Cream Puff Murder (Hannah Swensen, #11)(74)

“I don’t know what else they’d be doing up there,” Hannah told her.

“Good for them!” Michelle looked delighted. “I didn’t know Mother could sing.”

“She can’t,” Hannah said and left it at that. There was always the possibility that the floor would open up and swallow them. Or perhaps the karaoke machine would malfunction. Or maybe the microphone would start screeching with feedback and they’d have to shut it off.

Hannah watched in shock as the mothers reached the top step and turned to walk to the center of the stage. Delores picked up the microphone and held it between them as the first bars of the song they’d chosen began to play.

“What song is it?” Andrea asked.

“I don’t know,” Hannah answered her, and then she groaned as Carrie and Delores linked arms. “They’re not going to dance…are they?”

“I think they’re going to do some kind of step,” Michelle said.

“Bye Bye Love,” Norman said, and when all three Swensen sisters turned to look at him, he hurried to explain. “That’s what they’re going to sing. I recognize the intro. It’s an old Everly Brothers song.”

A few beats later, the mothers opened their mouths and began to sing. They looked as if they were having great fun as they stepped back and forth in perfect unison, and sang the lyrics.

Hannah had all she could do not to cover her ears. One glance around the table and she realized she was not alone. Norman looked pained, Andrea looked highly embarrassed, and Michelle looked as if she wanted to burst out laughing. As for Hannah, every extremely flat and loudly amplified note that reached her ears made her head throb and her teeth hurt. It had to be the worst rendition of an Everly Brothers song that had ever been performed.

The agony went on through verses too painful to enumerate, but it was met by a wave of raucous applause. When it was over, Hannah breathed a huge sigh of relief and wished she’d ordered that glass of wine. “That was really awful,” she said. “They weren’t in tune at all.”

Norman turned to smile at her. “That’s true, but both of them were equally flat, and that means that they were harmonizing.”

“I thought it was kind of cute,” Michelle said. “They weren’t nervous at all and the audience liked it.”

Hannah had to admit that Michelle had a point. The audience was still applauding, and a guy at the front table was calling for an encore.

“It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be,” Andrea said, and Hannah knew she was trying to be charitable. “At least they looked good.”

Hannah glanced toward the stage again and what she saw made her eyes widen. “Smiles everyone, and remember…we thought their performance was fantastic. They must have spotted us while they were singing, because here come the mothers!”

When the mothers reached their table, Michelle was the first to jump to her feet. “That was amazing, Mother,” she said, giving Delores a little hug. “I’ve never heard anything like it.”

Hannah stifled a chortle. Michelle had come up with a wonderful way of saying something that sounded like a compliment. And since she’d given Delores a hug, she was obviously trying to get back into their mother’s good graces.

“What did you think, dear?” Delores turned to Hannah.

“We all agreed that you and Carrie were in perfect harmony,” Hannah said, stealing Norman’s line.

“And you were in perfect step, too,” Andrea said, smiling at the mothers. “That must have taken some practice.”

“Five minutes in the ladies’ room,” Carrie admitted, turning to Norman. “What did you think, son?”

“It was quite a show,” Norman said, giving Carrie a kiss on the cheek. “All these years, and I never knew you could sing like that.”



Five minutes later, they were seated at a blue plastic booth in The Yum-Yum coffee shop, sipping mugs of coffee. Since the mothers needed caffeinated fortification for the trip back to Lake Eden and it was far too noisy to talk inside The Moosehead anyway, they’d all met at the small restaurant at the end of the block. Some last-minute arrangements had been made. Michelle would be driving Delores and Carrie home and staying the night with Delores. They’d only had two drinks at The Moosehead, but Michelle had offered and Delores and Carrie had accepted. Hannah was glad. It was a sign that forgiveness was right around the corner for Michelle’s untimely age-related remarks.

“Before I forget,” Delores said, turning to Hannah, “we found out why Ronni quit her job.”

“Except that she didn’t really quit,” Carrie added. “She was fired for skimming.”

Delores nodded. “She totaled her customers’ bar tabs early, took their credit cards, and rang them up. And then, when they wanted another round of drinks, she asked them to pay in cash and she slipped it in her apron with her tips.”

“How did she get caught?” Hannah asked.

“The bartender spotted her, the same bartender who was on tonight. The owner was giving him grief about coming up short. He knew he wasn’t giving away free drinks, so he kept an eye on the cocktail waitresses and caught Ronni in the act.”

“Ronni begged him not to turn her in,” Carrie took over the story. “She told him she needed more money so that she could quit her job at Heavenly Bodies. She said she was being stalked by someone when she was at work.”