A Deadly Delicious Delivery (A Chocolate Centered Cozy Mystery Book 2) Read Online Free PDF Page B

way so that she could join her grandmother in the kitchen. She could feel Luke’s eyes still on her until the door swung closed behind her. Ally and Charlotte were silent as they observed the officers finishing their search. Several chocolates were bagged as evidence. The partly-made batter for Charlotte’s chocolate cake that she was in the middle of baking was confiscated. Any open ingredients were bagged. Ally held her grandmother’s hand. She could feel it tremble.
    “Never in my life,” Charlotte whispered as she shook her head. Ally squeezed her hand.
    Once the officers filed out of the shop, one remained to tape a piece of paper onto the front window. “This may not be removed by anyone, but the health department or a police officer.” He looked at each woman with warning. Ally only nodded. Charlotte didn’t respond at all. After he left, Ally stared out through the window at the sign that was affixed to the glass. Not only was it overwhelming to think that somehow their chocolates were connected to the death of a woman, it was embarrassing to think that the entire community would be aware of the supposed connection.
    “Oh, Mee-Maw, what are we going to do?” Ally’s breath caught in her chest. In her mind everything was about to fall apart. They would lose the shop, the cottage, and then what? Could they even end up in prison?
    “Let’s see, your young detective…”
    “He’s not my young detective.”
    Charlotte took a deep breath and smacked her palms together a few times.
    “Okay, young Luke has shut down the shop because a woman died from eating poisoned chocolates. Chocolates that appear to have come from our shop.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Well Ally, did you happen to mix some antifreeze in when you made them?”
    “Mee-Maw!”
    “Then we have nothing to worry about, do we?” Charlotte smiled, but her expression was strained. “All we need to do is figure out who did put the antifreeze in the chocolates, then we will be able to open back up and Myrtle’s murder will be solved. It’s simple really. If we get caught up in things that we can’t control then we’ll never get out of this situation. In fact, Ally, I’m going to ask you to do something that I normally wouldn’t.”
    “What’s that?” Ally looked at her grandmother curiously. She had always known her to be clever, but the glint in her eyes was more intense than usual.
    “I want you to see if you can get information from Luke. I want proof that those chocolates came from our shop. I want to know what he saw when he found the chocolates, how many she ate, basically all of the details.”
    “What makes you think he’ll tell me any of that?”
    “The way he looks at you, Ally. There’s no question in my mind that if you ask, he’s going to answer.” Ally rolled her eyes and shook her head.
    “You’ve got it wrong, Mee-Maw. Luke is too by the book to reveal anything he shouldn’t.”
    “Well, then at most you’ll waste a little time. Right?”
    “I guess.” Ally nodded. She took a deep breath. “You’re right. There’s no point in sitting around and waiting for Luke to come back with an arrest warrant.”
    “Ally, don’t think like that. We haven’t done anything wrong. It’s a mistake, a terrible mistake, but a mistake just the same.”
    “I don’t know if I can really consider it a mistake. Even though I know that Luke didn’t have control over this, it still bothers me. He knows us, he knows that we didn’t do it.”
    “Does he? I mean, we haven’t known him that long. He could very well have some doubts. Besides, even if he is certain that we had nothing to do with it, he still has a job to do. Just go and talk to him. Let’s find out for sure what he knows before we look into things ourselves a bit.”
    “I doubt that he’ll like that,” Ally said.
    “Just like he has a job to do, so do we! Ally, we’re going to get to the bottom of this, and get our names cleared and the shop back