Allergic to Death (19 page)

“Was the zipper open?”

“Possibly.” Gigi’s brows drew together over her eyes. “I remember pulling it out of the car and fiddling with the zipper as we walked toward the house. So, yes, I think it was unzipped.”

“This is what the killer was really after.” Sienna held the pen aloft triumphantly.

Gigi nodded slowly. “I think you’re right.”

“Without her EpiPen, Martha would have no way of treating her reaction to the peanut oil the killer put on her food.”

Gigi’s heart contracted. The sun went behind a cloud, momentarily casting an ominous shadow across the driveway and the front lawn. Someone had taken Martha’s purse to prevent her from getting at her EpiPen. She shuddered. How frightened Martha must have been when she felt her throat closing up as she reacted to the peanut oil the killer had added to her food.

There really was a ruthless killer out there somewhere, Gigi thought. And all evidence pointed toward its being Carlo.

Gigi circled through the tiny parking lot behind the police station. Two cruisers were parked perpendicular to the building, and the rest of the spaces were filled with an assortment of vehicles ranging from a bright yellow Hummer to an old model Volkswagen Beetle with peeling tape over a cracked rear window. There was no room for Gigi’s MINI. And this was no place to double-park, even though she didn’t plan on being more than a minute.

She pulled back out onto High Street. A spot had opened up right in front of the station, but it was small and cramped, and she wasn’t taking any chances on parallel parking. It would be just her luck to have Detective Mertz come out and catch her struggling again.

Gigi pulled into the lot at the end of High Street in a space fairly close to the sidewalk. She retrieved a Gigi’s Gourmet De-Lite container with Alice’s name on it from the backseat.

The sidewalk was empty except for a dog panting in the heat outside of Brown’s Hardware. Gigi had been tempted to bring Reg with her but didn’t want to leave him in the car in such sultry weather.

Gigi pushed open the front door, and a uniformed receptionist buzzed her through an interior door.

“That for Alice?” She gestured toward the container in Gigi’s hand as she reached for the phone. “That gal is sure losing some weight,” she commented as she tugged at her belt, which created a slight indentation where her waist should have been. “I oughta give it a try myself.” She laughed, then began to cough and wheeze.

Alice appeared around the corner, looking even slimmer than the last time Gigi had seen her. Her hair was attractively styled, and Gigi was surprised to see that its customary gray had become a flattering ash blond.

Gigi held out the container with Alice’s name on it.

“Why don’t you come on back?” Alice waved a hand in the direction of her cubicle. “I’ve got a fresh pitcher of iced tea. You look like you could use a cool drink. No sugar,” she added with a twinkle in her eye.

Did she look that bad, Gigi thought? She put a hand to the back of her neck and lifted up her hair. She could feel the moisture there and could sense the hair curling messily around her face. She could even imagine the glowing shine on her nose and forehead. She mentally crossed her fingers that they wouldn’t run into Detective Mertz. Although, she decided she wasn’t going to think about why that should matter until later. Much later.

Of course, they ran smack into him in the hallway. He was exiting what looked like a conference room and had a sheaf of papers in his hand. They went flying like leaves in a windstorm.

“I’m so sorry.” Gigi bent to retrieve them at the same time that Mertz did, and they bumped heads. Gigi felt the heat rising from her toes to the top of her head like molten lava spilling over the sides of a volcano.

Mertz gave her a crooked smile that disappeared so quickly she wasn’t sure it had even been there. He fumbled awkwardly with the documents, seemingly engrossed in lining the edges up perfectly.

“Come on. Let me get you that cold drink.” Alice linked her arm through Gigi’s.

“I have some news for you,” Mertz began, the words coming out in a bark that startled Gigi.

She stopped in her tracks. “Yes?”

“We’ve closed the case,” he murmured looking everywhere but at Gigi. “The death of your client, Martha Bernhardt, that is.” He gestured at Gigi with the stack of papers. “Accidental death. Somehow peanut oil was used in her food in spite of all precautions…”

Gigi noticed how he avoided the use of pronouns. As in the second person singular. As in the accusatory sounding
you
and
you
put peanut oil
in Martha’s food
. The heat that had risen to her cheeks earlier intensified to blast-furnace level. She tried to say something, but her tongue had become stuck to the roof of her mouth.

