Pet in Peril

by Marie Celine

  On impulse, she took a picture of the desktop with her phone then, checking to make sure the coast was still clear, headed for the pantry. Once again using the light available to her from the phone’s screen, Kitty scanned the rows of products. There had to be peanut oil somewhere, she just knew it.

  Then a terrible thought struck her.

  How was she going to get out of the kitchen?

  Chef Moutarde was not going to stay gone forever. He’d turn off the pot-and-pan washer, maybe poke around a little to be certain nothing else was amiss. Then he’d return to his desk.

  She could be stuck here for hours.

  The pantry light exploded overhead, bathing the largish room in white light.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Chef Moutarde held a nasty meat cleaver in his right hand. It was the ProChef X15. Sweet blade. Kitty had seen the man chop through pork bone with that cleaver so she knew the damage the chef could do to her with such a weapon.

  It didn’t look like she was going to need to worry about getting out of the kitchen after all. It was getting out alive that might be the problem. She backed into the shelf behind her. A plastic jug teetered on the edge and she caught it in her hands.

  Peanut oil, of course …

  She held the plastic jug between herself and the chef as he stepped closer, the cleaver waving dangerously in front of her nose. Was he about to murder her? Like he had Victor Cornwall?

  The chef growled something French at her, his face locked in outrage.

  Kitty was certain of it.

  This was the end.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  ‘Freeze!’ Chief Mulisch hollered. His gun was drawn and its black muzzle seemed to fill the pantry.

  ‘Chief!’ shouted Kitty. ‘Thank goodness you’re here. This man was about to kill me.’ She jabbed the jug to indicate Chef Moutarde. ‘I think he murdered Victor Cornwall, too.’

  ‘Miss Karlyle,’ Chief Mulisch said, evenly, ‘put down the …’ He frowned. ‘Weapon?’ He blinked and lowered his pistol.

  Kitty looked at the jug of oil. ‘This?’ She kept one eye on the armed and dangerous policeman while balancing the oil back on the wire shelf. Chef Moutarde had lowered the cleaver. His arm hung loosely at his side. He bounced the nasty-looking blade up and down in his hand. She didn’t know how the chief had gotten here so fast or what he was doing here in the first place, but he was a godsend.

  Kitty looked from the chief to Deputy Mulisch, his son, who had accompanied him. ‘What are you waiting for?’ She looked at both officers. ‘Aren’t you going to arrest this man?’

  Deputy Mulisch looked like he was about to bust out a laugh. One look from his dad seemed to quell the impulse. Chief Mulisch scratched his jaw with the barrel of his weapon. ‘Arrest him? Chef Moutarde here is the one who called us. He said someone had broken into the kitchen, causing criminal mischief, ransacking his office—’

  ‘Ransacking his office! All I did was shuffle a few—’ Kitty snapped her mouth shut. Of course, this was several seconds too late. Ransacking his office. Please. All she’d done was move a couple of papers around on his desk. She had to give the guy credit for having even noticed. The self-proclaimed Mussels from Brussels had a good eye. Not a great palette, though. Kitty had tasted enough of his food to know that the man relied too much on his fats. And his roux, well, don’t even get her started. Roux was the foundation of practically all the major French sauces. His roux was runny and tasted like he substituted recycled newsprint for wheat flour.

  Kitty shot Moutarde a dirty look. She needed to do some quick thinking. ‘It’s not what you think, Chief.’ Kitty pleaded with her hands. ‘I was … I was hungry.’ Yeah, that sounded good. ‘I was looking for something to eat.’

  Chief Mulisch holstered his gun. ‘You can tell me all about it down at the station.’

  Kitty blanched. ‘Y-you’re arresting me?’ This was so not good. What would Fran think? What about The Pampered Pet crew? Steve was going to go supernova. And the brass at CuisineTV. Her nascent TV career could be chopped off as quickly as it had begun. And what about her mom and dad?

  Kitty groaned.

  What was Jack going to think? Fiancée of a Los Angeles police detective – arrested! It would probably make the front page of the Little Switzerland Gazette.

  Deputy Mulisch unclipped his handcuffs and stepped forward. The chief put out a hand to stop him. ‘Now, now. That won’t be necessary, Deputy. Will it, Ms Karlyle?’

  Kitty gulped and shook her head no.

