Read Ginny Gold - Early Bird Café 03 - Dead and Berried for Free Online

you tomorrow before noon.” Then she smiled and turned to walk away.
    Kori had to consciously refocus on the task at hand and finish packing up her tent. She decided to leave her cooking tools out rather than putting them back in her car for the night. She’d only have to bring the coolers home to refill the batters, fillings, toppings and pies.
    Just as she was finishing, Nora walked over and picked up a pile of two nearly empty coolers. “Need help?” she asked.
    “Sure. They all have to go back to the café so I can bring everything for tomorrow. Thank God I already have everything made. I don’t know if I’d be able to manage working longer today.”
    “Tell me about it. I don’t think missing the morning even had an effect on my sales.”
    “You still have enough jars of jam for tomorrow?” Kori asked, grabbing two more coolers and following Nora out to her car, Ibis tailing her, leash dragging on the ground.
    “Yup. And strawberry plants too. You have dinner plans?”
    Kori put her coolers down next to her car and popped the trunk. She had no idea how she’d fit all the coolers and supplies in her car earlier and still found a spot for Ibis. She packed the coolers into the trunk before answering. “Just something premade from the freezer. And a bottle of wine. Want to join me?”
    “Love to. Let me just stop by home to feed the dogs and I’ll see you in half an hour.”
    As soon as Kori got home and took Ibis for a quick walk, she set to work making sure she had everything all set for tomorrow morning. She arranged all of the crepe and waffle batters, toppings, fillings and more pies near the front of the walk-in fridge and then headed upstairs.
    Just when the oven was preheated and she was putting in a couple frozen spinach enchiladas, Nora walked through the front door.
    “Oh good, you let yourself in. I couldn’t remember if I’d left the café unlocked,” Kori said, turning around and placing a bottle of red wine on the island.
    Nora took a seat on a stool and started opening the bottle. “I locked it behind me. I hope you weren’t expecting anyone else.”
    Kori pulled out veggies for a quick salad and grabbed two glasses from the cabinet for Nora to fill. “Did you find out anything else this afternoon about Dan Roche?” Kori asked, ignoring Nora’s obvious line about having Zach join them and getting straight to the topic they needed to discuss.
    Nora shook her head. “I think you’d be in a better position for that. But I did spend all afternoon distracted thinking about possible suspects.”
    Kori paused in her veggie chopping and pulled the piece of paper with their only suspect listed so far—Stanley Roche—from her pocket and was ready to add another name. “Did you come up with anyone?”
    Nora got the bottle of wine opened and talked while she poured two glasses. “AJ Long. You know that name?”
    “Yeah. Actually I hired him last month to help me take care of an ant problem in the café. He would definitely have access to rat poison.”
    AJ had been the only pest exterminator in Hermit Cove for as long as Kori could remember—all the way back to when she was a kid and he would spray yards for mosquitoes. She was glad that fad had ended.
    “But I was thinking about Stanley too. And so would he.”
    “As a teacher? I don’t know.”
    “A chemistry teacher,” Nora stressed. “Even if he didn’t have any, I bet he could make some.”
    Kori was skeptical. “Maybe.” She sipped her glass of wine and turned back to the salad she was making. “But you said yourself that a teacher couldn’t be a killer. And his own brother?”
    Nora nodded. “I know. I just feel like we have to keep him on the list.”
    “Oh, he’ll stay on the list. But I think we should talk to him. Find out what he was doing Friday night. And what kind of stuff is in the chemistry lab that he’d have access to over the summer.”
    “Good point. He’s not even working right now. Back to AJ. What