He rubbed my back some more. “Yes, you’re right, I should have told you.”
I was unable to do anything more than nod my head against his shoulder.
“I’m not going anywhere, but I have to make a few calls.”
I nodded again, hoping he wouldn’t remove his arms to do it. I wasn’t sure I’d stay upright without them.
To my relief, he only moved one. “Hi. It’s Agent 1493. I need an SUV delivered to East 81st Street in Florence-Firestone as soon as possible. My vehicle has just been stolen. If you have a spare retrieval team you can set on the case now, you might be able to get it back before it’s chopped into pieces.” The person on the other end said something I couldn’t make out. “Yes, that’s right. See you shortly.”
“The tire’s flat.” I sniffled.
“What?”
“I saw he was stealing it, so I stabbed the tire with a screwdriver.”
“You had a screwdriver?”
“A broken one. I found it. I thought it might slow him down.”
The rubbing of my back resumed. “Good girl. That was quick thinking. I’ll tell the retrieval team when they arrive.”
Rub, rub, rub. It was starting to be less comforting and more irritating.
“You even saved Josh’s hate mail.”
I did a sob-hiccup again and pulled out of his arms, just to prove I could now stand on my own. “I did?”
He pointed at the box on the ground. It must have been in my lap when I’d been yanked out of the car.
“I mean, of course I did.”
He smiled, or at least his eyes seemed to. I was getting better at reading him. “That’s more like it.” He studied my disheveled appearance again. “We’ve got a replacement car coming soon. I’ll drop you home so you can get cleaned up. How does that sound?”
I stood there, swaying on my own two feet, thinking about my comfortable bed in my comfortable apartment, and realized a couple of things. One: Not falling apart in the last five minutes was an achievement for me and probably good practice for when Bruce-the-Bruiser came around. Two: Being held at gunpoint had burned through the brownies and left me starving. Connor was still looking at me, waiting for an answer.
“Does the plan involve food?” I asked.
“Sure, we can pick up some dinner on the way.”
“Then it sounds good.”
The replacement car was another black SUV. Connor drove in merciful silence, allowing me some space in my shell-shocked state. After a few minutes, I recalled why we’d been on that hellhole of a street in the first place.
“Did your contact have any information for us?”
Connor’s eyes left the road to assess how I was doing, and my mind flashed back to standing in his arms. I shoved the pesky memory away.
“He hadn’t heard anything, but he’s going to ask around.”
“Okay.”
“But enough of the case for you tonight. What do you want for dinner?”
I didn’t have to think long. I needed comfort food. “Pizza.”
“Pizza it is.”
His cheerful compliance aroused my suspicions. “Cheese pizza, hold the cyanide,” I clarified.
He looked at me again, his expression unreadable. “That, I can’t promise you.”
Jerk.
Fifty minutes later, I was snuggled in my bed, freshly showered and first aided, with a half-empty pizza box, a pile of hate mail, and a note from Oliver:
Chin up, Izzy ol’ girl. My manager said they’re looking for waitstaff at the Fox, and I know you’ve got buckets of experience with that sort of thing. Us heartbroken expats have to stick together. Working late tonight—so don’t cook.
Even though I wasn’t in the predicament he thought I was in, my eyes felt wet. How could a near stranger care more about me than my own husband had? I folded the note and slid it under the lamp on my bedside table before grabbing another piece of pizza. Lying to Oliver on a constant basis was going to be tough. Something I’d chew over some other time.
Freed from cooking duties, I only had Meow left to organize dinner for. I fed her some bits of ham where she was, curled up on my pillow, promising myself I’d get up soon to feed her properly. Meow wasn’t the only one I was neglecting. My poor Corvette was still at Connor’s, but he’d offered to pick me up tomorrow morning, and my bed had proved too alluring for me to argue.
I had every intention of starting on the hate mail and feeding Meow, but halfway through my sixth piece of pizza, I fell asleep with the light on, the hate mail unread, the cat unfed, and the pizza box still beside me.
