Grilled Cheese and Goblins

by Nicole Kimberling

  Gunther leaned down and said very loudly and very close to her ear, “You are under arrest for assaulting a federal officer.” Then, to Keith, he said, “You want to go have that look around now or wait till the police get here?”

  “Yeah, sure.” His jaw throbbed. He glanced at the dishwasher. “Show me to the meat locker, kid.”

  The dishwasher led the way back into the kitchen. They passed a busy line of grills. Flames and smoke leaped and billowed around the cooks as they tended the orders. Then they entered the back kitchen—a small, clean space whose walls were lined with steel prep tables and banks of shelves holding dry goods.

  “The big one’s right there.” Tentatively the dishwasher pointed back toward a heavy door. “But there’s another smaller one for the really expensive steaks that’s padlocked.”

  “Who’s got the key?”

  “It’s a combo lock.” This came from a burly Black guy who had followed them from the line. Keith thought he might be the head grill man. “Ms. Bullock is the only one who knows it.”

  “Of course she is.”

  After a wait of approximately ten minutes, Portland Police Bureau arrived with a pair of bolt cutters for the padlock and a car to transport Ms. Bullock. Being a member of the strike force, Gunther could have probably performed a spell to open it, but there were far too many bystanders and it was just as easy to use a human tool. By the time PPB carried Bullock away, the deep bruise on Keith’s jaw had begun to darken, but he refused to show any pain in front of the restaurant’s staff. There was still no way to tell where any of their allegiances lay.

  Keith entered the meat locker. He already felt ill. Very quickly he found himself fighting to avoid retching. Two naked bodies hung suspended upside down from chains, throats cut, blood collecting in buckets on the floor.

  To the left, on a stainless steel rack, were more remains. This one had been skinned, cut apart at the joints, and separated into several metal hotel pans, but Keith recognized the anatomy immediately.

  Gunther’s cookie search had led them straight to the abattoir. Plainly, the butchering had taken place here. For all his commentary about humans not abandoning their carnal pleasures easily, Keith would have never seriously thought that Bullock’s wife would have the sheer stupidity to continue her Thyestean feasting after her husband had been caught. Yet here she was.

  Keith stepped back outside for some air. Gunther had been waiting just beyond the door.

  “From your face I gather that you’ve found something?”

  “Have a look for yourself,” Keith suggested.

  Gunther held up a demurring hand. “I trust you. What do you want to do now?”

  Keith scanned the faces of the kitchen staff and of the servers who were looking anxiously on. It would be impossible for all members of the staff to be innocent. Cindy Bullock’s manicure made it clear that she never picked up a kitchen knife.

  “Put a uniform on this door, clear the dining room and call for a paddy wagon. We’re detaining and questioning all staff. We’ll also need to find the names of any not on shift tonight and have PPB bring them down to the station. Particularly the butchers. Someone with skills skinned those carcasses. I’m thinking we’re looking for one front-of-the-house person and one or two members of kitchen staff who were in on it with Ms. Bullock.”

  Gunther gave a slight salute and departed the back kitchen. Keith walked up to the line but didn’t walk through. Each and every one of those five guys had at least one knife. Plus, they’d be more cooperative if he respected both their territory and hierarchy. He held up his badge. “My name is Keith Curry. I’m a federal agent. Who is the person in charge here?”

  Unsurprisingly, it was the Black guy who had spoken first. His name turned out to be Baratunde and he was the chef. He outweighed Keith by at least forty pounds but seemed overall even tempered. “I need to ask you to shut this down and bring your people out to the dining room to be interviewed.”

  “What about the tickets?” He indicated the unmade orders with a wave of his tongs.

  Keith shook his head. “Shut it down. For tonight, anyway. We’re already clearing the customers. This is a crime scene.”

  The other man nodded slowly. Behind him, Keith could see one of the cooks texting someone. “And I’m going to ask to hold your phones for the time being, starting with his.”

  Baratunde whipped his head around to fix the young cook with a glare. “Damn it, Jesse. Bring that here. Haven’t you got any sense?”

  Jesse cowered as he handed over the phone. “I was just texting my girlfriend to say I’d be late, chef.”

