1 Uncommon Grounds

by Sandra Balzo

  “Excuse me.” It was Ed. “I’ve got the machine hooked up, but it’s different than your other one, so you’d better take a look.”

  We went over to the espresso machine, which looked to be an older model than ours. Ed confirmed it. “This machine isn’t fully programmable like your other baby.”

  Ed had been enamored of our first machine, which could be programmed like a computer for different-sized shots and strengths. “Push this button for a full shot, this one for a half. You can do double shots, using this double portafilter, but that means you’ve got to change the amount of espresso you’re using.”

  I nodded and tried to cut to the chase. “So if we’re doing single shots, we just use these.” I pointed to the buttons that had drawings of tiny coffee cups on them. “And if we want two shots we can use both sides of the machine.” Each side had its own espresso brewer and steaming wand.

  Ed nodded, conceding my apparent inability to understand anything more complex. “Yeah, that should get you through. Did the police take the other machine?”

  He looked fascinated. I decided I didn’t like Ed much. “If that’s all, let me give you a check.”

  “I’ll take a check for the rental on the machine, but I’m an independent contractor and I’d prefer cash for the labor portion.”

  Of course he would. I wrote the check to L’Cafe and had to go into my wallet to come up with the two twenties and a ten for Ed. Pavlik’s card was on the counter, so I stuck it in my handbag.

  As Ed packed up his tools, Tony Bruno came in. Tony was a nice man and a good dentist. I also suspected that he didn’t like Ted—his fellow dentist and my former fellow—much. That earned him bonus points with me these days.

  Tony was one of the group that hung out at Goddard’s, so I was surprised to see him stop by. “Hi Tony, I’m sorry, we’re not set up yet. We’ll be opening tomorrow.”

  He stepped aside to let Ed pass with a pleasant, “Back again, huh? These girls really keep you hopping.” Then he nodded. “I know. I just wanted to say how sorry I am about Mrs. Harper. She seemed like a nice woman. I feel so badly for the Harper kids.”

  He looked around the shop. “This is very nice, very nice. You say you’ll be open tomorrow?”

  Caron answered him, since I was distracted by the red Probe that had just pulled into the spot Ed had vacated. Kate McNamara. Was there still time to hide? I decided I could probably get away, but that would mean leaving Caron to the dogs. I sighed and pulled open the door. “Come on in, Kate.”

  I was braced for retaliation for my setting Langdon on her, but this time I wasn’t Kate’s target. She stormed in and looked around. “Where’s that bastard, Pavlik?” she demanded.

  Tony quickly excused himself, promising to return in the morning. At the same time, Caron snuck out the back way, leaving me alone with Kate. So much for loyalty.

  Kate, unaware that the new prime suspect was escaping, continued, her face just this side of crimson. “His office said he was here, now where is he?”

  “Kate! Calm down before you pop a gasket. Pavlik left half an hour ago. What do you want him for?”

  “He’s trying to block the press from the recount tomorrow. He can’t do that! Has he ever heard of freedom of the press? Public meeting laws? The Constitution, for God’s sake?”

  I have to say I was relieved to hear that Pavlik must think there was more to the political angle than he had let on. I decided to play dumb in hope of finding out how much Kate knew. “Why would Pavlik be interested in the recount?”

  Kate was disdainful. “Well, obviously, he thinks the election might have something to do with Patricia’s death. You know small town politics is a hot bed of graft and corruption.”

  Uh-huh. I played along. “Really? In Brookhills?”

  “Of course,” Kate snapped. “Why else would—” Suddenly she seemed to realize she was in danger of providing me with information I hadn’t stuck two quarters in a paper box for. She shut her mouth abruptly. “I’m afraid you’ll just have to wait for this week’s edition of The Observer, Maggy. Or maybe, just maybe, you show me yours, I’ll show you mine.”

  She slammed out the door.

  That night I went to bed early. Before I did, though, I tried to reach David again. Caron and I had both called repeatedly throughout the day and had failed to connect with anything but the answer machine. Sure enough, I got the machine again. I pulled aside the curtains and looked out the window as I waited for the beep. There was a car across the street again. Andrea next door must have a new boyfriend. Or maybe I was being stalked. Beep, beep, beeeep.

