by Don Bruns
It was a cagey answer, giving us nothing. They were still eliminating staff members, but why did Sophia think her husband was a suspect? I didn’t trust Conway. The guy was just a little too slick.
“While you’re here, Mr. Moore, why don’t we fingerprint you?”
It wasn’t a request. It was an order in the form of a request.
I turned to Em and asked her if she’d driven, but she just shook her head and looked away. And then I got it. The detective must have picked her up and brought her here.
“Need a ride?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
Conway didn’t stick around for the paperwork. I knew he wouldn’t, and I was seething inside.
After my printing, James and I drove back to the apartment by ourselves.
“Not a pleasant situation no matter how you slice it.” James smoked a cigarette, flicking the ashes out the window on the driver’s side.
“I thought you quit.”
“Now’s not the time, amigo.”
I should have been more worried about the case. Instead, “What the hell was that all about? Ted. Is he going out with her?”
“You two have never been committed. I don’t mean to be cruel, but she’s taken off before, Skip. She plays by her own set of rules. You know that, but you keep going back for more.”
“Yeah.” James was right about one thing. Em had taken off before. And I had no idea where or even if she was with someone. But he was wrong about the commitment. Em wasn’t committed. I had been committed since high school. If Em had ever shown any sign of a full-time commitment—
“Sometimes I think I should be committed.”
He looked sideways at me, then understanding I meant to an asylum, he gave me a broad grin. “I’ve thought that about you too, amigo.”
We were quiet for a moment.
“Talk to her about it, Skip. She’s apparently going through some emotional thing since Amanda was killed.”
And I’d decided that her concern about Amanda was part of it. I concentrated on my conversation with the baker babe and how I might approach her tonight. Screw James. Forget Em. If my girlfriend could play nice with the cop, I could flirt a little with Amanda’s kitchen friend. And maybe I could get some answers on this boyfriend thing that kept coming up. Had the dead sous chef been dating someone on staff? The inference had come up a couple of times. And there was the teenage incident with her jeweler boyfriend.
“I’m talking to Kelly Fields tonight. I’ll find a way, and I’ll get whatever answers there are. I’m the one who’s going to talk to her. Got it?”
James glanced at me, and I guess he saw that I was very serious.
“Got it. I’ll leave her alone.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
At our small kitchen table, I pulled up Amanda Wright’s Face-book page, staring at the profile photo and the cleavage she displayed. Long brown hair and what almost looked like a pout on her lips.
“Good-looking woman, James.”
“Not my type, Skip.”
“Hey, she went to our college, Samuel and Davidson.” I hadn’t known that. “What the hell, dude, she was in culinary arts with you. She was your classmate and you didn’t tell me?”
“Yeah.” He walked up and was looking over my shoulder. “It’s no big deal. I didn’t even remember her. She reminded me about it when we went out the first time. Said she dropped out after the first year.”
James had done the full four years, barely graduating with a bachelor of science degree in culinary arts.
“She did a year? That was it? A year? Wow. What exactly did your four-year degree cover?”
“On top of culinary arts? Baking, pastry, food service management, and other assorted crap.”
“So this girl dropped out of culinary school after a year, and yet she’s working a high-end restaurant, given a chance to be the chef in her own kitchen?”
“I know. I know.” He buried his head in his hands. “And I’m stuck as a line cook at some fast-food dump. But, Skip, you know how I feel. I don’t see the future in it. There’s way too much work involved, and we stand a much better chance to strike it rich if we keep our options open.”
“Really? You really feel that way?”
I had a business degree, James the culinary background. It had been an early dream of ours to open a restaurant on South Beach, and now we were investigating the death of someone who had come damn close to our dream.
“It doesn’t bother you that she was about to be at the top of her game, at her young age?”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah.”
“Does that bother me?” James stepped back and looked out the window, staring into the parking lot.
“It does, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, it bothers me. Now drop it. What else about her?”
I didn’t want to push him any more.
“She’s pretty vague about the rest of her background.”
“Photos?”
I clicked on photos, and there were just two. Her profile, with the low-cut top and a group picture of the kitchen staff. Dressed in their white jackets, they were all smiling. Bouvier was in the center, his right arm around Chef Marty and his left arm around Amanda.
“Just Google her name. Put cook after it.”
I ran it up on the screen and there were three Amanda Wrights. One was a cooking instructor, not our girl, and then there was an Amanda Cook Wright. The third reference was a newspaper article from a suburban journal called the Dade Gazette.
I read it out loud.
Nathan Brandt, instructor at Samuel and Davidson University, was arrested last night for sexual battery. A student at the institution, Amanda Wright, filed a complaint, claiming that Brandt had taken advantage of her during a student-teacher conference in his office. He remains in Dade County jail on fifty-thousand-dollars’ bond.
We were both silent for a moment.
“I didn’t see that coming,” James said.
“She was only there one year, and then she dropped out.”
“Maybe that’s why she dropped out.” He was right with me. “Damn, look up the guy and see what happened to him.”
I keyed in Nathan Brandt, Samuel and Davidson University.