  “Your woman can wait.”

  Keith found it sentimentally amusing that as an agent he inspired less fear than the chef.

  Baratunde collected the phones into a square plastic refrigerator insert. As he handed them to Keith, he said, “Jesse’s just a dumb kid, sir. He wasn’t trying to disrespect you.”

  “Sure, I understand.” He waved the chef into the back kitchen where they could have relative privacy.

  “I’m going to ask you straight-out. Have you ever been in this locker?”

  “No, sir. It’s Ms. Bullock’s private refrigerator. No staff is allowed in there.”

  Keith leaned back against a stainless steel prep table. “You and I both know that somebody must be allowed in. Ms. Bullock is not cooking for herself.”

  This drew a slight smile from Baratunde.

  “Not my staff.” The chef’s tone was final. “None of my boys have ever stepped foot in there.”

  “Who then?”

  “There’s a private catering company that uses this space on Monday nights when the restaurant is closed. Forbidden Pleasures, I think they’re called.”

  Of course, Keith thought. “Do they share all this equipment?”

  The chef nodded. “It’s part of their rental contract. They clean up fine, but they’re hell on the knives.”

  “Do you have contact information for this company?”

  “No, sir. We’re not allowed on the property on Mondays. Not even me.”

  “Did you ever think that maybe Ms. Bullock was hiding something?”

  “Sure,” the chef said. “Look at that big-ass lock.”

  “What do you think is in that refrigerator?”

  “Heroin.” The answer came without pause and with certainty. “Or maybe coke. Some kind of drugs anyway.”

  Keith nodded thoughtfully. That is exactly what he would have assumed in this guy’s position. He said, “Do you read the newspaper?”

  Baratunde’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Sometimes. I’m more of a talk radio man, though.”

  “Have you heard anything about the Cannibal Killer?”

  The chef’s face paled to the color of ash. He swallowed and said, “Some.”

  “Inside that walk-in, lying in stainless hotel pans that you probably use every day, are the butchered remains of at least three people,” Keith said. “You can see how I want to know more about this catering company that shares your kitchen, right?”

  The chef did not immediately answer. Keith wondered briefly if he had misjudged Baratunde. Maybe he truly had been complicit. Then, with no warning, the man lunged sideways and puked loudly into the trash can. The uniform didn’t look much better, but he, at least, hadn’t been eating off the same dishes used to process human protein. Keith waited while the chef splashed his face with water and stood, leaning on the hand sink, breathing deeply. Finally, he said, “Sometimes the caterers have leftovers that they leave in our refrigerator for the staff to eat.”

  The cause of Baratunde’s abrupt illness became sharply clear. “And?”

  “This morning they left some posole in our walk-in. I—for lunch—” Tears rimmed the chef’s eyes. Whether they were the result of impending further illness or horrifying remorse, Keith could not say.

  “Is there any left?”

  Baratunde nodded. “Ms. Bullock and I were the only ones who ate any. Nobody else wanted hominy.
She kept talking about how back in the day the dish was made with human flesh.”

  “You better show me. We’ll need to test it.”

  “I just need a second.” He leaned far over the sink, jaw working, plainly fighting the urge to vomit again.

  Keith said, “Take your time.”

  It only took Baratunde a few deep breaths to recover before he was able to lead Keith into the main walk-in, a long, narrow space. It was supremely clean and well organized. The chef plainly took pride in his profession.

  “This is it.” He handed Keith a long insert of quasi-congealed stew, taking obvious care not to touch the contents.

  Gunther ducked into the walk-in. “We’ve got the dining room cleared.”

  “Thanks.” Keith glanced at him and then at the chef, whose eyes were still glassy. The big man’s hands shook slightly. Keith remained placid while he removed a small vial from his pocket. He pulled a piece of flesh from the stew and squeezed a couple of drops of tincture onto it. The tincture shone blue. He looked at the chef and said, “It’s pork. We should keep it anyway. The container might have prints we can use.”

  The relief that swept across Baratunde’s face was that of a condemned man released at the last minute.

  “Thank the Lord.”

