Cake on a Hot Tin Roof

by Jacklyn Brady

  Miss Frankie’s warning to relax rang in my ears as I wound my way through the crowd toward two long tables draped in white and covered with confetti. The largest King Cake we’d made sat on the table amid the decorations, waiting for Musterion’s captain to perform the ritual cake cutting at the stroke of midnight. At the far end of the table, rows of silverware waited beside stacks of napkins that had been arranged in an artistic twist. The rest of the cakes should be in the kitchen, where the kitchen staff would cut and plate them so the waitstaff could deliver them at the appropriate time.

  Reassured that everything was in order, I started to turn away. But as my eyes glanced off the stacks of napkins for the second time, I realized that something was wrong. I moved in for a closer look, telling myself the missing Zydeco logo was probably just a trick of the dim lighting. But even when I stood directly over the stack of napkins, I couldn’t make that cartoon alligator standing next to the outline of a wedding cake appear.

  I didn’t know whether to be worried or irritated over the omission. I’d spent a substantial chunk of money on those napkins, figuring they’d work as a subtle form of advertising, and Estelle had assured me that she’d talked with the club’s kitchen manager about using them tonight. I knew the box had been in the van with Dwight when he pulled away from Zydeco, so why weren’t they on the table?

  I glanced around for Estelle or Dwight, hoping one of them could tell me what had gone wrong. I couldn’t find either in the crowd, so I decided to check with the kitchen manager myself.

  I know, I know. I’d promised Miss Frankie that I wouldn’t work, but I couldn’t just ignore the problem. And anyway, how long could it take to swap out the napkins? Five minutes? Ten? Even Miss Frankie couldn’t complain about that.

  After checking to make sure she wasn’t watching me, I slipped through the crowd and pushed through the doors I’d seen the waitstaff using all evening. Behind the scenes, the corridors were brightly lit and bustling with the activity that made me feel at home in a way the high-society crowd in the ballroom couldn’t.

  I followed a line of waiters bearing empty trays along a short corridor and rode the service elevator to the ground floor, drawing up in front of the kitchen just as a heavyset man backed through a set of swinging doors pulling a cart loaded with silver serving trays full of food for the buffet. He was watching his load so intently he almost flattened me in the process.

  I jumped back and put out a hand to keep him from plowing right over me. “Hey! Watch out!”

  He shot a look over his shoulder that was steely enough to sharpen knives. He looked harried and irritated, and ready to bite my head off. It was an expression I knew well. One I’d seen on Uncle Nestor’s face many times when he was working. I’m pretty sure others had seen the same look on my face. When he realized that I wasn’t one of his coworkers, he made a visible effort to rein in his temper and even managed a thin smile. “Sorry, ma’am, but you shouldn’t be here. This area is for staff only.”

  I smiled back to show there were no hard feelings. “I understand, and I hate interrupting when you’re obviously busy, but there’s a problem with the King Cake serving station. Could you tell me where to find the kitchen manager?”

  He released his grip on the cart and straightened slowly. “What kind of problem?”

  “The napkins are wrong.”

  He looked confused. “Excuse me?”

  “The napkins,” I said again. “Someone has put the wrong ones out.”

  The irritation he’d wiped away just seconds earlier came back with a vengeance, along with a look that said he considered himself several rungs higher up the ladder than me. “I personally checked that service station earlier. Everything was fine.”

  I tried not to squirm under the weight of his superior expression. I wasn’t that frightened little Hispanic girl from the wrong side of town anymore, and I refused to let him make me feel that I was. “I’m not trying to make more work for you,” I said, still determined to play nice. “And I don’t want to hold you up when it’s obvious you’re busy. If you could just tell me where to find the kitchen manager, I’ll take care of it myself.”

  He held out a hand, fingers splayed, as if he was trying to avoid touching something nasty. “I am the kitchen manager.”

  Peachy.

