Double Grudge Donuts

Book 8: Deputy Donut Mystery

by Ginger Bolton

Genres: Amateur Sleuth; Culinary Cozy Mysteries; Female Sleuths; Mystery

Synopsis

The countdown is on as Deputy Donut Café owner Emily Westhill gets ready for married life. But before she takes the plunge, she’ll need to poke a hole in a deadly criminal’s plans . . .

When the Fallingbrook Arts Festival rolls into town weeks before she’s set to tie the knot, Emily expects talent and friendly competition at the week-long summer series to go together like coffee and double fudge. But the fun crumbles fast after a lively bagpiper takes first place on day one and turns heads for the wrong reasons—all before Emily and her tabby cat find him dead in a clear case of murder. Along with a distinctive weapon at the crime scene, several strategically placed items leave disturbing clues about the killer’s identity, including a broken piece of a Deputy Donut mug . . .

While detectives aren’t sure who silenced the bagpiper’s music, they don’t trust Emily or her family to tell the truth. With her nuptials and career on the line, Emily launches an unsettling investigation to save herself from trouble and bring a dangerous figure to justice. The search not only brings too many suspects into the picture, but also leads to a strange discovery on Deputy Donut’s rooftop. A discovery that tells Emily she better get cooking, because someone may be watching her every move . . .  and carefully plotting to turn a wedding into a funeral!

Release date: February 20, 2024

Publisher: Kensington Books

Print pages: 256

Sample

Summer Peabody-Smith crumpled a business card between her fingers and whispered, “No . . .” Her knuckles were white.

I threw a questioning glance at her, but she merely shook her head and stared with a sort of despair at the lone performer in the ornate Victorian bandstand in the village square.

The tall, slender man in pressed black slacks and a neat white shirt played a third note on his cornet. And a fourth.

With my lack of musical talent, I didn’t recognize his tune as quickly as Summer must have. I had never before heard “Reveille” played so slowly. Summer crushed the business card into an untidy ball.

As far as I could tell, the notes the cornetist played were perfect. I could have relaxed and enjoyed the mellow tones, but I was too aware of Summer’s anguish.

The cornetist went on, note by painstaking note. People in the rows of folding chairs near us rustled and whispered, and I couldn’t help feeling sorry for the young man competing in the Fallingbrook Arts Festival’s Musical Monday evening show.

And then it got worse.

Squawk!

I couldn’t help turning around on my uncomfortable chair to see what had made the horrendous noise behind us.

A stocky, gray-haired bagpiper in full Highland regalia paraded immediately behind the rear row of seats. His bagpipe let out another discordant squeal. Many of the hundred or more people in the audience laughed.

Frowning, Summer and I focused on the cornetist again. Maintaining his dragging tempo, he continued playing “Reveille.”

The bagpipe behind us let out random screeches, and more audience members laughed.

Finally, the cornetist finished “Reveille.” He gave a stiff bow and strode out of the bandstand. His face was bright red. The evening was warm, typical for early August in northern Wisconsin, but most of the day’s earlier heat and humidity had dissipated to a soft haze.

Brushing past the cornetist in the aisle between seats, the bagpiper marched toward the bandstand. The crisp pleats of his green, black, and white plaid kilt swaying, he climbed up the two shallow steps into the bandstand. He picked up the microphone and announced in a gravelly voice that everyone was welcome to sing along.

I wasn’t good at distinguishing one bagpipe melody from another, but I figured out what this one had to be when people around me sang “My Bonnie Lies over the Ocean.”

Summer and I didn’t sing.

His cornet case in one hand and his face still red, the cornetist sat down in the seat beside Summer. She’d told me she was saving it for a friend, but she hadn’t mentioned that the friend was one of that evening’s competitors.

The wailing of bagpipe and voices ended. Most of the audience stood and applauded. Summer and the cornetist remained seated, and so did I.

The cornetist leaned toward Summer and me and asked, “Who is that?”

Summer smoothed the card she’d nearly destroyed. “He must be this guy, Kirk MacLean.” She held the card where both of us could see it. “Look what his business card says: HE WHO PAYS THE PIPER CALLS THE TUNE.”

