Fatal Reservations : A Key West Food Critic Mystery (9780698192003)

by Burdette, Lucy

  “Oh, you!” She slapped his arm. “It’s just the mah jong ladies. Our Valentine’s Day tournament: Busy minds and hands don’t get lonely, you know. But Hayley sure has something for you.” She smacked her lips and tipped her bobbling hearts toward the kitchen, where the glorious pink cake studded with raspberries waited in the fridge.

  He looked distraught. “Oh my god. It never even crossed my mind to get you anything.”

  “It’s a cake—that’s all,” I said, smiling to cover my disappointment. Even though I told anyone who would listen that Valentine’s Day is a trumped-up Hallmark holiday designed to put pressure on single people and struggling couples, some buried piece of me still yearned to be part of the lunacy. “We’ll have some after dinner. From what I’ve seen on their online menu, the desserts at this restaurant tend toward bean-paste confections.”

  “Ugh!” said Miss Gloria. She pinched her nose and then reached over to squeeze Wally’s wrist. “Thank goodness this girl is thinking ahead.”

  Wally grinned. “Can we give you a lift?” he asked her.

  “Oh no,” she said. “I’m picking up two of the ladies. I’m the only one in our crowd who’s still allowed on the road at night.”

  “God help us all,” I said, pressing my palms together like a prayer.

  Ray arrived just then, cutting off my rant that driving at night should be reserved for younger rods and cones, which wouldn’t have made a dent in her denial anyway. Simple truth: Nagging seldom changes anyone’s opinions. We all started up the dock to the parking lot, where Wally had left his beater Jeep.

  “You be extra-careful!” I hollered to Miss Gloria, and slid into the backseat, which had barely enough room for a small person, certainly not for Ray.

  “What kind of food are we eating tonight?” Ray asked as we pulled out onto Palm Avenue. “I didn’t even think to wonder. I guess that goes to show that I have a very open palate.”

  “Or no palate at all,” Wally added with a laugh. “Hayley says your wife has the stomach flu?”

  Ray glanced at him and then back at me, a curious smile on his face. “I thought you might have figured this out already. It looks like she’s pregnant. Morning sickness, except for her it seems to be morning, noon, and night. Not a lot of fun.”

  “Oh my god, Connie’s pregnant?” I squealed and threw my arms around his neck from the backseat. “I can’t believe she didn’t tell me.”

  “She wanted to tell you in person, not over the phone. And now she’ll have my head because I blurted it out before she could. Honestly, we’re scared to death.”

  “Total idiots manage to raise kids okay,” Wally started.

  “Thanks, man,” said Ray, punching him in the shoulder.

  “I didn’t mean it like that.” Wally laughed. “I think you’ll be super parents.”

  “You will,” I said. “You’ll be the best dad. And Connie will be an amazing mother. What fun!” I pulled out my phone to text Connie a message so full of exclamation points she might have found it hard to read. Wally pulled into the parking garage on Caroline Street and we started to walk toward the bight.

  Half a block ahead, I spotted Palamina waiting for us, dressed in a stylish black maxi-dress covered with gold shooting stars that made her look even thinner than she actually was. I waved at her and picked up my pace. “So glad you could make it,” I said when I reached her, not sure whether to hug her or shake her hand. I did neither, my arms swinging awkwardly by my sides. Palamina kissed Wally’s cheek and shook Ray’s hand, congratulating him after I blurted out the unnecessary details of his status as father-to-be.

  “Shall we head in?” Wally asked.

  We strolled up the dock, past the Hindu sailing vessel and a luxury yacht. A wide-plank walkway led us from the dock to the floating restaurant, which bobbed as we stepped aboard. I paused for a minute to admire the reverse view of the harbor—the lights twinkling from Schooner Wharf and Edel’s Bistro and all the other restaurants lining the dock. And behind them, the lights of the brand-new exquisite and pricey Marker resort. Locals had some concerns about how this place would fit in with the scruffy, down-home establishments along the harbor. All that remained to be seen.

  A man dressed in a white shirt and black pants emerged from the cabin onto the deck. “Can I help you?”

