Dying for the Truth (A Rockcrest Cove Cozy Mystery Book 4) by Emily Page

them. Clearly Connors was planning on using his size as a way to intimidate them, but Maddie was determined not to give him the satisfaction.
     
    “Ms. McDougal,” he said with a bit of formality.
     
    “Chief.”
     
    “Let’s get to it, why don’t we?” Connors said with a fake smile.
     
    “Let’s do,” Maddie agreed.
     
    Connors flipped through a file folder he had brought with him. “Let’s start at the beginning. How did you know Evan Foster?”
     
    Maddie took a look at Kyle, who nodded, before she answered. “Evan and I were friends while in culinary school.” She stopped there, following Kyle’s advice to keep her answers short.
     
    “Weren’t you rivals?”
     
    “I wouldn’t say rivals,” Maddie started. “That’s what other people would say, but Evan and I had different ways of reaching the same goals.”
     
    “Didn’t he steal your recipes to start his own business?”
     
    “No. Not really,” Maddie couched. “It was actually Emma who stole my recipes and gave them to Evan. I don’t believe he was aware that she was stealing them.”
     
    The muscles in Connor’s face tensed up, and you could see the vein alongside his neck throbbing from frustration. “But, how is it that his entire bakery has a menu that looks almost exactly the same as yours?” His voice sounded like a tight wire about to break.
     
    “Evan and Emma were partners. If she stole my recipes, it’s only logical that she used them to start the bakery.”
     
    “Then Evan was your rival.”
     
    “I didn’t say that. You did.”
     
    Connors stared at the small woman sitting across the table from him. His eyes rolled back in his head as he tried to figure out a way to unnerve her and get her to say something incriminating.
     
    “What were you doing at Evan’s bakery that morning?”
     
    “What morning?”
     
    “Last Monday, the morning of his death.”
     
    “I went to pay a friendly visit,” Maddie said honestly.
     
    “We have you on camera looking very agitated and angry,” Connors said.
     
    “What was I doing?”
     
    “You were yelling to someone inside the shop. You threw your pastries in the garbage and you left.”
     
    “So I was not the only person at the bakery that morning.”
     
    “No. There were others.”
     
    “Did you see me go in?”
     
    “No, we didn’t.”
     
    “And you saw me throw the pastries away.”
     
    “Yes.”
     
    “So how can you conclude that I committed the murder?”
     
    “You were there.”
     
    “Yes. Outside of the bakery, not inside.”
     
    “Right, but you could have come back later.”
     
    “When did Evan die?”
     
    “He was found dead in his office at about five thirty in the morning.”
     
    “When was I there?”
     
    “Around four in the morning.”
     
    “Did you find evidence that the surveillance cameras had been tampered with?”
     
    “No. The footage was pretty consistent.”
     
    “Did the camera show that I ever returned to the bakery?”
     
    “No. Only that one time.”
     
    “Was the office fingerprinted?”
     
    “Yes.”
     
    “Did you find my fingerprints?”
     
    “No.”
     
    “How did he die?”
     
    “He was poisoned with your cupcake.”
     
    “How do you know it was my cupcake? You said yourself that Evan’s store was using the exact same recipes as my bakery. Couldn’t someone who worked for him have had better access to poison him than I would?”
     
    Connors opened his mouth to say something but then realized that Maddie had quickly turned the tables on him. He had already said too much, but she had not given him much evidence to go on. The lady was smart and was not about to incriminate herself in such a way.
     
    “What kind of poison was used?”
     
    “The coroner called it glycoside amygdalin.”
     
    “Where did it come from? How was it administered? What was the quantity? Did you question anyone else that may have come to the store that morning?” Maddie’s questions came in rapid