by Клео Коул
“Oh, yeah,” I said, “this is Aphrodite’s ride.”
“So?”
“So I’ve been trying to reach her all evening, warn her she’s in danger. Obviously, she’s inside now with Gudrun.”
“We’re here to find our wayward barista. Not rescue a drama queen.”
“Calm down, Matt. You’re getting angry again.”
He grunted.
“This is a working factory,” I told him. “Deliveries arrive at all hours, There has to be a way in . . .”
The building was unadorned and had few windows. It housed a full-scale chocolate factory, along with facilities where Gudrun mixed her cocoa with the Blend’s coffee beans and Alicia’s powder to create the Mocha Magic syrup. The mocha concentrate was then bottled and sent to Long Island City where another facility freeze-dried and packaged it.
As I hugged myself against a chilly wind whipping off the water, I noticed a hand-scrawled sign beside one of the smaller gates: Late-Night Deliveries. Over that sign I found the doorbell and intercom. I hit the button and a buzzer sounded deep inside the building.
“What are you doing, Clare? Let’s go back to the car and wait for Nancy to show up.”
“But Nancy is probably inside already.”
“Clare, she took mass transit. You know how lousy subway service can be at night. Nancy might not even be in Brooklyn yet.”
“She’s had plenty of time to get here.” I said, buzzing again. Stubbornly, I pressed a third time, then a fourth. Finally, I reached for my purse and phone—only to discover I’d left them in the car.
“Matt, go back to the car and grab my purse from the front seat. I have Voss’s number on speed-dial. I’ll call Gudrun and tell her to stop ignoring the doorbell.”
Matt was halfway to the car when the intercom crackled. “Who is it?” The voice was soft and electronically garbled.
“Gudrun? Is that you? It’s Clare Cosi.”
“You’re looking for Nancy, your little lost barista.” I heard a sound. Was that a giggle? “Nancy is here with us. Would you like to come in?”
Matt heard the intercom and turned. But Gudrun sounded odd and I sensed there was something wrong, so I waved him back.
The noise of grinding metal startled me as a hidden mechanism raised the shutter. I glimpsed movement through the glass door. Two figures were silhouetted against the blinding lights inside the factory. Blinking against the glare, I realized one of the figures was pressing a very large handgun to the other’s head.
“Come in, Clare Cosi. Now, or your little friend Nancy dies,” the soft voice taunted through the intercom.
Gudrun Voss is Olympia Temple? Good God, how could I have been so wrong?
Matt saw me tense and moved forward. I swung one hand behind my back and made a gun out of my thumb and index finger, pumping the thumb a few times to stress my point.
Please, Matt, see my finger gun! Figure it out!
As I moved toward the door, I risked a sidelong glance at my ex. He watched, openmouthed, until I was almost inside. Then he turned and ran back to the car with an urgency that told me he’d gotten the message.
Matt will call the police. He’ll tell them there are hostages, and they’ll send a SWAT team. Everything will be okay . . .
I’d hardly pushed through the glass door when the steel gate descended again. My heart took off, my brow grew damp with perspiration.
Heaven help me, I’m locked in with a stone-cold killer . . .
The scent of chocolate permeated the air. A machine roared dully somewhere on the factory floor. I watched Gudrun remove a Blue Tooth headset and toss it aside.
“Step forward,” she commanded in a voice louder than Gudrun’s usual meek tone.
I took three steps—not quite lunging but fast enough to rattle my adversary. She stepped backward, onto the factory floor, dragging her silent, struggling hostage with her. Was it Nancy? I couldn’t see the girl’s face! A burlap sack covered her head. I couldn’t see Gudrun’s face, either. I recognized her signature black chef’s jacket, but her features were obscured by her long, dark, loosely hanging hair.
Nancy (if it was Nancy) hardly struggled and never spoke. The burlap hood muffled her frightened whimpers as she docilely followed Gudrun’s lead.
Piled up around me were large, fat burlap sacks, all stuffed with dried and fermented cacao from Madagascar, South and Central America, and the Ivory Coast of Africa.
Gudrun had hollowed out the center of the building, and I could see all the way up to the roof and its massive glass skylight. Roasters, winnowing machines, grinders, mixers, and vats of chocolate liquor lined the brick walls.
