Dan’s eyebrows went up. “Maybe. I didn’t think of that. I’m not sure I would know what to look for. You would, though, wouldn’t you? Want to take a look at it?”
“I thought you’d never ask.”
“First thing tomorrow, then.”
“First thing.”
I’d texted Garrett from the car, so he was waiting for us when we got back to the house. “I need to walk Sprocket,” I told him.
“Let’s go, then.”
“Don’t be too long,” Dan said. “Dinner will get cold.”
“You’d be amazed at what I can do with a cold Costco chicken.” I snapped Sprocket’s leash on.
“Nope. I wouldn’t. I’d expect miracles and you would meet expectations and then some.” He went inside, and Garrett and I headed off for the lighthouse.
“So what’s your plan for tomorrow?” he asked. “It’d be nice to have a sense of where you’re going to be.”
“I’ll be at the diner with Megan.” I pulled the collar of my coat up against the growing chill in the air.
We’d walked a few blocks in silence when he said, “So am I forgiven yet?”
I thought about it. I didn’t actually like being mad at him. “I’m thinking about it.”
“Are you thinking about anything else?” he asked. “Like maybe what we talked about in the courtroom?”
“You mean your non-proposal?” I pulled my collar up tighter. “It’s crossed my mind.”
“Can you give me an indication of which way you’re leaning?” He took my arm as we stepped down off a curb.
I turned to face him, grabbed him by the lapels of his coat and laid a big, fat, sloppy kiss on him. By the time I was done, I wasn’t cold anymore. I was pretty sure he wasn’t, either.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” he said, sounding slightly out of breath and pulling me even closer to him.
“Don’t,” I said. “I didn’t say yes. I just let you know which way I was leaning.”
Fourteen
It was eight thirty in the morning and we were huddled around Dan’s computer. I’d spent the day before at the diner prepping and doing some publicity work. Everything was in place or as in place as it could be until this afternoon when the last-minute preparations would need to be made. So we were going to make some headway on the investigation. By we, I mean Dan, Vera, Glenn, Garrett, Sprocket and me. “What are we looking for?” Glenn asked.
“I’m not sure yet. There might not be anything, but I think it’s worth looking. If you see anything that might give a hint as to who’s behind the camera, say something,” Dan said.
“What kind of hint?” Vera asked.
“Anything would help at this point. Maybe we could figure out how tall the person taping was.” Dan looked doubtful.
Huerta thought for a second. “Unless they were using a tripod.”
“Ooh! Good point. If the tape is really steady, they were likely using a tripod or something else to steady the camera. It’s ridiculously hard to keep a handheld video camera steady,” I said. I’d learned that from hanging around the set of Antoine’s television show.
Dan hit play. First we saw the empty parking lot behind the church, then a car pulled in. Justin Cruz got out of the car and looked around as if he was checking to see if anyone was watching. He then walked quickly across the parking lot to the back door of the church and after once again glancing around, let himself into the building.
The scene played out again, but with a different date and time stamp on it. Then it played out a third time. Dan hit pause. “Anything? Anybody?”
“It was definitely being steadied on something,” I said. “What about the angle? It’s like whoever it was knew exactly where to position the camera to get a clear shot of Justin’s face as he got out of the car and right before he let himself into the church.”
Huerta shook his head. “I’m trying to visualize the parking lot. I can’t quite figure that out.”
Dan stood up. “Field trip!”
• • •
It took a while to gather up everything we thought we might need. A laptop to watch the video on. A camera to see if we could duplicate the shot. A tripod. String. I’d given Vera a funny look as she put that last item in the box. “Haven’t you ever seen that on TV? How they take string to show how bullets would go, or blood spatter?”
I shrugged. It wasn’t like it would hurt.
We all piled into our vehicles and drove to the church. “Huerta, go let Reverend Lee know we’re here and what we’re up to.”
Huerta nodded and knocked on the back entrance. No one answered. He turned back and shrugged. “I don’t think he’s here.”
“Let’s get set up, then,” Dan said. “Garrett, you’re about the same height as Justin. Go stand by the door.”
Garrett did as he was told. Then with Vera holding up a laptop with the blackmail video playing, Huerta started moving around the edge of the parking lot in the trees to see if he could get the same angle on the video camera.
“You’re too far away,” Vera said. “Maybe it was zoomed in.”
“It can’t have been zoomed in. If it was, you wouldn’t be able to get the car in the frame, too.” I looked over her shoulder.
Vera shook her head. “Okay, then you have to take a few steps forward.”
“That doesn’t make any sense, either. Back here in the trees is the only place to hide,” Huerta said.
“Figure out how to match the view and then let’s figure out what makes sense, okay?” Dan said. “Our job is to collect evidence.”
Huerta took a few more steps forward with the video camera and stopped. Vera stood next to him and the two looked back and forth. “This is it,” Vera said. “We have the exact same view.”
Dan looked over their shoulders. “Okay. Now try zooming out and moving back toward the trees.”
Huerta did and then shook his head. “Doesn’t work.”
Dan took off his hat and scratched his forehead. “No. It doesn’t.”
