The Key Lime Crime

by Lucy Burdette

  Miss Gloria whispered, “That’s why I wanted to swing by this house again. I thought I saw a lost kitten in the bushes. Turns out I had.”

  “Wait,” said Nathan, who had returned to our group. “You thought you saw a kitten, and it just happened to be next door to a dead person?”

  She looked puzzled, seeming to absorb for the first time the reality of the macabre scene with the dead Santa. “Maybe I sensed something wrong here even though my mind was fixed on the little orange kitty … I feel so confused and upset.” A tear had squeezed out of her eye and wandered down her cheek.

  I hugged her shoulders and smiled at her and then Nathan’s mother. “If we’re finished here, let’s head back to the houseboat. I think we all need a drink.” I looked to Nathan for his okay. He nodded, and we started up the street to our car.

  “I’ll be there when I can,” Nathan called after us. “Definitely don’t wait on me for dinner. And I’m certain you’ll be asked to talk to us again, especially about the question of what caused you to return to this house.”

  Chapter Seven

  He was holding the cardboard cup in his fist and she thought the tension would make him squeeze it and spill the tea all over the table.

  —Ann Cleeves, Wild Fire

  From the parking lot, I spotted my mother and Sam sitting on the deck of the houseboat, looking relaxed in the glow of the fairy lights glittering along the roof line and wound through our houseplants. A bottle of prosecco chilled in an ice bucket. As we drew closer, Nathan’s dog, Ziggy Stardust, came hurtling up the dock, his shiny black fur glinting in the light of the dock’s lamps, Evinrude and Sparky in hot pursuit. They knocked into Miss Gloria, circled around us, and bolted back toward our houseboat. Miss Gloria shrieked and grabbed a lamppost before almost falling into the choppy water.

  “So sorry,” I said to Mrs. Bransford, grasping Miss Gloria’s elbow before she bobbled toward the water a second time. “Nathan’s Ziggy is a love but a bit of a wild man, too. I’m afraid we passed the tipping point into chaos when he moved in. Come on down; we’ll introduce you to the rest of the gang.”

  Ziggy had stretched out on my lounge chair, panting and grinning his doggy grin, as if he hadn’t been the cause of the latest ruckus.

  I introduced Nathan’s mother to mine, and then to Sam, and listed the animals by name. And then I went inside to scrub my hands. I couldn’t stop thinking about touching the dead woman.

  “My gosh,” my mother said when I returned. “That has to be the longest tour of the lights in Key West history! We never thought we’d beat you here.”

  “Unfortunately, we saw more than Christmas lights. Miss Gloria wanted to go back to the last display, and we found something very wrong.”

  “I thought I had seen a lost kitten—and I had, but it turns out there was also a dead body,” Miss Gloria explained.

  Sam poured drinks for all of us, and we reported the details of what we had seen. “Nathan said not to wait dinner for him because of course it will take some time to sort this out.”

  “Any idea what happened to her?” my mother asked.

  “Not really. She didn’t have a pulse when we came along, I know that much.” I glanced at my hands. Had I soaped long enough? “To my eye, it looked like she had been dead for a while, would you say?” I asked the others.

  “Her skin was very pale, almost bluish,” Mrs. Bransford agreed. She still looked pale, and why wouldn’t she, after finding a murdered woman?

  “The neighbor identified her as the new pastry chef over on Greene Street—the one who makes those glorious napoleons,” I said. “The one a lot of people expected to waltz away with Sloan’s Key Lime Key to the City. And the exact same person he ejected from his contest and the one who slammed Sloan in the face with a pie yesterday. In public.”

  “Good gravy, that sounds like an ugly scene,” my mother said. “And so tragic. Do they think Sloan killed her?”

  “Nobody said anything like that,” I said, “though Sloan was furious with her. But it’s way too early to tell.”

  She turned to Nathan’s mother. “The way your visit’s started, you may want to stay on our back deck reading romance novels for the remainder of the week. It’s very peaceful in our neighborhood.”

