Grilling the Subject

by Daryl Wood Gerber

  Aunt Vera’s mouth fell open. “He drank what?”

  “It’s a long story,” I quipped. “Ronald and Sylvia were arguing about Tina and Shane. They’re in love, it turns out.”

  “Isn’t he engaged to Emily?” Aunt Vera asked.

  “Yep.” I nodded. “And it turns out, Sylvia was jealous because she wanted Shane all to herself.”

  “She what?” Aunt Vera gaped. “But she’s—”

  “Married.” I cocked my head. “Ronald did the only rational thing. He retaliated by drinking Shane’s steak sauce.”

  Aunt Vera tsked. “What a soap opera. That Shane sure gets around.”

  “To his detriment,” I said.

  Aunt Vera continued to cluck her tongue as she wrote the newest additions on the sheet of paper and connected the names to Sylvia.

  “Do we believe Tina, by the way?” Bailey asked. “Do she and Shane have viable alibis?” She said to my aunt, “They claim they were watching the sunrise.” And turned back to me. “Did someone see them? There should have been witnesses. Lots of people stroll the beach at that hour.”

  Aunt Vera jotted the note by Tina and Shane’s names.

  “As for Emily,” Bailey went on, “like I said before, I really don’t see her being a killer, not with all the positive things she’s doing to have a healthy baby.”

  “I don’t, either,” I said, “except she wants a house and a husband. She’s been very clear about that. And she is about to lose both.”

  “Not to Sylvia,” Bailey countered.

  “True.”

  “Poor dear,” Aunt Vera said, rubbing her amulet.

  “Speaking of houses,” I said, “I wonder whether Cinnamon ever found out what Ava’s alibi was. Why was she at the house Shane is purchasing wearing dark clothes and carrying a duffel bag?”

  The telephone at the sales counter jangled. Bailey hurried to answer. “The Cookbook Nook, how may I help you?” She listened. “Yes, Chief, Jenna’s right here.” Bailey beckoned me with a finger.

  I cut a look at my aunt, who shrugged a shoulder. She wouldn’t admit she had summoned Cinnamon with ESP, but I wouldn’t put it past her. On the other hand, maybe Cinnamon had a touch of ESP herself and knew we were theorizing about the murder.

  I took the telephone receiver from Bailey. “Hi, Chief.”

  “Jenna. I—” Cinnamon hesitated. The sound of a busy precinct hummed behind her. “I’ve been talking to your father, who decided it was time to fill me in. Your husband. David.”

  “I’m sorry. I should have told you, but—”

  “No, Jenna, stop. I’m the one who should be sorry. I wish you had confided in me. I know why you didn’t. You think I’m the Wicked Witch of the East, but I’m not green or uncaring, and—”

  “West,” I corrected. “The green one is from the West. The Wicked Witch of the East is the one with the striped stockings. She died when the house landed—”

  “Jenna!” Cinnamon snapped.

  I sighed as energy seeped out of me. “I was conflicted.”

  “Please, in the future, turn to me. We’re friends.” Someone in the precinct interrupted, and she replied, “I’m ready. Jenna, I’ve got to go. Again, I’m so sorry about your husband. Let’s get together soon and catch up.” She ended the call.

  I hung up the receiver.

  Bailey knuckled me. “You forgot to ask her about Ava.”

  I dialed the precinct. The clerk informed me Cinnamon was already out the door.

  Aunt Vera said, “Jenna, a twist of fate.” She pointed to the parking lot. “Ava is right outside, farming, if that’s the correct term. You can nail this down.”

  Chapter 28

  Farming to a Realtor means concentrating all one’s advertising and marketing in one geographic location. Ava considers the flats of Crystal Cove, which was anything along the long stretch of Buena Vista Boulevard, her area to get the word out. Dressed in a smart two-piece aqua-blue skirt suit and heels, she bustled from car to car. Her toned calves from playing tennis flexed as she stretched to secure bright yellow flyers beneath the windshield wipers.

  “Ava,” I called as I hurried toward her. Aunt Vera stayed in the shop with Bailey because four customers were entering as I was leaving.