  “Reservation for four in the name of Wells,” said three of us at once.

  Ray—the only one who hadn’t answered—raised his eyebrows and grinned, as we trooped behind him. “Lots of chiefs in this crowd.”

  Inside the cabin, we paused to adjust to the dim lighting, and the host seated us at a low table surrounded by cushions arranged on the polished wood floor. I pulled out my phone and jotted a note: Some tables inaccessible to diners with disabilities—ask to be seated at regular tables in bow. A waiter wearing a short black kimono over black pants presented the menus, followed by fruity drinks topped with little pink paper umbrellas.

  “Our liquor license is in process,” he said. “So the cocktails are on the house, along with a complimentary glass of sake or beer with dinner. I’ll leave you with the menus, but please note that our special appetizer tonight is a traditional cold bento box, with two kinds of tofu including the Kyoto yudofu, the tuna and salmon roe sushi, and our edamame and daikon radish salad. We also have a few servings of puffer fish sashimi. If you decide you’re interested, we will tell you the price. Oh, and Chef is also serving one special entrée tonight: flambéed grouper served in a nest of locally sourced seaweed.” He bowed and backed away.

  “The puffer fish?” Ray asked. “Isn’t that the one that’s poisonous if the chef isn’t perfectly skilled?”

  “Don’t worry.” I snickered. “They aren’t going to want to poison someone during their first week open.” I made some suggestions about what we should order, explaining to Palamina that I try to cover all the bases in my reviews, from the sure-bet crowd-pleasers to offbeat dishes that might demonstrate a chef’s imagination and potential.

  We all studied the menu, and from the long pause in the conversation, I suspected that they were having as much difficulty sorting through the options as I was.

  “I can’t figure out what kind of food this is. The appetizers definitely sounded Japanese, but the entrées are sort of trying to be everything for everyone,” said Ray. “I’ll taste whatever you order. Since you’re the expert. You know I am not a fan of tofu.” He grinned. “But if you say it’s good, I’ll eat it.”

  “Man, what a sport,” said Wally. “If you’re going to eat tofu, I guess I will man up and eat it, too.”

  “You guys rock.” I turned to face Palamina, who still had her head buried in the large menu. “Anything in particular you want to be sure to try?”

  She grimaced. “So many choices. If it was me writing, that’s where I’d start the review,” she said. “What does it say about a restaurant when the menu is two feet long?” She handed her copy to me. “I went on a business trip to Tokyo and Kyoto about five years ago. I remember loving the shabu-shabu. And of course any kind of sashimi or sushi works for me. Except for that puffer thing.”

  The waiter approached the table again and I smiled up at him. “If you don’t mind, I’ll order for my friends.”

  He folded into a formal bow that didn’t quite mesh with his sun-bleached hair and tan face. “So you are the Japanese expert.”

  “Not exactly,” I said, “but apparently I’m in charge for tonight. We would like to try your specialty, the cold bento box. And then we’ll have several small plates, the chicken yakitori, the vegetable tempura, the beginners’ introduction to sashimi and sushi, the buckwheat soba noodles with bonito flakes and mountain vegetables. And the shabu-shabu sampler. Anything I left out that might be a specialty of the chef?”

  “Grouper fish flambé, of course,” he said. “The owners caught the grouper themselves last night. And we went out with Chef early this morning and gathered the seaweed from Smathers Beach.”

  I had to bite my lip t
o keep from snickering: hard to picture the restaurant staff moving among the early spring break revelers, scooping up seaweed.

  “Okay, we’ll try that, too.”

  “That’s a lot of food,” Palamina said. “Are you sure?”

  I nodded and continued to focus on the waiter. “And for our landlubbers, how about a hamburger all the way with truffled fries and the Maryland chicken. And the vegetarian pad thai and an order of Vietnamese spring rolls.” I settled back into my chair, realizing how ordering in front of Palamina made me feel tense—as tight as one of the Cat Man’s felines on a high wire. Almost as if I was auditioning for my job all over again. “I know it seems like more than we can eat, but I take leftovers home or give them to my homeless buddies,” I explained to her while attempting to uncrick my stiff neck. “The main thing is to try a fair sample of the menu. The budget doesn’t allow for multiple visits. Or at least it didn’t under Ava.”

