Death on the Menu

by Lucy Burdette

  If this was all true, she might very well have seen the murderer come out of the kitchen. If it wasn’t true … I tried to picture what she had been wearing Friday night, but all I could remember was last night’s sparkly tulle. And I couldn’t think of a reasonable way to ask about her other outfit. Was the Jimmy Buffett photo taken that same night? With her wearing sequins?

  “Could you possibly have seen Gabriel arguing with someone before he was killed?”

  She looked embarrassed again. “Honestly, I was very busy hobnobbing with the Cuban delegation, because getting in on the ground floor when those reefs are opened up is so crucial. And it wasn’t only me; everyone at those tables wanted something from Cuba.”

  A chime sounded and two Asian young people came into the shop.

  “You’ll need to excuse me,” she said, gesturing in their direction. “I really wish I had seen something helpful. I might have if I’d been paying attention to what was around me. But I wasn’t. I was very focused.” She began moving toward her customers. “Please let me know if I can set you up with snorkeling equipment or a tour.”

  “Maybe,” I said. “I’m a Capricorn. We feel a lot more comfortable on land.”

  She laughed along with me, but this time her amusement sounded forced.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Se formó tremendo arroz con mango. (A sticky situation is brewing.)

  —Cuban saying

  I left the shop and stood out on the sidewalk blinking in the bright sunlight. A half block from here, gaggles of tourists were packed onto Duval Street, carrying drinks in plastic cups as they navigated from one bar to the next. How many of them knew there was so much more to our town then this tacky street? How many would bother to visit the other local places I loved, the historical sites that made it special? This was one reason that I always directed first-time visitors to the conch tour trains. Although residents complained about the incessant noise of the trains passing through their neighborhoods with their drivers on loudspeakers, at least visitors got a balanced overview of the island.

  Since I’d ended up so close to the Truman Annex, I couldn’t help wondering whether my ex-boyfriend, Chad, had seen anything unusual Friday night. He lived in the former Naval Administration building that overlooked the Little White House grounds. Sometimes he worked at home; was this one of those days? After going back and forth in my mind, I called his office phone, knowing he rarely answered. He left that kind of work to his secretary, Deena Smith, with whom I’d been friendly until Chad and I blew up.

  “It’s Hayley Snow,” I said when she answered. “Good morning!”

  “Long time no hear from you,” she said, sounding astonished. “I hope you’re not in the market for a divorce lawyer.”

  “Not a bit,” I said, hurrying to add, “Though I have a terrific guy in my life, and maybe someday we’ll get married. I’m in no rush—don’t want to make another dumb mistake.” Though on general principle, I hated the idea of her reporting something pathetic about me to Chad, I honestly no longer cared about the relationship. It had been a brief but spectacular failure, but it had gotten me here to this island, and for that I would always be grateful.

  After I asked about her own romance and heard a bit about its progress (slow but steamy), I asked if Chad might have been on the Truman Annex grounds this past weekend and whether he’d reported any insider news about the murder.

  “Insider? Nothing that he shared with me,” she said. “He’s working at home today. Knowing him, if you call ahead and he recognizes your number, he’ll ignore the phone. If you’re in the area, maybe drop by?”

  “What if I brought him a coffee?” I asked.

  “Coffee won’t get you too far. But remember how much he loves those glazed doughnuts from that shop next to the Tropic? He won’t buy one for himself, but he can’t resist if someone offers him one.”

  “You’re a sweetheart,” I said, beginning to walk in the direction of Glazed Donuts. “We should get together soon and have a drink.”

  Which we probably wouldn’t, not while she still worked for him. One thing he understood was her value as a secretary. And front woman. She had the people skills that he lacked—he was the shark in the back office, she the soothing goldfish swishing through the water out front. For those reasons, he paid her very well. My stomach flip-flopped wildly as I got closer to Eaton Street, thinking about Chad’s possible reactions to seeing me. I lectured myself about ingesting pure sugar and carbs when I wasn’t hungry, but my anxiety and the memory of those light pillowy doughnuts won out.