For the next twenty minutes, the three of them moved around the parking lot two to three steps at a time, shook their heads and then came back to basically the center of the lot.
“It doesn’t make sense,” Vera insisted. “If the camera was set up here, there’s absolutely no way that Justin wouldn’t have seen it.”
“Which can only mean one thing,” Dan said.
“Justin knew the video was being shot,” I said.
“Which would only make sense,” Dan continued.
“If Justin was planning on being blackmailed,” I finished.
“Or if he blackmailed himself,” Dan said.
We exchanged a look. It reminded of when we were in high school and could have an entire conversation with a few glances.
“Why on earth would anyone blackmail themselves?” Garrett came over to look back and forth between the computer and the video camera. “That makes absolutely no sense.”
“It’s like the worst humblebrag in the history of humblebrags.” Vera sounded disgusted.
“What the hell is a humblebrag?” Garrett looked over at me, his brow furrowed.
“Does he live under a bridge or something?” Vera asked.
“No. I honestly think he might be so good and pure he doesn’t even hear about things like humblebrags.” I turned to Garrett. “A humblebrag is when you point out something about yourself as if it’s bad so that people notice something good about you.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Let’s say Dan says something about how it’s so hard for him to buy decent shirts because his shoulders are too broad for regular dress shirts. He makes it sound like it’s something bad: He can’t buy decent shirts. But in the process he points out how broad his shoulders are.”
Garrett nodded. “Oh. Now I get it. So Justin gets
up and makes this big brave announcement about being blackmailed so he can show everybody how he was trying to do good deeds at the church without taking credit, thus making sure that everyone knows he should get the credit.”
“Yes! I knew you’d get it!” I clapped.
“So he actually blackmailed himself to do that.” He shook his head. “That’s really pretty funny.”
“You know what might be funnier?” Dan asked.
“What?”
“Poisoning the popcorn that was supposed to be yours and then sending it off to someone else so it would look like someone was trying to kill you.”
No one laughed.
I started to feel really cold. “That’s too crazy, Dan. No one would do that.”
“I’ll admit, it’s crazier than setting up an elaborate fake blackmailing scheme to out yourself as a Good Samaritan, which is crazier than blackmailing two of your opponents for a seat on the city council to get them out of the way, but how much crazier is it?” Dan looked grim.
I took a few steps backward as if I could distance myself from the thought. “A lot crazier, Dan. A man died. Anything you do deliberately that causes the death of another human being is basically at the very top of the craycray pyramid.”
“What if he didn’t intend for anyone else to die?” Vera asked. “The coroner said that Lloyd wouldn’t have died from eating that popcorn if he hadn’t had a bad heart or if someone else had been around when he got sick. He would have gotten the medical attention he needed and he would have been fine.”
“What do we do?” I asked, feeling sick all over again at the thought of someone dying because they ate my popcorn, even if it wasn’t my fault.
Dan straightened his shoulders. “We arrest him for blackmail and then we sweat him.”
“Sweat him? We’re taking him for a shvitz?” I asked.
Dan rolled his eyes. “We’ll interrogate him.”
“Oh. That makes more sense than wanting to make sure his pores were clear.” I glanced at my watch. “Can you take me over to the diner now?”
“Tonight’s the night?” Dan asked.
“Yep.” Butterflies took up residence in my stomach. “Tonight’s the night Megan and I show Grand Lake how it’s done.”
• • •
I’d convinced Megan to close for the afternoon. She did a fairly brisk trade in coffee and pie around three thirty, but I assured her it would be worth it. It would give us some time to goose up the décor along with the food. Some white tablecloths. Some simple votive candles. It didn’t take much to completely change the atmosphere. Again, it was a matter of tweaks. Just like it was in the kitchen. Fresh mushrooms instead of canned. Homemade stock instead of stuff from a box. Fresh herbs instead of dried from a jar. Suddenly the diner went from being meh to swell!
Dario was already there when I arrived, chopping mountains of onions and mushrooms and snipping up fresh herbs. I walked in, gave Sprocket a treat and tied on my apron. It wasn’t long before we had a rhythm going for our prep. Megan, Dario and me. Who would have thought? Dario turned on the radio. Our rhythm picked up.
It was like a dance, but not just with our bodies. We danced with our sense of smell and our sense of taste. We moved to the beat of scent and sound. We bowed before the steam and pirouetted around our saucepans.
It was so good to be back in a kitchen again. I hadn’t realized how very much I’d missed it. I hadn’t noticed how heavy my heart had become until it lifted. Cooking wasn’t just my job, it was my joy. Cooking never let me down.
All of which left me extra dismayed when we unlocked the doors at five thirty and there was no one outside to barge in.
“Where is everybody?” I asked, turning to look at Megan.
Megan looked distinctly as if she’d bitten into a lemon. “Yeah. Where are they?”
I didn’t understand. I’d gotten people to tweet about it and the Sentinel to run a piece and put up flyers. There should be a line out the door, down the street, around the corner and halfway to Toledo. Instead there wasn’t anybody.
“Maybe it’s too early.” I bit my lip.
Megan gave me a look. “Do you know how many farmers eat here? Five thirty is late for dinner for them.”
