COZY MYSTERY: French Cuisine Murder: A Margie Lauderdale Cozy Mystery (Book 1) Read online

  French Cuisine Murder

  A Margie Lauderdale Cozy Mystery

  Liz Turner

  Free Bonus Book:

  Click here to receive a free copy of "Murder At The Menu Tasting" the prequel to "A Cozy Mystery in the Mountains" series. You'll automatically be added to our subscription list and notified of new releases. As an added bonus, you will also receive cooking tips from a certified chef.

  Other Cozy Mystery Books by Liz Turner:

  A Cozy Mystery In The Mountains Series:

  Murder on the Menu

  Trail Mix Murder

  Getaway to Murder

  Murder at the Festival

  A Rare Catch Cozy Mystery Series:

  Murder At Starlight Resort

  Murder At The Barbecue

  A Margie Lauderdale Cozy Mystery Series:

  French Cuisine Murder

  Wedding Bells & Murder?

  Copyright 2016 by Cabo Publishing Group - All rights reserved.

  This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author's imagination or used in a fictional manner. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely coincidental. No part of this publication or the information in it may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from Liz Turner, Cabo Publishing Group.

  Table of 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

  About the Author

  Preview of: Getaway to Murder

  Other Books by Liz Turner

  Chapter 1

  Margie sipped at her martini, her eyes running over the inside of the restaurant. It was French, the room glowing yellow with romantic, shaded lighting. Hints of elegance were evident from every single inch of the room; towering flower arrangements were dappled with crystals and cut glasses glittered in the warm light. Lace dappled the heavy curtains. The uniforms were well pressed and made of high-quality materials. Even the glassware was shining crystal cut into glittering shapes.

  Without thinking, Margie swiped her hair behind her ear and sighed. The motion, long ingrained in her muscle memory, was no longer needed. She’d cut all of her hair off two days ago, leaving her curls cropped to just under her ears. The fashionable new hairstyle tied in with her new dress, her new gloves, and her new life.

  “Another, ma’am?” The waiter asked, a thick French accent distorting his words. He pointed at her nearly empty glass with a gloved hand.

  Margie blushed a little; this waiter was handsome. He was well-formed with a quick smile and ice-blue eyes. He was attentive and alluring. She blossomed under his attention, even though she knew it was only to get deeper into her purse come tip time. The old Margie would have shut her mouth and looked down at her lap, embarrassed, but new Margie winked and looked him straight in the eyes. “No, thank you, sir.”

  The waiter left her with another quick smile, and she was alone again. There was almost no one else here in this restaurant in the middle of nowhere, just a couple of stragglers like her and a couple of bored hostesses tittering about a date. Margie was sitting cross-legged at the bar on a stool, facing out into the room, wearing a fitted red little number with a shorter hemline than she had ever would have dared in front of her father. She ignored the strangers in the booths around her, unwilling to seem too available. While she liked the very safe attentions of the waiter, she didn’t want any advances from anyone else.

  Margie turned her attention back to the menu. It had become fashionable recently to have French and other exotic cuisines in restaurants. The 1964 World’s Fair had made foreign food so attractive and desirable. Little foreign Mom and Pops like this one had been popping up all over the countryside, even in tiny towns as small as this.

  Margie never tried French food before so she wasn’t quite sure what she had just ordered. The name, Blanquette de Veau, had sounded so romantic. How exotic! She shivered with excitement that she hoped no one else could see. Now was not the time to be looking like a naive upstate girl with nothing but air between her ears.

  A girl traveling alone always had to be on her guard.

  Or so her father had always told her. “Be careful out there, Margaret,” he would say, his eyes hard and sharp as ice. “There are people who would take advantage of a pretty thing like you. Always keep your guard up.”

  This trip, although thrilling, was also a little bit scary. People would eye her curiously along her bus route. She kept her tickets clutched hard in her gloved hands, making sure no one pilfered them. Although she had a feeling that her father meant something very different when he was warning her against traveling alone, she still guarded against theft. Better safe than sorry. That was her family’s motto.

  Margie kept her drinking to one glass an evening. She kept all her things close to her. She made sure never to be out of a group when possible or to leave her things unattended. She never accepted anything from strangers and never talked to anyone who looked too sure of him or herself. Never trusted anyone with anything she could do on her own.

  Her father had drilled these things into her before she left. He had been against her leaving and against her moving to the city with her cousin. But she insisted on going, in cutting all of her hair off and in buying fashionable new clothes. She'd used her savings from her waitressing job at the only diner in her tiny hometown of Lakeshore, Michigan. Population: 1548.

  Well, now it was population 1547.

  Margie wouldn’t go back home no matter how hard things got in the city. Out to prove them all wrong, Margie was ready for anything.

