Death in Four Courses: A Key West Food Critic Mystery (5 page)

I followed him to the reflecting pool, which was now roped off, to the dismay of partygoers with pressing bladders who were being turned away from the restrooms. And others who wanted to rubberneck the emergency.

“What’s going on here?” Dustin asked Office Torrence. “You’re ruining our party. Where the hell is Jonah?”

“Mr. Barrows has been removed to the emergency room,” said Officer Torrence, raising his voice to match Dustin’s intensity. “And to your first question, as a precaution, we’re treating this area as a crime scene. Mr. Barrows may have been the victim of an attack.”

Dustin jutted his chin toward me. “You told me he’d fallen and hit his head,” he said fiercely.

I swallowed and shrugged. “I just found him in the pool. I have no idea how he actually got there.” I turned to the cop. “Can I go to let my mom know I’m okay?”

He nodded curtly. “Then I’ll need you back here. Did Mr. Barrows have any detractors that you were aware of?” the cop asked Dustin.

“Detractors? You mean enemies? You mean people he had insulted recently, or planned to attack later this weekend?” asked Dustin, his reddening face now damp with sweat. “You’d have to line up to join that party,” he added as I walked away.

By the time I located my mother to inform her that the evening was over, she had moved to a tall cocktail table in the garden and was busy chatting like old friends with the women who’d been seated in front of us in the auditorium. “Oh, look, here’s my daughter who I was telling you about,” she exclaimed to the women. “Hayley’s a food critic—she really should be lecturing up onstage this weekend.”

She handed me one of the glasses of white wine in front of her and drained the last half inch in the other. I noticed the remnants of a plate of hors d’oeuvres on the table next to her camera. Three tiny lamb chop bones without a shred of meat on them rested on the plate’s rim.

Mom saw my dismay. “This was all I could manage—this crowd is like starving wolves falling on a carcass. And I was ravenous too. And then it took you so long—I must have texted you five times…. If it helps at all, I got two of those lamb chops for you.” She smiled sheepishly.

I dug through the bag she’d been carrying for me and pulled out my phone, and yes, there were multiple messages.

“I left my phone with you—remember?” I tapped my khaki-clad thighs. “These pants don’t have any pockets.”

“But where in the world—” Mom stopped talking and finally looked at me: the rolled-up pant legs wet to the knees, the wilder hair than even usual, the shirt stained with greenish splotches and a bit of Jonah’s regurgitated spittle. “My God, Hayley, what happened?”

I took a big sip of wine and pulled her away from the other women. “There’s been an accident,” I murmured. “Jonah Barrows fell and hit his head and nearly drowned. I’m sorry about cutting the evening short, but I have to go. The cops have some more questions.”

“Is he all right?” She scrunched her face up. “Wait a minute. What do you mean, more questions? Why are you involved?”

“I found him, that’s all.” I folded my arms over my stomach and tried to radiate firmness: end of conversation. Sometimes it worked.

“Why are you wet? And where’s your sweater?”

“I found him in the dipping pool and had to drag him out. I’ll tell you the gory details later, okay?”

Mom looked at her watch. “I’m supposed to meet Eric and Bill about now anyway and walk back to their place.” She narrowed her eyes and scanned my body again, every rumpled, anxious inch of it. “You look awful. What aren’t you saying?”

I almost started to sniffle but pulled myself together and whispered, “I think he’s dead, Mom.” No need to have half the party guests leaning in to listen.

“He’s dead?” she bellowed.

“Shhhh … I’ll walk you out to the gate.” I gulped another big swallow of white wine, downed a piece of cheese, and herded her off to the entrance of the grounds.

“Over here!” called a familiar voice. Eric’s partner, Bill.

“Where’s Eric?” I asked. “Did you get something to eat?”

“He developed a sudden migraine,” Bill said. “I tried to get him to stay for a few minutes, but he really felt sick. I’ve never seen him so pale.”

“Oh, poor guy,” Mom said. “We’ll get him an ice pack. Does he carry migraine medicine? I can loan him a tablet of Imitrex. That never fails for me.”

Bill squeezed her hand. “You’re such a doll. Hope you don’t mind walking,” he added, “because I told him to take the car. We can certainly call a cab.”

