The metal doors let out a loud ding as they crashed into the wall. Anessa dropped the metal bowl she'd been using to mix her next creation. Dark brown mix splattered on the cabinets.

"What's wrong?" Anessa yelled with her hand to her chest.

I gestured at Jeffrey's bowl with my mouth open. "He's dead!"

Anessa whipped around to see behind her, and Tabitha pushed past me. Both women stood in shocked horror at the sight.

"Someone do something," I said and rushed to Jeffrey's bowl. The blue beta fish floated topside. His fins moved with the water as I grabbed the bowl and disturbed his serene resting place. "We killed my aunt's fish." Jeffrey was dead.

My family would never let me forget this. They'd talk nonstop about my fish killing at every family holiday. I'd have to move. Change my name. Get a new social security number and fake birthday.

"Are you sure he's dead?" Tabitha asked on the other side of the large metal table in the middle of the kitchen.

I stared at Jeffrey. He didn't flip over and start swimming. "I'm pretty sure."

"Here, poke him." Anessa handed me a toothpick.

I turned toward her and waved it in the air. "With a toothpick?"

She shrugged. "That way I can throw it away. I don't want fish guts on my good stuff."

"Shhh. Don't say the g word." I spun back to Jeffrey and gave him a quiet apology before gently poking him with the toothpick. Nothing happened, so I poked him again to be sure.

Tabitha gasped. "Don't stab him!"

She caught me off guard, and I dropped the toothpick in the bowl. "I didn't stab him! I poked him."

"Did he move?" Anessa asked, leaning to the side to see around me.

"No, he didn't magically bounce back to life after I tooth picked him."

Her shoulders drooped, and she stepped to the other side of the table, probably wanting to distance herself from the crime scene.

"I think he was too close to the oven," Tabitha said as I debated fishing out the toothpick to throw it away or make it part of his water burial.

The oven! His bowl was almost touching it and now that she mentioned the location, the left side of my body was unreasonably warm from standing there.

I turned to face them with my hands on my hips. "You cooked my aunt's fish to death?"

Tabitha glanced at Anessa's horrified face and stepped closer to me. "No, did you hear your aunt? He was old."

Anessa stepped up beside her. "Totally old. He died of natural causes."

I dunked my finger in the bowl. It was bathtub hot. "You roasted Jeffrey."

My best friends were fish boilers. What if he'd been a bunny?

I sniffed the air. Something smelled funny. Was it Jeffrey?

Why did these things happen to me?

I let my head fall back the way Broadrick did when he questioned my choices. It didn't help. Maybe I had to muster the mumble like he did.

"Do you think the cemetery has an extra space available?" I asked the ceiling.

"Vonnie, he was a wonderful fish, but they won't let you bury him at the cemetery," Tabitha said.

"Obviously." I returned my head to non-ceiling, talking position and stared at her. "It's for me because my aunt is going to kill me when she finds out you cooked her fish."

I needed Broadrick, but he'd gone off to save the world or something. Since I couldn't call him, I snapped a picture and sent him a text.

VONNIE: Jeffrey is dead. I'm going to jail for murder.

Anessa and Tabitha continued to stare at the bowl, offering me exactly zero pieces of advice.

BROADRICK: You need to dispose of the body and any evidence.

That was easy for him to say. He was two hours away from the crime. No one would suspect him of the murder.

VONNIE: How?

The panic started a headache behind my eyeballs. Like I didn't already have enough on my plate. Now I had to deal with covering up a dead relative's murder.

"The woman has a diaper bag for him. She's going to notice if her fish is gone," Anessa said to Tabitha.

Tabitha shrugged. "I'm just saying."

I rubbed at the top of my eye to help with the headache. It didn't. The two of them continued to argue ridiculous solutions quietly on their side of the room as I waited for Broadrick's text. Obviously, nothing good was coming out of their brain trust, so I ignored them.

BROADRICK: The toilet.

I opened my mouth for another gasp. How cold. How cruel. We couldn't just toss Jeffrey in the toilet and flush him.

Could we?

No.

He was my cousin.

