On the Lamb
Page 16
Niari’s team began to line up and shoot balls into the net. Soon after, the referees arrived, a man and a woman dressed in striped yellow tops, black shorts, and cleats. With a blast of the whistle, the game started, and players from both teams ran up and down the field. For the first half they battled it out, both teams a good match. No one scored, but Niari played well in midfield.
“Go, Niari!” Lucy shouted, when her niece had an opportunity to score. Niari shot, but the goalie stopped the ball from flying into the net.
“Keep up the pressure!” Sally and Emma both yelled.
At halftime, Emma went to talk with fellow parents from Niari’s team, and Lucy was left alone with Sally.
“How’s Melanie?” Sally asked.
“Not great.”
“We all know she didn’t do it. She’s a candy maker, for heaven’s sake, not a killer.” Sally eyed Lucy. “Have you or Katie found any leads?”
Lucy’s hands were jammed into her jacket pockets. “What makes you think we’re digging into things?”
“Oh, please. I know you too well, Lucy. I’ve been with your family for years, and just because your mom and Azad want you to stay out of things doesn’t mean you should. You want to help others. It’s part of your personality.” Sally leaned close and whispered, “And I think it’s great.”
Lucy was grateful and relieved for Sally’s support. She wasn’t just a longtime waitress, but a good friend. “Okay. I confess. Katie and I have been asking some questions, but we haven’t had much luck. I’m afraid I won’t be able to help my friend.”
Sally squeezed her arm. “I don’t believe that. Keep digging. Melanie needs you. Meanwhile, I’ll keep my ears open at the restaurant. People talk about all sorts of things after a satisfying meal.”
“Thanks, Sally.”
Another blast of the whistle and the second half of the game began. As time ticked by, both sides tried to score, but with no luck. Then, Niari passed the ball to a teammate who took a shot and scored.
“Great assist!” Emma yelled out.
A few minutes later, Niari had a breakaway of her own, took the shot, and the ball flew into the corner of the net.
The three women cheered and clapped. “I knew my niece could do it!” Lucy said.
“You must be good luck,” Emma said. “Niari will want you at all her games.”
Lucy wouldn’t mind. Another benefit of returning home was spending time with her niece. The game ended with a two-zero win. The players made their way to their parents and Lucy gave Niari a big hug.
“Winner’s choice. Ice cream or funnel cake on the boardwalk?” Lucy said.
“What about both?” Niari asked.
“It’s fine by me if it’s okay with your mom.”
Emma nodded. “I did promise her something special if she scored. We’ll meet you on the boardwalk.”
Lucy nodded. She needed to use the ladies’ room before leaving the soccer field. “I’ll meet you by the Freezy Cone.” She waved and headed for a redbrick building near the parking lot.
Thank God, the town had real bathrooms, no porta-potties. On her way back out, she spotted a man with a hoodie pulled over his baseball cap that shadowed his face. He pushed away from the brick wall just as she stepped outside and made her way to the parking lot.
Footsteps scraped on the blacktop behind her. She glimpsed back to see he was about ten feet away.
An unbidden image of the dark figure on the beach sprang to mind. She couldn’t confirm it, but she could have sworn that the figure had turned to look at her while she had been sitting on her patio with Gadoo.
She had a strange feeling the same man was following her now.
Most of the players and their families had already left the field; only a few remained in the parking lot. She spotted a couple of teenagers playing with a ball in a far field.
She picked up her pace. The unmistakable sound of footsteps told her he had as well.
Her Toyota came into view. Pressing the fob, she unlocked her car and quickly slid inside. She shut the door and immediately locked it. The man walked right by.
A glance in her rearview mirror revealed he was gone.
He must have cut through the parked cars to find his own.
She released a held-in breath. She was being paranoid. It was bright daylight. One shout and someone would have come running.
No one was following her.
* * *
As soon as Lucy parked by the boardwalk, she pulled out her cell and dialed Katie.
