Wasted Thyme

By Karen C. Whalen

Twice-widowed Jane Marsh ties the knot for the third time with longstanding fiancé Dale Capricorn. Jane's ready for a celebratory reception at her uber-trendy condo in downtown Denver with champagne toasts, fancy dress, and her family and dinner club friends. Everyone knows she and Dale's prettier and younger ex-wife Polly are "frenemies," but Jane starts fresh and asks Polly to cater the event. However, after the last guest leaves, Jane discovers the ex-wife dead—and Jane's the obvious suspect. If Jane doesn't find the real killer, her third marriage certainly won't be the charm.

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
• Release date: Dec 13, 2019
• ISBN: 9781509228522

Karen C. Whalen

Karen C. Whalen is the author of two cozy mystery series, the Dinner Club Murder Mysteries and the Tow Truck Murder Mysteries. The first in the dinner club series, Everything Bundt the Truth, tied for First Place in the Suspense Novel category of the 2017 IDA Contest. Whalen loves to host dinner parties, camp, hike, and read.

Book preview

Inc.

Once you get the thing you want the most, what you think will make you so insanely happy you just have to have it, that thing, you realize that it didn’t achieve Nirvana for you. Not that I would go back to being single. I love Dale. He’s my soul mate, but I still have to deal with the same everyday problems whether I’m married or not. And some of them are pretty big problems.

Jane gazed at the purple mountain range in the distance, the peaks a sharp white under a crystal-clear blue sky. A few moments ticked by. She gave Doug a sideways glance, and he ran a finger around his collar while he found something interesting to stare at on the ground.

He bumped himself to a stand and zeroed in on the door to the patrol car. I hope it works out. Obviously he had not been expecting an answer with real emotions and honest feelings. Olivia would so get it, though.

He flung open the door, then stopped and thumped the roof three times. Is that why you’re always trying to solve crimes? Are you searching for something? Maybe an adrenaline rush? Because I understand that.

In addition to holding grudges and being petty, had Jane become an adrenaline junkie looking for a danger-high, craving the opportunity to show off her sleuthing skills? That flood of endorphins and thrill of satisfaction, constantly seeking the next good thing, and once achieved, the next thing.

She hadn’t really considered that before.

Wow. He did have some insight after all.

Praise for Karen C. Whalen

This was a fabulous read with characters that were well developed. I definitely want to read more of this series.

~A Chick Who Reads

~*~

Take one feisty widow and her appealing friends, add a gourmet dinner club, sprinkle with murder, and you have a recipe for a delightful read!

~Laura DiSilverio, author

~*~

…a culinary cozy mystery that dishes up a serving of humor, wit, and a desire to keep turning the pages to find out whodunnit.

~Rhonda Blackhurst, author

Wasted Thyme

by

Karen C. Whalen

A Dinner Club Murder Mystery, Book 7

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.

Wasted Thyme

COPYRIGHT © 2019 by Karen C. Whalen

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or The Wild Rose Press, Inc. except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Contact Information: [e-mail]

Cover Art by Kim Mendoza

The Wild Rose Press, Inc.

PO Box 708

Adams Basin, NY 14410-0708

Visit us at www.thewildrosepress.com

Publishing History

First Mainstream Mystery Edition, 2019

Print ISBN 978-1-5092-2851-5

Digital ISBN 978-1-5092-2852-2

A Dinner Club Murder Mystery, Book 7

Published in the United States of America

Dedication

To the grands, Eric and Dorothy

And the daughters-in-law, Astrid and Joy

And Topper

Chapter 1

Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Capricorn. A spoon clanked against a champagne flute, and the guests lifted their glasses for a toast.

Outside the picture window, pink clouds melted into a turquoise sky above the distant mountaintops. A western sunset in Colorado. A ting-ting song of a spoon against glass. A pretty sight and a jaunty sound to celebrate a couple of middle-aged newlyweds.

