The Key Lime Crime

by Lucy Burdette

  She wasn’t fidgeting, so I couldn’t help adding a little more about my philosophy of reviewing. “I refuse to be one of those food writers who gets a free meal in exchange for saying everything is terrific when it isn’t. Sam Sifton or Pete Wells or Frank Bruni or Ruth Reichl would never say food was delicious if they didn’t mean it. And they would certainly never accept free food.” I stopped to catch my breath. “Sorry, rant over. In any case, I chose a couple of places for us to eat that I’ve discovered recently to have reliably good food without costing a bloody fortune. Last night’s dinner was one of those.”

  “That makes sense,” Helen said.

  “Oh, and one more thing, sometimes my bosses point me in a direction they feel would be popular in the magazine or that people have asked them to cover or that would be controversial in a good way. And the pastry chef was one of those subjects even before she was murdered, and obviously more so now.”

  Helen watched me wipe down the counters and put the leftover fruit in the fridge, looking thoughtful. “You say she was controversial even before the murder. What would be your theory about her death? This is what my ex-husband always used to wonder aloud.” She flashed a wry smile. “He wasn’t much good at being married and monogamous, but he was very smart about his work.” She glanced over at me, and I wondered for an instant whether she was going to confide in me about what had gone sour in their marriage.

  She didn’t.

  “Who wanted this person dead badly enough to take the chance of committing murder?” she asked. “It’s a very, very extreme step with enormous consequences. Would someone have strangled this person because she sold more pie then they did? Pastries, if you want to get technical.”

  “Well no,” I said. “When you put it that way, it sounds ridiculous. But I did get the sense at the opening event yesterday that she was a menace to other businesses. The financial pressure can be enormous if you are producing only one product and half the businesses in Key West are making exactly the same thing. All these shops are vying for tourists’ attention, vying for reviews on Yelp and TripAdvisor, vying to be on all the lists.”

  “What kind of lists?” Helen asked.

  “The best dessert in the Florida Keys, best key lime pie in Key West, Hemingway’s favorite pie, and so on. As if Hemingway ate pie.” I laughed. “If the stories are to be believed, he drank his sugar and calories in alcohol, thank you very much. This all might sound silly, but it’s pretty simple: publicity drives sales.”

  “And Claudette Parker was garnering a lot of attention.”

  I nodded. “Competition is tough in this town, and to make it harder, businesses have to earn most of their money in the high season. Which starts about now and runs through March. Then the locals can breathe a little sigh of relief, though it definitely means a drop in revenue.”

  “So it’s not inconceivable to think that if Claudette was functioning at the top of the pastry food chain, she could have been a target.”

  “Maybe. If someone was a little off-balance to begin with.”

  “And on the other hand,” she continued, “maybe she’d been flying under the radar, but this new venture brought her a lot of publicity. And perhaps garnered the attention of someone she’d rather not have tangled with.”

  I glanced at my watch and shrugged. “Maybe. We don’t know enough about her to figure that out. We better get moving if we’re going to pick up Miss Gloria and make it to the pie class on time.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  I also ask for a hot chocolate with whipped cream, because whipped cream can remind you why it’s good to be alive.

  —Deb Caletti, The Fortunes of Indigo Skye

  We zipped up to Houseboat Row, where Miss Gloria was waiting in the driver’s seat of her big Buick with the engine running. She had the windows open and some kind of rock music pumping out from the radio.

  “Want me to drive?” I asked.

  “No thanks,” she said cheerfully. “I don’t want to get rusty. And we don’t have far to go, so how much damage can I do?” She cackled as we got in, then craned around to grin at Helen in the back seat, gunned the engine, and lurched out onto Palm Avenue. I gripped the door handle and gritted my teeth, waiting for the sound of blaring horns and the crash of metal. Mercifully, none of that came.

  “We’ve got a lot on the schedule today, don’t we?” Miss Gloria asked. “I figure we’ll park in the garage on Caroline Street and then walk to the Pie Company, right?”

