After we closed up the truck and I ran the deposit to the bank, I picked up Sabine in the old Buick and headed to the restaurant. Sabine suggested parking a few blocks from their door, and I had to admit under the circumstances, I agreed with her. You can’t exude trendy in an old Buick that once belonged to your parents.
Sabine had obviously dressed for the occasion. She was wearing a form-fitting royal blue dress that made her look like a celebrity and was vaguely reminiscent of the dress Carona had worn to the truck. I wore a nice dress as well, but I was born Irish, and I’ll always look it. I’m never going to be the beauty that Sabine is. Sometimes I worry that Land will want someone more attractive, like his sister, but he always reassures me that I’m the one.
The décor was stunning; a black and white pattern permeated the entire space. The entire room had been painted white. The floor was a black and white pattern that led into the dining area of the restaurant. The walls held canvasses of various colors, a single shade to each canvas, and the tablecloths alternated between black and white.
The place was beautiful, and for a minute, I wished that my wedding reception could be held there, but I tamped down those feelings quickly. I knew that if I did have it there, I wouldn’t be able to afford the other dreams I was planning.
The maître d' sat us at a table in the middle of the dining area. We were on display there, and I was glad, knowing that if Carona were there, she would have to see us. I thought I saw a state senator at another table, and the anchor from the nightly news sat across from a girl young enough to be his daughter, but obviously wasn’t. Sabine looked at the menu and her eyes grew large. “Hope you brought some money,” she said as she flipped the page on the menu. “This is not for the working class.”
I opened my menu and felt the same. The filet was $45, and the salmon was a cool $30. I wished that Land and I had come here together, so he could see this with me, but he would have told Danvers about my hunch, and I wanted to be the first to find Carona and ask her what she was up to.
“So what’s your plan?” Sabine asked, taking a look around the space. “I don’t see her, but I’m not really sure who I’m looking for. From her name, I’m guessing Spanish perhaps. The accent was definitely Basque, but you can fake a good accent,” she said in a believable British accent.
Her glance at Carona had been brief and from an angle within the truck. I described Carona as best I could without being too catty. On a couple of phrases Sabine translated my words into what I really felt about the woman. I guessed that my bias was showing through, but I was glad that Sabine was on my side in the matter.
I looked around as well, but saw no indication of her presence. “My first thought was that she works here. There’s absolutely no way to give that clue if you’re only going to be at the meeting spot for lunch on Tuesdays. She’d need to be here more consistently. Some people might write the place off the list after one visit.” The far wall had two doors that presumably lead into the food preparation areas and the kitchen. I wanted to get a chance to look in those rooms, but in a fancy establishment like this, I was sure that they would not permit me to just wander back there.
Sabine took a sip of the water in front of her. “Both of Land’s wives are in food service. Coincidence? I think not.”
I threw her a mean look and thought about bringing up Danvers, but I knew she was jesting. She had on more than one occasion told me that she was looking forward to having me in the family. So I would let her comments go for the moment.
“I’m just not sure where she’d be here.” I scanned the room again for the woman, but no one matched her description based on my few minutes visit with her. I wondered if she had been adept at disguises. She could have been here now, but I saw no one with dark hair and of her height. I knew that so much on a woman could change with the help of cosmetics, wigs and stilettos. Facial structures and heights were about all that couldn’t be changed on the run.
“In the kitchen area,” Sabine said. “If she’s truly in hiding, then she wouldn’t want to be working in front of that large plate glass window. It’s like an advertisement—a strong desire to be seen.”
I nodded. Now we just needed a plan to get in the back of the restaurant. “Any thoughts on that?”
Sabine smiled. “You can always use the old line that you got lost on the way to the restrooms. It works.”
We made it through the appetizer of calamari, and a Cobb salad with a twist on their cheese selections. Sabine had ordered a T-bone steak, and I’d gone with the smallest filet on the menu. It was still going to be expensive in terms of detecting, but it was fun to be out and enjoying life. I couldn’t help but think that I’d be doing this in Europe soon.
We were looking at the menu for the desserts, when I saw her. Carona walked through the door that likely led to the kitchen. I barely recognized her with a white jacket covering her figure and an unflattering hairnet. It felt good for a second to see her dressed in more mundane clothing.
I stood up. “Excuse me,” I said in a loud voice.
Three things happened at once. Carona turned, saw me, and sprinted through the door. Before I could shout after her, the table exploded. A sudden hole pierced my menu on the table, and a woman screamed. A few tables away, a man had gotten to his feet as well, and he was pointing a gun in my direction. He had dark hair styled in a bowl cut and black eyes with a slightly Slavic appearance.
Realizing what was going on, I turned over the table, hearing the loud crash that brought the room to its feet. I grabbed Sabine, who just sat there transfixed. The diners nearest to the door were running out as fast as they could, while those back by the kitchen were either cowering under their tables or attempting to flee. The man didn’t seem to want them dead, though he motioned the gun in their direction to make them move back.