“Ocean Crest Town Hall.”
“It’s me. Did Bill mention any unsavory men lingering around town?”
“No, why?” Katie asked.
“I had the weird feeling I was being followed to my car by a man leaving Niari’s soccer game today,” Lucy said.
Katie’s tone was serious over the phone. “Following you? Did you recognize him?”
“No. He wore a baseball cap and a hoodie. I couldn’t see his face clearly.” She bit her lower lip. “I know it sounds silly.”
“It doesn’t sound silly at all. Our instincts exist to protect us. You should have called Bill.”
“I will next time. But it turned out to be nothing. I got in my car and the guy walked right by.” Lucy hesitated, then decided to tell Katie her other story. “I also spotted a dark figure on the beach a couple of evenings ago. He was walking on the dunes and stopped to look up to where I was sitting on my patio. He didn’t linger; it was only a couple of seconds, and then he just turned around and disappeared on the beach.”
“Now you’re starting to sound a bit paranoid,” Katie said.
“I know, right?”
“Bill hasn’t mentioned anyone loitering around town. The bikers have been a pretty calm bunch. They ride in the day, and most go to Mac’s Pub at night or walk on the boardwalk. But I’ll ask him.”
“Thanks.” It put Lucy’s mind at ease knowing that Bill was always there for both of them. He was still a beat cop who patrolled the town. If something was amiss, he would know it. Meanwhile, Niari was waiting to celebrate her winning goal.
Lucy hung up the phone and headed to the boardwalk for ice cream.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Bright and early the next morning, Lucy arrived at the restaurant to find her mother already stirring a large pot on the stove. Her signature beehive was perfectly arranged and the gold cross she always wore gleamed in the fluorescent lighting. Lucy knew better than to ask why her semiretired parent was here at five forty in the morning. For thirty years, Angela had risen early and arrived in the kitchen to prep for the upcoming day. Angela was an exceptional cook, taught by her own mother and mother-in-law. For years, her Armenian, Lebanese, and Greek dishes drew patrons from Ocean Crest and out of town. Like Madame Vega, her mother was a fixture in the town, not on the boardwalk, but in the restaurant.
Old habits die hard.
Her father, Raffi, didn’t have this problem and had slipped into retirement a bit more easily. He often spent his mornings at Lola’s Coffee Shop, drinking coffee with friends.
“You’re late,” her mother said as she cast Lucy a look over her shoulder.
Lucy glanced at the clock on the kitchen wall. “By ten minutes.”
“It’s still late.”
Lucy knew better than to argue with her mother, especially this early. Lucy eyed the empty coffee urn. She needed caffeine if she was going to make it through the morning. She turned her attention back to the stove. “What’s on the menu?”
“Kebab yepvatz lolig.”
Lamb kebabs with tomato sauce.
“Just like my mother-in-law prepared it. It’s practice for when you host Easter.
It went without saying that Lucy needed the practice.
Lucy took a deep breath. The dishes were growing more and more complicated. She’d recently “mastered” hummus, baklava made with phyllo dough that was as thin as sheets of newspaper, and stuffed grape leaves with meat and rice. She knew the lamb k
ebabs with tomato sauce were delicious, but tricky. If you didn’t season the lamb and prepare the sauce correctly, or if you overcooked the lamb, it would be dry and tough to chew. It didn’t help that Angela was a perfectionist.
“Don’t have that look on your face. I already marinated the lamb. We need to do the rest.” Lucy’s relief was short-lived. When she followed her mother into the walk-in refrigerator she found four large, stainless-steel bowls of marinated lamb.
This will take forever!
She knew shish kebab night was the most popular at the restaurant, but she’d never had to prepare all the food.
Back in the kitchen, Lucy slipped on plastic gloves and began the tedious task of threading the marinated, cubed lamb onto skewers. By the time Lucy’s bowl was half-full, her mother had threaded twice as many skewers.
