Parmesan Pizza Murder

by Patti Benning

  CHAPTER FIVE

  * * *

  “I’m sure all of you know why I called you in today,” she began, looking at the four employees gathered in front of her. Two were missing; Clara, who had left a few weeks ago to work at another small restaurant in town, and, of course, Sabrina. “A member of our team was killed last night while she was out on a delivery.”

  None of her employees were surprised by this news. When she had gotten back to the pizzeria the night before, she had found Rose still waiting for her. After telling the young woman what had happened, she had sent out an email to the others, who by then had heard about Sabrina’s death from Rose, and asked them to meet at the pizzeria early the next morning. It was obvious that the news had hit them hard; Iris’s eyes were red-rimmed from crying, and all of them looked as if they hadn’t slept at all. She didn’t feel much better herself; she had tossed and turned all night, and had left the house that morning without her customary cup of coffee, not feeling able to stomach the bitter drink.

  “I don’t know much about what happened, yet,” she said. “No one does. Today, I just wanted to talk about what we’re going to do here at the pizzeria. I know she didn’t work here long, but she was still one of us. I want to be sure we give her the respect she deserves.”

  “Are we going to open today?” Jacob asked. “That would feel weird, after what happened.”

  “I was thinking we’d keep the pizzeria closed for a couple of days,” she replied. “We can stay closed today, tomorrow, and Sunday, and reopen on Monday. Does that sound okay with everyone?”

  They nodded, all four of them much more somber than usual. Ellie closed her eyes, feeling a rush of emotion again for her missing employee.

  “I don’t know yet when her funeral or memorial service will be, but I think we should all go if we can. I’m just as lost about all of this as you are, but if anyone needs to talk about it, you can come to me.”

  “Should we, I don’t know, do something for her parents or something?” Iris asked.

  “I’m not sure,” Ellie said. “I don’t want to intrude. We didn’t know her all that well.”

  “You don’t have any idea who did it?” Pete asked.

  “No,” she replied. “We don’t even know what happened yet. I don’t want to say anything until the police know for sure. I don’t want to spread any rumors about this that aren’t true.”

  “I just can’t believe it,” Rose said. “When you told me she’d been in an accident, I just thought she was on her way to the hospital or something. I didn’t think she was dead.”

  “I wish that were true,” Ellie said. “I didn’t really know what was going on myself at the time. Trust me, this is just as shocking and horrifying for me as it is for all of you. As her employer, I’m the one that was responsible for her well-being while she was working here. Regardless of what happened, it won’t change the fact that she was out there delivering pizzas because I asked her to. We may have to put deliveries on hold until we figure out what happened. I don’t want to take the chance of it happening again and someone else getting hurt.”

  “You don’t think that whoever did this would do it again?” Jacob asked. “I’m sure it was just an accident – she was probably in the wrong place at the wrong time. No one’s targeting pizza delivery drivers.”

  “I agree that sounds unlikely, but I don’t want to take the chance,” Ellie said again. “Something just doesn’t feel right about this.”

  She didn’t tell her employees about the second pizza box she had seen at the scene of Sabrina’s death. She still wasn’t sure what to think of it herself. After getting back to the pizzeria the evening before, she had gone over the receipts, and confirmed that there had indeed only been one pizza on that delivery. Why had there been two boxes in the yard? She had mentioned it to Russell, of course, and he had told her he would put it in his notes. Neither of them knew what to think. It was a mystery, and one that she wasn’t anywhere near solving.

  “Anyway, that’s all I wanted to talk about today. Feel free to go home, or do whatever you want. We will resume normal shifts on Monday. Until then, just keep Sabrina in your thoughts. If I learn anything new, I’ll share it with all of you, I promise.”

  She watched as her employees rose and filed out slowly. She knew it would take them all some time to come to terms with Sabrina’s death, which was one of the reasons she was keeping the pizzeria closed. They were all human, and it wouldn’t be fair to expect them to work through their grief.

  It wasn’t just her small team of employees that would still be reeling with the shock of Sabrina’s death. Kittiport was a tightly knit community, and the death of such a young woman would have the entire town in an uproar. It was the perfect crime if someone had wanted to get everyone’s attention. Ellie knew that the news would be following the investigation of Sabrina’s death closely. The killer was sure to get his or her ten minutes of fame when he was caught. She just hoped that the person responsible was found sooner rather than later. Even though she didn’t want to admit it to the others, she was worried about them. Back in Chicago, she had heard stories of delivery drivers being mugged, but never thought it could happen somewhere like Kittiport.

  Had it been a mugging, though? She had yet to talk to Russell about the incident in depth, but surely he would have mentioned it to her if Sabrina’s wallet or other personal possessions had been stolen. Besides, what would an opportunistic mugger be doing on Green Street? Kittiport was small enough that it didn’t exactly have a bad side of town, but even if it did, Green Street would be far from it.