  While they chatted about other things to see and do on the island, I warmed up the sauce, dropped the shrimp into the bubbling tomato-paprika mixture, and heated up the rice in the microwave. After dressing the salad with a sharp mustard vinaigrette, Sam helped me ferry the food out to the deck where our table was set. The candles flickered in the breeze, our neighbor’s wind chimes tinkled, and tunes from an old Simon & Garfunkel album drifted over from the next pier. The water of the bight slapped our hull in a rhythm from the sea, and I began to unwind a little. I was grateful to have my mother and Sam and Miss Gloria here to help entertain.

  Dinner was delicious, or so said my family. Mrs. Bransford was less effusive. “There’s a very strong flavor that I am not recognizing,” she said. Which could have meant anything. Hated it? Loved it? Completely neutral?

  I grinned and continued to chat, choosing to assume she liked what she was noticing. I was always happy to hold forth on a new flavor sensation. “It’s a type of paprika from Spain. I saw it in a specialty bean catalog and could not resist it.”

  Sam patted his lips with a napkin and nudged me in the ribs. “Stand back when Hayley Snow or her mother gets on a foodie tear,” he said. “Any kind of tear, in fact. They are two wonderfully dogged ladies. I bet you are, too,” he added, to Nathan’s mother. “It shines through in your son.”

  The ghost of a smile flitted across her lips. But she didn’t say anything in return.

  “When do you suppose he’ll be home?” my mother asked. She glanced at her watch. “I hate for him to miss the welcome party. But we need to get going by nine.”

  I shrugged my shoulders. “It was a grim scene and lots of witnesses. But the kind of witnesses who didn’t actually see anything but wanted to know everything about what was going on. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s up half the night.”

  “What about dessert?” Sam asked hopefully. “Not that I need it.” He patted his stomach.

  I grinned. “No one ever needs dessert, not in a physical way. If you don’t mind tasting, I have a roundup article due day after tomorrow on the best of the island’s key lime pie. I have the first wave in the fridge.”

  My boss Palamina had been lobbying for this topic ever since she arrived in Key West. I’d explained many times that my introduction to key lime pie had been terrorizing to the point of producing posttraumatic stress. But she’d continued to nudge me until I had to give in, especially given that the conclusion of the big contest was happening at the end of the week. When my article published, our magazine would be ahead of the curve.

  “How much room could one poisoned pie take up in a person’s mind?” Palamina wanted to know.

  A lot, it turned out. Nathan and I had first met when a woman died of poisoned key lime pie—and I was a suspect. The meeting had not been the least bit romantic—he played the fiercely suspicious detective and I played me, only more hysterical than usual. Not a good first impression for either of us.

  I took pictures of the pie slices I’d collected earlier today, then arranged the slices on platters to bring out to the deck. “I wanted you to get a look at them before I cut them into pieces,” I said. “Some of them are works of art, aren’t they?”

  My dinner guests exclaimed over the mile-high meringue from Blue Heaven, the lime zest flecks in the meringue from the Moondog Cafe, and the flowery piping of whipped cream from Old Town Bakery.

  “This may be too sad to taste,” I said, pointing to the sample I’d put on its own plate, a napoleon drizzled with a pale-green glaze. “It was prepared by the woman we found on the porch this evening. Or at least the recipe was designed by her.”

  My mother exchanged a glance with Miss Gloria.

  “I vote we taste on,” said Miss
Gloria. “We’ll be appreciating her legacy.”

  Mrs. Bransford had fallen quiet, barely nibbling each pie. She expressed a slight preference for the Moondog sample. “I’m not really a citrus pie kind of person,” she said.

  “Well, I sure am,” said Miss Gloria. She tucked into each of her samples with gusto. “What’s nice about all of them is that they tend to be a little tart, and that complements the crust so perfectly. I despise a sickly-sweet filling.”

  As I was making notes on the pie samples, Nathan called. I excused myself and hopped from the deck to the dock, then headed down to the parking lot to talk in private.

  “I’m going to be quite late,” he said. “It appears the victim was strangled. It’s possible the woman was killed inside and then dragged out and arranged on the porch. Anyway, that’s the working theory. We’re going door to door in the neighborhood to see who was home and what they might have seen or heard.” He cleared his throat. “I am sorry you had to deal with that. And I’m sorry to dump my mother on you this way the very first night.”

