Lizz Lund - Mina Kitchen 02 - Christmas Bizarre (19 page)

“
But I thought you did the bacon thing?”

“We
did. But we already defrosted the shrimp, you see?”

It was as clear as mud to me.

I exited my front door with every trepidation known to man tap-dancing across the back of my brain. I’d left Vinnie with Uncle Vito and his silencer. Not to mention Buddy and his selves.

Miriam
stood waiting at the door. “Come in, get out of the cold. Here, you need this.” She thrust a glass of what appeared to be mulled wine in my hand.

“Why, thanks
.”

“Sure.
It’s quite a thing to be involved with a former Moil. I know.”

There was scuffling and shouting from my house.
Personal note to self: if I ever have a boyfriend again, make sure all arguments are held someplace other than within my very thin walls.

“You ripped me off!”

“You’re hallucinating!”

“Blood! I need blood!”

“You don’t even have a scratch!”

Miriam pushed the glass at me.
“Mina, drink. You’re better off. It will be over soon.”

Then there was
a thud.

Miriam stared at her wrist watch.
“Three, two, one…”

Vito
walked calmly through the front door, like he was ready to unload groceries. No panic, no sweat, nothing. Wow. I guess this was what being a professional was about, after all.

“Is he dead?” I had to ask, right?
I probably had a big bleed to clean up.

“Who, Vinnie? I thought you said he was in your room?”

“Buddy! Bernie! Whoever he is!”

“What, you think I’m going to prison for him?
Nah.”

Miriam and I exchanged glances.

Miriam cleared her throat.
“Sweetie Pie, what was the thud we heard?”

“Oh, that was just
Bernie after I tasered him.”

A t
aser? When was that unpacked?

I fretted.
“So what do we do now?”

“We wait for his ride.”

“Ride?” Miriam and I sang in unison.

“What kind of a heist has a ride?” Miriam tsked.

“The kind who has his driver’s license revoked.”

“What?
He just bought that beaut of a car!”

“I know
snookems. But he got pulled over since he bought the car. Seems like he got the car just before his license expired.”

“And?”

“And, PennDOT insisted on his taking an eye exam. And he failed.”

I shook my head.
“Geez, no wonder he fell.”

“Actually, Vinnie tripped him.”

“Really?” Good cat!

Vito cleared his throat.
“ Bernie said Vinnie was real friendly-like, especially after he gave him some kitty treats.”

“I have kitty treats?”

“Don’t you? Like Stanley’s Tweetsie Wheatsies?”

“Tw
eetsie Wheatsies?”

“Oh my yes! You don’t have to say that twice!”
Miriam winced.

Stanley bounded into the room and gnawed Vito’s trouser cuff
with fervor.

“
Does my good boy want his Tweetsie Wheatsies?” Vito dragged Stanley by his ankle into the kitchen in search of puppy treats.

“Umm… I don’t mean to be a stick
in the mud, but when do we think Bernie’s ride will get him?”

Miriam nodded.
“That’s a good question. We’ll find out after Vito takes care of Stanley. Have a sip. How do you like it?”

I sipped the mull
ed wine gingerly. It looked like red wine. And it felt warm. With some sort of spices. And sugar. And something that tasted like a bit of a Worcestershire sauce back kick. But worse.

“My.”

“Warms you up inside, don’t it? Bet you can’t figure out my secret ingredient!”

With every fiber of my being – and wanting Vito to rid my house of
his long lost pal – I concurred.

“Ha! I knew it!
It’s Manischewitz with ginger – and a little Chinese fish sauce! It’s international!”

Oh boy
.

Vito
strode in solo and looked out the window. “Looks like I’ll need to get Bernie ready for his ride.”

“How do you know?”

“He told me he was getting picked up at four.”

“That seems a little early for a heist, honey.”
Miriam took a long pull at her mulled Manischewitz.

Vito shrugged.
“He said he didn’t want to miss the early bird special.”

He lumbered out and into my house.
A few moments later, they both came out, with Bernie a bit worse for the wear. Getting tasered can’t be comfy. Miriam and I watched a car pull up. Vito left him in the middle of the lawn, and waited. The sun poked out for a moment. Bernie immediately pulled his coat over his head.

Dexter
drove up in Bernie’s new car. He stepped out and tried to negotiate him into the car.

“I can’t be out in the light! I’ll burn!”

Dexter shoved him forward. “You’re not in sunlight, you old coot. Get in the car!”

“I had a hat! And an umbrella! And a scarf!”

Who did he think he was, the Invisible Man?

Vito dashed in and out of my house more nimbly than was
conceivable. He handed Bernie’s props to him.

“Thank you.”

“No problemo. Not a big deal for an old pal.”