“There’re over one hundred references.”
“Check one.”
I moved down twenty and clicked it.
Nathan Brandt, business ethics instructor at Samuel and Davidson University, will be lecturing at the Junior Service League of Brandon—
“When?”
“About one year ago.”
“Okay, they couldn’t prove the charges. He’s still there.” James straddled one of our two rickety kitchen chairs.
“Or she dropped them.”
“You know, there’s this growing list of people we need to interview.” James was tapping his foot. Checking his cell phone, he stood up. “We’ve got to go, amigo. Almost showtime.”
“You’ve got to go, amigo. I’m not washing dishes for a third night.”
“Six thousand bucks and a missing Juan Castro says that you are, friend. And remember, you’re talking to the lovely Kelly Fields tonight.”
He was right. I was. And I did.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
It started off slow, and I got a chance to share a moment with Carlos, the runner. He walked back into the kitchen and eyed me for a moment. I was leaning against the stainless counter as he approached.
“Juan’s not coming back?”
“I haven’t heard.”
Carlos squinted his eyes. “What I tole you, it was not serious.”
“Have you talked to him?”
“No.” He was quick with his comeback. “I realize that when I say to you he was interested in the sous chef, you might think—” Shrugging his shoulders, he turned away from me.
“Carlos,” he looked over his shoulder, “was there a boyfriend? Was Amanda seeing someone here?”
“You a cop?”
James
was right. Asking questions was a dead giveaway.
“Definitely not a cop. I just wondered.” Damn, it was hard to ask questions in a nonchalant manner. If you asked a question, it immediately became an inquisition. He turned and addressed me.
“If you’re not a cop, Juan was jealous.”
“Of what?”
“Of someone in the kitchen who was seeing her.”
“He knew that?”
“He ask her if she would go for coffee one night. It took a lot of courage, but he wanted to do it. So he ask her. He’s separated from his wife, broke up with his girlfrien’ and—”
“And?”
“She told him she was seeing someone.”
“It could have been anyone.”
“She then tell him it was someone on the staff, and she was very sorry that she had to say no.”
“Who was it?”
“Maybe no one. There was no real sign that she was involve with anyone, and Juan tole me that he thought she was just makin’ an escuse.”
He paused. “There was a rumor. Maybe she got caught outside with someone, but only that. A rumor.”
God, I wanted to pursue this. Carlos was giving me some really solid ideas, but I couldn’t give us away.
“You said, ‘if you’re not a cop.’ What if I was?”
“This conversation never happen.” He walked into the kitchen, and I looked around for the pastry chef.
Five minutes later I heard the commotion. A rise in the volume of voices. James walked back and grinned.
“Staff is stressed. Chef is barking out orders in case you haven’t heard.”
“Why?”
“The singer Enrique Iglesias and twenty of his entourage just walked in. Chef Jean is apparently on his way down to personally welcome them and apparently Iglesias and company are expecting some extras that are not, I repeat, not on the menu.”
“That’s not a good thing?”
“It’s not a good thing, amigo. Stuff that’s not on the menu is never a good thing. We earn our pay tonight.”
The dishes were slow in coming back, and until the dinner party was finished, I didn’t have much to do.
Bright-orange flames erupted like a volcano under pans laden with sauces, vegetables, and meats. I could smell chicken or some fowl roasting in the oven. The staff was scurrying back and forth, barely avoiding each other in the narrow confines. The aroma was that of Thanksgiving, with turkey and stuffing.
Kelly Fields was using a hand torch to brown the tops of a number of crème brûlées and I sauntered over to her.
“Dessert for the star?”
Her gaze never left the fifteen ceramic cups. “He’s just another customer.”
“I haven’t been here very long—”
“Two nights,” she said with attitude.
“But I can’t believe Chef Jean would leave his home and come down here for ‘just another customer.’”
“What do you care?”
“Are you kidding me?” I was getting my courage up. “I’m going to be scraping garbage from a plate used by a very famous person. Pretty exciting stuff.”
Finally she glanced up. I saw the corners of her mouth move upward and I knew I had her.
“You are involved in the creative process, Mrs. Fields, but I get what’s left over. It may not be glamorous, but—”
She laughed. “You’re really a dishwasher?” She gave me a sidelong glance. Somehow I knew that she didn’t believe it. It was as if she knew.
“I am. For two nights, as you pointed out. And now, for number three.”
“I’ve met a lot of dishwashers, but you take the cake.”
It was my turn to laugh. “Baker’s humor?”
“Oh, my God, I didn’t even realize—”
I hesitated. I didn’t want to push this too fast, but the moment seemed right so I asked.
“Kelly, is there any chance you’d have coffee with me after our shift tonight?”
“Coffee?”
“Just.”
“I’m married.”
“Coffee. Nothing more.”
She stared down at her torch, browning the desserts.
“I’m married. We’re separated. Temporarily, but still—”
“Coffee.”
“Kelly,” Marty shot me an angry look, “where the hell is the brûlée?”
