Murder Over Easy (A Sunny Side Up Cozy Mystery Book 1) Read online

  Murder Over Easy

  A Sunny Side Up Cozy Mystery Book 1

  Rosie A. Point

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  More for you…

  Thank you, Reader!

  Copyright Rosie A. Point 2020.

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  Cover by DLR Cover Designs

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  Created with Vellum

  1

  The cat was out to get me.

  It sat on the top step of my auntie’s cottage, its black paws placed neatly beside each other, its yellow eyes focused on me. Every time I tried taking a step up the garden path, it would hiss, fur standing on end.

  Now, I wasn’t exactly expecting a welcome wagon when I’d arrived in Parfait, Florida, at the crack of dawn, but this was ridiculous. An angry cat, humidity that had no right to exist at 6am, and the depressing realization that all my belongings fit into one wheeled suitcase—boy, was I living the life.

  I cleared my throat, and the cat flicked its tail.

  Why had Aunt Rita never told me she owned a cat? Though, in this case, it seemed more like the cat was the one who did the owning.

  “Auntie,” I warbled. “I’m here!”

  She’d expected me two days ago, but paying all my ex-husband’s debtors had taken longer than I’d hoped. There had been complications. People who I hadn’t even known had had dealings with Damon had come out of the woodwork, looking for handouts. A lot of them were Russian. And intimidating. And had told me if I called the cops, I would regret it.

  Try not to get depressed this early in the morning.

  “Auntie Rita?” I called.

  The cat hissed at me again.

  “Oh relax,” I said to it, hoping that my shouting hadn’t woken the neighbors. Parfait was a small, coastal town, and the last thing I wanted to do was make enemies on arrival. According to Aunt Rita, the locals adored her café and were pretty laid back, unless you got on their bad side.

  I took a breath and fiddled with the extended handle of my suitcase. This was absurd. I couldn’t let a cat get in my way. Aunt Rita had invited me to stay at her house while I got back on my feet after the messiest, scariest divorce in history.

  And, yeah, I had been through the ringer, but I wasn’t about to let a feline with an attitude problem prevent me from having a good start to my ‘revival.’

  Granted, my revival had so far comprised three sweaty bus rides and being hit on by a toothless man who smelled of bourbon and peanut butter. Interesting combination, I’d give him that.

  “Aunt Rita.” I tried one last time.

  The cat meowed, showing off disastrously sharp fangs.

  “Look,” I said, directing myself to the cat, “I like cats. Pretty much every animal is great in my books, barring chickens. Long story.” I waved a hand. “The bottom line is, I’m expected, OK? Aunt Rita knows I’m coming, so you can chill out.”

  Another disdainful flick of the tail.

  Grow a pair of ovaries, Sunny, for heaven’s sake. What’s the worst that could happen? It launches at your ankles?

  I did have tender ankles.

  “OK,” I said, “I’m coming up.”

  The cat had understood that, it seemed, because it rose on all fours and yowled like a bat out of the nether. It hissed and spat, clawing as I walked up the cute garden path that led to Aunt Rita’s single-story cottage.

  “Shoo!” I waved a hand. “Shoo!”

  The cat streaked toward me, and I braced for clawed impact. It disappeared underneath a bush rather than inflicting flesh wounds.

  “Huh, would you look at that,” I murmured. “All hiss and no claws.” I trudged up the front steps, grinning at my silly idiom, and stopped on the cutesy, floral-print welcome mat.

  I rapped my knuckles on the front door. “Aunt Rita?” It was early, but my aunt usually rose with the birds. She had when I’d lived with her, and I doubted that habit had changed over the last twenty years. Shoot, every Christmas I visited she’d woken me up with coffee at 4:30 am.

  Twenty years. Gosh, was I really that old?

  Thirty-eight and back at Auntie’s house, looking for a place to stay, broke as the day I left.

  I knocked. “It’s me, Sunny.” Still no answer.

  The house was quiet as the grave.

  Uh oh. OK, no need to panic.

  My aunt always kept a spare key in plain sight, just in case she wasn’t home when I came to visit. She’d changed her hiding spot from under the mat to the potted plant hanging from the eaves about a year ago. That was after I’d pointed out that everyone kept their spare key under the welcome mat.

  I dug around in the soil in the potted plant and extracted the key. I dusted it off, my nerves building.

  Why wasn’t she answering the door? And why was her cat acting so weird? And when on earth had she gotten a cat?

  I let myself into the cottage’s entrance hall. It smelled faintly of lavender and chocolate chip cookies, as it always did. The evil cat streaked past me into the house, hissing for good measure, and I shut the door behind me.

  “Auntie?” I called out and flicked on the lights.

  The place was immaculate—polished wood floors, styled in teal and cream, with framed pictures of me and Aunt Rita along the walls, showing my progression from geeky teenager to woman.

