The Grilling Season Read online

  “And so you quit.”

  Amy looked away for a moment. Then she said, “Well, not just then. You know how it is with institutions you’re involved with. Institution of marriage, institution of the job, institution of the church. At first you’re doing work you love and everybody’s nice. Then maybe the work gets boring but you like the people so much you don’t want to leave. Then some of the good people leave and you think, well, it’s not as good as it used to be but it’s better than going out there looking for something new.”

  I looked over at Macguire, who was perusing a magazine on nudist colonies.

  “Pretty soon,” Amy went on, “there are only a handful of people you like, or a handful of things you like, about the institution. Then bad things begin to happen. In our case at ACHMO, we got Suz Craig, a female vice-president we didn’t like. She came in and made us all miserable. And although we got a great deal of camaraderie out of talking about her behind her back, it was scant comfort.”

  “I still don’t understand why someone didn’t complain.”

  She sighed. “There was talk of it, but you know, who was going to bell the cat? Human Resources? Brandon Yuille is so terrified of losing his job that he wouldn’t even join in on our gossip. Poor guy, he had enough to deal with with his mother dying.”

  “Was she covered by ACHMO?”

  “Don’t know,” Amy replied. “Brandon talks a blue streak about food and always brought us goodies, but about his personal life he was extremely closemouthed.”

  “How about Chris Corey? Did he hate Suz Craig, too?”

  “We all hated her, Goldy. She tormented Chris for being overweight and for being late on his deadlines. She used to say that this wasn’t a waiting room where he could be an hour late for all his appointments. And so on and so on. She was cruel and spiteful and manipulative. Plus she was ruining the HMO with the way she was handling cases like Patricia’s. She wanted us to find dirt on the people suing, without realizing how that kind of activity could backfire. An HMO can’t survive bad publicity. People just won’t sign on.”

  “So if you didn’t leave when she refused to co-sign your loan, why did you finally leave?”

  “You know, I never could figure out if Suz wanted me to leave or wanted me to stay. If she wanted me to leave, why didn’t she just let me buy my store? If she wanted me to stay, why did she threaten to use the gambling issue in a way that would hurt me? I’m telling you, the woman was just mean.” She sighed. “The very last straw for me was when we had a team meeting and in front of all my colleagues, Suz told me I was over the hill, didn’t know the first thing about healing people. She even said I didn’t dress like a professional.”

  I couldn’t help it. I eyed Amy’s shapeless, spangled dress - that - could - double - as - a - nightgown. She laughed.

  “Don’t worry, Goldy, I didn’t wear this kind of thing to work. But I wasn’t going to wear short wool suits that came up to my behind and didn’t even keep my legs warm in a Colorado winter.”

  “So you … “

  “I went home after the public dressing-down Suz gave me and I looked in the mirror, hard. I asked myself, ‘Are you happy?’ And the answer was such a resounding ‘No’ that I went in the next day and quit. Then she threw a fit about my quitting. She swore she’d tell anyplace I applied that I had gambling problems and couldn’t hold down a steady job. ‘Who am I going to hire in your place?’ she wanted to know, after screaming at us for weeks that we were expendable. I just listened and kept telling myself, ‘In eight hours, Amy, you will never have to listen to this tyrant again.’ Because that’s what Suz was—a tyrant.”

  “And so you just walked out.”

  “Yup. Gleaned out my desk, took my two weeks of vacation as my notice, and that was it. I never looked back. I had some savings to tide me over, used my pension payout to buy the store instead of getting a loan, and now I’m doing what I love.” She smiled. “By next year I may even be showing a profit. I’ll start some new pension savings.”

  I looked at the brightly decorated store, the sparsely filled shelves of herb capsules and poorly stocked freezer, the “health” magazines that included the soft-porn rag Macguire was finding so entrancing. But the place, like Amy, had … well … the place had an aura. And the aura was one of happiness. Aura! Yikes! Listen to me!

  “You know what I’m talking about,” she insisted. There was a slightly accusatory tone in her voice. “You opened your catering business after being married to Dr. Gorgeous. You must be ecstatic to be free of him.”