Although the cornetist’s attempt at a smile was tepid, he was stunning—square-jawed with a straight nose and rich brown eyes. “Original.” He was probably older than I’d first thought, but still young. I guessed he was in his early twenties. Women his age probably swooned.

I wasn’t about to swoon over anyone besides Brent, my fiancé. Summer was interested in another detective, one who didn’t live near Fallingbrook.

Summer tore the card in half and thrust the pieces into a pocket of her plaid shorts. “I should introduce you two. Emily, this is Quentin Admiral. I used to babysit him out at Deepwish Lake. He and his parents live in Chicago, but their summer home is down the lake from ours. Quentin, this is Emily Westhill. She’s one of the two owners of the Deputy Donut café.”

Quentin and I stood. I smiled up at him, shook his hand, and congratulated him on his performance. He muttered, “Sorry I let that rude piper get the better of me.”

Summer demanded, “But what happened to you before he made his bagpipe scream in apparent pain, Quentin?”

Audience members stopped clapping and sat down. I eased into my seat.

Quentin sat, too. “Tell you later.”

With his bagpipe under one arm, Kirk MacLean strutted out of the bandstand, and a bluegrass group took over. They were followed by a pair of fiddlers, and then, to my surprise, three of Deputy Donut’s regular customers. The women wore frilly white aprons over red gingham dresses. Smiling broadly, they wielded their concertinas as fiercely as they wielded their knitting needles weekday mornings in Deputy Donut where they, along with two other women, called themselves The Knitpickers.

People in the crowd seemed to have decided that each performance after Quentin’s deserved a standing ovation.

Unlike me, my parents had loads of musical talent. They and the Fallingbrook High School music teacher, Lisa-Ruth Schomoset, were that evening’s judges. They conferred, and then Lisa-Ruth went to the bandstand and shortened the microphone stand. With her drab brown curls, oversized glasses, shapeless tan dress, and clunky sandals, she looked tiny in that bandstand.

She tapped the microphone, assured herself that it was working, and announced that third prize went to the concertina ensemble. Hands over their mouths in obvious amazement, the three women stood and hugged one another. Laughing and swishing their full skirts, they hurried to the stage and accepted their ribbons. On the far side of the audience from me, the other two Knitpickers hooted and cackled. I clapped and cheered.

Lisa-Ruth called Quentin to the bandstand for second prize. Red-faced, he collected his ribbon and jumped over the two steps. He landed on his feet without the slightest stagger. He might have been slender, but he was athletic. I guessed from his broad shoulders that he’d spent a lot of time canoeing on Deepwish Lake.

Lisa-Ruth announced that the first prize went to Kirk MacLean. The bagpiper swaggered to the stage.

Quentin strode to us. We congratulated him. He gave us terse thanks. Glaring at Kirk MacLean, he almost seemed to be holding his breath.

I couldn’t help contrasting the pain and vulnerability of people Quentin’s age with the enthusiasm of the concertina-playing Knitpickers, who were probably in their seventies. They’d been ecstatic about coming in third, while Quentin seemed upset at winning second place.

I looked up into his face and offered the only consolation I could think of. “Summer and I are going to the Fireplug. Would you like to join us?”

Still frowning toward where Kirk MacLean had disappeared, Quentin seemed to hesitate.

Summer prompted, “Say yes.”

He let out a deep breath and grinned at her. “Yes.” They were both about six feet tall.

I picked up my tote bag. “Good. You’re committed, and now I have to warn you that my parents are coming, too. They’re two of the judges who gave you only second place.”

Beyond the other side of the rapidly emptying seats, Lisa-Ruth scurried away from the crowd and disappeared among tents displaying arts and crafts.

Quentin flapped his hand in a nonchalant gesture. “Second place is good.” I suspected that he had recited that sentence, in that monotone, many times.

Summer ran fingers through her ruby red hair, which for once fell in waves to her shoulders instead of being pinned on top of her head. “I’ll bet that bagpiper has never played with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Quentin has.”

His face was losing its redness and returning to tan. “The bagpiper played well.”

