Cappuccinos, Cupcakes, and a Corpse (A Cape Bay Cafe Mystery Book 1) by Harper Lin Page B

pleasure of this visit?”
    I decided to plead a need for commiseration. I sighed deeply. “Well, Mrs. Collins, you know, Mr. Cardosi’s death has just been weighing on me. I know you said on the day he…” I paused for effect. “The day he passed away that you’d spent a lot of time with him, so I felt like you, of all people, would be able to chat with me about him.”
    “Oh yes, dear. So sad, isn’t it? And him so young yet.”
    I hadn’t really thought of Mr. Cardosi as young , but I supposed if you were pushing eighty, as Mrs. Collins was, Mr. Cardosi’s late sixties did seem rather youthful.
    I nodded. “You were close to him?” Chris the Cell Phone Guy had shared freely after just a simple question, and I hoped that technique would work similarly well with Mrs. Collins.
    “I was! That’s why it’s been so hard for me. You know, so many of my friends are passing now. Your mother, then Gino Cardosi. And death comes in threes, you know. I just keep waiting for who will be next.” She shook her head sadly.
    I looked at her sympathetically. I wished she hadn’t mentioned my mother, but I supposed it had been a bad couple of months for our block, and she was entitled to be sad about it too.
    As I’d hoped, she continued talking after a brief pause. “You know, lately, I’d been going over in the evenings to help Gino practice courting a lady.” The shock must have shown on my face because Mrs. Collins rushed to continue. “Oh no, no, no, dear. He wasn’t courting me . It was someone else—he wouldn’t tell me who. But he hadn’t dated anyone since his Carolina—that was Matteo’s mother—passed away twenty-five years ago, and he was dreadfully out of practice. We just went over basic things—pulling a chair out for a lady, helping her with her coat, how to not make a mess of himself when eating spaghetti Bolognese. I helped him pick out some outfits to wear out to dinner with her that made him look like the respectable businessman he was.”
    I got the feeling from the way Mrs. Collins was talking that she wished she really had been the one Mr. Cardosi was courting—if he was actually courting anyone at all. I reminded myself of Mrs. Collins’s tendency to exaggerate and Matty’s confidence that his dad was largely a loner. It seemed entirely possible that Mrs. Collins had invited herself over to Mr. Cardosi’s with the intention of making him over as a suitor for herself, or some other watered-down version of what she had told me. But then something she said caught my attention.
    “Apparently the lady he was seeing, despite being a more mature woman like myself, was quite technological. She wanted to be able to—oh, what is it you young people call that? When you type to each other on your phones?”
    “Text?” I prompted.
    “Yes! Text! Apparently she wanted to be able to text messages to Gino, but his cell phone didn’t do that, and he wanted to get a new one that would let him do that. He went to that awful place across from his barbershop, but the young man who works there was quite rude to him. Gino didn’t buy anything.”
    So maybe there was something to Mrs. Collins’s story after all. I glanced at the clock on the wall and realized I needed to get to the coffee shop. I swallowed the rest of my tea. “Mrs. Collins, I’ve had such a lovely time with you, but I need to get to work. Thank you for the tea.” I rose from my chair so she wouldn’t be able to delay me by starting more stories.
    She sighed and put everything back on the tea tray. “Well, I do appreciate you coming, dear. You know you’re welcome here any time. Watching you grow up was always such a joy. You know, Mr. Collins and I were never able to have children, so having you across the street was almost like having one of our own grandchildren there.”
    I stopped and looked at her. I had never known that she felt that way. I gave her a hug. “Thank you, Mrs. Collins. That’s so sweet of you.” When I