Murder and Marinara: An Italian Kitchen Mystery (Italian Kitchen Mysteries)

by Genova, Rosie

  If I knew my partner-in-solving-crime, she’d be at my door at 2:58. In the meantime, though, I had to finish out the lunch shift. And pray there would be no more visits from Regina Sutton.

  • • •

  Sofia made the wise decision to stop for coffees before showing up at my door. We sat out on the deck, facing the ocean, sipping the reviving caffeine and scribbling notes as we talked.

  “I can’t believe Sutton actually showed up at the restaurant,” Sofia said. “What do you think that was about?”

  “Well, to warn me off, of course. And maybe to check things out for herself. She said her ‘team’ had already been over the garden. And probably noted everything in it.”

  “Including this.” Sofia held up the white plant tag, then slipped it into the red folder.

  “Don’t remind me.”

  “Vic, there’s no proof this plant killed him. And wouldn’t his stomach contents show that anyway?”

  “Yes, they would—in another couple of weeks, when the testing is done.”

  “But all Danny said was that the medical examiner had a ‘hunch about a natural substance,’ right?”

  “Right. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned from writing mysteries, it’s not to trust coincidence. And symptoms of Digitalis poisoning plus a foxglove plant on the scene is a bit too coincidental for me.” I looked across at Sofia. “And for Nonna, apparently.” Then I shared the conversation with my grandmother, right up to the moment Nonna was ready to dump the evidence out on the compost heap.

  Sofia shook her head and grinned. “I could just see her carting that plant off the premises.”

  “She almost did. You don’t think a little thing like a felony arrest would stop her, do you? No, it was the thought of her precious Danny getting kicked off the force.”

  “Speaking of my beloved husband, SIL, let’s go over again what he told you that day out on the marina.” She pulled out a page from the folder. “Okay. So the police know about the threatening letters Angie talked about.”

  “Right. But that’s as much as he would say.”

  “Do you think the person who sent the letters is the same person who killed him?”

  “Of course it’s possible. But in a sense, he was a public figure. He produced a reality show that’s a sensation, but was also crude and offensive.” I shrugged. “To tell you the truth, I’m surprised he didn’t get more threatening letters.”

  “Okay,” Sofia said. “What else is here? Both water bottles were clean, right? The one you served him and the one he brought with him.”

  “Yup. And the biggest bombshell of all was, of course, that both Angie and Emily have an alibi.”

  Sofia held up her pen. “Which checked out.”

  “Unfortunately.” I stared out at the water, my mind returning to the same thought: It’s Tim or Mr. B. But something else buzzed around my brain, something as annoying and elusive as the sand flies that tormented us each summer. But just as quickly, it flew away.

  “Hey, Vic,” Sofia said, her voice rising. “Hang on a minute. Danny also told you Parisi was on medication. Who’s to say one of those two crazy women didn’t slip something into his medicine bottle? Maybe it just looks like something he ate killed him.”

  I sat straight up in the deck chair. “Holy crap. I hadn’t thought of that. Gosh, Sofe. I wonder if he took a pill during lunch? Angie would have had access to his medicine.”

  “So would Emily,” Sofie said firmly, “and you know it. She saw him the day before. It would have been easy enough to switch a medicine bottle or add something to his.” She grabbed my arm with a samurai grip. “Wait—they use Digitalis for heart medication, don’t they? It must come in a pill form.”

  “Of course! And he was already on beta blockers. Who knows what that combination might do to somebody with a bad heart?” I grabbed my sister-in-law’s face and gave her a big smacking kiss on the cheek. “You’re a genius, Sofia Delmonico.”

  She grinned at me. “You mean I’m a fricken genius.” She already had her laptop open for a search. She tried “beta blockers and Digitalis” and got a bunch of articles from medical journals that weren’t for the lay reader. She groaned. “I might be a genius, but I’m no doctor. I’m lost here.”