  Ava spun around and offered a big, hearty smile. “Jenna.” Her joy wilted. “Oh, Jenna, I’m so sorry. I heard . . . about your husband.” She embraced me, flyers in hand. “Wow, what a shock!”

  What a gossip mill we had in Crystal Cove, and what a reversal from the way Ava had treated me in the alley. Isn’t it amazing how one person’s bad luck can make a hostile person sympathetic?

  I pressed apart and said, “I was wondering if Chief Pritchett contacted you.”

  “She called me a couple of times”—Ava moved on to another car and slotted a flyer beneath the wiper—“but I’ve had to put her off.”

  Since when was Cinnamon so lax that she would let a suspect put her off?

  “Ava,” I said, trailing her. “You need to contact her.”

  “I will, but I’ve been running like a chicken with my head cut off. See, I listed D’Ann Davis’s house last night, and there are already three offers coming in at dusk tonight. Plus I’m having an open house there in a bit.” Ava shoved one of her flyers into my hands. It boasted, in big bold black letters: DREAM COTTAGE FOR SALE. Open today 2–5 p.m. An aerial picture of D’Ann’s house was inserted below with the address. “It’s like a feeding frenzy,” Ava went on. “Celebrity heightens the sales value of any home. Have you seen it? It’s so adorable. Red everywhere. That’s D’Ann’s color. And the porch has the most incredible view.” Ava hiccupped out a laugh. “What am I thinking? Of course you’ve seen it. Her house is right next to your father’s. I’ve gotta run. Again, Jenna, I’m so sorry about your husband.” She scurried ahead.

  “Ava, wait! I know what Chief Pritchett wanted to ask you.”

  “You do?”

  “She wants to know your alibi for the morning Sylvia died.”

  “My—” Ava jutted a hip and leveled me with an icy look. “This is all your doing, isn’t it? First, you set the police after me to find my diary, and now you demand they interrogate me? What did I do to deserve this kind of attack?”

  “You didn’t—”

  “You’re always sticking your nose into things, Jenna.”

  “No.”

  “Yes you are.” Ava skirted around the front end of a Mercedes and stuck a flyer on a red-and-white MINI Cooper. “I understood your curiosity the first time, months ago, when your friend was murdered, and even the second time when a second victim died right on your doorstep.”

  Actually, the victim to whom she was referring died right outside The Nook Café’s kitchen door.

  “This time,” Ava went on, “I appreciated the fact that you were snooping because your father was a suspect, but he’s been cleared, hasn’t he? So why are you so interested now? Why are you targeting me?”

  “You were seen in the area at the time of the murder.”

  “By whom?”

  “Tito Martinez.”

  “Him.” She grumbled while racing to the next car, “He hates me.”

  “Why would he hate you?”

  “Because I won’t advertise in the Crystal Cove Crier. I do this instead.” She brandished another flyer. “I work my rear end off.”

  “He saw you, Ava,” I said, not backing down, “at the home you’re selling to Shane Maverick. Flora Fairchild saw you, too. What could she have against you?”

  Ava balked. “Flora? I like Flora. She likes me. I sold her the darling house she owns. She hands out my business cards to her customers.”

  “Flora said she noticed you because you weren’t dressed in a suit, as you typically are.” I indicated her outfit. “You were in jeans and an overcoat and you were carrying a flashlig
ht and a big duffel over your shoulder. In fact, she said you were wearing a Japanese stick in your hair. Where is that?”

  “I—” Ava ran her tongue along her upper lip. “I wasn’t wearing one of those sticks.”

  “She said your hair was up, and the style didn’t suit you.”

  “I’m telling you my hair wasn’t anchored with a Japanese stick. I hate those things. They never hold. I used one of these.” She fished in her tote and pulled out a promotional hair gadget that involved a two-inch-square plastic card bearing her Realtor’s logo impaled with a pen. Definitely not Japanese or lethal. “These are gimmicks I give out to female buyers.”

  “So you admit you were there? At Shane’s house.”

  She pursed her lips, clearly disgruntled. “His future house, if I can hold the escrow together.”

  “Why wouldn’t you?” I recalled Emily telling me that she thought Ava was stalling the sale on purpose.

