Lemon Meringue Pie Murder Part 24

"Makes sense," Hannah said, considering the possibilities. She wasn't sure how it all tied in, but Rhonda had worked at the drugstore. Maybe the fact that some of the stolen money had ended up there didn't have anything to do with Rhonda's murder, but it was certainly interesting.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Andrea turned to her.

"Yes," Hannah said quickly. "We need to find out more about that old bank robbery."

"h.e.l.lo down there!"

All three sisters turned to see Norman standing at the top of the steps that led to the dock.

"Is it okay if I come down? Or is this a sisterly bonding moment?"

"We're already bonded," Hannah said with a laugh. "That happened the first time Mother tried to make us eat canned peas. Come on."

Once Norman had joined them on the dock, Hannah tossed him the mosquito repellent. "You'd better use this. The mosquitoes are thick tonight."

"Thanks, but I don't need it."

"What do you mean, you don't need it? They're bloodthirsty. I thought I was going to need a transfusion before I could get the cap off the bottle."

"Mosquitoes don't bite me."

"What?!"

"It's true," Norman said and he looked perfectly sincere. "I don't know why, but mosquitoes just leave me alone."

"Do you take some kind of vitamin supplement?" Mich.e.l.le asked.

"No."

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"How about soap?" Andrea suggested. "Do you use a special kind?"

"Just whatever's on sale at CostMart."

Hannah began to frown. As far as she knew, mosquitoes bit everyone. They certainly regarded her as a five-course dinner, complete with dessert and beverage. Norman must be putting them on and she'd call his bluff. "I don't believe you, Norman. Roll up your sleeve and stick out your arm. I want to see this for myself."

"Okay," Norman said agreeably, rolling up his sleeve.

All three sisters watched as a small cloud of mosquitoes descended, each of them emitting a high-pitched, irritating whine. One of them almost landed on Norman's bare arm, but it veered away at the last minute.

"See?" Norman grinned. "They just don't like me."

Hannah gave up in defeat. It was true. Mosquitoes didn't like Norman. But could she love someone the mosquitoes didn't like? She'd have to think about that later. Right now, they still had the problem of Mich.e.l.le's ten-dollar bill to solve.

"I guess I'd better bring you up to date," Hannah told him. "Mich.e.l.le got a ten-dollar bill today and we found out it was part of the loot from a bank robbery."

Norman listened while Hannah explained. "And you need to find out more about that old bank robbery?" he asked.

"That's right"

"And it happened in Redwing in nineteen seventy-four?"

"That's what Doug Greerson told me."

"Then it's easy. It must have been a lead story in the local newspapers at the time. I'll check to see if any of them have archives on-line."

"You can do that?" Hannah was impressed. Her computer skills were limited.

"No problem. I've got my laptop in the car. Do you want me to get on-line right now?"

"Not now." Hannah shook her head. "I want to keep this private."

214 "Private, as in not telling Bill or Mike?"

"That's right. I'm already involved in investigating Rhonda's murder and they're okay with that. But if they find out that Mich.e.l.le is the one who had that ten-dollar bill, they'll have to tell the Feds. Mich.e.l.le doesn't need that. They'll ask her a million useless questions and ruin her vacation."

"You've got a point. How about if I come over to your condo with my laptop when the party breaks up?"

"That'd be great." Hannah looked up as she heard footsteps. Mike and Bill were coming down the stairs.

Bill was the first on the dock and he walked over to Andrea. "We've got to take off, honey. We just got word that the autopsy report's in and we need to go over some things with Doc. Tracey wants to know if it's okay if she stays out here overnight. Delores and Carrie promised to play a board game with her."

"Tell her it's fine. She loves to stay overnight with Grandma."

"That'll work out perfectly," Mich.e.l.le said. "Tracey can have my bed and then Mother won't be alone."

Hannah turned to her youngest sister in surprise. "Alone? Where are you going?"

"I've got a date."

"Don't let him take you to any isolated spots," Mike jumped into the conversation. "We still haven't caught Rhonda's killer."

Mich.e.l.le laughed. "You don't have to worry about me. I'll be perfectly safe."

"Are you sure?" Mike still looked concerned.

"I'm positive. I'm going out with Lonnie Murphy."

Hannah stifled a laugh. That ought to take the wind out of Mike's sails. Lonnie was the newest hire at the Winnetka County Sheriff's Department and Mike liked him. Lonnie's older brother, Rick, had been with the department for three years, and Mike had told Hannah that eventually the two Murphy brothers might make a good detective team.

^lou said Tracey could have your bed," Mike reminded Mich.e.l.le. "Are you planning to stay out all night?"

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"Of course not, but Lonnie and I went to high school together and we've got a lot of catching up to do. It could be a late night. I don't want to wake Mother when I come in, so I was going to ask Hannah if I could stay with her."

"Of course," Hannah agreed quickly, before Mike could think about giving any other dating advice.

"I don't like leaving you alone, honey." Bill sat down and slipped his arm around Andrea's shoulders.

"I won't be alone. I'll drive over to Hannah's. When you're through working, you can get Mike to drop you off there and we'll go home in my car."

"It could be three or four hours. We're meeting with Doc and then we have to catch up on the paperwork."

Andrea reached up to pat Bill's chest. "Don't worry about me, honey. If I get tired, I can sack out on Hannah's couch."

