Running Out of Time (A Dodie O'Dell Mystery, Band 3) - Softcover

Trauth, Suzanne

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1601837240 ISBN 13: 9781601837240

Verlag: Kensington, 2017

Inhaltsangabe

Restaurant manager Dodie O'Dell's themed food ideas have been called cute, clever, and delicious, but never revolutionary—until now. Dodie's Windjammer Restaurant is stocking the Etonville Little Theatre's concession stand with colonial-era desserts and drinks: Swamp Yankee applesauce cake, pumpkin bread, hot cider punch, and mulled wine to complement the latest production. A local playwright has adapted Thornton Wilder's Our Town into Eton Town, shifting the story to colonial America and the founding of Etonville, New Jersey, shortly after the Revolutionary War.
 
On opening night, hours before the curtain rises, Dodie runs into an agitated actress backstage with blood on her hands. Then a stranger is found among the chairs set for a graveyard scene with a knife in his chest. The show will not go on—the theatre is now a crime scene. Hoping to clear the red-handed suspect, Dodie returns to the role of amateur sleuth to mull over the clues and beat the backstage stabber to the punch—before someone else becomes history . . .

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Suzanne Trauth is a novelist, playwright, screenwriter, and a former university theatre professor. She is a member of Mystery Writers of America, Sisters in Crime, and the Dramatists Guild. When she is not writing, Suzanne coaches actors and serves as a celebrant performing wedding ceremonies. She lives in Woodland Park, New Jersey. Readers can visit her website at www.suzannetrauth.com.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Running Out of Time

By Suzanne Trauth

KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

Copyright © 2017 Suzanne Trauth
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-60183-724-0

CHAPTER 1

Winter in Etonville, New Jersey was not for the faint of heart. The temperature had hovered at fifteen degrees all morning. I backed my Chevy Metro out of the driveway and inched my way down Ames, turning in a wide arc onto Fairfield Street. The streets were empty. Smart folks had stayed home this Sunday morning. I shifted my right foot from the accelerator to the brakes and back again, wary of the layer of ice that glistened on the roadway. Living down the Jersey Shore had not completely prepared me for the ordeals of cold weather months: substantial snow, ice, cold, wind, sleet, more snow, freezing rain —

A horn honked and I jammed on the brakes. My Metro did a one-eighty, skidding into the intersection of Fairfield and Main. I came to rest three feet from the front bumper of a late-model silver Lincoln Continental. I was panting audibly as an occupant of the other car's passenger seat alighted. A middle-aged man in a camel-colored coat with a bronzed face, slicked-back dark hair, and sunglasses.

"Are you okay?" he shouted at me.

I nodded dumbly and studied my shaking hands on the steering wheel. Foolishly, I'd ignored the yellow light and hadn't seen his car heading south on Main. It was my fault, though he was probably driving over the speed limit.

I wound down the window. "I'm so sorry. Didn't see you ..." Puffs of cold breath shot out of my mouth.

"No worries. All's well." He kicked one leather-clad shoe against the bottom of the doorframe to remove snowy muck. "Take it easy." He climbed into his Lincoln with a Massachusetts license plate — it was a game of mine, noticing and remembering plates: a white background with red letters and numbers, Massachusetts printed at the top, Spirit of America at the bottom — and said something to the driver.

"Yes. Yes, I will," I said quickly and watched them back up, maneuver around my Metro, and continue down Main Street. I completed my turn onto Main and eased down the road. Twenty-five miles an hour.

"Achoo!" A sneeze burst out of my stuffy nose and scratchy throat. For the fifth time in the last two hours, I told myself I should have been home installed on my sofa wrapped in a warm blanket, hot buttered rum in one hand, the latest thriller by my favorite author in the other. Or binge-watching a series on Netflix. Instead, I was watching a baking class create early American cakes in the Windjammer restaurant kitchen while listening to the wind howl as it rustled down Main.

Betty from Betty's Boutique, Etonville's version of Victoria's Secret, popped out of the Windjammer's pantry. "Bless you!" She brushed a shock of brown, shoulder-length curls off her face with one floury palm. "Dodie, I can't find the nutmeg."