“How do you do it so fast, Mom?”
“Experience. You’ll get better.”
Lucy didn’t necessarily want to get that much better. She just wanted to know how to make the dishes. As the manager, she felt she should know how each dish on the menu was made, but she didn’t want to take Azad’s job. He was the head chef now and could prepare anything much better than she could—some would say even better than Angela.
But that wasn’t something she’d ever discuss with her mother.
“Next, we have to prepare the sauce that we’ll pour over the meat once it’s grilled. Sauté the onions, but don’t burn them,” her mother warned.
Lucy followed instructions and began heating the onions, then added diced and seeded tomatoes and spices. Delicious smells soon filled the kitchen.
Angela glanced over her shoulder as she worked. “How are you and Azad?”
Lucy stiffened, and the spoon clattered against the side of the pot. She warily glanced at her mom. Her parents both adored Azad and had wanted her to reconcile with him the day she set foot in Ocean Crest. Her mother especially liked him, and had once commented that if Lucy married him it would keep the business in the family. The manager and the cook—it was just like her parents’ roles. The idea was enough to make her run for the hills.
Her relationship with Azad was not something she was willing to talk about with her mother. Other things, like cooking and her fascination with Cooking Kurt from the food channel were, but not Azad.
“Well?” Angela asked, her voice impatient.
“Azad is fine. We both are.”
“Hmm. Your father said you went on a date. I’m happy. He is good for you, Lucy.” Her mother must have sensed that the topic of conversation wouldn’t go much farther. “Well, what have you and Katie been up to?”
This was a better topic, but it also came with pitfalls.
“We are the same,” Lucy said, evading the question her mother was really asking.
But her mother would not be put off. “Are you and Katie still worried about your friend, Melanie Haven?”
Her mother understood that both Katie and Lucy had a hard time staying out of things, especially when one of their friends was in trouble. She also knew her mother had been vocal about not wanting Lucy to put herself in danger by investigating the recent crime. Lucy hesitated, then decided to be honest. “Who wouldn’t be?”
Her mother sighed as she continued to watch Lucy stir the pot. “Melanie is a good girl. I don’t know why that detective thinks she killed Gilbert Lubinski.”
Her mother’s words captured her attention, and Lucy turned to look her in the eye. “What do you mean?”
“Detective Clemmons came here yesterday to ask me questions about Melanie.”
Lucy took a quick, sharp breath. “What? Why would he do that?”
“I thought it was unusual at first myself, then guessed he was simply asking townsfolk about her.” Angela waved her hand. “You know, about Melanie’s character.”
Her mother may have rationalized the detective’s behavior, but Lucy wasn’t convinced. “I haven’t heard of him speaking with any other townsfolk. What else did he ask you?”
“He wanted to know more about the Haven family. I told him I didn’t know much. Only that the father opened the candy shop on the boardwalk around the same time we opened Kebab Kitchen. I mentioned that Melanie had a sister, but I haven’t seen much of her over the years.”
Lucy’s mind kicked into overdrive. Why would Clemmons come here to ask her mother questions? What could he possibly have been thinking? That Lucy had held something back when he’d questioned her at the bonfire?
She could ask Bill, but she doubted he would know the answer. Bill hadn’t yet been promoted to detective and he wasn’t on the case.
“He would have asked Raffi, too, if he was here.” Her mother’s lips thinned with irritation. “Your father was at Lola’s Coffee Shop, which is where he’ll go this morning.”
“Is that a problem?”
“It is. I want you to go there this morning and fetch him for me.”
Really? She had no desire to get involved in her parents’ quarrel over her father’s coffee and social habits. But she wanted to know if Clemmons had found her father and questioned him as well. “I’m supposed to meet Katie there this morning. If I see Dad, I’ll tell him you’re asking for him,” Lucy said.
“One more thing. I asked your father to take me to Cooking Kurt’s book signing in Philadelphia.”
