Page 27 of Toxic Apple Turnovers

The band starts up, and he glances back at the stage and signals for them to wait.

“I’d better get up there. It’s nice seeing you both again. And congratulations on the upcoming wedding. I’ll do your gig for free!” He hops on stage and doesn’t miss a note of the song already playing.

“Hear that, Lemon? We’ve already booked a wedding singer.”

“Next July is starting to shape up nicely,” I tease. “What do you think of that stuff about Amanda?”

Everett takes a breath, and his chest expands the size of a door. “I hate to say it, but he painted her to be something akin to a social climber.”

I nod in agreement. “And she didn’t seem to mind that the rung she was stepping on was set over a Canelli landmine. Why do you think Connie omitted that little tidbit about Amanda stealing her man?”

“Saving face?”

“Or deflecting us from the fact she put a hit on her?”

Everett wraps his arms around me, and we sway slowly to the music.

“I don’t know, Lemon. The Canellis aren’t known for poisoning women. This would be a first.”

“It’s almost something that a woman might do,” I say, locking eyes with his. “A woman who was scorned and likes to take care of things herself.” I don’t mind quoting Connie one bit.

“Do you think Connie is our killer?”

“I don’t know, but it’s sure not looking good for her. Monday is the funeral. I’ll try to feel out Connie again. Maybe invite Fiona? She really likes her, and she might loosen her up a bit. I’ll try to speak with Janelle Hastings as well.”

“Working at a funeral. There really is no rest for the weary.”

“There’s no rest for the wicked,” I counter. “Amanda Wellington’s killer had better watch their back.”

Everett’s chest rumbles with a dull laugh as he spins me, and my line of vision falls to Noah and Cormack dancing just the way we are a mere three feet away. Cormack has her eyes closed, her cheek pressed right up against Noah’s heart, and I can’t help but wonder if she’s envisioning what it would be like to be his wife.

I’d give anything for our lives not to be so complicated.

But then, maybe we’re both in the arms of the ones we belong with.

I turn my head, and my gaze snags on Chrissy. He gives a quick wink my way, and I wonder how much of what he said was the truth and how much was a lie.

The song ends, and the bride and groom are ushered to that floating cake in the proverbial sky as the guests all gather around en mass awaiting a bite of its sugary goodness.

A drumroll starts up and the cake is slowly lowered, smoothly at first then in odd, uneven spurts, causing the cake to slide to one end. The crowd gasps in horror, and I clap my hand over my eyes to watch through my fingers. I may not care for Crystal, but what’s unfolding is every baker’s nightmare. And at a wedding no less.

The groom grabs a chair and jumps up in time to straighten the wood panel before it dumps a bucketful of buttercream over the guests below.

“I got it!” he calls out as the crowd erupts in cheers.

The ropes that hold it to the ceiling snap like rubber bands, and the platform, the entire cake comes crashing down. Chrissy swipes the bride from danger as the cake falls to her feet with a splat.

Owlbert flies overhead who-whoing away, and it sounds as if he’s laughing.

“There is something to be said for doing things the old-fashioned way, Lottie.”

“Amen to that,” I whisper under my breath.

Now that the debate as to if cake installations are better than a traditional setting has been answered, I’ve got a far more pressing question I need answered.

Who killed Amanda Wellington?

And why?