  “Let me try.” As I read over her shoulder, I learned a few important facts. The substance in Digitalis used in heart medication was digoxin. Sometimes digoxin was prescribed with beta blockers, but there were a number of warnings listed about using the drugs together. And then I read the sentence that changed everything. “Here it is, Sofe!” I pointed at the screen. “I don’t get the chemistry either, but listen to this: ‘Digoxin concentrations are increased with beta blockers, causing serious decrease in heart rate.’”

  She turned to look at me, her eyes wide. “One of those women fixed him a nasty pharmaceutical cocktail.”

  “And whichever of them did it also engineered that meeting in Ocean Grove to give herself an alibi.” I nodded slowly. “It makes sense, SIL. Finally, something makes sense. And my money’s still on Angie for the culprit.”

  She shook her head. “I vote Emily. That business card is a fake, and there’s something suspicious about her showing up at the restaurant to see you.” She shut down her computer and stood up. “In fact, it’s high time we did some digging into her life, and I’m gonna start right now. I’ll check in with you later.”

  After she left, I watched the waves break on the shore and my heart lifted. For the first time in days, I had some hope. Hope that Tim wouldn’t end up on trial for murder. Hope that the restaurant wouldn’t close down. And hope that I’d finally get back to my book and put all of this behind me. And then my phone rang.

  “Hello, Victoria!” I winced as Nina LaGuardia’s trilling TV voice assaulted my ear. “Do you know what day this is?”

  “Uh . . . Thursday,” I said weakly.

  “Now, really, do you think that playing dumb will work with me? You know very well your time is up. We need to schedule that interview, and pronto!”

  “Listen, Nina. I’m close. I really am. And if I’m right, this story will be huge.” I needed to throw her something, and quickly. “I happen to know the county prosecutor will be bringing in persons of interest any day.”

  “I know that,” she said impatiently. “What I don’t know is who killed Gio Parisi, which is what you promised to find out. Are you telling me you don’t have that information for me?”

  I swallowed, and the sound seemed to echo across the entire beach. “I need more time. Just a couple of days.”

  “Uh-uh. Sorry, darling. We had a deal. So you’d better be ready to have your skinny behind in hair and makeup at five tomorrow morning.”

  “Wait, Nina.” I had to hold her off. What could I possibly give her that would buy me a couple more days? And then inspiration struck. “Would you hear me out for a second?”

  “I’m very busy, Victoria, so make this quick.”

  “You give me two more days, and I’ll do another exclusive interview with you when my next mystery comes out.”

  She yawned loudly into the phone. “Not interested.”

  “That’s too bad because the next book in the series is the HBO tie-in.” I crossed myself and sent up a quick Act of Contrition, neither of which would be enough to keep me from burning in hell for this one.

  Her voice quickened with interest. “HBO picked up your books?”

  “I really shouldn’t even be talking about it, so this is all on the down low at the moment, okay?” I lowered my voice for effect. “I mean, De Niro’s people still have to get back to us.”

  “Robert De Niro!” she squealed. “Oh my God, is he playing Bernardo?”

  “That’s the plan.” In my dreams, anyway. “So can I have a couple more days?”

  She sighed. “Victoria, you’d better come through on this. On all of it. Or that little ‘no comment’ snippet is going to look like an award-winning production compared to what I’ll do to you next time.”
>
  I had no doubt of that. So now I had about forty-eight hours to find Gio Parisi’s murderer. Or to get Robert De Niro on the phone.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  The next morning officially kicked off Memorial Day weekend, and a reprieve for the Casa Lido hovered tantalizingly near. But only if we could prove that Parisi took something that caused his fatal heart attack, most likely in tandem with the beta blockers he was already prescribed. Did the dead man habitually carry his medicine? Or did he take it at home and leave it in a medicine chest where anyone (and by “anyone,” I meant Angie) could have substituted something else for it? But how easily could that be done? How could the Black Widow have obtained the drug, for example? There were still so many missing pieces, the most important being what the police knew about Parisi’s meds. I was about to risk a phone call to my brother when Sofia’s number appeared on my phone.

