Sugar Coated Sins by Jessica Beck

herself by running away.”
    “I told Trish that.   She promised to tell me the moment Hilda got
in touch with her, and she also vowed to plead with her to come back to April
Springs.”
    “Do you believe her?” Jake asked
me.
    “Trish?   With all my heart.   If she says that she’ll do something, you can
take it to the bank.   It may seem as
though we’re on opposite sides of this, but I trust her.”
    “Then that’s good enough for me.”   After a few more swings, he added, “Not that
I won’t pursue Hilda on my own.   I can’t
depend on her good intentions.”
    “What are you going to do?”
    “It’s urgent that I speak with
her, Suzanne.   She’s a person of interest
in a murder, no matter how long ago it occurred.   My hands are tied.”
    “I realize that.   I just hope she comes back on her own.”
    “So do I.”
    “How did it go with Judge Hurley?”
I asked. “Or are you allowed to say?”
    “If he’d given me anything
substantive, I might be tempted to keep it to myself, but he barely talked to
me two minutes.   When he realized what I
was asking him about, he suddenly remembered an important engagement.   Don’t worry.   I’ll corner him yet.”
    “Would you like any help with
that?” I asked.
    “No, at least not yet,” he replied.
    “Have you spoken with Benjamin’s
sister yet?”
    “She’s coming by the station
tomorrow.   She was in meetings today that
she couldn’t postpone, and I figured our interview could wait,” Jake said.   “So, what’s on tap for you and Grace
tomorrow?”
    “Well, I’m not entirely sure about
her, but as far as I’m concerned, I’m going to be making donuts, just like
always.”
    “I mean after that,” he prodded.
    “At this point, I’m not really
sure.   That’s the good thing about donut
making, though.   It gives me plenty of
time to think.”
    “Well, keep me posted,” Jake said,
and then he stretched and looked at his watch.   “Shouldn’t you be going to bed about now?”
    “I can stay out a few more
minutes,” I said.   Our shifts were at
such crazy odds that I didn’t get nearly enough time with my husband.   So what if I stole a little sleep from the
night?   I’d manage to get through it, and
in the meantime, I’d be able to spend a little more time with Jake.
    Soon enough though, I headed off
to bed despite my intentions.   After all,
I had a big day ahead of me.   After
making donuts all morning, I planned on digging back into Benjamin Port’s life
to see if I could figure out who had poisoned him on purpose.

 
    “What are those?” Emma asked me
the next morning in the kitchen of Donut Hearts when she came in.
    I’d been playing with ideas for
new ways to present yeast donuts, and I was having fun with my latest
creations.   “They’re nut-shaped donuts,”
I said.   “First I cut the donuts into
squares instead of using my rolling circle cutter, and then I lop off diagonal
corners to make them look like nuts.   What do you think?”
    “They’re cool,” she said.   “You should make bolt-shaped ones to go with
them.”
    “Boy, we both need to get lives
outside of the donut shop, don’t we?” I asked her with a grin.
    “I don’t know.   I’ve tried the outside world, and personally,
I like it here.”
    “Truth be told, I do too.”
    After I finished making my cuts, I
had a good amount of leftover dough, so I combined it all into a ball, rolled
it out until it was about a quarter of an inch, and then cut it into small
strips.   On a whim, I braided three
strips together and set them aside as well.   Why not have a little fun?   After
all, this was one of the spur-of-the-moment creations I liked to come up with
every now and then.   Emma’s forte for
experimentation came to the coffee we served, but after a particularly bad
combination a month before, we were sticking to our regular roasts for a while.
    The rest of our prep went
normally, and when we were ready to open the