Milkshake Murder

by Stacey Alabaster

  You can do this.

  There was one thing niggling in the back of my mind. When Claire had told me about the letter, during that whole convo, she had sounded a bit…hesitant to tell me what she knew. And I didn’t know what was up with that.

  I just knew that Claire was acting a bit weird. But then again, she was always a bit weird. And she did like to hoard information over other people, especially me.

  Maybe it was nothing. I shrugged it off and kept hurrying along, the black shoes I had bought especially for the job already giving me blisters after just three shifts. I wondered how long J was going to buy the “Matt’s just injured his shoulder” line before she realized what was really going on. She was a smart kid and it would not take her long to figure out that the grownups were lying to her.

  At least in Rushcutter’s Bay with her grandparents, she would be a little bit isolated from all the drama. That was where I had to send her that night so that I could work.

  I had already gotten into a fight over the issue with my mum on the phone that morning. “Really, Alyson?” my mum had said to me. “With everything that is going on, you can’t even help out and mind J?”

  But that was exactly what I was trying to do. Help. I tried to tell my mum exactly that. That working at The VRI was the best thing I could do to help. But mum had just said, “A waitressing job hardly matters at a time like this,” and hung up the phone. But she had agreed to come and get J at least.

  All eyes were on me as I walked into The VRI. I tried not to let it bother me. I was used to facing rumors by then.

  “Reinhold,” I said, brightly greeting him by the coffee machine out front. He was wearing a blue suit with lapels. It was the weekend, Friday night, and I supposed that was the both the busiest night of the week and the night that he was most dressed to impress.

  He stopped dead in his tracks. Blinked at me a few times as though he wasn’t sure he was really seeing what he was seeing. “I’m surprised you came in for your shift,” he said. I thought everyone was surprised I came in for my shift, judging by the stunned looks on everyone’s faces.

  “Well, we all need money, don’t we?” I said, trying to sound casual. Not nervous. After all, as far as they were concerned, that was why I took the job. When actually I was losing money by being there. Because the wage of a waitress was far less than I got out on the beach making my designs.

  Reinhold usually started off my shift with a list of tasks for me to perform and he usually handed me an apron. But this time, he was still and silent.

  I held his gaze. “Are you going to kick me out?” It was illegal to fire me for no reason other than that my brother was in jail, and he knew that I knew that.

  He smiled thinly at me and adjusted his cufflinks. “Why don’t I show you to your section for tonight?”

  I noticed that I was kept well away from the beverages during the setup and the start of service.

  Emma came up and whispered to me while I was clearing a table at the back of the restaurant. The customers had barely touched their lamb cutlets, and I knew that when I took the plate out for Craig to wash, he would ask questions. But the customers had already left so I had no idea why the cutlets weren’t to their liking.

  I was trying to find a way to sneak out the back and into Reinhold’s office, but Emma was holding me up.

  She was mumbling something about Claire’s bookshop and her voice sounded hushed and worried. “Did you see me there?”

  I had no idea what she was referring to

  “Huh? You were in the bookshop earlier?” I asked.

  “Er, yeah, I was looking for a book on…er, how to knit!” Her face panicked for a moment, then it relaxed and she looked relieved for some reason. Really weird.

  I had no idea what that was all about. So random.

  Then she scooted off back to the front of the restaurant to greet customers, and I returned to clearing the back tables, which was my ‘section’ for that night—out there in what was basically Siberia, the tables that were left for walk-ins without reservations because they were next to the bathrooms. I was removed from everyone else. I was never going to be able to get a break to get away, though. Reinhold had told me to run plates and trays as soon as I got a spare minute so that I was kept busy all shift with my hands full yet unable to interact with any of the prestigious customers.

  But then I figured out a way to sneak into his office. I knew that Reinhold had his nightly meal—prepared by the head chef—at ten each night once the shift was a little quieter, and he always sat near the bar so that he could chat with his favorite regulars. He would be eating for twenty minutes at least, and his office would be unguarded.

  Well, almost. There was Craig in the kitchen, washing dishes. I snuck in and waited until he had started the hose, which was so loud that he wouldn’t know that there was anyone sliding along the backside of the wall toward the office. He was getting drenched, scrubbing filthy pots and pans. Scrubbing quite angrily as well. I was the last thing on his mind, the last thing he was noticing.

  I slipped into the office and started leafing through the drawers of the desk. Not carefully either. I had to throw caution to the wind. If this was my last shift at The VRI then so be it—I had to get that letter.

  “Come on, where is it?” I asked, wondering if Claire’s hunch—or her anonymous tip, whatever it was—was actually wrong after all. There were just old rosters from years earlier and tax receipts.

  “Oh my gosh!” I said when I found it. I only had a few seconds to read it over to make sure I had actually struck gold. There it was—the full letter. It contained the bits that Rachael had printed but also the more sinister parts threatening that Arthur had better be careful of where he ate and drank in Eden Bay if he wanted to keep his life.

  “What are you doing?”

  It was Craig.

  I spun around and quickly shoved the letter into the front pocket of my apron.

