by Leslie Karst
So far, so good. I zipped by the beach volleyball courts and past the Cocoanut Grove and the arcade. Risking a look back, I saw Tony’s truck just behind me, veering to the right to try to run me off the road. My heart pounding, I bunny-hopped the barrier into the bike lane to avoid him and rode on harder. Past Neptune’s Kingdom. Past the Hurricane ride. Almost there.
A red light loomed ahead. I sped through it without stopping, narrowly avoiding a woman with a stroller. And as I turned to look for Tony, I saw him also run the light, swerve to miss the stroller, and crash head-on with a large delivery truck turning left off Riverside Avenue.
I breathed a sigh of relief and faced back forward—only to run smack into a kid on a skateboard who’d come out of nowhere from my right. The last thing I remember is me and my bike flying through the air, headed straight for a cluster of brightly colored beach balls.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“Where am I?”
“I can’t believe you just said that. What a cliché.” Eric was slightly out of focus, but I was able to make out the grin on his face. “Where do you think you are?”
“Uh . . .” I blinked a few times and looked about me. A room. Lots of white. Sheets. I was in a bed. Ah. “The hospital?”
“You got it.”
I shifted my body, and a sharp pain shot through my left shoulder. “Ow!”
“Try not to move around too much. You broke your collarbone and your wrist. And you suffered a pretty severe concussion to boot.”
That would explain the pounding headache. Leaning back against the pillows, I closed my eyes and tried to remember what had happened: Tony chasing me, the crash, the ambulance. Right.
“The kid on the skateboard—is he okay?”
“Yeah. He’s young. Just a few bruises.”
“And Tony?”
“He’s also here in the hospital—just a few doors down, as a matter of fact. Though you fared a lot better than him. Looks like he might be partially paralyzed from a broken neck.”
I nodded. Instant karma, I was thinking.
“He wasn’t wearing a seat belt,” Eric went on, shaking his head and making soft clucking noises, “and you weren’t wearing your helmet, young lady.” He took my good hand and looked at me, concern in his eyes. “You really scared me, you know? I’m not going to harp on you about it now, but sometime real soon I’m going to need to know what the hell happened out there between you two.”
I jerked forward again and immediately regretted it. “My bike!”
Eric smiled. “It’s fine. Well, other than the handlebars, which snapped in two. But the frame looks to be intact. Your dad took it home with him. He just left, by the way. Had to go deal with some restaurant thing but said he’d be back soon.”
I nodded again. “Thanks. So what time is it? How long have I been here?”
“A few hours. It’s a little after nine. They’re going to keep you overnight just to monitor your concussion. But the doctor said you’d be released in the morning if it all looks good.”
I closed my eyes but then immediately snapped them open again. “Buster!” I said, thankfully remembering this time not to jerk my body. “He can’t be left alone again all night. Someone needs to go get him from Tony’s house.”
“Oh, right. Look, don’t you worry about it. I’ll make sure he’s okay. I’ll go get him myself if need be.” Eric patted me on the arm. “You gotta try to chill, babe. You hungry?”
I was, actually. “Yeah.”
“That’s a good sign. I don’t think the kitchen is still open here, but I can go out and get you a sandwich or something.”
“How ’bout a burger, fries, and chocolate shake?” Hey, if now wasn’t a good time for some classic junk food, when was?
After Eric left, I closed my eyes again and contemplated what had happened that afternoon. So it had to have been Tony, after all, who’d drugged and then killed Letta. And then I’d gotten too close to finding out, and he’d come after me. I shuddered at the thought of how stupid I’d been and how I’d almost suffered Letta’s fate.
But at least it was all over. And I was pretty sure I now knew how Tony had done it.
The thing that was bugging me, though, was that I still didn’t get exactly why.
***
I was cleared to go home at eight the next morning, my vital signs having been pronounced normal—but not until all the paperwork was done for my release, the doctor said, which could take a couple hours.
“Can I walk around the halls?”