“You’re not my
old pal anymore, you thief!”

Well,
Mr. Pot, meet Mr. Kettle.

It got a little chilly outside watching the boys bickering in the snow,
especially with Dexter leering at me in front of a running car with an open door. I started to shiver and it wasn’t from not wearing a coat. 

“Well, I’ll leave you boys to it then.”
I whirled around and raced back to the front porch.

“I’ll be seeing you, Mina.
We got a lot to catch up on,” Dexter shouted after me.

I returned a fake smile, shot inside my house, and flipped Dexter the bird from the safety of
my closed door.

I no sooner
stood inside, when the smoke alarm chirped, and was chorused by every other appliance in the house. The electric was on – huzzah!

I
cranked up the heat, checked the fridge settings and dashed upstairs to release Vinnie. Vinnie responded by yawning and settling down for the remainder of his nap on top of my pillow.

The doorbell rang.
I dashed back downstairs and found Miriam. “You should come back over. You shouldn’t sit around in the dark and the cold. You’ll get depressed.”

“The electric’s back on, see?”

Miriam peered around and smiled. “That’s a relief!”

Agreed.

“We’re going to be trying the other recipe tonight, the one with the shrimp. Would you like to come over and help us?”

Bless their hearts
.

“Actually, I think I better check my fridge to see what might have defrosted and needs taking care of.”

“Then maybe we could bring a sample over later?”

I pulled the throttle loose on
concocting lies. “I’m pretty sure I’m going to need to prepare for another party.”

“Oh! Those massage parties!
They sound like a great idea! Say, what kind of food do you make for people to eat lying down? Something with skewers, huh?”

I
fumbled desperately at the back of my empty gray matter for another lie when Vito walked over. “C’mon sweetie, Mina’s got to check her house and all.”

“Oh, I wasn’t even thinking!
You’ll be resetting clocks and timers for hours, I bet.”

I looked gratefully at Vito.

“Well, we’ll leave you to it. All’s well that ends well!”

“I’ll be right with you, Miriam.
I left something of mine in Mina’s basement.”

“See you in a few!”
Miriam exited and I exhaled.

Vito walked toward me.
“I made a kind of a fib, just now.”

“Oh?”

“I already put my business case away, if you know what I mean.”

I nodded and pretended I did.

“I didn’t like the way that Dexter guy was looking at you. You know him?”

I sighed and gave Vito the condensed version of mall workers gone postal.
As well as his being in business with Vito’s old pal. And my ex-coworker, once removed. From jail, that is.

“You make sure you walk to your car with a buddy after your shifts, you got it?”

“You want me to walk with Buddy?”

Vito flapped his arms.
“That wouldn’t be my first choice.”

“Oh.
Got it.”

“I don’t know who that guy is, but if he’s hooked up with Bernie, and that guy Myron, he can’t be up to anything good.”

“Am I going to find anything else in my basement that I should know about? I mean, besides blood?”

Vito shook his head.
“Nope. You’re good.”

“So no more unexpected visitors, right?”

“Exactly.” Vito headed toward the door. “You want I should bring Marie back?”

“Oh, yes! Almost forgot!”
I hurried after him, and while Vito distracted Miriam in the kitchen, I covered her up. Soon we were lugging her into the front hallway.

“I can take her upstairs from here, Vito. Thanks.
And I’ll play it safe and lock the door as soon as I get back down.”

“No problem
o, Toots. I’ll lock your door with my key.” And he did.

I spent the rest of the even
ing resetting clocks and alarms. Even though things had returned to normal, I felt a bit unsettled. I found a Chinese recipe that called for air drying a duck to give it crispy skin. Since the one I had on hand was frozen, I defrosted it in the microwave and used my blow dryer.

I have to
stop sleep cooking. It’s just not working for me. Once again, my kitchen was a disaster area. Although the roast duck with Pomegranate-Hoisin glaze looked superb. I wondered idly if I could give it to Trixie and Mike, as an early Christmas present.

I didn’t have anything on my calendar until th
e evening. The only up to this side was that my limbs wouldn’t be inflicted with another pediatric beating, even though the income ledger would suffer. The rest of the day should be dedicated to soy sauce mitigation. I figured a good seven hours of scrubbing might return the kitchen to its proper self. Note to self: liberally applying soy sauce across counter-tops has severe repercussions. I was glad I hadn’t re-painted since I’d obviously aided and abetted the Disney-puked walls.

Vinnie and I had rolled through our morning routine and I was deciding how much longer I could procrastinate
doing the first shift of dishes when the phone rang to the rescue.

“Whatcha doing?”

“Scraping soy sauce from underneath my fingernails.”

“Haven’t you heard of a manicure?”