Hannah wasn't sure how she felt as she listened to this tender exchange. On the one hand, it was nice to have someone who was concerned about you. But on the other hand, you couldn't ever feel truly independent. Marriage was a trade-off. You gave up some things and you gained others. Since Hannah knew she'd balk at the trade-off aspect, it must mean that she wasn't ready for that walk down the aisle, at least not quite yet.

Chapter TWenty.

Hannah reached out for Moishe, who seemed fascinated with Norman's computer and was sitting on the coffee table, pawing at the keyboard. "Guard your computer, Norman. I'll carry him in the kitchen and fill his food bowl. Then he might leave you alone."

"He's okay. He's just curious." Norman scooped Moishe up and settled him down on his lap.

"He shouldn't be that close to your computer," Andrea advised, waving away some orange and white cat hairs that were floating around in the air. "He's shedding."

"That's what cats do. It's not his fault." Norman scratched Moishe behind the ears with one hand and typed with the other. "I'll blow out the keyboard with compressed air when I get home."

"Are there any more leftover cookies, Hannah?" Andrea picked up an empty bag and crumpled it.

"No, but I'm baking fresh. Let me go see how they're coming."

Hannah stepped into the kitchen and sniffed the air. The new cookies smelled wonderful, a blend of cinnamon, nutmeg, and a secret ingredient that Norman and Andrea would never LEMON MERINGUE PIE MURDER 217.

be able to identify. It was so unusual, no one would ever think of it and it would remain a mystery to anyone who tasted the cookies. And that's what she'd call them, Mystery Cookies.

As if on cue, the oven timer beeped and Hannah opened the door to take out the sheet of cookies. She'd gone into the kitchen to mix up this batch right after she'd noticed that Norman and Andrea were going through her bags of leftover cookies like starving wolves at a sheep convention. At first she'd planned to make Chocolate Chip Crunches, but she'd been out of chips and cornflakes. Peanut b.u.t.ter Melts had been out, since the jar of peanut b.u.t.ter was nearly empty. Her Old-Fas.h.i.+oned Sugar Cookies would have worked, but they required chilling time and the wolves in the living room might attack if their stomachs weren't placated. She'd stared at her pantry shelf for a moment to a.s.sess her stock of ingredients, and then she'd flipped through her cookbook for the recipe Grandma Ingrid had called Red Spice Cake and adapted it for cookies on the fly.

Once Hannah had transferred the hot cookies to a rack and slipped another pan in the oven, she put the dozen cool cookies she'd made on a plate and carried them into the living room. "Here. These are ready and I've got more on the way."

"Thanks, Hannah." Andrea took a cookie with her left hand and munched while she continued to take notes from Norman's computer screen. "These are really good. They're moist and cinnamony and ... is that a word?"

"Is what a word?"

"Cinnamony."

Hannah laughed. "If it's not, it ought to be."

"Mmm..." Andrea reached out for another cookie. "What are these?"

"Spice cookies. I'm going to call them Mystery Cookies."

"That's a good name." Norman grabbed a cookie before Andrea could take her third. "What's the mystery?"

"There's a secret ingredient and I don't think anyone can guess what it is. Except maybe Andrea."

218 "Me?" Andrea looked surprised. "How would I guess? You know I don't bake."

You don't cook, either, Hannah thought, but she didn't say it. Andrea had taken enough heat over the years about her lack of culinary skills. "Just think about Grandma Ingrid's Red Spice Cake and you'll know."

"But that was made with..." Andrea stopped abruptly and began to grin. "I think I get it. Does this mystery ingredient come in a red and white can?"

"Yes, and don't tell anybody. I'll have to tell Lisa because she'll be helping me mix the dough, but I'll swear her to secrecy."

"I'll never tell. I promise." Andrea raised her hand to her chest and gestured. "Cross my heart and hope to die. I wonder where that comes from."

"It's a reference to the crucifixion. It's like knock on wood. That's a reference to the wooden cross."

"Really?" Norman turned to stare at her. "How do you know that?"

Hannah shrugged. "I read it somewhere a long time ago. Little things like that stick in my head."

"If you had a computer you could find out all sorts of things like that on-line," Norman told her.

Hannah sighed. They'd had this discussion before. Norman was trying to pull her kicking and screaming into cybers.p.a.ce. "Why would I need to find it out if I already know it?"

"You don't know it all. It's fun doing research on the Web and it's way past time for you to get a computer. As a matter of fact, I think you should have two."

"One for each hand?" Hannah quipped.

"No, one for here and one for The Cookie Jar."

"But why? I'm doing just fine without a computer."

"You could have a master file of your recipes," Andrea jumped into the fray. "Then you wouldn't have to make copies and keep them in both places. If you made a change in a recipe at work, you could send it to your computer at home.

219.

When you got home, you could print it out and then you'd always have the updated version."

"That's what I do now. I just run down to the drugstore and make a copy and bring it home."

"But that's the whole point." Andrea was insistent. "You wouldn't have to run down to the drugstore. You'd be saving money, too. That copier down there is expensive."

Hannah laughed. "And two computers aren't?"

"Not as expensive as you think," Norman took over the argument. "They're practically giving away last year's models. Since you don't need it for anything fancy, you wouldn't need to be state-of-the-art."

"You're ganging up on me," Hannah accused them. "And here I am, feeding you cookies. That's not nice."

Andrea reached out for her fourth cookie. "You're right. I wish you had a printer at home, though. Then I wouldn't have to copy all this stuff off Norman's screen. It's like copying off the blackboard at school and I hated doing that. I always got a terrible headache."