Page 9 of Toxic Apple Turnovers

Lainey comes in close, and she’s not crying at all—she’s red-faced with fury is what she is.

“You are cursed!” She swats me on the shoulder with her purse.

“Hey”—Meg pulls her back—“go easy on her.”

“I’m not going easy on her,” she snips as she edges in as close as Meg will allow. “You found the body, didn’t you? Lottie Lemon, I’m going to take you home and tie you to the kitchen table!”

My mouth falls open as both Meg and Mom try to calm her down.

“Lainey”—my voice wavers as I try to take a step in toward her, but Everett holds me back—“I don’t know what you’re implying, but whatever it is, it’s not true.”

“It’s true!” Lainey shakes her head, but it’s not anger she’s seething with. She looks darn right frightened for me.

Keelie and Bear make their way to our circle, and Keelie breaks out into spontaneous tears. “I can’t believe it’s Amanda. Bear and I just hired her to—” Her mouth falls open as she looks my way. “Oh, never mind. It’s not like you never kept an engagement from me.”

I gasp at the implication. “Keelie, are the two of you engaged?” It feels horribly wrong of me to feel a slight thread of excitement over the prospect given the present circumstances.

Keelie gives a sorrowful nod, and we all offer up a somewhat subdued congratulations.

“Come here, you two.” I pull them both in for a hearty embrace. “Congratulations.” Fresh tears blur my vision, for an entirely better reason.

I pull back, and just as I’m about to open my mouth and let them know all of their pastry needs are covered for the foreseeable future, a flicker of light to my right garners my attention and my vocal cords are paralyzed with fright.

The ghost of that tiny orange tabby I met up with a year ago blinks into existence before blinking right back out, followed by the ghost of that squirrel that was at the opening of my bakery. And as soon as he disappears, I see the ghostly frame of Everett’s father, the original Judge Baxter. And just as quickly as he came, he too disappears.

“Oh my goodness,” I whisper as I turn to Everett. “I just saw your father for a brief moment.”

“What?” Everett glances in the direction I was looking.

Noah heads this way, his eyes wide, and there’s a note of concern in his face that I usually don’t see during any phase of an active homicide investigation.

He ticks his head at Everett and me, and we follow him to the side as my mother hollers for Keelie’s mother so they can share the joy, now that the engaged cat is out of the bag. Keelie and I are not only best friends, but we found out last winter that we’re related as well.

“What is it, Noah?” I clutch onto his arm. It’s safe to say, after finding poor Amanda, after seeing the dead from my past in quick succession that way, I’m feeling more than concerned myself.

“Everett, I’m going to ask you to please take Lottie home.” No sooner does he get the words out than an entire army of deputies drains from the scene as they race to their patrol cars.

Everett watches as a couple of them leap over the oversized pots my mother has staged at the mouth of the property. “What’s happening, Noah?”

He shakes his head ever so slightly as he looks to his old stepbrother as if he doesn’t want to say it in front of present company—present company being me.

I give his arm the death squeeze. “Spill it, Fox, or don’t bother speaking to me again.”

He takes a deep sigh. “There’s been a rash of break-ins reported all over Honey Hollow tonight. Five at last count.”

“What?” I don’t waste a single second. I head back to where my family is congregating with Keelie’s, and I shout for them all to get home. “Something is happening. You need to get home quick.”

Everett whisks me off into his car, and we speed all the way to Country Cottage Road.

And my eyes can’t believe what they see.

Chapter 4

“Everett!” I cry out as I jump from his car before he ever pulls into my driveway. It’s dark as pitch out, but I can see the disturbance just as plain as day.

The front door to my rental sits ajar, the window to the right is shattered, and there’s glass all over the porch.

“Pancake! Waffles!” I scream for my sweet cats as I burst in through the front door.