Gourmet Holiday Murder: Book 6 in Papa Pacelli's Pizzeria Series Read online

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  GOURMET HOLIDAY MURDER

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  EPILOGUE

  Gourmet

  Holiday

  Murder

  Book Six

  in

  Papa Pacelli’s

  Pizzeria Series

  By

  Patti Benning

  Copyright 2016 Summer Prescott Books

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication nor any of the information herein may be quoted from, nor reproduced, in any form, including but not limited to: printing, scanning, photocopying or any other printed, digital, or audio formats, without prior express written consent of the copyright holder.

  **This book is a work of fiction. Any similarities to persons, living or dead, places of business, or situations past or present, is completely unintentional.

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  GOURMET HOLIDAY

  MURDER

  Book Six in Papa Pacelli’s Pizzeria Series

  CHAPTER ONE

  * * *

  Eleanora Pacelli pulled her hat down more tightly on her head, partly to hide the faint bruise from her fall off a roof a couple weeks ago, but mainly to keep the icy wind from biting at her ears. December had hit northern Maine with a vengeance, and the warm days of summer already seemed like a faraway dream.

  “So, what do you think?” she asked, shoving her hands deep into her jacket pockets as another gust of wind assaulted her. Powdery snow lifted from the ground and blew across the sidewalk in front of her.

  “You’re sure you don’t want to wait until spring to do this?” the contractor asked. George Walsh was a tall, thin man with a slightly threadbare jacket. He had a habit of tapping his fingers together that Ellie found not annoying, exactly, but distracting. They were standing behind the pizzeria, near the employee entrance, gazing at the back wall, a wall that Ellie felt she now knew as well as the back of her own hand.

  Ellie nodded. “I think a drive-up window will help keep sales up even when it’s freezing out. The way things are set up now, people either have to park in the back and walk all the way around the block to the front entrance, or try to find a spot to park along Main Street. No one wants to walk further than they have to when it’s cold. This way, customers will be able to drive right up to the window and pick up their pizza without leaving their car.”

  “Well, it’s doable,” he said, giving the brick wall next to the employee entrance an appraising look. “It’s going to cost you more right now, though, it being the off season and all. It would be less expensive for you to schedule something for the spring or summer.”

  “I know, but I think it will give our sales a bump over the winter,” Ellie said, biting back a sigh. She didn’t have to justify herself to this man. All she wanted was an estimate. “My hope is that it pays for itself by spring. I’ve already got estimates from a few contractors. You’re actually the last I’m seeing before I make a decision, so it shouldn’t take long for me to get back to you.”

  “Right, well I can give you a rough quote now. You’re probably looking at least…” he told her the number. Ellie nodded. It wasn’t the highest she had heard over the last few days, but it wasn’t the lowest either. Of course, she wanted to make sure that work that she was getting done was quality work, so she wouldn’t be making her decision solely on the quoted price. Mr. Walsh was still in the running.

  “Thanks,” she told him. “I’ll give you a call by tomorrow evening, all right? I’ll let you know either way. I really appreciate you meeting me out here on such short notice like this.”

  “Thank you for considering my company,” he said, shaking her hand. “I look forward to hearing from you, Ms. Pacelli.”

  Ellie went back inside the building with relief. It was already freezing outside, even though winter didn’t officially start for another couple of weeks. She was not looking forward to the frigid weather of late December and January. Why couldn’t Nonna have lived somewhere warm? If only she and Papa had decided to retire somewhere nice, like most people, then I could be running a pizza shop in Florida right now…

  Still, she couldn’t complain. Just months ago, she had lost everything—her fiancé, her apartment, and the career she had worked so hard for over half her adult life. She had thought that she had hit rock bottom, but had another dose of bad news when she found out that her paternal grandfather had died. Her move back to Maine to care for her elderly and now-alone grandmother, however, had been a blessing in disguise. She was glad that she was getting the chance to spend time with Nonna, even if it just made her regret even more her distance from this side of her family for so many years.

  Spending time with Nonna wasn’t the only good thing that had come of her return to Kittiport. She had been handed a full-time job—managing the pizzeria—on a silver platter, and just weeks ago had been given full legal control of the restaurant by her grandmother. It was still hard to believe that she was a business owner. The addition of a drive-up window was her way of trying to make it all seem real. It was her first major change as the new owner of Papa Pacelli’s. She just hoped that it didn’t end up being a flop.

  “How’d it go?” one of her employees asked as she shut the door behind her.

  “The price he gave me was about mid-range,” she told him as she pulled off her hat. “I’m going to have to take a look at his website again, and see if I can find any reviews about him online. I think it’s a tie between him and that guy we had in yesterday.”

