Potts Better Butter Bakery Read online

  Why was he here? Did he find out somehow that Connie and Gina were living on the Cape? Could that have been a reason that brought him here? He didn’t get that information from me or my family, at least I don’t think so.

  Bubba? No! He doesn’t have a clue about Vegas, he only knew we worked there and had an act in one of the casinos. Both our Mom and our Grandma made certain he never found out more than that, either. Truthfully, there never was more than that. We kept ourselves away from that sordid lifestyle. Grandma and Mom had our cell numbers so we could stay in touch, but our private life was just that, private. Mom was in a daze most of the time and Grandma was too busy taking care of Mom and Bubba to look past what we shared with her. When Mom died and then Grandma died a month later, we knew it was time for us to come home. Bubba needed us.

  He grew up here on the Cape where I knew he would be safe. Vegas was too dangerous for a young boy. We paid for his education in private schools and Grandma made certain he did well and kept up with his studies. Mom was locked into herself after Dad died shortly after Bubba was born. She was never the same care-free woman anymore. Grandma knew that. I swear Grandma stayed alive just to care for Mom.

  Well, that is all past now. I have my sister and we can take care of Bubba. I’m so happy he decided to stay with us and help out. Most of his friends have left the Cape to find careers in other places.

  He’s a good kid and knows more about growing marijuana than we ever could.

  He’s well versed in the new regulations and the legalities now that it’s legal here in Massachusetts. We really need him and his advice. The shop depends on him.

  She yawned and stretched, snuggling deeper into her covers, plumping her pillow into a soft mound. She glanced at the clock.

  Look at the time, it’s already past midnight. I didn’t realize it was so late. We go to see Connie and the baby tomorrow, no, today. We can stop and get a gift on the way. What do you buy for a baby boy? Football? Baseball? I’m certain we will find something appropriate.

  Sativa yawned again, reached over, turned out the light and pulled her comforter up over her head like she had done since she was a little girl to keep the bad dreams away.

  She closed her eyes and fell into a deep dreamless sleep.

  Chapter Seven

  Much later that day.

  “Still no idea who he is?” Doc asked as Matt came through the door into the haze of the morgue, chased by a gust of wind and a spray of rain. Wonder why morgues always have that damp clammy feel and smell about them? Matt pondered as he squeaked his way into the dimly lit room on the basement floor of the old, abandoned town hall. The town council aptly nicknamed it the Mournful Morgue. Matt visibly shivered, not from the damp of the rain, but from the dank atmosphere of the small depressing room.

  “No more than what I told you before, Doc. According to Sativa and Indica, he’s some gangster from Vegas, Basilio “Bugsy” Cappelli. That’s the name Sativa gave me,” Matt replied.

  He slammed the door against another bluster of cold, wet wind, “So much for balmy Spring weather,” he muttered under his breath as he struggled out of his rain-soaked mackintosh, shook out most of the raindrops and draped it over the back of a chair beside the desk.

  “Friend of hers?” Doc asked as he scanned over the paper work he had to fill out for all bodies that came into the morgue.

  “Both girls claim he was no friend. They avoided him. Bad company, mob connections.”

  Doc gave a long, low whistle, “And he’s lying here in our morgue? Not a good thing. If they get wind of this in Vegas -----” his voice trailed off into worry.

  “I’ve done a background on him and he is coming up pretty clean. We’re running it through the CIA and FBI. Maybe they will have something. Can you get me his fingerprints and some DNA?”

  “Sure. What about his family?” Doc asked.

  “None that we know of. What we have discovered so far is he was brought up on the streets of San Francisco. Tossed from foster homes to juvenile, and back into more foster homes. He was pretty wild. No one wanted him,” Matt concluded.

  “How did he end up in Las Vegas?”

  “Probably like a lot of other low lifers at that time, they went where the action was and Vegas had a lot of action in the early days. Not always a good thing. Vegas was a festering pot for crime and corruption.”