Jane and Dale pinched their champagne glasses between their fingers and hooked elbows. Excitement jumped in Jane’s stomach, like the bubbles popping in the champagne. She was happy to be married, happy about everything, everything but her new last name, Capricorn. She still hadn’t told her new husband she didn’t want to use his last name.

She lifted the flute to her lips, and Polly’s face came into view. Polly stood right behind Dale. A little too close. Every time Jane turned around, there stood Polly, and Jane had nearly stepped on her toes several times. Polly dogged her heels more than Jane’s attention-seeking puppies—the beagle and schnauzer, who at this very minute were underneath the guests’ feet in every direction. The puppies won the world’s-cutest-dog contest, but the woman topped the most-aggravating-people contest.

Polly took a few paces back, her arms crossed and her eyes raking Dale up and down as if he were one of her delectable desserts. Her eyes flicked to Jane and her face transformed into a friendly smile. Maybe Jane was reading her wrong. Polly crooked her finger forward and backward between them and mouthed, I want to talk to you.

Is it about the food?

No, something else.

Jane nodded, but before she could ask what, Caleb gave her a one-arm hug, a quick squeeze-and-release in the way of grown sons. He said, Congratulations, Mom. Caleb’s wife gave her a swift embrace, too. Warm familial feelings replaced the irritation Polly had generated a moment ago.

Jane circulated around the condo, asking everyone how they were doing and thanking them for coming. After greeting her dinner club friends, her eyes cut to her new neighbor who lived on the floor directly below. A local celebrity and jazz singer, Floressa Nisbet, sat on the piano bench next to her significant other, Spencer Yardley. Floressa’s skin was the color of brown umber, deep and rich and beautiful, but a frown marred her Hollywood-worthy face. Polly now stood a little too close to Spencer. In her late thirties, Polly was attractive with her thick, dark hair and slim figure. Wearing a short cocktail dress, she looked like one of the guests instead of the caterer. Jane couldn’t blame Floressa for being annoyed; Polly was irritating that way.

Jane went into the kitchen where Polly’s assistant was arranging fancy crackers on a tray with a bowl of cheese dip. A strong whiff of marijuana hit her nose. Uh-ho. Wacky tobaccy. Giggle weed. Reefer Madness right here in her very own kitchen. And a couple of ex-cops counted among the guests.

Polly swept through the doorway and placed empty wine glasses on the counter. Vera? Did you just get back from your break?

Yeah. Red veins wove across her assistant’s bulging eyes.

What did you do? Polly wrinkled her nose.

Nothing.

You’re fired. Polly pointed toward the front door. Get out now.

Heat rose from Jane’s chest to her face. If only she could duck and hide. She hated confrontation even when it didn’t involve her. Witnessing someone else’s most-embarrassing-moment made her teeth itch and the back of her scalp clench. Polly had a reputation for being a hard boss, but employers did have the right to fire their workers for drug use on the job, even if marijuana was legal.

The rings on Vera’s pierced lower lip wobbled, then she yanked off her apron. She stormed past them, plowing into Polly and knocking her into Jane before stomping through the living room and out the front door.

Jane and Polly steadied themselves and gave each other wide-eyed looks. Polly said, Sorry about that. She’s done this before and I should’ve fired her the first time. I can handle the rest of the party by myself. You go on, have fun.

If you’re sure. Jane glanced at the mess in the kitchen. The cleanup would require extra hands, and Polly would need her help after the guests left. But right now, she wanted to celebrate her new marriage and enjoy the party. Jane skirted past Polly toward the living room, and Polly followed with the appetizer tray. Polly set the food down on the piano where Floressa held one of Jane’s dogs in her lap.

Jane’s older son, Luke, grabbed her by the shoulder. Mom, Brittany and I have something to tell you.

She turned toward him. What?

We’ll tell you later when there’s not so many people around.

Sure, Luke. Jane studied her son. His voice was keyed up, his face happy. Good news, then. How exciting—more exciting than the drug bust that just went down in the kitchen.

