Chicken Soup & Homicide (20 page)

"Yeah, thank you," Bruce said as he used the spatula to pick up a piece. There were so many kinds of meat piled on it that the crust bent from the weight where it wasn't supported by the metal server. When the waitress was out of earshot, he wagged his eyebrows at Carla, "Eat up, sweetheart. You're going to need some energy for the plans I have for later."

The comment made a lot more than her fingertips tingle. No matter how much her head told her to stay away from him because his career was at stake, her heart had missed him so much it felt like it would burst. Once the real killer was found, she was going to sucker-punch Pitts in retribution for all of the damage he'd done.

"Son of a bitch."

Carla looked up. She had been staring at her slice of pizza while she was thinking. "What?"

"Pitts is sitting in the parking lot watching us."

She followed his gaze. Sure enough, the familiar black Impala was sitting in the second row of the lot. He was too far away to see his expression in the shadows of the car's interior, but it seemed like there was a gleam of white teeth in the darkness. A predator stalking his prey.

"I'll be right back," Bruce said as he threw his napkin on the table and scooted out of the booth. "Stay here."

She watched him stalk out the pizza parlor's door. He hadn't bothered to grab his coat even though the temperature was well below freezing. This was her battle as much as his, and he wasn't going to face it alone. She grabbed her coat and waved at the waitress. "We'll be right back. Please don't clear off the table."

"No problem," the waitress called as Carla sprinted out the door. She ran through the parking lot while struggling to put on her coat, then stopped a few feet behind Bruce.

"You need to lay off this vendetta," Bruce snarled as Pitts got out of his car. "I don't know what you have against me or my girlfriend, but I've had enough."

"Oh, poor baby. Am I being a big old bully?" Pitts asked in a mocking, childlike voice.

"You know Carla didn't commit the murder." Bruce took a step closer. There was barely a foot between the two men. "And in case you haven't noticed, you don't have any allies at the station. Nobody wants anything to do with you. What a way to impress your new coworkers. Show them how lazy and incompetent you are by trying to pin a murder on innocent women."

Pitts took a quick step back. His fist shot out and connected with Bruce's jaw. Bruce didn't even flinch when the lightning-fast jab connected. It was like watching a statue being attacked. Pitts hissed as he shook his hand while Bruce just glared at him, still not moving, showing no sign of being fazed. A trickle of blood seeped down his chin. Without a word, Pitts hopped back into his car, which was still running, and slammed it in reverse. The back bumper crunched into a snow bank at the back of the lot. The car jolted forward. Pitts flipped them off as he tore past them.

Carla gently touched Bruce's forearm. "Come back inside. It's really cold out here."

He looked at her, but there was no recognition in his eyes. Just pure, dark hatred. Back inside the pizzeria, Carla slipped back into the booth while he disappeared into the bathroom. The other couple sitting in the window booth behind them stared at her wide eyed. Watching Bruce take the punch must've looked like a scene from a Terminator movie. Hopefully, nobody had called the police to report the fight.

The waitress brought another round of Cokes even though both of their glasses were still full. "Do you need me to call the cops or an ambulance?"

"No." Carla looked at the bathroom door. "It was just a little misunderstanding. Everything's fine. Sorry to cause a scene."

"Not a problem. You should see it around here when the high school lets out. I think the kids can get kicked out of school for fighting on the grounds, so they take all of their battles here. I'm sure there's enough blood in that parking lot to give a CSI a nervous breakdown."

Carla smiled at the waitress, who was trying very hard to make the tense situation better. She appreciated the effort to lighten up the mood. Not every person would care. "I'm an ER nurse. I see lots of young men who didn't quite think things through completely."

They both turned to look at Bruce as he exited the bathroom. The waitress patted the table. "Let me know if you need anything, boxes, dessert, a shot of whiskey." She winked. "I keep some in my locker for rough shifts."

"Thank you. I may take you up on that offer."

Bruce slid onto the bench. "What offer?"