I could only see this because I’d had the good sense to put a compact in my purse, and the mirror at an angle showed me what was going on with the man. Sabine, who had been quiet, rummaged on the floor, picking up the silverware around us. I wasn’t sure what type of person cleaned up in the face of an armed stand-off, but that was her response, and who was I to judge.
I watched as another man strode out of the kitchen with his hand gripped tightly around Carona’s upper arm. He had pinned her arm behind her back, and walked her up to where the gunman stood. He was definitely the muscles of the team. His jacket strained over his powerful form, and he couldn’t have buttoned the jacket on a dare. I could see his holster in the compact mirror.
Sabine gazed in the compact’s mirror. The gunman had turned to face Carona and wasn’t looking in our direction. I was unsure what to do now. I could try to get to my phone, which had fallen out of my purse when I flipped the table. I hoped I could get it before they could fire a shot. Yet that would have brought undue attention to us, and that was the last thing I wanted at this point. I wanted to be just another scared patron until I figured out a plan.
Sabine leaned forward and threw one of the knives at the men. Before they could react, she threw two more. The first hit the gunman in the hand, and the second sliced open the arm of the man holding Carona. I had been worried about her ability to cut the ingredients for condiments, and here she was flinging knives like she was the main event at the circus. I was in shock. Sabine put a finger to her lips and waited. We could see the gunman put his gun down on one of the tables and wrap his hand in an all-white cloth napkin. The man holding Carona had let go as well. She looked at the two men who were attending their own wounds.
Without a hesitation, she grabbed the gun. The two men backed up to the wall. Carona called to one of the men under a table. When he approached her, they talked for a second, and he took the gun, pointing it directly at the two men.
Before I could even stand up, Carona had left through the kitchen door. Sabine and I stood up in tandem, and we sprinted for the door, but she was long gone. We made it to the alleyway, but at the exit door, we saw no sign of her. She could have gon
e in any number of directions, and there were only two of us.
We stood in the doorway, panting. “Where the hell did you learn to throw knives like that?” I asked Sabine.
She shrugged it off. “Land taught me when I was a kid, and then I just kept practicing. I don’t get to use it much,” she replied with a smile. “Not much cause for it in Capital City.”
I watched her face as I told her the next piece of information. “If he’s not here already, you know that Danvers will be here in a few minutes, right?”
She nodded. “I thought about that earlier, but it seemed selfish to let my grudge get in the way of saving that woman’s life. I can deal with him. I have two more knives in my pocket.”
“That’s big of you,” I said with a smile.
Of course, my words were prescient. Danvers was in the restaurant within a matter of minutes. He hadn’t been informed of our involvement in the matter, and his jaw dropped when he saw the two of us dressed up and waiting for the police to take our information and let us leave.
“I’ll handle this one,” he said to the police officer, pointing at me. He was not happy to see me.
“What the hell are you doing here?” he asked. I could literally see the realization of the clue and the restaurant show on his face. “You solved her little puzzle and came here to talk to her yourself. You can’t do that.”
“I didn’t get to talk to her. Sabine and I were just having a leisurely meal.” I proceeded to tell him the entire story of what had happened. Danvers called to the maître d', who came over. He looked at the two of us suspiciously.
He confirmed that the restaurant had security cameras, and the police were welcome to the footage if it would help explain what had happened.
The two men, now in handcuffs, were being escorted out of the building. Sabine watched the second one intently.
“Do you know him?” I whispered to her.
She nodded. “The shorter one looks familiar, but I can’t place him just yet. It will come to me.”
The shorter man was the one who had brought Carona back into the dining area. He had dark hair with pale skin that spoke of years indoors. I wondered if perhaps he’d been in prison, his skin was so fair. His eyes were small and ferret-like though, and they lingered a moment too long on us for my comfort. I didn’t want them to remember me or anything else about today.
The other man, who was also dark-haired, didn’t look anything like Land or his sister. So whatever was going on here, it had little to do with their homeland. I hoped that it had little to do with them at all.
Danvers waited until the two men were gone before he spoke again. “You obviously recognized the one man. Where do you know him from?” he asked Sabine. To my knowledge that was the first thing he’d said to her since they’d officially broken up. It wasn’t much in terms of a reconciliation or even a détente, but it was worth something.
She shrugged. “He looks familiar, but I can’t place him at all. Give me some time, and I’ll come up with it. Or you could just ask my brother. He’ll know where we know him from.”
“I sent him a snapshot already. He doesn’t recognize him at all. Just you. So what gives?” Danvers was showing all the signs of annoyance that I knew so well.
Sabine just shrugged. “I told you I don’t know. What’s his name?”
“They’re not talking, so we don’t know that yet. I’ll definitely be around to tell you after we find out who he is and what he was doing here.”
Sabine rolled her eyes. “My heart be still.”
While I heard the sparring going on between them, I struggled in my brain to think of how Sabine could know a paid killer, when her brother, who had kicked around the world and gone on dangerous missions, did not. The places where she could have known him without Land’s presence were few and far between.
I started working on the areas where their lives had diverged and what could have led her to know this man. Land had been gone while she was younger, and while they had both lived in Capital City for the past several years, Sabine had been in college whereas Land had worked with me. Personally, I was willing to bet that we’d met far more criminals in the last few years than she had.