Polly darted by, saying over her shoulder, Jane, don’t forget we need to talk. Find me after the party’s over.

She had forgotten. What was up with all these secrets anyway? How frustrating. She grabbed a cracker and scooped on some cheese dip before popping it in her mouth, then snatched another glass of champagne. She needed to find her dinner club friends. And Dale, too.

After a little while, the conversations and laughter settled down and the crowd thinned. By the time the last straggler departed, Jane was worn out. As much as she loved, loved, loved her friends and family, being around a crowd exhausted her. Dale gave her another kiss, a goodbye kiss this time, before he, too, left to drive his elderly aunt to the airport.

Polly was busy in the kitchen. The woman had her chores down to a science. She wheeled out the tall metal cart full of trays she’d stored in the laundry room and started stacking baking sheets on the shelves. Jane tied a large, white apron over her dress and slipped off her high heels. She filled the sink with hot, soapy water and crammed dirty dishes into the dishwasher. The kitchen mess dwindled little by little until the last dish was put away.

Everything turned out great, Polly. Your restaurant did a good job with the food. Thanks so much for catering the party. Jane bent down and gave her dogs each a tiny bit of leftover tenderloin.

It was the least I could do for Dale.

Jane gave her a tight smile, twisting the water out of a damp rag. I’m going to look around and make sure we got all the glasses.

Polly bumped the refrigerator door shut. I’ll take the cart down the elevator.

Do you want help loading it in the van?

No. It has an electric lift. I’ll be right back.

Okay. Jane swept her gaze over the living room—no champagne flutes left behind—then escaped in her bare feet to the bedroom. The dogs followed her from the hardwood onto the carpet, their nails on the floor going from ticka-tacka-ticka-tacka to mute. She waited for them to come through before shutting the door behind them.

She leaned against the wall, closed her eyes, and enjoyed the moment. There was nothing like peace and quiet and time to herself. Dale hadn’t made it back yet, and the party had ended, what? An hour or so ago? What was keeping him? Nudging herself to move, she went into the bathroom and dabbed a cool cloth over her face. She shed the apron and smoothed the fabric of her dress over her hips.

She needed to ask Polly what she wanted to talk to her about. Quit putting it off. No more hiding out.

She stole back down the hall. Only the chugging dishwasher murmured in the otherwise silent house. A nasty spill stained the rug, so she shooed the dogs away and went for her cleaning supplies. Once Jane spritzed the carpet with cleaner, she discovered someone had gotten sick in the powder room. Oh dear. She cleaned up the toilet with pine cleaner and bleach. Uh-oh. Doggie-doo congealed near the balcony door. Holy cow. What next?

But no. The dog pile was probably a prank, a plastic fake. The dinner club was notorious for practical jokes and she was the queen of them all. Reaching for the silly dog poo, she stuck her fingers in the real deal. Ugh. Not a prank. She gagged a little in her mouth. She hurried over for paper towels, flushed the wad down the toilet, and scrubbed her hands under hot water with antibacterial soap.

Polly was taking a long time loading the cart. Maybe she was back and enjoying her own break on Jane’s deck overlooking the mountains. No, the balcony was empty, but Jane was glad she checked. One last plate was on the railing, so she brought it into the kitchen. Had Polly departed without saying goodbye? If that was the case, Jane had dodged the little chat Polly wanted to have. Fine by her. Time to get out of the dress.

The door to the guest room yawned open a crack and a bad smell emanated from inside. Something was definitely off here. She pushed the door the rest of the way open.

Polly lay on the floor next to the bed…and…double-yuck. She’d been sick.

Jane fell to her knees and shook the woman’s shoulder. Polly! Polly! Are you okay?

A knob of panic formed in Jane’s chest, turning tighter and tighter, making it hard to breathe.

Polly wasn’t okay. In fact, Polly Capricorn, Dale’s ex-wife, was dead.

