Battered to Death (Daphne Martin Cake Mysteries) by Gayle Trent

anyhow. She’s probably like Beulah Breckinridge.”
    “Beulah Breckinridge?” I asked. “Who’s she?”
    “Oh, honey. Beulah Breckinridge always went around Brea Ridge like she’d just stepped out of a bandbox. She acted like her . . . well, like her bodily functions . . . smelled like rose petals—if you know what I mean—and that she was above all the rest of us. Well, one day Beulah was in a car wreck and broke her leg. Her dress was so tight that the EMTs had to cut the thing off of her. And wouldn’t you know it? Beulah Breckinridge’s panties were full of holes, and her bra was dingy.” Myra finished with a nod that indicated that this anecdote should make sense to me. It didn’t.
    “That makes Beulah like Clea because . . . ?”
    “Because she’s all flash and no substance,” Myra said. “She looks nice on the outside, but on the inside, she’s all holey panties and dingy bras.” She patted my shoulder. “Don’t you let her get to you.”
    “Okay,” I said, still unable to make much sense of Myra’s analogy. “I won’t.”
“And another thing—Mark and I are making some headway into this case.” She took my arm, pulled me away from the group, and lowered her voice. “First of all, we looked into that assault case where Jordan Richards’s wife dropped the charges. She also dropped him. She divorced him, and one website said she took a ton of money with her.”
    “Do you and Mark think she might’ve come here and confronted Chef Richards or something?” I asked.
    “We’re looking into it,” she said. “We’re also looking into the other woman whose fingerprints were on the cake stand.”
    “Pauline Wilson,” I said.
    “Yep,” said Myra. “In college, little Miss Pauline was a shoplifter. So, she has a darker side than you’d initially thought.”
    I inclined my head. “Just because she shoplifted a time or two when she was in college doesn’t mean she killed Chef Richards.”
    “No, but it shows you very good and well that she’s not all goody-goody either,” she said.
    China joined us. “I heard that last part about Pauline Wilson. Myra’s right, Daphne. All you know for sure is that you didn’t kill Jordan Richards. The only fingerprints on the murder weapon are yours and hers. You have to keep an open mind.”
    “I know,” I said. “I’ll keep an eye on her.”
    “So will I,” said Myra.
I glanced at my watch. “It’s almost time for me to get started in the timed cake competition. Four of us have an hour to decorate a cake with a beach theme using only the supplies we’ve been given. Wish me luck!”
    “Good luck,” Myra said. “I’ll be mingling to see what else I can find out.”
    “Me too,” China said.
    Knowing that Cagney and Lacey were on the case, I returned to Violet, Leslie, Alex, Molly, and Chris to let them know where I was going.
    “Ooh, I’m coming to watch,” Leslie said.
    “Alex, would you like to watch Daphne compete in the timed cake decorating competition?” Molly asked.
    Alex nodded. Behind his back, Molly gave me a thumbs-up. I thought that must mean we were making progress.
    As I walked toward the competition area, I overheard two celebrity chefs talking about Chef Richards.
    “Did you hear that somebody drowned him in cake batter?” the man asked. “If that’s not poetic justice, I don’t know what is.”
    “Poetic justice would’ve been if they’d drowned him nude in a bathtub filled with batter,” the woman said. “He was always quick to disgrace anyone he could. The tables would’ve really been turned on him then.”
    They both snickered.
“I just wonder who’s going to get that plum TV spot he’s giving up,” the man said.
    She grinned. “I hope it’s me.”
    “And I hope it’s me,” he said.
    “Hey, maybe they’ll pick us both,” she suggested.
    His mouth turned down at the corners. “You know, that’s not a bad idea. Let’s do a demo tape and send it in.”
    They were excitedly making