  I followed the advice on the recording and left a detailed message. “David, this is Maggy. I’m sure you don’t feel like talking to a lot of people right now, but Caron and I wanted to see how you and the kids are. We, uh, we’re planning to open the shop tomorrow, and wanted to make sure that was all right with you. Also, we wondered if a date had been set for Patricia’s funeral.”

  Finishing up with a hurried, “So call us when you feel up to it,” I hung up. I felt awful for talking about business and funeral arrangements in the same breath.

  I called Frank in from the yard and confided that I felt like a real shit. He licked my face and we went to bed. Not together. Unlike some people, I had standards.

  Chapter Nine

  The next morning, Caron and I met in the parking lot at 5:30 so we could enter the store together. I’m not sure what we expected. We didn’t have any more partners to find dead.

  Once inside with the coast—and the floor—clear, we put on a CD to bolster our courage and swung into action.

  By 6:00, the brewers were plugged in and switched on and the brewed coffees of the day, Breakfast Blend and Viennese Cinnamon Decaf, were ground. Caron ran plain water through the brewers to clear out the water that had been sitting in the lines, while I filled the creamers.

  “Dang,” I said, putting the remainder of the quart of cream in the fridge. “We don’t have any whole milk.” The police must have taken the gallon that had been sitting out on the counter. Not that we would have used it anyway.

  “We’ll just have to use two percent,” Caron said, posting the names of Today’s Brews on the menu board.

  “I could go get some,” I volunteered, checking my watch. “The QuickieMart—”

  “Don’t you dare leave me here alone,” Caron said, hanging the menu on the wall and turning to face me.

  She looked nervous and why not? She had plenty to be nervous about these days: The affair. Bernie’s reaction if he found out about the affair. The question of whether Roger would keep his mouth shut about the affair. The question of whether I would keep my mouth shut about the affair. Oh, and then there was Pavlik, of course, and Patricia’s death itself.

  “It’s going to be okay, Caron,” I said, going over to give her a hug.

  She pulled back and looked at me. “I hope so,” was all she said, and we went back to work in silence.

  By the time 6:20 rolled around, we had filled the bud vases with daisies and put them out, a pot of each coffee was brewed and waiting, and another of each was in progress. By 6:25, the bakery truck had arrived and the pastry was in baskets in the display counter.

  At 6:30, I turned on the front lights, flipped the sign to “Open,” and unlocked the door to...no one. I stepped out and looked around. No one. I picked up the newspaper and walked back in, dropping it on the reading shelf.

  “No one,” I said to Caron.

  She was less concerned. “Nobody knows we’re opening today. We’ll just look at this as a dry run.”

  “Not too dry, I hope,” I muttered.

  Caron was looking towards the window. “Maybe you’ll get your wish.”

  I turned around. Sure enough, cars were pulling into the parking lot. One, then two, then three, then four. Since nothing else was open on this side of the shopping center, they had to be heading to Uncommon Grounds.

  Now I’m no fool, I knew they were coming partially—
who am I kidding—mostly from curiosity. I’m not proud, though. Come for the crime, stay for the coffee.

  I manned the espresso machine and Caron poured the brewed coffees and handled the pastry. As we had planned with Patricia, we tried to greet everyone by name. We knew about half the people and would be working on memorizing the names of the other half, assuming they came back, over the next week or two.

  Among the first arrivals was Henry Wested, who walked over from the senior home. He ordered a double cappuccino and settled into the corner stool at the counter.

  Laurel came, too, (large decaf, steamed milk, to go) as well as Way (large breakfast blend, black) and Rudy (small breakfast blend—a token purchase before he headed over to Goddard’s for his real coffee).

  Gary, coffee purist that he was, wouldn’t let me talk him into something as exotic as a cappuccino or a latte when he arrived. He did ask for a cup of Breakfast Blend to go, though. As I was pouring it, Laurel passed by on her way to the condiment cart. Gary sniffed. “Do you call that coffee or is there a cinnamon bun stuffed in there?” He gestured to her road cup.