  Glazed Donuts was operated by an adorable young couple, who usually sold out of their amazing treats by midafternoon. Today the chalkboard outside the door described the specials as a key lime pie doughnut; a thick chocolate option with chocolate icing and covered with big, round chocolate sprinkles; and a maple-glazed doughnut with candied bacon, which I’d had in the past and swooned over. But since Chad preferred plain glazed, I ordered two of those and a latte to go and continued on my mission.

  I hurried past the post office and through the gates into the Truman Annex. All of the side gates leading to this complex were locked at six PM except during the Fantasy Fest Parade, when none of the residents wanted rowdy, partially nude revelers to get trapped inside. These same gates had all been locked during the day and evening of the first fancy party of the weekend.

  When I reached the grounds of the Little White House, I paused to take in the view of the lawn. This was truly a lovely green space on our crowded little island, and it would be a terrible shame to lose it. It was hard to picture more condos getting shoehorned in around the White House, but I did not have a developer’s eye.

  I circled the lawn and approached the front door of my ex’s condominium. I pulled in a deep breath and pushed my shoulders away from my ears. It wouldn’t do to look nervous in front of Chad. He had a nose for weakness, finely honed from years of representing angry parties in nasty divorces. What could I say to convince him to talk about his impressions of Friday night, assuming he’d been here watching? He was predisposed to think of me as pointlessly nosy. I picked up the phone and pressed the numbers for his apartment. No answer. I hung up and tried one more time. Nothing.

  As I was about to give up, a tall, older woman approached, pulling a red wagon that contained an elderly Jack Russell dog with a cast on his back leg. I recognized her as Molly Shallow, the neighbor who lived directly under Chad’s apartment on the first floor. Maybe she’d been here Friday night—and maybe she’d be less wary about talking to me than Chad would have been.

  I broke into a huge smile and explained quickly who I was and why I was there, skipping over the low point in our nasty breakup that she had probably witnessed when Chad put all my belongings out on the sidewalk. And glossing past the fact that I had no official reason to be poking around, instead giving her the explanation about my article on Cuban influences in our town.

  She cocked her head to the right and then the left, like a wary bird. “Were you the girl whose stuff my neighbor stuck out on the curb?” She pointed to the cut in the cement that was reserved for short-term loading and unloading and handicapped residents.

  What could I say? It wasn’t going to work to lie, so I nodded.

  “Honestly,” she said, her eyes narrowing as if to size me up, “I didn’t think you’d last around here. I thought you would have left the island not long after what he did.”

  “Turns out I’m more stubborn than that. I love this place, and I found a job at Key Zest that I adore, and I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Good for you. I’m not going anywhere either. Tell me again what you want to know?”

  “I’m trying to get a sense of some of the people who attended this weekend’s conference. And also wondering whether you were here for the big event on Friday?” I kept chattering about how tragic the events had been and how terrible the effects might be on our island if this wasn’t resolved quickly. “Do you have a few minutes to cha
t? I come bearing doughnuts.” I held up the white bag.

  She nodded after a bit, and gestured at the little dog. “Come in. This is Paddy. He tore his ACL two weeks ago.” We entered the vestibule of her apartment, which was old-fashioned yet comfortable, reminding me of my grandmother’s home.

  “We can sit outside,” she said, leading us through the living area and out onto a large deck overlooking the harbor. The dog hobbled over to a bed shaped like a bone and settled in as we took seats in metal garden chairs. An enormous Disney cruise ship was docked at the nearby Margaritaville Westin, and the notes of “When You Wish Upon a Star” began to ring out.

  Chad had grown to hate the cruise ships that filled the piers on this end of the island, but I’d enjoyed watching the tourists disembark—all part of the tropical island charm. I opened my bag and handed her one of the doughnuts on a napkin.

  “Thank you,” she said. “When the universe brings you a doughnut, or a cookie for that matter, I think she expects you to enjoy it.”

  I grinned and set upon my own sugary orb.

  When we were finished eating, I repeated my first question. “Were you here Friday night for the opening party?”