  Jacob Stevens was a lanky young man who had been working at the pizzeria for longer than Ellie had been there. At the moment, he was busy mixing up another batch of pizza dough—an endless task that any of them could do with their eyes closed.

  “The one who said this place has the best pizza he’d ever eaten in his life?” he asked.

  “That’s the one.” Ellie grinned, remembering. “Really, it’s the fact that he said he hates Cheesaroni Calzones that won me ove
r. Anyone who doesn’t like them has got to be a good guy.”

  Cheesaroni Calzones was her main competition in town. The man who owned it, Jeffrey Dunham, had hated her since the moment they met, and had tried to sabotage the pizzeria a few times in the past. His right-hand man, Xavier Hurst, had once been Papa Pacelli’s manager; Ellie had fired him when she discovered that he had stolen thousands of dollars from her grandfather. As far as she was concerned, someone who shared her dislike of the two men deserved the benefit of the doubt.

  “Did I hear someone mention Cheesaroni?” asked a young woman who had just pushed through the door to the kitchen. Iris was the newest addition to the team at the pizzeria, and Ellie was still getting used to her outlandish sense of style. Today, her short hair was dark red with bright purple tips, and her chipped nail polish was a bilious neon green. She looked like she belonged in a dance club, not a family-friendly pizza restaurant, but she had a bubbly energy and an earnestness that Ellie had immediately taken to. So far, she hadn’t had any reason to regret hiring the woman.

  “We were just talking about how Ms. Pacelli’s probably going to hire the guy who said he didn’t like them,” Jacob told her, going back to his dough.

  “Well, he also gave me the second lowest quote,” Ellie said a bit defensively. “The one who had the lowest quote never called me back after I asked for references, so I’m not going to take a chance on him.”

  “When do you think construction will start?” Iris asked as she washed her hands at the sink.

  “I’m hoping sometime next week,” the pizzeria owner told her. “It shouldn’t take too long; they’re just cutting a window in the side of the building, installing some glass, and putting an awning up. We’ll probably have to shut down for two days at the most.” She wasn’t even going to try to keep the pizzeria up and running while the construction company was working on the window. She doubted her employees would want to work with a gaping hole in one of the kitchen walls, not to mention the fact that getting drywall dust all over the pizzas wouldn’t exactly help the restaurant’s reputation. It would be nice to take a few days off and spend some time at home with the woman who had made all this possible.

  Ellie’s grandmother, Ann Pacelli, had inspired her to install the window. She was still wearing a sling for her broken arm, and had complained about how difficult it was for her to carry out pizzas one-handed. Jokingly, Ellie had suggested that they install a drive-through window to make it easier for her, but the idea had taken hold and seemed to grow on its own. She was toying with the idea of adding an outdoor eating area as well, but that could wait until summer. For now, all she wanted was to make it as easy as possible for her customers to pick up pizzas during the frigid Maine winter. Her goal was to exceed her grandfather’s sales record by midsummer. From there, who knew where the pizzeria would go?

  As the sun sank in the sky and Papa Pacelli’s began to draw in more customers as people got off work, Ellie pushed the upcoming construction project out of her mind and turned her thoughts instead to what she was going to do for Christmas. She felt torn between her grandmother and her mother. The latter had left her a voicemail inviting her back to the Midwest to spend the holidays at her house. She was tempted to go, but she knew that would likely mean leaving her grandmother behind to celebrate Christmas on her own. Though Nonna had invited both of her children to come over for dinner on Christmas Eve, Ellie doubted that either would show up.

  It was a tough decision to make, but in the end, she knew that she wouldn’t be able to leave her grandmother alone over the holidays. Besides the fact that she firmly believed no one should be alone over Christmas, the memory of Nonna’s fall down the stairs a few weeks ago was still fresh in her head. Even with the older woman’s friends checking on her, there would be too much opportunity for something similar to happen while no one was there. Still, she wasn’t looking forward to her calling her mother back with the news that she wasn’t coming over for Christmas.

  “I’ll have to figure something else out for next year,” she muttered as she slid a bacon and spinach pizza onto a platter for one of their eat-in customers. “Life is never simple.”

  “Huh? Sorry, Ms. P., I didn’t catch that,” Jacob said. He had just come in from a delivery, and was shrugging off a snowy jacket.

  “Just talking to myself, Jacob,” she said. “Did it start snowing again?” She knew the road out to the Pacelli house likely wouldn’t be plowed until morning. Hopefully her little car would be able to make it home without sliding into a ditch. The cellphone service out there was spotty enough that she didn’t like her chances of getting rescued.

