Death of an Italian Chef

by Lee Hollis

  “Because he caught me coming out of the company’s office trailer at the construction site,” Hayley admitted, wincing.

  “You broke into Vic Spencer’s mobile office?”

  Hayley reached for her bag and opened it, rummaging around. “I know I shouldn’t have done it, but—”

  “Seems to me that you are the only one at risk of being arrested here. There is a little thing we like to call breaking and entering,” Herrold said.

  Donnie snickered.

  Hayley found the bottle, yanked it out of her bag, and dramatically slammed it down on the desk.

  Sergeant Herrold stared at the bottle. “What are those, eyedrops?”

  “No,” Hayley barked. “According to the label, it’s Maitotoxin.”

  Herrold and Donnie both gave her blank looks.

  “It’s a toxin that stops the heart. I found it in Vic Spencer’s trailer, where Chuckie has been staying ever since his girlfriend kicked him out.”

  Herrold grabbed a tissue from the box on her desk and used it to pick up the bottle and read the label.

  Eureka.

  She was finally showing a modicum of interest.

  So was Donnie, who stared wide-eyed at the bottle, clearly wigged-out that he was in such close proximity to a deadly poison.

  Herrold gently set the bottle back down and nodded, then slowly raised her eyes to meet Hayley’s again. “Okay, thank you. I will look into it.”

  She had said the right words, but Hayley was still not convinced Sergeant Herrold would actually follow through and launch any kind of serious investigation.

  But Hayley had done everything she possibly could for now.

  Except pray for Chief Sergio’s return from Brazil soon.

  Chapter 34

  Hayley hurried out of the police station and hustled to her car. She knew she had to get to the Island Times office. She had been missing in action at the paper for an unacceptable amount of time ever since Randy’s gallbladder attack.

  Although she was fairly confident Sal would not fire her, given how utterly lost he would be without her, she did not want to endure another one of his earsplitting tirades where he loved to use his favorite cliché, “You’re skating on thin ice, missy!” Hayley had no clue why he called her missy when he was mad, but she assumed he had picked it up from when he was a kid and his father yelled at one of his five sisters.

  As Hayley dashed across the street to her car, she nearly got mowed down by the mail truck. Hayley could see Lonny Chapman through the windshield; a cherubic-faced, rotund postal worker gripping the steering wheel with his chubby hands, panic in his eyes. Hayley waved apologetically as she reached the curb on the other side of the street and called out, “Sorry, Lonny!”

  The mail truck kept going, but Hayley spotted Lonny shoot an arm out the driver’s-side window and give her a brief thumbs-up.

  Jumping behind the wheel of her car, Hayley barely had time to flick the key in the ignition when her phone buzzed and vibrated on the passenger seat where she had just tossed it.

  She glanced down at the screen.

  It was Tilly.

  Hayley left the car idling, still parked at the curb, as she scooped up her phone and tapped the speaker button.

  “Hi, Tilly. Listen, I was just about to call you. I found some disturbing evidence in Vic Spencer’s office trailer that strongly incriminates both him and Chuckie Rhinehart, so I want you to stay at the hospital and don’t go anywhere—”

  “I’m not at the hospital, Hayley,” Tilly said.

  Hayley sprang up in her seat. “What? Where are you?”

  “Home.”

  “Tilly, I specifically told you not to go home. I need you to get out of there and drive directly over to my house. I will call Randy and tell him to expect you.”

  “I can’t. Not yet, anyway. I still have to pack a few things and I have a cake in the oven.”

  “A cake? I don’t understand! I thought you had a double shift at the hospital today.”

  “I did, but I ran into Dr. Cormack in the staff break room first thing when I punched in, and he deliberately ignored me and refused to make eye contact, pretending like he didn’t even know who I was, and I got very upset. My head hurt, I was all thumbs, I dropped a tray of meds all over the floor and they got all mixed up and had to be thrown away. I burst out crying while taking a patient’s temperature. The poor man thought he was dying! I have been a complete mess today, so that lovely Shelley Clark, who was just getting off her shift as I was starting mine, offered to cover for me so I could go home and calm down and get some rest. Wasn’t that sweet of her?”