  “I see your point,” she said. Though she didn’t sound convinced. “I’m glad to hear you’re thinking about the budget.”

  After selecting complimentary beer and sake to go with the dinner, Wally and Palamina began to talk shop about future financial planning for the e-zine. Ray and I wandered out to the deck to admire the night again. Across the harbor, the lights of the restaurants winked, reflecting a swash of stars in the sky. The air smelled like salt and fresh fish, with a dash of diesel fumes to keep us moored in reality. I suspected we were both thinking of the last time I was here with him—I’d been shot and in serious shock. I plucked at the rubber band on my wrist, which Eric had suggested might distract me from unpleasant recurrent memories.

  “Your new boss is a little intimidating,” said Ray, his eyebrows drawing together in concern.

  “She’s not so bad,” I said, leaning on the railing and looking over the side. Gray shapes glided through the water underneath the boat. “You should’ve been around when Ava Faulkner was in charge. Palamina is a walk in the park compared to that witch.”

  He grinned. “I’m glad to hear it. When you first moved down here, you were anxious about everything. I think you’ve developed more of a backbone.”

  “It wouldn’t take much to improve from those days, would it?” I asked with a snort of laughter. We strolled around the outside of the restaurant and headed back into the dining area.

  Ray held up his phone. “I’m going to give Connie a buzz, make sure she doesn’t need me.”

  I ducked into the ladies’ room to freshen up.

  On the way back out, I heard Wally’s voice rise over the rumble of conversation from the other diners.

  “Can I speak frankly? Hayley’s reviews are the one thing you don’t have to micromanage at Key Zest. She’s improved one hundred percent since she started, especially since getting that monkey Ava off her back.”

  “What did I say?” asked Palamina, all surprised innocence.

  “Nothing direct, but I get the sense that Ava’s distrust of Hayley may have taken root in you.”

  I felt my face grow hot and I froze, not wanting to show up at the table immediately and let on that I’d overheard their discussion. Wally was putting my submerged fears into words. I tensed for the worst.

  “Not at all,” said Palamina. “I was only trying to make a few suggestions. Keep in mind that you may not be in the most—how can I put this?—unbiased position.” Her voice remained pleasant but firm. “Hayley is adorable and eager. But she’s young and a bit impulsive—don’t you think? I worry about her decision making, that she loses her focus.”

  “Did you know that Paul Woolston of the Times reads her stuff every week? He loves what she does,” Wally said. “He told me that not only does she understand food; she understands why people eat it. What they crave and what they tend to turn away from—and the psychology behind those decisions. And that’s unusual in a food critic. Particularly a critic who’s not working in the rarified stratosphere of a major newspaper in a big city.”

  Palamina shrugged, the expression on her face neutral. “We’ll have to see how it goes, right?”

  I retreated farther into the hallway that led to the ladies’ room and counted to a hundred. Then I adjusted my shirt, ran my fingers through my hair, and marched back to our table.

  “I am so looking forward to this dinner,” I said brightly, then took a swig of the sake that had been left near my place setting. My eyes burned as the alcohol seared my throat and I choked and spluttered. Ray returned from calling Connie and slapped me on the back. “Watch it there, maestro.”

  The first course was delivered and we began to eat.

  “Have they solved the murder yet?” Ray asked. “Spooky that the body washed up right near Tarpon Pier. Is your friend the tarot card reader really involved?”

  Wally shot me a warning look, which I read as, “Stay out of it.” A man with a round, pleasant face and a close-cropped salt-and-pepper beard approached the table, a woman with lovely silvery curls following him. They waited for us to finish our discussion.

  “I’m sure he had nothing to do with it,” I said. “And I won’t stand by and watch him get blamed for something he didn’t do. That’s all I’ll say.” I cracked a tight smile at the man standing by.

  “Good evening, folks,” the man said. “Thanks for coming out this evening.”

  I recognized his smooth baritone voice from the city commission meeting—this was the owner of the restaurant, Edwin Mastin. He’d gotten a haircut for opening night.