  “It’s … well …” From the wall, the Maharishi beamed down at me. “It’s nirvana,” I admitted.

  “Then you know what I’m talking about.”

  “I do. But now Dr. Gorge—John Richard has been charged with Suz Craig’s murder and my son is suffering like you wouldn’t believe. For my son’s sake, I need to find out if his father really killed her.”

  Amy considered the green gingham curtains at the front of the store for a long time without replying. Then she said softly, “I believe in the forces of the universe, Goldy. He who has sinned will sin again. The truth will all come out. You need to trust.”

  “I do trust, Amy. But to everyone’s astonishment, John Richard Korman is out on bail. He may come looking for you, want to ask questions, and then lose his temper. It’s the control freak in him. Very predictable. Anyway, I’d feel better if you weren’t alone. Can you get somebody to work in the store with you? At the very least, keep the phone handy in case you have to dial 911.” I reached out for her hand. “John Richard called me from jail. He wanted me to come over and investigate you.”

  Amy pulled her hand away from mine. Her voice grew chill. “Is that why you’re here?”

  “Amy, please. I know this man. I’m here to warn you. He was involved with ACHMO, you were involved with ACHMO, and most certainly you didn’t get along with Suz.” I paused. “John Richard thinks you might have killed her, and that you’ve set him up to take the fall for you. Believe me, he’s not a person you want to have gunning for you.”

  She shook her head as she ran her fingers through her shiny red hair. “These people,” she muttered sadly. “I swear.”

  Chapter 19

  Jake’s earsplitting howls greeted Macguire and me before the van turned into our driveway. The cause for this canine distress was the arrival of Donny Saunders. The investigator for the Furman County district attorney sat on the top step of our front porch. Well, well, it was about time.

  Donny boasted slicked brown hair, a prominent nose and forehead, and an arrogant, horse-toothed smile he displayed whenever he stole the credit for a major bust. The closest Donny Saunders usually came to an arrest was sending seized material to a lab. Most recently, a uniformed officer had discovered twenty-five kilos of cocaine during a speeding stop. Donny Saunders had filed the report and then brayed endlessly afterward about making the biggest drug seizure in the history of the county.

  At the sight of him, I took a deep breath. A good investigator would have been at my door no later than Saturday afternoon, right after I’d discovered the body of Suz Craig and been questioned by Sergeant Beiner and her assistant. Two days had now gone by. The fact that Donny was finally paying me a call was not a good sign that the crime was being efficiently investigated.

  “Hey, Goldy, how you doing!” he greeted me. “Got anything to eat? I’m starving! And you better do something ‘bout that dog!”

  I struggled to appear friendly even as I gagged at Donny’s Vegas-style suit of shiny blue fabric that shimmered and glinted as he swaggered toward us. I introduced Macguire, identifying him only as a houseguest.

  “I’ll need to talk to you alone,” said Donny with his usual smug self-importance as I opened the front door. What a hospitable statement.

  “Gosh,” murmured Macguire in a hurt tone, “that’s the third time today people haven’t wanted me around when Goldy Schulz talks to them. Do I have b.o. or something? Guess I’ll just go sit by mys
elf. Wait till it’s time to take ten more herb capsules.” Before I could soothe his feelings, however, he plodded to the backyard to reassure Jake. After a moment the howls ceased. Unfortunately, my torment was just beginning.

  “I’ve got a lot of cooking to do,” I warned Donny. “I’m doing a big event tomorrow.”

  The enormous shoulder pads inside Donny’s sapphire suit rose ominously when he shrugged. “Not to worry! How would I bother you? Cook away, little lady! A woman’s place is in the kitchen! Ha! Ha!” His good-ole-boy tone made me grit my teeth. “But say,” he bulldozed on, “you got anything good to eat that’s, you know, ready?”

  I closed my eyes, tried to count to ten but only got to four. I remembered my promises to Arch on the one hand and to Tom on the other. Maybe I could actually learn something from Donny. But I doubted it.

