The Grilling Season Read online

  Exhibition Salad

  with Meringue-Baked

  Pecans

  Pecans:

  1 egg white

  ¼ teaspoon cinnamon

  ¼ teaspoon salt

  ⅓ cup sugar

  4 tablespoons melted butter

  2 cups (½ pound) pecan halves

  Preheat the oven to 325°. Butter a shallow 10-by 15-inch jelly-roll pan.

  Beat the egg white until stiff. Mix the cinnamon and salt into the sugar. Keeping the beater running, add the sugar mixture, 1 tablespoon at a time. Fold in the melted butter and the pecans. Spread the pecan mixture in the prepared pan and bake for 15 minutes.

  Remove the pan from the oven. Using a spatula, carefully flip the pecan mixture one small section at a time. When all the pecans have been turned over, return the pan to the oven. Bake an additional 15 minutes. Watch them carefully—do not allow them to burn. Cool the pecans on paper towels.

  (Only 1 cup of pecans is used in the preparation of the salad. The other cup can be eaten as a snack or frozen in a zippered plastic bag. These pecans also make a wonderful holiday gift.)

  Sherry Vinaigrette:

  1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

  ¼ teaspoon sugar

  1 tablespoon best-quality sherry vinegar

  2 tablespoons best-quality olive oil

  Salt and freshly ground black pepper

  Whisk together the mustard, sugar, and vinegar. Whisking constantly, dribble in the olive oil. Add salt and pepper to taste. Makes ¼ cup.

  Salad:

  2 cups (2 ounces) fresh arugula

  6 cups (6 ounces) of a mixture of fresh radicchio, endive, and escarole

  ¼ cup sherry vinaigrette

  1 cup sugared pecans

  Wash, dry, and trim the arugula and the other greens. Tear them into large bite-size pieces. Just before serving, toss with the vinaigrette. Sprinkle the pecans over the top and toss again. Serve immediately.

  Serves 4

  Even on the tape I could tell Brandon was startled. I could imagine his sparkling dark brown eyes and enthusiastic smile dimmed with pain. “My mother … “—his anguished voice was just above a whisper—“was barely conscious for the last three months of her life. That other woman was her nurse.”

  “An ACHMO nurse. Your father slept with her.”

  “You’re insane.”

  “He’s lonely, Brandon. During the day I’ll bet he’s lonely all the time.”

  And that was the end of that tape. Sheesh! Again I was stunned that Suz Craig had had the audacity to make these tapes. And to threaten people like that? Incredible. I could certainly see why she’d felt she had to hide the tapes from July 14. These cassettes were much more incriminating of her than they were of the people she was attempting to blackmail. Although someone hadn’t thought so. Were there any tapes of the Jerk visiting her office?

  I nudged the brioche dough over the pies and slid them into the ovens. They were the kind of concoction you could serve at room temperature or reheated. The final job was to prepare the promised salad. Macguire had filled several large zippered bags with freshly washed bunches of arugula and other delicate field greens. Before leaving home I’d snagged a jar of homemade sherry vinaigrette and packed up a batch of crusty, meringue-coated pecans.

  By the time I had the salad assembled, the pie crusts were golden and puffed. The melted Camembert filling, with its garlic-and-herb seasoning, smelled heavenly. I carefully removed the pies and placed them on the counters to cool. I’d reheat them, along with the chicken, just before the closing supper.

  I stared at the four tapes on the counter. I needed to do something with them. If Suz Craig had felt they were so incriminating that they should be buried, then I certainly didn’t want to keep them. ReeAnn had gotten herself blown up, I was willing to bet, by someone who thought she had these very tapes. I didn’t want to have them in the LakeCenter kitchen, in my van, or even in my home. I wanted them to be in a safe place until Tom could get them. But where?

  As I scanned the ballroom, I couldn’t get the nasty, threatening voice of Suz Craig out of my head. What would she have been able to find out about me? I wondered. If she’d married John Richard, she could have gotten hold of Arch’s records from when he was in therapy after the divorce. Maybe she would have used them to gain a reduction in child support, or for some other, more sinister intent. I shuddered. I needed to call Tom. In my haste, I’d forgotten the cellular in the van.