  I gripped his cool, limp hand and gave it a firm shake. “Well, then, I guess you’re the man I’m looking for. I’m Rita Lucero, the hostess for tonight’s party. Could you tell me where to find the box of napkins I had delivered this afternoon? They’re embossed with Zydeco’s logo.”

  With a put-upon sigh, the manager started pushing the cart toward the service elevator. “I’m sure they were delivered, but the staff set up that serving station using the club’s napkins. That’s our usual practice. You understand. It’s club policy.”

  I’m pretty sure my mouth fell open. “Seriously? You have a napkin policy?”

  He gave me a tight-lipped smile. “My hands are tied. I’m sure you can use your napkins for some other event.”

  Maybe, but that wasn’t the point. I was 95 percent sure he was lying to me because he didn’t want to be bothered, and that just made me angry. Perhaps I should have just let it go, but there was a principle involved. And some pride.

  “Obviously there’s been a misunderstanding,” I said, “but I’m sure you and I can clear it up easily.”

  The elevator bell dinged softly and the manager gave his cart a nudge, positioning it so I’d have a hard time getting on the elevator. “Not if it means you interfere with the work my staff has done.” The doors swished open and he maneuvered the cart inside. “Look, Ms…. Whatever. If the napkins you’re so worried about were delivered, I’m sure they’re here somewhere. I’ll make sure they’re returned to you when the evening is over. There’s no need for you to worry. Just relax and enjoy the party.” With that he pulled the cart into the elevator behind him, still blocking the door. An instant later, the doors swished closed, leaving me staring at my very angry reflection in the shiny metal.

  Seven

  I counted to ten as the elevator carrying the kitchen manager climbed to the upper floors. I didn’t want to make waves and put Zydeco in a bad light, but the man’s condescending attitude and his refusal to honor our agreement had my blood boiling.

  Counting to ten didn’t help, but it never had. The time for negotiating was over. I was determined to find those napkins and deliver them to the King Cake station as originally planned. Still seething, I tried every door in that long corridor in case someone had tossed the napkins into a storage room. When that failed to yield results, I stopped a passing waiter and asked directions to the club’s service entrance, reasoning that Dwight had probably put the box back in the van when that annoying manager refused delivery.

  When the waiter directed me to a narrow hallway on the far side of the kitchen, my irritation jumped a few degrees higher. The club had a policy for napkins, but not for security? I was more convinced than ever that the kitchen manager had lied to me—and I hate being lied to.

  A few minutes later, I let myself out the back door and headed toward Zydeco’s van, parked beneath a solitary streetlamp on the far side of the employee lot. The night was surprisingly chilly, but it felt so good to step away from the craziness inside and breathe the cool, fresh air that I took my time walking toward the van. By the time I reached it, I’d calmed down enough to register that I didn’t have my keys.

  Terrific.

  On the off chance that Dwight had left me a way in, I checked every door on the van, but I was out of luck. Dwight had locked up securely.

  A less irritated woman might have given up at that point, but the stubborn streak I’d inherited from my mother kept me going. Cupping my hands around my eyes to block the light, I scoured the inside of the van. Sure enough, the box was there, nestled behind the driver’s seat. I swore under my breath and made another circuit, as if I thought one of the doors might have unlocked itself by magic.

>   All my life I’d struggled with a sense of inadequacy. It had taken years to get it under control, and I hated how quickly it could rise up to haunt me. The kitchen manager’s patronizing attitude had infused those napkins with special meaning. Come hell or high water, I was going to get them on the table before midnight.

  I hurried back across the parking lot, calculating how much time it would take me to find my keys, retrieve the box, and replace the napkins. Distracted, I tugged on the door I’d come out of a few minutes earlier, but my hand slid off the handle and the door stayed shut. Paying closer attention, I tried again but the door still didn’t open. I tried again. And again. Eventually pulling so hard I broke two fingernails, but the door didn’t budge an inch.