  “Yes, Tilly, but you shouldn’t be home—”

  “Don’t worry, I am almost done packing. You can tell Randy I will be over there just as soon as my cake is done. Shelley suggested I come home and do something that relaxes me and baking always relaxes me. You will love this cake, Hayley. It’s going to be a triple-chocolate layer cake. I still have to make the frosting. I hope I have enough unsweetened cocoa powder left in the cupboard.”

  “Tilly, please, listen to me—”

  But Tilly’s mind was unfortunately elsewhere. “We can all have a slice or two together for dessert this evening, you, me, and Randy.”

  Hayley heard a ringing sound.

  “Tilly, what’s that sound?”

  “Someone’s ringing the doorbell.”

  “Don’t answer it!”

  “I’m sure it’s Lonny the mailman. He always rings the bell when he has a package that’s too big to fit in the mail slot. I’ve been expecting some new kitchen utensils I ordered off Amazon a few days ago. They’re supposed to arrive today. Hold on, Hayley.”

  “Tilly, wait!”

  But it was too late.

  She could hear Tilly put down the phone and yell, “Coming, Lonny!”

  Hayley knew it could not be Lonny the mailman at the door.

  She had just nearly been run over by his mail truck not two minutes earlier. There was no way Lonny would already be at Tilly’s house on his mail route in that short of a time frame.

  “Tilly, don’t answer the door!” Hayley yelled as loud as she could, knowing it was pointless because Tilly was too far away from the phone to hear her.

  Suddenly Hayley heard a shriek.

  Her whole body tensed.

  It was Tilly.

  Hayley jammed her car into gear and raced as fast as she could over to Tilly’s house. When she screeched around the corner onto Tilly’s street, she immediately spotted the front door wide open.

  Hayley veered into the driveway and screeched to a stop. She leaped out of her car and hurried up the cement walk to Tilly’s front porch. She stopped, clutched her phone, ready to call the police.

  But what would she say?

  She didn’t know what had happened. The shriek could have just been Tilly’s excitement over the arrival of her new kitchen utensils.

  Or at least that’s how Sergeant Herrold might interpret it. In Herrold’s mind, Hayley was just the Girl Who Cried Wolf, a nuisance with too much time on her hands, definitely not to be taken seriously. No, Hayley had to be absolutely sure Tilly was in real danger before contacting the police yet again.

  Hayley poked her head through the door without actually stepping inside. “Tilly?”

  No answer.

  Hayley took a baby step inside, clinging to the doorframe with one hand, ready to turn around and bolt at the first sign of trouble.

  “Tilly?”

  Nothing.

  Just an eerie, unsettling stillness.

  Hayley took another step, this one bigger, until she was past the door and inside the small house, hovering in the tiny foyer.

  In the living room, there was an open suitcase on the floor with clothes strewn about, as if it had been dropped and the lock popped open and everything inside had spilled out. She also noticed a porcelain lamp had been knocked off a side table next to the couch and had cracked in half.

  These were sure
signs of a struggle.

  Someone had broken in and dragged poor Tilly away.

  She had to call the police now.

  Sergeant Herrold was going to hear her out this time, whether she liked it or not, because Tilly’s life was now in grave danger.

  She was certain of it.

  She reached for her phone in her back pants pocket when suddenly the front door slammed shut, startling her. Hayley spun around to see Chuckie Rhinehart with one beefy arm wrapped around Tilly’s throat while holding a gun to her head. They had been hiding behind the door all along when she had come in.

  Chuckie slowly, menacingly redirected his aim, pointing the gun straight at Hayley, who swallowed hard as she shot her hands up in the air, squinting her eyes fearfully, as she prayed he would not suddenly pull the trigger.

