A Call for Kelp Read online

  Also by Bree Baker

  Seaside Café Mysteries

  Live and Let Chai

  No Good Tea Goes Unpunished

  Tide and Punishment

  A Call for Kelp

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  Books. Change. Lives.

  Copyright © 2020 by Bree Baker

  Cover and internal design © 2020 by Sourcebooks

  Cover illustration © Trish Cramblet/Lott and Associates, DRogatnev/Shutterstock

  Sourcebooks, Poisoned Pen Press, and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks.

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

  All brand names and product names used in this book are trademarks, registered trademarks, or trade names of their respective holders. Sourcebooks is not associated with any product or vendor in this book.

  Published by Poisoned Pen Press, an imprint of Sourcebooks

  P.O. Box 4410, Naperville, Illinois 60567-4410

  (630) 961-3900

  sourcebooks.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Baker, Bree, author.

  Title: A call for kelp / by Bree Baker.

  Description: Naperville, IL : Poisoned Pen Press, [2020] | Series: Seaside Café Mysteries ; book 4

  Identifiers: LCCN 2019050887 | (paperback)

  Subjects: GSAFD: Mystery fiction.

  Classification: LCC PS3602.A5847 C35 2020 | DDC 813/.6--dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019050887

  Contents

  Front Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  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

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Recipes from Sun, Sand, and Tea

  Acknowledgments

  Excerpt from Live and Let Chai

  Chapter One

  About the Author

  Back Cover

  Chapter One

  “Hey, y’all!” I greeted the selfie mode on the cell phone poised in my outstretched arm. “This is Everly Swan, your trusty seaside iced tea shop owner and baking addict, signing on to try something new for you this morning.”

  Recording short instructional videos for my café’s website had become a weekly occurrence for me, and I was hoping to make things more exciting for my followers by getting out of the kitchen.

  “In case you haven’t heard, we’ve got something big going on in Charm today, and I thought you might enjoy an insider’s look at the hubbub.” I quickened my steps across Bay Street to the nature center, where most of my town and seemingly half the world population had gathered for a look at Mitzi Calgon, the pirate movie equivalent of Princess Leia.

  A warm ocean breeze tickled my neck and cheeks as I approached the crowd, and I hoped with enough editing the video would turn out okay. I’d never recorded anything beyond the walls of my historic Victorian, but it seemed like a good day to start. Considering that this was the first time in a long time that I’d done more than put my hair in a ponytail and dressed in anything fancier than cutoffs and flip-flops, it was worth a try.

  My beekeeping great-aunts had secured Mitzi Calgon’s support in a documentary to save the American honeybee, and she was in town today for a celebration luncheon. In other words, the perfect time to finally give viewers a look at the postcard-perfect world outside my front door.

  I nearly skipped up the front steps to the squat, brown brick building on the bay side of our little island, panning the crowd as I went. “All this buzz for the American honeybee has me dreaming of honey-laced recipes. Maybe after this we can make some good old-fashioned honey butter, muffins, or taffy.” I paused the video and tucked the phone into my bag for safety as I opened the front door.

  “Oops. Pardon me,” I said, sucking in my gut and shimmying sideways through the crush of bodies inside the nature center.

  I’d never seen so many people in one place outside of Times Square at New Year’s Eve, and I’d only seen that on television. People had traveled far and wide for a chance to meet the guest of honor. I didn’t blame them. Mitzi was best known for her iconic role in the film franchise, Blackbeard’s Wife, in which she had played the lead role some forty-plus years ago. She was a superstar by all rights, but I was interested for another reason. I’d recently learned that she’d known my grandma, who I missed so much it hurt, and I had about ten million questions about her for Mitzi.

  “Eep!” I yipped as someone stepped backward onto my peep-toe sandal in what felt like cleats.

  Only a little farther, I told myself, winding past a clutch of coeds wearing eye patches and plastic hooks for hands. The large double doors at the end of the hall were closer than ever, and my chances of reaching them without becoming permanently pressed between Mitzi’s fans like a flower caught in an old book, were increasing with each tenacious step.

  Gold and white satin banners hung from the ceiling above the doors, and a honeycomb arrangement of black octagons had been taped to the white marble floor around the entry. Honeybee advocacy and statistics posters lined the wall in both directions, and locally farmed honey was available for sample or purchase at a desk draped in black linens.

  Thanks to my family’s centuries-old obsession with beekeeping and my great-aunts’ continued love for the practice, a production crew had arrived in Charm this week. Tomorrow the crew would film a documentary based on my aunts’ lives as beekeepers, and Mitzi Calgon would do the voice work from a luxe studio in Los Angeles. Today, however, Mitzi was here to help create an early buzz.

