Cream Puff Murder (Hannah Swensen, #11)(48)

“What do you mean?”

“I want to help you investigate, and Mother’s giving me her car for the week. She’s picking me up at nine, and the only commitment I have is to go out to lunch with Carrie and her. I’m perfectly willing to do some legwork for you. Just name it.”

Hannah thought fast. “If it’s ready, please get the phone list from Mother and bring it to me at The Cookie Jar. Andrea and I are staying at Heavenly Bodies for a while after class to nose around, so we won’t be there until ten or eleven. Once we have the list, we can check alibis for any suspects that Mother and Carrie unearthed.”

“Okay. Anything else?”

“You can help Lisa bake a batch of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Cookies.”

“What are those?”

“A recipe based on Chocolate Sauerkraut Cake.”

“That’s one of my favorites. Do the cookies taste like the cake?”

“Almost exactly.” Hannah shrugged into her parka and picked up her gloves. “I’ll see you later. Describing those cookies is making me hungry. I’d better get out to Heavenly Bodies before I gain weight just thinking about them.”



Within two minutes of entering the back door of The Cookie Jar, Hannah and Andrea were seated at the work island, sipping mugs of freshly brewed coffee. It was shortly after eleven in the morning, and Michelle had just told them that she didn’t have the list of suspects.

“Mother didn’t give you the list?” Hannah was surprised. Delores was always efficient when it came to anything phone-related.

“She said they still had quite a few callbacks to make, that a lot of people they called weren’t home. There was a play at the community theater, a shower for Dot Larson’s new baby, parents’ night at school, and a bunch of church functions. Some of them ran really late, and Mother didn’t think that they should call past ten at night.”

Hannah knew about one of those church functions. Clara Hollenbeck hadn’t come home until after midnight from her Bible study group.

“Anyway, they’re going to tie up the loose ends today. Mother wants us all to meet her out at the Lake Eden Inn for dinner at seven tonight, her treat. That way we can talk about the case.”

“Who’s us all?” Andrea asked, and Hannah bit down on her tongue to keep from correcting the awkward phrasing.

“You, Hannah, me, Mother, Carrie, and Norman.”

“Okay. You can count me in. Bill’s working late anyway.”

“Hannah?” Michelle turned to her.

“It’s fine with me as long as I have time to run home and feed Moishe before I drive out to the inn.”

“But how about that Kitty Valet Mike gave you?” Andrea asked. “I thought it was for occasions when you couldn’t get home at the regular time…like tonight.”

“It is for occasions like this. It’s just that Moishe’s been eating every scrap of food I put in it, and he’s always hungry when I come home at night.”

“If he’s eating that much, it won’t hurt him to miss a meal,” Andrea pointed out. “Mother’s dinners never run long. You can feed him when you get home.”

“You’re right. I can.” Hannah tried not to think of how disappointed Moishe would be when she didn’t come home at the regular time to fill his Kitty Valet.

“So what did you find out at Heavenly Bodies?” Michelle asked.

“Nothing,” Andrea answered her.

“Nothing?”

“Nothing yet,” Hannah amended it.

“They wouldn’t talk in front of me,” Andrea explained. “I think it’s because I’m the sheriff’s wife. Hannah has to go back out there alone this afternoon.”

“So you’re going to talk to all the fitness club members about Ronni?” Michelle guessed.

“We narrowed it down a little more than that,” Hannah told her. “Roger, our old fitness instructor, was back in class this morning. He can’t do a lot of the exercises because of his broken arm, but everybody understands.”

“We talked to him after class,” Andrea went on with the story, “and when we told him we were investigating Ronni’s murder and we needed to talk to all the women in the classes she taught, he went to the computer and enrolled Hannah in both of her afternoon classes.”

Michelle looked worried. “Are you going to be able to do all that extra exercising?”

“I don’t know, but I’ll try. If I’m really stiff and sore, I can come in late, or quit early, or whatever. The important thing is to catch Ronni’s students after class and find out what they thought of her.”

“Make sure you get the names of anyone who dropped her class or transferred to another one,” Andrea reminded her. “Roger seemed to think there were a couple of those.”

“How about interviewing the security guard?” Michelle asked.

“Tad Newberg. I was planning to talk to him right after I finish the classes, but I could use your help.”

“You’ve got it. What do you want me to do?”

“Meet me out at Heavenly Bodies at five. I checked Tad’s schedule, and that’s when he comes in today.” Hannah glanced over at Andrea. “I could use your help, too.”