“Right here, Chef.” She picked up the tray and walked it to the prep table. Turning back to me, she smiled. “Coffee, right?”
“I couldn’t be any more clear.”
“It’s not that I’m class conscious, but—”
“I get it. Coffee with the dishwasher? Look, I plan on moving up the ladder very soon. You can always say you knew me when.”
“I can’t.” She turned away. “Sorry. If I have coffee that late I can’t sleep.”
Damn. I’d struck out on the first try.
“Warm milk?”
She gave me a sidelong glance. “Maybe I could do that. Warm milk. That would help me sleep, right?”
“It’s a date.” I’d actually pulled it off. I was going out with Kelly Fields, and I was going to learn a little more about our victim, Amanda Wright.
James walked over and I could see sweat on his brow.
“Try making duck leg confit and sauce from scratch with a complementary salad for nineteen and a Chicago-style hot dog for one. First of all, you need raw materials, and frankly, we didn’t have them.”
“You survived?”
“We did. We had one of the runners, Jimmy Gideon, hitting every restaurant within a five-mile radius. But, he got the stuff, so—” James shrugged his shoulders, obviously elated to have been a part of the excitement. “The sad part is that so far I haven’t picked up much information.”
“I think you’re enjoying this,” I said.
“Maybe just a little. But I know it’s going to end, so I can revel in the moment. Know what I mean?”
What I knew was this. We needed a lot more work to solve this case.
“And you?” James asked.
“Got some very interesting information from Carlos, the runner, and—”
“What information?”
“Amanda told Juan Castro she was seeing someone on staff.”
“Who? For God’s sake, who, Skip?”
“The dishwasher told Carlos that he thought she made it up to get rid of him after he asked her out on a date.”
“Shit.”
“But, there’s a rumor she got caught out back with someone, so we can pursue that story.”
“Damn. All I got was a slice on my thumb from chopping asparagus.”
“And James, I’ve got a warm milk date after work.”
“A what?”
“Warm milk date. I’m having coffee, she’s having milk.”
“Tonto, you’ve got a question-and-answer session with the cookie lady. Tell me I’m wrong.”
“You’re not wrong. I do have a question-and-answer session with the lady. I’m quite excited.”
“Ask her about Amanda’s sexual battery thing from college. See if that ever came up in conversation.”
“James, I’m going to ask her about everything I can think of.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
I saw Bouvier and the ever-present Sophia before I left the restaurant. They’d apparently spent some time with the singer and his group, and Sophia had come back to the kitchen just before closing. Dressed in a long black dress and a string of pearls, she seriously reminded me a little bit of Miss Piggy, her eyes somewhat sunken in her plump face, and her wide nose sucking up all the available oxygen.
As she emerged from Chef Jean’s office, I caught her looking at me as I walked out the back door with Kelly Fields. She didn’t look happy. Maybe there was a policy about dating the help, but apparently Amanda Wright had done it. Oh, yeah, and maybe that’s what got her killed.
The coffee and milk date happened three blocks away at a restaurant on Bayshore Drive called NoVe Kitchen and Bar
. They are open until three a.m. and the food and drinks aren’t bad. Em and I had eaten there before, and when I walked in with Kelly, the waitress acted as if she knew me. Of course, it wasn’t the same waitress we’d had, so it was all fabricated.
“Do you have warm milk?” I asked her as we eased into our chairs.
“If Chef accidentally left it out all day.”
That was not an option. “Very funny. Can you get me a cup of coffee and my friend a warm milk?”
“Actually,” Kelly looked over at the bar, studying the selection, “bring me a beer. Yuengling draft.”
I knew we were going to hit it off. “Make that two.”
“So, Skip, you’re working this profession because you plan on making it big in the dishwashing business someday?”
“There are bigger restaurants than L’Elfe. If I master dishwashing here, I could move to Twenty-One in New York, or Commander’s Palace in New Orleans. Maybe the French Laundry in Napa or a Bobby Flay restaurant in New York.” James and I had talked about the big guys, we just hadn’t visited them yet.
“But you’d miss the warm climate and the friendly staff. Like the pastry chef.” She gave me a broad smile, and I felt like I could ask her anything.
“You were good friends with Amanda?”
Her smile disappeared, and as the waitress set bottles on the table, she grabbed hers and squeezed it.
“I’m sorry, if it’s not comfortable—”
“Did you know Amanda?” she asked.
“No,” I said. “But I’ve followed the story. James, my friend who’s the new sous chef, he went out with her twice. I guess they decided it was not to be.”
The lady put her lips together and nodded, as if she understood. Again, I thought she might have figured it out. Then I saw the look collapse.
“Oh, Jesus. What a terrible end to a life with such promise.”
“I agree. And you know what’s funny?” It wasn’t funny at all, but I wanted to ease into the Q and A. “One of the runners came up to me tonight and said that he thought the former dishwasher, Juan Castro, had asked Amanda out. He insinuated she told him she had a boyfriend on staff. Was that true?”
Kelly Fields took a long, slow swallow of beer. A sensual swallow. But I was more interested in her answer than the image.