  “Where is she?” I scooted my bag into place next to an end table. My gaze landed on an envelope propped against a vase of flowers. My name was scrawled across the front in my aunt’s looping handwriting.

  I lifted it, frowning. Why would she leave me a letter and not call me if she had a reason for not being here? Then again, I was a few days late.

  I slit the envelope open with my aunt’s silver letter opener and slipped out a single sheet of folded parchment paper.

  My heart tha-thumped in my chest.

  Dear Darling Sunny,

  If you’re reading this letter, I’m long gone. I regret to inform you that I’ve decided to go on a cruise with a few lady friends. To the Bahamas! Can you imagine it? Me in the Bahamas, sipping Bahamian drinks and dipping my toes in the water.

  Now, you might think I’m crazy for leaving Florida, which is basically a prime vacation destination, but I need a break.

  It’s for this reason that I’m leaving you in charge of the Sunny Side Up Café until I get back.

  I nearly dropped the letter in shock. “What?” I had no experience running a business whatsoever. I had gone to college to get a business degree, but my studies had be
en cut short when I’d married Damon. Besides, I couldn’t cook a meal to save my life! Except for maybe spaghetti, and even that was touch and go.

  I straightened the page and kept reading.

  Don’t worry, dear, you’ll have plenty of help. Just try not to burn the place down while I’m gone.

  I’ll be unreachable for a few days until we’ve settled in, at which point you’ll be able to contact me via the number on the back of this letter.

  Have fun! Live a little!

  Sincerely,

  Aunt Rita

  P.S. I’ve already had my neighbors feeding Bodger, but if you could take over from them once you arrive, that would be perfect. Also, Bodger hates everyone except for me, so make sure to lock your bedroom door at night. He has a tendency to leap at people’s faces when they close their eyes.

  Each word in the letter was worse than the last.

  I was alone in my aunt’s house with a homicidal cat and a café to run. Talk about out of my depth. And what had she meant about having plenty of help?

  A knock rattled the front door, and I jumped and nearly dropped the letter.

  2

  “Hello?” I called out, uncertainly. “Who’s there?” I was still in a mental swirl over Aunt Rita taking a vacation and leaving me in charge of her business. In a letter. Say what you wanted about my aunt, but she had style.

  “Miss Charles?” A warm, deep voice came through the door. “Is that you?”

  “Yes,” I said, and folded my aunt’s letter. I tucked it into the pocket of my blue jeans, then opened the door.

  One of the most handsome men I’d ever seen stood on the threshold. Dark brown, wavy hair, sparkling blue eyes, five o'clock shadow on his strong jaw, he welcomed me with an amiable smile.

  Instantly, my red flag ‘don’t trust him no matter what’ mind alarm sounded.

  “Ready to go?” he asked, smile widening.

  “Who are you?”

  “Oh, right, of course. Rude of me. My name’s Nick Talbott. I live next door.” He gestured to the cottage to the right of my Aunt Rita’s. It had a well-kept garden and a cute picket fence. “I’m here to help you get settled at the café.”

  “I—OK?” I needed a minute to catch up.

  “Your aunt told you you’d be taking over at the Sunny Side Up, right?”

  “She wrote me a letter about it.”

  “A letter.” Nick quirked an eyebrow. “Oh, Rita.” He gave an affectionate shake of his head. “That’s just like her. She’s always causing mischief and mayhem wherever she goes.”

  I nodded, swallowing. “What did you mean about me being ready to go?”

  “I’m the chef at the café,” he said, gesturing to his chef’s whites. I’d been so taken with his ingratiating smile that I hadn’t noticed he was in uniform. He checked his watch. “We usually open around 8am, and I like to get the prep done early. Might be a good idea to get down there now so I can show you around.”

  “It’s 5:30 am,” I squeaked. “I haven’t even had a coffee yet.”

  “We’ve got plenty at the café. Croissants too.” He paused, casting his gaze over my outfit. “You might want to change into something lighter than that. The air-conditioning’s been on the fritz for a week and the technician can’t make it out until tomorrow afternoon. I’ll give you five.”

  “Oh. OK.”

  He took the door from me, since I’d frozen to the spot, and closed it in my face.

  I blinked.

  This was surreal. I’d gone from losing everything, being sure I would make nothing of myself and feeling incapable because of it, to being thrown in the deep end.

  I didn’t know the first thing about food or hospitality, other than the ‘customer was always right’ mantra. And though I considered myself a friendly person, I wasn’t the obsequious type. I called people out when they were rude.

  “Be back in five minutes,” Nick said through the door.

  His words jolted me back to the present. I rolled my bag down the hall and found my aunt’s guestroom. Quickly, I changed into a pair of khaki shorts and a light cotton blouse before hurrying through to the kitchen and locating a tin of wet food for the resident demon cat.