  Island Food & Spirits

  BY HAYLEY POWELL

  I can’t tell you how many nights after work I have stood, staring into my pantry, desperate for some inspiration for what to make for dinner! This particular night, I was saved when I happened to zero in on a box of orecchiette, which literally translates in Italian to “little ears”! I adore this underrated gem of a pasta! Of course, after an exhausting day at the office, I didn’t want to have to prepare anything too fancy, just a simple, easy dish that could be whipped up in a half hour. That’s when it hit me! Peas and pasta! A longtime staple in my house! I hadn’t made it in quite a while, and then I remembered why, which made me chuckle.

  Bruce was sitting at the kitchen table and asked me what was so funny, and so I sat down at the table and filled him in on the whole hilarious story.

  Back in the day when Mona’s kids and mine were still young and rambunctious (they still can be rambunctious, but now most of them are old enough to vote), Mona and I would pack them all up (my two and her seven—no, eight. Honestly, who can keep track?) on hot summer days and trek over to the Glen Mary wading pool, which was located just down the street. All of us, kids included, would load up our arms with beach balls, rubber duck floaties, towels, and even a fold-up chair or two, while Mona’s dog King, a monstrous German shepherd, effortlessly pulled a wagon tied to his leash, packed with an ice chest of cold drinks, peanut butter sandwiches, snacks, and sometimes even a kid or two sitting on top of the cooler.

  We were quite a sight to see marching down the street. If we waved a few American flags around, passersby would assume we were just part of Bar Harbor’s Fourth of July parade!

  Now as most parents know, after a whole Saturday afternoon in the sunshine, splashing around in a wading pool, any kid would get pretty worn-out. And that’s exactly what Mona and I always counted on! We wanted that pack of wild kids exhausted and barely able to keep their eyes open! The plan was to head home at dusk, park the kids in the living room with a Disney movie—preferably one that took a while to get exciting, so at least a few of the younger ones would pass out early on—then Mona and I could safely retreat to the deck and enjoy a cocktail or two before I would make a simple supper for everyone.

  On this particular evening, I decided to make peas and pasta. After refreshing Mona’s Paloma cocktail, I headed to the kitchen and took out a bag of frozen peas from the freezer, and then set it out on the counter to defrost a bit before joining Mona back outside on the deck.

  We were howling about some embarrassing story from our middle school years when my daughter Gemma suddenly came rushing out, in her dramatic seven-year-old way, and exclaimed, “Aunt Mona, I think you need to come inside because Dennis Jr. told Dougie that if he put peas up his nose, they would come out his eyeballs! I told Dougie that Dennis was just fooling him, but he didn’t believe me.”

  That’s when Gemma took a long pause for dramatic effect (something I’m sorry to say she picked up from her mother) before continuing, “Of course they didn’t come out of his eyeballs, but they did get stuck in his nose and now he can’t breathe very good.”

  As you can imagine, Mona and I jumped to our feet and dashed inside to the living room, where poor little Dougie was standing in the middle of the floor, crying his eyes out, a spilled bag of peas all around his feet. Dennis Jr. was huddled in the corner, trying to will himself invisible so his frantic mother would not see him.

  Mona grabbed Dougie and tilted his head toward the ceiling to take a quick peek up his nose. Then she turned to me and mouthed the words, “I don’t know what to do!”

  I scurried to the kitchen, grabbed my bag, and fumbled around for a pair of tweezers before rushing back to the living room, handing them to Mona, and cried, “Try these!”

  Mona had barely got the tweezers past the opening of the nostrils before Dougie was screaming and squirming and trying to free himself from his mother’s grasp. Mona sighed. “I guess we’re going to have to take him to the emergency room!”

  “No! I don’t want to go to the hospital!” Dougie wailed.

  Mona picked little Dougie up in her arms, his tiny arms and legs flailing, and headed for the door, giving Dennis Jr. a little side-eye and silent warning that he was in big trouble.

  Suddenly, without warning, with Dougie’s mouth wide open as he was crying, the boy let out a loud hiccup, followed by a big sneeze, and peas shot out of his nose and across the room, one bouncing off the top of my forehead.

  All the other kids thought the flying peas out of Dougie’s cannon nose were the coolest thing they had ever seen, except for Gemma, who found the whole pea trick “gross.”

