“She was talking about Vivian stealing from Meredith, but in her head, she was furious about a specific recipe—that Harvest Moon Cake. She didn’t say whose it was, but her thoughts made it clear that’s the exact recipe in question.”
“That’s a motive right there,” Clarabelle declares, stabbing a piece of waffle with her fork for emphasis. “Hell hath no fury like a chef whose secret recipe has been pilfered.”
“It’s not enough to prove anything,” I caution.
“Then we need more information,” Peggy says with the determination of someone who’s solved every crossword puzzle in the Sunday paper for forty years straight—and she has. “We should order dessert.”
“We just ate our weight in breakfast offerings,” I remind her.
“Dessert loosens tongues,” Peggy insists. “People talk when there’s pie.”
“I don’t think?—”
My objection is cut short by a bloodcurdling shriek from Cricket, who launches herself from my lap onto the table with her fur standing on end. A split second later, Rookie emergesfrom under my chair with a mighty bark that sends half the patio into cardiac arrest.
Within two seconds flat, the cause of their distress becomes immediately apparent as a rather large seagull lands on our table before making off with the last of Clarabelle’s bacon.
“Stop that winged thief!” Clarabelle shouts, swinging her cloth napkin at the bird as if she’s trying to swat a fly with a parachute. “Get back here, you avian bandit! You’re nothing but a filthy feathered felon!”
The seagull—totally unbothered by Clarabelle’s linguistic creativity—hops to the railing next to us with its salty prize.
Rookie lunges, Cricket pounces, and Clarabelle makes another wild swing.
Screaming ensues, expletives are shouted, and a few loose tears are shed—and that’s just from me.
Clarabelle’s momentum carries her right over the railing and I lunge to catch her but miss by inches while Peggy grabs for her turkey hat.
The waitress returns with coffee refills and yelps at the quasi-deadly sight.
With the agility of someone a third her age, Clarabelle hooks her foot around the last rung of the railing and manages to stop herself from free-falling into the water below. And in an effort to help her back to dry land, my foot catches on the leg of the table, upending it in the process. Plates, glasses, and food go airborne in a spectacular display of breakfast acrobatics.
The seagull in question takes off with an indignant squawk—because clearly this is more excitement than any bacon theft warrants. Cricket leaps to safety on my shoulder, while Rookie does his best to bark Clarabelle back to solid ground.
Within seconds, a small army of men and women help me hoist Clarabelle Harper back on the right side of the railingwhere she belongs just as the remainder of our Pumpkin Palooza Brunch Platters rain down on the patio like caloric confetti.
A slight applause breaks out over the entire restaurant as every head turns toward our table—or rather, what used to be our table before it became ground zero for the Great Breakfast Explosion of Pelican Cove.
I stand frozen, a piece of pumpkin waffle sliding slowly down my sweater. Peggy clutches Clarabelle’s turkey hat, her mouth forming a perfect O. And Clarabelle herself takes a bow, looking simultaneously shocked and rather pleased with herself.
Figures.
“Well”—she announces to the stunned crowd—“I guess we won’t need to order dessert after all.”
Twenty minutes, several profuse apologies, and one extremely generous tip later, we’re being escorted off the premises with the polite urgency usually reserved for bomb threats.
As we limp toward Ginger, covered in various breakfast items and trailed by a small parade of opportunistic seagulls, I can’t help but feel we’ve worn out our welcome at yet another establishment in record time.
But we didn’t leave empty-handed. Between Autumn’s wayward thoughts and her tip about Oliver Prescott, we’ve got two more threads to pull in this increasingly tangled ball of suspicious yarn.
Meredith Thorne’s recipe was allegedly stolen. Autumn Harrington was thinking about a Harvest Moon Cake recipe. Oliver Prescott had some mysterious beef with Vivian.
The question is, which thread leads to a killer, and which ones are just loose ends in the messy tapestry of small-town rivalry?
One thing is for sure—someone in Brambleberry Bay used deadly ingredients for more than just seasonal baking. AndI’m going to figure out who, even if I have to taste-test every pumpkin spice creation from here to New York.
After I change into clothes that don’t smell like maple syrup and bacon, that is.
And at exactly seven o’clock tonight, there will be a meet-up of the murder club at my place.