“They wouldn’t take me.”

“You’re kidding!”
K. was horrified.

“Maybe not.
But it’s a good guess.”

“I’ll have to give you
volcanic soap
for a stocking stuffer!”

“Do you think it will work?”

“Let’s find out. Do you want to play shopping?”

I sighed.
“The mall?”

“Of course!”

“I’m a bit malled out…”

“But you’d be going as a
civilian
. Sans Sparkle.”

“
My jammies are already sans Sparkle.”

“
Don’t you have
any
more Christmas shopping to do?”

“No.
But I have a duck.”

“Pardon?”

“Never mind. Actually, I do have one errand to run there.”

“
Oh. This sounds like a return.” He sounded sad.

“Just stamps.”

“Are they damaged?”

“
Definitely.”

“That settles it.
Come pick me up and a mall-ing we will go.”

“What’s wrong with your ride?” I frowned
at the taxi service implication. Besides, the soy sauce stains had me irked.

“Nothing. Just the annual check-up.”

“Check-up?”

“Inspection.
Can’t get it back until tomorrow.”

I sighed.
We made our plans and I dashed around like a maniac.

K. all but
leapt out his front door and into the van. “Secret Savers!”

“
Huh?”

K. tapped his phone.
“Just texted me three minutes ago!”

“What is it?”

K. stared at me. “Super secret sales.”

“On what?”

“Don’t know. It’s a secret. See?”

I shrugged.
I really didn’t.

We
hummed our way along to “Good King Wenceslas” and parked at a ridiculously long distance from the mall entrance. It was almost as far away as the employee parking.

“My!
It must be a super sale!” K. hastened his stride.

I hurried to keep up.
“Well, it’s sure not a secret.”

We dove inside the mall panting, glad to be out of the cold.
We were both flushed.

“Back for more abuse
from the kiddies?”

I whirled around and saw Myron
standing behind me, sipping a jumbo-sized soda.

I took a breath.
“Actually, I think a little’s come your way, finally.”

“Flies…honey…” K. crooned
.

I waved him off, and dug around my purse.
“Here. I want a refund.”

Myron looked at the book of stamps, and smiled
nastily. “I’m sorry, we can’t refund
used
stamps.”

“No?
Maybe you can refund
counterfeit
stamps?” I waved the “counterfeit” stamped envelopes at him.

Myron’s face went pale.

“Counterfeit? Really? What a nuisance. Why don’t we just return them at the post office?” K. asked.

“
No!
We’ll take care of that right away. It must be some error on their part. The post office has hired so many part-time helpers for the holidays, nobody knows a thing. I’m sure it was a mistake. Follow me.” Myron all but raced to the Mail-It-2! Kiosk currently dubiously manned, by Dexter.

“Please be careful with that!
It’s bone china. I marked it fragile especially,” the plump woman on the other side of the counter instructed him.

“No problem.”
Dexter took the package, went behind a screened area, and tossed it soundly into a bin. So much for fragile.

Myron leaped behind the counter and opened the register.
“Here, now give me the stamps.”

I handed him the
remainder of the booklet and he gave me fifteen dollars.

“This is too much.
I can’t make change.”

“That’s al
l right. Consider it a reward for bringing this to our attention.”

Was he actually being nice to me?

Dexter shot me a sideways look, and hastily finished his transaction with the woman whose China he’d smashed.

“Well, look who we have here.
Very convenient of you, Kitchen. You left me in the cold yesterday.”

“Now, now Dexter.
Mina’s done us a considerable service by making us aware of some odd stamps in our inventory.”

“Odd, huh?”

Odd is right. “They’re not odd, “ I said. “They’re counterfeit.”

Dexter grinned.
“You don’t say.”

Myron glared at him.
“It’s hard to believe, but one never knows. Why don’t you re-check our inventory, Dexter?”

Dexter smiled creepily.
“I might have other plans. Mina might need some help out to her car.”

“But we just got here!” K.
cried.

“That’s too bad.
Maybe later.”

I turned around to see Myron making
slashing motions at his throat. Dexter was nodding and smiling. I didn’t like it. I grabbed K.’s elbow.

“Well, thanks for the refund.”

W
e hurried away from the kiosk, just as an elderly woman in a wheelchair approached them tentatively. “I don’t suppose you could sell me just one stamp? I don’t need a whole book. I’ve just got to mail this check to my daughter.”

Dexter and Myron exchanged wicked smiles.
“Why, of course we can.”

K. and I
skittered into the middle of the mall and flopped down on a bench.

“I don’t like him,”
he said.

“Who?”

“Myron.”

“I thought you were going to say Dexter.”

“Him either.”

“Ditto.”