  “Oh, Reinhold told me to come in here to print off a copy of next week’s roster,” I quickly lied. There was a printer in the corner of the room, but it looked dusty and like it hadn’t been used for months, maybe even years.

  Craig came closer to me. He was a big guy. “Reinhold emails the rosters out to everyone at the start of the week.”

  “Er, my phone isn’t working. Or my computer. You know, big issues with the telecommunications companies and these stupid new cables that are being laid…so he said I could print mine out so that I had a paper copy.”

  He nodded toward my apron pocket. He must have seen me shoving something in there when he’d walked in. “Show me.”

  My heart was racing. I was going to be sprung and kicked out and fired and the letter was going to be ripped out of my hands.

  So, I had to make a decision about what was most important. If I fled right there and then, I wouldn’t get my tips for the night and I might not even get my paycheck. Matt, J, and I needed that money. But we also needed Matt free and home with us.

  So, the decision was easy. “I don’t have to answer to you!” I said, pushing past him. And I mean literally pushing past. I had to shove him out of the way, and he hit the frame of the door since I caught him off balance.

  “Hey, you can’t just do that! Who do you think you are! I am telling Reinhold what you just did!” He was rubbing his arm as I ran through the kitchen toward the back door, ready to vanish into the night.

  I didn’t know what the consequences were going to be.

  But I had my proof. The letter than he wrote to the Journal. All I had to do was show it to Rachael and she could confirm it was the one that she received and printed, and we would have proof that Reinhold threatened Arthur. That he wanted him dead.

  And she would print the story. So that everyone in Eden Bay knew. The police would have to take notice of that at the very least.

  As I ran out into the mild night air, it all started to become crystal clear to me. Of course Reinhold did it. He was cold. Calculated. He hated Arth
ur. And it wasn’t as though Reinhold didn’t also have a motivation for doing what he did at Captain Eightball’s—it was a kill two birds with one stone kind of situation. He could kill off the guy who was threatening his business and take out a competition at the same time. The VRI had been awfully full since people were too scared to eat at Captain’s.

  So I knew I had him.

  And now I’d just have to sit and wait to see what Craig would do.

  13

  Claire

  Bianca was in a very strange mood, like she was stifling laughter when she came into the shop. She’d been in Sydney for a couple of days, but she’d been filled in on all the town drama since arriving back. I couldn’t tell whether she was being smug or whether she actually cared. “So, what does that mean? You still going to date him while he is in jail then?” she asked, filing her nails at the front counter while I unpacked a new batch of boxes. One of my nails actually snapped while I was pulling back the packaging and I stared at Bianca’s perfect manicure.

  Must be nice for some.

  But I avoided answering her question.

  To tell the truth, I hadn’t even visited Matt since he had been in jail. I couldn’t stand the guilt—didn’t know how I would be able to look him in the eye.

  I kept quietly unpacking the boxes while ignoring Bianca. I hoped she would just leave me in peace, especially once I realized that the book that I’d been waiting for had arrived.

  But getting left alone in peace was a pipe dream. Especially when I was reading books about poisoning. About murder.

  “Still looking through those books?” she asked, hopping off the stool and coming over to supervise what I was reading. “Umm, might still look a bit suss if someone spotted you with that one, cuz. They will think that you are in on it together. That you are trying to take the whole town out.”

  “Well, yeah, don’t drink any espressos that I make for you then,” I said wryly, returning my attention to the book.

  It was a new book about poisons, one that I had just gotten in, and it specifically talked about nicotine poisoning. So, it could give me a more in depth overview of what a nicotine poisoning would look like. Apparently, unless the nicotine was pre-prepared, soaked overnight to mask the bitter taste, it would have been easily detected in the drink. Something like coffee—a coffee-flavored milkshake, say—may have masked the taste a little, but not completely.

  I needed to find out exactly what Arthur ordered that day, and exactly who had been working on shift.

  I was just headed toward the door of Captain’s, when Alyson skated right up in front of me.

  “You’ll injure yourself again,” I told her. “Skating is not your forte. You’re more suited for the aquatic sports.”

  “Yeah, well, being out in the ocean is too painful at the moment,” she said, jumping off her board and picking it up. “Being near the surf just reminds me of Matt at the moment.”

  Yeah. Everything reminded me of Matt at that moment. Especially the building I was standing right in front of.

  I told her I was going inside and tried to step around her, but she was blocking the door for some reason. “What are you going in there for?” she asked me, like I was betraying her in some way. Really accusing.

  “Because I have some questions for Simpson. Let me get past, Alyson!”

  She completely blocked the door and would not let me budge. “But I already have the proof that Arthur wrote the letter… We know that Reinhold threatened him. It’s a fact.”

  So, she thought that was just case closed then?

  “There’s no harm in getting some extra information.” I was past the point of getting frustrated. I just wanted her to move, and I was willing to push her myself.

  She crossed her arms. “It sounds like you think Matt did it.”

  “What?” I tried to push past her. “Don’t be silly, Alyson.”

