Never Say Pie (A Pie Shop Mystery) Read Free

mixed up with men who had an unhappy relationship in their past or a hang-up about commitment. Unfortunately that covered just about all the men in my age group. I was also here to make a living on my own which I was finally doing, thank you very much Grannie for your support.
    The Food Fair officially opened and crowds flooded the parking lot. I handed out samples and took orders for pies from some of my regular customers, which I’d deliver later. I sold pies to strangers too and answered questions about our quaint little town. I told how Crystal Cove had been discovered in 1542 by a Portuguese explorer named Cabrillho.
    “We’re grateful to him for discovering our town, but even better, he also left us his wife’s pie recipe for crosta de torta , which I still follow faithfully,” I told a group of out-of-towners. The part about the discovery was true. As for his wife and the pie recipe I follow, I made that up. Even pie bakers are allowed a little poetic license. I should say especially pie bakers are allowed whatever it takes. We wake up with the birds, start yawning during the TV news at night and have no time for a social life. All that, and then we have to compete with cookies, cakes, and muffins.
    The good thing was the customers ate up my stories along with my pies. The more customers, the better I got at playing the born-here-in-the-small-town baker role. It was tiring but fun too. By noon I was afraid I’d sell out. Of course that was my goal, but maybe I should have been prepared with more inventory.
    Besides tourists, I also saw a few residents I hadn’t seen for years, not since I’d returned to town after a stint in the big city. Principal Blandings was one of the people I wasn’t all that anxious to run into.
    “If it isn’t Hanna Denton,” said the mustachioed high school principal, looking a little older, a little heavier, and a little less frightening than when I was in high school. “So you’re back home in Crystal Cove. How are you adjusting to life in our little burgh?”
    “Just fine,” I said. “How are you, Principal Blandings? Still terrifying the poor freshmen?”
    “Not at all,” he said. “I’m the one who put the ‘pal’ in principal.”
    I winced. How many times had I heard him say that about being our pal at every single assembly year after year. With a pal like him, who needed enemies?
    “And you’re the one who put bubble bath in the drinking fountain,” he said narrowing his beady eyes.
    “I was hoping you’d forgotten that,” I said. I hadn’t forgotten the remarkable sight of the cascading bubbles or the ten hours of community service I had to do as punishment. “Can I offer you a piece of pie as a peace offering?” I held out a boxed slice of Butterscotch Pecan.
    “Thank you. That almost makes up for the time you let the lab rats loose in the halls with your partner in crime, Kate Sullivan.”
    “What a good memory you have. I can explain about that. We felt sorry for them cooped up in their cages. It was a humanitarian act.” I don’t think he believed me. Maybe he’d never seen rats imprisoned in a cage. Not from his lofty seat in the principal’s office. I wondered what he thought about Sam back in town as the police chief. Some of the things he’d done in high school made me look like Mother Teresa.
    “A humanitarian act. That’s what your grandmother said in your defense. How is she, by the way?”
    “Fine. Here she is now.” I waved at Grannie some fifty yards away. I recognized her large straw hat and her posse of bridge buddies from Heavenly Acres.
    “Good luck,” the principal said. I think he also muttered, “You’ll need it,” but I’m not sure because he’d quickly moved on to the next booth. Maybe he was afraid Grannie would rag on him about the suspension he’d given me after the lab rat episode. Grannie had a good memory also, and she never forgot or forgave anything negative anyone ever said or did to me.
    The only thing