Read Tea with Milk and Murder (Oxford Tearoom Mysteries ~ Book 2) for Free Online

boyfriend, right? And from what little I saw, Cassie seems very happy with him.”
    I winced internally. How could I explain my irrational dislike of Jon? “No, no special reason… just a personality clash, I guess.” I leaned forwards. “ You obviously didn’t believe his story if you’re grilling me about it.”
    “I didn’t say that. It’s good practice to double check everything—get different witness accounts of the same events.”
    “But you do think it’s murder, right?”
    “The SOCO team have only just got here and the forensic pathologist is still examining the body. I’ve only had a quick chat with him so nothing can be confirmed until I speak to him again; in fact, he probably won’t be able to tell me anything for certain until he does the post-mortem.”
    “Aw, come on! He must have given some indication that there was foul play! Otherwise, why are you spending so much time interviewing everybody? Do you think Mabel Cooke and the Old Bi—I mean, her friends—are right? That the girl was poisoned?”
    Devlin’s expression was guarded. “We’re making no assumptions at this point. It’s still too early in the investigation.”
    Grrr.
    Devlin’s blue eyes twinkled suddenly in amusement at the expression on my face and he relented. “But yes, I do think it’s a suspicious death. I understand that she was having some kind of seizure—convulsions—before she died? Unless she has a history of epilepsy or some other medical condition which could bring on seizures, that could very well be a symptom of poisoning.” He looked at me keenly. “You were one of the ones who ran over to her—did you touch her?”
    I shook my head. “I tried, but she was thrashing around so much and I… I wasn’t sure what to do. Some of the others were trying to restrain her but I was afraid to hurt her. To be honest with you…” I said, shamefaced, “I was a bit paralysed.”
    Devlin’s voice softened. “It’s perfectly normal, Gemma. Unless you’ve been specifically trained for it, not many people will know what to do in a medical emergency like that.”
    I swallowed uncomfortably. “Yeah, but… well, you always wonder if there was something you could have done that might have made a difference…”
    “I don’t think you have to worry about that. I think whatever caused the girl’s death—whatever was introduced into her system—was too powerful for anyone to have prevented the result.”
    “So you do believe what Mabel Cooke said about the poisoning!” I said.
    He gave me a dry look. “Mrs Cooke and her friends have an interesting theory, which probably bears more resemblance to an Agatha Christie novel than reality. When I pressed them, they admitted that they didn’t actually see the girl behind the bar put anything into the teacup. It was just their certainty that the girl could have done it and would have done it. But they don’t have any hard facts or proof. Having said that, we will take everything into account.”
    “In that case…” I hesitated.
    “Yes?”
    “Well, I’m not totally sure about this, but… when I bent over her, I thought I could smell something… something sweet… like almonds.”
    Devlin’s gaze sharpened. “Almonds? Like bitter almond?”
    I shrugged. “I don’t know… What’s the difference? It’s that sweetish almond smell—you know, the kind you get in cakes and marzipan and creams and shampoos…” I looked at him curiously. “Does it mean something?”
    “There is a famous poison that has a characteristic smell of bitter almonds on the victim’s breath,” said Devlin thoughtfully. “Cyanide.”
    “Cyanide?” I stared at him. “I thought you said this wasn’t like a mystery novel.”
    Devlin shrugged. “I also said we would consider every possibility. The symptoms Sarah Waltham had would certainly fit with those of cyanide poisoning…”
    I suppressed a shudder. Cyanide? This was getting more and more unbelievable!
    “It may be