“You had dinner with your family last night?” Lisa looked shocked when Hannah nodded. “But you just got back from your honeymoon yesterday. Don’t tell me you cooked for your whole family last night!”
“I didn’t cook. Everybody was waiting for us when we got home and they brought takeout food.”
“That’s nice . . . I think. Unless you and Ross wanted to be alone.”
“Not really. We were alone for a week. And it was nice to see everybody again.”
“I’ll bet your mother could hardly wait to tell you about . . .” Lisa stopped and swallowed hard. Then she cleared her throat. “Sorry. I get a little teary-eyed when I think about Tori Bascomb. She was so good to me, giving me acting lessons for free. She said I had real potential and I should be starring in every Lake Eden Players production.”
“You should be if you can find the time. Maybe I should stay late and let you go early when they have rehearsals and . . .”
“No,” Lisa said firmly, cutting off the rest of Hannah’s offer. “I’d much rather tell stories here. Tori taught me a lot about good storytelling.”
“I think you do just fine right now.”
“I do okay and it sure brings in the business. I’ll be telling the story about Tori today, and that’s one of the reasons I’m here early. We always sell out of cookies and so I’m baking more this time.”
“Is that what smells so good?” Hannah smiled as she sniffed the air. “Do I smell chocolate and orange?”
“You do. It’s a new recipe I just made up last night. I call them Orange Fudge Cookies. I just put them in the oven and . . .” Lisa glanced at the clock on the kitchen wall, “. . . they’ve got a few more minutes to go. Tell me what your mother said about the murder.”
“Not a word. I think Andrea and Michelle managed to convince her that she shouldn’t bring it up on my first night home.”
“That must be it. She didn’t waste any time telling me about it. As a matter of fact, she was waiting for me when I unlocked the back door at five o’clock yesterday morning.”
“Really?” Hannah was amazed. “Mother was here at five in the morning?”
“On the dot. And it was before I’d even baked anything with chocolate.”
Hannah laughed. Delores was, and had always been, a real chocolate lover. “She’s going to love your Orange Fudge Cookies.”
“I hope so. She was pretty upset when she told me about finding the body, Hannah. Her voice was shaking and she had to sit down. I really don’t know how you do it.”
“Do what?” Hannah was puzzled.
“I don’t know how you stay so calm when you find a murder victim.” Lisa stopped and thought about that for a moment. “I guess it’s because it’s happened to you so many times in the past. After a while, you must almost . . . well . . . expect it.”
Hannah thought about it. “Sometimes I do expect it. There are times when I just know there’s something wrong. I hope against hope that it’s not what my instincts tell me it is, but my instincts are usually right. But even if I’m almost expecting it, it’s still a shock.”
“Maybe, but you always do everything right. You call the sheriff’s department, you wait for Mike or another detective to arrive, you’re coherent when you tell them what happened, and you seem so in control. I think I’d fall to pieces if I ever found . . . well, you know.”
“No, you wouldn’t. You’d do what you had to do. Everyone’s stronger than they think they are. And it’s not that I’m used to finding murder victims. It’s just that I don’t show my emotions right away, that’s all.”
Lisa looked thoughtful. “It must be that way with Mike, too.”
Hannah took a moment to consider it. “You could be right, Lisa. It probably bothers him when he’s at home alone.”
“There’s the timer,” Lisa said, reacting to the electronic beeping that had just begun. “I’ll take the cookies out of the oven. As soon as they cool a little, you can taste one and see if your mother will like them.”
“They have chocolate, don’t they?”
“Yes. Both baking chocolate and chocolate chips.”
“Then she’ll love them. Mother thinks chocolate is a food group.”
*
“These are wonderful cookies!” Delores said to Lisa, who was placing sheets of unbaked cookies on the racks in their industrial oven.
“Thank you, Delores,” Lisa responded to the compliment. “I’m glad you like them.”
Delores took a sip of her coffee and reached for a third cookie. “I love the combination of chocolate and orange.”
“I know you do, Mother.” Hannah said and smiled at her. “You’d love the combination of chocolate and absolutely anything.”
Delores thought about that for a moment. “Maybe not chocolate and pickles, although there is that wonderful chocolate sauerkraut cookie you make, dear.”
“Thank you.” Hannah reached for another one of Lisa’s cookies, even though she’d intended to limit herself to one. Although she hadn’t stepped on the scale to validate her suspicions, she was quite certain she’d gained at least five pounds on the honeymoon cruise. “Go ahead, Mother. Tell me about finding Tori Bascomb’s body.”
Delores took a deep breath and another bite of her cookie before she began. Then she launched into her account of the evening before Hannah and Ross had come back to Lake Eden. Hannah knew that her mother had given the account at least two times before. Certainly Mike had heard it when he’d interviewed Delores, and she’d told Lisa so that the story could be told at The Cookie Jar. Andrea and Michelle must have heard all about it right after it had happened, but her mother’s hands were still trembling slightly and Hannah slid the cookie plate closer to her.
Long moments passed while Delores spoke. Hannah listened carefully, occasionally asking questions she hoped would help her mother recall certain details.
“And that’s it,” Delores concluded, looking up to meet her daughter’s eyes. “Doc said I was very brave.”
“Very,” Hannah agreed. “You did everything just right, Mother.”
“Mike doesn’t think so. He didn’t like me going into Tori’s condo all by myself.”
“Of course he didn’t.”