We wended our way south from the bandstand along paths between majestic trees that must have been planted about the time that Fallingbrook’s square—it was actually a rectangle—was laid out. Above us, cicadas toned down their chorus.

Summer asked me, “Where’s your handsome detective?”

Remembering the days when I had denied that Brent was “my” detective—or my anything—I smiled back at her. “Working, but he should be off tomorrow night for the Troubadour Tuesday show.”

Quentin asked me, “Is he a singer?”

“He has a great voice—at least, I think he does—but no, he’s not going to compete or perform. He’ll sit in the audience with me unless he’s sent out on a call.”

Summer pushed a low-hanging branch out of her way. “How many more days until your wedding?”

I didn’t have to think about it. “Fourteen. Two weeks from today.”

Quentin deadpanned, “But who’s counting?”

My tall, wiry father and short but equally wiry mother caught up with us and congratulated Quentin. At the south end of the square, we crossed Oak Street together, and then turned south on Wisconsin Street. The sky was almost the color of my pale orange sleeveless dress.

Harold, the balding, fiftyish owner of the Fireplug, was chatting to patrons on his sidewalk patio. He hurried to us. “Welcome! Great to see you all again. I’m afraid we have no tables free out here, but there’s probably one big enough for your group inside. Get yourselves settled, and Ed will take your orders.”

Inside the cool, wood-paneled pub, all of the booths were full, but a large table in the center of the pub was available. We claimed it.

A big man with a broad forehead emphasized by the way he wore his dark hair pulled back in a ponytail came to our table and greeted Quentin by name. Like Harold and the other staff at the Fireplug, Ed wore a short-sleeved shirt with a fire hydrant embroidered on it. He removed a pencil from behind his ear and took our orders.

A few minutes later, while he was handing us chilled mugs of foamy beer, my mother confessed, “I actually like the sound of bagpipes.”

My father gazed toward one of the many framed maps decorating the pub’s walls. “I always have.”

I stared at a map as if seeing through it all the way to Scotland. “There’s something haunting about them, as if they’re calling to us from long-ago centuries.”

My mother quoted dreamily, “ ‘The skirl of the pipes, the beat of the drums’.”

Quentin repeated, “Skirl. Whoever made up that word was probably talking about an enraged squirrel trapped in a metal pipe. Sorry, but bagpipes grate on my ears.”

Ed plunked my mug down with so much force that beer nearly sloshed over the rim, and the spider tattooed on his very muscular right forearm appeared to jump out of its web. “I hate bagpipes!” Maybe he realized that his reaction was extreme. He set the remaining mugs down quietly and stalked away.

My mother turned to Quentin. “Your playing was perfect. You hit the right notes and played well. There was just one thing . . .” She closed her mouth tight, like she always did when she was afraid of saying something she might regret.

Quentin supplied the word. “Tempo.”

My mother gave him an apologetic grin. “It was like you wanted to put people to sleep, not wake them up like ‘Reveille’ is supposed to.”

Summer twirled a curl around one finger. “Why did you play so slowly, Quentin? I’ve heard it out at the lake at horribly early hours, and you always play it at a blistering pace. Perfectly, too.”

Quentin set his mug down. “It’s this thing I do as an attempt at humor at shows and festivals where audience members might want to have fun. I play ‘Reveille’ really slowly, then ‘Taps’ at the same pace, which suits ‘Taps.’ Then I play them both again, speeding up each time. When I get to the final speedy version of ‘Taps,’ the audience is usually laughing.”

Summer accused, “But tonight, you stopped after one slow rendition of ‘Reveille.’ ”

Quentin reddened again. “The audience wasn’t going to laugh as much at me as they were already laughing at that bagpiper. I lost focus and quit.”

My mother looked about to cry. “I wish you had done what you planned. You probably would have captured first place. Kirk’s the janitor at Fallingbrook High. Lisa-Ruth Schomoset teaches music there, and I got the impression that Lisa-Ruth doesn’t like Kirk. Did you notice that, Walt?”

