Fish Fry and a Murder Read online

  Fish Fry and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 9

  by

  Kathleen Suzette

  Copyright © 2019 by Kathleen Suzette. All rights reserved. This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination, or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronically or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author or publisher.

  Books by Kathleen Suzette:

  Clam Chowder and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 1

  A Short Stack and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 2

  Cherry Pie and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 3

  Barbecue and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 4

  Birthday Cake and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 5

  Hot Cider and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 6

  Roast Turkey and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 7

  Gingerbread and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 8

  Fish Fry and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 9

  Cupcakes and a Murder

  A Rainey Daye Cozy Mystery, book 10

  Books by Kate Bell, Kathleen Suzette

  Apple Pie A La Murder,

  A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 1

  Trick or Treat and Murder,

  A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 2

  Thankfully Dead

  A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 3

  Candy Cane Killer

  A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 4

  Ice Cold Murder

  A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 5

  Love is Murder

  A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 6

  Strawberry Surprise Killer

  A Freshly Baked Cozy Mystery, Book 7

  Pushing Up Daisies in Arizona,

  A Gracie Williams Mystery, Book 1

  Kicked the Bucket in Arizona,

  A Gracie Williams Mystery, Book 2

  Candy Coated Murder

  A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 1

  Murderously Sweet

  A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 2

  Chocolate Covered Murder

  A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 3

  Death and Sweets

  A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 4

  Sugared Demise

  A Pumpkin Hollow Mystery, book 5

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Author’s Note

  Chapter One

  “We’re going to catch our death of cold out here,” I said, trying to keep the whine out of my voice. The sun was just starting to peek its head over the horizon and the blowing wind had my nose running. I rubbed the back of my gloved hand beneath it. I wasn’t a morning person under the best of circumstances.

  Cade chuckled. “You’ll be fine. As soon as the sun is up, you’ll warm right up.” He hefted the ice chest from the trunk of his car and set it on the frozen ground. “There’s nothing like time spent in the great outdoors.”

  “I don’t think I’ll warm right up,” I grumbled and picked up the two canvas folding chairs from the trunk. It was early January in Idaho and all I wanted was to hide beneath my electric blanket and sleep the morning away. A girl could dream, right?

  “Come on, be a trooper. I know you can do it,” he teased and led the way to the edge of the lake. “We’ll have a mess of fish caught before you know it and then you can stand in front of a roaring campfire and fry them up for us.”

  “Yeah, that sounds like fun,” I said and yawned.

  “At least the fire will warm you up,” he said over his shoulder.

  I stumbled after him, my thick layers of clothing making me feel less than graceful. We stopped at the edge of the frozen lake and Cade looked it over.

  “What if it doesn’t hold us?” I asked. I had never been ice fishing, and I didn’t think I would enjoy it. Mostly because it involved ice and bitterly cold temperatures. I had spent all of my life in snowy areas, first Idaho, then New York, and now back to Idaho, but I had never really embraced cold weather activities. At least, not when they occurred outdoors.

  “It’ll hold. I hear there’ve been a lot of trout pulled out of this lake this season.” He set the ice chest down and headed back to the car for his fishing equipment.

  I unfolded the two chairs and set them on the ground, then sat down in one. I pulled my knit hat down lower over my ears and re-wrapped my scarf. My eyes began to tear up from the wind and I blinked to clear them and sniffed.

  “Hey, what are you doing sitting down?” Cade asked, returning with a tackle box the size of a small safe, two fishing poles, and an auger to drill holes into the ice.

  I looked up at him. “I like the feel of solid earth beneath my feet. I think we should fish from right here on the bank.”

  He chuckled and shook his head. “How are we going to do that? The lake’s surface is frozen solid. You can’t cast your line out and expect it to do anything other than bounce across the ice.”

  I shrugged. “Just drill a hole a couple of feet out. I bet I can cast the hook into it from here.”

  “If I drill a hole a couple of feet from the bank, the water beneath it will only be a few feet deep. The fish aren’t hanging out in the shallow water just waiting for us to catch them. Where’s your sense of adventure?”

  “My sense of adventure abandoned ship when it saw we were headed out into the cold. What if the ice doesn’t hold us? I’ve seen videos of people falling through the ice and freezing to death before they can climb out,” I protested.

  “You’ve seen real people die in these videos?” he asked skeptically. “Or are you talking about when you watched Titanic?”