  Ava moaned. “If you must know, there are black widow spiders in the attic. Nests and nests of them. The owner didn’t reveal that little tidbit. I went in the dark of night with the exterminator to check them out because I was worried that if Shane found out, he might back out of the deal, seeing as Emily is pregnant, and, well, spiders. Ick!” Ava flapped a hand, then continued. “And you know how it goes. If one buyer backs out, then another will, and another, and my reputation could be ruined.”

  “Did any buyers back out because of Sylvia’s habit of causing a ruckus in the neighborhood?”

  “Uh-uh.” Ava shook a finger. “Don’t go spinning that tale. Sure, she was a shrew and made everyone miserable, me in particular, but I didn’t have one sale go bust because of her antics. I certainly wouldn’t kill her, even if I had.” She fished in her purse again and pulled out a business card. “Here. Call the exterminator if you want to confirm my story about the spiders. His name is Gus at Bugs R Us.”

  “Flora didn’t mention seeing an exterminator’s truck.”

  “That’s because I asked Gus to park two blocks away. The company logo is a distinctive ugly cockroach. I’m not stupid.” Ava tapped my arm. “Now, listen up. I paid Gus a lot of money to keep silent, but it’s okay if he talks to you. Tell him I said that.”

  * * *

  I returned inside the shop. Three of the customers that had entered as I exited were chatting among themselves by the culinary fiction table. Bailey was nowhere to be seen. I scooted around my aunt who was tending to a customer and, using the shop’s telephone, called Gus the exterminator.

  Gus, not believing Ava had given him the okay to talk to me, put me on hold and dialed her. When he came back on the line, he was more than happy to come clean about his pre-dawn exploration with her. He wanted to tell me about the size of the spiders they had discovered on their foray; I passed on the detailed information and ended the call, no wiser as to who killed Sylvia than when I had accosted Ava.

  While making a mental list, Katie appeared at the entrance to the breezeway. “Yoo-hoo. Treats!” she shouted and did a U-turn.

  “You are a godsend.” I followed the amazing aroma to the table where Katie was setting the basket.

  “What’s in these? Corn and what else?”

  “They’re blueberry buttermilk corn muffins.” She unfolded a checkered napkin that was keeping the muffins warm. “Try one.”

  I did. “Heaven. How I wish I could make muffins.”

  “You can.”

  “No way. Too many ingredients. My palms get sweaty whenever I see a recipe for one.”

  Katie set the basket down and planted a fist on her hip. “Jenna Hart, what is with you? Baking is like math.”

  “I did well in math.”

  “I know. Straight A’s, if I recall. You intimidated all the boys. Here’s the thing. Consider the wet ingredients are one ingredient and the dry ingredients are another ingredient.”

  “I’m not following.”

  “You set out two bowls: one large, one small. You put all the wet ingredients into the larger one and the dry ingredients into the smaller one. Now you have two ingredients.” She pulled a stack of recipe cards for the muffins from her pocket. They were neat-looking cards with a Nook Café logo in the upper left. “Take a gander.” With a finger, she outlined a portion of the directions. “See how the wet ingredients include only five things? That is one recipe. Make it.

  “Now look at the second set, which only has five things. Make it.” She underlined that section of directions. “They’re in order in the ingredient list, so you can’t mess up. Combine the two ingredients”—she curled her fingers in quotation marks for the word two—“and ta-da, you’ve made a complicated recipe simple. Yes, some chefs will give you grief and say you can’t dump ingredients in all at once, but for a beginning cook, it’s perfectly fine.” She set the stack of recipe cards beside the muffin basket. “By the way, I printed these so customers can have a takeaway and think of The Nook Café for a quick meal.”

  “Great marketing.”

  “I’m learning.” Her gaze softened. She placed a hand on my arm. “I’m so sorry about David. How are you holding up?”

  Something snagged in my heart. “It hits me about every hour. Sort of like when he died the first time. I get busy and then there’s a lull, and wham . . . David. Dead. Again.”

  “Here’s the good thing. You know it will get easier.”

  My lips started to quiver. I pressed them together and nodded. It would get easier. With time.