“Sure. Just don’t wander too far, so we can find you when we need to.”
After a disappointing breakfast of overcooked eggs, cold toast, and watery coffee, I went in search of Tony. On hearing that he was down the hall, I’d been struck with the need to confront him. But I’d have to do so before talking to the police. Once he was arrested—and I had no doubt my statement would assure that—I wouldn’t get the chance again.
I wasn’t scared, exactly. From what Eric had said, I figured Tony was, at least for the moment, immobile from his injuries. So he wasn’t going to leap out of bed at me wielding a knife or anything like that. He’d be a very captive audience. But I was feeling uneasy. I’d never knowingly been in the presence of a murderer before, much less accused one of his crime.
I found him down the hall. The door was open, and I could see him lying in bed, eyes closed, with some sort of contraption around his neck. His left leg was up in traction.
“Good morning, Tony.” I came in and sat down, taking care not to knock my sling against his tray table. “Fancy meeting you here.”
His eyes opened. He didn’t say anything, but the muscles in his face tightened when he saw who it was.
“I just wanted to stop by and have a little chat. No need to say anything if you don’t want. It can be a one-sided chat.” He was eyeing my hospital gown and bandages. “Yep,” I said. “I ended up here too, thanks to you. But unlike you, I’ll be going home real soon. I think it’s going to be a while—a very long while—before you get to go home.”
Tony closed his eyes, but I didn’t care. I just kept on talking. The anger was starting to come, and it felt good to have the upper hand. Cathartic.
“I think I’ve got it figured out, what happened.” Was that a smile? I ignored it. “That night at Dixon’s when Javier told you about Kate—that was the first time you’d heard about Letta’s affair, wasn’t it? You were lying when you said she’d already told you. And it surprised the hell out of you. So you had your brother—who’d been with you at Dixon’s that night and also heard what Javier said—you had him go up to Kate’s farm to check her out for you. How you found her, I’m not sure. But I’m guessing Javier told you her name and said something about her being one of the restaurant vendors. With that information, it wouldn’t have been too hard to figure it out.”
The smile was still there, but it seemed a little forced now.
“Once you confirmed Javier’s story, that Letta was indeed involved with Kate, you fumed about it for a while and eventually came up with a plot to kill her. And at the same time decided that you’d frame Javier, the bearer of the bad news, thereby taking the heat off yourself.”
A nurse came into the room to check Tony’s monitor. “Oh,” she said to him cheerily. “I didn’t know you had a friend who was also in the hospital. That’s nice.” Tony didn’t even open his eyes. I made polite small talk with her as she changed his IV bag and marked his chart and then continued with my narrative once she’d left the room.
“The first thing you did was snitch some yellow jasmine from Javier’s apartment complex. You must have been following him, and I bet it felt like Christmas when you saw that vine growing at his place—the perfect final touch. And it almost worked too. It was only after the toxicology report came back that the police decided they had enough evidence to arrest Javier.”
Tony opened his eyes briefly and then shut them tightly again.
“You showed up that night at G
auguin after everyone had gone but Letta. I imagine you just sat in your car or something, waiting. Once Javier left, it was a good bet she was alone. She offered you tea, as you knew she would, and it was a simple matter, when she wasn’t watching, to slip some of the yellow jasmine into the pot along with the tea as it steeped. And she wouldn’t have noticed that you didn’t drink anything from your own cup.”
I was getting to the hard part—not hard to figure out but hard to talk about. I simply couldn’t fathom how someone could plunge a knife into the chest of another human being, especially one lying helpless, as she must have been, on the floor. You’d have to stab pretty hard for the blade to even go in. And he didn’t do it only once but multiple times. Just thinking about it was sickening.
“The drug took effect after a few minutes,” I finally managed to go on. “When she got weak, you took the key to the knife cabinet from her purse. Of course you knew which one was Javier’s prized chef’s knife; everyone who’d ever been in that kitchen did. So you got that one out of the cabinet, and . . .” I stopped.