  “We are the owners, Olivia and Edwin Mastin,” he said. Olivia waved and beamed.

  “We’d love your feedback, both good and not so good,” Edwin assured us. “With a new restaurant, there are always things that can be improved.”

  “You must have spent some time in Japan,” I said. “You don’t see shabu-shabu on a menu very often. Or puffer.”

  “We won’t have that on the menu regularly, but our chef insisted that we carry it for the opening and my wife agreed,” he said with a friendly smile. He patted her on the back. “She’s the Japanese expert. I would have been fine with fried fish and steamed shrimp, but she convinced me that our town needed something different.”

  “I thought Key West could use something a little more challenging,” Olivia said. “We’ve got plenty of seafood restaurants on the island already.”

  He waved his arm at the bustling dining room. “I believe she was right. Again. Although I see you’ve chosen some of my favorites, too.” They moved aside so the waiter could deliver our main courses, including the landlubber dishes I’d ordered.

  “Your waiter mentioned that you not only run the restaurant, but you catch the fish as well?” Ray asked.

  Edwin smiled. “Unfortunately we’re getting too busy to spend as much time on the water as we’d like. We’ll leave you to enjoy your meal.” He hesitated. “I couldn’t help overhearing—another murder is a real shame for this island. That kind of publicity hurts all of our businesses. So I can only hope the police wrap this up soon.”

  “Me, too,” I said, “me, too.”

  Once the Mastins had moved on to the next table, I asked Palamina, “How did your meeting with Commissioner Greenleigh go?”

  She made a face. “I really got nothing of substance. It was like a puff piece in a magazine, only in person.”

  I nodded, trying to look sympathetic. But feeling a tiny bit of pleasure that she had run into the buzz saw that could be Key West politics.

  We powered through most of the food, especially enjoying the process of cooking the thin slices of beef in a pot of simmering broth. When Wally insisted that his lips started tingling after tasting the tiniest bite of puffer, none of the rest of us tried it. We ordered one bean cake just to say we’d sampled dessert; then I collected the check.

  We saw Palamina off, and the three of us returned to Houseboat Row. “Come in for cake?” I asked Ray.

  “I’d better get going. But I’d love to take a piece to go for Connie.”

  I rushed into o
ur galley, cut two pieces of raspberry cake, wrapped them in foil, and sent him off. “Are you hungry now?” I asked Wally. “Or should we wait on dessert?”

  He patted his stomach. “Let’s wait a bit.” He sat on the couch and tapped the seat beside him. All three of the cats leaped up and nuzzled his hand.

  “Scram, you guys.” I scraped them off the upholstery, then sat, and he circled his arms around me and leaned in for a long kiss, which turned into another, and another.

  “I’ve been looking forward to that,” he said with a smile. “Missing you.” He brushed a curl away from my forehead, leaving me tingling from my head to my toes. After a few more kisses, the conversation with Palamina, and Lorenzo’s dilemma, and my mother’s unhappiness, all floated away. I even began to forget that I had a senior citizen roommate.

  The screen door banged and Miss Gloria burst into the living room. We leaped apart, straightening our clothing and our hair. I was sure my cheeks were flaming red; I felt like a teenager caught necking with a boy in the living room by my parents.

  When I had collected myself, I looked up and noticed the contraption on Miss G’s head that had replaced her bobbing hearts. A black band circled the crown and her forehead, and a webbing of straps crisscrossed her white hair to hold the band in place. Attached to all that was something that looked like a small pair of binoculars.

  “Good gravy, what are you wearing?” I asked.

  At the same time Wally said, “What in the world are you doing in those glasses? You look like a sea creature.”

  “Night vision goggles,” she said with a smirk. “Hayley kept nagging me about how well I could see, and my sons did, too. And so I started to believe them, even got a little worried about driving at night. But it turns out there’s no need in the world to be concerned. Because these are amazing.” She slipped the contraption off her head and handed it to Wally. “Try them out—you’ll see.”

  “Where did you get them?” Wally asked as he peered through the lenses.

  “They were in a bag of cat food,” she said. She picked up Lola and began to rub her ears.