  “I’d appreciate it if you’d go and see how your crew is doing.”

  “Yes, sir.” He went, smiling.

  The second the door closed, Keith crumpled the meat in a napkin, whispering, “I’m sorry—whoever you were.”

  Gunther drew closer. “I thought blue meant human.”

  Keith nodded. “The chef doesn’t need to know that though. He doesn’t need to have that knowledge on him for the rest of his life—that he’s a cannibal. It’s bad enough that he’s going to lose his job when this joint shuts down. Working here isn’t going to be a resume builder, either. We’ll still send it to the lab—just for documentation. And prints, like I said.”

  Gunther said, “Do you need a minute?”

  “No, let’s just go get this over with.”

  Chapter Six

  Interviews at Bauer & Bullock went quickly. Few staff knew much about Forbidden Pleasures. Keith called it quits around nine, when his jaw started hurting him too much to pay attention to their uninformative answers. He decided to save Bullock’s interview for the morning, when he was less tired and after she’d spent the night in jail.

  Once they reached the hotel, Gunther went to the ice machine to make up a pack for Keith while Keith himself poured two vodka shots and drank them both in quick succession.

  Returning with a softball-sized bag of ice, wrapped in a clean white towel, Gunther said, “By the way, it was bison.”

  “No, the carcass in the fridge was human. Trust me.” Keith held the ice pack to his jaw, wincing at the cold against his tender flesh.

  “I mean the preferred protein at my family’s midsummer meal. It was bison. You asked and I never answered.” Gunther sat down beside him on the bed. Keith’s proximity alarm buzzed and buzzed again, warning him of Gunther’s closeness. He pulled it off and threw it on the nightstand. He didn’t need the watch to know how near the other man sat. Every part of Keith’s body seemed to be responding to the nearness—to the smell of Gunther’s faintly spicy cologne, to the knowledge of his sheer masculinity.

  He needed to get laid and that was a fact.

  Gunther said quietly, “Is your jaw hurting you a lot?”

  “It hurts enough.” The bruise did hurt, but if he was honest, the real wound had been mainly to his pride. He said, “Getting hit by a crazy, slap-happy bitch isn’t what I wanted from this evening.”

  “I admit I had other hopes as well.” After this remark, Gunther lay back and fell silent. Keith glanced sideways, wondering if the other man had somehow drifted to asleep. His eyes were closed, his fingers laced behind his head. His abdomen rose and fell slowly. His expression had softened. His mouth looked supremely kissable. Keith imagined himself leaning over and tasting Gunther’s mouth, wondering if a hint of tobacco still lingered there.

  And for so many reasons that was the stupidest impulse Keith had had in years.

  Without opening his eyes Gunther said, “Are you hungry?”

  “I’ll make myself some grilled cheese in a minute.”

  “That’s pretty much the only thing you eat now, isn’t it?”

  “Pretty much.”

  Gunther shook his head. “It doesn’t seem like that could possibly be good for you.”

  “Says the man who ate two and a half packs of cigarettes today.”

  “I didn’t say my diet was good. I’m just saying that you might want to take a multivitamin.”

  “I ate an orange last week,” Keith said. “Grilled cheese is easy when you’re cooking for one.”

  “Why don’t you include me in your dinner plans then?”

  “I don’t cook meat anymore.” Keith felt like a complete weakling admitting this but also knew that Gunther probably didn’t truly understand how pathetic this made him seem in the professional cooking world.

  “I didn’t say it had to be meat.” Gunther opened his eyes, regarding Keith with a steadiness that made him look away.

  “You’re a goblin. Meat is what you want.”

  “You know we prefer to be called Luminous Ones. And I think we don’t know each other well enough for you to know what it is that I want.”

  “You’re telling me that your favorite food isn’t meat?”

  Gunther shrugged. “When I was a little kid my favorite food was Christmas lights. I used to eat them right off the string like candy.”

  “You’re shitting me.”

  “Not at all. My godfather used to bribe me with them so I’d stop sucking all the butane out of his lighter. So while it’s true that I haven’t eaten many vegetables in my life, I’m feeling very game today. So how about it?”