"To-go boxes, dessert, or a shot of whiskey. There's a good chance we'll need at least one of them. Or all of the above, considering what just happened. Why the hell did he hit you? Seems like you have a lot more reasons to sucker-punch him. Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. He was quick but didn't have much power. I doubt I'll even get a bruise." He touched the slightly swollen spot on his lip. "I'll just grab a handful of snow when we leave to help keep the swelling down. As to why he punched me…I hit a nerve. That action was as good as an admission that he's framing you because he doesn't have any decent leads."

Elegance Salon always made Amy feel better. Her former coworkers welcomed her with smiles and hugs. Just what she needed when she was feeling run over by the garbage truck of life. The massage and facial she'd scheduled would help too. She pulled open the front door of the salon and gave her customary greeting, a series of squeaky sneezes. The custom-scented lily of the valley shampoo didn't agree with Amy's allergies. The sneezing fit caught the attention of the salon's owner, Thalia. She poked her head around the wall that separated the cutting stations from the reception desk.

"Amy! How are you doing, sweetheart?" Thalia asked as she rushed at Amy and locked her in a breathtaking bear hug.

"I'm okay." Amy wriggled free from the hug and began unbuttoning her coat. "But I'll be better after I spend the next few hours here."

Thalia's newest hair-color experiment was stunning. The tips of her shoulder-length hair were dark purple, which darkened to black on the top of her head. She tucked a strand of the ombrè-tinted hair behind her ear and narrowed her eyes. "I don't believe you're okay. How could you be after finding another body?"

Her former boss hit that nail on the head. She wasn't okay. And the problems went way beyond almost getting tackled by a dead man falling out of a freezer. But she'd only arrived ten minutes early for her massage appointment. There wasn't time to whine about her messed-up life. An abbreviated version would have to do. "Finding Chet's body sucked. Hopefully life will get back to normal soon."

"You're a stronger woman than I," Thalia said. A woman with penciled-in eyebrows and a head full of highlight foils peaked around the wall beside Thalia's cutting station. She glanced at the client, then leaned closer and whispered, "Sorry to cut our visit short, but my client has an important lunch date."

After Thalia went back to work, Amy made a circuit around the salon, visiting with her old friends. Then she left them to their work and took a seat in the waiting area. Everything about the salon was plush, from the gilt-framed mirrors to the squishy black chairs in the waiting area. She picked up the latest issue of
Glamour
magazine and flipped through the pages.

She glanced up when another woman sat down across from her. It was Mariah. The pastry chef at Cornerstone restaurant, who Sophie was trying to convince to work at the café. Amy had come to the salon to get some relaxing pampering, and life had given her another opportunity to nose around about the murder.

"Hello," Amy said as she wiggled her fingers in a greeting. "You're Mariah, right?"

"Hi, I met you at Sophie's place, didn't I?"

"Yes. I'm Amy, Sophie's recipe consultant." Amy set the magazine down. Her massage was scheduled to begin in a few minutes. There was no time to waste with polite chitchat. "My husband and I had dinner at Cornerstone a few days ago. It definitely seemed like the employees were happier than the last time we were there."

"No kidding. We all expect to pay our dues when we sign on at high-end restaurants, lots of pressure and expectations. Working under Britton was like being sentenced to the chain gang. The man's ego far surpassed his skills. He couldn't cook or run a business."

That wasn't news. Britton was oblivious to how badly he treated people, or maybe he just didn't care what people thought about him. "You know, I overheard someone on the staff mention that Chef Michael was scoring over and over. Do you have any idea what that means?"

Mariah laughed so hard she drew the attention of several of the stylists working on the floor behind her. The bright sunshine streaming through the window highlighted cobalt-blue streaks in her black hair. "Oh, probably that he got promoted to the head chef position and became Mrs. Mahoney's new cuddle bunny. She's already given him a Rolex, and on Sunday night he got a new Corvette from her for his efforts."

"A Corvette. Really?" So that was the surprise Bridget had referred to in the locker room. Amy had wondered what the gift was. She never guessed it would be something as large as a luxury sports car. Mrs. Mahoney's motto must be Go Big or Go Home.

Mariah nodded. "He drove it to work on Tuesday and bragged about how she gave it to him."

"So everybody knows about him and Mrs. Mahoney? It's common knowledge?"

