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  Praise for

  Red Velvet Revenge

  “With a rodeo, a road trip, and the delectable title Red Velvet Revenge, the Fairy Tale Cupcake bakers are back, lassoed into big trouble this time. You’re in for a real treat with Jenn McKinlay’s Cupcake Bakery Mystery. I gobbled it right up.”

  —Julie Hyzy, bestselling author of the Manor House Mysteries and White House Chef Mysteries

  “Sure as shootin’, Red Velvet Revenge pops with fun and great twists. Wrangle up some time to enjoy the atmosphere of a real rodeo as well as family drama. It’s better than icing on the tastiest cupcake.”

  —Avery Aames, author of Clobbered by Camembert

  Buttercream Bump Off

  “A charmingly entertaining story paired with a luscious assortment of cupcake recipes that, when combined, make for a deliciously thrilling mystery.”

  —Fresh Fiction

  “It is the characters and their interaction and dialogue that make this a standout mystery…Buttercream Bump Off is another tasty entry, complete with cupcake recipes, into what is sure to grow into a perennial favorite series.”

  —The Mystery Reader

  “A hilarious story with smart heroines…If this series doesn’t leave you hungry for more of Melanie and Angie, or for a baker’s dozen of cupcakes, then shame on you!”

  —The Romance Readers Connection

  Sprinkle with Murder

  “A tender cozy full of warm and likable characters and a refreshingly sympathetic murder victim. Readers will look forward to more of McKinlay’s tasty concoctions.”

  —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

  “McKinlay’s debut mystery flows as smoothly as Melanie Cooper’s buttercream frosting. Her characters are delicious, and the dash of romance is just the icing on the cake.”

  —Sheila Connolly, author of Fire Engine Dead

  “Jenn McKinlay delivers all the ingredients for a winning read. Frost me another!”

  —Cleo Coyle, national bestselling author of the Coffeehouse Mysteries

  “A delicious new series featuring a spirited heroine, luscious cupcakes, and a clever murder. Jenn McKinlay has baked a sweet read.”

  —Krista Davis, author of the Domestic Diva Mysteries

  Berkley Prime Crime titles by Jenn McKinlay

  Cupcake Bakery Mysteries

  SPRINKLE WITH MURDER

  BUTTERCREAM BUMP OFF

  DEATH BY THE DOZEN

  RED VELVET REVENGE

  Library Lover’s Mysteries

  BOOKS CAN BE DECEIVING

  DUE OR DIE

  Red

  Velvet

  Revenge

  Jenn McKinlay

  BERKLEY PRIME CRIME, NEW YORK

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) • Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England • Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.) • Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.) • Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India • Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.) • Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE: The recipes contained in this book are to be followed exactly as written. The publisher is not responsible for your specific health or allergy needs that may require medical supervision. The publisher is not responsible for any adverse reactions to the recipes contained in this book.

  RED VELVET REVENGE

  A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with the author

  PUBLISHING HISTORY

  Berkley Prime Crime mass-market edition / July 2012

  Copyright © 2012 by Jennifer McKinlay Orf.

  Excerpt from Going, Going, Ganache by Jenn McKinlay copyright © 2012 by Jennifer McKinlay Orf.

  Cover illustration by Jeff Fitz-Maurice.

  Cover design by Lesley Worrell.

  Interior text design by Laura K. Corless.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  ISBN: 978-1-101-58111-7

  BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME

  Berkley Prime Crime Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME and the PRIME CRIME logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  ALWAYS LEARNING

  PEARSON

  For Lynne and Bob Orf,

  the best in-laws a girl could ever have.

  I feel very lucky to be a part of your family.

  Acknowledgments

  First, here’s a shout out to Daneen Holcomb, who came up with the fabulous title Red Velvet Revenge. Well done! Also, I have to thank the artist, Jeff Fitz-Maurice, who created this spectacular cover. I want to go there now.

  As always, I need to thank my fans (best fans ever) for joining in the fun and making the Cupcake Bakery Mysteries national bestsellers! Truly amazing!

  For always helping me get to the finish line, I want to thank Jessica Faust, Kate Seaver, and Katherine Pelz.

  And lastly, a big thank you to my families, the McKinlays and the Orfs, and to my dudes Beckett, Wyatt, and Chris—this would mean nothing without all of you.