  “Right,” I said. “And Helen and I have agreed, we aren’t investigating. On the other hand, if some tidbit related to Claudette falls in our laps, we’ll gather it up and pass it on to Nathan.”

  “Remember to think about the person behind the crime,” Helen aka my mother-in-law said, leaning forward and grabbing the driver’s side headrest. “We’re not only collecting recipes, we’re understanding a murderer. And his victim.”

  “Oh, Hayley is unbelievable at that,” said Miss Gloria, glancing in the rearview mirror. “She has more friends than anyone I know—and that’s because she knows what makes people tick. And even if she doesn’t care for somebody, she works at understanding why they’re crabby. And the next thing you know, they’re friends. I’m certain Nathan’s told you how she solved a couple of crimes. Not that he appreciates that one bit.”

  She chuckled, and I squeezed her arm to thank her for sticking up for me, but then let go fast so she would concentrate on swinging around the curve that led into Eaton Street without taking out cars in the oncoming traffic. She found an open space in the Caroline Street garage, avoided nicking anyone’s paint job, and we wended our way through a mob of visitors to the shop on Greene Street.

  “Please,” I whispered to Miss Gloria, “let me ask the questions?” I didn’t dare say the same to Helen, but I hoped I’d made my point clear.

  We signed in at the cash register, and Sigrid led us to the back room of the shop with three other students—Lori, Judy, and Louise, friends visiting from New Jersey to celebrate the New Year and escape a week of bitter-cold temperatures. Sigrid gestured for us to stop next to two large sinks.

  “No one starts the class without washing up and dressing in our chef’s costume,” she said, grinning. She described how we should scrub our hands and then don plastic gloves and aprons and finally a hairnet.

  “All you ladies look so cute,” said Miss Gloria. “You are rocking those hairnets. We need pictures of this.”

  “Give me your phones,” Sigrid said, “and I’ll take some pix.”

  I hardly wanted this outfit broadcast on social media. The net flattened our hair against our heads, and the clear plastic on our hands and torso made us resemble packaged meat. Not a good look for any of us. On the other hand, Palamina would love it if I posted these photos on Instagram and Facebook. Pictures of pie after pie after pie could be broken up with some comic relief. And it might relax the instructor if we behaved like normal students rather than murder inquisitionists. I took off one of the gloves, dug in my back pocket, and handed over my phone.

  Miss Gloria clapped her plastic-covered hands together. “I feel like we’re Lucy and Ethel in the chocolate shop—remember that episode in I Love Lucy? I watch it once a week, along with the video about the cat who sings ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star’ with his owner. With the world such a mess, it pays to find things that make you laugh. I’ll find it for you when we finish the class,” she told the ladies from New Jersey.

  Mrs. Bransford looked a little googly-eyed. My roommate could have that effect on people until they got used to her chirpy nature.

  We were taken on a brief tour of the rest of the kitchen. In my current frame of mind, I couldn’t help noticing that the cooler and the freezer were each large enough to stash a dozen bodies. Sigrid explained the story of how the shop’s founder had fallen into some financial difficulties and had the idea of reaching out to the guru of the TV show The Profit, Marcus Lemonis. “After profits improved, Lemonis ended up purchasing the compan
y from the original owners,” Sigrid said. “Now he insists that we stick to the original recipe—no shortcuts allowed.”

  Once the tour was completed, we followed her out to the cooking stations, which were separated from the tourists eating ice cream and pie in the seating area by a glass wall.

  “I’ve done some of the mixing ahead of time,” Sigrid said. “So we can focus on the fun parts. The graham cracker crust in these pies is not made of actual crackers but rather the ingredients that would make them up, that is, flour, sugar, butter, and honey.”

  We each dumped a scoop of crumbs into a mini aluminum pie plate and pressed them out evenly with a second pie plate.

  “No one wants to see a fingerprint in their pie,” Sigrid explained, smiling broadly. “Another secret to our award-winning recipe is whipping cream added to the filling.”