“Where’s Aphrodite?” I demanded. “I know she’s here.”
“You know, do you?”
Gudrun’s voice was much too forceful, and I finally realized that I’d been played—and I’d been right.
“I know a lot of things,” I told the killer. “I know you’re not Gudrun Voss, for instance. And I know you’re not Daphne Krupa, either. Your name is Olympia Temple.”
The hostage began to struggle, and her captor cuffed her with the butt of the gun. Alarmed, I stepped forward, and Olympia leveled the weapon at my heart. With a sharp laugh she tossed her head, and the black wig fell away, revealing her pixie hair.
“I know everything, Olympia. And Soles and Bass—the policewomen I’ve been helping—they know everything, too.”
“Everything?” she cried. “What do they know? What do you know?”
I know the SWAT team is on its way, I thought. Only a minute or so had gone by, and I had three or four to wait, maybe more. The police wouldn’t be using sirens, so I wouldn’t hear them coming, but I needed time for them to get to us, and that meant I’d have to keep this maniac talking.
“I know you used an ice sculpture to fake your suicide,” I told her. “The ice hit the water like a body, then melted away so authorities would find shreds of your clothes and no sign of an artificial dummy. You used the same trick on the yacht—with our missing Venus ice sculpture—to fake your own murder.”
“How can you know that?” Olympia said, her tone clearly shocked.
“I know that—and I know how you got off the boat without getting caught . . .” While I spoke I searched for a way out, or a way to strike back. “Like the nymph in Ovid’s Metamorphoses , Daphne transformed into a laurel—not a tree this time, but a man. You became John Laurel, the reporter whose press pass you got from Susan Chu.”
“Poor Susie, she never figured anything out, never saw it coming when I hit her. I would have killed her, too, but I needed a witness to tell everyone I was dead. So I hit her from behind, painted the name Rufina, then screamed to get everyone’s attention before throwing the ice sculpture overboard and slipping away to transform again.”
I nodded my head, feigning admiration. “A stroke of genius. You had us all fooled. You were too smart.”
“You figured out a lot—for a glorified deli-counter girl.”
“But not everything,” I said, reigning in my fury. “I never figured out where you hid that umbrella. The one you used to bludgeon Patrice to death. Or the raincoat that kept blood splatters from staining your party clothes.”
“You actually helped me that night,” she said. “You and Mrs. Dubois knocked over that fiberglass Greek column and broke the interior light. The hollow tube was dark, so I stuffed the umbrella inside, along with my raincoat.”
I nodded again, like an impressed protégé. “You played us all.”
Olympia flashed a twisted smirk. “People are fools. Tell them what they want to hear, show them what they want to see, and they’ll follow like lemmings.”
“Is that how you lured Aphrodite tonight? Did you tell her what she wanted to hear?”
“Close enough. I waited for Gudrun’s closing time and took her hostage. Then I used Gudrun’s e-mail account to send a message to Aphrodite. ‘I’m going to the press with the truth about the drug in Mocha Magic unless you meet m
e at my shop at once.’ Worked like a charm. Dressed as Gudrun, I waved her inside and slammed the gates. Aphrodite and her little golden-haired assistant, Minthe, walked right into my trap.”
I was walking, too. Every few seconds I’d take a small step forward. Without realizing it, Olympia was backing away from me.
“But your plan tonight,” I said, desperate to keep her talking. “I can’t make sense of this . . .”
“Because you’re too stupid,” she said. Olympia squared her shoulders, clearly proud and pleased to have an audience, someone who could appreciate her masterful plan. “These women, these Sisters, condemned my mother to a cage, like some kind of animal. A place so horrible there was only one escape possible—”
“Suicide.”
“Now Alicia and Sherri will spend the rest of their days caged like animals, too.”
“And Aphrodite? Will she spend the rest of her life in prison?”
“That whore? The one who ruined my life?” Olympia shook her head. “Oh no. She dies here. Tonight. Thanks to the e-mail I sent, the police will think Aphrodite came here to murder Gudrun.”
“Why?”