  “Jenna, dear.” Aunt Vera peeked into the breezeway. “Your cell phone is humming. It’s Rhett.” She handed me the cell phone and said, “When you break free, tell me about your conversation with Ava.” Then she moved to the sales counter to finish up with the customer.

  I pressed Accept on my phone. “Hi.” Tears pressed at the corners of my eyes. I needed to get past this fragile state. I hoped attending the funeral would help me. I hoped David was at peace. I hoped the SFPD weren’t giving his mother any trouble. I would bet this time they wanted to do an autopsy to make sure David was dead. Ugh.

  “Do you want company tonight?” Rhett asked.

  “Yes. Come to dinner. I’ll make muffins.”

  “Only muffins?” he teased.

  “And roast chicken.”

  “I’ll bring a salad.”

  “Excellent.”

  I returned to the sales counter; the customer had left. My aunt was organizing cash in the register.

  I said, “Aunt Vera, we need to deconstruct the window display soon.”

  “Yes, the extravaganza is winding down, but never mind that right now. What did Ava have to say for herself?”

  I told her about the spiders, adding Ava was worried that if word got out about them, she might lose the sale and one lost sale could snowball into more lost sales.

  Aunt Vera visibly shuddered. “Spiders. Creepy. Have you called Cinnamon?”

  “Ava is on her radar.”

  “Yes, but if you tell her, she’ll have one less suspect to interrogate. I’m sure she’ll appreciate the information. She’s with your father at Nuts and Bolts.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Earlier, I was at Latte Luck Café, picking up a cappuccino. They were having their weekly coffee. From there, they were heading to the precinct and then to the hardware shop. It seems Cinnamon needs a one-to-one tutorial in home renovation. He’s going to fit her with a set of tools.”

  Dad must have been the one who interrupted Cinnamon when she and I were talking.

  Aunt Vera nipped my elbow with her fingertips. “Go. The walk will do you good. I’ll tend the store.”

  “Where’s Bailey?”

  “She ran out with Tito while you were with Ava. It seems there’s some glitch with their wedding venue.”

  Bailey couldn’t be happy about that. Tito, either.

  “Go!�
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  Chapter 29

  The day was warm. No clouds blocked the sun’s glare. I was glad to be dressed in white. As I walked along Buena Vista Boulevard, I revisited Sylvia’s murder. Something that Rosie told me at the diner niggled at the edges of my mind. What was it? I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Dang!

  When I arrived at Nuts and Bolts, a Closed sign hung on the door.

  “Looking for your father?” Flora Fairchild waved from the doorway of her shop, the closest store in what I called our mini–San Francisco, an aqua-blue-and-white complex composed of eight narrow, two-story bayside structures, each with porthole-style windows. “He and Chief Pritchett”—she pointed down the street—“went to the smoothie shop.”

  I chuckled. Were they grazing through the morning; first, coffee, and then something more substantial, all so Cinnamon could learn how to renovate her home? I thanked Flora and made a U-turn.

  In the lingerie shop past Home Sweet Home, the owner was already re-dressing her window with the Beach Reads theme: men’s red robes hung on racks with red-hot thriller novels poking from the robes’ pockets; ladies’ red peignoirs and red-feathered satin masks were draped on top of steamy romance novels. I gave the owner a thumbs-up sign. She waved hello.

  Continuing on, I negotiated my way through a knot of customers heading into Artiste Arcade. A For Sale sign hung in the display window at Sterling Sylvia. Ronald, looking ruddier and spryer than he had at the diner, was inside the shop chatting with a wealthy local dowager. The woman, who had oodles of money and way too much time on her hands, was taking notes on a legal pad. Was she considering buying the place? Ronald moved about the shop, gesturing gracefully to displays à la a Home Shopping Channel model.

  Seeing the display in the front window gave me pause. In the time since I had last passed by, Ronald had created a memorial for Sylvia. A silver-framed picture of her stood in the center of a wealth of jewelry, and I was struck by how skinny yet stunning Sylvia had been with her silver-white hair and her fondness for the color silver: silver clothing, silver eye shadow, ornate three-tiered silver earrings, and—