Dark Chocolate Murder Read online

  “You don’t sound too happy about that,” Justin observed, snickering.

  Indignantly, Belinda replied, “Well, it’s not a very stimulating job.”

  “What would you rather be doing?” Justin asked bluntly.

  Belinda replied without hesitation, “Baking.”

  The admission sent her into a series of mental flashbacks of her former life. Before her marriage to Daniel, Belinda had worked as a pastry chef for one of the most posh hotels in Boston. She had adored every aspect of that job, especially the creative flow of energy from blending ingredients and whipping up indulgent treats. As a pastry artist, she had delighted in inventing new sweets to surprise customers with, like chocolate covered brie cheese bites and vanilla bean cake infused with Chardonnay. When she quit, Belinda had been on the verge of receiving a promotion from lowly Sous Chef to Executive Pastry Chef.

  Daniel, whom she had only been dating for three months at the time, reacted disapprovingly to the news of her pending promotion. He had convinced her that the hours would be too long and erratic. He told her he was ready to settle down and wanted a wife with a nine to five job. At 33 and eager to marry, Belinda had quit her job at the hotel and fallen prey to the corporate grind. Even during the best days of her marriage, the few that there were, Belinda had regretted the decision. Since her divorce, Belinda was slowly becoming embittered from her bland job and didn’t like the taste at all.

  “Baking?” Justin repeated, amused. “Gotta watch the waistline.”

  Belinda flinched. Although she was not slender, she considered her body beautiful. She was proud to be shaped like the voluptuous Hollywood stars of yesteryear who looked like women, not malnourished stick figures.

  “My waistline is just fine, thank you,” Belinda said with a false smile. “I guess you prefer the waif supermodel type?”

  “Can’t blame a man, can you?”

  Belinda didn’t respond, but instead chose to remember all the catcalls and doting attention she had received from men over the years, men who went gaga over her lush curves.

  “Let’s order,” Belinda clipped.

  As she stared at the menu, she dared to revisit a dream she hadn’t contemplated in years. Tucked away in the hidden recesses of her mind was a fantasy that seemed too incredible to ever happen. Opening my own chocolate shop. The words danced around playfully in her head, and she smiled at the prospect of it. Then she frowned, wondering all of a sudden what was holding her back. She was single again, had a fair amount of money saved, and was stuck in a job she deplored. What’s stopping me?

  Years of watching The Oprah Winfrey Show had taught her the importance of a woman’s “aha moment.” She felt very strongly that she was having one of those right now, in this stuffy restaurant, sitting across from a man she wanted to send on a boat to Antarctica.

  What’s stopping me? The question would not leave her alone. All throughout the painful dinner date, that one question silently tugged at Belinda as though leading her to some unknown but inevitable place in the future.

  *****

  “Bonjour, ma soeur,” Belinda greeted her younger sister, Crystal, for their weekly Sunday phone call.

  Across the Atlantic Ocean, Crystal replied, “Bonjour! Tu me manques beaucoup.”

  “I miss you so much, too,” Belinda answered sadly.

  Ever since Crystal had married a French businessman and moved to Monaco two years ago, the sisters had only seen each other once. Crystal and her husband, Jean-Jacques, had flown into Boston to attend a relative’s wedding. But since then, the close-knit sisters had been forced to communicate only by phone, kept apart by thousands of miles and different time zones.

  “Then why don’t you finally visit?” Crystal implored. “You need a vacation! When was the last time you took any time off from work?”

  Belinda reflected on that for a moment. The last day off she had was in February when she came down with a nasty cold. But before that? She couldn’t remember. And the memory of a vacation was even hazier. Belinda thought in disbelief how her last vacation had been…her honeymoon? Was that right? She and Daniel had gotten off to a rocky start on their stressful honeymoon in Wyoming. Pigheaded Daniel had insisted on going camping and roughing it in the wilderness. Belinda loved nature but had always pictured her honeymoon in a more romantic and relaxing venue than the inside of a vinyl tent.

  “You know, I do need a vacation! And I would love to see Monaco. Maybe I could even kick my high school French up a notch,” she laughed.

  “That’s my girl! Let’s plan your trip right now!” Crystal enthused.

  “Slow down, Crystal. Actually, I wanted to talk to you about something.”

  “Is Daniel bothering you again? Tell him you don’t want to get back together!” Crystal said harshly.

  Crystal despised her former brother-in-law. First, the bozo had made Belinda give up her dream job, then he had verbally abused her all throughout the marriage, calling her ‘lardass’ and other demeaning names. In Crystal’s estimation, Daniel had gotten exactly what he had coming to him when Belinda finally served him with divorce papers.