“Because she threatened to reveal the truth about that drugged-up mocha powder of yours. And after Aphrodite shoots Gudrun, she’ll burn this place to hide the evidence. Of course, some of you will be trapped here in her fire—and because Aphrodite didn’t count on your interference, she’ll be knocked unconscious before she can escape, too. The police will find the gun still in her hand.” Olympia smiled. “Death by fire—a fitting fate, don’t you think? A whore on her way to Hades.”
As I continued moving slowly forward, Olympia kept backing up. Now she stood beside a metal shelf holding cellophane-covered buckets of dark mocha syrup.
I heard a moan coming from the other side of that shelf. I risked a peek and saw Aphrodite sprawled on the floor but stirring. Gudrun lay nearby, stripped down to her black brassier and slacks. My breath caught when I spied Nancy, lying right next to them, eyes closed, arms curled.
Oh my God, Nancy! Is she still alive?
I choked down my fear, my rage. “I know something else, Olympia. I know that’s not my barista you’re threatening. Why don’t you let the poor girl go?”
Olympia faked surprise and pushed the girl to her knees. Then she ripped the sack away. Minthe’s puppy dog eyes blinked up at me.
“My mistake,” Olympia said. Before I could react, she pressed the gun against Minthe’s head and pulled the trigger.
The blast was deafening. One second Minthe’s thin, pale face was there—and then it wasn’t. The body flew sideways and struck the plank floor with a hollow thud.
“You crazy bitch!” I screamed.
Then we both heard a crash loud enough to cut through the gunshot still ringing in our eardrums. Shards of shattered skylight rained down. Along with the glass came a figure clinging to a thin black cord
“POLICE! SWAT TEAM! FREEZE! WE’RE ARMED! DROP YOUR WEAPON! GIVE IT UP!
Unfortunately, it wasn’t a real SWAT team—it was Matt, all alone. He’d heard the shot, freaked, and taken a reckless chance. For a moment he hung suspended above the factory floor, yelling that he was the police, the army, SEAL Team Six, and whatever else popped into his head. Then, suddenly, whatever he’d used for a rope snapped under his weight, and Matt plunged straight down.
“POLICE! PUT YOUR HANDS UP! YOU’RE UNDER AR—oooph!”
Matt landed on a stack of Madagascar cacao. The hard landing shut his mouth and eyes. The fall knocked him out!
Olympia was rattled, then raging. She approached my unconscious ex, gun extended.
Oh no you don’t! I rushed her. Reaching up, I yanked a pail of mocha syrup off the shelf, dumping it over her head.
As Olympia knocked the pail away, I grabbed her wrist with both hands. She fought me, eyes closed, blinded by the brown goo. She was strong, but I was determined, and it came down to a battle of wills.
As we struggled over the gun, Aphrodite ran by us, on her way to one of the factory’s windows and a fire escape beyond.
“Help me!” I begged. “Grab the gun, Aphrodite! Do something!”
But she kept going, her only interest saving herself! With a single heave, she lifted the big window and crawled through onto the metal fire escape. Night air whipped her flowing dress as the river’s black water roiled below.
Olympia could see by now—enough to realize her prize prey was escaping. Enraged, she kicked me hard, sending me backward.
“Die! Die! Die!” she howled as she pumped three shots into Aphrodite’s back. The goddess swayed in the wind, then tumbled into the water below.
Olympia whirled to face me. But I was ready with another bucket of Mocha Magic—and this time I swung it like a club. Again and again, I bounced the metal pail off Olympia’s head. The chocolate-covered monster finally dropped without a sound, and I kicked the gun out of her limp hand.
“Matt! Matt!”
I ran to my ex and dropped to my knees beside the pallet of cacao beans. He wasn’t moving, and it didn’t look like he was breathing, either. I brushed aside his shaggy hair, touched his cheek—and his eyes opened!
“I think I hurt myself . . .” He moaned.
“You big, dumb, stupid hero! You could have killed yourself!”
“Oh, man, the dog was worse than the fall.”
“Dog?”
“A very fast German shepherd guarding the construction site next door. I climbed that building to jump to this one. But not before that damn shepherd bit me in the butt.”