“Anyway,” Mertz shrugged. “I thought you’d want to know.” He stared at Gigi for a moment, and she couldn’t tell if he was blushing slightly or it was the red haze of fury in front of her eyes. “Well, I guess that’s it.” He spun on his heel suddenly and headed in the other direction, his shoulders stiff and set.

“Very interesting.” Alice glanced at his retreating back. She turned an appraising eye on Gigi.

“What is?”

“I think he likes you.”

The
Woodstone Times
made the most of the story. Gigi noticed the heavy black headline even before she slid the
paper from her newspaperbox. She read the article as she made her way back up the driveway, Reg dancing around and around her feet.

She threw herself into one of the Windsor chairs arranged around the breakfast table and opened the paper to the second page and the continuation of the story.

It was just as Mertz had said. The police had concluded their investigation and determined that Martha’s death was an accident caused by an allergic reaction to peanut oil. The reporter had obviously tracked down Barbie Bernhardt, because there were several quotes from her confirming that Martha’s last meal had come from Gigi’s Gourmet De-Lite.

Gigi’s stomach did a belly flop and landed somewhere in the region of her knees. This was the final straw, the last nail in the coffin of her fledgling business. After reading this, no one would ever want to do business with her again.

As if to confirm that fact, the phone rang abruptly. Gigi answered slowly, half suspecting who it was going to be.

She wasn’t wrong.

“Yes, of course I understand,” she said politely, although of course she didn’t understand at all. “Yes, I can see how there just isn’t any other option.”

She hung the phone up slowly. The deal with Branston Foods was off. Even though she had expected it, the news still hit with the force of a twister. Her stomach dropped even lower.

She was doomed.

“I don’t know what to do,” Gigi wailed, snapping the long, thin piece of crostini in half and then in half again. She put it down on the table without taking even a nibble.

She and Sienna were seated at the table Carlo and Emilio
kept for favored guests—tucked in a quiet corner, away from the kitchen, with a view across the lawn and down to the river, where heat shimmered off the sluggishly moving water.

Sienna twirled her stemmed water glass in her fingers. “Why did Barbie have to talk to that reporter? What a bitch! She must have known that this would land you in the soup. No pun intended,” she added as she took a sip of her water.

Gigi tried to smile, but her face refused to cooperate. She felt stiff with anxiety. What was she going to do if she started losing all her customers? Waiting tables at Al Forno or becoming a cashier at the Shop and Save wasn’t going to pay her rent, let alone all her other expenses.

“We’re going to have to come clean about finding Martha’s purse.” Sienna drizzled olive oil on her bread plate and tore a chunk of bread off the loaf on the table. “I’m sure Detective Mertz will agree that the thief must have been after the EpiPen.”

Gigi poked at one of the pieces of crostini and watched as it rolled away from her. “What good is that going to do?”

“For one, it establishes the fact that Martha’s death wasn’t an accident. If someone went to the trouble of stealing her medication, they obviously wanted her to die from the allergic reaction.”

Gigi shivered. “But if we tell him, he, too, might make the connection between Carlo and Martha’s review and the notes in her purse…”

“It’s a chance we’ll have to take. Otherwise people will continue to think that it was your fault.”

The Bernhardts’ neo-Georgian mansion had been fully restored to its former glory, Gigi noted as she pulled into
the circular drive. The flower beds were immaculate, the lawn verdant and carefully cut, the bushes pruned into pleasing shapes. The front windows were gleaming, and the entryway well swept. All of the former Bernhardt employees must have been reinstated, because she doubted Winston and Barbie had done it themselves.

Their knock was answered by a young woman whose scuffed athletic shoes were at odds with her pristine pink uniform. She scowled at Gigi and Sienna briefly before indicating with a languid sweep of her arm that they should enter.

They stepped through the door and stood uncertainly in the center of the plush Oriental area rug.

Winston wandered into the foyer just then, a quizzical expression on his face and a bottle of frosty champagne in his hands. He was wearing velvet monogrammed slippers, white linen trousers and a short-sleeve navy shirt. He stopped short when he saw Gigi and Sienna.

