Pie Hard

by Kirsten Weiss

  Clearly, he hadn’t spent his youth watching Three Stooges movies, or he’d know the proper way to throw a pie. I peeked over the work island.

  He grabbed a crate of berries and hurled it in my direction. The wooden crate skimmed low, skipped across the butcher-block work island, and hit the counter behind me. Raspberries exploded from the crate, scattering across the black floor mats.

  “You bastard!” Raspberries weren’t cheap! I grabbed a sauce pot and chucked it across the work island, but not quickly enough.

  He ducked. The pot banged against the wall and clattered to the floor.

  He grabbed a glass measuring cup from a nearby counter and pitched it at my head. The measuring cup slowed, hanging in the air. I could count every rotation. Then I remembered to stop the special effects fascination and start moving. I dropped low. The measuring cup shattered against the wall, and I shrieked. Something stung my cheek.

  Charlene barreled from the flour-work room and brandished a rolling pin. She flung it like a throwing star. It skimmed in front of his nose.

  The intruder jerked backwards, slipped, fell. He vanished behind a work table and as quickly sprang to his feet.

  I reached for another skillet, and discovered there weren’t any. A thick Vogue magazine lay on the counter near Charlene.

  “Magazine!” I shouted.

  “Yeah!” She tossed it to me.

  I threw it, The magazine fluttered, rustling like a bird over the work island. It struck his head and fell harmlessly to the floor.

  “You picked the wrong damn kitchen!” Charlene hollered.

  He staggered to the alley door and struggled with the lock.

  I wasn’t going to let him get away. I raced across the kitchen. My feet hit a slippery patch and flew from beneath me. I fell, catching a metal counter on the way down with my armpit. Pain jolted through my chest. My feet skidded, cartoonish, on a patch of un-matted floor.

  The burglar unbolted the door and flung himself into the alley.

  “Run! Run. you coward!” Charlene shouted.

  I straightened, triumph surging through my veins. “That’s right!” I wasn’t going to get pushed around or burned out again. I whooped, turning to Charlene. “Yippee-pie-ay, mother—”

  Something hit me in the face. My vision darkened, and I staggered. I gasped, spluttering.

  A pie fell at my feet.

  I wiped my hand across my eyes, and it came away cherry. “Why’d you do that?” I gaped at Charlene.

  Her lips quivered. “Whoops. I might have gotten overly excited.”

  “You threw a pie at me!”

  “Friendly fire. It happens.”

  “You did that on purpose.” Something dropped to my shoulder, and I brushed a chunk of crust and cherry filling to the floor.

  “Heat of battle. We should call the police.”

  “I will.” The mat was unpleasantly slick, and I kept one hand on the counter for balance.

  “Why are you walking that way? Are you hurt?” Her jaw sagged. “Your feet! You’re cut!”

  I looked down. My feet were stained crimson. “The raspberries,” I said. “Why was that crate even open?”

  “I might have put some in my yogurt for breakfast,” Charlene admitted, grabbing a broom from one corner. “But it was only a few. And the delivery came early. You’re lucky I was here to accept it.”

  Keeping the phone three inches from my sticky ear, I called the police and reported the intruder. While I wiped my face with a dish towel, the dispatcher promised to send someone right away. I hung up and brushed raspberry clots from my feet. The berry stain wouldn’t come off as easily.

  “Fire,” Charlene said.

  My throat tightened. I dropped the towel into the sink. “Where?”

  “No, we need to check to make sure there’s no fire. The last time you walked in on someone, the building was booby-trapped. What if someone—?”

  “Charlene, go outside and wait.” I hurried through the swinging door into the restaurant.

  Ignoring my request, Charlene followed. No gas dripped from the pink booths. No sticks of dynamite topped the Formica tables.

  I sped to my office and opened the door. “Nooooo,” I howled.

  The books and boxes that had been on the metal bookshelves were now on the floor. Straws in paper wrappings littered the linoleum. Drawers hung open from my desk. The closet door was open wide, revealing a tumble of overturned supply boxes and my small safe, which was thankfully closed.

  At least my old computer was still in one piece. It was also on. I knew I should have password protected it.