  ‘We’ll get this all sorted out downtown.’ He turned to the chef. ‘You’d better come too.’

  ‘Avec plaisir,’ replied Moutarde.

  The police station wasn’t so bad. Once you got past the fact that you were under arrest, thought Kitty. The interrogation room was downright cozy. She studied her palms. So why was she sweating?

  ‘Let me get this straight,’ Chief Mulisch said, smothering a yawn. His hand reached to his mouth. There were bags under his eyes. Apparently the man did not sleep in his uniform, having tossed on a rumpled flannel shirt and khakis that looked like they’d been spending more time at the bottom of the laundry basket than they had on clothes hangers. A lightweight navy LSPD jacket and black loafers completed the ensemble. ‘You went to the pantry at one o’clock in the morning looking for something to eat.’ His fingers drummed the tabletop. ‘You couldn’t, perhaps, have considered checking your minibar?’

  Kitty sat across from him at the long wood veneer table. ‘Minibar,’ she said, forcing a smile. ‘Now why didn’t I think of that?’ Deputy Mulisch was leaning against the front counter on one elbow while conversing with Moutarde. The chef’s gestures were animated and he flashed Kitty an angry look now and then. He did it again and she cringed. ‘Look, I think that man could be responsible for Victor Cornwall’s death and Eliza Cornwall’s near death,’ Kitty whispered, leaning in toward the chief.

  ‘Ms Karlyle.’ Chief Mulisch shook his head, the weariness practically dragging his face to the ground. ‘We’ve been over this and over this.’ His hands beat the table. ‘What possible reason could Chef Moutarde have for killing Victor Cornwall?’

  ‘I don’t know yet,’ Kitty admitted. ‘But I’m going to find out.’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ He stood over her. ‘You need to leave policing to the police, Ms Karlyle.’

  ‘I’m trying to find a killer for you. And save my friend.’ Kitty stared him down. ‘I’ll do whatever it takes.’

  ‘Maybe a night behind bars will convince you otherwise.’ His brow went up two notches.

  Ouch. The man was good. ‘But the peanut oil,’ began Kitty. ‘You saw it. Eliza is allergic to peanuts.’

  ‘What I saw was you pilfering the resort pantry in the middle of the night.’

  ‘I told you, I was—’

  Their argument came to a halt as a commotion arose outside the door. Both turned. Rick Ruggiero, the resort’s manager, was in the lobby. He spoke to Deputy Mulisch then jabbed his finger several times in Chef Moutarde’s direction. The chef didn’t look happy. But again, that was par for the course. Ruggiero spun on his heel and yanked open the door to the interrogation room without knocking or asking permission to enter. ‘Harry, what the devil is going on here?’

  Chief Mulisch strode over and rested a hand on the manager’s shoulder. ‘Calm down, Rick. Everything is under control.’

  Ruggiero had an orange-striped pajama top tucked into a pair of relaxed-fit jeans and was wearing a baggy black overcoat. What little hair he had couldn’t settle on a direction or a style. ‘My night duty clerk called and informed me that Ms Karlyle has been taken into custody! Have you all lost your minds?’ He looked accusingly at all three men.

  ‘Now, Harry. Your chef called in a nine-one-one to report somebody skulking around in the kitchen. We found Ms Karlyle in the pantry.’ His lip twisted up at the corner in a wry smile. ‘She says she was hungry.’

  ‘So?’ The manager looked flabbergasted.
‘Give her some food, for goodness’ sake!’ He glanced at Kitty and she dutifully gave him her best innocent and hungry look.

  Chief Mulisch shuffled side to side as if balancing on quicksand.

  ‘But she broke into your kitchen, sir,’ Deputy Mulisch said. He was in full uniform. Kitty wondered if he had been on duty when the call came in or just liked to play dress up even after hours.

  ‘Broke into?’ snorted Ruggiero. ‘We don’t even keep the kitchen locked up.’ He glared at his chef. ‘What’s to break into?’

  ‘I suppose if the chef doesn’t want to press charges …’ Chief Mulisch looked to the chef.

  Ruggiero was looking at the chef too and not very happily. He threw a backhanded wave at Moutarde. ‘Of course he doesn’t want to press charges. Furthermore,’ the manager said, drawing himself up to his full height, ‘the Little Switzerland Resort and Spa does not wish to press charges. Ms Karlyle and the crew of The Pampered Pet are our special guests. Our very special guests.’