We retreated inside a jewelry shop for some much needed bling therapy. Which bought me time to fill K. in on Dexter’s back-story.

A
few dozen stores later, K. was laden down with shopping bags while I chomped on a soft pretzel with mustard.

“I can’t believe you didn’t buy a thing!”

“I bought a pretzel.”

“It’s almost gone.
And it doesn’t count.” He spotted a Starbucks. “I need a boost. C’mon. My treat.”

We got our Christmas-oomphed lattes and
found a table outside the store. K. took a sip, then coughed.

“Too hot?”

He shook his head violently.

“Are you choking?”

He nodded. I slapped his back a bit. He grabbed me by the shoulder, and pulled my ear toward his mouth. “
Look over there. Dexter!
”

I carefully
looked up to see Dexter leaning against a store window advertising maternity wear, staring at me with a wild grin. I wondered idly about Dexter’s mother, and how Dexter got to be Dexter. That was, if she hadn’t left him swaddled at the entrance to a prison.

“I think it’s time to go.”

“Done.”

After loading the van with K.’s
shopping, we hopped inside and shivered. The radio blared and we zipped off. I glanced up at the rearview and noticed the car behind us. I made a left out of the mall, then a right onto Harrisburg Pike. It did, too.

“What’s the matter?” K. asked.

“I think we’re being followed.”

“Really?” K. turned around for a better look.

I made the left onto Good Drive, but the car continued past us up Harrisburg Pike. It was a green Crown Vic.

After depositing K. and his treasure, I trundled on home. It was getting dark and a fine, icy mist came swirling down. The windshield wipers slipped in and out of time with the radio, the driver’s side wiper smearing a big icy blotch over my side of the windshield. Great, another thing to buy/replace. Feh. I was thinking a night home with Vinnie sounded a lot cozier than meeting James at the Darn Boor.

I pulled in
to the garage. Vinnie was waiting for me inside the front hall, as usual. “Anyone interesting call?”

“Mgaw-ooomph.”

“Really?” I checked the voicemail and found nothing. I could have sworn he said Ma called. Also, no word from James, so I figured we were still ‘on’.

I changed sweaters for something that could double as date-worthy, without being too obvious:
a semi-scoop-neck red cashmere pullover. I threw on a grey blazer at the last minute; so I wouldn’t look too much like a date (in case this wasn’t) and more like a business meeting (which it probably was.)

I
fed and petted Marie, went back downstairs and did the dinner thing for Vinnie. While I waited for him to finish, I indulged in a sip of mug o’Merlot.

“You be good.
I’ll see you later.” I patted Vinnie on the head, and went back out into the tundra.

I found the Barn Door after passing
it by and re-circling several hundred times. No wonder it was a local watering hole. You couldn’t find it unless you were a cow.

But inside it was cozy and warm and had a good share of patrons.
I looked around for James.

I found him sitting at a table by himself, with a newspaper.
“Well, there you are, Kitchen.”

Kitchen?
Hmm. Definitely not a date. “Sorry to be late. Wow, it was tough finding this place!”

James
folded his paper. “Yes, I forgot the first time can be somewhat geographically challenging. My bad. Beer?” He poured me a glass of beer from a pitcher that sat on the table.

“Thanks.”
Well, beer was a nice change, right? I noticed that at least it wasn’t Krumpthfs.

A petite blonde with red and green streaked bangs bounced up to our table.
“Hello? My name is Heather, and I’ll be your server tonight. Would you like to hear our specials?”

“Please,” James answered.

And so on. The specials consisted of a lot of items I suspected were headed toward a dumpster. I stuck with standard fare: cheeseburger and fries. James ventured on the adventuresome side and chose the Chef’s plate: a thick-cut pork chop stuffed with chicken liver, mushrooms and kale.

“So, how are the new clients coming?” I asked, attempting at some business-like small talk.

“Swimmingly! I never dreamed holiday stress could be so profitable.”

“That’s great.”

“And the catered gift cards are selling like hotcakes. You’d better be prepared to be very busy after the first of the year.”

“That’s wonderful!”

James nodded. “It seems like we’ve found quite the niche.”

Heather came back with our orders.
“Anything else?”

James looked at me
. I shook my head.

“Great.
Enjoy your meal!”

I looked at my dish.
It was completely pedestrian: an overcooked frozen burger with a side of soggy fries. I looked at James’ plate: his pork chop looked fried.

We ate our meal somewhat awkwardly, amidst the usual pleasantries about the weather
and more talk about his clients, yada, yada. And of course, with James continuing to outline the coming months’ calendar of events. Which, while not date-worthy, provided more than a glimmer of hope work-wise.

Heather returned.
“Anything else?”

James nodded.
“Just the checks.”