  “I don’t really want to cook,” Keith said.

  “What do you want to do then?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You must want something.”

  Though he knew Gunther was still talking about their dinner plans, Keith felt so demoralized and tired and maybe slightly drunk from the vodka shot on an empty stomach that he found himself saying, “What I want, Heartman, is to fuck you and not have to talk about it afterward.”

  Gunther didn’t immediately respond and Keith realized he’d gone too far, so he added, “That’s just about the only thing that would make me feel okay about today.”

  Gunther sat up and then stood up. Keith stared down at the mottled brown carpet, expecting the other man to take his coat and go. He heard the rustle of fabric.

  Soon I’ll hear the click of a hotel door closing, Keith thought. Instead he just heard more rustling. He glanced up and to his astonishment realized that Gunther had shed his sport coat and tie. His cuffs hung, unfastened, while he worked the buttons of his dress shirt open.

  Stupidly, Keith asked, “What are you doing?”

  Gunther pulled a slow smile, looking him straight in the eye as he shrugged out of his shirt. He wore a white undershirt that molded to his flat abdomen. His biceps and forearms bulged, angular masses of muscle. “I’m preparing to make you feel better about today.”

  Keith gave a dry laugh. “Okay, nice one. You got me. How about we get Thai takeout from that joint around the corner?”

  “Afterward.” Gunther stepped out of his shoes and unbuckled his belt.

  With a weird mix of pleasure and fear, Keith realized Gunther wasn’t joking. He said, “I don’t have anything . . . for that.”

  “I do. Inside pocket of my overcoat.” He dropped his pants. Even in white boxer briefs and black dress socks, Gunther looked amazing. He didn’t keep either of those on for very much longer, though. Nor did his undershirt remain in place. Naked, Gunther’s pale body seemed like it could have been cut from paper. His legs were heavily roped with muscle. Though his chest was mostly bare, a fine line of dark hair ran from hi
s navel to his groin. His cock, like the rest of him, seemed perfectly proportioned. Long, uncut and resting on a pair of the most even testicles Keith had ever seen.

  Gunther stepped closer. Keith set his ice pack aside and rested his hands on Gunther’s hips.

  Gunther shuddered and murmured, “Chilly.”

  “Sorry.” Keith ran his palms up over Gunther’s abdomen, then around to his back, sliding down over his round ass, the tips of his fingers lightly brushing the tender inside flesh.

  Keith watched Gunther’s face as he gently explored Gunther’s body. “You really were perfectly made.”

  “Through no effort of my own, unfortunately. But thank you.” Gunther rested his hands on Keith’s shoulders, spreading his legs slightly, allowing Keith greater access. Gunther’s cock was fully erect now, the head bobbing very near Keith’s face. He nuzzled the shaft, cheek pressed against Gunther’s abdomen.

  Gunther said, “I hope you will invite me into your bed soon.”

  “In a minute.” Keith caught the head of Gunther’s cock, sucking it, tasting it. Now that he knew Gunther was trans-goblin he half expected some vile Zippo-fuel flavor to assault his senses and kill his desire. But Gunther tasted just like he had before. He tasted just like he looked—perfectly human, while simultaneously being inhumanly perfect. Gunther arched into him, just slightly.

  Keith stood and nibbled Gunther’s lower lip, sampling that flavor too, though he’d never truly forgotten it. How could he? Spicy, fragrant, rich and slippery. Luscious as drawn butter. Gunther’s lips parted, soft and passive to Keith’s explorations. His hands rested lightly on Keith’s sides, as if they were waiting to receive a permission slip before even attempting to touch Keith’s chest.

  Keith supposed that that was exactly what Gunther was waiting for, given Keith hadn’t even loosened his tie. Cheek pressed against Gunther’s throat, he said, “Lie down with me.”

  Gunther said nothing. He merely climbed onto the mattress and stretched out on his stomach as he had numerous times in the past.

  At the small of his back, Gunther had a tattoo. A small triangular blackwork design with a point that dipped down toward the cleft of his ass. It was just about the last thing Keith expected to ever have the pleasure of seeing again, but once he did, he could not get his clothes off fast enough.