  “It couldn’t be helped,” I said. “You haven’t been on call in a while, and I guess you had some excitement coming. Not a problem here. We’re having a fine evening, considering how it started. But you’re missing a key lime pie tasting.”

  “Save me a bite of the best one,” he suggested. Probably only being nice—like his mother and unlike mine, he wasn’t a sugar addict. “But don’t worry about dinner; one of the guys went out for sandwiches. But definitely save me a space in your bunk.”

  “Always,” I said. “Be careful. I love you.”

  “Love you too,” he said.

  I returned to Miss Gloria’s place and reported what he’d told me. “He expects he’ll be very late. Don’t worry about cleaning up,” I told my mother, who’d started to clear the dishes. “I know you guys have another big day on the calendar.”

  After hugs all around and assurances from me and Miss Gloria that we’d see our guest tomorrow, Sam and Mom guided Nathan’s mother off the boat and disappeared up the dock toward the parking lot where my mother’s vehicle waited. We collapsed on the lounge chairs, me and Evinrude on one, Sparky, Ziggy, and Miss Gloria on the other.

  I listened for the sound of my mother’s van starting up, a clattering noise followed by the catch and rev of an engine rather than the quiet whir of a perfectly tuned modern car or hybrid. Theirs was an old van with a lot of miles on it that Sam had helped Mom fit out for catering. The back of the vehicle had refrigeration, shelving from floor to ceiling, even a double sink with an enormous storage cabinet underneath. To my mind it had never completely lost the scent of the pool chemicals it had carried in its former life. Sam assured me that in fact the smell came from the bleach they used to keep the space clean. There was still no name painted on the side of the van, as my mother couldn’t decide what to formally call her business.

  “She’s a perfectly nice lady,” said Miss Gloria, after we’d heard the van drive away.

  “I hate to say it, but it’s a relief to have her staying somewhere else,” I said. “Can you imagine if we’d decided to have her bunk on the couch?” I rolled my shoulders, which felt like blocks of concrete even without that disturbing vision.

  “She runs a little cool, I’ll give you that,” said Miss Gloria, grinning. “Maybe she even shades toward cold fish. But let’s give her the benefit of the doubt. She had a long travel day and then a big shock. And remember, Nathan didn’t thaw instantly either when you first met. I bet she’ll warm up to you in no time.”

  “Did she seem upset to you after she noticed the body?” I asked.

  “Cool as a cucumber,” Miss Gloria said.

  “Maybe she shows distress quietly,” I said. “She looked super-pale to me, but she didn’t say a word. Maybe she keeps her feelings locked inside. I’ve heard that about southern ladies; it’s not considered proper to let it all hang out.”

  “Maybe,” Miss Gloria answered.

  “But a death,” I said. “A murder. Hard to imagine you wouldn’t be rattled to discover such a scene.”

  “Completely. I was. It was so awful, I felt like my head was going to explode. Thank goodness the kitten distracted me.” Her face fell, and she pushed her animals aside and stood up. “I’m pooped—going in to bed. This whole night turned into more excitement than I’d banked on.”

  I got up to give her a big hug. Sparky and Nathan’s dog Ziggy followed her to her bedroom. Evinrude barely tolerated Nathan sharing our bunk; he’d made it clear that sleeping with a dog was more than he could take. And besides, Miss Gloria seemed to love the extra company.

  I began to wash the dishes, letting my mind run over the day.

  The question about how Mrs. Bransford was feeling following our grisly discovery made me realize I was in a bit of shock about the events of the evening, too. I’d been so busy worrying about entertaining my mother-in-law and getting dinner served and the pies tasted that I hadn’t really thought about the facts.

  Was it possible that part of Miss Gloria’s mind had noticed the body from such a distance, in the dark? Why had the dead woman been arranged in such a grotesque way? Who in the world would strangle a woman and then dress her in a Santa suit and drag her out onto the porch? What kinds of secrets did Claudette carry?