  Ruggiero turned to Kitty and pressed his hand in hers. ‘I apologize sincerely for any inconvenience or embarrassment,’ he said, shooting a quick look at the chief, ‘this incident may have caused you, Ms Karlyle. If there is anything at all I or my staff can do for you, please do not hesitate to ask.’

  Kitty smiled. ‘That is very kind of you, Rick, but I’m sure we can put this all behind us.’

  ‘I’m sure the chef is equally sorry for this – this,’ he waved his hands in the air, ‘misunderstanding. Isn’t that right, Moutarde?’

  Chef Moutarde muttered something in French then made his reluctant apologies to Kitty.

  ‘Count your lucky stars that Ms Karlyle has such a kind heart, Moutarde. And think twice before calling the police to have one of our guests arrested, would you?’

  Moutarde’s face heated dark red. ‘Of course,’ he said with a smile, but there was no hiding his rage – at least not from Kitty.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Kitty slipped off her shoes inside the door. Sleep, all she needed now was sleep. Assuming her rattled nerves would let her get any rest. Her body and soul had been raked over the coals. First Henri Moutarde practically pounces on her with a meat cleaver, then the police drag her down to the police station. That was it. In the next life, if there was one, she was coming back as a tuxedo cat. Preferably one with a Beverly Hills or Bel Air zip code.

  Fran’s bedside light shot to life. ‘Where have you been, young lady?’ Fran’s arms were folded across her chest and her hair was tucked into a hairnet. She wore a Jamaica Reggae Festival 2003 T-shirt.

  ‘Are you crazy, scaring me like that?’ Fred loped over and rubbed against Kitty leg. She nuzzled his nose absently. It helped to calm her nerves.

  ‘Tell me about it.’ Fran sounded insulted and more than a little put out. ‘I wake up in the middle of the night and you’re nowhere to be found. What on earth were you up to?’

  Kitty slumped into the side chair near Fran’s bed. ‘I decided to do a little snooping.’

  ‘Without me?’ Fran huffed and pulled off her hairnet.

  Kitty shrugged. ‘You were sound asleep.’ She grinned. ‘You came in pretty late yourself. I didn’t want to disturb you.’

  ‘Yeah, well, I had dinner with John.’

  ‘Oh, Fran …’

  ‘He’s a good guy. I can tell.’

  Kitty couldn’t agree less. Fran was a terrible judge of men. But there was no telling the woman that. It would only make her angrier and more stubborn. Kitty crossed to the sink and poured herself a glass of water, partly out of thirst and partly to keep her friend from seeing the look of disapproval on her face. Her throat was parched and scratchy from all the fast talking she’d had to do.

  ‘So, did you discover anything?’

  Kitty poured some water into the pets’ bowls while she was at it, then returned to the chair. ‘I discovered that the police around here have no sense of humor.’ Kitty told Fran how she’d gone to the resort’s kitchen in an attempt to look around the pantry and been caught by Chef Moutarde.

  Fran listened in wide-eyed disbelief and hooted when Kitty described Henri catching her in his pantry and then Chief Mulisch showing up with his gun drawn.

  ‘It really wasn’t all that funny,’ Kitty said, holding up her head with her hands. She’d been afraid for her life. Then her freedom.

  ‘I can’t believe you went snooping around without me. You know you can count on me. Besides,’ she said with a grin, ‘I love snooping. Just ask any of my ex-boyfriends.’ Fran pushed back the covers. ‘Do you really think Henri might have had something to do with Vic’s murder?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Kitty said through another yawn. ‘He’s got a temper – we know that. And he admitted that he didn’t think much of Victor because he always complained about the food. But is that enough to kill a man over?’ The Belgian was certainly hot-headed enough. ‘I saw handfuls of financial papers on the chef’s desk.’ Kitty showed her the picture she’d taken with her phone. Fran couldn’t make heads nor tails of the numbers either.

  ‘It does seem a little weird that he’d be hanging around the restaurant in the middle of the night.’

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Let’s Google him.’ Fran had crossed to the desk and woke her computer tablet. Kitty flicked on the desk lamp. Fran entered the chef’s name in the search engine and hundreds of entries appeared. Many were dead ends but there were more than a dozen legitimate hits and Fran scanned each one.