My father winced, almost as if he were in pain. “Doesn’t like him sounds mild. Detests him might be more appropriate.” I stared at my father in surprise. He seldom made cutting remarks. He softened it by adding, “But she admitted that his playing was faultless, and that he truly did engage the audience. It was close, though. I’m sorry, Quentin. We were torn about giving him instead of you first prize.”

Quentin drew squiggles through the condensation on his mug. “It doesn’t matter. And I’m sorry I was less than gracious about accepting my ribbon.”

My mother asked, “You were? I didn’t notice.”

I had noticed, and judging by my father’s expression, he had, too.

I noticed something else. Quentin’s apology did not quite seem sincere. He studied my face for a second. “I’m angry at myself for quitting my performance before I’d barely begun it. I’m not angry at the bagpiper.” He shifted his attention to my parents. “Or at the judges.”

I suspected that he actually was angry at Kirk and also at the judges, but his anger had been tempered by the half hour that had passed since the awards were given out—and by being in a social situation with my folks.

Outside the pub’s front door, Harold’s laugh boomed out. “Come on inside! And next time, be sure to bring your bagpipe. You can play it inside or out!” He ushered Kirk, wearing his Highland outfit, into the pub.

Quentin turned toward me and made a horrified grimace. I had to smile.

Harold pointed at our table. “That gentleman over there in the white shirt has a musical case of some sort. You could play a duet.” He waved farewell and went back out to his patio.

Kirk sneered—actually sneered—at Quentin. “A dirge.” His voice was loud enough for everyone in the crowded pub to hear. “Only amateurs have to play that slowly.”

Quentin looked down at the table and fiddled with his coaster.

My father grinned, leaned forward, and said in a conspiratorial voice, “Imagine the disharmonies of a cornet and a bagpipe playing in different keys at the same time.”

Quentin let out a begrudging laugh.

“Golden tones from the cornet, and . . .” My mother seemed to struggle for words.

Summer gave me an apologetic look. “Caterwauling from the other. Not your cat, Emily. Dep would never caterwaul.”

I admitted, “She’s been known to.”

Ed returned to our table. We didn’t need anything else, but he stayed and asked me, “Aren’t you the one who owns the fifties police car with the huge plastic donut lying flat on top?”

“I’m part owner, along with the father of my late husband. We deliver food and beverages that we prepare in our shop.”

“That must be nice. Harold’s promising to come up with a fun way of delivering burgers and fries, but for now, we use his van.” He looked behind him as if checking to see if Harold were nearby, then mimicked holding handlebars and ringing a bike’s bell. He lowered his voice. “I’d go for a bike, myself.”

I said, “That would be fun.” I thought, But I prefer our tarted-up 1950 Ford with Deputy Donut on the sides and an enormous fake donut on the roof.

Kirk hadn’t taken a seat. Still standing, he stared at one of the framed maps on the wall near the door.

Ed snarled at him, “Hey, piper, buy something or leave.”

Harold must have been right outside the door. He poked his head around the jamb and frowned at Ed.

Kirk reached into his sporran and dumped coins and a small white rectangle on the table below the map. Kilt swaying, he marched out.

Ed lowered his head and apologized quietly to the people at our table. “Sorry, that was rude. I was trying to protect you and everyone else in here.”

Quentin focused on Ed, but said nothing.

My father asked, “Protect us from what?”

Ed clenched his fists, causing the spider tattoo to appear to crawl toward our table. “From being robbed.”

My mother squeaked, “Robbed?”

Ed quirked a thumb at Quentin. “Hey, Quentin, you know why.”

Quentin blinked. “I do?”

“Sure. That’s the guy who was hanging around the gym on Wednesday. He was wearing shorts that time, and he’s trimmed his beard and hair since then, but that’s him.”

Quentin stared toward the doorway where we’d last seen Kirk. “I didn’t recognize him, but you might be right.”

“Of course I’m right. He robbed both of us. And don’t go saying that I was the one who broke into lockers and stole our wallets and my phone. You and I were side by side all morning. That guy’s not a member of the gym, but he hung around, not using the equipment, or anything, just sort of . . . watching. It freaked me out. He went toward the locker room, and then he must have left, because I didn’t see him in the gym again that morning. Or ever until just now. Did you, Quentin?”

