Lemon Meringue Pie Murder (Hannah Swensen #4)(2)

The hands of her apple-shaped kitchen clock were approaching five-twenty by the time Hannah finished her third cup of coffee. She refilled Moishe's food bowl and poured the rest of her coffee into the car carrier Bill Todd, her brother-in-law, had given her two Christmases ago.

" 'Bye, Moishe. Be good while I'm gone," Hannah said, giving him a scratch under the chin and then slinging her saddlebag-sized purse over her shoulder. "I may be condemned to lettuce for supper, but I promise that you'll get a big bowl of..."

Hannah broke off in mid-sentence as the kitchen wall phone rang. It had to be her mother. No one but Delores would call her this early. For a fleeting second, Hannah thought about letting the answer machine pick up, but her mother would just track her down later, perhaps at an even more inconvenient time. There was no sense in delaying the inevitable.

The phone pealed a second time and Moishe turned his back on it, sticking his haunches in the air and flicking his tail. Hannah laughed, amused at his antics. Delores was not one of Moishe's favorite people. She was still laughing as she grabbed the phone and answered, "Hello, Mother."

There was silence on the other end of the line and then Hannah heard a chuckle, a male chuckle. "I'm not your mother."

"Norman?" Hannah plopped her purse on the kitchen

LEMON MERINGUE PIE MURDER 13

table and sat down in a chair. Norman Rhodes was one of her favorite people and she dated him occasionally. "What are you doing up this early?"

"I always get up this early. I wanted to catch you before you left. Hannah, I need a favor."

"What is it?" Hannah asked, smiling as she pictured Norman. She could hear water running and she knew he was making coffee in his mother's kitchen. Norman wasn't what most people would call handsome, but Hannah liked his looks. He had the kind efface people instinctively trusted.

"Will you reserve a big table at the rear of The Cookie Jar for me at nine-thirty this morning?"

"I can't," Hannah said with a grin.

"Why not?"

Hannah laughed outright. "Because I don't have any big tables. They're all the same size. How about if I push two together for you?"

"That'd be fine. I've got some exciting news, Hannah."

"Really?" Hannah glanced up at the clock. She was running late, but that was all right. The pies wouldn't take long. She'd baked the crusts before she'd left work yesterday, and all she had to do was cook the filling and put on the meringue. She wanted to talk to Norman. She'd just work a little faster when she got to her cookie shop.

"I made an offer on a house and it's been accepted."

"You bought a house?" Hannah hadn't had an inkling that Norman was in the market for a house.

"That's right, and I want to sign the papers this morning before the seller changes her mind. I got a really good deal on the Voelker place."

"That's wonderful," Hannah said, hoping that Norman knew what he was getting into. The Voelker place was a wreck. It was on a nice piece of land overlooking Eden Lake, the body of water that was within Lake Eden's city limits, but the house hadn't been modernized in over six decades. "Are you going to remodel it?"

14

Joanne Fluke

"It needs too many improvements for that. I just bought it for the land. I'm going to tear it down and build our dream house."

Hannah wondered if she'd heard him correctly. "Did you say our dream house?"

"That's exactly what I said. I'm talking about the one we designed for that contest we won. Those plans were perfect, Hannah. It's a great house and it'll be a real showplace."

Hannah was speechless, a real rarity for her. She'd helped Norman design the plans and she'd been ecstatic when they'd won the contest. They'd split the prize money and she now had a window air conditioner in her kitchen at The Cookie Jar, eight new ceiling fans that had been mounted in the coffee shop, and new shelving that was being installed in her pantry. Their dream house was a great house, but Hannah had never in her wildest imaginings thought that Norman would actually build it! What was he going to do rattling around in a four-bedroom, three-bath, split-level home anyway?

A frown appeared on Hannah's brow. Certainly Norman wasn't planning on living there alone. Had he assumed that she was going to marry him without bothering to ask? And if he wasn't about to propose to her, did he have someone else in mind?

"I guess I must have shocked you," Norman said with a chuckle. "You've never been quiet for this long before."

Hannah nodded, even though she knew that Norman couldn't see it. "You shocked me, all right. I can't believe you're actually going to build it."

"Well, I am. Living with Mother is a real pain. Every time I leave the house, she asks me where I'm going and what time I'll be back. I know she means well, but she can't seem to accept that I'm an adult."

"I know that feeling," Hannah sympathized. Carrie Rhodes had been attempting to control Norman's life ever since he'd come back to Lake Eden to take over the family dental business. "Was your mother upset when you told her that you were moving out?"

LEMON MERINGUE Pffi MURDER

15

"She doesn't know yet. Fm going to tell her at breakfast this morning. She's been complaining about how they need more storage space for Granny's Attic and I'm sure she'll be glad to get all of my stuff out of her garage."