by Клео Коул
Twenty-Six
“Where are we going, exactly?” Mike asked.
“Tenth Street and fifty-second.”
“Hell’s Kitchen?”
I nodded. “Joy moved into the two-bedroom about six months ago. It’s not too far from Restaurant Row—a prime location for two aspiring chefs.”
Mike laughed. “Two chefs living in Hell’s Kitchen. Funny.”
“Believe me, the irony was not lost on Joy’s roommate. Yvette’s family owns the Ice Castle ice cream franchise, and they subsidize her lifestyle here in New York and in Paris, where she’s interning now.”
Outside, the sun was bright, and the air was crisp but thankfully not too cold. It was Monday morning rush hour pretty much everywhere on Manhattan Island, but once we were in the car, the trip wasn’t too heinous, owing to the fact that Mike seemed to know exactly how to get around most traffic snarls. The man had skills. And apparently a penchant for conjuring parking spaces because, miraculously, we found a spot right in front of Joy’s building.
I paused in the large lobby to pick up my daughter’s mail, which had piled up in her box since Friday. I noticed a large envelope in the mix. The return address was Solange. A rubber-stamped note indicated the missive was hand-delivered by messenger service this morning. I tore into the envelope and found an invitation inside.
Mike peered over my shoulder. “What’s it say?”
“‘Dear employee or vendor of Solange,’” I read. “‘You are cordially invited to a memorial dinner to celebrate the life and legacy of Chef Thomas Keitel. A four-course meal will be prepared by Chef Robbie Gray and his staff. As part of this celebration, hosts Faye Murray Keitel and Anton Wright will make an exciting announcement concerning the bright new future of Solange, New York, and its sister restaurants.’”
“Sister restaurants?” Mike said.
“There are no sister restaurants. And since when has Solange been called Solange, New York?” I faced Mike. “This is it! “This is why Tommy Keitel was murdered! Anton Wright and Faye Keitel are going to franchise Solange. That must have been their plan all along—”
“Whoa, Clare. Slow down.”
But I was too pumped to slow down. “Don’t you see, Mike? Wright spent millions opening three restaurants, but Solange was his only success. Naturally he’d want to capitalize on it. He probably told Chef Keitel his plan, and Tommy went ballistic. He wasn’t interested in French cuisine anymore. Tommy wanted out. He wanted to move to Russia. He just wanted to be free again.”
“But other chefs can cook Keitel’s dishes, right? Why did Anton even need Keitel?”
“They’re signature dishes. According to Tommy’s contract, he owned all of Solange’s recipes, not Anton.”
“Why couldn’t Anton buy them?”
“Because Tommy was too much of an egomaniac to sell! Billy Benedetto told me that Tommy refused to sell him the Italian recipes he’d invented for his eatery, even though Chef Keitel never used them again.” I shook my head. “If Tommy wasn’t attached to a restaurant any longer, he simply didn’t want them serving his dishes. Period.”
I waved the invitation in Mike’s face. “Don’t you see? Anton wanted to expand, Tommy didn’t, so Anton murdered him, then made a deal with Faye Keitel to use Tommy’s name and recipes for his franchise.”
“You could be right, Clare, but you don’t have any proof—”
“I have a theory! That’s more than I had an hour ago. Now I have to get the proof.”
“You have to build a case. Which means you’ll have to go to this memorial dinner, for starters. When does it take place?”
“Tonight at eight o’clock.”
Mike looked at the invitation. “This must have been sent out as part of a mass mailing.”
“For sure.” I nodded. “Someone in Anton Wright’s office probably just used a staff list. Joy was still on it, so she got the invite.”
Mike grabbed my arm. Only then did I notice that others had gathered in the lobby. “Let’s go,” he said. “We’ll talk upstairs.”
We climbed four flights in silence. I unlocked the door, and a blast of stale air hit us. I crossed to the window and opened it. I was relieved to find the place neat and tidy. Joy used to be a real slob when she had me to pick up after her, but it was apparently different now that she had her own place. I took the neatness as a sign of her budding maturity and I said so to Mike.