Danvers cleared his throat. Apparently he’d been talking to me, but I’d been lost in my own thoughts. “What?” I asked.
“Why were you here?” Danvers asked. “As if I didn’t know.”
“Just checking out a place for the reception. I love the décor,” I said, and then gushed about the monochromatic canvasses for good measure.
“Yeah, well save that for Land. He’s on his way.” Danvers made it sound like a threat. I knew that Land would not be happy with my presence here, but on the other hand, he’d had the same clues that I had. I’d just got the correct solution first.
After that, we went through a detailed account of what had happened. I didn’t spare anything from what we ordered to seeing Carona being manhandled by the two men. I spent a certain amount of time telling Danvers about Sabine’s talent with the knives. I wasn’t sure if he knew about that skill or not, but given that he’d made her angry, I thought it best to highlight her self-defense talents.
I was getting ready to go through the account once again when Land showed up. He ran up and gave me a long hug. I could almost feel the fear rising off of him, and for a moment, I felt guilty that I’d caused him worry. That hadn’t been my intention. I had just wanted to prove to myself that my hunch had been right. I’d had no desire to get into a knife fight with gunmen at a trendy restaurant.
“What the hell were you thinking?” he asked as soon as he was certain that no one had shot me. I knew that the tender moment would only last so long.
“I just came here to see if I was right. After all, I’ve heard of all the restaurants in town because of the wedding. So it was the first thing that popped into my mind.”
“You could have told me. I’ve been worried to death about you since Danvers sent me that photo.” He moved me out of Danvers’ range. “She was here?”
I nodded. “Until the shooting started. I thought that we might be able to get some information out of the owner. She has to have filed certain personal information in order to get a job. Social Security number, address, things like that. He might be able to give us a lead on her.”
Land took a deep breath. “I’m sure that Danvers will think of that too.”
“But he can use the social security number and things like that. We could use a phone number or address,” I suggested. “We can still use low tech and find her before he does.”
“Maybe,” Land replied. “This isn’t her first time doing this sort of thing. She’ll have been careful as to what she wrote on her employment records. It’s not as if we could walk right up to her house and knock. If we could have done that, she’d have just sent us her address.”
I saw his point. The use of the puzzles was a way to ensure that only a dedicated thinker could find her location. Even so, I bet there were other clues on the employment application. I went back to give Danvers my story one more time, and Land waited off to the side.
The plan was that I would keep Danvers busy by asking a few questions about the case, which he would then argue with me about. Land could go back to the offices and see what he could find out about the employment application.
Danvers grew frustrated quickly with my questions about carrying arms in a public place, the chances of Sabine being charged for knife throwing along with his bias there, and a few other things. By the time he realized what I was doing, Land was standing along the wall near where the door to the kitchen was located. I wasn’t sure if he’d only made it that far, or if he’d accomplished what he’d set out to do.
Finally, Danvers let us leave, though he insisted that he’d want a signed statement from Sabine and me. I agreed for the two of us, since Sabine had returned to not speaking to him.
We made it down the block to the Buick before I spoke. “Did you find out anything?”
; Land smiled and nodded. “I’m only going to share this with you on one condition. You’re not to go gallivanting off without me to investigate this. ‘Til death do us part, remember?”
“Not for nine more days,” I reminded him. “But yeah, deal,” I said, knowing that he had the upper hand here. I couldn’t do anything if I didn’t know what information he’d uncovered.
He showed me his phone where he’d taken two photos, representing both pages of the employment application. “It was lying on the manager’s desk. It wasn’t a big deal to take a few photos of it.”
He enlarged the photo for me. Carona’s address was shown as “234 Main Street.” It sounded achingly fake. I was surprised that a well-run restaurant would have accepted that address. It would have set off alarms for me.
“I checked. It’s a warehouse. I’m doubting that we’ll find anything there. Even if she was living there, she’s sure to be gone now,” Land said.
“What about the phone number?” I asked, pushing the photo over to see the rest of the page.
I snorted. The number read “8675309.” I rolled my eyes.
Neither Land nor Sabine understood the reference. Since they’d likely been living in their hometown 6000 miles from here, I bet they didn’t have the same exposure to 1980s pop music as the rest of us. The telephone number was one of the most popular of all phony numbers, coming from a pop song called “Jenny.” I wondered how Carona knew this if Land and Sabine didn’t. Had she heard the song at the time, or had she learned it later? In either case, the phone number was worthless to us as a clue.
For her employment history, she’d had the gall to list my food trucks as her work history for the past year. She indicated that she’d wanted to move to a more upscale venue as her reason for leaving. I was annoyed. First, this trendy restaurant had not even bothered to check her employment history, and secondly, she felt that the food trucks weren’t good enough for her.
That meant that the warehouse was the likeliest option here. I started looking up information about the warehouse on-line. It belonged to a local grocer, who apparently used it for storing prepackaged frozen foods. It wasn’t the type of place that people would go for fun, so a person could likely find some quiet and seclusion there.
FOOD TRUCK MYSTERIES: The Complete Series (14 Books) Page 114