At six a.m., I woke up from a dream that had started out with a pimply teenager holding a gun to my head, only for him to morph into Bruce-the-Bruiser. He manhandled me into an abandoned building and tied me to a chair. As he’d leaned in to gag me, he’d smiled, revealing an assortment of gold teeth and nearly smothering me with a wave of rotten fish breath.
At least I woke up before I wet my pants.
I was desperate for the toilet, so I stumbled out of bed, barely registering that I’d been using the pizza box as a pillow. Maybe because Meow had been using mine. Hard to miss when I saw my reflection in the mirror, though. My right cheek made me look like a burn victim in a low budget horror film.
I groaned and stepped into the shower.
I was giving Meow a second serving of breakfast to make up for last night, when I heard a knock at the door. The pizza box imprint was mostly gone from my face, so I opened it. Standing on the landing was a sweet little old lady, complete with sparkling blue eyes, rosy, lined cheeks, and snow-white hair pulled back in a bun.
Only she was wearing a modern turquoise shift dress that hung from her bony frame as it would from a model’s, paired with opaque black stockings and ballet flats. She was possibly better looking than I was, and definitely better dressed.
“Can I help you?” I asked, feeling as out of my league as I had with Josh Summers.
She stuck out a slender, blue-veined hand. “I’m Etta Hamilton. I saw you moving in a few days ago and wanted to introduce myself. I live just over there in 3A.”
“Ms. Hamilton—”
“Call me Etta.”
“Etta, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Isobel Avery, but my friends call me Izzy.”
“Well, I’m not sure we’re friends yet, dear,” she said, giving me a quick once-over before stepping past me into the apartment. “Do you have any cookies?”
I was pretty sure she was supposed to bring me cookies as a welcome gift, but I’d baked some when I first moved in and am hardly the type to deny an old lady food. I pulled them out and put them on a plate.
“Would you like tea, too?”
“That would be fabulous.”
She settled herself into a dining chair with the grace and posture of a ballet dancer and surveyed the room as if it would spill its secrets. Maybe it would. I switched the kettle on.
“I thought from all those fancy store bags you lugged up here the other day that you’d have made it a bit nicer in here.”
I shrugged. “Those were from my boyfriend.” I was grateful my face was hidden from her while I sorted through the tea bags.
“Oooh. Is he the one that dropped you off last night?”
The kettle whistled. “That’s the one.” But how do you know about him? As I carried the mugs, milk, and sugar over to the table, it crossed my mind that Etta might be a Taste Society agent sent to keep an eye on me. She was cool enough to be a spy.
She’d eaten at least two cookies already. That made her seem more ordinary. Except she’d done it without smudging her lipstick.
She patted me on the shoulder before dumping a heaping spoon of sugar in her tea. “Thank you. I’m starting to think you might be my new favorite neighbor if all your cookies taste this good and you bring eye candy the likes of your boyfriend around here.”
“Thank you?” I sipped my tea to hide my uncertainty.
“So, Oliver told me you’re fr
om Australia?”
“That’s right.”
“Ever killed a crocodile?”
“Uh, no—”
“That’s a shame. I thought you might like to go gator hunting with me some time. I’ve got a friend down in Louisiana who needs the local population cut down.”
“I’ve never even shot a gun.”
Etta banged her mug down on the table. “Well… hell.” Her face went slack and she stared over my shoulder with unseeing eyes. As if she were in shock.
Okay, probably not a spy.
When she didn’t say anything after a few more seconds, I ventured my own question. “So, how long have you lived here?”