The son of a bitch chose now to open his eyes and stare at me.
“You stabbed her. Over and over again. It was like fish in a barrel in her drugged state.” I returned his look with one of disgust. “What a coward.”
He shut his eyes once more.
“The thing that had everyone confused was the fingerprints on the key. But that was easy, wasn’t it? With Letta dead, all you had to do was wipe off your prints, press her dead fingers on the key, and return it to her purse. Then you washed and wiped clean the cups and teapot, wiped the knife handle, and left, taking care not to leave your prints on the door knob. The fact that they would be found on other things in the room wouldn’t incriminate you, since you were a frequent visitor. You’d been there that afternoon, in fact, to deliver the cherry blossom branches.”
The image of him bringing flowers to Letta on the very day he knew he was going to stab her to death was especially disturbing. I tried not to think about it.
“And then, after I asked you whether you knew about Letta and Kate, you realized I was getting close to the truth, and you had your brother follow me and try to scare me off. How are his eyes, by the way?” Tony didn’t respond, but I could see his jaw harden.
“There is one thing, though, that I can’t figure out. I just don’t get why. I mean, I certainly understand how you would get angry when you found out about Letta having an affair. But so enraged that you’d plot to stab her to death? And then actually go through with the plan? I just don’t get it.”
When Tony finally spoke, it startled me; I hadn’t been expecting an answer.
“You could never understand,” he said with a sneer. Opening his eyes, he fixed his gaze past me, toward the door. “I loved Letta; I really did. But when I found out she was with a woman . . .” The way he said the word “woman,” as if it were the most distasteful thing imaginable, was unnerving.
He continued to stare at the door, jaw now working up and down. “I know they were mocking me,” he went on after a bit, his cold eyes reminding me of those dead fish that had been floating in his cooler, “her and that bull dyke. And I couldn’t get the picture out of my head—of the two of them lying in bed, laughing about me and then doing . . . whatever it is they do.” He spat out these last words, and it was easy to detect the revulsion in his voice. “As if some broad could ever give her as good as I could.”
Tony shifted in the bed and pulled his sheet up a little higher. “And Javier—he had to pay, too. For dissing me like that.” Then, almost under his breath, “No one’s gonna do that to me.”
“Tell me, Tony. Were you really engaged to Letta?”
“No. I asked her, but she never did say yes.” He grunted. “Now I know why. But I’m glad she said no. It would’ve been even worse if I’d married her.”
I left him to his bitter reflections.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
It was good to see Javier back in his chef’s whites again; they suited him way more than the orange had. He waved as I came into the kitchen and then went back to sorting through a box of cherries on the counter.
“The first of the season,” he said, holding up a handful of the flame-colored fruit. “Kate dropped them off this morning along with her regular delivery—‘a free extra,’ she said. I’m going to take the best of ’em to go with my duck and then have Amy use the rest for a clafoutis.”
It had been over a week since my—is it too dramatic to call it a “brush with death”? “A brush with beach balls” is what Eric would no doubt say. Ever the wit, he’d been quick to observe, once he knew I was out of danger, that my instincts had been correct. It was just too bad that the beach balls had been a decoration made out of concrete. He also couldn’t resist pointing out that Tony and I had both crashed right in front of the bumper cars ride, which he found amusing to no end.
My collarbone and wrist still hurt. The doctor had told me I’d have to stay off my bike for at least two months, but the good news was that the pain should start to subside in another week or so.
Upon my release from the hospital, Eric had driven me straight to the police station to make a statement. Based on what I’d told them, they’d been able to get a warrant to search Tony’s house and vehicle. On my advice, they’d confiscated the remains of my beer as well as the vase of white flowers sitting on the kitchen counter. I wasn’t positive, but I had a strong suspicion they’d prove to be poisonous. In addition, they’d seized his computer, some clothes, and the smashed-up truck.