  After another check up Dougie’s nostrils to make certain all the peas had been dislodged, Mona ordered Dennis Jr. to go wait in the truck while she gathered up the rest of her brood to go home.

  After they left, I took in the sight of all those peas on my kitchen floor (I hadn’t mopped in a week), and turned to my own kids, Gemma and Dustin, and said with a smile, “How about pizza?”

  After that incident, I lost my appetite for peas and pasta for quite some time, that is until recently. I even updated it for Bruce’s taste, and I am happy to report that it has now become a favorite weeknight staple for the two of us on busy days when we don’t feel much like cooking and want something easy to make. Trust me: This is sure to be one of your favorites too, especially with the Paloma cocktail, Mona’s preferred drink of choice, even today.

  PALOMA COCKTAIL

  INGREDIENTS:

  2 ounces grapefruit juice

  2 ounces simple syrup

  1 ounce lime juice (fresh is best)

  2 ounces club soda

  2 ounces tequila

  Lime wedge

  Rub a lime wedge around the rim of a cocktail glass, then dip the glass in coarse salt and fill with ice.

  Pour into the glass your grapefruit juice, simple syrup, and lime juice and stir to combine, then top off with your club soda.

  SIMPLE ORECCHIETTE WITH PEAS AND GORGONZOLA

  INGREDIENTS

  2½ cups of orecchiette (if you can’t find them,

  medium-sized shells will work)

  ¾ cup peas, fresh or frozen

  ¼ cup half-and-half

  ¼ cup Gorgonzola, crumbled

  ½ cup fresh basil (more if you like)

  Salt and pepper to taste

  Parmesan (optional)

  Boil your orecchiette as package instructs.

  In a large pan add the butter and melt on medium heat.

  When melted, add your peas and give them a stir.

  Add the half-and-half and stir.

  Add the cooked orecchiette and mix well, coating the pasta.

  Remove from heat and serve. Feel free to add some freshly grated Parmesan at the end because you can never have too much cheese!

  Chapter 35

  Hayley could see the panic in Chuckie’s eyes as he appeared to contemplate his next move. Tilly looked like a helpless rag doll he was clutching against his chest.

  She sobbed softly.

  “Tilly, are you all right?” Hayley asked gently.

  Tilly nodded slightly, sniffling, her mouth almost cover
ed by Chuckie’s massive muscled forearm.

  Hayley kept her hands high in the air as she softly spoke to Chuckie. “Don’t you think this has gotten way out of hand, Chuckie? Not only do you have two eyewitnesses who saw you slipping out of the hospital after you killed Chef Romeo, you now also have me to contend with, and I’ve been talking. More people know now. You might as well stop trying to cover up your crimes. You need to turn yourself in. It’s over.”

  “I’ll be the one to decide when it’s over!” Chuckie spat out, squeezing the gun so tightly his knuckles were a ghostly white.

  “How many more people do you have to hurt in order to protect your boss, Vic Spencer? He’s not worth it,” Hayley said, trying to stay measured and calm but not quite succeeding.

  Chuckie stared at her, puzzled. “What are you talking about?”

  “Doing Vic’s dirty work for him. Don’t expect him to stay loyal to you. Once everything is out in the open, you can bet he’ll cut a deal to protect himself and let you take all the blame,” Hayley said.

  Another blank look from Chuckie.

  And then he laughed.

  “You got it all wrong. I didn’t take out Chef Romeo for Vic. I did it for me . . . for my father!”

  “Your father?”

  What did Chuckie mean by that?

  And then it hit her like a thunderstrike.

  Bruce’s legwork in Brooklyn.

  The rival Italian restaurant Chef Romeo had put out of business.

  “Your last name isn’t Rhinehart, is it, Chuckie?”

  Chuckie shook his head. “Nope. Rhinehart is the last name of an old girlfriend I decided to use when I moved up here.”

  “Your real name is Caruso.”

  “Well, she’s finally getting somewhere,” Chuckie sneered.

  “I—I don’t understand,” Tilly squeaked.