  While I was trotting back to my vehicle, I realized I now had to turn this whole thing over to Tom. I’d tried to sustain my relationship with Arch by fulfilling a promise to look into the case of the murder of Suz Craig. John Richard had been accused and appeared, for the most part, guilty. But the case had been more than a can of worms. It had been a tankful. With the tapes I’d discovered, and the physical evidence that would soon come back from the crime lab, Tom would help Donny Saunders figure out what had really happened to Suz.

  Still, I couldn’t help wondering how someone could have known, or could have taken the time to find out, what he or she had to know to plan out the murder of Suz Craig. You can’t put the dish in too early or it won’t come out right. Timing was everything. Not only would the killer have to know all about Suz, he or she would have to know all about John Richard’s financial situation, what kind of car he drove, the ID bracelet, everything. And, most obscurely, the killer would also have to know under what circumstances John Richard used to beat me, what triggered his abusive rages. He or she would have to know about Suz and John Richard’s monthly anniversary celebrations and that getting the Jerk totally frustrated would set him off—like lighting a fuse. The killer could get him frustrated by sending him notice of a failure to receive a bonus, when he was already deep in financial hot water.

  But it all seemed like a terribly long shot. There was still a slim chance that John Richard wouldn’t lose his temper, no matter how provoked.

  In my van the cellular phone was bleating insistently. I grabbed it and flipped it open, but whoever it was had hung up. Arch? I called Tom but got his machine. I told him about the tapes and that he should send somebody up to the LakeCenter to retrieve them. Then I picked up the large plastic container of cookies.

  The cleaning crew had left by the time I reentered the LakeCenter. The floor gleamed like a mirror and the thousands of little Babsie faces smiled beatifically at me. My cellular squawked again. I thumped the container of cookies down on the counter and reached for it.

  “Goldy? Where’ve you been?” It was Frances Markasian. “I’ve been trying to reach you for hours! What’d you give me this number for if—”

  “Spare me, Frances.”

  “What happened?” she cried. “Where are you?”

  “I’m at the LakeCenter doing a catering job for the doll show. What do you want?”

  “One of my sources told me a woman with a van was snooping around at Suz Craig’s house, digging around outside. Was it you? What did you find?”

  “Nothing. And who’s your source?”

  “Suz’s neighbor, Lynn Tollifer. She saw your van and called me. Did you find those tapes?”

  “Frances, you’re too much.”

  “Well, I didn’t, I mean … I’m coming over. I want those tapes!”

  “Forget it! The cops get them—”

  “So help me, Goldy, I’ll strip that van of yours and pull every pot out of that LakeCenter kitchen, I’ll—”

  “Cool it, Frances, I don’t have the tapes,” I lied.

  “You’re lying, I swear. I’m in a meeting, and my editor won’t let me leave. But I’ll be over there in half an hour, so help me—”

  I disconnected.

  Oh, brother. Wait a minute. This place had a live security guard. This place also had vigilante collectors if the guard couldn’t do his job. Again, I scanned the LakeCenter ballroom. Where could I put the tapes, in a place that would take Frances forever to find them? The table full of Holiday Babsies looked the most pro
mising. They all belonged to Gail Rodine, and she wasn’t selling. I’d stash them in the doll boxes, call Tom again, and have the cops figure it all out.

  It was unlikely that I’d have the place to myself for long, so I raced across the ballroom to the right display and slipped one tape each under the skirts of Holiday Babsies from 1991, 1992, 1993, and 1994. There were at least thirty dolls there. Gail Rodine lived in Aspen Meadow, and when she took the dolls back home, Tom could get the tapes without much trouble. He wouldn’t be happy about it, though.

  When I tucked the flap of the last box into place, I heard a loud thump at the front of the LakeCenter. My skin turned cold. The Jerk. Had I locked the side door? I couldn’t remember. I trotted toward it. Unfortunately, the slickly polished floor was as slippery as a skating rink. I skidded sideways, desperately twisted to regain my balance, and finally managed to land with a crash on both of my hands. I yelped with pain. By the time this case was over, I’d be covered in bruises from head to toe.