  “Yah, but they had Frank Sinatra, The Rat Pack, Pattie Page, Elvis, and all the rest of them that spent a lot of their time and talents there during the 1950’s, 60’s, and 70’s.” said Doc, a nostalgic tenor to his voice. “Wish I had been there.”

  “Yes, Vegas wasn’t a nice place then, hasn’t changed much.” Matt said, sarcastically. “Anything on the murder weapon?

  “A few prints which I sent off to be checked. Seems they belong to some hood named Lavinio Torino, nickname, Knifey, also from Las Vegas.”

  Doc went over to a cabinet on the wall behind his desk, opened one of the doors and pulled out the knife in a plastic bag. He gingerly carried it to his desk and laid it down carefully as if it might come alive and stab him.

  “This isn’t your usual weapon. Well, knives aren’t usually used by the mob. Guns are their forte. This knife was made by Bugatti in Italy. Rare antique. Ivory handle which means it must be pretty old. Sharp as hell. He probably picked it up in a pawn shop somewhere. It is light enough to be thrown and deadly to the target. Got our Bugsy right between the shoulder blades. He travelled quite a distance before he actually fell and died. Must have been pretty painful!”

  “Gruesome!” Matt grimaced and shivered at the thought.

  Doc was thoughtful for a few minutes. “Did you open those packages he had with him when he was stabbed?”

  “One package had a brand new pair of Nike’s still in the original box. Another had a gray Cape Cod sweatshirt, tags still on it, but the third one had a bunch of brand-new baby clothes!”

  “No kidding. What would he want with baby clothes?” Doc scratched his receding hairline and looked inquiringly at Matt.

  “We know he had a wife somewhere on the East coast, maybe she’s here. We need to do more checking.” Matt told Doc, and thought, I have a feeling that Sativa knows more about this than she has told me. He made a mental note to drop by the bakery and ask some more off-the-record questions. I probably won’t get the answers, but at least she will know I’m suspicious.

  “So, Doc, anything else you can add to my file?”

  “Only that he was a user, but no traces of anything in the body. See the marks on his arms?” Doc said as he turned the arm for a better view.

  “Yah, I see those, but was he clean when he was hit?”

  “Far as I can tell, yes. No alcohol or any other substances. He must have sobered up before he came here. No traces in his blood. No idea how long he was sober, though, could have been months.”

  “Do you think he turned around?”

  “I’ll do some analysis on the kidneys,” Doc said, “that might give us more information. Why the interest?”

  “Wondering why he decided to come clean, Doc. That’s all. There’s more to this killing than we see on the surface. I’m beginning to think this was not a simple mob hit.” Matt pulled his soggy mackintosh from the back of the chair and shrugged into it, wincing at its smarmy wetness.

  “Okay, let me know if you find out anything else,” Doc said as he straightened the gurney and wheeled the sheet covered body over to the vault, slid it into the drawer and slammed it shut.

  “I will, Doc, thanks for your help.” He strode over to the door, yanked it open feeling the full force of the wind and drenching rain as he left the morgue and headed over to the station.

  “God, I love Cape Cod!” he muttered sloshing through a large mud puddle drenching his cordovans.

  Chapter Eight

  Later that night.

  The Mournful Morgue was deathly silent (oops, pardon the pun), Doc had left a few hours ago not long after Matt, his preliminary paperwork sitt
ing open on the desk. The howling winds of the earlier evening had pushed the storm out to sea and the last remnants of rain were still dripping intermittently on the windows. The well at the base of the threshold in front of the basement door puddled and slowly drained to sloshy mud. Inside the dark room, the air was clammy and reeked, redundant of formaldehyde.

  “Wake up, Bugsy” a voice inside the vault hissed, echoing off the walls of the closed drawer. “You know who I am, wake up and let’s talk.”

  “Go away, I’m dead. Leave me alone.”

  “I know you’re dead but you can still hear me, so wake up, dammit.”

  “Fritzie, is that you?” recognition dawning.

  “Ya, it’s me, so wake up and talk to me.”

  Fritzie, you died six months ago, The mob got you.”

  “Right, they got me and now they got you. Wake up so we can talk like old times.”