****

Jane couldn’t explain to the police why she didn’t call 9-1-1 right away. They asked her over and over and over again. Having taken a course in CPR, she’d tried to revive Polly, but it was obvious she was gone, past help. So Jane sat on the floor in a stupor, numbly holding Polly’s hand instead of phoning for an ambulance.

Jane wasn’t aware of how much time had elapsed while she tormented herself thinking about her husband’s ex-wife and their up-and-down relationship. She and Polly started out as enemies, even though Jane had met Dale years after their divorce. Their rivalry had eventually grown to frenemy status, then truer friends of a sort. Maybe not good friends, but civil enough friends. Jane had even asked Polly to cater her reception.

Dale was the one who called 9-1-1.

He’d found them in the guest room and immediately dialed the police. While waiting for the ambulance to arrive, they divided up names and texted guests to alert them to the possibility of food poisoning. But messages had only gotten out to a few people before the police barged in and another sort of scourge began.

Very quickly, a forensic unit took over at the condo, and the police whisked Jane and Dale away in the back of a police car to the downtown Denver precinct on Washington Street. Once there, the guards ushered them into separate interrogation rooms. The detective asked Jane questions like…why didn’t she call for assistance immediately? Why did she clean the toilet with bleach? Why did she wash her hands with disinfectant? Why did the condo reek of pine cleanser? Did she get along with Dale’s ex-wife? Was she jealous of Polly? And worse yet…what did she know about poisons?

Jealousy was a motive for murder. Poison appeared to be the means.

Tears streaked Jane’s face, mascara smeared her cheeks, and intense panic stormed through her mind, as she tried to answer the police questions.

At the end of those long hours in the tiny interrogation room, the officers locked her in a holding cell with a concrete bench built into a cinderblock wall. They hadn’t arrested her, only detained her, but were the police going to charge her with poisoning Polly? Maybe she should request a phone call to her son, Caleb, an attorney. Did she need one?

It hit her anew…

Polly dead.

Gone.

Never again to greet them at the door of her restaurant, lead them to the best table, ask them to try out the new wine on the menu. Younger than Jane by more than ten years, Polly had had a lot of living left to do and was way too young to die.

A sense of doom hung heavy on her mind. Jane was sick, sick, sick about Polly’s death, but truthfully, what really bothered her the most? Polly dying? Or Polly dying at her big event? At her wedding reception. In their new home. Jane shook off the thought, instantly ashamed. Polly didn’t choose this. And now was not the time to play the blame game.

Jane had wasted so much time in her fifty years, she understood the regret of it. One thing she wouldn’t do going forward, she wouldn’t spend so many hours at work. And housecleaning. Did a clean house matter so much? Of course, she planned to shampoo the carpet the next day…unless she had to spend tomorrow and every day after that in prison. And to think, a few hours ago she’d been hosting a party with Dale. Now she presided over a pity party in jail.

Her fingers slid along the white-washed cinder-block walls, cold and rough, and she stumbled her way to the ledge that formed the bunk, hard and uncomfortable. The jail cell with the stainless-steel commode in the corner smelled like urine, body odor, and the sweat of fear. Talk about needing a good cleansing.

She’d concentrate on something else. This nightmare would end any minute now. Certainly she’d be released before long.

So think positive. Yoga breath, yoga breath. Visualize happiness…concentrate on Dale. The heaviness in her chest lifted for a moment, but another bout of panic dragged her back down. Her husband was probably locked up in a cell like hers. Was he as worried about her as she was about him?

Jane spread out flat on the hard-as-a-rock cement slab, her fancy lace dress bunched underneath her. The police had confiscated her heels and—this was a little embarrassing—her miracle, super-duper, elastic body shaper and tummy-tucker. Her belly was now straining against the fabric.

She sucked in her stomach, and water sprang from her eyes.