  “You have got to be joking,” I muttered to myself, stepping off the pavement into a flowerbed so I could see through a window. That narrow corridor stretched away toward the kitchen, but the waiters and kitchen staff who’d been rushing around a few minutes ago had disappeared completely. Reasoning that they couldn’t have gone far, I banged on the door a couple of times.

  Nothing.

  I shouted for help.

  Nada.

  With my mood deteriorating rapidly, I finally conceded that I wasn’t going to get back inside through that door and set off in search of another way inside.

  The grounds were brightly lit on the other side of the building, the side where members and their guests were coming and going, but the employees didn’t fare so well. Shrubs and bushes that had appeared lush and green in the daylight now cast deep shadows across the sidewalk and lawn, and only a couple of security lamps in the parking lot helped to chase away the gloom.

  The cool air that had seemed so inviting before had grown uncomfortably cold and I shivered as I walked, cursing the kitchen manager for the locked door and my lack of a sweater or jacket. Logical? No. But by that time I was ready to blame him for just about everything that had gone wrong.

  My feet cramped in the strappy little sandals and the hem of my skirt grew damp from brushing the grass. After what felt like hours, I hobbled around a curve on the path and found a small clearing in the trees just large enough for a lopsided park bench and a trash can.

  Almost weeping with relief, I limped over to the bench and tugged off my sandals, barely resisting the urge to toss them into the trash can at my side.

  I could see the members’ entrance of the club from there, but it was still at least fifty yards away. A cluster of uniformed valets lounged on the front steps, enjoying their free time until the guests started leaving. Between here and there, the sidewalk I’d been following turned into a pathway that wound in and out of the trees, probably tripling the distance I’d have to walk.

  I don’t know how long I stayed there, rubbing my sore, tired feet and listening to the sounds of the night. I’d already been gone from the party longer than I’d expected to be and I had no doubt that Miss Frankie had noticed by now that I’d slipped away. I’d have some explaining to do when I got back inside and, frankly, I wasn’t in any hurry to have that confrontation.

  Bits of conversation and laughter carried on the breeze kept me from feeling isolated, and I closed my eyes for a minute to decompress. That was a mistake. Exhaustion washed over me like a wave at high tide. The next thing I remember was the sound of a door opening and closing somewhere nearby. I sat bolt upright, heart pounding as I tried to shake the cobwebs from my groggy head. I was barely capable of thought, but I was coherent enough to know that if there was a way back into the club that didn’t require another fifty-yard hike, I was all over it.

  I got to my feet and reached for my shoes, but the sound of voices coming from the bushes stopped me short of actually picking them up.

  “There you are,” a woman said. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you. What are you doing out here?”

  I heard a soft sound that might have been feet scuffing on pavement followed by a man’s voice drawling, “I’m fortifying myself with a drop of liquid courage. Care to join me?”

  Apparently, I wasn’t the only person who’d bailed on the party. I left my shoes on the bench and followed the walking trail into the bushes, hoping to spot the door they’d used and figure out a way in for myself. I’d only gone a few feet when I rounded a sharp curve and glimpsed a couple standing on a small patch of concrete in front of a door that had been propped open with a piece of cinder block.

  I guessed the woman to be in her mid-forties, a striking brunette with a Victoria Beckham haircut. The man was a few years younger. Tall. Handsome. Privileged. His light-colored hair was tousled, as if he’d been running his fingers through it, and he held a silver flask in one hand. But it was the look on his face, a mixture of contempt and pain—obvious even from a distance—that made me pull back into the shadows to avoid being seen.

  The woman let out a deep sigh that almost got lost in the sounds of the night and waved a hand toward the flask. “Is that really necessary? There’s plenty of alcohol inside.”

  He studied the flask for a moment before he answered her. “That’s true, Mellie dear, but the company out here is infinitely more interesting.”

  A cold gust of wind blew through the trees and she wrapped her arms around herself for warmth. “That’s because nobody else indulges you the way you do yourself.”

  “Some call it indulgence,” the man replied. “I call it survival.”