  “I wasn’t an invited guest, but a few of us residents sat out on lawn chairs and watched for a couple hours.” She brushed a few flakes of sugar off her lap. “We felt like kids watching a baseball game from the roof next to the stadium. Only of course they wouldn’t let us anywhere near the roof or even the balconies. I would have given anything to shake Mr. Obama’s hand, though not all of my neighbors were fans. And the music from Jimmy Buffett—that was a treat! I’m no Parrot Head, but being so close to a legend was special. We could smell the Cuban food and wished we could be eating it. Torture!”

  “My mother was the caterer,” I told her. “She and her sous-chefs did an amazing job, and it was all going so well. Until the end, of course. Those popping noises were so puzzling and disturbing. Did you happen to see what happened?”

  “Of course, the police have been here several times already asking that very question.” Her little white dog struggled to his feet and hopped over to my chair to snuffle my fingers, then lick them clean of sugar. “I have a feeling it was unauthorized fireworks. We had some atrocious renters in this building last week who didn’t seem to understand civility. First, they threw a wedding right on our pool grounds.” She threw her hands up in disbelief. “They didn’t ask anyone for permission; they just did it. The filters have been clogged with hideous plastic flowers ever since. And there was trash everywhere. And all throughout the week, their teenagers were caught trying one prank after another, including setting off fireworks and sending drones out. The president of our condo board finally had to ask the family to check out early.”

  Her renter scenario would mean that the popping sounds were unrelated to the murder. And that the timing of Maria finding her brother’s body was simply a rotten coincidence. Possible, I supposed. But surely the police would have explored this avenue? Nothing else seemed to be turning up.

  “Have you thought to ask Rusty Hodgdon? I believe he was attending the party.”

  “I’ve talked to him a bit. How do you know Rusty?” I asked. The web of connections on this island should never be surprising.

  “I’ve been a member of the Key West Writers Guild for years and years. And he’s our president at the moment. How do you know him?” she asked.

  “I met him at the Hemingway Home,” I said, “where he’s a wonderful tour guide. He can really spin a tale. What’s his writing like?”

  She peered at my face. “You don’t plan to print this in your paper?”

  “Of course not,” I said, scrambling for a plausible reason to be asking. “I’ve seen his books displayed at the Key West Island bookstore, and I wondered if they were good.”

  She thought this over. “He’s a bit like the girl with a curl in the middle of her forehead.”

  I must have looked puzzled, because she continued right on.

  “When he shares his own work with our group, mostly thrillers, it’s very strong. Even gripping. But when he tries to imitate Hemingway”—she made a face—“I mean, who’s good at imitating Hemingway? Even Hemingway’s own work sounds stiff and stilted to my ear sometimes. And what the copycat writers lack is a lifetime of feelings about what it meant to be Hemingway. His intense admiration for macho pursuits. His love of women and his inability to remain faithful. It’s hard to channel all that while copying a master’s spare style.”

  I couldn’t think of any more reasonable questions and she seemed to be tiring, so I thanked her for talking with me and started back toward the office. I wasn’t sure I’d learned much new. Certainly a man wouldn’t have murdered another man because his copycat writing wasn’t up to snuff. And besides, I’d found the lines Rusty had quoted hysterical. But suppose a man was obsessed with the whole concept of Ernest Hemingway?

  Stealing the gold medal, that could have been in Rusty’s wheelhouse. And then suppose Gabriel caught him at it?

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  My pastry chef says the more battle scars, the better the food.

  —Amy E. Reichert, The Coincidence of Coconut Cake

  Drooping a little from the letdown after my sugar doughnut high, I took the stairs to Key Zest two at a time. Wally, Palamina, and Danielle appeared to be having a staff meeting in the vestibule.

  “Oh my gosh,” I said, feeling my stomach clunk to my knees. “Did I forget a meeting?”

  “Impromptu,” said Palamina. “We know you’re working hard out in the field.”

  “But since you’re here, I can ask instead of emailing: possible to have all three of your articles in by end of the day tomorrow?” Wally asked. “Everything else is already laid out.”