  “Okay, okay, I’m awake. How did you find me?”

  “Easy. I heard them talkin’ about a hit on Cape Cod. You had just left for that location. Figured it was probably you.”

  “You followed me?”

  “I been followin’ you since I got hit.”

  “Why?”

  “We was best buddies. We was kids together in ‘Frisco. I wanted to protect you. Sorry I didn’t get here in time.”

  “Well, thanks anyway.”

  “Do you know who did this to you?”

  “Yah, I do, but what good is that gonna do now?”

  “Wanna see him fry?”

  “Who, Knifey? The mob will prevent that, besides, what can we do?”

  “A lot. I got news that he’s still here on the Cape. He wants the money you stashed away.”

  “That money’s for Connie, Gina and the baby, my baby grandson.”

  “The mob thinks otherwise.”

  “Tough! That was my insurance for my family.”

  “The mob knows you have a family but they don’t know where they are.”

  “Right, and its gonna stay that way.”

  “How long do you think you can hide them?”

  “I dunno, you tell me.”

  “Bugsy, we’re dead, you and me.”

  “Yah, I know I’m dead, now.”

  “Scary, isn’t it?” Fritzie chuckled.

  “We’re ghosts, aren’t we? Or something like that?” Bugsy sighed, “I never thought I would live to see this day.” He paused, “Boy that wasn’t funny.”

  “Listen, Bugsy, as ghosts we can do anything -- or almost anything and nobody can see us.”

  “Come on, this is no time for jokes.”

  “I’m not joking, Bugsy, I been lurking around you and you never even suspected.”

  “You have?”

  “Yup!”

  “So, what do you have in mind?”

  “First, where are Connie and her daughter?”

  “That’s what I’d like to know!”

  “How are we gonna protect them if we don’t know where they are?”

  “I’ve been thinkin’ about that.”

  “Where do you think they might be?”

  “Can we fly?”

  “Yah, that’s how I got here!”

  “Good, c’mon, I have an idea.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “To the Better Butter Bakery.”

  Bugsy sat up and threw the sheet to one side as he levitated off the slab in the vault.

  “Wait a minute, you have to put on some clothes, you can’t fly around butt-naked.”

  “Why not, nobody can see us.”

  “Well, I can.”

  “Since when did you have such scruples?”

  Fritzie scooped the sheet from the morgue table and threw it at Bugsy.

  “Here, wear this!”

  “Thanks.” He draped the sheet around himself.

  “That’s better, come on, I’m starving.”

  “Can we eat?”

  “Naw, but I like to think about it.”

  Chapter Nine

  The Better Butter Bakery the next morning.

  “What time is Connie expecting us?” Indica asked her twin while she sprayed oil on two baking sheets preparing for the next batch of Better Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies.

  “Not until later, after lunch.” Sativa answered from down the hall as she folded the third load of laundry.

  Indica shoved the last batch of cookies into the oven and finished washing up bowls and cookie sheets after a morning of baking.

  “Can we bring some cookies with us?”

  “Yes, the regular ones, of course.”

  The basement door slammed open and Bubba rushed into the bakery carrying a beautiful potted plant.

  “Mom, Auntie, here is a plant for Connie and Gina. I grafted it a few months ago and it took.

  “What is it?” asked Indica while Sativa smiled fondly at her son.

  “A new strain of marijuana I created. I spliced two of my favorites together and came up with a whole new strain. I’ll call it Potts Pot.”

  Both girls laughed. Sativa asked, “Which strains did you use?”

  “Why, Sativa and Indica. of course.” Bubba grinned and held the plant up for inspection.

  “It’s quite pretty,” Indica smiled as she took a closer look at the plant. “I like the leaf. Can we smoke it?”

  “I think so. I haven’t tested it yet. It’s still too soon to tell. The leaves aren’t mature enough.”

  “You thought of this?”

  “No, Auntie, there are a few of these hybrids out there, but our original plants, the ones your Mother had, are a very pure strain, I have been grooming this particular hybrid for a few months. I wanted to see if I could do it.”