  I suggested a cheese sandwich and Donny eagerly accepted. He quickly added that bread kind of stuck in his craw and he’d need three or four beers to wash the crumbs down. My hopes for our conversation sank to a subterranean level unavailable to geologists. But since the brioche had completed its first rising, I removed it from the refrigerator along with a six-pack of Dos Equis. I punched down the cold, silky mass of dough, set it aside for its second rising, and proceeded to make Donny a sandwich of thickly sliced homemade bread, pesto, fresh tomato, and chèvre. He asked for his second beer when I placed the sandwich in front of him. I handed him the cold bottle with the hope that it might loosen his tongue to share information I hadn’t heard yet. I dreaded to think, though, what my husband would say about my plying an investigator with brewskis in the middle of the day.

  “Say, this is pretty good!” Donny mumbled, mouth full. He took another enormous bite and munched thoughtfully. “Whaddaya call this white cheesy stuff?”

  “Chèvre.”

  His horsey teeth pulled into a wide grin. “Nah, Goldy, that’s a truck.”

  I forced a smile. “What do you want to talk about, Donny?”

  “Okay,” he said seriously, wiping his mouth and then using his napkin to blow his nose. “Few things.” He swigged the beer. “Suz Craig. You found her.”

  “Yep.” I decided I’d better cook. Otherwise the temptation to lose my temper might be too great. “I sure did find her.” I took out a cutting board and a zester and ran the tool down the side of a lemon. Zest strands curled outward, sending a fine, pungent mist of lemon oil onto the board. “I saw her in a ditch as I was driving down the road just before seven last Saturday.”

  “And she was your ex-husband’s girlfriend.”

  “She was, indeed.” I minced the zest, then retrieved a coffee grinder that I used exclusively for pulverizing fruit zest and nuts. “Haven’t you read my statement?”

  He gestured with the now-empty beer bottle and unsuccessfully repressed a belch. “I took a look at it. Now, what we need to establish here is John Richard Korman’s prior patterns. You know, his similar activity. How he used to beat you up. How he almost killed you. That’s the way I’ll build my case.” He eyed the Dos Equis carton longingly, but I ignored him. “Goldy,” he continued, gushing with sincerity, “I’ve seen lots of criminals like this before. Once they do it, they get a taste for it. They keep doing it. Until they kill somebody.”

  “Wait, Donny. What about the autopsy results?”

  “Coroner’s office should have ‘em at the sheriff’s department by the time I get back to the office. But don’t you worry your pretty little head about that. So, when was the last time John Richard Korman clobbered you?”

  I took a shaky breath, remembering. “Seven years ago. He broke this thumb”—I gestured—“in three places not too long before we divorced.”

  “Okay, I’ll have to check what the pathologist says about Suz Craig’s hand, if there’re any contusions there. If we’re lucky, maybe he broke her finger, too. How would Korman attack you? You don’t mind me asking?”

  “He’d grab my arms, shake me very hard. He liked to punch me in the face, even though most high-income abusers are devious enough to avoid the face. I usually ended up with a black eye.”

  “Which eye?” He was not writing.

  “The right. Which was the black eye on her, too, I noticed.”

  “You’re correct there, little woman. Okay, now when he clobbered you, would he knock you out right away? Or would the fight go on for hours?”

  I gripped the knife. Recalling these events never became less painful. “It depended on how angry he was,” I said softly. “But, Donny,” I couldn’t help interjecting, “what about the facts of this case? Since I never pressed charges, a judge may not allow all this. Have you talked to anyone down at Suz Craig’s office? At ACHMO?”

  “Oh, yeah. I was down in Denver talkin’ to some execs at the HMO this morning—”

  “Which execs?” The only ACHMO executives in town had been busy raiding John Richard’s office in Aspen Meadow. Had the rest of the department heads returned from the San Diego conference?

  “Well … talking to Suz Craig’s secretary, actually, ‘cuz most of the rest of the guys are off on some trip. But you can learn more that way. Those gals really know what’s cooking, if you know what I mean.” He winked.