Tears stinging my eyes, I hugged him—then I jumped and Matt bolted upright when a controlled explosion blew the steel gate off. Ropes fluttered down from the shattered skylight, too, followed by armed and armored men. Boots hit the plank floor all around us. More men stormed through the blasted gate, weapons raised.
A SWAT team—a real one—had finally arrived.
“What took you so long,” Matt groused.
A tactical officer in black armor emerged from behind the metal shelf, Nancy Kelly in his arms. Pale and shaken, my barista touched her bruised head. But her buoyant inner Nancy returned when she saw me.
“Holy smokin’ rockets, boss. What the heck hit me?”
Forty-Five
Two days later things were back to normal at my coffeehouse—“normal” being a relative term, considering Village life.
“Remember, Punch,” Tuck said from behind our counter, “the part you’re auditioning for today is the most important role in Return to Munchkin Land.”
“But it’s only the chorus, Tuck, just a small part.”
“Punch! What do I always say?”
The lean Latino put down his cup and sighed. “There are no small parts, only—” He suddenly froze, glanced around.
“You can relax,” I assured him from the next stool. “There are no small actors in here today.” (Since we’d opened six hours ago, I’d served a steady stream of hulking, hairy men.) “Exactly,” Tuck said. “And where would the Wicked Witch be without a dependable army of Flying Monkeys?”
“Ha!” Nancy cut in, arriving for her lunchtime shift. “She wouldn’t need them if she had a flying Matteo!”
“More like a plunging Matteo from what I heard,” Esther cracked.
“Matt was very brave,” Nancy said, eyes glazing as she tied on her apron. “He saved my life. I’ll be forever grateful to him.”
Esther stared at Nance a long moment. “Oh no.”
Nancy turned to Tucker. “When is Matteo coming back to the Blend, do you think? Will he be working as a manager again, the way he did the other day? That was a great day! He’s such a good manager!”
“Oh, boss!” Esther sang.
I glanced up from Matt’s revised delivery schedule. “What?”
She leaned down. “Did you hear that?”
“Matt’s flying to Costa Rica next week,” I said. “Let’s hope Ms. Kelly is over her new crush by the time he gets back.”
&n
bsp; “I guess we should look on the bright side,” Esther said. “At least she’s over Dante.”
“Nancy’s lucky he’s not pressing charges.”
“Speaking of charges,” Esther said, “did you check out New York One’s In the Papers segment this morning? We’re still the top story across the city.”
I nodded.
Tuck moved toward us. “You know, I can’t decide which headline was my favorite. Chocolate-Covered Serial Killer Gets Licked, Spider-Man Saves 3 in Willy Wonka Hostage Drama, or Cocoa Kook Goes Loca for Mocha.”
“Well, kook is certainly the right noun,” Punch said.
“No doubt,” Esther said. “That sicko actually smiled for her mug shot.”
“I know!” Punch cried, smoothing the monkey hair on his arms. “That girl is cray-zee!”
“But not crazy enough for an insanity plea,” I pointed out, glad of it.
Olympia Temple was no longer the wayward little girl hiding behind a curtain of hair. The media had discovered a brand-new sinister star, and she shined darkly for them. But Warhol’s famous fifteen minutes had begun ticking away already, and Olympia would soon learn what every convicted criminal knew—the brief clock of fame winds down to interminable years behind prison walls.
“You know something I can’t stop thinking about?” Tucker confessed. “Olympia called herself Daphne and escaped off the boat as Laurel. Anyone who knows Ovid or a bit of basic mythology could have connected the two. It’s as if she wanted someone to discover the clues.”
“From what Soles and Bass told me, serial killers tend to take pride in their work. Olympia Temple made killing her art. On some level, she wanted it to be appreciated.”
“What? The art of murder?”
I nodded. “Sociopaths get high on power, control, and manipulation. They also crave pity. I guarantee you, Olympia sees herself as the victim in all this, the star of her own sick show.”
Tucker’s eyebrows rose. “Sounds like my little directorial pep talks to the disparate citizens of Oz. Every actor, no matter the size of his role, is the star.”
“Exactly, and given what we now know about the late Ms. ‘Aphrodite’ Pixley—from her antics in college to her setting employees against each other—that woman was probably a sociopath, too.”