Mystery At The Autumn House Inn

This is an old work in progress.  And This should hold you till I get that writing fairy muse to come back.

Rebecca Colleen a willowy, green-eyed, Auburn haired, woman in her mid-thirties. Self-employed caterer and the owner of Colleen’s catering service.

The clock began the usual incessant early morning screeching, with her eyes still closed tight grumbling rather loudly, “GRRRR! BLASTED, ALL! FREAKING, CLOCK!” She grabbed the clock with violent force; Rebecca flung it across the room with the intention of hitting her bedroom window, fell short, instead hitting the wall falling on to the floor shattering into large pieces.

Being a rather chilly autumn morning, much cooler than usual, she dreaded getting up from her warm bed. She lay around trying to think of an excuse not to get out of bed, since she could not think of anything; she started to roll out of bed while brushing her Auburn hair from her face. She quickly stumbled to the kitchen as she grabbed her warm fuzzy robe.

With her toast in the toaster, she stood with her hands over, happy to have the warmth. Once she warmed up enough, she put on the pot of coffee, as always would dip her spoon into the apple butter, eating out of the jar while drinking her orange juice. With everything finished, she sat in her big lounge chair as, she ate her breakfast looking outside at the lovely fall colored trees; after which she decided to get dressed to go for a quick jog, hopeful the chilly air would wake her up.

She returned home a short time later, to find a message on her answering machine. It turned out to be her best friend Nicolette Maynard; she hit the shower before returning the call, which to her next-door neighbor’s disgust, always aloud-musical one, for someone who couldn’t carry a tune neither in nor out of the shower, she sure loved to sing.

Later after the 10 minute; torture I mean shower, she finally called her back to find out what all the fuss’s about, turns out Nicolette wanted Rebecca to go with her to visit an old acquaintance up in Vermont.

After about 5 minutes, of verbal pressure she started to protest the idea, she soon changed her mind deciding to agree. It had been many years since she took a vacation; Nicolette insisted she was in need of one, nearly the same argument could be said about her business since ran it from her tiny sixth floor Cleveland apartment.

She had always begged her to get a bigger apartment, since she did make enough money from her business. At least from one particular catering event she had done for a wealthy elderly woman, a funeral service held for the death of her loved one, a cat by the name of Mr. Fluffy. She never forgot that experience after catering for it.

The elderly woman apparently thought her cat had wandered out and died. Little did she or everyone realize the cat had been stuck in a hole in the upstairs guest bedroom closet, for the past six months without anyone realizing; until to everyone’s surprise the cat came strutting into the living room where the service held.

This event paid Rebecca rather well, Mr. Fluffy resumed his happy days of eating all the scraps she provided, along with long naps in front of the sunny side of the house. Getting dressed again, Rebecca decided to go shopping for non-perishable grocery item’s personal items.

When she returned home by the early afternoon, Rebecca had gone over as usual not just buying what she needed, but buying what she did not need. As she cut the tags off placing them into the washer with the rest of her clothes, as fixed a hot bowl clam chowder, before heading off for the small parties, she was to cater for a young couple’s engagement.

After loading everything, she had cooked the night before she got into the car and realized she had forgotten her purse. She ran back into the apartment building up the six flights of stairs to retrieve it. Nicolette had always warned her she would do that one day, to her disgust the day arrived after forgetting it. She spent the rest of the evening in a funk.

She could finally go home to bed, quite relieved about that. Now excited as well for the next morning when she would be on a plane with her pal, heading to the Vermont countryside Inn for rest and relaxation. Exhausted she skipped dinner; did all her packing for the trip and headed straight to bed for much-needed sleep.

By five in the morning, she was up, ready to go outside of her building when Nicolette pulled up in her minivan. She peered through the windshield as she pulled up alongside the curb. Finding Rebecca sitting on a large amount of bags, Nicolette thought to herself “She does know we are only going for a week, why does she always do that?”

After taking a few minutes, to load everything in the car, they were finally on their way to the airport, hopeful even with the traffic they would make it on time. They turned out to be wrong, when they nearly did not make it to their plane, after going through grouchy baggage handlers and searchers.

They made it, just in time running up to the terminal, practically flinging their tickets at the flight attendant; she quickly cleared the tickets and off. They scrambled to get on the plane. As soon as they found the seats they sat down buckled up, while trying to catch their breaths.

As soon as the plane took off Nicolette dozed off, to the neighboring passenger’s disgust, she was an apparent snorer, a loud snorer. Rebecca looking around in embarrassment tried to muzzle the noise, coming from her friend while trying not to kill her in the attempt to salvage the peace and quiet.