  Mellie rolled her eyes. “It’s hardly that,” she said. “Now please, come back inside. Bradley’s going to be looking for you, and you don’t want to disappoint him.”

  The man took a long pull on the flask and carefully capped it. “Don’t you think it’s a little late to be worried about that?”

  A flicker of conscience told me I shouldn’t be listening, but sore feet and curiosity kept me rooted to the spot. I couldn’t remember meeting either of them, which only added to my interest. Plus, I didn’t want to make a noise and give myself away. They’d think I was spying on them…and I was. I knew for certain that both Miss Frankie and Aunt Yolanda would object to that.

  Mellie let out an exasperated sigh. “So you’ll just hand Susannah a reason to complain about you? I thought you were smarter than that.”

  The man laughed. “She doesn’t need any help from me. That woman makes a career out of complaining. I don’t know how my brother puts up with her or…or why.”

  Mellie grinned slyly. “Oh, I think you do.”

  “Sadly,” he agreed. “It’s downright pitiful what that brother of mine will do for sex. No offense intended. He made the biggest mistake of his life when he left you, Mellie.”

  “Water under the bridge,” she said. “You need to learn how to put the past aside, Judd.”

  “Ah, but that’s the tricky part about the past,” the man countered. “It won’t go away. Believe me, I’ve tried to make it disappear. Repeatedly.”

  “You’re trying the wrong methods. Alcohol won’t change anything.”

  “Perhaps not,” he agreed with a lift of an eyebrow, “but it helps me forget those things I cannot change.” Ignoring Mellie’s disapproving frown, he held up the flask to offer a toast. “I give thanks every day to the good Lord for creating such a useful tool.”

  Mellie held out a hand as if she thought he might willingly give up the flask. “Just listen to you,” she scolded. “Your mother would roll over in her grave if she could hear the way you talk. Now come back inside and pretend to care about your brother’s big night for an hour. After that, I don’t care what you do.”

  The man stared at her outstretched hand for a moment, then shook his head and laughed. “I have a better idea, sister dear. Why don’t you run back inside and care about tonight for me? That ought to make him happy.”

  She smiled sadly and put her hand on the younger man’s cheek. “It’s not him I’m concerned about, Judd. I thought you knew that.”

  He patted her hand gently and stepped away. “I know that you’ve always been decent to me. More decent than any o
f the others, though God only knows why you should be.”

  “You’re much harder on yourself than anyone else is,” Mellie told him. “I wish you could figure that out.”

  Her words didn’t appear to have an impact. Judd just stuffed his hands in his pockets and turned from her. “Go on in,” he said as he took a step away from the door. “I’ll be in shortly.”

  A look of weary exasperation crossed her face, but she didn’t try to stop him. “I’m going to hold you to that,” she warned. He kept walking, and a moment later he disappeared into the trees. With another regretful sigh, Mellie slipped back into the building and I let out the breath I’d been holding.

  I stood there just until the sound of his footsteps died away, then hurried back up the path to the bench where I’d left my shoes. Mellie hadn’t moved the cinder block when she went back inside, and I was anxious to use the door myself before I lost my chance.

  It only took a moment to retrace my steps. I rounded the curve in the trail and the bench came into view, but my shoes weren’t where I’d left them. Slightly winded, I stopped walking and stared at the empty park bench in confusion.

  Something at my side rustled and Judd stepped out from the shadow of a huge magnolia tree, my sandals dangling from the fingers of one hand. “Evenin’, ma’am. If I’m not mistaken, I believe these belong to you.”

  He must have known I’d been eavesdropping. I could feel the heat rushing into my face, but I hoped he wouldn’t notice in the darkness. “Yes, I—I—” Brilliant. I reached for the shoes. “Thank you.”

  He moved his hand just out of my reach. “Did I startle you?”

  “A little,” I admitted. “I wasn’t expecting to run into anyone out here. I came out through the service entrance and somehow managed to lock myself out. I’ve been looking for a way back inside.” I realized I was babbling and cut myself off before I could embarrass myself further.