  “Oh, I’m not being silly. I am seeing the facts as clear as day, Claire. Why else would you be going back inside Captain Eightball’s unless it’s to get proof that Matt is guilty?”

  I couldn’t believe that she was actually accusing me of this.

  Maybe I had been a little quiet about what I really thought about Matt’s guilt. All I was doing was being cautious… Deep down, I would never believe that Matt was capable of anything like that, but I had to tell the cops what I knew. I had to let justice take its proper course. But now Alyson was really annoying me. I got past her once and for all, but she ran after me and stood in front of the door. Typical. She always had to have the final word. Couldn’t let one thing rest when she thought she was in the right.

  “It would be awfully convenient for Matt to be guilty, wouldn’t it?”

  Okay, now I really didn’t know what she was talking about. I couldn’t figure out on what planet it would be convenient for my boyfriend to be guilty of murder. Maybe Alyson had an explanation for it, but I was tired and just wanted her to get out of my way.

  “And why on earth is that?”

  “Because if he is guilty and goes to jail then you don’t have to worry about having a family with him or breaking up with him. It solves your problem for you.”

  I just stared at her for a long time.

  “If that’s what you really think, Alyson, then I don’t know what to say to you.”

  I hunted around for the owner, but Simpson wasn’t even there that day. He had gone to visit family in Sydney apparently and left Kate in charge. I was so annoyed with Alyson that seeing Kate was almost a breath of fresh air. Almost.

  I sat down at one of the barstools and rested my chin in my hand like I was the weariest girl in the world. Kate actually chuckled a little bit and asked what she could get me.

  I was really craving a milkshake.

  But the killer was still on the loose. Possibly working there. Because I knew that the person they had behind bars was not the killer.

  So, I sighed deeply and ordered a soda water instead. Yeah, that was about five percent as good. But Kate must have seen the look on my face, because she winked at me and said, “Go on. I know what you really want. I’ll make it myself so you have nothing to worry about.”

  “Okay,” I said, nodding. “Chocolate and extra ice cream, thanks.”

  I watched her back as she left to go and get ice cream from the freezer. As long as she kept the cup in her hands the whole time and didn’t let anyone else touch it, I should be okay. She certainly couldn’t have killed Arthur because she wasn’t even in town the day it happened.

  She finally returned and slid it over toward me, smiling—almost kindly—at me.

  I took a sip. Perfectly mixed. Even better than Matt did it, though I wouldn’t tell him that.

  It went down, and I waited just a moment.

  No violent death.

  Kate winked at me and refused to take my money for it, saying it was on the house. “It’s not like we’re selling many. We need to use the milk up before it goes bad.”

  And then she shocked me. I mean, she had already surprised me with how nice she was being to me, but then she really shook me to my core.

  “So, after I left your shop the other day, I felt super bad,” she said, wiping the counter.

  I slurped up the last of my milkshakes and glanced up at her. “Really?”

  She nodded. “I only said what I said to hurt you,” she said, wiping up the condensation I had left behind. “And that’s not the kind of person I am. Well, I suppose it is seeing as I did it. But it’s not the kind of person that I want to be. So, I am sorry.”

  I nodded a little, still feeling a little skeptical, unsure whether to buy this story, but she did seem genuinely sorry.

  “Matt and I broke up because…” She paused and didn’t continue, but I already knew the reason. “You know, things started getting a little heavy.”

  I nodded and stared at the empty spot where my glass had been. “Actually, I understand. It’s all a lot for me as well. I still feel super young, you know? I’m not s
ure I’m ready for all that yet.”

  She sighed a massive sigh of relief. “Gosh I know exactly what you mean,” she said with a laugh as she threw her head back. “And what about how Matt still harbors this secret desire to be a pro surfer? I mean, it’s a little ridiculous?”

  I laughed in return… Were we really bonding over this? Hang on, were we really bonding, at all?

  Well, this was something I’d never expected to happen. Certainly not on that afternoon, anyway.

  But now that I was down one friend, I needed a new one.

  And maybe we actually had a lot more in common than had originally occurred to me…

  “I’m knocking off in ten minutes if you want to hang around and get a drink?”

  I couldn’t believe I was even considering it, but I ended up saying yes. And that was how I came to be having a drink that evening with my former mortal enemy.

  “You know I didn’t even want to come back here,” Kate said, taking a swig of her whiskey. “Only did it as a favor to Simpson, for old time’s sake. This place can be kind of a drag. Kinda like a throwback, you know.”

  I was surprised. I always thought she was like Alyson, an Eden Bay diehard who thought it was the best place on earth. Then again, even Alyson was thinking of leaving, so maybe there weren’t any diehards left.

  I laughed and said that I agreed. “I’m with you there.” I shook my head. “Sometimes I wonder what I am doing back in this town.” I stared into my drink. “Especially if things don’t work out between Matt and I.”

  Kate sounded philosophical as she spoke. “Ah, you don’t know that all hope is lost just yet. Things have a habit of working out in ways you never expected.” She picked her glass up and clinked it against mine. “And for what it’s worth, you really don’t have to worry about me. I’m so over Matt that I even unfollowed all his social media months ago.”