  She gestured at an enormous mixer that rotated, then helped Miss Gloria pour in evaporated milk and heavy cream and, finally, lime juice. When the filling had thickened, we ladled the mixture into our miniature crusts. Watching my mother-in-law, I suspected she had little experience with even the basics of cooking. Sigrid had made it as easy as possible for our class of students, preparing large quantities of batter and the miniature crusts ahead of time. But even pouring the liquid into a graham cracker crust seemed difficult for Helen. Sigrid came over to help.

  “Wasn’t that awful about the pastry shop up the street?” Helen asked, once her pie shell was filled. “Did you know Miss Parker well?”

  Now I wondered if she’d pretended to be inept so she could query our host. I decided I should never, ever underestimate her.

  Sigrid grimaced. “Hardly at all, though I hated to hear that news. She was so young and so talented.”

  “Have you heard anything about what might have happened? Who might have wished her ill?”

  “Nothing like that. But between my shifts here and my son at home, I’m not out and about much either.” She crossed over to the far counter and prepared us each a plastic bag with a metal tip, then filled the bags with whipped cream. “Feel free to decorate your pies as you wish,” Sigrid said. She grinned, watching Miss Gloria make a smiley face on the pie’s surface with her cream.

  After we completed our pies, Sigrid took multiple pictures with each person’s phone. “You are invited to take your pie with you. Or if you prefer, we can keep it here in the freezer and you can pick it up later.”

  “If you can spare a fork, I’d like to eat mine now,” said Miss Gloria, almost dancing with anticipation.

  “Remember we’re due for lunch at noon,” I said. “Sure you don’t want to save it for dessert tonight?” Although who was I to be giving advice about holding back on sweets, especially to an eighty-something woman? She was the one who’d taught me that holding back on anything was a mistake. Because who knew when we might be snatched from this earthly adventure and sent on to the next?

  “Or maybe we leave two of them here and taste yours?” I suggested.

  “Perfect. The best of both worlds—the appearance of abstinence, followed by gluttony.” She folded up her plastic apron and laid the gloves on top, then carried her smiling pie to a table in the shop. She handed us each a plastic fork. I took a bite and closed my eyes to savor the flavors and think of how to describe them. Super-creamy, with a hint of tartness underneath, and finally a welcome crunch of graham. Helen only dipped her fork in the pie and licked the filling off.

  “Delicious,” she said to Miss Gloria. “Good job.” She lowered her voice so the people around us wouldn’t listen in. “What was your sense of Sigrid as a possible suspect?”

  I paused, looking at Sigrid behind the glass wall, cleaning up after the class. She was chatting and laughing with another worker. The tables around us were filled with tourists drinking coffee and eating slices of pie like ours. This place was very successful, and it felt as if Sigrid was part of that.

  “She seems to really love her job,” I said. “I don’t think the enthusiasm about this company’s history was faked. I also didn’t get any inkling that this shop was threatened by Claudette Parker.”

  “I’m guessing not,” said Helen. “We certainly didn’t get much out of her on the subject of Claudette. As in, nothing. But she isn’t the owner of this place. So she probably isn’t invested financially. Other than as an employee. And she appears to be performing her duties well. Didn’t it sound as though she was fully committed to the Pie Company and excited about its story?”

  “Yes,” I said. “And if you consider how busy this place is, it’s hard to think they have been affected by the new pastry shop. If you compare the pie we made to Claudette’s key lime napoleon, they are really not the same product. They wouldn’t seem to be in direct competition, because I could imagine different audiences for each of them. These pies are probably purchased for folks who yearn for the magic of Key West, while the other pastry is a gourmet experience, bigger than our island.”

  “And besides,” said Miss Gloria, “she said they shipped those things all over the country. I can’t see that happening with the fancy flaky pastry.”

  I nodded my agreement. “It wouldn’t hold up. It would arrive as a soggy mess.”

  “But this makes me think,” said my roommate. “Didn’t the pie on our picture window look a lot like this?” She pointed to the dish we were eating. “Why in the world would someone like Sigrid break into our place and smash her own pie?”