  “It’s just the wind kicking snow up,” he said. “The sky’s clear, but the snow is drifting onto the road. I’m not looking forward to taking the next delivery out.”

  “I can tell Iris to stop taking delivery orders, if you don’t feel safe driving in this weather,” Ellie offered. “The last thing I want is for you to get in an accident.”

  He considered it for a moment, then shook his head. “Thanks for offering, but I’ll be fine. The weather’s going to get a lot worse this winter. Plus, I could use the tips.”

  By the time Ellie brought the spinach and bacon pizza out to her guests, she had a whole new set of worries resting on her shoulders. She didn’t like the idea of sending her employees out to deliver pizzas when the roads were dangerous. She would have to look into creating a new policy—maybe she would stop all deliveries if there was more than a certain number of inches of snow on the ground, or during winter weather warnings. She was responsible for her employees’ safety, and knew she would never forgive herself if something happened to one of them on her watch.

  “One large thin-crust bacon and spinach pizza with white sauce,” she said as she set the pizza tray down on the table. “Is there anything else I can get you?”

  “I think this is it, thanks.” The middle-aged woman smiled as her teenage daughter pulled a slice of pizza off of the platter. “I love what you’ve done with this place. The Christmas decorations are gorgeous, though I do miss those little turkeys you had on the tables over Thanksgiving.”

  “Thanks. I love decorating for the holidays,” Ellie said with a smile. “It can be a lot of work, but I think it really helps get people in the mood to celebrate.”

  She paused on the way back to the kitchen and admired the pizzeria, trying to see it as her customers did. There were green, red, and white Christmas lights lining the display window at the front of the room, as well as a strand of lights along the edge of the counter where the register sat. A fake tree that had been decorated by her employees took up the corner next to the soda fridge, and she had small figurines of Santa and his reindeer on each of the tables.

  My home away from home, she thought, feeling a burst of affection for the pizzeria. Running the place wasn’t always easy, but it was definitely worth it.

  CHAPTER TWO

  * * *

  The Pacelli house was a big colonial to the north of town. It faced the coast, and sat at the edge of a state park. With the ocean in front of it, and tall pines behind it, Ellie was constantly surrounded by as much nature as she could ever want. Truth be told, she could have done without the dark, looming trees and the bitterly cold sea winds, but there was something to be said for the privacy and peace that came with living away from town.

  The interior of the house was clean and well decorated, and right now smelled of reheated Thanksgiving food. Bunny, Ellie’s black-and-white papillon, was staring up at an old woman sitting hunched over her food at the breakfast nook in the kitchen, while Ellie took a plate out of the microwave.

  “I never thought I’d be tired of turkey and stuffing,” Ellie said. “But I’m getting there. You cooked for an army, Nonna.”

  “Well, I didn’t want all of the food that I bought to go to waste. If I had known that you would spend the holiday in the hospital, I would have only bought enough groceries for the two of us.”

  “I can’t co
mplain. It’s good cooking.” Ellie took a seat next to the older woman, doing her best to ignore Bunny, who was now gazing up at her hopefully.

  “How is the work on the pizzeria coming?” Nonna asked.

  “Not bad. I decided which contractor to use yesterday. The work should start soon.”

  “Isn’t your friend’s husband a contractor?”

  Ellie knew she meant James Ward, who was married to her best friend Shannon. She had gone on a couple dates with his brother, the sheriff. Russell Ward couldn’t have been more different from James, and she found it easy to forget the two were related. They might not have looked much like brothers, but they were both good men to the core.

  “James is a contractor, but he just accepted a big job. Shannon offered to tell him I was looking for someone, but I didn’t want to bother him. It’s just a little window that needs to be put in. He’s so nice, that I know he would offer to do it, but I’m sure he’s got more important things on his plate.”

  “That’s very thoughtful of you,” Nonna said, giving her hand a pat. “You’re such a kind person, Ellie. I don’t know what I’d do without you. I really appreciate you coming to stay here with me. I don’t think I say that enough.”

  “Well, I’m happy to be here,” Ellie said. It was true. Returning to Kittiport had been like coming home after a long vacation. The little town on the coast of Maine was where she belonged; she felt it in her heart.

  After lunch, the older woman retired to her room and Ellie did something she had never done before; she clipped the leash onto Bunny’s collar, got into her car, and drove to the nearest entrance to the state park that bordered her grandmother’s property. It was a beautiful day—clear and still, with the sun glittering off snow-covered trees—and she wanted to enjoy it to the fullest.