Free As Gouda as Dead by Avery Aames Page B

going down?” she asked.
    â€œHey,” Rebecca cut in. “What if he saw an escaped convict? Don’t restaurants and bars receive those printed notices like police precincts do?”
    â€œWhatever he saw,” I said, “it made him race off.”
    â€œWhy didn’t he call Chief Urso on the telephone?” Tyanne asked.
    â€œCell reception was bad last night. What I want to know is why didn’t he send a text message?”
    â€œNo, no. Tim wouldn’t text. Not ever.” Tyanne shook her head. “He was a romantic. Words, he said, were meant to be uttered aloud or put into handwriting. Nothing digital. Not even an email.” She wrapped her arms around herself and hugged. The effort made her shudder. “Golly, I’m going to miss him.”
    â€œWould you like something warm to drink?” I asked.
    â€œI’m fine.” She sighed. “Tim said he had a surprise for me on Valentine’s Day. I think he’d finally found the courage to ask me to marry him.”
    A sense of gloom welled up within me. “That reminds me. Did you get my voice mail message?”
    â€œI did. I’m sorry I didn’t call you back. What did you want to talk about?”
    â€œJordan and I—” I swallowed hard. “We’re going to postpone our wedding.”

CHAPTER

    â€œWhat?” Tyanne and Rebecca shrieked in unison.
    I held my hands in a T for timeout while glancing around the shop. None of the customers appeared to be listening in. The pair who had taken photos at Snapshots were still browsing the gift displays. The others were filling their shopping baskets with goodies.
    â€œDon’t worry,” I whispered. “We’re still getting married. We didn’t think, what with Tim dying and the murder happening at the farm, and—” A tiny moan escaped my lips. “We’ll pick another day; we haven’t done so yet, but we will. And Tyanne, you’ll be paid for everything to date.”
    â€œSugar, I’m not worried about the money, but shouldn’t we keep the date and simply change the venue? I’m sure we could drum up someplace special. That chapel in the hills or the library or even here. We could decorate the wine annex with—”
    â€œNo. Thanks. The mood . . .” I shook my head. “No.”
    Tyanne slung an arm around me. “Now I’m the one who’s sorry.”
    Rebecca joined the group hug.
    â€œIt’s okay,” I said. “Truly. I want to find out who killed Tim first. Then we—all of us—can move on.”
    â€œAha!” Rebecca said. “So you’re going to investigate.”
    â€œWill you, Charlotte?” Tyanne blurted. “Oh, please, say
yes
.”
    â€œNo, I’m not.” Okay, I would if I could, but I had nothing. No clues, no hunches. “No,” I repeated. “Urso has it handled. He’s personally invested, and we all know Deputy O’Shea won’t let this rest.”
    Believing the only way for me to keep myself calm was to get busy, I did exactly that. After Tyanne left and while I waited for customers to finish making their choices, I tidied the cheese cases and created a few new flags to stick into some of them. For the award-winning Hooligan cheese from Cato Corner Farm, I wrote:
So stinky it’s got to be good
. For the Hubbardston Blue, a creamy goat cheese with a subtle gray rind and the flavor of truffles, I wrote:
This cheese will chase away the blues and mend a broken heart
.
After I added the new flags, I made silver snowflake silhouettes and added them to the others in the display windows.
    When customers concluded their business and the store was once again empty, I retreated to the office and set to work on our website. Without my Internet guru to help, it was worse than tedious. I was almost as bad at website design as I was at drawing and painting. I struggled with placing the