“Don’t be silly,” my mother said. “I’m perfectly capable of walking. I wore my sensible shoes.” She leaned over to kiss my cheek. “Hayley’s the glamorous one in this family.” She started to follow Bill out but then turned to look at me one last time.

“Are you sure you’ll be okay? I can stay if you need me. When I spoke to Miss Gloria on the phone last week, she said she’d be happy to have me camp out on the sofa.”

All I needed was my mother on Miss Gloria’s lumpy
settee—only she wouldn’t be on the couch, because I’d feel too guilty about letting her sleep there. “I’ll be fine,” I said, flashing a bogus smile.

“See you tomorrow,” Mom said, and returned to hug me again. “Get a good night’s sleep—I’m sure everything will turn out just fine.”

She wouldn’t have said that if she’d seen Jonah, but I patted her arm and tried to radiate reassurance through what felt like a very weak grin. Then I turned and trudged back to the pool as instructed. Officer Torrence and a young policewoman with a blond ponytail and a torso as thick as a tree trunk were still talking to Dustin. Torrence beckoned me over.

“Miss Snow, had you encountered Mr. Barrows earlier in the evening?”

“I saw his lecture, of course,” I said. “I’d hoped to meet him and ask him to sign my book, but my mother insisted on sightseeing, so we were late to the party.”

“Did you have an existing relationship with Mr. Barrows? How were you certain it was him in the pool?” Torrence asked.

I took the easier question first. “The color of his shirt was so distinctive. And we’d just watched him onstage for forty-five minutes. He was very much on my mind.”

“So you weren’t acquainted before tonight?”

I felt my face pink up with embarrassment. “I’m a fan,” I admitted. “I’ve written to him. And I’d hoped to interview him for my magazine.”

“Written to him?” asked Torrence, his forehead creasing. “How many times?”

“Three. Possibly four. Though I never got more than
a perfunctory acknowledgment. ‘Thanks for your kind words’ or something to that effect.”

“Wrote him about what?” asked the lady cop.

I cleared my throat, looking down at the policewoman’s sturdy black brogans. “Career advice,” I muttered. “Tips on how to become a food critic. And then requests for an interview.”

“Did you make arrangements to meet with him tonight?” Torrence asked.

My heart was hammering so fiercely, I was sure they could hear it. And my palms were slick with sweat. Why did I feel so guilty when I hadn’t done anything but admire his work and try to save him?

“He said to look for him at the party. I knew he would be busy, and a million people would want a piece of him. But it was the chance of a lifetime. I also brought a book, hoping to have him sign it.”

“Was he angry about the way you pressed him? Or frightened?” asked Torrence.

“Of course not! I was completely professional. Not a fan freak.”

Dustin listened to this conversation unfold, a look of horror creeping onto his face that caused his jowls to quiver. “Maybe he was giving you career advice when he, uh,
slipped
into the pool?”

“That’s not how it went!” I yelped.

At the same time, Officer Torrence said sternly, “We’ll handle the questioning here, Mr. Fredericks.” And back to me: “Earlier you said that you used a bird statue to try to fish him out of the water. Can you show us that, please?”

I led them over to the brick patio surrounding the pool. Two of the metal birds wading in the pond were still there, high-stepping through the water lilies. But the broken egret statue had disappeared.

“The other bird is gone,” I said. “Maybe one of your guys picked it up?”

“What other bird?” asked Torrence.

Half an hour later, I was back on my scooter, heading up the island to the Tarpon Pier Marina where I lived in a tiny second bedroom on my friend Miss Gloria’s houseboat. The moon laid a silvery path across the water of the bight, which slapped gently against the dock. A whiff of fish floated from the cleaning table on the other side of the walk as I locked up my bike.

Miss Gloria’s snores were rattling through the living room by the time I reached our home. Seventy-eight and an early riser, she was often lulled to sleep by her boat’s motion before the ten o’clock news. My nerves tightly wound by the disaster with Jonah, I’d be lucky to get any sleep at all. I considered popping down to have a nightcap with my former roommate Connie, a
couple of boats up the finger. She’d suffered with me through the aftermath of the first murder I’d witnessed, and our friendship had only improved since I’d moved out of her place and into Miss Gloria’s. Just as I decided to go, her lights winked off. So I settled down in my bunk, my gray tiger, Evinrude, beside me. I ran my hands over the curves of his head and neck and buried my face into his dense fur. His motor sputtered and caught.