  Cursing, I sat at my desk and stared at the screen. None of the files were open, so I’d no idea what the intruder had seen. Why had he been snooping on my computer?

  Someone pounded on the alley door, and we jumped.

  “The police.” I hurried into the kitchen and opened the door.

  Jake, one of our regular delivery men, huffed inside carrying crates of fresh veggies. He brushed past me and thunked the crates on an open counter. The deliveryman lifted a clipboard from the top of the crates and extended it to me. “Here you . . .” His gaze traveled the kitchen. The crimson smears on the floor, the remains of pies spattering walls and tables, the scattered pans and cutlery. “. . . go.”

  “Thanks.” I took the clipboard and hastily signed.

  “Everything all right in here?” he asked, his biceps flexing.

  “Fine,” I chirped.

  “Okay.” He backed through the kitchen door and into the alley.

  Charlene sniffed. “You think he’d never seen a pie fight before.”

  I shut the alley door, and there was another knock.

  Startled, I yanked it open.

  Glowering, Gordon stood in the doorway.

  I cringed. “Oooh.” I must have shut it in his face. “Sorry.”

  “What happened?” Beneath his suit jacket, his shirt collar was open, exposing a V of hair and a sliver of muscular chest.

  “What are you doing here?” Charlene asked. “You don’t work the early a.m.”

  “No, but the dispatcher knows to call me whenever there’s a pie-related incident.”

  “A one-man Pie Town task force, eh?” Charlene asked.

  One corner of his mouth quirked. “Something like that. I heard there was a break in?” His gaze traversed the wrecked kitchen.

  Talking over each other, Charlene and I told him what happened. He took notes in a miniature leather-bound book.

  He arched a brow. “And so you thought you’d throw pies at him?”

  “Her,” Charlene said.

  “He started it,” I said.

  “I thought you weren’t able to identify the intruder,” he said to me.

  “She was tall and slim,” Charlene said. “It had to be Ilsa.”

  “It could have been a man or woman,” I said. “And I didn’t throw any pies. That would be wasteful.” That hadn’t stopped Charlene.

  “It was self-defense,” Charlene said, typing on her phone with her thumbs. “I grabbed whatever was handy.”

  “Are you tweeting this?” I asked, exasperated.

  “Someone may know something,” she said.

  “Right,” Gordon said. “Anything else that might help us I.D. him or her?”

  Charlene drew back her shoulders and raised her chin. “Val hit him in the head with a skillet.”

  “Ouch.” Gordon scribbled a note. “That’ll leave a mark.”

  “It only grazed the back of his head,” I said. “And it wasn’t cast iron. It barely fazed him.”

  Two uniformed policemen arrived and peered in through the alleyway door. Gordon nodded to them. “B-and-E. Anything missing?” he asked me.

  “Not that I could tell,” Charlene said.

  He shut his notebook and met my gaze. “All right. We’ll print your office and the doors. I noticed some scratches on the rear lock.”

  My eyes widened. “The deadbolt.”

  “What
about the deadbolt?” he asked.

  “I bolted it after I came in, and he struggled with it when he was leaving. He must have been inside the whole time. I locked him in with us!”

  “I’ll dust the deadbolt for prints.”

  “I did notice he was wearing gloves,” I said.

  “We’ll take the prints anyway,” he said. “Maybe he removed them at some point. It’s not easy typing with gloves on. And Val?” He leaned closer, his green eyes darkening.

  My heart beat faster. “Yes?”

  Slowly, he reached for me, and brushed a lock of hair over my shoulder. “You’ve got cherry pie in your hair.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Cameraman in tow, Ilsa strode into the wrecked kitchen. Her blue eyes widened, her grip tightening on the paper grocery bag in her arms.

  Raspberries lay scattered over the black-matted floor. Fragments of pie splattered the walls.

  She sucked in her breath, expelling a torrent of French. “How do you expect to work in this disaster zone?” Ilsa smoothed the front of her white chef’s jacket. “This is a health code violation!”

  Steve adjusted the camera on his shoulder, rustling the fabric of his brown windbreaker. He grinned and pressed a button. Its tiny red light switched on. We were rolling.