  “Listen, Vic,” she said. “I’ve done every people search imaginable online, and I can’t find Emily Haverford. At least not one fitting the description of our Emily Haverford. There’re only two in New Jersey. One’s a baby and the other died last year.”

  “Did you try some other states?”

  “New York and Connecticut. It didn’t make sense to look anywhere else. She told you she’d known Parisi for years, and he’s got two addresses, one in New York and one in north Jersey. If she saw him on a regular basis, she’d have to live somewhere nearby, right?”

  “True. But I think we should do a countrywide search just to make sure.”

  “Well, I also did a reverse lookup on the phone number on her business card. It’s a cell phone in Ocean County, which argues that she’s living in Jersey. I’ll do a US search, but I doubt I’ll get anything. Let’s face it, SIL. There’s only one logical explanation: The woman who came to the restaurant is using a fake name. Which means she has something to hide.”

  “It could be that she’s married. Maybe she was living a double life, carrying on an affair with Parisi using another name.”

  Sofie’s tone was doubtful. “What makes you think that?”

  “Don’t forget, Angie knows her as ‘Emily.’ The guy in Ocean Grove heard her use that name. If that’s not her real name, she’s been using that alias for a while.”

  “It all sounds sketchy to me. I think you should try that phone number on her card.”

  “That’s a good idea. I could call her on the pretext that I’ve got more information about Parisi’s death.”

  “And then get more information about her. Keep me posted.”

  As soon as I ended Sofia’s call, I tried the number Emily Haverford gave me, only to get her voice mail, in which she identified herself as “Emily.” I was beginning to agree with my sister-in-law—there was something sketchy about the woman calling herself Emily Haverford.

  Would Danny tell me anything at all? In my desperate state, it was worth a try.

  “What is it, Vic?” His voice held suspicion, impatience, and a small note of warning.

  “Can you talk?” I whispered.

  “Yes. Why are you whispering?”

  “Good question, since I’m alone in the cottage.” I hesitated, knowing I could be compromising him with this call. “Look, Dan, I know I said I wouldn’t—”

  “You can stop right there, sis. I heard all about Sutton showing up at the restaurant.”

  I winced. “You did?”

  “We all did—my fellow officers, my chief, the mayor—you name ’em, they heard it.”

  “Oh, shi . . . shoot. I’m sorry, Danny.”

  “Can’t be helped,” he said shortly.

  For some reason, I was whispering again. “So I guess this means that if, for example, I had a question about Parisi’s medication, you couldn’t answer it.”

  “Got it in one, kid.”

  “Or,” I continued, “if I wanted to know about Parisi’s stomach contents. Or Emily Haverford’s real name.”

  I heard him sigh loudly. “Listen, Vic, I know that Nonna’s on your back about this. But you have to stop this little investigation you’ve got going—and that includes my wife.”

  “But, Danny, you don’t understand. I—”

  And what was I to say? I have a theory that hinges on information you can’t give me. Oh, and I just found a foxglove plant in the garden, and it’s poisonous, in case you didn’t know. Of course, the police might already have this information. But if they didn’t, and I told Danny, he’d have no choice but to tell them. And he was already in some hot water.

  “What don’t I understand?” His question came out as a snarl.

  “Nothing, okay? Don’t go all ‘bad cop’ on me.” I looked out my window at the peaceful blue sky and calm gray ocean. “There’s just one thing I have to ask, Dan. Is there even a chance that Tim could be arrested for this?”

  The silence that stretched out between us said it all.

  • • •

  When I got on my bike that morning, I didn’t head in the direction of the restaurant, but toward the other end of town to a place I hadn’t visited in more than eight years. As I pedaled down the familiar street, the years melted away and I was once again a gangly girl with a desperate crush on an older boy, riding past his house in hopes of a glimpse of him.

  I stopped the bike in front of a white seaside colonial with black shutters and a wide porch with tall columns—the house where Tim had grown up. I stood there thinking how different this classic home was in comparison to our two-family house across town. But when I fell in love with Tim, I’d also fallen in love with this house and his elegant, educated parents.