  ‘Here’s something,’ said Fran. Her fingers paused over the screen, enlarging the news item. ‘Henri had a restaurant some years ago in Boston.’

  ‘I know.’ She told Fran how she’d seen the cover of Boston Magazine in the chef’s office and a picture of Chez Moutarde.

  ‘OK,’ Fran said, ‘but did you know that, according to this article in the Herald, he lost that restaurant?’

  ‘Oh?’ Kitty leaned in for a closer look, holding her palm up to her mouth to catch a yawn. ‘Let me see.’

  She scanned the online news article. It seemed that Chef Henri Moutarde had been forced to close his successful eatery due to having used its equity as leverage in a downtown development deal. When the deal went bust, the bank foreclosed on his restaurant. Ouch.

  ‘This article was written when a news writer discovered Henri working as a sous chef at the Omni Parker House Hotel.’ Fran tapped the screen, calling up an image of the hotel.

  Restaurant owner to hotel sous chef. That was quite a big fall.

  ‘Interesting,’ Fran said, tapping a sharp nail against her teeth.

  ‘What?’ Kitty asked. Was there something about Victor maybe?

  ‘The Omni Parker House is supposed to be the home of the Parker House roll and Boston cream pie.’

  ‘Oh.’ Kitty fell to the edge of the bed, exhausted. She reached out and rubbed her aching feet. A glance at the bedside clock informed her that it was now three-fifty in the morning. ‘We may as well get to bed – try to get at least a couple hours rest in before this vacation continues.’

  ‘Here’s something else.’ Fran’s hand traced the screen.

  Kitty raised an eyebrow. ‘Yes?’

  ‘It says here that Ho Chi Minh was a baker at the Parker House and Malcom X was a busboy.’

  Kitty shook her head. ‘OK, now you’re just making things up. Please, turn that thing off and get some sleep.’

  ‘I’m not making anything up.’ Fran thrust the tablet under Kitty’s nose, forcing her to look. ‘JFK had his bachelor party there.’ Fran jiggled an eyebrow. ‘Wish I could have been there to see that.’

  Kitty’s eyes scanned back and forth. Interesting, but it wasn’t going to help her solve Victor Cornwall’s murder. Not unless Victor Cornwall’s murder was somehow tied into the JFK conspiracy. She rather doubted it.

  The next morning, groggy despite two cups of strong in-room coffee courtesy of Wolfgang Puck, Kitty sat back down at the desk. She pulled a pad of resort stationary from the dr
awer and a pen.

  Fran came out of the shower, bundled in a frothy white robe, her hair wrapped in a white towel. ‘What are you up to?’

  Kitty ran the tip of the pen over her lower lip. ‘I’m making a list of suspects and possible motives.’

  Fran sat down on Kitty’s unmade bed and crossed her legs. ‘Who’ve you got so far?’ She pulled a bottle of the resort’s free lotion from the pocket of the robe and began rubbing her legs down, first the right, then the left.

  ‘Besides you, you mean?’ Kitty’s face broadened into a wicked smile.

  ‘Very funny.’ Fran pulled a face. ‘You should be a comedian rather than a gourmet pet chef,’ she said, putting air quotes around gourmet pet chef.

  ‘I’m putting Colonel Mustard at the top of my list.’ Kitty diligently wrote out the chef’s name.

  ‘You’re just mad because the guy went after you with a meat cleaver.’

  ‘Gee, you think?’ cracked Kitty. ‘He had the means and the motive. All we need now is opportunity.’ She turned to Fran. ‘Who’s next?’

  Fran thought a moment, tossing the empty lotion bottle in the trash bin. ‘John Jameson, I suppose.’ She frowned. ‘I don’t believe it for a second, though.’

  Kitty jotted down his name. ‘He had the motive and his ex was Vic’s current wife, not to mention he’d lost a bundle of money because of Vic. That’s a double motive in my book.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ quipped Fran. ‘You’ve seen Eliza Cornwall. You’ve talked to her. The man might have been happy to see her go. That woman is a piece of work.’

  Kitty pouted. Fran had a point. But still. ‘Speaking of Eliza …’ She dug into her purse and handed a slip to Fran.

  Fran unfolded it. ‘What’s this?’

  ‘It’s a speeding ticket that Eliza received.’