  Red

  Velvet

  Revenge

  Table of Contents

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-one

  Twenty-two

  Twenty-three

  Twenty-four

  Twenty-five

  Twenty-six

  Twenty-seven

  Twenty-eight

  Twenty-nine

  Thirty

  Th
irty-one

  Thirty-two

  Recipes

  Going, Going, Ganache

  One

  “What are we going to do about the business?” Angie DeLaura asked. She was sitting across the table from Melanie Cooper, dishing up her 23 Skidoo sundae while Mel sipped on her Camelback soda.

  They had escaped their cupcake bakery, leaving it under the supervision of their two employees, and were sitting in the Sugar Bowl, Scottsdale’s landmark ice cream shop. Mel always had the Camelback soda, vanilla ice cream scooped into old-fashioned soda with a pitcher of extra soda water on the side; it was her longtime favorite.

  She glanced around the pink and chrome interior and noted that the Sugar Bowl hadn’t seemed to age a day since it opened in 1958. Not that she had been around then, but her mother, Joyce, had been, and she remembered coming here when she was a little girl just like Mel remembered coming here with her father and her brother when they were kids. There was something about the thick glass ice cream dishes served on paper doilies on the classic white plates that was charmingly nostalgic.

  Growing up, the Sugar Bowl had been a favorite hangout of Mel and Angie’s along with their other childhood chum Tate. The three of them had practically owned the table by the window, where Mel and Angie now sat enjoying the respite from the scorching-hot July day outside.

  Summer in the Valley of the Sun was as mean as an old man with sciatica. The sidewalk was so hot, Mel was sure the bottom of her flip-flops were going to melt. Just walking around the corner from their shop, Fairy Tale Cupcakes, had made both Mel and Angie sweat like marathoners, which they clearly were not, given that the relentless heat had them moving about as fast as a pair of desert tortoises.

  “What do you mean what are we going to do about the business?” Mel asked. She was staring out the window, watching the midday heat rise from the street, making everything shimmer as if it actually were melting under the ferocity of the midday sun.

  “It’s a hundred and fourteen degrees out there,” Angie said. “Our tourist business has completely dried up, and the last special order we had was for the Levinsky bar mitzvah two weeks ago.”

  Mel made a very loud slurp on her straw and reached for the pitcher to add more soda. She looked at Angie and said, “Your point?”

  Angie blew out a breath, stirring the dark brown bangs that hung across her forehead. The rest of her long hair was piled up in a clip on the back of her head. She gave Mel a level look as she scooped up another gooey spoonful of her sundae.

  “I think we should close for a week or two,” Angie said. Mel opened her mouth to protest, but Angie barreled ahead. “Hear me out. It’s costing us more money to be open than to close, we can both take a vacation until monsoon season hits, and then when we reopen, our regulars will be back and our tourists will slowly trickle on in again.”

  “You know, if you want to go to Los Angeles to see Roach, you can just go,” Mel said. “We don’t have to shut down the bakery so you can go be with your boyfriend.”

  Mel knew her tone was harsh, but sheesh! Close down the bakery? She couldn’t help but think that it would be the kiss of death for their small business.

  Angie’s eyes narrowed and she plunked down her spoon with a plop. She looked like she was winding up to argue, and Mel braced herself, as Angie’s fiery temper was hotter than the desert sun and known for leaving scorch marks on the recipient of her ire.

  Angie never got the chance to let loose her volley of mad. With a bang and a puff of blue smoke, an ancient, oversized van/truck lurched into a parking spot on their side of the street. Mel and Angie whipped their heads in the direction of the noise.

  “Is that…” Angie began, but Mel was already rising to her feet.

  “Yup, it is,” she said. “I’d recognize that shaggy mane and the other bald head anywhere.”

  Angie began to shovel the last of her sundae into her mouth. She slapped her free hand to her forehead, and Mel knew Angie had just given herself a walloping case of brain freeze.

  They hurried to the cashier’s window by the exit and paid their tab. Mel rushed back to leave their waiter’s tip tucked under her soda pitcher.

  “But Oz and Marty are supposed to be watching the bakery,” Angie said as she followed Mel out the door.

  Mel was pretty sure the blast of heat that smacked her full in the face as she stepped outside singed her eyebrows. She tried to look on the upside—as in, no waxing or plucking—but people without eyebrows just looked odd.

  She ran her fingers over her brow bone just to reassure herself that they were still there and then felt positive that the acrid smell that was assaulting her nose wasn’t burnt hair but rather the noxious blue smoke coming out of the tailpipe of the decrepit van in front of her.

  “Oz,” she called to her young intern. “What are you doing here?”

  The young man who had been the bakery’s paid intern since last spring turned to look at her from where he had his head under the hood of the van.