“Ah, delivering the goods are you?” He motioned finally with his head toward the Gourmet De-Lite container in Gigi’s hands. “Just about to open a bit of bubbly to celebrate.” He held up the bottle of Veuve Clicquot and grinned.

“Celebrating?” Sienna grabbed Gigi’s arm and pulled her farther into the large, square foyer.

“We are indeed, and you must join us.” He snapped his fingers at the girl in the pink uniform. “Sabrina—”

“Selena,” she corrected, glowering at him, fierce, dark brows lowered over her black eyes.

“Yes, yes, Selena, of course. Please fetch us some glasses, would you?” He held up his left hand and counted. “Four to be exact.”

“What are we celebrating?” Gigi asked as Selena stomped off without a word.

“Come in, and I’ll tell you.” Winston pointed toward an open door just off the foyer.

Sienna and Gigi looked at each other, shrugged and followed Winston into the other room.

The room had bookcases lining each of the walls with yards and yards of leather-bound volumes filling the shelves. Gigi wondered if Winston or Barbie had read any of them or if they had been purchased wholesale to fill up the space. Two voluptuous armchairs were pulled in front of a monstrous, yawning fireplace with a plump sofa opposite. Winston waved them toward the sofa, and Gigi and Sienna perched carefully on its quilted, black leather edge.

Winston put the champagne down on top of a walnut desk and began to wrestle the cork from the bottle. It was ejected with a satisfying
pop
as sparkling wine fizzed over the sides.

“Bravo!” he exclaimed, clapping.

Selena reappeared with four champagne flutes and plunked them on the desk, banging them so hard that Gigi was afraid the delicate crystal would shatter.

Winton poured them each a glass and was passing them around when Barbie strolled into the room. She was wearing white Bermuda shorts, a pink silk shirt and woven leather sandals. Her toes were painted the exact color of her top.

“Oh,” was all she said when she saw Gigi and Sienna.

“I’ve invited your friends to join us, my dear.” Winston swept a champagne flute in their direction.

Barbie’s nostrils flared slightly, as if she had encountered a bad smell in the room, and Gigi had the distinct feeling Barbie was about to inform him that they were most certainly not her friends, when she clamped her mouth shut and graced them with a chilly smile.

If she hadn’t wanted information so badly, Gigi would
have bolted. That and the fact that Sienna was clutching the edge of her skirt, holding her in place.

Winston handed Barbie the fourth champagne glass, and she held it to her mouth, although Gigi could have sworn she did little more than wet her lips with the expensive French wine. Obviously, Barbie was taking her diet more seriously than most of Gigi’s other clients, Alice excepted.

Sienna raised her glass in a mock toast. “So what are we celebrating?” She looked from Winston to Barbie and then back again.

Barbie shrugged. “You started this. You tell them.” She eased down into one of the armchairs, glass held aloft lest it spill. She glanced at Winston and crossed one slender leg over the other, her delicate designer sandal dangling from her bare toes.

“Yes, indeed.” Winston rubbed his hands together briskly. He plucked his glass from the desk and thrust it toward them. “To Stuckey and Sons.” He tossed back a gulp of champagne.

Gigi took a sip, her eyebrows raised questioningly.

“The deal is done. Signed, sealed and delivered.” Winston smacked the desk, and a stack of documents bounced and trembled. “Or it will be as soon as all the legal ends are tied up. It will make me a very rich man. A very rich man, indeed.” He threw back another gulp of wine before grabbing a long sheaf of papers rolled and fastened with a rubber band.

Gigi glanced around the room, wondering how Winston would describe his current situation.

He spread the papers out on the desk and stabbed the center of them with a long forefinger. “Say hello to the new Woodstone Mall.”

Gigi and Sienna went to peer over his shoulder.

Gigi tilted her head, trying to read some of the writing, which was upside down. She pointed toward the blueprints. “Isn’t that where the Woodstone Theater is?” She frowned.

“So it is.” Winston drew his finger around the blueprint in a circle. “These will be the shops, here. High-end places like Gucci and Chanel and Louis Vuitton.”

Gigi glanced at Barbie, and she could have sworn she saw her mouth water. Barbie walked over to the desk and peered at the plans splayed out on top.

“What’s that?” She jabbed a spot with a pink-tipped finger.