  Laurel laughed. “It’s ‘Viennese Cinnamon,’ you cretin.” She turned to me and winked. “If it doesn’t look and smell like motor oil, he doesn’t consider it coffee.”

  It was true. I could picture Gary sneaking back to his office and dumping the fresh coffee into his old pot to stiffen it up a bit over the burner before he doctored it up and drank it.

  I handed Gary his coffee and he toasted Laurel with the cup. “See you at the recount at nine, I assume?”

  “Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Laurel muttered darkly as she left. Gary gave me a wave and a wink and followed.

  The next man in line was grousing about something to the woman behind him. When he turned, I recognized him. His name was Pete-something-or-other and he was one of the movers who had moved me out of my old house and into the new.

  I could see Pete trying to figure out where he knew me from, and his eyes turned speculative as he got it. First, he had moved me from a nice big house into a shack, and now here I was waitressing. He probably figured I’d been dumped and left destitute. He was at least half right.

  “Yeah,” he said, sidling up to the counter, “you might want to tell your bosses here that some working men need to get moving early. Maybe they should think about opening earlier.”

  I didn’t illuminate him about my ownership status, since God knows I might be waitressing at Goddard’s next week. “Oh, really? What time do you start?”

  Pete looked like he played football in high school—itsy-bitsy head set on a tree-trunk neck. The salt-and-pepper beard helped balance him out some, making his head look bigger and hiding part of his neck. He propped his arms on the counter and I feared for the glass-topped bakery case. “Me? I’m off to work by five, five-thirty, at the latest. I’m running late today. Had to take my kid to school.”

  He looked around to see if anyone was listening and said, in what he seemed to think was a quiet voice, “You know, I seen lights in here early the day your boss-lady was killed, when I was sitting at the stoplight on Civic. But I didn’t see nothing when I drove past. Wish I would of known, maybe I could have helped.” He handed me a bill and I pulled his change out the cash register.

  As I put it in his hand, I asked, “So you went by at about five?”

  He rocked back on his heels and considered. “No, not that early, probably more like quarter after.”

  “Could you see into the store? Were all the lights on?”

  He folded up his bills and put them in his pocket. “The lights were real dim, you know, like emergency lights? I could just see shapes, like the counter and the tables, but no people.” He dropped his loose change in the tip jar and went out.

  As I made a mocha for the woman Pete had been talking to, I wondered whether his information meant anything. The lights he was talking about had to be the backlights. If they were on at five-fifteen, that meant Patricia was already here. The fact he hadn’t seen her meant that either she was in the back room, or that she was already on the floor. Dead.

  I pumped chocolate into the mocha. Well, if nothing else, the information might help Pavlik pin down the time of death. I’d tell him the next time he materialized.

  The queue in front of the cash register was long, out the door at times, but most people seemed to relish the chance to stand and talk. Some spoke openly about the murder, even asking questions. Others whispered, glancing at Caron and me furtively. I think I preferred the people who went ahead and stuck their foot in it.

  By 9:00 a.m., the time the recount was scheduled to begin at Town Hall, the rush had ended. The cash register tape told us we had sold sixty-three cups of coffee, twenty-two specialty drinks and thirty pieces of pastry. Not bad in two and a half hours.

  The “To-Go” crowd had pretty much gone, but the little tables were nearly filled. A couple of them contained moms, happy for adult conversation after the rigors of getting their kids off to school. At another, an older man and a woman in suits were discussing business. At the counter, a young guy in khakis and a golf shirt was doing some paperwork.

  Henry still sat in the corner watching the world go by with an empty cappuccino cup. I went over to clear the table next to him and took along the coffee pot.

  “It was good seeing you yesterday, Henry,” I said in an effort to make up for the fact that I’d been so focused on Langdon at Goddard’s, that I’d barely nodded to Henry. “Can I give you some coffee in there?”

  I stood poised with the pot over his cup, and he nodded. “How did you like the cappuccino?” I asked, as I poured.

  “Very good,” Henry mumbled. “Used to drink them when I was in Europe during the war.”