  “Hey, Mel,” he said. He stepped back and opened his arms wide. “Check it out. Isn’t she a beauty?”

  “That depends. Is she a contestant in a demolition derby?” Angie asked. She was fanning the back of her neck with one of the thick paper napkins from the Sugar Bowl.

  “Heck no,” Marty said, stepping forward. He was a dapper older gentleman who had come to work in the bakery several months before, when Mel and Angie had discovered that if they were to have any sort of personal life, they needed backup.

  Oz and Marty exchanged excited glances and then spoke together. “She’s your new cupcake van.”

  Mel looked at Angie and assumed her dumbfounded expression mirrored her own, and then looked back at the van. She took in the oversized white behemoth, which reminded her of an old bread truck. It was covered in faded Good Humor and Blue Bunny ice cream stickers, and she felt her powers of speech evaporate as she tried to form a response.

  “I know it isn’t much to look at now,” Marty said. “But we could trick this baby out and it would be sweet.”

  “Where did it come from?” Angie asked.

  “Mi tío Nacho—er, my uncle Ignacio left it to me when he died last year,” Oz said. “It’s been in my cousin’s garage down in Tucson, and they finally drove it up.”

  “That’s great, Oz,” Mel said. “I’m so happy that you’re going to have some wheels.”

  “No, it’s not just for me,” Oz said. “You two gave me my first job at the bakery and I want to give back. Marty and I are thinking we can motor around the hood and sell cupcakes.”

  “In that?” Mel asked. She had visions of her carefully cultivated image for the bakery going up, well, in a puff of blue smoke.

  “Come on,” Marty said. He took Mel’s and Angie’s elbows and half guided, half dragged them toward the back of the van. “You just need to go for a ride and you’ll see the potential.”

  “All right, I’m going,” Angie said, and she shook Marty off. Oz hefted up the rolling door in the back and Mel and Angie climbed aboard. Vintage steel freezers lined both sides, and Mel took in the scratched sliding window on the left side of the truck that appeared to have been retrofitted.

  There was no seating. Angie plopped down on the floor, and Mel sat beside her while Marty and Oz scrambled into the front. Mel wrinkled her nose. Something smelled bad, like an expired dairy product. She suspected the smell lingered in the beige shag carpet but she didn’t want to get close enough to verify her suspicion.

  It took three turns of the key and a punch to the top of the dashboard to get it going, but the van finally coughed itself back to life, and Oz backed out of the parking spot, using the overly large side mirrors to guide his way.

  The polyester shag carpet that covered the narrow strip of floor between the banks of freezers stuck to Mel’s sweaty legs and itched. She sat with her knees drawn up and noticed that Angie did the same.

  They puttered around Old Town Scottsdale, and then Oz headed out to the open road
.

  “Let me show you what she can do,” he said, as slick as any used-car salesman.

  “Really not necessary,” Angie said. “Around the block will do.”

  But it was too late. Oz took Indian School Road out toward the highway. They were idling at the on-ramp traffic light when a big pink van pulled up beside them. Mel got a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach.

  Marty and Oz had their windows down, because, in addition to the sour milk smell, blue exhaust, and itchy shag carpet, the van’s air conditioner didn’t seem capable of cooling the van to a temperature of less than one hundred.

  Mel peered out the window over Marty’s shoulder and groaned.

  “What is it?” Angie asked. She rose and moved to kneel beside her.

  “Olivia Puckett from Confections Bakery just pulled up beside us.”

  Two

  As if sensing their stare, Olivia’s head swiveled on her thick neck in their direction. Her nose wrinkled as if, from several feet away, she were getting a whiff of eau de stink from the truck, but then her eyes met Mel’s and her expression cleared. The corners of her mouth turned up in a humorless smile.

  “What is that?” she shouted.

  “It’s a van. What does it look like?” Marty shouted back. He’d had a few run-ins with Olivia in the past, and she was not on his short list of favorite people.

  “It looks like a piece of sh—” she shouted back, but Oz revved the engine, drowning out whatever she had been about to say.

  “Don’t you listen to her, baby girl,” Oz said as he patted the dashboard. “She’s evil.”

  But Olivia had misconstrued his attempt to keep the truck running as an invitation to race.

  She leaned out of her window and yelled, “You want a piece of me? Come get it!”

  “She did not just say that,” Angie said to Mel.

  “Oh, yeah, she did,” Mel said.

  Olivia was revving her engine, and she cackled, looking at them like they were no more than bug guts smashed on her windshield. They both turned to lean over Oz’s seat.

  “You heard her!” Angie said.