  She shook her head, pushing the mystery aside for the time being. With nothing to work off of, and not a single clue to point her in the direction of what might have happened, she knew that she wouldn’t get anywhere and she was frustrated with this line of thinking. With her employees gone, the pizzeria was silent and empty. It reminded her disturbingly of a morgue, which she supposed was fitting, considering what had happened.

  Not wanting to spend more time than was necessary in the building, she grabbed her purse off the counter and walked out the door. She wanted to go home, and do what she could to begin sorting through her own feelings about her employee’s death.

  “Ms. Pacelli?”

  She jumped at the sound of someone saying her name. Sabrina’s death really has me on edge, she thought as she turned around to see Kyle standing near the edge of the building.

  “Sorry, the front door was locked. You said to come back later to talk about a possible position over the holidays?”

  She bit back a sigh. By later, she had meant in a few weeks, and definitely not the day after one of her employees had passed away. She realized he may not yet know about the incident, and she didn’t have the energy to tell him.

  “Sorry — Kyle, wasn’t it? Now isn’t a good time. Bring me a resume sometime next week and we can talk about it.”

  “What day would be best?”

  “I don’t know,” she said, distracted. “Monday.”

  “Okay. Thanks. I’ll see you then. Have a nice day.”

  “You too,” she said, giving him a vague wave as she turned towards her car. All she wanted was to get home and try to sort out her feelings. Everything else would have to wait until later.

  CHAPTER SIX

  * * *

  Being home was comforting. With Bunny at her heels and the sound of Marlowe chatting away in her cage in the other room, Ellie knew that she wasn’t alone. One problem with being engaged to the sheriff was that whenever something bad happened, he was inevitably busy with work. That meant that she didn’t have his shoulder to cry on when she needed it the most. Of course, she still had her grandmother.

  Nonna was in the kitchen, her usual spot when she wasn’t watching television or taking a nap, or out with one of her many friends. The kitchen table looked out across the backyard, which ended at the edge of the state park. White pines – Maine’s state tree – filled the view. Ellie had never been compl
etely comfortable with the forest. It didn’t help that she had been involved in a couple of frightening experiences in that forest. Even if nothing bad had ever happened in there, however, she would still be uncomfortable with the dark spaces between the trees, where anyone or anything could be hiding. If it was just her living alone in the house, she would have shut the curtains the second it started getting dark out, but her grandmother liked leaving the drapes open so she could look outside and admire the stars and occasional glimpses of visiting wildlife.

  Right now, of course, the sun was shining and the forest looked much less intimidating than it did in the evenings. Ellie walked over to the stove and filled up the tea kettle, placing it on one of the burners. Her grandmother was reading the newspaper and sipping a mug of tea.

  “Anything interesting in there?” she asked, taking her favorite mug out of the drying rack beside the sink. She regretted her words almost immediately. She knew that Sabrina’s death was on the front page, and closed her eyes, hoping that her grandmother wouldn’t bring it up.

  “The last farmer’s market of the season is this Sunday,” her grandmother said, putting the paper down. “I’ll miss the fresh veggies.”

  Ellie relaxed. She had mentioned her employee’s death to her grandmother that morning, but hadn’t mentioned any details about it, and was glad that the older woman seemed to realize she needed to think about something else for a while.

  “Okay, we can go together,” Ellie said. “Do you mind if I see if Shannon wants to join us?”

  “No, of course not. I like her. Do you think Russell will come along as well? I haven’t seen him for a while.”

  “I don’t know,” she replied. “He is going to be pretty busy with this case –” she broke off, angry at herself for approaching the very subject that she had wanted her grandmother to avoid.

  “Of course.” Her grandmother looked away from her face. “Ellie, just let me know when you’re ready to talk about it, okay?”

  Ellie nodded. “I will. Thanks, Nonna.” She cleared her throat. “So, um, what you want to do for lunch today? The pizzeria’s closed until Monday, so I won’t be going into work at all today.”

  “Well, we have that chicken in the fridge that needs to be cooked. I was thinking of making a chicken pot pie later. It’s good comfort food, and I think we have all of the ingredients.”

  “That sounds wonderful,” she said. “Let me know if you need any help.”

  By the time she finished her tea, she was almost regretting closing the pizzeria for the day. She would’ve felt better at work in the kitchen, making herself useful and actually doing something instead of just moping around the house. She felt something nudge her leg. She looked down to see Bunny gazing up at her hopefully. There’s still someone who needs me, she thought, giving the little dog a smile.

  “Do you want to go outside?” she asked. Bunny gave a single bark, her universal signal for yes. “Okay. Just a short walk, all right?”