Burning tears rolled down the sides of her face and dripped onto the hard bench. Others in adjoining cells cried out, and DT screams ricocheted off the cement walls. Never had she spent more frantic hours, thrashing about on that narrow cement ledge that served as a bunk. Calmness and sleep followed claustrophobia, wakefulness, trembling, and chills.

The police must have forgotten about her.

Morning finally arrived and a guard unlocked her cell and told her to follow him. She expected more questions, but instead the guard escorted her through several corridors to a desk where a clerk handed her a large paper sack containing her purse, her cellphone, the unmentionable body shaper, and her heels. She shoved her feet into the shoes. Next the guard released her from the holding area into a busy lobby. A man in a navy-blue business suit held out his hand and introduced himself as her attorney. As soon as she heard his name she forgot it.

Dale stood beside the lawyer.

Her husband’s complexion was shallow; he looked shocked by her appearance.

Hers was not the face a new husband wanted to see on his bride in the morning.

Chapter 2

Why didn’t you call 9-1-1? Her younger son, Caleb, spoke in his lawyerly voice. He was licensed to practice law, but at the moment wore a hipster T-shirt that read, Too awkward to function. His experience was in civil, not criminal law, but he knew about legal procedures and how things should go down.

Jane’s eyes didn’t quite meet Caleb’s or the questioning looks on the faces of her other son or her daughters-in-law.

I don’t know why I didn’t phone for help. I think I was in shock. She didn’t feel all that much better now, even after she’d had a shower and change of clothes. Her head hurt and she still had anxious heart-pounding moments. Her skin crawled at the memory of the brick-hard bench in the cold cement cell, like creepy-crawly things were scrambling up her arms and spooky-scary things were sneaking up behind her back. It hadn’t helped that she’d missed church that morning for the first time in months.

Caleb ran his fingers through his short, dark hair making it stand on end. A foot taller than Jane, he had her same dark brown hair and same slim build, or rather the build she’d had before she’d gained those extra pounds. You’d think you’d be used to finding dead bodies by this time, Mom. Yes, she’d been involved in a couple of murder investigations a time or two in the past.

Erin, Caleb’s wife, gave her husband a stern look. I would’ve been in shock too, Jane. I’m sure I would’ve done the same thing. But Erin, sweet and shy, would never have found herself in this kind of a situation. Her daughter-in-law patted Jane’s wrist where her new tattoo of sunrays shooting out from behind a partial moon was etched into her skin.

Luke sat at the table with his muscled arms crossed, scowling. You could tell the two were brothers. Caleb and Luke stood at the same height, but the Army had bulked Luke up with extensive physical training. Luke’s wife, Brittany, with her long, brown hair pulled into a ponytail, twirled her wedding band around on her finger.

Dale walked the few steps over from the kitchen to the breakfast nook with a full coffee pot. He said to Jane, I made an appointment with the attorney for tomorrow. I couldn’t get you in today since it’s Sunday.

She held out her cup for a refill. Do I really need a lawyer? I’ve only been questioned, not charged with anything, not even read my rights. I’m not sure what they accomplished by detaining me overnight.

You need an attorney, just in case. I don’t want to take any chances.

How’d you pick this lawyer, Dale?

I called your boss for a recommendation.

She shut her eyes and took in a long, shuddering breath. She worked as a paralegal at an insurance defense firm. Now everyone at work would know she’d spent a night in jail. And she was well aware that when asked for a recommendation most attorneys referred people to their law school buddies. Who knew how good this attorney was? But since she was not acquainted with any criminal lawyers herself, how could she complain? She was actually relieved Dale had taken charge. She opened her eyes and said, I appreciate you finding an attorney for me. Thanks for handling that, Dale. I’m just glad the police didn’t keep you overnight, too.

Of course, hon. Dale wrapped his arms around her shoulders from behind. If they take you in for questioning again, we’ll be prepared.

She leaned into her new husband. The anxious look dropped from Caleb’s face. Her son worried about her, but she had a husband to keep her safe now, so Caleb didn’t need to carry the whole load of worry.

Brittany asked,