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weeks?” she asked after a few moments.
    “Well, I think she said it was Wanda Boyle.”
    Candy felt a prickling on her arms. “Wanda Boyle? You’re sure she said her name was Wanda Boyle?”
    Wilma Mae nodded. “Yes, I believe so. Why? Is something wrong?”
    Candy’s shoulders slumped, and her chin fell to her chest as she let out a long breath. “Oh boy.”

FIVE

    At Wilma Mae’s invitation, Candy took a few minutes to examine the secret drawer. She could see nothing unusual about it, other than the fact that it was ingeniously designed. She played with the mechanism that released it, pushing the drawer into its hiding spot, then popping it back out a few times.
    She leaned in for a closer look. There were no tool or scratch marks, no signs of forced entry, nothing to indicate the drawer had been broken into. Nothing, as far as she could see, to indicate anything had been stolen from it—or that anything had ever been inside, for that matter.
    That meant whoever had stolen the recipe— allegedly stolen the recipe, Candy reminded herself—must have known how to open the drawer.
    Could Wanda Boyle have done such a thing? Would she have broken into Wilma Mae’s home, climbed those stairs, found this bedroom, and activated the release mechanism that opened the drawer?
    Why would she have wanted the recipe in the first place?
    As Candy pondered these questions and continued to study the drawer, she said hmm several times, causing Wilma Mae to look at her expectantly. But since she wasn’t a forensics expert, she didn’t know what to do next. Look for fingerprints? Hair samples? Fibers? Way out of her league. She was hardly an investigator of any sort, even in the broadest definition of the term. She still found it amusing that people around town thought of her as a detective at all—which, of course, she wasn’t. She knew that better than anyone.
    And here was the proof.
    A helpful note from the alleged thief would have solved the problem—perhaps with an address and phone number to make things easier? In the end she had nothing concrete, no theories or suppositions to offer the elderly woman.
    As they headed back downstairs, Candy tried to sort out all she had just heard and seen.
    Wilma Mae was quite a tale spinner—that much was true. But was anything else?
    Candy was torn. The practical part of her couldn’t help thinking that maybe Wilma Mae had simply misplaced the ledger that contained the recipe—left it out on another shelf somewhere, or in the back of another drawer, or given it to someone and simply forgotten she’d done so. People forgot where they put things all the time. Even Candy did it, all too often, much to her frustration. And Wilma Mae was well into her eighties. These sorts of things happened.
    That was the simplest explanation. But was it the right one?
    Maybe Wilma Mae was telling the truth. Maybe someone—Wanda Boyle?— had stolen the recipe from the elderly woman . . . but again, Candy asked herself, why?
    There seemed to be only one logical explanation: the Lobster Stew Cook-off. Wilma Mae had said the recipe was valuable. It probably was, Candy realized—in more ways than one.
    Because, ultimately, it was an award-winning recipe.
    That could make it very valuable to certain people in town. But was it worth the risk of stealing it from the home of an elderly woman? That was the part that nagged at her the most. Who could, or would, do such a thing? Who would be that desperate?
    Candy almost let out a quick laugh. Knowing this town, she could probably think of a half dozen people, and not even break a sweat doing it.
    In some strange way, it was all starting to make sense to her. Winning the annual cook-off was a fairly prestigious achievement around town—the newspaper devoted substantial portions of two issues to it. There was no doubt some people were petty enough to steal recipes from one another if it gave them a competitive edge. These sorts of things happened in small