The Secret Ingredient Murders: A Eugenia Potter Mystery Read Online Free PDF Page B

Genia refrained from saying, “It’s just a cookbook.” The truth was, it wasn’t “just” a cookbook to Genia, either, and it certainly wasn’t to Stanley Parker. She had a feeling he had been lying in wait for someone like her to come along and help him produce it. He brought to the project his collection of cookbooks and his publishing connections; she had a modest talent for thinking up original recipes; they were both good cooks. Voilà: a perfect team. They’d devoted many full and satisfying days to their project.
    Genia glanced up at the kitchen clock and felt a shock.
    “Janie, it’s nearly six-thirty! Where’s Mr. Parker?”
    “I thought your guests weren’t coming until seven-thirty.”
    “But he promised to get here early. Hand me the phone, will you?”
    She took the portable telephone that her niece gave her and punched in the familiar number at the Castle. After three rings, she heard Stanley’s familiar gruff voice saying, “Parker here. If you’re calling with good news, leave a message. If it’s bad news, call somebody else.”
    Genia smiled as she hung up. That was a brand-new message. And it was so like him! Stanley thought he could say anything he liked to anybody, and they just had to take it. Never famous for his tact, in his old age he was becoming infamous for his blunt, barbed observations.
    “I guess he’s on his way,” she said to Janie.
    The girl nodded, but Genia didn’t feel so sanguine. He should have arrived a half hour ago, and he hadn’t called to say he’d be late. Besides, he was an old man, and he’d been acting lately as if he didn’t feel very well. What if he’d had a fall, or even a stroke? There was nobody at the Castle to help him except for that worthless Ed Hennessey, and Stanley had told Genia he was going to fire the man this very day. Genia felt a twinge of alarm. What if Eddie had taken the news badly? What if he had gotten angry and harmed the old man? When another five minutes passed and Stanley still hadn’t arrived, Genia put down the apple she was working on.
    “Janie, do me a favor. I want you to take my car and drive up to the Castle, and make sure he’s okay—”
    “Mr. Parker won’t like that.”
    “Pretend you’ve come to ask him if he needs a ride.”
    “He’ll say no.”
    “I know he will, but then you can drive back and tell me that everything’s all right.”
    After Janie left Genia found she couldn’t concentrate on her cooking. Having made sure that nothing was going to burn, she walked out onto the deck of the house and looked in the direction of the path that meandered through the woods from Stanley’s house. She told herself she was being a worrywart. Surely he would arrive at any moment, possibly even sputtering up on that old motorbike of his. On second thought, that was another cause for concern. Maybe she should have sent Janie through the woods to look for him there.
    Genia tried to tell herself she was being foolish, that there was no reason for her to stand there fretting over him as if he were a little boy who couldn’t find his way home.
    Raindrops started to fall, spotting the wooden floor of the deck and the railing. She’d heard Harrison Wright predict this very change in the weather on the last news program she had watched. A few light drops fell on her hair and shoulders, but Genia didn’t move. A few sprinkles wouldn’t hurt her. She continued staring off into the woods, oblivious to the spectacular ocean view to her left, and thinking instead about Stanley and about her other guests. She wasn’t worried about the rest of them getting there; certainly not the mayor of Devon, Lawrence Averill, or the Realtor who had found this house for her to rent, Celeste Hutchinson. Nor Harrison Wright and his pretty wife, Lindsay, who was president of the local arts council. Or David Graham, or her own niece, the twins’ mom, Donna Eden. Nor their artist dad, Kevin, from whom their mother was divorced. Kevin,