  I wheeled the bike down the stone driveway to where I’d find Tim, in the carriage house at the back of the property. Tim had occupied this house on and off since he’d turned eighteen, a fact that scandalized my parents, who firmly believed their children should be under their roof at all times, even after they married. I had a rush of memories as I stood in front of the arched doorway of the cottage; I raised my hand to knock when Tim opened the door.

  He was unshaven, wearing pajama pants and a ripped T-shirt bearing the faded letters of the Stone Pony. “Hey,” he said. “I heard your bike on the driveway stones.”

  “You used to listen for that sound, once upon a time.”

  He rubbed his stubbly chin and smiled slightly. “I remember.”

  I followed him into the cottage, unprepared for the mess that met my eyes. Dirty dishes lined the tiny kitchen counter; there were clothes draped over every available surface, and the pullout couch seemed to be serving as both eating and sleeping area. I wrinkled my nose. “It smells like boy in here.”

  “Thanks, Vic. If I’d known you were coming, I would have tidied up.” He heaved open the small kitchen window, letting in the sweet sea air.

  “Much better.” I shifted a pair of jeans and a nachos bag to one side of the bed and sat. “What’s up?”

  He slumped into the only other seat in the small living room, stretching his long legs out in front of him. “You tell me. Am I fired?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Why? It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “You know why they fired you the first time.”

  He lifted his head and looked at me steadily. “Because I hurt their daughter so bad they couldn’t stand to look at me.”

  I blinked, surprised to feel the tears. “They forgave you a long time ago, Tim. And right now, I think they just want you to lie low for a while. Until it all blows over.”

  “‘Lie low’ suggests I did something.” He sat forward in the chair and planted his hands on his knees. “And you know I didn’t, Vic.”

  I looked at this man I’d known for more than half my life. He was bleary-eyed and stubbly, his hair a mess of unruly curls, yet I still felt a surge of affection (and other things) when I looked at him. I saw a man who’d been my friend and my lover, a man who’d brought me both grief and joy. I saw an indulged only son who had found his calling late in life and had troub
le committing either to a woman or a job. He was temperamental and passionate, flirtatious and funny. Tim Trouvare was many things. But he wasn’t a murderer.

  “You’re right. I do.”

  He got up from his chair and sat down next to me. “You believe me?” he asked, taking my hand.

  I nodded, but slipped my hand from his. “About that I do.” I pushed the curls back from his forehead. “I don’t think you’re capable of killing anybody. Unless perhaps they got in your way in the kitchen.”

  He grinned, making my heart do a little somersault. But then his face grew serious. “This doesn’t look good for me, Vic.” He stood abruptly and started pacing the length of the small room. “I served the guy his last meal. I washed his plates afterward.”

  “And you had a history with his wife,” I added, a bit more acerbically than I intended.

  Tim plopped back into the chair, both arms hanging at his sides. “Right. You don’t need to remind me.”

  “I think maybe I do, Tim.”

  He frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means that when I asked you about Angie, you implied you’d seen her only one time before Parisi came into the restaurant. But you’d had more contact with her than that. I saw you on the phone with her.”

  “Well, yeah, there were some phone calls.” He hesitated.

  “And despite what you told me, she’d been to the restaurant more than once, right?”

  Tim blinked and squirmed as though there were a white light shining in his face. “Yeah, maybe a couple of times.”

  Funny how those words—a couple of times—could propel me back eight years in time to this very room. To the night Tim confessed he’d fallen in love with somebody else. Back then the pain had had a knife-edge so sharp, it took my breath away; now it was simply a dull ache. But it hadn’t gone away. “That night in the pantry,” I said, “I asked you if you’d been involved—”

  “You meant was I sleeping with her,” he interrupted. “And the answer is no.” He came over to where I was sitting and knelt at my feet, his hands resting on my knees. “She and I were done a long time ago, Vic. If she cheated on her husband, it wasn’t with me.”