They’d hit the jackpot. Traces of a blood type matching Letta’s had been found on a pair of Tony’s shoes as well as on the floor mat from his truck. It would take a while for the DNA testing to be done, though no one doubted the blood was Letta’s.
The beer would also take several weeks to analyze, but the flowers had been identified as lily of the valley, which not only is highly toxic but, when ingested, causes the very symptoms I experienced: hot flashes, dizziness, hallucinations, and headache. A website I found said that if enough is consumed, it can lead to coma and death from heart failure.
I also learned online that lily of the valley has a bitter flavor with a sweet aftertaste. No wonder he’d served dark beer. And even the water the cut flowers are kept in is poisonous. So he must have poured some of the water into my glass while I was distracted with looking at those photos on the fridge. Oy. Miss Marple would never have let that happen.
Tony’s computer had provided incriminating evidence as well. Its browsing history turned up numerous searches over the past several weeks about poisonous flowers, including both yellow jasmine and lily of the valley.
The idea that he’d been planning to poison me in advance of my turning up at his house was disconcerting. But then again, maybe he merely had the flowers in the vase as a just-in-case? And then, of course, I had to go and show up, asking about that damn vine and reacting to the photo on the fridge. Great timing, that was. So I didn’t know if they’d be able to prove that Tony’s attempt on my life was premeditated, but it didn’t really matter. Letta’s murder clearly was. That, along with the fact that he’d used the lily water on me and then tried to run me down with his truck, would be more than enough to send him away for good. And his brother was likely to get some real time as an accessory to the crime, according to Eric.
I grabbed one of the cherries from the box Javier was picking through and popped it into my mouth. Sweet and juicy.
“Got a minute?” I asked him.
“Sure.”
“Let’s go upstairs.”
He wiped his pink-stained hands on the towel tucked into his apron and followed me up to the office.
I’d been thinking a lot about “things” over the past week. Important things. Or at least things that should be important. Nothing like being poisoned and then almost run over by a truck to make you put stuff in your life into perspective.
And one of those things had been Gauguin.
“I’ve been talking to Shanti about our profit and loss statement,” I said when Javier had gotten settled in the wing chair opposite the desk. “In particular, about how much play we have on the cost side.”
Javier nodded, not sure where I was going with this.
“I’ve also been doing some research into the price of grass-fed beef, pastured pork, and free-range hens.”
“Ah.” He looked relieved.
“And really, it’s not as bad as I would have thought. Look.” I handed him the printout of a price list I’d gotten online. “If we raise our menu prices by just a few dollars, I think we can do it. And then we can advertise as selling only humanely raised meat and sustainable seafood, too. I want to become a part of the Seafood Watch Restaurant Program.” I pulled the pocket guide I’d found at Letta’s house from my purse and showed it to Javier. “This was in Letta’s kitchen,” I said, “so I’m pretty sure she was considering changing the menu. I want to honor her wishes. No more longline-caught tuna. No more imported shrimp . . .”
Javier was smiling.
“What?”
“You. You’re talking real fast, you know?”
“Sorry.”
“No, it’s okay. I think it’s great how excited you are.”
I set the Seafood Watch card down. “Well, anyway, I just wanted to see what you thought about the idea.”
“Hey, if you think we can do it, then I say let’s do it. You’re the boss.”
“That brings me to the other thing I wanted to discuss.” I’d thought about this over the past week, too, and had finally come to a decision. “As you can no doubt tell, I’ve made up my mind to keep Gauguin. Letta wouldn’t have wanted me to sell, and the more involved I get with the place, the more I realize how much it means to me.
“But at the same time, I’m not ready to just up and quit Solari’s, cold turkey. Even though my dad has said he can get on without me, I know it would be hard for him, more on an emotional level than anything else. And besides, the job brings in good, steady money. So here’s the deal: I’ve talked with my dad, and he’s agreed to let me go to part time—just work there a couple days a week—so I can have time for Gauguin, too.”
