Death by Lime: A Key West Culinary Cozy - Book 5 by Summer Prescott Page B

talking about the tall, hot guy?”
    Marilyn looked down and blushed. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she protested lamely.
    “Uh-huh…then why is your face turning pink,” the young woman grinned.
    “Warm in here today,” the shop owner fanned herself dramatically. Clearly a change of subject was in order. “Let’s tackle this baking, shall we?”
    “Of course,” Kelcie nodded knowingly.
    The two women spent the morning making Marilyn’s famous Key Lime pies, as well as cupcakes, filled strawberries, and their newest pastries, which had completely sold out before noon yesterday. Tiara came in after teaching her Yoga on the Beach class, and was ready to report to her mother the status of the shop’s finances.
    “So here it is…” she laid a handful of spreadsheets on the desk in front of her mother. “Profits have been consistently rising to a degree that if you’d like to expand in this building, or open a second location, you should be in a position to do that by the end of the year,” she announced proudly, showing Marilyn the figures.
    Marilyn shook her head in happy disbelief, tears welling in her eyes. “I never thought…” she said, unable to continue.
    Tiara grinned and hugged her mother. “I always knew that it was just a matter of time, Mom. You did this. You made this happen. I’m so proud of you.”
    “I’m the one who’s proud,” Marilyn said, wiping her eyes. “You’ve helped me so much with the books and the marketing and growth strategy…I couldn’t have done it without you.”
    “Sure you could’ve, it just would’ve taken way longer,” her daughter teased, lightening the mood. Both of them cracked up. “We have planning to do, but at the moment, I need to get up to the front to help customers, and you and Kelcie need to do your kitchen thing,” Tiara decreed, heading for the door.
    Marilyn lingered at her desk for a few minutes after her daughter left to open the shop. She’d come so far from the divorce-torn single mom who had made Key Lime pies in her tiny kitchen to keep her and her daughter alive. Now, her beautiful daughter was a college graduate, and her business was thriving. Life was good. Buoyed by the wave of self-confidence that Tiara’s good news had inspired, she picked up the phone and called the dashing Detective Bernard Cortland, who was more than willing to be bribed with a piece of her Key Lime pie.
    **
    “So do you have any idea who your admirer might be?” Detective Cortland asked, easing his fork into a luscious slab of pie.
    “No, I can’t think of anyone,” Kelcie shook her head. “It’s not like I’m a big flirt. The only places that I go are here, my apartment, and to my boyfriend’s place occasionally.”
    “You mentioned the coffee shop, do you go there every day?” he probed, savoring the tangy, gooey sweetness of his dessert.
    “Well, yeah, but the guy who works there doesn’t like girls, so he’s totally safe,” she explained.
    “Okay,” Bernard nodded. “Do you have any other activities?”
    “I try to go to Tiara’s Yoga on the Beach class whenever I wake up early enough, but other than that, and a few trips to the library, I’m pretty much a homebody,” she shrugged.
    “Do you volunteer at the library?”
    “No, I’m a book junkie,” she confessed with a smile. “I have a handful of favorite authors and I read everything that they write.”
    “Well, it certainly sounds like you don’t live a high-risk lifestyle, but there are a few things that you can do to minimize your exposure. Often, things like this have a tendency to just go away on their own. Unreturned love isn’t much fun, so the admirer tires of the game and moves on to something else. There are cases, however, where the obsessive behavior escalates, and, I don’t want to scare you, but when that happens, it can be dangerous.”
    Kelcie’s eyes widened at the detective’s warning. “So, what should I do?” she asked