"Try the spice shelf. Second from the top," I said, blowing my nose and eyeing the recipe for Swamp Yankee applesauce cake. Georgette, of Georgette's Bakery, had volunteered to take her "students" through their pastry paces before the opening of the next Etonville Little Theatre production. We'd been baking for three Sundays now and today was the final session.

"That's one teaspoon of salt?" asked one-half of the Banger sisters duo, two elderly siblings who kept their ancient digits on the pulse of the town. Gossip was their game.

"No, it's a tablespoon," Georgette said patiently. "And remember we are multiplying everything by twelve. We want to end up with a dozen cakes." She jabbed at a copy of the recipe — her stubby, thick fingers were born to knead dough.

The sisters bobbed their gray heads and began to measure.

"Mildred, be sure the baking soda is dissolved in warm water before you add it to the batter," Georgette said to Etonville's choir director and turned to me. "It might have been easier to buy the concession goodies," she muttered.

"Maybe, but I needed something that fit the American Revolution." For the past two years the Windjammer had provided food that matched the period of the ELT plays: themed dinners, a food festival, and now stocking the concession stand. "These early American desserts are perfect. Apple pie, pumpkin bread, hot cider punch, mulled wine. It's going to be great." I smiled my big fake grin, the one I trotted out on occasions when I knew I was in over my head, because it was too late to call things off. The Windjammer freezer was jammed with the apple pies and Georgette had offered to store the pumpkin bread and applesauce cake in her bakery. The punch and mulled wine were left for later this week.

"I hope it's all edible." Georgette returned to the group of bakers and cautioned them. "Let's beat that batter until it's well mixed."

I heard the tinkle of the welcome bells above the restaurant entrance. Probably an out-of-towner who didn't know that the restaurant was closed on Sundays and the only culinary activity afoot was a baking class on steroids. I crossed my fingers that the ELT audiences would be hungry before the show and during intermission.

I pushed open the swinging doors that led into the dining room and was greeted by a blast of cold air. Lola Tripper, current artistic director of the Etonville Little Theatre, forced the front door shut and leaned against the jamb.

"It's feels like zero out there!" She stamped her knee-high boots on the doormat, leaving bits of frozen slush to settle into its bristly fibers.

"With the wind chill, yeah."

Lola flipped the fur-lined hood of her high-end winter coat. "I ignore that wind chill stuff. It's either freezing or it isn't."

"Right." I took her coat, some Icelandic clothing brand. "Looks warm."

"Canadian goose down. Windproof and waterproof." Lola fluffed her blond mane.

Definitely not wallet-proof. I sneezed.

"You poor thing. What are you taking for it?" she asked.

"The usual. Aspirin, vitamin C, a shot of whiskey." That last was my great-aunt Maureen's remedy for whatever ailed you. She usually came down with "something" once a week. "What's happening next door?" The ELT was about ready to open its version of Our Town.

"We're actually ready for tech rehearsal. With only a few items to catch up on. Chrystal has to let out the waistcoats for some of the men. And her crew is still altering aprons and breeches. Good thing we have the ruffled shirts and the men's stockings from Romeo and Juliet." Lola grimaced. "I told Walter we needed to stay on budget for this show."

"So ... that's why he insisted on a rotating stage?" Lola grunted. "He had a vision. You know Walter and his visions."

I certainly did. "You're the director. Walter's only the playwright."

Walter Zeitzman was the on-again-off-again director of most ELT productions. But when the board balked at the budget for a big musical, Walter offered his adaptation of Our Town — called Eton Town — as a replacement, shifting the script to colonial America to celebrate the founding of Etonville, shortly after the American Revolution. I got Walter's vision; I just wasn't sure his playwriting skills were up to the challenge.

Lola twisted one strand of hair in a recognizable nervous gesture. "The turntable sounded like a good idea. One side for Act One, the other for Act Two. Passage of time. Life moving round and round ... you know."

I'd been to rehearsal. It was more like life grinding to a halt every few seconds. "I hope he gets it running more smoothly before opening night."

"That's where he is now. With the cast off today, he...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Kensington
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2017
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1601837240
• ISBN 13: 9781601837240
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 220
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Dietmar Rusche; 15110751138; rusche.dietmar@gmx.de; ; Dr.-Willi-Bergmann-Str. 13; St. Andreasberg; 37444; Deutschland