Pink Velvet Murder: A Frosted Love Cozy Mystery - Book 9 (Frosted Love Cozy Mysteries) Read Online Free PDF Page B

house. Missy
refused his kind offer, assuring him that she’d be fine as long as she stayed
inside and kept her doors and windows locked. Beckett then offered to sleep on
the couch downstairs if it would make her feel better, but she refused to
impose on him that way, and eventually he took his leave, making her promise to
call him if anything out of the ordinary happened.

Chapter 9
    Missy
sat across the table from her friend Echo in the seating area of Sweet Love,
Echo’s vegan ice cream shop, spooning her favorite Vanilla Bean “rice cream”
into her mouth, savoring the silky sweetness.
    “I
just can’t believe that Donna would do something like this,” Echo worried. She
was concerned not just because the girl worked for her, but because she seemed
like such a “normal” teenager. “You know, it’s crazy, you think that you know
who you can trust in this world, and yet you find out all the time that people
aren’t at all what they seem to be.”
    Missy
swallowed a bite of her frozen treat. “Well, the possibility still remains that
she didn’t do it,” she suggested.
    “Yeah,
but apparently the police interviewed some people who overheard her argument
with Mrs. Dowler, and they said that threats were exchanged. It’s just so sad
all the way around,” the free-spirited shop owner shook her head, discouraged.
    “Why
was Mrs. Dowler teaching anyway? Her husband came from a wealthy New Orleans
family and owns a highly successful brokerage firm,” Missy mused, puzzled.
    “Donna
said that teaching was basically a means of paying for her hobbies,” Echo
explained. “Apparently her tastes were pretty expensive.”
    “Really?
She didn’t seem like the high rolling type at all,” she frowned.
    “She
collected antiques from all over the world. Their house on the north side is
supposed to be a treasure trove that collectors and museums would envy.”
    “Hmm…I
wouldn’t have guessed,” Missy raised her eyebrows in surprise.
    “On
a lighter note…I met a fabulously attractive guy yesterday,” Echo confessed
with a grin.
    “Do
tell!” Missy leaned forward.
    “He’s
new in town and said he’d never heard of vegan ice cream before, so he came in
to see what it was all about. Said he noticed the shop when he was across the
street, buying the most delicious cupcake he’d ever had,” she waggled her
eyebrows comically.
    “Oh,
I love to hear that!” Missy exclaimed.
    “He
said that the two of you had met, and I got the impression that he was rather
taken with you,” she said slyly. “But then of course, I flirted with him like
mad to make him forget you and turn his attention my way,” she teased.
    Missy
blushed slightly, remembering that she had wondered whether or not Carlton
Dobbs was flirting with her or merely being kind. “I remember who you’re
talking about. Carlton, right?”
    “Carlton
indeed,” Echo said putting her chin in her hands dreamily.
    “He
did seem quite nice.”
    “Quite
nice?” her friend scoffed. “The man was kind, well-mannered, well-spoken, and
smokin hot! Not all of us are lucky enough to have a catch like Chas Beckett on
our arm. Carlton is the best thing that’s graced my doorstep in a very long
time.”
    Missy
kept her doggy play date in the park with Carlton to herself, not wanting to
make her friend feel bad. Besides, it was merely a coincidence that they had
happened to run into each other. “So, did he ask you out?”
    Echo
frowned. “No, he didn’t, but I think he might. I dropped some hints about being
happy to show him around, and he seemed to be open to the idea, so we’ll see.”
    “Well
good for you,” Missy encourage her friend. “He seems like a really nice guy.”
    “Who’s
incredibly gorgeous,” her zany mahogany-haired friend reminded her.
    “If
you say so,” Missy giggled, shaking her head.
    Missy
finished her dessert while Echo tended to a customer who had come in, then
hugged her friend goodbye and went back across the street