  It felt good to be outside. It was chilly enough that she was wearing a light sweatshirt, but it felt good after the heat of the summer. She loved the salty scent of the oceanside air, and the sounds of the wind and the surf. The road she lived on was sparsely populated, and as she walked further away from her house and the town, the houses got further and further apart until she was alone with nothing but the road, the trees, and to her right, the coast.

  Bunny was familiar with their walks, and knew exactly where they were going. She sniffed along the edge of the road as they walked, happy as could be. The little papillon had been with Ellie for the past three years, and was her constant companion. Ellie loved the little dog, and was glad to see that she didn’t seem to be suffering at all from her broken leg that she had endured not too long ago. Her small bones may be fragile, but they healed fast.

  “It really is beautiful out here, huh?” she said as they walked. Even though she knew that the dog couldn’t understand her, the way Bunny’s little tail started to wag faster felt like an agreement to her.

  She and the dog moved off the road to make room for a car that sped past. It reminded her that she wasn’t all alone out here; she was surrounded by people, even if she couldn’t see them. There were houses back in the trees, cars zipping by, and people out on the water in boats. There were people all around… and one of them was a killer.

  The thought made her shiver. She decided to call Russell when she got home. She needed to ask him about what had happened. Even if he couldn’t say anything officially, he might have some ideas. She hated not knowing. Were her other employees in danger? Was she in danger? Was anyone in town safe anymore?

  She had faith that Russell would find whoever had killed her employee, but that didn’t mean that she wanted to just sit back and wait while he did all of the leg work. She had known Sabrina personally so this wasn’t something that she could just sit back and let someone else handle.

  “All right, girl, it’s time to head back,” she said. Her ears were getting chilled since she hadn’t brought a hat, and she wanted to call her fiancé sooner rather than later.

  When she got in, she brought Marlowe with her to her home office. She placed the big red parrot on the wooden perch by the office window and took a seat at the desk. It was her grandfather’s office; a large room with sturdy furniture and bookshelves lining the walls. She had redone some of it, replacing the chair with something more modern and comfortable and updating the electronics in the room, but it still reminded her of Arthur Pacelli, which was odd since she had barely known the man. She supposed she must have had a few old memories of being in the room when she was a child. She felt a pang of regret for the man that had impacted her life so much, but who she had never really taken the chance to get to know. There were some things that she would never be able to go back and fix, just like Sabrina’s death. She may not be able to fix it, but she might be able to get the young woman some justice.

  Just as she was reaching for her phone, it rang. She hesitated when she saw that it was Linda. The second pizzeria hadn’t even crossed her mind once since Sabrina had been killed. Her hand hovered over the phone for a moment, then she pressed the red button to decline the call. She could deal with it later. Right now, she just wanted to talk to Russell.

  She was glad when he answered the call. She knew he was probably busy, and resolved not to make the call too long. She didn’t want to take any time away from him tracking down Sabrina’s killer. She just had to know what he had discovered so far.

  “Hey,” she said. “How are you?”

  “Tired,” he admitted. “I was up all night working.”

  “On Sabrina’s case?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “It’s being investigated as a homicide right now.”

  “What happened? What did you find?”

  “Well, forensics determined that she died from a blow to her temple. The weapon wasn’t found at the scene. Someone attacked her, then fled.”

  “Was it a mugging?” she asked

  “That’s the thing. No. She had cash in her wallet, none of her cards seemed to be missing, and she was wearing jewelry when she was found.”

  “That’s so odd,” Ellie said. “You don’t have any idea why they did it? Why someone killed her?”

  “No. That makes it a lot harder. No motive makes it difficult to find a killer unless they left behind some sort of physical evidence. Fingerprints alone won’t work unless they’re already in the system.”

  “Do you think it was someone she knew? Were they targeting her, or was it just chance that she happened to be there?”

  “There’s no way to tell,” he said. “Right now, I’m just going through the photos from the crime scene and reviewing all of the testimonies we have from the residents of the street.”

  “What about the second pizza box?” she asked. “Have you figured out what it was doing there?”

  “No,” he said. “That’s the oddest thing about all of this. Are you sure that the order was only for one piz
za?”

  “Yes,” she said. “I double checked the receipt when I got back.”

  “Well, it was definitely a Papa Pacelli’s box. I’m really not sure what to think of it. I don’t know if it has anything to do with the murder, or if it’s just something odd. Maybe she accidentally grabbed a second pizza when she left the restaurant.”

  “Maybe,” Ellie said doubtfully.

  “I know this is hard you,” he said. “I’m doing everything I can to get to the bottom of it.”

  “I know,” she said “I –”

  Her phone beeped, letting her know she had an incoming call. It was Shannon.

  “Do you have to go?” her fiancé asked.

  “It’s your sister-in-law,” she said. “I should probably take it. I’m sure she’ll want to talk about all of this, I haven’t spoken to her since it happened.”