I shoved my phone into my back pocket and made an executive decision. "Jeffrey needs a funeral."

Tabitha bit her bottom lip. "That's a lot of evidence to leave behind."

"Right." Anessa tipped her head to the side.

"It's a grave... err... toilet side ceremony and then we'll flush the body."

"They sell betas at the pet store," Anessa said.

Now we were getting somewhere. These ideas had merit.

"You should take a picture of him so you get the right fin colors and everything when you buy his replacement," Tabitha said.

Anessa pushed at her slightly. "She can't take pictures of a corpse. That's incriminating."

"I already did," I said and snapped a closeup of his fins. And then another with the flash. I didn't want my aunt comparing Jeffreys and finding out they weren't a match.

I'd delete them from my phone after I bought the new one. Then I'd take a bunch of pictures of New Jeffrey and show them to my aunt about what a fun vacation he had at the bakery to cover my tracks.

Yes, it was practically the perfect murder coverup.

No one would ever know. Except me, Broadrick, Anessa, Tabitha, and the security crew monitoring the bakery cameras, which probably meant Ridge's entire team. Oh, and New Jeffrey. But besides them, no one would ever know.

It was the perfect crime.

"Okay, we are totally pulling this off," I said to the girls. "Someone get me a spoon so I can fish him out."

Anessa's entire face crinkled up. "You are not using one of my good spoons on body recovery."

"I'll get a disposable cup from the front," Tabitha said and left to retrieve it.

My phone buzzed in my pocket.

"When are you going to buy a new one?" Anessa asked. "The store is probably closing soon."

All good points. "I'm going to wait."

The less time I had New Jeffrey, the less chance I'd kill that one too. My new cousin was safer at the store.

Tabitha returned and fished out Jeffrey, the toothpick, and a bit of water in her large to-go cup.

My pocket buzzed again with a reminder of the text. Ugh.

I pulled it out as we walked to the bathroom together with Jeffrey held out in front of Tabitha on his funeral march.

LIZZY RAGLAND-UPCOMING FIANCEE: Do you want to get together today for shopping?

I checked my wrist for the time. Nothing. I really needed to buy a watch.

VONNIE: Today is not a good time. I'll get back to you.

LIZZY RAGLAND-UPCOMING FIANCEE: Okay, but don't wait too long to fix the problem.

I squinted at the phone, forming wrinkles in my forehead. What did that mean? Something told me that maybe I didn't like Lizzy Ragland.

But I didn't have to like her to make her a fiancée rather than a girlfriend and cash my check.

I ignored her message and opened the bathroom door for Tabitha, who carried in Jeffrey with care. I appreciated that she took her pallbearer responsibilities seriously.

Anessa used her shoe to lift the seat, and Tabitha poured the cup's contents into the bowl. We all stood around it staring at dead Jeffrey. The toothpick bobbed into him a few times.

"Should someone say something?" Anessa asked as the toothpick hit Jeffrey in the head.

If he didn't wake up from that, he was totally dead.

They both looked at me. Shit.

"I have to say something?" I clarified.

Both women nodded. Ugh.

"Fine." I leaned a little more over the bowl, not wanting to get too close. "I only knew Jeffrey a short time, but he seemed like an excellent fish. His fins had an extra bounce in them."

"Can fins bounce?" Tabitha whispered to Anessa.

I frowned at them for interrupting my eulogy. "He was a special fish and a wonderful cousin. Now he's going to a special place."

There, that seemed fitting. I motioned to Anessa, and she lowered the handle, flushing the toilet. The water spun and Jeffrey followed the current, making little circles as he jetted toward the bottom of the bowl.

I saluted him as he disappeared from sight and Anessa lowered the lid and flushed the bowl again. "Just in case."

"Now what?" Tabitha asked.

I walked past her and pushed open the bathroom door as a customer came through the front, ringing the bell. "I'm going to bed."

NB needed dinner, and I needed a good long sleep before I had to face another day of murders, fiancée shopping, fish buying, and whatever else life threw at me.

Anessa returned my wave as I walked out the front door and headed toward home.