Duffy Brown's Blog: New Cozy Series - Posts Tagged "murder"

Reagan Summerside here and I think I’m losing my mind...bodies are going missing! How can this happen? I misplace stuff all the time like my keys and where the heck is my purse, I always misplace my purse—Old Yeller, big yellow plether thing that hold my life--but a body takes misplacing stuff to a whole new level.
It all started when I was cutting through a back alley to get to Walker Boone’s house. We just got engaged so I was taking a shortcut to get to his place fast. I would like to say I was in a hurry because I missed him and I did miss him but the fact is I had questions. I needed to know where were we going to live once we got married and who would do the cooking and what kind of toothpaste were we going to use? But that’s another issue and right now there’s a missing body.
When I was cutting thought the alley there was a white Caddy with a body in the back. At first I thought the person in the back was maybe a tired old soul needing a place to take a nap but no one sleeps with eyes open, right?
I would have stuck around to take a closer look but a big rat and bigger roach ganged up on me and I ran for it. When I bought Boone back to the car the body was gone.
Okay, this is all pretty bad but what makes the situation worse is that I know who owns the Caddy. It belongs to the Abbott sisters who live next door to me. They are adorable retired school teachers who supplement their income by being Savannah’s fave professional mourners. No one can get a funeral weeping like the sisters.

So what should I do? Call the cops? What if the sisters are responsible for that body? Then they’d be arrested and I can’t have my neighbors in jail now can I especially if they had a real good reason? Not neighborly at all. Should I just forget the whole thing like Boone suggests? He says I’m on dead-body overload from tripping across them all the time.
Got any suggestions? What would you do if you found a body and then it went missing? Here’s a recipe for one of Auntie KiKi’s martinis to help you find an answer.
Lethal In Old Lace
Consignment Shop Mysteries
Duffy Brown.

Auntie KiKi’s Death by Chocolate Martini
Chocolate martini for when you need both chocolate and a martini

1 1/2 ounces chocolate liqueur
1 1/2 ounces Creme de Cacao
1/2 ounce vanilla vodka
2 1/2 ounces half-and-half
chocolate syrup, for rim


Mix all ingredients in a cocktail shaker filled with ice and shake.
Pour into a chilled cocktail glass rimmed with chocolate syrup. Add cherry skewered on toothpick. Does that sound delicious or what!

Evie Bloomfield here from Tandem Demise, third book in the Cycle Path Mysteries. Tandem DemiseI’ve come to Mackinac Island from Chicago. Some of my friends say that one place is just like another but they are so wrong. So I gave them instructions. This is how you know you are on Mackinac Island and you are so not in Chicago.
... if you have ever gotten frostbitten and sunburned in the same week. (though truth be told this could be Chicago too)
... if you can identify an Ohio accent.
…if you don’t need car insurance
…if a fender bender is a two-bike crash
... if you learned to pilot a boat before the training wheels were off your bike.
... if you point at the palm of your right hand when telling people where you live
... if "Down South" means Toledo.
... if a Big Mac is something you can drive across.
... if you have no problem spelling Mackinac Island.
... if you have as many Canadian coins in your pockets as American ones.
... if the trees in your backyard have spigots.
... if you know that a place called "Kalamazoo" really exists.
... if you bake with "soda" and drink "pop".
... if you know what a pastie is.
... if you know how to play Euchre.
... if fudge and bicycles remind you of home sweet home.
... if you can name all 5 of the Great Lakes, and point to their locations around your left and right hands.
... if you know that Pontiac and Cadillac are cities.
... if you can actually pronounce Ypsilanti.
... if you own only three spices - salt, pepper and ketchup.
... if you design your Halloween costumes to fit over a snowsuit.
... if you keep track of the miles you put on your snow blower.
... if you think everyone from the city has an accent.
... if you think sexy lingerie is tube socks and a flannel nightie.
... if your snow blower gets stuck on the roof.
…if you save your Christmas tree to help mark the path across a frozen lake for the snow mobiles
... if summer takes place the second week of July
... if you find -20F a little chilly.
... if the kids drive to school in a snow mobile.
... if you know the 4 seasons: Winter, Still Winter, Almost Winter, and Yesterday was summer.
... if you consider it a sport to gather your food by drilling through 18 inches of ice and sitting there all day hoping that the food will swim by.
... you know the day the horses get off the ferry and return to the island
... if you have worn shorts and a coat at the same time.
... if you often switch from "heat" to "A/C" in the same day.
... if you see people wearing camouflage at social events (including weddings.)
... if down South to you means Ohio.
... if you go out to a fish fry every Friday.
…if the whole town is 500 people strong
... if you know what a Yooper is.
... if you know that UP is a place, not a direction.
... if you know it's possible to live in a thumb.