  “I am not talking about Titanic. I saw real people. I guess they probably didn’t actually die, but did you know you can freeze to death in icy water in less than fifteen minutes?”

  He laughed and shook his head, taking a few steps out onto the ice, then bent over and used the manual auger to quickly drill a hole. “There. See? The ice is nice and thick. Come on out and bring those chairs. I’ve got ice to drill and fish to catch.”

  I sighed, got to my feet, and folded the chairs up again. The ice did look thick, and it wasn’t that I doubted Cade, but I didn’t like the idea of walking out onto that ice. Cade had bought me a pair of ice boots so I wouldn’t slip, and I had put on two pair of socks to keep my feet warm, but they weren’t working very well. My feet were freezing. I had also worn two layers of thermals beneath my clothes and I felt like the kid on A Christmas Story when his mother made him wear that absurd snowsuit. I drew a line at the ridiculous looking bib overalls Cade was wearing. They were bright orange and apparently waterproof. A girl’s got to keep her sense of fashion even when ice fishing. />
  I looked up as Cade continued walking further out onto the ice. “Hey! Don’t go so far out.”

  He turned and waited as I gingerly made my way onto the ice. I paused at the hole he had just drilled and looked into it. The ice appeared to be at least four inches thick. I strained my ears for cracking sounds, but the ice was blessedly silent.

  “Come on. The big fat fish are out in the deep,” he called. “I want to catch the really big ones. Go big or go home.”

  “I’ll take little skinny fish if it means I can stay on the shore,” I said as I braced myself and headed slowly in his direction. “Going home now would be even better.”

  “Live a little, Rainey. Look on the bright side. If we do fall in, you’ll have something to tell our grandchildren.”

  I gasped and looked at him, then looked back at my feet. I didn’t have any children, let alone grandchildren. Cade and I had only been dating a few months, but I had never been so happy in all my life. I had come off of a nasty divorce a year earlier and I swore I would never fall in love again, and yet, here I was. Not that I was admitting I was in love. Not yet, anyway. But sometimes, out of the blue, Cade would say something like he had just said, and I’d think, this is it. This is the real thing. The love I have waited for my whole life. As these thoughts passed through my mind, my foot slipped on the ice and I gasped again and put the folding chairs down on the ice, using them as a crutch to keep me upright.

  “You okay?” he called. He had ventured further out onto the ice and I wished he would just stay put.

  I looked up and smiled as the sun rose behind him. He looked stunning in the early morning light, silly overalls and everything. “I’m okay.”

  I made my way out to where he had set the tackle box down and begun drilling a hole in the ice. Unfolding the chairs, I set them several feet away from the hole. I had visions of my weight adding to the stress of holes being drilled into the ice and my ever-creative imagination saw us both falling into the treacherous water beneath the ice.

  He glanced at me. “I can’t sit in the chair with it so far way.” He moved over to a spot about eighteen inches from the hole he had just drilled and made another one. The auger was amazingly quick in drilling holes into the ice.

  I scooted the chairs closer once he was finished with the second hole. “We could just go to the grocery store and buy some fish.”

  “Once again, where’s your sense of adventure? Besides. I bought these spiffy overalls. It would be a waste of money not to wear them.”

  “Yeah, I can see why you’d want to wear them. Everyone from Sparrow to Boise can see them.”

  He snorted. “These overalls are like your little black dress on date night. Would you want to dress up and stay home where no one can see you?”

  “Well, when you put it like that,” I said and sat down on my chair.

  “Exactly. Now, what kind of bait would you like on your hook? I’ve got big fat nightcrawlers, minnows, and stinky marshmallows.”

  I looked at him. “I don’t want to appear to be a greenhorn, but are the nightcrawlers and minnows alive?”

  “Of course. The fish like their breakfast to have a little game. Makes them friskier.” He opened his tackle box and began sorting through it.

  “I was afraid of that. I’ll take stinky marshmallows.” I sat back in my chair and watched the sunrise. It was eerily quiet out on the lake and if it hadn’t been so cold, I might have enjoyed it.

  “I’ll bait our hooks and then go get the ice chest,” he said as he removed the lid from a jar of fluorescent pink marshmallows.

  I peered at the ice beside me. The wind had blown most of the snow off of the lake’s surface and I could see through it. It was a little unnerving as I saw what looked like a fish dart beneath me.

  “This is really weird,” I said. “What if I fall through the ice? I mean, seriously. Do we have a plan?”