  “Ah, that explains it. I don’t think a lot of the older people around here have ever had a cappuccino. Maybe you’ll convert them for us.” Was I a marketing whiz, or what?

  Henry nodded and turned his attention to his coffee. I took the hint and retreated behind the counter.

  Laurel had promised to call with the results of the recount. I figured it would take at least two hours, so I was surprised when the phone rang at 9:30. “Uncommon Grounds. Can I help you?”

  “It’s gone,” the voice on the other end of the line said.

  “Laurel? What’s gone?” My only contact with her this morning had been over a large Viennese Cinnamon and I doubted the loss of that could have caused the tremor in her voice.

  “The ballot. It’s vanished.”

  “But how could that be?”

  “You’re asking me?” She seemed to be verging on hysteria. “How would I know? I’m only the town clerk. The ballot was only locked in my cabinet, by my volunteer. How should I know? All I know is that it’s gone. I’ve got to go, here comes that bitch Kate McNamara.” Slam.

  The moms were leaving and shouting goodbye. I waved back distractedly. The disputed ballot was gone. Meaning what? I didn’t know and I didn’t have time to think about it at the moment. A group of seniors came in and I spent the next half hour explaining cappuccinos versus lattes versus mochas.

  By the time 11:00 a.m. rolled around, things had quieted way down again. Henry had left around 9:30 and only one table was currently occupied, by a pair of women in tennis whites. I’d told Caron about the missing ballot and though she still hadn’t been very talkative, we’d agreed that it pointed toward Rudy, since he remained the clear winner if the ballot wasn’t found.

  That was assuming the results hadn’t changed in the recount itself, something Laurel hadn’t mentioned in her truncated phone call. I tried to call her back, but kept getting disconnected. An early lunch break seemed in order. Caron agreed, as long as I brought her back a cheeseburger from Goddard’s.

  Waiting for the light to change so I could turn left out of the parking lot onto Civic, I saw Kate McNamara’s Probe heading the opposite direction toward her office. She looked intent, like a woman who had gotten her story. I hesitated, almost turning r
ight to follow her, but then saw someone was already following her. Langdon Shepherd in his Christ Christian Chevy Suburban.

  I turned left.

  When I got to Town Hall, Jeannie, Laurel’s young assistant, told me Laurel had just left “for lunch, I suppose.” I stuck my head into some of the other offices, but no one else was around either.

  I decided to give Jeannie a try. “So, what happened this morning with the recount?”

  She glared at me from under her pouffy brown bangs. “What happened? Who knows? I was out here trying to keep up with these phones. There was this big commotion, then it got quiet, then more people yelling and then, about ten minutes ago, everybody just walked out, just like that, and left me here.” The phone rang. Jeannie picked it up and slammed it back down again.

  With nothing to be gained from Jeannie except, perhaps, a bloody nose, I left. Sitting in my car, I tried to decide what to do next. Gary’s squad wasn’t outside the police station, so I assumed he wasn’t there either.

  I gave in and decided to go see Kate. I knew she was at her office and I didn’t have time to track down anyone else. I just hoped Langdon had either been heading elsewhere or had already come and gone. I checked my watch. I’d better get moving, I had to get back to Uncommon Grounds with Caron’s cheeseburger. I didn’t want to add low blood sugar to her problems.

  Happily, Kate was in and Langdon was nowhere in sight. The receptionist, who doubled as the paper’s circulation manager and photographer, led me back. Kate was hanging up the phone when I came in.

  “Well,” she said, “does this mean you’re willing to talk to the press, Maggy?”

  I’d been thinking about how to deal with Kate. I sat down and leaned forward, planting my elbows on her desk. “I’m willing to talk with you, Kate, but there are some conditions.” Maggy’s my name, hardball’s my game.

  “Off the record doesn’t do anything for me,” she warned.

  “That’s not one of them. You and I both know you’re past your deadline. The Observer is being printed as we speak. So here’s the deal: I’ll talk to you for next week’s edition. In return, I want you to tell me what you know. You said it: You show me yours, I’ll show you mine.”