  Gordon looked up from his notepad. “What are you two doing here?”

  “Ah.” Ilsa smiled seductively at Gordon. “Like.”

  My mouth pinched. Gordon had that effect on a lot of women.

  “I see the authorities have taken an interest.” She nodded to the police officer printing the door to the dining area. “It is about time.” She edged past an overturned crate of raspberries.

  The cameraman, Steve, tracked her moves.

  “The more important question,” she said, “is why are the police here—and not the health inspectors? Those piecrusts may be a culinary crime—”

  “My crusts are perfect,” Charlene snarled.

  “—but I did not think the police would be involved.” Ilsa set her bag on a metal counter and leaned closer to Gordon.

  “There was a break-in.” I straightened Charlene’s overturned chair with a thump. “And you know we don’t leave the kitchen like this. You saw it the other day.”

  Lugging a black bag, Frank walked into the kitchen and stopped dead, scanning the wreckage. “Holy mackerel.” He dropped the bag and ran his hand over his slicked-back hair. “What happened here?”

  Was it my imagination that Gordon stiffened? The detective folded his notebook shut and slipped it into the inside pocket of his navy blazer. “I’ll leave the officers to finish up. Do you need help putting this place back together?”

  “No,” I said. “It isn’t as bad as it looks.”

  “All right. I need to go.” He brushed a kiss across my cheek.

  Startled, I stared at him as he left and the heavy alley door swung shut.

  I touched my fingers to the spot, still tingling from the contact. It was only a friendly kiss on the cheek, but he’d never done that before—at least not while on the job.

  “Earth to Val.” Charlene snapped her fingers in front of my nose. “We’ve got to get busy if we’re going to be ready for opening.”

  “Were you robbed?” Frank straightened the lapels of his tweed jacket

  “I need the tripod,” the cameraman said.

  “Sure, sure,” Frank said. “Val?”

  “It doesn’t look like anything was taken,” I said, “but we surprised an intruder. Charlene and I drove him off.”

  “With a pie fight? I’m sorry we missed that,” he muttered.

  I shot Frank a sharp look.

  He had the grace to look abashed and unzipped the black bag at his feet. “I guess I’ve gotten more interested in production work than I thought I would. On the bright side, he mustn’t have been a very serious burglar—to be chased off by two women with pies.” He handed Steve the tripod. “Val, can we chat for a moment?”

  Charlene threw up her hands. “Who’s going to clean this place? You know I can’t do any heavy lifting.” She stomped into the flour-work room and slammed the door.

  I edged around the central work island and picked up my shoes, lying near the blue pie safe. “What’s up, Frank?”

  “Do I want to know why you’re barefoot?” His brow creased with concern. “What’s that on your feet? Blood?”

  “Raspberries.” I grimaced. I wondered if I could get replacement berries in time. “What’s up?”

  Steve clipped the video camera onto the tripod, and sat it on a corner of the counter.

  “I’ve talked it over with the crew,” he said, “and we plan to finish filming today.”

  Disappointment surged in my chest. Why did I care if he left? The show was nothing but trouble, and I knew Frank wouldn’t stick around. He never had. “Is Chief Shaw letting you leave town?” My feet were dry, the raspberry stains set like a tattoo, and I tugged on my socks.

  He crossed his arms over his tweed jacket and leaned one hip against the counter. “No, but we don’t know when we’ll be released, so we need to be ready to go when it happens. Apparently, my production schedule has been lollygagging.”

  I smiled at the word and wriggled my feet into my tennis shoes. “I admit that a part of me is glad it will be over.”

  “Will you?” he asked, expression intent.

  “I mean . . .” I floundered. I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, but I wasn’t ready to bury the proverbial hatchet or have a tearful family reunion on camera. “Ilsa was right,” I said, gruff. “We can’t start work in the kitchen until we get this mess cleaned up.”

  “Oh,” he said, “don’t worry, the crew will help.”

  “That is not my job,” Ilsa said.

  “If you want to finish filming today,” he said, “it is. Then we can all take a break and enjoy a vacation at the hotel until the police tell us we can go.”