  “No, no, it’s nothing about Daniel. He knows we’re not getting back together. I wanted to talk to you about making a change in my life,” she spoke slowly, unsure of how the word ‘change’ would sound out loud when she said it. Other than for her divorce, change had been a foreign concept to her for many years.

  “Go on,” Crystal urged, her interest piqued.

  Belinda drew in a deep breath. “You know how I’ve always wanted to open my own chocolate shop?”

  “Yes!” Crystal cried, immediately sensing where Belinda was heading and feeling an irrational excitement for her.

  “Well, I think I’m finally going to do it. After all, what’s stopping me?” Belinda repeated the question that had haunted her during the appalling blind date and followed her into her dreams later that night.

  “That’s what I’ve always said! What’s stopping you? Nothing and nobody! Oh, I’m so excited for you, Belinda! Where are you going to open it? And when?” Crystal demanded gleefully.

  “Well, I hadn’t thought about the particulars yet. I guess I would set up shop somewhere here in Boston. I’ll have to scope out locations and…”

  Crystal interrupted, “But you’re not happy in Boston. If you’re going to make a change, why don’t you go all the way?”

  “You mean move out of state?” Belinda asked, intrigued. The thought of leaving Massachusetts hadn’t occurred to her, but it was certainly an appealing idea. Most comfortable in a sundress and sandals, Belinda had always dreamed of living someplace warm and summery. Someplace like Monaco…

  Reading her sister’s mind, Crystal burst out, “Not just out of state! How about out of the country? You could move here!”

  “Oh, that’s ridiculous! I barely speak French and I don’t have a work permit. And you’ve told me how hard it is for foreigners to get approval to work in Monaco,” Belinda protested, although she whole-heartedly loved the idea and was already fantasizing about how she would tell Jerry that his reign of obnoxiousness was over.

  “It’s not hard when you have family living here! Jean-Jacques and I would help you every step of the way. We could even open the store in our name for legal purposes. You could just transfer the money to us to rent a storefront. We would be like your silent partners, but all the profits would be yours! Oh, Belinda, don’t say no!”

  Belinda laughed as her sister’s voice became squeaky with mounting eagerness. It would be hard to say no to such an enthusiastic invitation, but there were so many details to sort through.

  “How do you know that all this would be okay with Jean-Jacques?” Belinda asked.

  “I’ve got him wrapped around my little finger, and you know it,” Crystal boasted.

  It was true. Jean-Jacques was a very laid back man with a comfortable amount of wealth and a consuming love for his American wife. Belinda had no doubt that Crystal could persuade him to
help with this endeavor.

  “But what about the logistics? I mean, it would be such a complicated move,” Belinda argued, as years of self-defeat threatened to steal this opportunity from her.

  “Belinda, don’t worry about all that. Don’t overthink this. You’re finally ready to grasp your dream and it’s right here in front of you. Don’t let it slip away,” Crystal pressed on.

  Crystal’s encouragement was a powerful magnet that Belinda could not resist. She had allowed herself to be trapped in a status quo existence for far too long. How much older did she have to get before initiating a change in her life? Deliciously, she thought how exciting it would be to celebrate her 39 birthday on the French Riviera rather than in Boston. Her birthday was just two months away in May. Could she make this move happen in time? Or would she celebrate the swan song year of her thirties in an apartment she hated and at a job that made the word hate seem mild? At that moment, Belinda didn’t know how she was going to make it happen, but she knew she would. She had to. This May, she would blow out the candles on her birthday cake on a picnic blanket next to the Mediterranean Sea…

  “Are you still there? Belinda?” Crystal queried, wondering if she had been too pushy.

  “I’m here, Crystal. I was just thinking,” she replied in a daze.

  “You were thinking---AND?” Crystal demanded impatiently.

  “And you’re absolutely right. I’m going to do this. I’m going to move to Monaco and open a chocolate shop.”

  Crystal’s scream of delight pierced Belinda’s ear drum from across the continents. Despite her ringing ear, Belinda smiled, feeling strongly in her heart that she was making the right decision.

  “I can’t believe this! Oh, I’m so happy! Jean-Jacques and I will be there for you to make every detail picture perfect, I promise! Just go quit that heinous job and buy your plane ticket!”

  “Yes, I have to get a plane ticket. And there’s also the matter of going to the consulate and obtaining a visa…and I’m going to have to break the lease on my apartment…and put most of my stuff in storage or just donate it…and…” Belinda trailed off, suddenly feeling overwhelmed.

  Perceiving her sister’s signature apprehension, Crystal assured, “Yes, those details will all be taken care of. When something’s meant to be, things have a way of taking care of themselves. And I really feel this is meant to be.”

  “So do I,” Belinda replied huskily, believing the words with every morsel of faith she possessed.