Maybe I should have called Detective Nate Bransford instead. He’d led the investigation of a murder late last fall in which I’d been one of his “people of interest.” Once the case was settled, it was clear we were both interested—in each other. In fact, we had a date for dinner tomorrow night. I hit his number on redial before I could start obsessing whether it was too late for a social call or inappropriate to discuss business after hours.

“It’s Hayley,” I said. “I figured you were up—they say crime doesn’t sleep. So I guess the cops aren’t allowed to either?” I snorted with nervous laughter. “I suppose you heard what went on at the literary conference?”

“I heard,” he said. “Why was I not surprised to see your name in the report?”

Which hit me in an entirely bad way—if there was a good way—because it had been a long, stressful day and I was hoping for some empathy. I had a choice of getting mad or starting to cry. And one of my New Year’s resolutions was to cry less and speak up more. I hated to ruin a perfectly good resolution this early in January.

“And why was I not surprised to be treated like public enemy number one when all I did was find the guy and try to save him?” My voice trembled in spite of the resolution.

“Look, Hayley,” said Bransford in his most soothing way—which wasn’t all that soothing once you had been under the microscope in one of his cases—“they’re only trying to figure out what happened. And you found the body. It’s quite possible that you noticed things you weren’t even aware of seeing—and it’s their job to dig for these details. My guys were trying to cover all of the bases.”

“One was a woman, not a guy. And she was a bigger jerk than Officer Torrence.”

Bransford heaved an impatient sigh. “Torrence is the best investigator we have on the force. Besides, your information was not particularly reliable. The alleged murder weapon was not where you said it would be.”

“That stupid bird,” I said. “I knew your cops didn’t believe me.”

“You said you left it next to the pool, but it wasn’t there,” said Bransford.

“So you’re suggesting that I’m lying?”

“I’m suggesting that perhaps you misremembered where you saw it.” He paused, his voice carefully emptied of expression. “If in fact it was actually there.”

“It was there all right,” I said. “How should I know what happened to it? Maybe someone kicked it into the bushes? Or the staff saw it was broken and threw it in the trash? Or maybe the guy who really hit Jonah carried it off. And I can assure you that it wasn’t me.”

“Come on, Hayley. Don’t get your hackles up. My guys have to do their jobs. They have to consider all the possibilities. They owe it to the man down.”

The man down? First of all, why would he defend his cops, who made me feel like a suspect when the worst I’d done was send Jonah a few e-mails asking for an interview? And then try to save him. And second, I was starting to have flashbacks of me and my ex-boyfriend Chad as our relationship tanked. I’d followed Chad to Key West and then discovered he was far more dedicated to his divorce law practice than he’d ever be to me. Never mind discovering the other women in his life about whom I’d had no clue.

Here was another man whose work—whose everything but me—would come first. Better to cut him loose now before I got attached. Better to cancel the dinner date we’d finally scheduled before we both wasted a rotten evening.

“Let’s forget about tomorrow night,” I said. “I have a job to do too, and you’re not helping. Besides,” I added, not wanting to sound completely shrewish, “I should never have agreed to schedule that dinner. Not only do I need to review the restaurant, but my mother’s in town for a couple of days and it’s rude to go off on a date and leave her alone. Some other time. Or not,” I muttered under my breath.

“Have her join us,” he said gallantly, ignoring my dismissal. “I’d like to meet her. You said seven o’clock? And I’ll speak to the officers about their interviewing technique.”

I waffled, somewhat mollified. I wanted to go out
with him, but I didn’t want to be a pushover. Was he really another Chad or was I being too sensitive because of my history? Too early to tell. “It wasn’t only what they said. It was their tone—all condescending and accusatory, as if they thought I was hiding something and if they pushed me a little harder, it would all spill out.”

“Their tone,” he said flatly. And after a pause: “We’ll work on that.”

Miss Gloria’s cheerful clattering in the galley woke me early after a restless night. “Are you up, Hayley? Stay there. I’ll bring you some coffee.”

I was up now. But I couldn’t get mad at her. Her son had offered me a perfectly sweet place to live in exchange for keeping an eye on his mother. And she was so obviously thrilled to have my company. And she was adorable.