It unfortunately was a failed attempted smiling uncomfortably as she pointed to her while shrugging.

Twenty minutes, went by as Rebecca, along with everyone ultimately found something to preoccupy him or her. Watching the in-flight movie with headphones, while she found it amusing to use her snacks as a form of torture on her sleeping friend, Nicolette finally awoke as the plane was preparing to land. To her surprise, she found peanuts all over her shoulder’s chest.

Rebecca had tried to make a three-point unsucessful shot to her mouth.

As they were both getting their carry-on baggage out of the overhead compartment, Nicolette glared at her friend the entire time, thinking of ways to get her back. Once arriving in the terminal, greeted by people waiting for other passengers, one woman, in particular, stood out A woman in her sixties in drably looking clothes standing there holding a sign that just said plainly Nicky Maynard, it happened to be Jacob Alexander’s nickname for Nicolette

She did not say a word to them only pointed to the name on the poster board, then started grabbing a couple of the bags to carry to the car. They just looked at each other as the woman turned toward the exit, going out ahead of them where they soon followed quickly behind her.

The car rides to the Inn was a quiet one, until when they pulled into the driveway of the quaint little Victorian styled Autumn House Inn. As they approached the bottom step, he grabbed Nicolette’s bag and gave her a kiss on the cheek.

Then taking Rebecca ‘s bag from her hand, he leaned in order to kiss her cheek; her demeanor, however, insisted that he shake her hand whom he did so willingly putting down the bag.

He ushered them inside the house that looked just as Victorian as the outside exterior.

He placed the bags on the floor beside the desk, just as he told them lunch would be ready soon along with where their room keys and rooms were a loud yell came from toward the kitchen. “JACOB!”

He rolled his eyes and moaned under his breath “I’m coming; I’m coming; you old windbag, Hold your horses!” Said aloud, “I’m Coming Martha.,” Politely excused him-self with a nod.

They grabbed a key, heading toward their rooms, Nicolette crashing on the bed in her room, while Rebecca to hyper from the plane ride, unpacked the luggage she brought in with her.

Suddenly remembering she had two other bags in the car, went downstairs to the car to get them, as she approached the bottom step, she could hear Jacob in his office yelling. Deciding to eavesdrop, she tiptoed toward the office to listen to his conversation; she could hear Jacob’s yelling more clearly.

“AFTER EVERYTHING, I HAVE DONE FOR YOU; THIS IS HOW YOU REPAY ME; YOU WILL NOT GET AWAY WITH THIS.”

It went silent, a minute later the phone slammed violently against the wall of his office. As it did she bolted out to the car grabbing all her bags she’d left bolting in and up the stairs before she thought she was seen heading into her room closing the door so that no one would have known she’d been downstairs. Where she spent until being called down for lunch, thinking about the phone conversation.

At lunch, she avoided asking him why he was yelling or flung the phone, instead they talked about how they all met Nicolette, spending the rest of the day spent in peace. The late evening, however, was not as quiet after dinner and everyone had gone to sleep.

It was about one in the morning when Rebecca, who had not slept yet heard some commotion coming from the downstairs, grabbing her robe, she headed out down the stairs quietly careful not make any noise.

As she got to the bottom step, she gulped hesitantly while wondering if she should just turn around and go back upstairs. Her persistent nosiness got the better of her; she made her way slowly toward the dining room, then the kitchen. She backed up, toward the wall inching her way, closer toward the doorway.

Whereas she peaked around, she saw Martha lying on the floor, she approached her carefully once close enough she realize she was not alive. She backed up, looking at the body mortified by what she has seen. She turns around bumping into the dining room furniture trying to get out of there. She bolted up the stairs bursting into Nicolette’s room.

Shrieking while trying to, awaken her friend. Who is dead to the world asleep? Nicolette’s mumbled as Rebecca frantically shook her awake. She popped up, puzzled why she had been awakened at this early hour. Rebecca not able to blurt out any words just grabbed her by the arm pulling her out of bed and out of her room.

At the top of the stairs, she motioned for her to remain quiet as they went downstairs. By the time, they had reached the middle of the stairs, Nicolette protested angrily. “What on earth is wrong with you?”

Putting an arm against her chest, she held Nicolette against the wall as she peered into the kitchen. She could not believe it; the body had mysteriously disappeared. Storming into the kitchen in shock, she muttered incoherently. “What, how? There was a dead body here.”

Nicolette glared at her as she thought, “She’s completely lost it. Officially, she barked in anger. GOOD NIGHT REBECCA! Leaving her distressed and confused friend to ponder what had just happened.