Free Cooking Up Trouble by Joanne Pence Page B

when they were seated. “I wasn’t. Tell me about it.”
    “There’s not much for me to tell. The first night only Reginald, Chelsea, and I had dinner with Finley, and Iwent to my room before he left for his nature walk. Tonight, Miss Greer wouldn’t let me help, so I didn’t see her at all after dinner.”
    “That’s all?”
    “Maybe it’s not much, but it’s the truth. Now you just have to figure out who’s lying.”
     
    Paavo quietly turned the knob on the door that led into the kitchen. There was no light, no sound at all.
    He flicked on the flashlight, looked over the kitchen, and walked over to Miss Greer’s sheet-covered body.
    He had arranged the sheet so that it formed a tiny pleat by her left shoulder, another by her right foot. The pleats were still there. Nothing about the sheet looked as if anyone had touched it.
    Proceeding to a corner, he sat on the floor and shut off his flashlight. If anyone came in here tonight, he wanted to know who. And why.
    This house was filled with a looney-tunes group doing their best to scare each other away, and the man who put it all together was missing. Now the cook had been killed. It didn’t make sense. But it would, in time.
    Particularly if whoever killed Miss Greer came down to dispose of any evidence that might have been left behind.
    His vacation with Angie would have to wait a while after all. Footsteps. He broke off his thoughts and watched the kitchen door.
    The door opened. Light steps entered the room then stopped. Paavo silently got to his feet. He was just about to turn on the flashlight and find out who had snuck in here when the kitchen lights were turned on. He blinked from the sudden brightness.
    “Moira,” he said.
    She gasped, her hand at her chest, staring at him. “What are you doing here?”
    “I should ask you the same thing.” He was guarded, watching her carefully.
    “I couldn’t sleep,” Moira said, slowly walking toward him. “All of this…my brother missing, now Miss Greer dying. I just wanted to sit with her a while. She’d only worked with us this past month, but I feel like I’ve lost a friend.” Tears sprang to her eyes. “I’m sorry.”
    “It’s all right.” Paavo slid his hands into his pockets. “It’s been over five hours since Quint left,” he commented.
    She rubbed her forehead. “The road up here washes out easily, and runs so near the edge of the cliff that it can be very dangerous. They’ll wait until it stops raining, or at least until the sun comes up so that they can see the road better.”
    “Could be.”
    She gave him a quizzical look. “If you’re waiting for the sheriff, why do it in the dark, Inspector Smith? Do I detect something going on here?”
    “Curiosity.”
    “Two can play at that game.” She shut off the kitchen lights.
    He flicked on the flashlight as she crossed the room to sit beside him on the floor.
    “How did Miss Greer come to work for you?” he asked.
    “Is this twenty questions?” she replied.
    “You don’t have to answer.”
    “I know.” In the darkness, he could hear the resignation in her voice. “She showed up at our door one day. She lives in town and said she needed work, that if we had anything at all, she’d be interested. When my brother learned she was willing to cook whatever he told her—he has very definite ideas about food—he hired her to do that and to help me with the housecleaning.”
    “Did she live here or in town?”
    “In town. If the inn ever got very popular, and I needed help with breakfast, we thought we might offer her a room. But for now our arrangement was that she’d arrive in time to prepare a light lunch, help with the cleaning in the afternoon, and then make dinner and do the cleanup.”
    “Did anyone from town come to visit her here?”
    “No one.”
    “Do you know if she has family or friends there?”
    “No family. No close friends that I could tell. But she knew almost everyone.”
    “Any enemies, or anyone she was