  He jerked a thumb at Danielle’s computer, open on the desk. He was wearing his palm tree–dotted Key Zest shirt, which had been our team uniform until Palamina arrived at the magazine with her more highly developed sense of style. Whatever was going on—and maybe it was just me being paranoid or guilty about all the time I’d missed here lately—I sure didn’t feel like part of the team right now.

  “Absolutely,” I said, trying to sound confident and competent though I felt neither. “Three, though?” I finally added, because as stupid as it sounded to be asking, it would be altogether worse to have promised something that I didn’t deliver. “I’ve got the one on Cuban influence blocked out”—so not true, I had the introduction only—“and I can quickly finish up the Cuban food visits tomorrow.”

  “Of course, yes on those,” said Wally in an impatient voice. “But we also discussed the roundup on Cuban mix sandwiches. Aren’t you about ready to wrap that up, too?”

  Palamina smiled graciously, softening his blunt words a little. “It would make sense to run that piece in this issue, since our focus is on Cuba.”

  I tapped the side of my head with the palm of my hand. “Oh yeah, got that one almost in the bag, too. Miss Gloria and I hit Sandy’s yesterday, so I’m certain I have enough material.”

  “We’re eager to see how you’ll spin it so it’s not just a list of sandwiches and their ingredients,” said Wally.

  Did that mean he found my last roundup article lacking? This, of course, was the challenge of every food writer—how to write about the food but also make the piece about something bigger. Had I gotten too small? Or was I getting insecure and overly suspicious and reading too much into every word?

  I retreated down the short hall to my tiny office, feeling unsettled and scattered. Why were they being so hard on me? Or were they? There was no way I could get my work done sitting in this cubby only feet from my bosses, speculating about what was wrong. When I heard the door to their shared space close, I grabbed my stuff and returned to Danielle’s desk at the top of the stairs.

  “Is it just me, or are they acting weird?” I whispered. “I feel like Wally’s mad at me, but he won’t come out and say it. But it makes me feel like he and Palamina are
on the A team and I’m on the bench. Or some other kind of dumb sports metaphor.”

  Danielle snickered, but then her face got serious. “I think Wally does feel like you left the team. But it’s not work, it’s personal. And I suspect he’s not evolved enough to recognize what he’s doing.” She ran her fingers through her blonde curls. “You’ve fallen in love, and he’s a little sad about it. And he’s a guy, so it’s hard for him to talk about.”

  Yikes. And here I thought we’d sorted all our previous relationship stuff out. Plus, I thought I’d been pretty circumspect about my romance with Nathan. “What am I supposed to do about that, Miss Ann Landers? Do I come right out and confront him?”

  Danielle gathered her hair into a ponytail and then let it drop down her back. “If you’re by yourself with him sometime, maybe mention that you miss his friendship? It would only embarrass him if you pointed out that he seems jealous.”

  I nodded. She was right, as usual.

  “And meanwhile, work your tail off, girl!”

  “Got it. I’ll be home writing if you need me.” I trotted down the stairs to retrieve my scooter. On the slow traffic-ridden trip up island, I mulled over what Danielle had said about Wally. He and I had never experienced the passion that I felt now with Nathan. And it seemed possible that Wally could sense that and was regretful or envious. Was I falling in love? I thought maybe she was right. In fact, if I was being honest with myself, I’d already fallen. That thought felt like touching a hot stove burner with my finger. I pushed my mind back to this past weekend’s tragedy.

  While waiting at the light on the corner of Eaton and White streets, I realized that in the matter of Gabriel’s murder, I’d been looking for the money trail. Maybe I needed to be searching for the passion there too. Because I couldn’t think of a reason that any of the people I’d met or chatted with would want to stab Gabriel. Right smack in the middle of the biggest party of the season. Yes, Bob was passionate about the Little White House and obviously worried about funds. Yes, Dana was passionate about diving and fishing and Cuba’s coral reef, and maybe expanding her own business to amazingly fertile new oceans. And yes, according to Molly, Rusty was passionate about Hemingway and his own writing and how the two compared.