  Her lips pursed. After a moment, she nodded. “I would like a holiday. Come, Steve.”

  The cameraman’s jaw clenched, but he made a final adjustment to the camera on the tripod and got to work, righting overturned boxes and dumping raspberries into one of the sinks.

  “Err,” Frank said, “I need to go check something.” He scuttled from the kitchen.

  “How predictable.” Her voice was icy. Ilsa peeled back a black fatigue mat and set it against a counter. Raspberries scuttled across the bare patch of linoleum.

  I filled a bucket with soapy water. “Oh? Do you know him well?”

  “It does not take long to understand a man like that,” she said.

  Steve grunted. “Producers.”

  Like Steve’s wife had been? I pressed my mouth shut.

  We had the kitchen ship-shape just as Abril walked through the alley door.

  Steve unclipped the camera from the tripod and set it on his shoulder.

  Abril paused, took a half step back, then lifted her chin and walked inside. She grabbed her apron off a hook by the door. “What are we doing today?”

  “Today,” Ilsa said, “I am going to teach you how to style a piecrust.” She glanced toward the closed flour-work room door.

  “Style a crust? How French,” I joked.

  Ilsa stared impassively down her long nose.

  “Because French fashion . . . I’ll get Charlene,” I said.

  “Since your piecrust maker does not line the tins or prepare the pies,” she said, “I do not think she needs to be included.”

  Also, Charlene would flip her lid if she heard we were “styling” her crusts. She griped whenever I added little cutout stars to the tops of our blueberry pies. Charlene was a piecrust purist—a stance I respected. Usually. Some pies, like key lime, really do taste better with graham cracker crusts.

  Luther, his Hawaiian shirt untucked beneath his photographer’s vest, sidled into the kitchen. Silently, he clipped a mic to my t-shirt.

  My eyes watered from the alcohol fumes wafting off his skin. How long had he and Ilsa sta
yed at the pub last night? Ilsa, crisp in her baker’s whites, didn’t seem worse for wear.

  “But have no fear,” Ilsa continued, “I will be teaching Miss Charlene how to make a chocolate piecrust.”

  Charlene would rather slam her hands in the industrial oven than change her crust recipe. I cleared my throat. “It’s Mrs. And I’m not sure that’s necessary.”

  “You mean . . . like a cookie crust?” Abril asked.

  “No,” Ilsa said. “We’ll be adding cocoa to her existing dough mixture. But that is neither here nor there.”

  “Say something,” Luther said to me. He pressed his hand against the headphones over his ears.

  “Is this okay?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” he said. “You’re good. Abril?”

  She cleared her throat, and he winced, adjusted her mic.

  “Try again,” he said.

  “The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain,” she said.

  He gave her two thumbs up, and then slouched toward the swinging door to the dining area.

  “You’re supposed to be the AC too,” Steve shouted after him. “Assistant to the cameraman!”

  Luther made a rude gesture and continued from the kitchen.

  Steve swore. “He’s drunk. Again.”

  “Leave him alone,” Ilsa said.

  The cameraman reddened but fell silent.

  Ilsa and I discussed today’s specials—almond toffee, lemon-blueberry cream, and a whiskey pulled-pork shepherd’s pie. The latter would be my lunch today. Have I mentioned I love my job?

  “No,” Ilsa said. “None will work for this exercise.” She snapped her fingers. “The strawberry-rhubarb.”

  We didn’t have any ready, but there was no time like the present. Abril and I got busy mixing the ingredients, and we filled the bottom half of a dozen pie tins.

  Ilsa pulled plastic cookie cutters from her bag. She laid them in neat rows atop the butcher-block work island.

  Abril returned with a tray lined with balls of dough on wax paper.

  While Steve filmed, Ilsa demonstrated techniques for braiding pie dough. “You can lay this across the top of a pie as part of the lattice, like so.” She demonstrated over a pie tin mounded with strawberry rhubarb. “Or, you can make a longer braid and run it around the edge.”

  “It seems to take a lot of time,” I said cautiously. Time was a luxury some bakers didn’t have.