Her eyes snapped back into sharp focus and she picked up her mug. “Oh, ages. Long enough to know everyone else in this apartment building is about as much fun as a barrel of dead monkeys. Mr. Larson in 1A’s a war veteran, so you’d think he might be interesting, but the only words I’ve ever heard him speak were to his hamster. Then that Flanagan couple in 2A are always too busy fighting or fornicating to be social, and don’t get me started on Ms. Pleasant in 1B; I’ve never met a bigger sourpuss. I’ve thought about sending her on a hot date to try to sweeten her disposition, but by golly, I don’t know anyone I dislike enough to send with her. Meanwhile, Mr. Winkle in 2B surrounds himself with fish like a crazy cat lady does cats. He’s happy to talk, but if I have to hear about his Siamese fighting fish one more time I’m afraid I’ll fall asleep standing up, and that’s real dangerous at my age. I could break a hip, you know. And there are a couple of young Korean gentlemen who just moved in to 1C, but all they seem to do is smoke weed and play video games. They haven’t invited me to join in either.”
She chewed another mouthful of cookie. “If there’s nothing on TV, what am I supposed to do all day?”
I shoved a cookie into my mouth to save me from having to answer. I’d just learned more about my neighbors in three minutes than I had in the last week, and I could already tell that Etta was going to be my favorite.
“Can I smoke in here?”
“Um…”
“That’s all right. We’ll go stand on the landing.” She took a last swig of tea and headed to the door, expecting me to follow.
I brought my tea with me, a silly grin on my face because my imagination had just put Etta and Aunt Alice in a room together.
Etta lit up with efficient grace and pressed the cigarette to her lips. Her lipstick was still perfect. She didn’t smell like an old lady either. She smelled like magnolia, maple, and tobacco.
“I only started smoking a year ago,” she said. “Never smoked in my life before that.”
“Oh? What happened a year ago?”
She eyeballed me as she took another drag. “Happened? Nothing happened, that’s the problem. You get to my age and most of your friends are dead or in some old folks’ home and can’t tell you apart from their own children. I got friends who wore natural, undyed cotton and ate organic grass and beetles and stuff like that, and they were the first to go. Then I’ve got friends who smoked like a green branch in a fire and drank like prohibition was coming back, and they haven’t been ill a day of their lives. I figure it’s stress that’ll kill you first. They’ve even done studies about it. So I decided, hell, if it feels good, I’m gonna do it. And smoking feels good after you get over the initial disgust.” She shrugged and inhaled again. “Same as sex really.”
I opened my mouth and shut it again.
She finished the cigarette and ground it out on the metal railing.
“Well, Isobel, it was nice meeting you. Hope to see more of your cookies and man candy ’round here soon.” She gave me a wink, which she totally pulled off, and sauntered back toward 3A.
I was admiring her retreating figure with a mixture of astonishment and awe when my phone buzzed with a message from Connor. “Man candy should be here in about ten minutes, so keep an eye out,” I called to her. Then I remembered I was still in my bathrobe and raced inside to finish getting ready.
Connor got out and opened the car door for me. The perfect gentleman boyfriend. He was wearing fitted navy jeans, black dress shoes, and a pale lilac long-sleeved shirt rolled up at the cuffs. The stubble from yesterday was gone. Professional but approachable, I guessed. Nobody seemed to wear suits in LA, so the one he’d worn at my interview must’ve been chosen to intimidate.
Watching him walk back around to the driver’s side, I suspected Etta would appreciate today’s ensemble—his tailored shirt hugged his body, and the jeans did wonders for his ass.
We were in a black SUV that was neither the stolen one nor the loaner that had replaced it. The interior held Connor’s subtle leather and citrus scent, so I figured it was his.
“How many cars do you have?” I asked out of idle curiosity.
“Not so many that you can keep giving them away.” He turned the engine over, his face its usual uninformative mask.
I thought hitting him was probably not the best way to start our day together. “I’ll keep that in mind next time I’m staring down the barrel of a gun.”
Neither of us spoke for a minute.
“I’m thinking of learning how to use one. A gun I mean.”
“Good idea.”
I snuck a peek to see if he was toying with me. He wasn’t. I gulped. Mum would kill me if she ever found out. Dad would buy me a beer and ask if he could have a turn. Etta would drag me off to Louisiana.
“I’ll take you to the shooting range later. But right now, we have a lead to follow up on.”