“I just wish she’d been this tidy in her personal life, then she wouldn’t be in so much trouble right now.”
On my way to the bedroom to gather up some clothes, I spied a blinking light in the living room: Joy’s and Yvette’s answering machine. The digital display indicated there were nine messages.
I sighed and pressed Play.
“Message one. Thursday, twelve fifty-five p.m.,” the electronic voice announced.
“Bonjour, mon amie,” chirped Yvette. “I’m sitting in an outdoor café on the Left Bank, up to my chin in hommes, hommes, hommes. More fool you for interning in New York City, where all the men are married or unemployed actors. Oo-la-la! I’ll take Paris. Call me—and don’t forget to water the herb garden.”
“I’d better do that before I go,” I reminded myself.
“Message two. Thursday, eight nineteen p.m.”
There was a pause. I heard breathing on the digital recording, from a man who was no longer breathing. Then came the voice of a ghost. A dead man. “Hey. It’s Vinny—”
“Mike, listen!” I cried.
“I’m here,” he said.
“Joy, I have to talk to you,” Vinny said. “I left a message on your cell, too. When you get off work, come out and see me, okay? Something happened last night when I stayed late to do all that prep work Brigitte assigned to me. I was in the walk-in fridge for a long time, so long that Anton Wright thought he was alone. Well, I overheard Mr. Wright in the kitchen—”
There was a long pause, and my heart stopped, thinking the time had run out on the message.
“Anton was talking to someone on his cell,” Vinny continued. “He and this person planned on doing something bad. Stuff you wouldn’t believe. Listen, Joy, you have to come see me. I can’t go in to the restaurant. When Anton saw me, I ran. And now I’m scared to go back. Chef Keitel is, like, never there anymore, and I don’t have his cell number, so I don’t know how to warn him what Anton’s planning, but I know you see him. You have to warn him. He’ll listen to you. Then maybe he can tell me what I should do, too! You have to talk to him before it’s too la—”
“End of message,” the digital voice declared.
“There’s the proof,” I said. “Vinny heard Anton plotting the murder of Tommy Keitel. He tried to tell Joy so she could warn Tommy.”
Mike shook his head. “That’s what you thought you heard, but to anyone else, that message is inconclusive.”
“You’re crazy—”
“Listen to it again, Clare. Then imagine how a jury might hear it. And how a defense attorney might spin it as referring to something completely innocent.”
I played the message again, and my shoulders sagged. “You’re right, Mike. There’s no real proof here.”
“No, there isn’t.” Mike folded his arms. “But I think I know how we can get it.”
“How?”
“Last night you went out on a limb for me. Do you think you could do the same thing for Joy?”
My eyes met Mike’s. “I think we both know the answer to that.”
I arrived at Solange at seven fifteen, almost an hour before the festivities were to begin. I flashed Joy’s invitation to the man at the door.
“Madame, you’re—”
“Early, I know. But I wanted to speak to Mr. Wright and Mrs. Keitel.”
I breezed past the doorman, strode into the dining room.
The tables were set, complete with name tags. Members of the waitstaff were still bustling around. I didn’t recognize anyone, but why should I? For this event, Solange was staffed by men and wo
men from Robbie Gray’s restaurant, Anatomy. The crew from Solange was on the guest list.
I spied Faye Keitel in the middle of the dining room, speaking with a tall maître d’. She looked stylish in a designer gown that put Madame’s green Valentino suit to shame. Her highlighted blond hair was coifed in an elegant French braid, her makeup perfect. Beside the pair, I saw Anton Wright in black tie. He held a wine bottle at arm’s length while he read the label.
Faye tensed when she noticed my approach. Anton sensed her reaction and set the bottle aside.
“Remember me?” I said.
“Oh, hello,” Faye replied, forcing a smile. She glanced at Anton. “This is Clare Cosi. She’s—”
“The mother of Joy Allegro, the innocent girl you framed for murder.”
The maître d’ did a horrified double take. Faye and Anton didn’t even blink.
“Please excuse us, Matthew,” Faye said.