“He has another cookbook out already?” Lucy asked.
Her mother pierced her with an annoyed stare. “He’s a chef, Lucy. But that’s not the point. Your father refuses to take me. Talk to him.”
Her father disliked the celebrity chef and had often commented that Cooking Kurt was a fraud. Because of how quickly he kept pumping out cookbooks, Lucy wondered if her dad’s bias had merit.
“Mom, I’ll try to—”
A loud pounding like cannonballs striking the front door made Lucy jump.
“Who’s that this early in the morning?” Angela asked.
“I’ll go check.” Lucy washed her hands, removed her apron, and hurried through the swinging doors that led from the kitchen into the dining room. The restaurant wouldn’t open until nearly eleven, and the front door remained locked.
Out the large bay window, she spotted the Ocean Crest Town News van parked in the handicapped spot, then noticed Stan Slade, the head reporter, standing outside the front door. He pounded on the door once more.
Lucy slid the dead bolt and cracked open the door. “Hello. The restaurant doesn’t open for another couple of hours.”
“I’m aware,” Slade said. “But the news business starts at the crack of dawn.”
Lucy’s gut tightened. Clearly, he wasn’t here to eat. That meant he was here to interview her or ask her probing questions. Neither possibility sat well with her. They didn’t have a great past relationship.
“What do you want?” she asked.
Stan pushed his black-rimmed glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Is that any way to greet a friend?”
Lucy shot him a look of disbelief. Stan Slade had left a high-paying New York City reporting job to relocate to Ocean Crest and take the position of head reporter of the Town News. No one knew why Slade had done it. Had he hated the big city, or had something happened there to force him to come live in the small shore town?
Either way, his past articles had not put Lucy or the restaurant in a positive light, and he’d caused nothing but trouble for her. She didn’t trust him one bit.
At Lucy’s silence, a corner of his mouth twisted upward. “All right,” he grumbled, “maybe not good friends, but allies.”
When she tapped her foot, he tried again. “Acquaintances,” he muttered.
Lucy opened the door wide, and Stan strode inside, halting by the hostess stand. He wasn’t that much taller than she was, maybe five foot five, but he always seemed to peer down at her through his dark-rimmed glasses.
“Why exactly are you here, Mr. Slade?” Lucy asked.
“To interview you about the circumstances of Gilbert Lubinski’s death.”
“None of them found the body.”
“I didn’t find the body,” she countered.
“Ah, but your friend Melanie Haven did. But she refuses to talk about it and slammed her candy-shop door in my face.”
Smart girl. Lucy was beginning to wonder why she’d unlocked her front door.
“You’re the second one to find the body,” he said. “My readers want details.”
Her agitation grew. She was getting nowhere arguing with the stubborn reporter. She needed to make him leave, the faster the better. “You should ask the police. Maybe even ask to see the coroner’s report. It would be much more accurate than whatever I can tell you.”
“Readers want juicy details. Not some clinical report.”
She dug her fingernails into her palms in frustration. She needed to stay in control, calm and collected. If he thought he would get nowhere, he would leave on his own. “I’m sorry, I don’t have anything for you.”
“I also know you can’t resist sticking your nose in other people’s business.”
So much for control! Her frustration veered into anger in a heartbeat. “What the heck does that mean?”
He stepped away from the hostess stand and came close, his dark eyes focused on her behind his glasses. “I meant it as a compliment. Your track record’s better than the police’s.”
“It didn’t sound like a compliment.”
Slade flashed a crooked smile. “How about a truce? If you ever need to make something publicly known, promise me you’ll come to me first.”
She eyed him warily. It was a strange request. He’d never asked her to do something like this before. He’d mentioned allies, and Lucy couldn’t help but wonder if this was what he’d meant. She also couldn’t imagine an instance when she’d need him to print something, other than a paid advertisement for the restaurant and a coupon for ten percent off a customer’s bill during the summer season.