  My heart hammered as I broke free from the crowd and ducked under the velvet rope holding everyone at bay. “Hey,” I said, wiggling my fingers at the straight-faced, black-suited men guarding the room. “May I?” I flashed my official pass for good measure, though I’d already spoken to both men the night before. While I’d been helping to transform the large nature center display room into a beautiful honeybee-themed luncheon area, they’d kept an eye on Mit
zi and the production team.

  The men parted, stoically, prying the double doors open for me to pass.

  Inside, the fruits of my labor were shown abundantly. Nature center flora and fauna displays had been replaced with round tables covered in alternating white or gold tablecloths. Jars of honey from my aunts’ hives had been clustered together as centerpieces, tied with thick, black satin ribbon and seated upon octagonal mirrored trays. Enormous paper pom-poms in coordinating colors hung at various heights from the ceiling, and classical music drifted softly from hidden speakers throughout the room. I liberated my phone once more and took a few still shots of the enchanting results.

  A stage had been erected at the front, complete with podium and floor-to-ceiling velvet curtains. Signs along the stage and affixed to the podium carried the name of the company, Bee Loved, and the name of the film to be made, Bee the Change, as well as the name of the woman everyone had come to see, Mitzi Calgon.

  I stood dumbstruck for a moment, second-guessing my yellow and white sundress. I was more of a cutoff shorts and T-shirt kind of gal, and I always chose flip-flops over heels, but this was a special occasion so I’d dressed up. I reached nervously to tug the tip of my ponytail and found a neatly pinned chignon instead—one more indication that I was as much in costume as any of the folks wearing pirate gear and honeybee wings. My heart raced as I considered turning tail and running.

  Then the women I’d come to see took notice of me and smiled. My great-aunts Clara and Fran waved from Mitzi’s side. “Everly!”

  I put my phone away and reminded myself to breathe, then fussed with the hem of my suddenly-too-tight dress and paced my steps upon approach. My aunts had dressed up too. Aunt Clara wore a long golden gown and Aunt Fran a black pantsuit. Their unintentional yin and yang wardrobes paired perfectly with their contrasting skin, hair, and eye colors, not to mention personalities. I’d gotten a lot of Aunt Clara’s sweet-as-honey disposition, but I looked more like Aunt Fran with brown eyes and dark hair, though her hair was more salt than pepper these days. “Hi,” I said as normally as I could manage, given the bundle of nerves tightening inside me.

  My aunts took turns kissing my cheeks and squeezing me before Mitzi took my hands in hers as if we’d known one another for years. Her face lit up as she took me in. She was stunning in a head-to-toe white gown that emphasized her slender figure and perfect porcelain skin. Her silver hair was bobbed and tucked behind her ears with diamond-studded bobby pins whose sparkle couldn’t compete with her smile.

  A look of pride crinkled the skin at the corners of her striking blue eyes. “Your grandma was the most beautiful woman in Hollywood, and you look just like her, you know?”

  Grandma was never “in Hollywood” the way Mitzi was. Grandma had only visited before my mother was born, but emotion clogged my throat anyway as I pulled Mitzi into a hug. A wave of grief and loss tangled up with hope and gratitude. As long as Mitzi was in Charm, I would have a piece of Grandma back. “It’s so nice to meet you,” I said. “It means the world to us that you’re here.”

  “I think this is how Hazel would want it,” she said. And she was right. Grandma would have loved having her here.

  My aunts had only recently filled me in on my grandma’s youthful escape from Charm, our little barrier island on the outskirts of North Carolina, to Los Angeles when she was barely twenty. She’d had big dreams but soon returned without explanation beyond the fact she was pregnant. I’d left home to chase a cowboy several years back, but I’d only returned with twenty-five extra pounds and a broken heart.

  “Her smile lit up a room,” Mitzi continued. “I took one look at her and I hated her. That’s when I knew we had to be friends.” She laughed. “She could’ve stolen every role I auditioned for with that wicked grin of hers, but she was happy to work on sets instead of onstage. America’s loss, I think. But oh, how she loved her life here. Your family and this town were the main content of every letter she wrote to me. I only wish I’d made good on my promise to visit sooner. We always think we have more time.”

  “She wrote you letters?” I asked.

  “Right up until she passed. I read about her death two days before her final letter arrived.” Mitzi’s eyes twinkled with emotion, maybe even a little mischief. “I kept every one of her letters. More than two hundred, accumulated over forty years, and I’ve brought them all with me.” Her petal pink lips twisted into a perfect cat-that-ate-the-canary smile. “I brought them for you.”

  My jaw sank open. “What?”

  “They’re all yours,” she said brightly. “A few photographs too.” Her phone rang, and she pulled it from her beaded bag, then gave it a sour look.

  Aunt Clara wrapped an arm around me, looking as pleased with the news of Grandma’s letters as I felt. “Everything okay?” she asked Mitzi when her smile didn’t return.

  Mitzi pursed her lips and rolled her eyes before tucking her phone back into her clutch. “Yes. Sorry. Small annoyances.”