  I glanced over at the commercial kitchen again, watching Sigrid work and trying to imagine her creeping down our dock in the dark, ransacking our houseboat, and smashing her own brand of pie on the window. “That doesn’t make a lot of sense.”

  Helen nodded her agreement.

  “And I couldn’t swear it was this exact pie. All I remember for sure is that it wasn’t topped with meringue.”

  Miss Gloria and I finished eating half the pie, and then we wrapped the remainder up to finish after lunch and went outside. Greene Street was even busier than it had been an hour ago, and the sun had broken out fiercely, steaming last night’s spilled beer and who knew what else out of the sidewalks. We walked around a tangle of rental bikes that had fallen into a heap of spokes and down two blocks to Fitzpatrick Street and over to the Roof Top Café. As we passed Sloppy Joe’s, I heard a bass guitar pumping out of the open doors and noticed all the tables were full.

  “You probably won’t want to get any closer to that bar than we are right now,” Miss Gloria advised. “I took my son there once. It’s a young person’s game.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Bake it, share it, and love it. Add the extra eggs, build stiff peaks in her honor, let your pie send sweet music into the world like Anne did, and every time you serve the pie, tell the story of Anne Parker Otto.

  —David Sloan, “Robert the Doll’s Killer Key Lime Pie,” Keys Weekly, April 26, 2019

  We met Amber upstairs in the Roof Top Café, a beautiful restaurant featuring tall ceilings painted in rustic white, set off by bamboo dividers and hanging plants and ceiling fans over the white-clothed tables. Amber was a young woman with long dark hair and bangs, black liner circling her eyes, and a vivid personality. This served her well for the business she had developed as a “concierge” to all things Key West. From the looks of our primo location in the upstairs dining room—near the porch but not outside in the sun—she had already made friends with the hostess. She greeted my mother-in-law effusively and began to make lunch recommendations. The waitress stood by to take our orders.

  Amber set her phone on the table. “Since you are just visiting and probably aren’t here that long”—she winked at me, as if perhaps I’d been complaining about my mother-in-law’s visit—“I always recommend the taste of Key West. That includes half a Cuban sandwich, two conch fritters, a cup of black bean soup, and everyone’s favorite, key lime tart.”

  Helen groaned. “Please, no key lime desserts. Remember we’re going for tea and cookies right after this. And nothing fried. Maybe a
salad?” She glanced at her menu. “I’m not really hungry. I’d like the Sunset salad, dressing on the side, and an unsweetened iced tea.” She switched her focus from the waitress to the rest of us. “Have you noticed that in a lot of restaurants, even if you ask them to dress a salad lightly, they seem incapable of complying?”

  “That’s never a problem for me,” said Miss Gloria with a laugh. “I will have the Caesar salad with grilled chicken, load on the dressing. And I’ll take whatever extra you don’t put on hers.” She winked at the waitress and pointed to Helen, who laughed. She was beginning to appreciate the conundrum that was Miss Gloria.

  After Amber and I placed our orders, the waitress click-clacked across the wooden floor and Amber began to grill my mother-in-law. Where had she come from? Had she ever visited Key West before? What was on her bucket list? Did she need any suggestions?

  Helen admitted she’d never been to the island but then turned the questioning back to Amber. “Tell me about your business,” she said.

  “My newest brainstorm is a brochure featuring establishments that are located just off Duval Street. Lots of people roll off their cruise ships and never get any further than the bars and T-shirt shops on Duval. Which is a terrible shame, since we have so much to offer, don’t you think?”

  “Amber has a Facebook following you wouldn’t believe,” explained Miss Gloria. “And every day she has multiple posts about real estate, bars, restaurants, music. Her top fans comment all the time.”

  “They do,” said Amber, grinning broadly. “Miss Gloria could be a top fan if she ever retires. The people who comment the most get a special badge identifying them as such.”

  “In fact, I bet if you posted a question on your Facebook page about the key lime killing, you would get all kinds of insider information and theories,” said Miss Gloria.