  Well, almost anything.

  As she pondered whether or not she should remove her gloves to eat, the lights went out, leaving her in complete darkness.

  She froze in place, her hand closing so hard on the martini glass it almost shattered. Someone brushed by her foot and cursed. A man's voice she didn’t recognize. Her heart beat so loudly, she’s pretty sure the man could hear it. A muffled cry. Someone whispers, “Who are you?” into the darkness. Screams filled the air. Probably from the hostesses.

  A hiss, a gargle, a thud, and then the electric hum of complete and utter silence.

  Margie, still frozen in place, heard cursing and then the metallic clinking noise of a lighter being flicked on. The tiny glow of a lighter illuminated an unfamiliar face. The face was male and looked unhappy; perhaps a cook or busboy. Margie finally relaxed enough to set down her glass on the bar, laughing at herself for being afraid of the dark. What a goose she was! No matter. At least, she didn’t scream like the hostesses.

  Blinded by the sudden return of the lighting, it took Margie’s eyes a few seconds to readjust. The hostesses were holding each other’s wrists, looking around with their eyes a little too wide. They laughed after a moment, releasing each other and giggling like fools.

  The handsome waiter stumbled into the room, blinking away the darkness. “Is everyone alright?” h
e asked, his accent making the words nearly unintelligible.

  But Margie couldn’t hear him. She was staring at one of the booths to the left of her barstool. One of the stragglers in the restaurant had his head pressed against the lacquered wood of his booth’s table like he was sleeping. The long fingers of his hand wrapped around the stem of his wine glass. An ever-expanding puddle of blood spread across the table.

  Margie screamed, her voice shaking the crystals in the chandelier.

  Chapter 2

  By the time the police showed up, Margie had managed to gather herself together enough to get up off of the tiled floor where she had fallen. She found another place to sit, dabbling at the endless tears that dripped from her eyes. Now that she could not longer see the body, it was a little easier to convince herself that she had imagined it all.

  The French waiter gave her a glass of water, looking just as shaken as she was. He seemed to be handling it far better than she; he was carrying the few people in the restaurant refreshments. When he was forced to be idle, however, his nerves seemed to take over. The poor man was shaking and rubbing his hands together so fiercely; Margie was sure he was rubbing his skin right off of his fingers. He ended up cleaning the bar a thousand times before the police finally ordered him to stop.

  “Why did I ever leave home?” Margie said out loud, to no one in particular. Her home was boring, provincial, and suffocatingly old-fashioned. But, at least, no one got murdered there. People died when they were supposed to, in their seventies and eighties, surrounded by their families, or occasionally in car accidents. None of this improper murder nonsense.

  “Is your home far from here?” One of the hostesses, tears carving red lines around her eyes, joined Margie at her table. Her eyes looked everywhere but in the direction of the police crowded like vultures around the body.

  Margie shook her head. “Home is about three hours north. A place called Lakeshore. The town's so small, it’s not even on most of the maps.”

  The girl nodded, sitting down in the booth across from Margie. Her yellow hair was bobbed, cut just below her ears, like Margie’s. The hostess’s eyes were a beautiful green; they looked like they belonged set in a gold ring. Her perfect mascara was mostly undamaged from her crying, but some had run daintily down her cheeks. She looked like a lost fairy from one of her younger brother’s fairy tale picture books. The hostess dabbed at her tears, sniffing prettily. Margie was quite sure she could never in her life learn to cry so beautifully.

  “Same here; my hometown is so tiny, no one would ever call it a town.” From under the blanket the medical personnel had wrapped around anyone who might be in shock, she held out a perfectly manicured hand, and Margie shook it. “Camelia.”

  “Margaret. Call me Margie.” She shook the hand as she had been taught, with a firm grip and eye contact. Camelia didn’t seem to care much if her shake was proper. Her wrist was weak, and she seemed distracted.

  “What brought you to Bristol, Margie?” Camelia lit up a cigarette, holding onto it like it was the only solid thing the world. Her fingers shook, making the column of cigarette smoke waver in the yellow lighting.

  “Passing through,” she answered. “On my way to the city.” The city was only two hours away from this place by bus, but it suddenly felt too close. Did people get murdered in the city all of the time too? Was this going to be a daily occurrence? The tiny part of her that desperately wanted to return to Lakeshore was growing by the minute. “Perhaps it was stupid of me to leave home. I should have stayed and done as my parents told me.”

  The pretty hostess looked like she wanted to say something in response, but she never got the chance. “Excuse me, ladies,” a police officer interrupted. “I need to speak with both of you.” The man was tall, in his mid-thirties maybe. He looked tired like this investigation had dragged him out of bed. Perhaps it had. Margie didn’t know the hours police detectives kept.