“Very well,” the maître d’ replied, then disappeared into the busy kitchen.
Anton stood beside Faye, arms folded over his chest. Faye Keitel peered down her nose at me.
“You’ve gotten our attention. Say your piece,” she demanded.
I ignored her, faced Anton Wright. “I know all about that phone call the other night. You planned Tommy Keitel’s murder in Solange’s kitchen. Vincent Buccelli told me all about that conversation—before you murdered him.”
“You’re crazy,” he said unconvincingly. Clearly Anton was rattled. But Faye Keitel regarded me through a gaze like ancient ice.
“Why would Anton kill his golden goose?” she asked.
“Because the goose was about to fly the coop. Tommy was bored and wanted a new challenge.”
I faced Anton again. “Tommy told you he was gone when his contract expired, which messed up your plan to franchise the Solange name, didn’t it? How could you find backers without Tommy’s reputation to peddle?”
Anton sneered. “I already had the investors, because I’d already sold the idea. I’d signed the contracts and taken the money—”
I blinked. “My God, no wonder you were so desperate.”
“I took a bath on those other restaurants,” Anton said. “Solange was a moneymaker, but it didn’t make up for my losses. I needed the cash, so I sold the franchise idea. All Tommy had to do was sign on to the deal, and he’d be a millionaire ten times over—”
“But he wanted nothing to do with your scheme. He wouldn’t even sell you the recipes, would he?”
Anton winced, and I knew I’d struck a nerve.
“What do you want, Ms. Cosi?” Faye asked.
“The same thing Billy Benedetto wanted,” I replied.
When I mentioned the late Mr. Benedetto, even Faye seemed rattled. I took some satisfaction in that.
“Oh, yes. I spoke with Benedetto, too. Before Anton murdered him.”
“What do you want?” Faye repeated impatiently.
“My daughter is going to cop a plea for Tommy’s murder,” I replied. “She’ll spend six or seven years in prison. When she gets out, you are going to back her restaurant to the tune of six million dollars.”
“Now why would we do that?” Anton asked. “You can’t prove your ridiculous claims.”
“I don’t have to prove anything,” I replied. “All I have to do is talk to Roman Brio. He’d certainly be interested in my tale, interested enough to ask questions, maybe write an exposé. What would happen to your deal then?”
Anton locked eyes with Faye. “With Benedetto gone, I thought we were through with blackmail—”
“Shut up,” Faye said softly.
But Anton wouldn’t. “There’s precious little profit in this as it is. We can’t slice off another piece of the pie. That’s why we got rid of Benedetto—”
“I told you to shut up, Anton.”
“I should have never listened to you, never let you seduce me, talk me into this,” Anton said.
“Excuse me, Anton,” I said. “But you wouldn’t be the first sucker who let his mistress talk him into murdering an inconvenient husband.”
“I didn’t kill Tommy!” Anton replied. “Vinny, yeah, because I had to. And Benedetto because he was costing me money. But it was Faye who killed Tommy. She couldn’t wait.”
Faye howled, and I whirled to face her. She had a steak knife in her hand, lifted from one of the place settings, and she lunged at me!
I managed to deflect the blade with my forearm, which saved my life. It plunged deep into my shoulder instead of my throat.
“Carnegie Hall! Carnegie Hall!” I yelled while I continued to wrestle with the crazed woman.
The police who’d been waiting outside poured into the restaurant. Detective Lippert cuffed Anton Wright. Ray Tatum pulled Faye Keitel off me and disarmed her.
I stumbled backward against a table. I was a little dizzy. My shoulder hurt like a son of a bitch, and I felt something warm flowing down my arm. My knees buckled. Before I hit the floor, Sue Ellen Bass and Detective Soles caught me, one on each arm. They cleared a table and stretched me out on the white cloth. Detective Soles pressed a stack of napkins against my wound to stanch the bleeding.
They were asking me questions, but their voices were whispers. And they both seemed so far away. From my position on the table, I could see Solange’s gargoyles were still up there, on their high perches, but the detectives were closer…and they looked like angels, floating against the restaurant’s sunny yellow walls. I blinked, my vision going fuzzy.