  “Well done, Bubba.” Indica said, a touch of pride in her voice.

  “Thanks, Auntie, what time are you leaving?”

  “In about half-an-hour. We want to stop and get a gift for the baby.”

  “I need some more potting soil, so I probably won’t see you until you get back later.” Bubba disappeared back down into the basement as Indica pulled out a bakery box and started filling it with layers of cookies.

  “See, I told you the bakery was the right place,” Bugsy said as he perched on a top shelf among a few baking pans so he could look around.

  “Boy those cookies smell wonderful. My Foster mom used to bake cookies like that. Makes me homesick,” Fritzie groaned and floated up beside Bugsy.

  “Indica is filling that bakery box with cookies. They are going to see the baby and we’re gonna go along,” Bugsy grinned (if a ghost could grin) “and I get to see my beautiful new grandson,”

  “Do you think they would mind if I had a cookie?” Fritzie asked.

  “Wait until she drops one and throws it into the trash, you can have that one. You can’t just take one from the case. They’ll see it floating in the air…”

  “Right, I forgot,” Fritzie said, “I don’t think I can eat one. It’s nice to think about it, though!”

  Later, at Connie and Gina’s …

  “Come in, come in,” Connie chirped as Sativa and Indica, laden with packages and the plant came through the door. “I’ve missed you two.”

  Sativa handed Connie the Potts Pot Plant and wrapped her arms around her dearest friend hugging her close, the plant between them.

  “We’ve missed you, too.” Sativa said as she released her hold on Connie rescuing the plant and setting it on the hall table.

  “Is this from Bubba?”

  Sativa nodded.

  “It’s beautiful. I don’t recognize the leaves. I’ve never seen one so beautiful, did he grow it?” Connie asked as she gently moved it to the window-sill admiring it.

  “Yes, a hybrid.” Sativa answered.

  “And, what’s all this?” Connie asked as Indica dropped the rest of the packages down on the hall table. They could hear a baby crying from the other room and Gina singing softly.

  “A few things for our baby God-child,” Indica said as she slid
past Sativa and Connie into the other room to see the baby.

  Gina was seated in a large rocking chair trying to sooth the fussing child, rocking him gently back and forth. Indica held out her arms and Gina gratefully passed the baby to her.

  “Thanks, Auntie, he has been fussing for a while. Can’t seem to settle him down.”

  The baby immediately stopped crying as Indica beamed, cooing soothing sounds while she walked around the room cuddling the baby in her arms. She slid him up onto her shoulder, the baby gave an exceptionally large ‘burp’ and everyone giggled with relief.

  “Thanks, Auntie Indica, you’re marvelous!” Gina smiled and stood so Indica could sit in the rocker.

  “Gina, look at all of these presents.” Connie carried them into the room and set them down on the coffee table. “Honestly, you really should not have bought all of these. You are spoiling him already.”

  “Well, we wanted to. Indica would have bought out the entire store if I hadn’t stopped her.” Sativa went over and looked at the baby as Indica rocked him to sleep.

  “He’s perfect!” Sativa said as she gazed in delight at the infant. Pulling her eyes away, she went over to sit on the sofa. Connie opened the bakery box and sat down next to her.

  “Are these okay to eat?”

  Sativa and Indica giggled and nodded as Connie, satisfied, chose one.

  “I heard about the man dying practically on your doorstep,” Connie said as she nibbled the cookie. “Did you know him? The papers didn’t say much. Who was he? The news said he was from Vegas, but that was all.”

  Sativa swallowed the lump in her throat and took a very deep breath. She looked sadly at her dear friend.

  “Connie, it was Basilio.”

  Connie dropped the cookie, blessed herself several times and started to cry. Gina was watching wide-eyed not saying a word.

  Sativa wrapped her arms around Connie and hugged her close. She handed her a package of tissues and let her cry.

  “What happened? “she murmured through her tears.

  “No idea, Connie, he dropped dead on the sidewalk in front of the store with a knife in his back.”