  That bit I could begin to answer by searching on the Internet to make a start on understanding her history. When the kitchen was spick-and-span, I went out to the deck with my computer, pulling an afghan around my shoulders and arranging Evinrude alongside me for comfort and warmth.

  Claudette Parker had come from New Jersey—which I would not hold against her, as both my mother and I were Jersey natives. She was described as a talented pastry chef with a thriving business in her hometown of Glen Rock, which I remembered as a well-heeled suburb of New York City. She had studied at the Auguste Escoffier School of Culinary Arts and interned in Paris. By adding up her training and experience, I figured her to be ten or so years older than me, maybe mid to late thirties.

  With such distinguished training and a thriving business, why had she moved to this island? There had to be a story behind that. I continued to read.

  As her neighbor had told Nathan, Claudette was new to town, having opened her shop Au Citron Vert in October. I remembered watching the empty storefront on Greene Street get transformed over the summer so that it now resembled a Parisian pâtisserie. Once the shop was open, her pastries had made a big splash, and from the press she was attracting, it had looked as though she might blow the other bakeries out of the water. The bakery and the pastry chef had scored a big feature on the front page of the Florida Keys Weekly right after Thanksgiving. I’d been home more than usual, tending to Nathan’s injuries, and had the time to read all the local papers cover to cover. Had she made deadly enemies in Key West in the short time she’d been here? It sure seemed that way.

  I closed my computer and went inside the houseboat to get ready for bed. I couldn’t help wondering why my mother-in-law had come to visit in such a hurry without any notice. Maybe I could think of a way to ask Nathan about this so it wouldn’t sound as though I was acting inhospitable. Or maybe it made no difference. I should welcome the fact that she might be ready to accept me as part of her family and put the past behind.

  I lay awake for what seemed like hours, waiting for Nathan, my mind whirling with questions. I kept returning to one: had Miss Gloria spotted the body from the street when we first rode by, at least subconsciously? Could she possibly have known this woman? It didn’t seem likely. The dead woman was from New Jersey, and Miss Gloria had lived in Key West forever. And Michigan before that. I remembered that as we got closer to the porch, Mrs. Bransford had experienced a premonition, or so she’d said. Could she have anticipated something like this? It almost seemed like she had expected something terrible to happen even before it did.

  That seemed ridiculous. The frantic whirring of an over-busy mind. As usual. Go to bed, I told myself. And start fresh to
morrow.

  Chapter Eight

  But up front, next to the desk where the hosts have mastered the art of checking reservations without making eye contact, is a café/wine bar. A glass case there serves as a temporary prison for aging pastries and tragic snacks.

  —Pete Wells, “What If Brexit Were a Restaurant?” The New York Times, December 19, 2018

  By the time I woke up the next morning to my tiger cat’s incessant face patting, Nathan had come and gone. Last night, I’d finally drifted off to sleep after hours of rumination. I’d hoped to stay awake until Nathan arrived, but my eyelids had gotten heavier and heavier and I’d finally lain down on the bed with Evinrude to rest for a minute. I woke up with the sun shearing through the blinds, already late for my day.

  I vaguely remembered Nathan climbing into bed and feeling the warmth of his body alongside me. Or had I dreamed that? He’d left a pot of coffee on the stove and a note on the kitchen counter.

  I slept on the couch most of the night; you looked so cozy and I was restless. I didn’t want to wake you. Besides, Evinrude was hogging my spot. I’m so sorry about the way this week is unfolding. If you can just keep an eye on my mother for one more day, I will owe you forever. Sorry not to see you awake. [Here he’d drawn a frowny face.] Going in early and hoping they’ll let me out this afternoon early. What’s on the docket? Love you, Nathan.

  As if I had his mother’s visit planned out like she was visiting royalty. Sigh. Dear, sweet Nathan—he was going to be an interesting husband.

  Miss Gloria had left a note as well, explaining that she and Mrs. Dubisson, her best buddy from up the dock, had taken Ziggy Stardust on their early walk. Otherwise she was free for the day and prepared to help me entertain.