Mike Quinn strode across the room. “We’ve got it all on tape,” he announced, glancing around, looking for me. Then Mike saw me on the table. He saw the blood. “Son of a—”
“Mike?”
“Clare! You’re hurt! My God!” His rugged face loomed over me. He looked scared.
“What’s wrong, Mike? Didn’t we get them?”
“We got them, sweetheart. You got them.”
“Good…Okay, then I can close my eyes now…finally take a rest…”
“No, Clare! Stay awake! Please, sweetheart!”
Mike’s booming voice began to fade. I saw him shouting at the female detectives. “Keep pressure on that wound, do you hear me? Where are the paramedics? Is the ambulance here? Dammit! Get the paramedics in here!”
“Sorry, Mike. I’m just a little tired…”
Then someone turned off the lights.
Epilogue
“Night, boss,” Esther called, waving at the door of my hospital room. “Take care of that shoulder now. And go easy on the meds.”
“My lady knows of what she speaks. So listen, Clare Cosi, and don’t be weak.”
“Okay, Boris.” I tipped my hat to the hippest Russian rapper in the country—or at least on this floor of the St. Vincent’s Hospital. “I’ll keep it real.”
It was late, close to the end of visiting hours, and Esther and BB Gun were the last to depart. They’d just helped me polish off a sinfully delicious box of Chef Jacques Torres’s handmade chocolates that Janelle Babcock had delivered earlier in the day.
My daughter and ex-husband were back at the Village Blend by now. Madame had gone off to meet her beau for a late dinner—that mysterious younger man I had yet to meet. And I’d been entertaining an endless stream of visitors all day long: Tucker, Gardner, Dante, Detectives Soles and Bass. Even Napoleon Dornier had dropped by to see how I was doing.
Now that Joy was cleared of Tommy’s murder, there was no more tension between Nappy and me. In fact, he confided that he’d already found a backer for his own restaurant. He was taking Tommy’s entire staff of cooks with him—Ramon included. And he was hoping I’d consider supplying the coffee beans.
Janelle was the only Solange staffer to decline Dornier’s offer. She’d found a position with one of the most prestigious cake makers on Manhattan Island, a job that would easily double her pay (which was one reason she said she’d splurged and bought me the gourmet chocolates).
I yawned and fell back against my hospital pillows. The r
oom was full of flowers and cards, balloons and stuffed animals. The angry stab wound to my shoulder still smarted, and the meds were still necessary, but the surgery had gone well, and the doctors said I’d be leaving the hospital in a day or two.
“Knock, knock?”
“Is that the start of a joke?” I called. “Or a visit?”
“It’s a visit…from a visitor who has his hands full!”
Mike.
I’d last seen the man hours ago in his detective jacket and tie. Now he was back, in worn jeans and a distressed-leather bomber, apparently bearing gifts.
“What have you got there?”
One hand held a huge thermos, the other a stack of paper cups. “Since you can’t go to the Village Blend, I brought the Blend’s coffee to you.”
“Oh, Mike, you’re a savior! I’m dying for a cup!”
“I figured you would be about now. ’Cause I know hospital coffee. You’re talking to a real vet when it comes to line-of-duty injuries.”
I remembered the scars I’d seen on the man’s naked chest. And I remembered what had happened after I’d seen those scars…and touched them, and kissed them. But that line of thought wasn’t going to let me sleep tonight, not without a bucket of icy cold banya water dumped over me.
“So…how did we do, Lieutenant?”
Mike moved my rolling tray next to the bed and poured me a cup of French-roasted Kenya AA from the thermos. “We got it all on tape, sweetheart,” he began, handing me the steaming cup then pouring one for himself. “Anton’s admission that he killed Vinny and Benedetto, his statement that it was Faye Keitel who murdered Tommy. It was a thing of beauty what you did—including deflecting that knife.” He reached out, caressed my cheek. “It saved your life.”
“Yeah. But I shouldn’t have ended up in here at all. I should have remembered what Roman Brio told me about Tommy’s wife.”