  “Of course,” Margie said, her voice wobbling. “Anything that might help.”

  The officer held a small pad of paper and a pen in his hands. The tattered brown trench coat he wore hung heavy on his shoulders as though it weighed more than the fabric should. “I’m Officer Brighton.”

  “Margie, Margaret. Officer Brighton,” Margie said formally. “Oh, and...” she paused for a deep breath, “Lauderdale is my last name.”

  “Camelia Grace Jacobs.”

  “Can you please go through everything you heard tonight, Miss?” He asked, pointing at Camelia.

  Camelia said her piece, telling the detective exactly what she had witnessed. He jotted something down in his notebook as she spoke. She looked nervous, constantly twirling the same lock of hair around her fingers and pulling on it. Margie was wondering how the hair didn’t just fall out from all of the abuse. Her testimony whittled down to nothing useful in Margie’s estimation, but an experienced crime solver might see something in it. After she had finished, she wandered off in search of a drink and ashtray to help steady her nerves.

  Officer Brighton sat down in the booth across from Margie, still taking notes in his notebook. “And you, Ms. Lauderdale? What did you see?”

  “Nothing, it was pitch dark,” she answered honestly.

  The police detective looked up from his notes, studying her face to see if she was being fresh.

  Margie fluttered her eyelashes nervously. “I was sitting there at the bar, drinking a martini when the lights went down. The shades were down, and no light came in from the street. The hostesses both screamed I think. There was no one immediately around me when the lights when out, but then someone brushed by my foot. It scared me so badly that I froze. Then I heard someone say ‘who are you’ in the dark somewhere near the booths where the -” Margie choked, glancing at the booth where the body still lay, just out of sight. She shuttered then turned back to the police officer. He had a sympathetic look on his face. “When whoever it was brushed by my foot, he cursed.” She blushed, hoping the officer wouldn’t make her repeat the word she heard. “But it was not a voice I’d heard before. Kind of a southern boy accent. And I’m usually pretty good at memorizing things.”

  The officer looked at her again before making more notes in his journal. The man’s eyes were like steel, gray and hard. Margie looked down at her lap where her gloved fingers had twined around one another. “So would you recognize the voice again if you heard it?”

  “I think I could.” Margie looked around. “Am I free to go?” She was desperately ready to find her hotel and bury herself in a huge pile of blankets. She wanted to go to sleep and pretend all of this was a dream.

  Officer Brighton sighed, shuffling through his notes. “You’re the only person we have that’s even close to a witness in this, Ms. Lauderdale. You are free to go, but staying to help identify the voice you heard would be invaluable to the case. Mr. McCarthy deserves justice as much as the next guy.” Officer Brighton very carefully avoided looking at her as he spoke.

  Margie wrinkled her nose at him. “I have bus tickets to the city first thing in the morning, good sir, and not enough money to stay for days or weeks while you clean up around here.” Sadness overwhelmed her. Poor Mr. McCarthy. What could he have done that was worth his murder? “I wish I could be more help, but I have nowhere to stay, Officer Brighton.”

  “You could stay with me.” Camelia returned, an ashtray in tow. “I just lost my roommate to the big city a couple of days ago, and I don't have a new one yet. The bus station would refund you for another day if you explained the situation.” She sat down next to Margie, her voice ragged with smoke as she whispered, “I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep in that place all alone after this,” right in Margie’s ear. Camelia smelled like smoke and looked at her with big, green pleading eyes.

  Poor darling, Margie looked over the girl; she did look quite frightened. Margie’s heart sunk a little; she’d been wanting to go to the city for years. But the world seemed determined to keep her from it yet again.

  Well, she thought
, a small smile on her face, if I’ve waited for years, what’s a little longer?

  Margie nodded at the girl, who whooped in response. “I’ll give my cousin a ring and let her know.”

  Chapter 3

  Twisting her fingers around the coiled cord, Margie held the pay phone to her ear. It was something of a relief to have no hair in the way of holding the receiver against her shoulder, but it still felt strange for it to be missing. She felt a little naked without it. Her gloved hands held the receiver to her ear, and she had the glass door of the booth closed tight around her. The world outside was muffled and distant.

  “Yes, father, that’s right. Not far at all,” she said, trying to sound cheerful. “It’s been quite a wild ride so far.”

  “Of course, Father. Camelia seems like a nice woman.”

  “No, Father. Nothing exciting has happened, I am just doing a new friend a favor.”

  “Of course, Father. The restaurant she works for needs a little extra help; that’s all. Should be a gas. I don’t have anything to do for the week or so until my new job starts, and I could use the extra few dollars.”