  “Ah.” I put down the knife and zapped the lemon zest in the grinder. Then I pulverized the blanched slivered almonds and piled them into a pale mound. “So. What did Suz’s secretary have to say?”

  “Well …” He reached for another beer, pried off the top, and took a long swig. “I really shouldn’t say.”

  “Why not? Maybe I could help you. Fill in the blanks.”

  He harumphed, popped the last of the sandwich into a corner of his mouth, chewed, and licked his fingers. Sometimes I wondered if the only decent food Donny ever got was when Goldilocks’ Catering got mired in one of his investigations. “I’m telling you, Goldy, nobody likes Korman. But nobody liked that Craig woman, either. I mean, nobody. You know, you’d think people wouldn’t speak ill of the dead. But get right down to it, I’m surprised nobody did her right there in the office. Course, they didn’t have the pattern, like our Doc Korman.”

  I beat unsalted butter with sugar, egg yolks, vanilla, and lemon zest; measured out flour and the other dry ingredients, and then mixed them with the creamed mixture to make a nutty, buttery, heavenly-smelling dough. “Have you been looking at any other facts of the case, Donny?”

  “Tha-a-a-at’s why I’m here, right?”

  I wondered briefly if I could nip out for one of the tranquilizers Marla had given me. Maybe Amy’s herb capsules had sedative powers. But no—there was a chance Donny’s boastfulness would win out and he’d tell me what Suz’s secretary had had to say. If I didn’t appear too eager, that is. So I concentrated on the question of how to provide a high ratio of tart raspberry jam to cookie dough. Scooping the dough into cupcake pans and then topping them with spoonfuls of jam would work. I ignored Donny and set about buttering a pan.

  He continued eagerly. “You listening? You wouldn’t have believed how much that secretary, name of Luella Downing, hated Ms. Craig. Luella was in some kind of state this morning.”

  I tsked, but continued assiduously spraying a pan.

  “See,” he persisted, “this Luella resented Ms. Craig ‘cuz Ms. Craig had made it her business to know some money details of Luella’s divorce.” I looked up from the pan and raised my eyebrows. Donny smirked triumphantly. “I told Luella I wouldn’t prosecute or nothing.” I hid my exasperation and nodded knowingly. He went on. “Come to find out that Ms. Craig knew Luella had liquidated her IRA and put the money into her parents’ account so’s Luella’s ex wouldn’t find it. Our Ms. Craig used that info to get Luella to shut up about the taping.”

  I dropped the pan on the counter. “Taping of what?”

  He held up a hand. “I’m getting there. And don’t worry, I checked to see where Ms. Luella was over the weekend, just in case she’d gotten it into her head to off her boss over the IRA stuff. Luella was organizing a rummage sale f
or her parents’ church in Aurora. The story checks out—Beiner went to the church and interviewed the parents.”

  A minute amount of admiration for Donny wormed its way into my brain. “So … what was Luella taping?”

  “Luella wasn’t taping. Suz Craig was. Any meeting in her office.” He lowered his voice. “Like the frigging White House, you asked me. See, nobody but Ms. Craig and Luella knew. Luella says if she’d dropped the dime on her boss, she would have lost her job and possibly her IRA bucks.”

  Babsie’s Tarts

  1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

  ¾ cup sugar

  2 egg yolks

  1 teaspoon vanilla extract

  2 teaspoons finely grated lemon zest (see Note)

  1½ cups bleached all-purpose flour (add one tablespoon in high altitudes)

  1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

  ¼ teaspoon ground cloves

  ¼ teaspoon salt

  1 teaspoon baking powder

  1¼ cups blanched slivered almonds, ground (see Note)

  1 to 1¼ cups best-quality seedless red raspberry jam

  Beat butter until creamy. Add sugar and beat until thoroughly incorporated. Beat egg yolks slightly with vanilla and lemon zest. Add to creamed mixture, stirring thoroughly. Sift dry ingredients together, then stir into creamed mixture. Stir in almonds.