Quentin grasped the handle of his beer mug. His knuckles paled. “I wasn’t paying attention. The thief could have been someone else. Anyway, the manager at the gym was probably right that I hadn’t locked my locker.”

Ed’s spider tattoo jumped again. “I locked mine. Someone picked the padlock.” He explained to the rest of us, “The locker room has a door to the outside. That bagpiper didn’t come back into the gym, so he must have left through the locker room and let the door lock behind him.”

I asked Ed, “Do you trust the manager of the gym?”

“Mostly. Nothing like that happened before or since, only Wednesday when that guy was hanging around for no good reason.”

My dad asked, “Did you report the theft to the police?”

“Yeah, and I already have some of my replacement cards and ID.”

Other customers signaled Ed for more beer. He headed toward their table.

Quentin’s face had gone blank, as if he’d stopped listening to Ed. He put bills on our table. “I should go.”

My mother pointed at the little pile of bills. “That’s too much.”

Quentin glanced toward where we’d last seen Ed. “He could use the tips.”

Summer asked him, “Do you need a ride back to the lake?”

“I drove.” Quentin strode out.

Summer half-stood and watched him go. “I hope he’s not planning to search for that bagpiper and confront him about his rude disruptions. Or the theft Ed mentioned.”

Startled, I asked, “Would he?”

She put down her empty beer mug. “Probably not. He was a difficult and willful little boy, but he’s about twenty-five. He must have outgrown his tantrums. Besides, he’s able to make a living with his talent.”

My mother opened her eyes wider. “That’s impressive! And he’s staying out at your lake?”

Summer was still watching the doorway. “His parents are professors, so they usually spend most of the summer out there. I think Quentin has most of August off.” She thrust money onto the table. “I should go, too.”

My parents and I also left cash and stood. On my way out, I glanced at the map that seemed to have intrigued Kirk. It showed the neighborhood destroyed in the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. The white rectangle Kirk had left on the table below it was one of his business cards.

My father held the pub door open for us.

Thanking him, I glanced back into the pub. Ed paused at the table beneath the map, scooped up Kirk’s coins and card in one big hand, and slipped them into a pocket.

On the patio, Harold waylaid us. “Sorry about Ed’s outburst to the man in the kilt. Ed’s a good employee, but he needs to watch that temper and stay in his own lane.”

My father said gently, “No problem, Harold.”

My mother added, “It won’t stop us from coming back.”

My parents, Summer, and I strolled south along Wisconsin Street. Above us, the sky glowed with the final, pinkish remains of the evening’s sunset. A breeze brushed my skin like velvet. Neither Kirk nor Quentin was in view. Summer watched traffic as if she were hoping to see Quentin drive past on the way to his parents’ summer home. At my street, Maple, my parents and I said goodbye to Summer and turned west.

We passed older, larger Victorian homes and then newer, smaller ones. Built in 1889, my yellow brick two-story cottage still had its charming, ivory-painted gingerbread trim. Alec and I had bought and restored the house before that devastating night when he and Brent were both shot and Brent was the only one to survive.

The porch light and a lamp burning inside the living room welcomed us. In my cozy living room, Dep purred and rubbed against our ankles. My father picked her up and held her like a baby, a small, soft, short-haired tortoiseshell tabby baby with donutlike circles on her sides and an orange-stripy patch on her forehead. She purred louder.

We all went upstairs. My parents were using my guest room, which, when I didn’t have guests, was my home office. My mother stopped in the doorway. “We don’t have to get up as early as you do, Emily. Go ahead and use the bathroom first.”

“You’re sure?”

My father called from inside the bedroom. “We’re sure. We’ll read awhile before we turn out the lights.”

When I was ready for bed, I didn’t latch the bedroom door. I turned out my light and heard my door open just enough to let a little kitty in, and then her slight weight landed on the duvet covering my shins. She purred. I fell asleep.

And was startled awake by the skirl of the pipes.

Listening in the darkness, I lifted my head from the pillow. Dep shifted on my legs, and I could feel her tension. No whispers came from my . . .