  I put food in his bowl, hoping that he would eat it, then refreshed his water supply.

  The knock came at the five-minute mark exactly. At least this Nick guy was punctual—a good trait in a chef, right?

  I opened the door, and he thrust a mug into my hands. “Jasmine made this for you,” he said. “Thought it might help you since you’ve had a long night.”

  “Thanks,” I said, and took a sip of the strong black coffee. “Who’s Jasmine?”

  “My wife,” he replied. “I’ll introduce you to her later, but for now, we should probably get down to the café.”

  I locked the cottage, tucking the key into my pocket, then followed him to his car. He opened the passenger door for me.

  “You don’t have a car?” he asked.

  I shook my head. I wasn’t about to go into the grubby details about how I’d had to sell it to cover my ex-husband’s debts.

  “That’s fine. I can give you a ride to work each day. But I leave early.”

  Nothing sounded less appetizing. I got into the passenger seat and clipped on my seatbelt.

  Ten minutes later, we’d come to a halt outside the Sunny Side Up café. It was a friendly place, with blue walls and a giant fried egg painted on the sign above the door. It was situated on one of Parfait’s wide streets, with a view of the sandy beach and whispering waves. A boardwalk overlooked the ocean, and I pictured myself taking lunch breaks there, the sun on my face and the sea salt in my hair.

  Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad. It was a pleasant change from the city.

  “—little cow!” The yell came from the boardwalk.

  Nick, who’d been fishing the restaurant keys out of his pocket, froze. “Ah. Here we go again.”

  “Huh?”

  He nodded to two women standing at the entrance to the boardwalk. One old and hunched over, her purple-gray hair bobbling as she shouted and gesticulated, the other young and short, with poker-straight black hair glistening in the rising sun.

  “This is a common thing around here?” I asked. “People fighting at the crack of dawn?”

  “It’s the crazy time in Parfait,” he replied. “Too hot to sleep, so people decide they’ll head out for a beach walk and end up airing their grievances to each other or about each other to each other.”

  “That’s a lot of each other. And grievances.”

  “Pretty much,” he said, shrugging. “The elderly woman’s name is Frances. She’s… not someone you want to mess with. She’s got a red-hot chili pepper temper.”

  “What, like the band?”

  He laughed. “No, like the actual chili pepper. Like a California Reaper.”

  “Eugh.”

  “She comes into the café every morning, so consider this your first lesson of the day. Stay out of her way. Just smile and nod and give her whatever she orders. Then again, you don’t have to worry about that. You’re the acting manager, not a server.” He unlocked the café, then entered and jabbed in the alarm code.

  I followed him inside, and a wall of heat hit me. “Oh wow,” I said. “It’s even hotter in here.”

  “Glad you changed?”

  I nodded.

  Nick handed me a set of keys. “Rita left these for you,” he said. “You and I are the only two people who have a set now, so if anything goes wrong… well, it won’t. Don’t worry. Let me walk you through the place.” Nick’s tour was exhaustive, from the steel-countered kitchen to the dining area with its circular tables and checked yellow and white tablecloths to the brass register behind a broad counter that held baked goods.

  “These items are ordered in from suppliers.” He gestured to a standing fridge with glass windows—cakes turned in circles on stands, some of them already with a few slices removed. “We replace them every few days or when they’re fin
ished, depending on which comes first. The cheesecakes are always the most popular. Key Lime in particular.”

  I’d already lost track of most of what he’d told me, but I nodded like I was onboard, forcing myself to smile. Sweat gathered on my top lip, as the sharp sunlight streamed through the front windows and across the pale wooden floorboards. The walls were a pleasant peony blue, carrying happy pictures of customers with food, many of them featuring my Aunt Rita.

  What I wouldn’t have given for her to be here right now.

  I was so out of my depth, it was scary.

  “All right,” Nick said, clapping his hands together. “Now, I’m going to teach you how to make an over easy egg.”

  “What? Why? You’re the chef, I—”

  “It’s Rita’s signature dish,” he said, “and everyone who works here is expected to know how to make one. We get so many orders of them, it’s sometimes helpful to have the servers making them to order should I be otherwise engaged.”

  “Why not just hire more chefs?”

  “They’re not exactly a dime-a-dozen in Parfait. Besides,” he said, offering me another shatteringly handsome smile, “it’s tradition. You wouldn’t want to go against tradition, would you?”

  3

  “They’re at the doors, scrambling to get in. Excuse the pun.” Didi, a server on duty this morning, rolled her eyes at her own joke. She was young, with long dark hair streaked pink, and wore a t-shirt with a Korean pop music group on the front, all in different cute poses. Didi had informed me she was a BTS-stan the minute she’d entered the door. I had no idea what it meant and was too flustered to ask.