  “Stop it. You aren’t going to fall.” He handed me the baited fishing rod. “Now, all you really have to do is put the hook into the hole and wait for the fish to bite. Maybe move it around a little. I put a float on it. Trout like to stay somewhat near the surface and like to see their food float. I’ll be right back.”

  I watched as he headed back for the rest of our equipment, then turned back to the hole in the ice. I got to my feet and peered into it, trying not to get too close to the edge. A small fish darted across the opening and I jumped a little. If Cade thought he was going to get nice fat fish, he might be mistaken. The two I had seen so far were far from large. I dropped the hook into the water, releasing some line, then scooted back to my chair and sat and waited.

  Chapter Two

  “So, again, how does fried fish for breakfast sound?” Cade asked me. “I brought a little hibachi barbecue, charcoal, and a skillet. We can have a feast right on the bank of the lake.”

  I scrunched up my nose, my eyes still on my line. “I’m not sure fish sounds very good for breakfast. Lunch or dinner, yes. But I’ve never had it for breakfast.”

  “It would make a great recipe for your cookbook. Americans have been fishing and cooking up their breakfast near lakes and rivers for centuries. It’s very rustic.”

  “Yeah it would be a great recipe for my cookbook, but not for breakfast,” I said firmly. I was writing an Americana themed cookbook and while ice fishing was definitely an American pastime in states where it snows, I still didn’t think I could stomach fried fish for breakfast.

  He made a sound of disapproval, then handed me a thermos of coffee. “Maybe this will cheer you up. At the very least, it’ll warm you up.”

  “Mmm,” I said, brightening, and took the thermos from him. “I’m so glad you thought of coffee. I was just daydreaming about coffee and realized I hadn’t thought to bring any.”

  “I took the liberty of adding cream and sugar to it when I made it,” he said, baiting his hook with a minnow.

  I looked away. I didn’t have the stomach for fishing. The stinky marshmallows were all I could handle. Steam poured out of the top of the thermos when I removed the inner plug and poured coffee into the cup that came with it. My father used to take a big thermos of coffee with him to work every morning and I suddenly felt nostalgic. “This smells so good,” I said and took a sip. The warmth was heavenly on this cold morning. I watched as a fish darted beneath the ice near my feet. It still gave me the willies so see them swimming so close to me.

  “There’s nothing like hot coffee on a cold morning. How’s the cookbook coming, anyway? You haven’t talked about it much lately.”

  I shrugged. “I got a little behind on it over Christmas, but I’ve been sending out book proposals to agents. Hopefully I’ll hook one pretty soon. Get it? ‘Hook’?” I chuckled at my own joke.

  He snorted and shook his head. “You’re too cute.”

  I looked over at him. His dark brown hair shined in the early morning sunlight. “You’re pretty cute yourself.”

  He glanced at me and opened his mouth to say something, then turned back to his fishing line when the pole suddenly jerked in his hand. “I think we’ve got a winner. Come to Papa.”

  He jerked back on his rod, then began to reel the line in. The fish pulled on its end of the line and Cade jerked the rod back again.

  “I think it’s a big one,” I said. The tension on the fishing line was robust as Cade continued to reel it in.

  “You may be right,” he said, getting to his feet. He took a couple of steps back and continued to crank the handle on the reel. After a couple of minutes, the fish came to the surface of the water and Cade took hold of the line, pulling it out of the hole in the ice. “Tada!”

  “That’s a big one all right,” I said, standing up as the fish danced on the line.

  The fish was large enough to feed several people. It suddenly occurred to me that someone had to scale and gut the fish, and I knew it was not going to be me. I drew the line at cooking it.

  “Breakfast,” he said sounding self-satisfied. “There’s n
othing like fresh fried fish in the morning.”

  I sighed and turned away as he removed the hook and put the fish into the bucket he had brought. “I’m really not feeling it, Cade,” I said. “In fact, I’m feeling a little nauseous at the thought.”

  “What do you mean? Are you getting sick?” He looked at me, concern showing on his face.

  “I mean I’d rather buy my food at the grocery store where I don’t have to think about it ever having been alive.” I took another sip of my coffee. It was cooling down quickly out in this cold weather. If I didn’t drink it right away, I was going to have iced coffee.

  He arched one brow. “You do know that all meat was alive once, right? Even the stuff you get at the grocery store?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Yes, and I do like meat. But I don’t like this,” I said, indicating my fishing pole. I didn’t have the heart for it. Let people who had grown up on farms and who liked to hunt and fish catch all the food. Grocery stores were for civilized people.