“You have regulars, right?” Dario asked, leaning out the door to look down the sidewalk.
She glared at me. “Of course I have regulars. Who doesn’t have regulars?”
“Regulars you could call and ask if they’re coming? Maybe offer them a free dessert to entice them?” Dario suggested.
She sighed. “I could maybe do that.” She headed back toward the office.
I stayed at the front door and chewed my lip harder.
My phone dinged. It was a text from Haley: Save us a table.
I texted back: No problem.
Then I contemplated going to the bathroom to cry.
In the end, Megan and Dario and I had five people at our grand opening. Six if you count baby Emily, although she didn’t actually order so it seemed like a stretch to count her as a customer. Haley, Dan, Garrett and Evan were at one table. Antoine was at the other.
“Why are you here?” I asked Antoine after seating him. He had on a shirt and shoes, so he was going to get service.
He smiled up at me. “I would never miss an opportunity to eat your cooking, chérie. Surely you know that by now.”
He’d missed plenty of opportunities when we’d been married, but it seemed smarter to let that vichyssoise run under that particular bridge at the moment.
He opened the newly printed menu and asked, “What do you suggest?”
I hesitated. I knew I should probably tell him I didn’t care what he ordered, but he had such a good and educated palate. It wouldn’t hurt to get his opinion on a couple of things. “Try either the popcorn soup or the beer cheese soup with the popcorn garnish.”
“Any particular reason?” he asked.
“I’m trying to figure out if we’ve put too much emphasis on the fennel instead of the basil. I can’t decide and Megan thinks I’m crazy.”
“Done. One popcorn soup. What else?”
“The wedge salad and then for dessert the vanilla ice cream with the caramel and chocolate popcorn garnish,” I said in a rush. “Are we overdoing the Green Goddess dressing with the salad and are we putting enough popcorn on the ice cream?”
“I cannot wait. It sounds lovely.” He handed me the menu. “As are you.”
I didn’t feel very lovely. Not lovely at all. I felt dejected and sad and frustrated, but we’d already cooked the food. It seemed a shame not to serve at least some of it.
• • •
After we closed the diner, Garrett and I walked home. It was cold but not windy, and I needed to clear my head. What had gone wrong? Why hadn’t anyone come? Even if it had been a few of Megan’s regulars, they could have tasted the food and told other people. My heart was heavy and my head was spinning. The cold air helped, but only a little.
“You sure spent a lot of time at Antoine’s table,” Garrett observed.
“I wanted to know if there was too much fennel in the popcorn soup.” I kicked at a pebble on the sidewalk.
“You didn’t ask me if I thought there was too much fennel in the popcorn soup. I have a mouth. I have taste buds. I have opinions.” He jammed his hands into the pockets of his jacket.
“No. I didn’t ask you about that. I also don’t ask Antoine about legal matters. You know the law. He knows food.” It seemed perfectly obvious to me.
“I know food.” He seemed to be very interested in his feet at the moment, not meeting my gaze at all.
How on earth was I going to explain this? “No. You don’t. You eat food. You’re lovely to cook for. You’re the most appreciative audience, but you’re just an eater.”
Garrett stopped walking. “Just an eater? That
’s how you see me? As an eater?”
I stopped, too. “Of course I see you as more than an eater. I see you as a smart, handsome, kind, lovely man who I love to spend time with. But in the kitchen, you’re an eater. I don’t see you as a fellow chef.”
He stared up at the branches of the elm trees that sheltered the street. “I suppose that’s fair. I don’t like it, but I guess it’s fair.”
I slid my arms around his waist and rested my head against his chest. “It would be nice if something tonight were fair.”
• • •
The next morning, I’d been up for close to an hour by the time Garrett got out of bed and through the shower. “What’s that heavenly smell?” he asked.
“It’s a frittata.” I slid the pan out of the oven. The frittata had begun to brown on top, but was still fluffy beneath. I set it on the counter and set a timer for five minutes to let it cool so it could set up before slicing but would still be hot.
Garrett looked at it with longing. “Is it for your sister?” he asked.
I shook my head and took a step closer to him. He smelled like shampoo and shaving cream and toothpaste. His dark hair was still wet.
He smiled. “Is it for me?” he asked.
I nodded and took another step. There wasn’t any space left between us anymore.
“Okay if I say I love you again?” he asked.
It was nice to hear it when it was just the two of us alone. No courtroom. No audience. No pressure. Just truth. I nodded harder and then kissed him. Hard. With feeling. Frittatas are good cold, too, after all.
A little later, I propped myself up on one elbow in bed. “You know what I think I should investigate today?” I said.
“No.” Garrett pulled me back down to rest my head on his chest.
“Do you want to know?” I asked.
For a second it seemed like he was going to make some kind of smart-ass remark. Then instead, he said, “Very much so.”
I pulled back for a second, ever so slightly stunned. “I think we should investigate the second poisoning. It’s got to be related, but I don’t quite see how. I can’t see the connection.”
Garrett sat up. “Well, the obvious answer is you. You and your popcorn are the connection between Lloyd McLaughlin and Marta Hansen being poisoned.”
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