travels led him down a stretch of deserted cobblestones. The street was quiet, secluded, frozen over in white. Everything was set now, except for the gloves.
Thick with insulation, the gloves had provided warmth to spare on this long, cold slog, but now they posed a problem. Any padding between trigger and guard could make life difficult—or death, in this case.
So off came the right glove. A bit of anxious sweat on the fingertips slickened the surface of the pocketed weapon. The seasonal weather swiftly solved that glitch.
Icy metal. My new best friend . . .
Impatient now, the shooter moved to finish the job. Then this ridiculous getup could be discarded, replaced with personal outerwear—garments now sitting inside the newly purchased gym bag, which would also be tossed.
Next the gun would be wiped clean and carefully placed. Finally, the alibi would be established, an appearance at a public place, one previously frequented. A register receipt would confirm date and time.
And speaking of time . . .
The shooter’s big boots crunched firmly through the sidewalk snow. The air was cold but blood turned colder when stiff fingers tightened around frosty metal.
It’s time to end this problem, the shooter thought. Time to silence forever the rest of Santa’s nights . . .
ONE
“WHAT does Christmas taste like?” “What does Christmas taste like?”
That was the question I’d posed to my top baristas the night I discovered Alf Glockner’s body. Until I stumbled over the man’s remains, however, I hadn’t been thinking about murder or corpses or crime-scene evidence. My mood hadn’t plummeted; my worries hadn’t started; my buoyant holiday spirits hadn’t crashed through the floor.
I, Clare Cosi—single mother of a grown daughter and manager of the landmark Village Blend—still believed this was a season for celebrating. Which was why, on that particular December evening, my mind was not focused on clues or suspects or the riskier aspects of defying a cocky NYPD sergeant, but on the much simpler problem of my shop’s bottom line. Hence the question to my staff—
What does Christmas taste like?
“Well, nutmeg’s a must,” Tucker replied.
An itinerate actor-playwright and my most reliable employee, Tucker Burton was lanky as a floor lamp, his lean form topped by a defining shock of floppy brown hair. Sitting across from me in our empty coffeehouse, he tossed back the signature hair and added—
“Cloves. And cinnamon. Definitely cinnamon.”
“Festive spices all,” I agreed. “But we’ve got them covered—” Turning in my chair, I tipped my pen toward the chalkboard behind the espresso bar. “Our Eggnog Latte’s got the nutmeg; the Caramel Apple Pie is loaded with cinnamon; the Pumpkin Spice includes all three—”
And that was the problem.
Those drinks had been on the Village Blend’s seasonal menu for years now, and they were starting to feel tired. With the sluggish economy taking its toll on everyone’s wallets (mine included), I needed to accelerate the ringing of our registers before we rang in the New Year. And, yes, I had a strategy.
Later tonight, I was holding a private latte-tasting party; and first thing tomorrow I planned to place a new menu of tempting holiday coffee drinks on a sidewalk chalkboard in front of the coffeehouse. I even had an Excel spreadsheet ready to go. Come January, after the halls were no longer decked and Santa had sent his red velvet suit to the cleaners, I’d start analyzing our sales results to get a handle on the better-selling flavors for next year.
“What else tastes like Christmas?” I repeated. “Come on, people, think back to your childhoods!”
My own foodie memories were as treasured as that over-used reference to Proust’s madeleine—from my grandmother’s anisette-flavored biscotti to the candied orange peels in her panettone. And, of course, there was her traditional struffoli: I could still see those cellophane-wrapped plates lined up in Nonna’s little Pennsylvania grocery, the golden balls of honey-drenched dough mounded into tiny Italian Christmas trees (just waiting to help make me the chunky monkey I’d been until my midteens).
Unfortunately for me, Fried Dough Latte just didn’t sound like a winning menu item.
“What I remember is the pralines,” Tucker said.
“Pecan pralines?” I assumed, because he’d been raised in Louisiana.
“Of course. Every year, our next-door neighbor made them from scratch and gave them out as presents. Another woman on the block was German, and she made up these delicious gift tins of frosted gingerbread cookies—”
“Pfeffernüsse?” I asked. “Lebkuchen?”
“Gesundheit.” Tucker replied. “Of course, my own mama, being a former Hollywood film extra, was obsessed with Bing Crosby and White Christmas, so we had all