  “Mitzi,” called a tall blond woman in a designer pantsuit and four-inch heels as she wound her way through the room of decked-out tables. “Lunchtime.”

  “You’re not eating with us?” I asked. It was a luncheon, after all.

  “I never eat in front of a camera,” Mitzi said. “Too many chances to be caught with food in my teeth, on my face, or falling into my lap. Save me a seat, and as soon as I finish at the podium, I’ll be down to sit with you and your lovely great-aunts. Maybe we can do something after this is over. I want to tell you everything I can remember about Hazel’s life in California and you have to tell me everything she left out of her letters.”

  “Deal,” I said, my heart expanding painfully in my chest.

  Mitzi turned to leave, then backed up suddenly. “Oh my.”

  A pair of workers in matching nature center polos pushed a giant plexiglass box on a cart in our direction. Standing six feet high and as many feet wide and deep, the box was very familiar to me. It was my personal nightmare. Honeybees swarmed inside, occasionally bumping against the breathable mesh top. One of my aunts’ educational hives sat on a clear acrylic table at the front.

  I gave the box a wide berth, slipping between tables to put more space between myself and the bees I’d feared irrationally my entire life. I gasped when I bumped into someone. Mitzi was a step behind me, moving away from the bee box as well. “Sorry,” I said, sighing a soft giggle of relief as the box was pushed up a ramp onto the stage and behind the velvet curtain.

  “I hate bees,” Mitzi said, one hand pressed to her chest. “I’m allergic. I haven’t been stung since I was a child, but I’m deathly afraid now. I keep an EpiPen with me everywhere I go. Just in case.”

  I puzzled at the bizarre truth. “And you agreed to be the voice of this project?”

  “For your grandmother.” She winked. “Besides, that was as close as I’ll ever get to the bees. Tomorrow I’ll be back in LA, sitting comfy in a sound booth.”

  “But you’ll stay tonight,” I clarified, needing to hear again that we would talk about Grandma soon.

  “Absolutely, and don’t let me forget to tell you about the night she met your grandfather.” Mitzi covered her mouth to stifle a bark of laughter. “He was lost for her the moment he laid eyes on her.”

  “You knew my grandfather?” I asked, flipping my gaze to meet Aunt Clara’s and Aunt Fran’s wide eyes.

  “Mm hmm.” Mitzi waved her beaded clutch in goodbye and followed the blond down a hallway toward the nature center’s staff offices.

  My grandpa’s identity had always been a mystery to us. My aunts believed he was a famous actor who’d died suddenly on set a few months after Grandma’s return to Charm. She’d never confirmed their theory, but according to my aunts, Grandma had grieved deeply until the birth of my mother, who promptly became her world.

  According to Aunt Clara and Aunt Fran, Swan women were cursed in tw
o ways and blessed in every other. First, we were allegedly bound to the island town our ancestors had founded after fleeing the witch trials in Salem. Second, we were cursed in love. I didn’t believe in magic or curses, despite the consistency with which Swan husbands seemed to meet untimely deaths. Maybe that was naïve of me, or maybe denial was my superpower. I hadn’t decided.

  Aunt Clara rubbed my back. “We should have dinner at our place tonight. Offer Mitzi a room there instead of wherever she’s staying.”

  Aunt Fran nodded sharply. “Agreed. I’ll make midnight pancakes.”

  Midnight pancakes were a late-night tradition of my people. Anytime a Swan’s heart was broken, we were stressed out, or we just couldn’t sleep, Aunt Fran made pancakes. The buttery delights always helped me sleep. I used to believe the recipe, batter, or homemade syrup were magical, but now I knew it was more likely a carb coma that knocked me out afterward. Regardless, I loved midnight pancakes.

  A set of figures soon appeared in the hallway where Mitzi had vanished. My best friend, Amelia Butters; her father; and Wyatt, the cowboy who’d once broken my heart, strode purposefully in my direction.

  Amelia looked amazing, as usual, in a fitted blue sundress with small white buttons, a matching handbag, and heels.

  Her dad, on the other hand, looked like a lunatic. It might’ve been the eye patch and full-blown pirate costume. “Argh!” he said with a grin. “I’ve come in search of me bride. The wench who has claimed me icy heart and warmed it to the point of hellfire for her service.”

  Aunt Clara clapped silently at his strangely accented monologue, a set of lines from Mitzi’s movies, I presumed. “Bravo!”

  Aunt Fran hugged Amelia, then looked at Mr. Butters with appraising eyes. “You just missed Mitzi, but she’ll be back.”

  “Aye,” he said, “and I shall be waiting.”

  Amelia hugged me next. “You look beautiful.”

  “Thanks.” I blushed, per my usual, never sure what to do with a compliment. Normally, I would change the subject. “Your dad looks happy. I never knew he was such a fan.”