“Oh?” I was just glad he hadn’t asked me about my progress on the hate mail.
“A bunch of background checks came back. It seems that our ex-California Culinary Champion, Albert Alstrom, has been a suspect in two suspicious deaths but never with enough evidence to nail him. Each victim was a stumbling block to advancing his career, and his M.O. is consistent with hiring someone for the job.”
“Does he happen to have a prescription for Ambience?”
“We don’t know. Medical records are locked up tight, and if he’s gotten away with murder twice, he wouldn’t be stupid enough to use something he has a prescription for anyway. Ambience is pretty easy to acquire illicitly, so Albert could be our man, but he’s not going to open up to a private investigator working for Josh Summers.”
“So what do we do?”
He looked me over. I was wearing a pair of those A-line, high-waisted skirt-shorts thingies that seemed to be all the rage at the moment, in gray, paired with a coral blouse that somehow didn’t clash with my hair. High-heeled sandals combined with the short hemline to give me the illusion of long legs—as long as I could stay upright in them anyway. It was the first outfit I’d grabbed in my rush to get ready, but once again, the stylist had worked her magic.
“Luckily for us, Albert has a soft spot for his female fans,” Connor said.
I started to shake my head, but stopped when I thought of Dana.
Connor didn’t miss my hesitation. “Neither of the suspicious deaths were violent or direct,” he said. “One guy died of an alleged overdose, the other had a fatal crash under the influence, so you should be okay as long as you’re careful what you eat and drink. Besides, you’re not a threat to his career.”
I closed my eyes for a moment. What’s the worst that could happen?
“You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. It’s not part of your job description.”
“I’ll do it.” My tone was firm. My stomach was squishy.
“Okay. I’ll put a wire on you so I can hear what’s going on, and I’ll be nearby to bail you out if anything happens.”
I nodded.
“What do you know about Alstrom?”
I’d seen him on TV a few times, but he’d never done anything to capture my attention beyond being another chef. “Not a whole lot.”
Connor passed me a manila folder. “Well, as his new biggest fan, you’d better get reading.”
7
While
I looked over Albert’s file, we ordered breakfast at a stereotypical American diner, complete with the red vinyl seats and Formica tables.
“I didn’t think this would be your kind of place,” I said.
“Just making sure your practical assessment covers a wide variety of food and environments. You’d be surprised how some celebrities eat.” He grabbed a laminated menu, looking entirely too pleased with himself. “Besides, the coffee here is delicious, darling.”
Of course I had to taste his meal first, including the coffee—which I very professionally resisted the urge to spit in—so my omelet and pancakes were cold by the time I got to them. I chowed down anyway, still reading the file. When I finished, I had a hard time believing Albert could hurt anyone.
He looked like the nerd next door. His high school photo depicted him with his light-blue eyes overpowered by a face full of mountainous angry red pimples, topped off with a bad bowl cut and braces. He must’ve been bullied relentlessly. His yearbook quote was “I’ll show you all,” and he had. I couldn’t help but be pleased for him.
Fourteen years later, he was renowned for his ingenuity in molecular gastronomy—a fancy style of cooking using scientific techniques. From the three or four words I understood in the section listing his scientific achievements, I gathered he’d invented some doodad that improved infusion outcomes in some applications. He’d also masterminded a wildly successful restaurant in LA, contributing to the explosion in popularity that molecular gastronomy was enjoying around here.
His success had come hand in hand with a string of hot girlfriends in the past few years. There was even one fiancée, but that had ended before the altar.
I stared at the more recent photographs of him. He was thirty-two now, over a decade younger than Josh Summers. He’d done well to win California Culinary Champion of the year so many times already. While his look had improved as his fame grew—his dark hair was stylishly tousled, his skin and teeth flawless, and his thin, angular face handsome in a tragic-artist kind of way—traces of nerd showed through in the slump of his shoulders and the self-conscious unease in his smile.
Eat, Pray, Die Mystery Box Set Page 7
