wasn’t sure what this meant. She hoped that there wouldn’t be an ugly article about her in the paper, and she really hoped that she wasn’t really a part of a feud. She just wanted to run her taffy shop in peace. Why did that have to be so difficult?

  3

  Dinner and a Designer Discussion

  Lydia tried not to think about her encounter with Amber, but she couldn’t quite dispel it from her mind. She had a sinking feeling that something bad was going to happen, and she couldn’t shake it. She had made sure that her taffy shop was locked up tightly that night, so no one could cause any mischief after she closed, and she tried to focus on her evening
plans.

  Her brother, Leo, was coming over for a late dinner so they could discuss selling the family house. The siblings had been raised by their Uncle Edgar and Aunt Edie in the house, and Lydia had returned there after their uncle had fallen ill. After his death earlier in the year, it was stated in the will that they would sell the house. When Aunt Edie returned from her world travels (that Uncle Edgar insisted she go on once he was gone), she wanted to move into a smaller house where she could make new memories instead of only focusing on the past. Lydia would also move into her own place with her dog, Sunny.