"Oh yeah. It's not like they work very hard to keep it hidden." She shrugged. "Rumors spread fast in the bubble of a restaurant anyway. My guess is Chef Michael is awesome in bed, since Chet only got a Dodge Charger from her. An equal trade of automobile performance for bedroom performance."

The massage therapist called Amy's name. "It's been fun chatting with you," Amy said as she gathered up her purse and coat.

Ten minutes later, Amy was in a massage room and staring at the marble tile floor through the hole in the table's headrest. She could probably cross Bridget Mahoney off the list of possible murderers. If the woman flaunted her younger lovers like trophies, she should be smart enough to know she would be one of the first people the police would look into if one of them wound up dead. Well, a normal police officer would look at her. Pitts probably didn't even know about Chet's affair with her.

* * *

There was nothing like being transported to Paris via retail therapy. Amy had never been to the City of Lights, but she figured there was a good chance a similar shop would be tucked into a chic shopping district there. It felt more like a confectionery store, with butter-colored walls and vases full of dusty-pink roses tucked into wall niches or sitting on ornately carved tables. Unlike the other lingerie store in Kellerton, La Belle Femme didn't have limbless mannequins dressed in scraps of zebra-print Lycra. In fact, there wasn't even a mannequin in the store to give not-so-spectacularly proportioned customers body envy. Her body probably resembled squishy, unbaked bread after being kneaded by the massage therapist.

Amy made a circuit of the racks, stopping to admire a lace bra with tiny, silk ribbon rosebud accents. Since she and Alex were cruising back on the Happy Marriage Road, she wanted to add some zing to the journey. But she couldn't decide between a nightie that she could make a grand entrance in, or barely there bra and panties for Alex to discover like a spicy chipotle ganache inside a chocolate truffle. She pulled a blush-pink silk chemise off the rack and held it up to examine it closer. A phone began playing a classical music melody in someone's purse behind her. The music stopped, and the voice that answered the call stopped Amy in her tracks. It was Bridget Mahoney.

"Make an offer that can't be refused. It's a pretty simple concept, so I don't know why you are having such a hard time with it. I want that property, and I want you to keep negotiating until it's mine."

Bridget stashed the phone back in her purse as she wandered over to peruse the same rack as Amy. She nodded a greeting. "I need new minions. I wish Chet wasn't dead so I could wring his neck for all of the trouble he's causing me now."

Amy put her hand over her mouth to hold back a giggle. Mrs. Mahoney had a sharp sense of humor that was disarming. "Could you send some minions to my husband's business too? He needs a few more so he can stop working twenty-hour days."

"Well, my dear, you are on the right track. I doubt I can be of much help finding employees, but I guarantee if you wear anything from here, your husband will forget all about work. Sometimes you need to remind men of where their priorities are supposed to be." She picked out two Grecian goddess-style gowns and draped them over the other clothes on the rack. As she studied her selections Bridget said, "Speaking of priorities, do you have any idea what is going on with the investigation into Chet's murder?"

Amy flipped through the hangers in front of her, not even looking at the exquisite lingerie hanging on them. Mrs. Mahoney seemed to value honesty and enjoyed the shock value of unpolitically correct statements. Amy decided to go for her own version of a conversational zinger. "I'm a top suspect because the detective apparently thinks Sophie and I needed to kill Chet in order to beat him in the showdown."

Bridget's throaty laughter bounced off the walls of the small store. "Oh, I'm sorry, but that is so ridiculous it's funny. I honestly can't figure out what that detective is doing. This is a high-profile case, and the police department seems to have assigned some kind of bumbling idiot to it. Shouldn't my relationship with Chet have raised a red flag? Beyond that, I humiliated him a few weeks before he was murdered by demoting him at the restaurant he built. I'm not sure if that detective hasn't found that information or if he's afraid of me. Either way, he hasn't talked to me about those things. Any detective worth their salt would've at least stopped by for a respectful little chat…like you and I had."

If a meeting between Bridget and Pitts ever did happen, she wanted to be a fly on the wall. It would be a mental tennis match the equivalent of Serena Williams taking on an eight-year old who only picked up a racket because his phys ed teacher told him to. "I don't know what Pitts is doing either. It seems like he's dreaming up unlikely scenarios and then trying to stick people to them. I think he's using the Krazy Glue method of solving a murder."