Evening Bags and Executions(48)

“Lacy and Belinda were super close growing up, before they had a falling out over some concert tickets,” I said.

Donald uttered a small chuckle. “Teenage girls. I had two older sisters, and I remember how crazy they were. Best friends one minute, fighting the next. Losing their minds over those British groups.”

I had an ’N Sync flashback.

I still love Justin.

“The Rolling Stones, Herman’s Hermits, Peter and Gordon,” Donald said. “The Beatles, of course. All the girls were gaga over them.”

“So Lacy and Belinda really weren’t close?” I asked, trying to steer Donald back to a subject that would benefit me. “That’s too bad. It’s good to have family around.”

“I don’t think Lacy’s family ever approved of her. When she left home she left them all behind, for the most part,” Donald said, then paused for a minute. “Lacy wasn’t the easiest person to get along with. She was so driven to be successful with her bakery—and I guess she achieved that, but, as the saying goes ‘everything costs something.’ ”

Lacy’s success had apparently come at the expense of not being close to her family—but from everything I’d heard about Lacy, that was probably okay with her.

I kind of knew how she felt.

The door bell jingled and a customer walked in. Donald gave me a nod and went behind the counter. I left the store.

All the police cars had cleared out of the parking lot, and there was no sign of the white Crown Victoria Detective Madison usually drove. I wanted to talk to Darren about the future of the bakery—and, thus, the future of the Yellow Submarine cake and my job—but the Lacy Cakes delivery van he was driving was gone. I figured this wasn’t the best time for the discussion, anyway. I’d catch him later.

I couldn’t get my conversation with Donald out of my head. Apparently, Belinda wasn’t close with Lacy, as she led me to believe. I guess Darren was right when he’d told me that she was intruding, insinuating herself into his decisions about what to do with Lacy’s estate.

I’d gotten the idea from Belinda that she expected to inherit something from Lacy. Maybe she thought that the falling out they’d had all those years ago had been forgotten and Lacy would remember her in her will with either money or an interest in the bakery.

Or maybe she’d mislead me and knew that, even after all those decades had passed, Lacy still hadn’t forgiven her and wouldn’t leave her one thin dime. If so, her only option was to stick her nose in and hope that Darren would give her some of Lacy’s possessions, or maybe even let her run the bakery for him.

Paige had said she thought Belinda worked as a housekeeper, which was really hard work. She was in her sixties now and she looked kind of rough, like maybe she had some health problems. Running a bakery—especially one as lucrative as Lacy Cakes—would definitely be a huge step up for her.

Maybe she was after money. Maybe it was the bakery she wanted.

Or maybe something else was going on.

I got in my Honda and pulled out my cell phone. Darren had made a point to tell me how he’d been saddled with all the family problems after Lacy left home, issues he was still dealing with, apparently. He’d made himself sound like the victim, which could have been true, but I couldn’t help but wonder if he wasn’t trying a little too hard.

I accessed the Internet, did a search of his name, and paged through a lot of links until I found something that had been posted earlier this year. It was a blog that mentioned Darren’s name, his business, and a church where Darren served as a deacon.

Apparently, donations were at an all time low at the same time Darren’s business had dropped off. The blogger didn’t come right out and accuse Darren of skimming money from the church—only mentioned this so-called coincidence.

I sat there for a minute, thinking. Bloggers could post anything, whether or not they had evidence and facts. Just raising the question created doubt.

It sure made me think twice about Darren.

My cell phone rang. My heart jumped when I saw that it was Jack Bishop calling.

“I found you a murder suspect,” he said.

Cool.





CHAPTER 15


The Perch was a rooftop restaurant in downtown L.A. I hadn’t been there before, and I was pretty impressed when I stepped off the elevator.

Immediately, the Enchantress evening bag flew into my head. I was meeting Marcie later to shop for it, plus a cocktail dress for Sheridan Adams’s event. This would be the perfect spot to wear both.

The place featured two outdoor fireplaces, fire pits, lots of greenery, and blooming flowers. There were seating groups of white wrought iron and wicker furniture complimented with cushions in black-and-white patterns and blue floral prints. Views of the city were breathtaking.