Sweet Revenge (Cocoa Narel Chocolate Shop Mysteries Book 1) by Morgana Best Page A

get himself well groomed. “Oh, Narel, there’s been another murder!” Carl hurried past me and I closed the door behind him. I followed him into the kitchen, where he turned on my coffee machine. He slumped over my countertop. “I just can’t believe it,” he said.
    “What happened?”
    “I don’t know where to start!”
    I sat at my little kitchen table. “Just start at the beginning.” My breath was coming short and hard, and I didn’t feel well. There must be a serial killer on the loose.
    “I couldn’t sleep very well last night,” Carl said. “You know I’m always like that after I eat a curry.”
    I nodded, and waved him on.
    “It was just awful, Narel.”
    “What was?”
    Carl shook his head. “I couldn’t sleep so I tried to get back to sleep, but I couldn’t, so I turned on the news. And there it was!”
    I wanted him to come to the point, but I knew that speaking would only delay matters, so I stayed silent.
    “And then I saw on the news that someone had been killed on the railway crossing.”
    “Who was it?” I said unable to keep silent any longer. “Was it someone we knew?”
    “Yes,” Carl said. “It was Hamilton Howes.” The coffee machine had now heated and Carl poured coffee into two mugs.
    I was somewhat in shock. “Hamilton Howes? That’s another of The Populars!”
    “Exactly,” Carl said. “Three Populars in a row.”
    I bit my fingernail. “I don’t mean to sound selfish at such a time as this, but I’m glad I was nowhere near him. This is the first of three murders that had nothing to do with me.”
    Carl and I sat in silence for a while. “How did you say he was killed?” I asked him after an interval. “Railway crossing? Was he in his car?”
    Carl shook his head. “That’s just it; the TV said a train hit him and didn’t mention the car. The reporter said that the driver and all the passengers weren’t hurt, but I suppose they wouldn’t be if they ran over a person and not a car.”
    I put my hands over my ears. “Stop, Carl! It’s just too gruesome!”
    Carl ignored my plea and continued. “Yes, it was gruesome all right! The TV showed what was left him being wheeled away on a gurney. That poor guy, his brown jeans were in such poor taste. My mother always said that if you don’t wear your best underwear, whatever would happen if you were run over, and then your underwear was on display for all the world to see? But poor Hamilton was wearing horrible brown clothes as outer clothes. The man had no taste, and now he’s dead.” He shook his head sadly. “The reporter said he was drunk, but I don’t know how she knew.”
    “The police probably told her,” I said. “No one in their right mind would stand on a railway line waiting for a train to get them.” Then a horrible thought came to me. “You don’t suppose he was tied to the lines somehow?”
    Carl looked shocked. “No, surely not. The reporter probably would’ve said if he had been. But it’s the northern crossing, the one with no lights, and it’s a long walk from town. What would he have been doing out there at night? It would’ve been dark, but he would’ve easily seen a train coming with its lights on, and all the noise and everything.”
    “Yes, he would’ve had to have been pretty drunk not to notice that.” I said. “And what was he doing on foot so far from town? You wouldn’t think it make it that far if he was drunk.”
    Carl drank a full cup of coffee before answering. “You know, we’re not making any sense because it’s so early in the morning and we haven’t had enough coffee yet. We’ve been talking as if it was an accident, but he was obviously murdered. Someone must have driven him to the train line and put him on the tracks. They must have got him extremely drunk or perhaps even drugged so he couldn’t move, because even a very drunk person would get out of the way if they saw a train coming for them.”
    “Yes, that does make sense,” I said.
    “We