  *****

  A volatile Nor’easter struck during the night, dumping more than a foot of snow on New England. Crankily, Belinda trudged in her snow boots to clean off her car the next morning. Jerry, inconsiderate as ever, hadn’t called for a delayed opening, and she would have to hustle to make it to work in time. Grabbing a shovel and digging out the crippling snow that had buried her car’s tires, she fantasized about how she would break the news to Jerry later that morning. Each swipe she took with the brush at her windshield made her wickedly wish she were hitting Jerry’s hot head. After half an hour of breathless exertion, Belinda finally dug her car out of the snow. Sopping wet from head to toe, she turned the heat up to full blast in the car, now fantasizing about balmy days and nights on the French Riviera.

  Chapter Two

  “Where’s my coffee?” Jerry tapped a pen on his desk impatiently as Belinda eyed him with detachment. “I asked for a blonde roast with sugar substitute.”

  Belinda was floored. Had the creep really expected her to make a coffee run in the aftermath of a colossal snowstorm? Then, it dawned on her: he was still capitalizing on the fact that her employee review was pending. Jerry generally didn’t ask her to fetch his morning java, but with her annual review creeping up, he had begun making all sorts of demeaning requests. The previous week Belinda had picked up the rat’s dry cleaning, delivered lunch to his office, and battled with the broke-down copy machine to make duplicates of his mortgage refinancing documents. This Monday morning, she was not inclined to do anything for the man. No, she would not do anything for him, but she would certainly tell him a mouthful…

  He stared at her with patronizing gray eyes from across his enormous oak desk, not having the slightest clue that his power over her was about to come to an abrupt end. Biting on his pen, he ground out like coffee beans, “I’m starting my week with a headache thanks to your incompetence. How difficult can it be to get a cup of coffee for the man who’s about to start writing your annual review?”

  Calmly, Belinda reached into her briefcase and retrieved a sheet of paper. Still completely oblivious to her purpose that morning, Jerry ranted on. “I must say, Belinda. Your review is looking worse and worse as we speak. I may even need to put you on probation. And you know what that means. No raise,” he spoke the last words on a note of rich satisfaction.

  Belinda sorely wished she had bought Jerry’s hot coffee so she could dump it over his head. But, clearing her throat, she reminded herself that she was the one with the power now, and she could wield it in a classy way that would make Jerry look like the small man he was.

  Glancing down meaningfully at the sheet in her hand, Belinda explained, “Jerry, this is my letter of resignation. As of today, I am giving you two weeks notice. My last day of employment here will be next Friday.”

  The pen Jerry had been chewing bled ink across his papery lips. He sputtered, searching in vain for a napkin to wipe his mouth with. Angrily, he rubbed his mouth on his sleeve as the black ink smeared his white business shirt.

  Feeling a pang of embarrassment for the imbecile, Belinda looked away and discreetly placed the letter on his desk. Rising to leave the office, she squared her shoulders and walked towards the door with newfound dignity. She didn’t recall ever holding such a posture in Jerry’s undermining presence.

  “Don’t ever ask me for a reference! You don’t even want to know what I would say about you!” He grimaced bitterly at her. “The job market is awful. You’ll come crawling back to Jerry before you know it! But Jerry won’t hire you back!”

  Belinda flinched as Jerry arrogantly referred to himself in the third person. More confident than ever that she was making the right choice, Belinda scurried to her cubicle to turn on the computer and start the day’s work. Grinning, she saw that Lenore was waiting for her at the cube.

  “Good morning, sunshine!” Belinda greeted her friend and gave her a spontaneous hug.

  Laughing, Lenore said, “That blind date must have been amazing!”

  “No, it was horrible,” Belinda answered with a broader smile.

  “Huh? Then why are you so happy this morning?” Lenore asked in confusion.

  “Well, for one, I just told Jerky I quit,” Belinda announced gleefully, placing a hand over her mouth to contain the giggles bubbling in her throat.

  “You what?! Girl, are you serious?” Lenore seemed flabbergasted but wore a smile to match Belinda’s.

  “Yup. I sure am. And do you know why I quit?”

  “Because Jerry is a you-know-what and your job is a joke,” Lenore supplied in a hushed tone.

  “That’s all true. But it’s not the reason I quit. Remember what I told you I always wanted to do with my life? Even before I got married?” Belinda hoped her friend would remember the wistful conversation they had shared over drinks last fall.

  A light of recognition instantly sparkled in Lenore’s pretty eyes as she replied, “Your chocolate shop! Yes, you’re going to do it?!”

  “I’m going to…” Belinda was about to say ‘try’ but swallowed the word. Affirmatively, she corrected, “Yes, I’m going to do it.”

  “Okay, I don’t know what happened to you between Friday and Monday, but I am loving the new Belinda Rockland. This is so overdue for you.” Lenore squeezed Belinda’s arm affectionately.