  I tried to roll over and was only partially successful. My back seemed to have regained its flexibility, but the only thing really paining me now was my left hand, in particular, my left thumb. Broken in three places by the Jerk, and destined forever to give me trouble.

  I looked at my aching thumb. I looked at it and looked at it, and I had a dawning sense of horror. You’ll be throwing pizza in no time, the orthopedic surgeon had told me after a particularly savage beating had brought me to the hospital along with the broken thumb. He knew the pattern of bruises inflicted by the Jerk because he’d seen them before. I’ll be kicking field goals in no time, he’d promised, much later. What do you think … you’ll go back to being an orthopedic surgeon? Suz had said. Your voice sounds so familiar, I’d said. Did you treat Arch?

  No. He’d treated me. A long time ago. He could plan the murder because he knew exactly what to do and how to make it look as if John Richard Korman had done it.

  At that moment the side door of the LakeCenter swung open and Chris Corey appeared, a heavy, bearded study in fury. He saw me on the floor, holding my aching thumb. He snarled: “I see you’re still good at getting yourself injured! How’s the thumb? And while you’re telling me, give me those tapes!”

  Chapter 28

  I scrambled to my feet. Pain shot through my body, but I had to think. The front door to the LakeCenter was locked; the back door was locked—for security. Somehow I had to get out through the entrance where Chris Corey stood.

  “I don’t have them,” I replied shakily.

  “I know you do! I paid that kid, Luke Tollifer, to watch Suz’s house. Where are they?”

  “In the car, in the car! My van!”

  “Show me!”

  I made my way to the door, thinking I might be able to slip past him and run. Before I could squeak by, however, he grabbed my left hand, and then my thumb. Cruelly, he twisted it behind my back. I yelped. At the same time, I noticed the cast on his ankle had mysteriously vanished.

  “Where’s your phone?”

  “In … in my apron pocket.”

  He felt inside my pocket with his free hand, tugged my phone out, and sent it skittering across the shiny floor. “I want the tapes, then I’ll leave. Walk to your van, get those tapes, then I’m gone. Scream, and I swear to God I’ll hit you harder than I did her.”

  Oh, God. Fear washed through my body. My feet slid out from under me. He wrenched me up off the slippery floor.

  “Please, Chris, don’t,” I gasped. “Think about what this is going to do to you. To Tina.”

  “Yeah, yeah. ‘Think about Tina’ is what I should have done before, huh? Move.”

  “Okay, okay,” I gasped. My thumb throbbed in agony. I feared I’d pass out. Chris pushed me forward through the threshold of the side door. I looked back at him, insanely confused that his limp had also disappeared. As he fiercely nudged me along the log wall, a gaggle of red-wing blackbirds erupted from the wetlands bordering the Lake-Center.

  I looked around wildly for help. The parking lot was empty except for my van. Where had Chris parked? I thought about screaming. But who would hear me? We were hundreds of yards from the road, even farther from the Lakeview Shopping Center.

  As we rounded the building, Chris pushed me along the sidewalk toward the parking lot. I caught a glimpse of a car on the far side of the building—the side opposite the kitchen. Of course. He’d driven up quietly and parked away from the kitchen. And naturally he knew how to be quiet; hadn’t he approached Suz’s house in the darkness and quiet, in a Jeep just like John Richard’s?

  The guard was no help. Chris had clobbered him—the crash I’d heard at the front—and he lay sprawled next to the trash can.

  “Where are the tapes?” Chris asked as we neared my van.

  “Aah … aah … “

  He wrenched my thumb brutally. “Where?”

  “I can’t … think … if you’re hurting me,” I protested in a low voice. I was using negotiating skills I had learned long ago, to keep John Richard from hurting me. When he relented a bit, I said, “Aah … under the … passenger seat. It’s a tight squeeze, you’ll never be able to reach. Better let me … get them.”

  The first cars of the doll people appeared at the far end of the dirt-road entryway to the LakeCenter. Stall, stall, I thought desperately. Chris wrenched open the passenger-side door and pushed me inside, still gripping my thumb.

  “You have to let go of me,” I gasped. “Or I can’t get them.” I tried to think. Where was my tire iron? Did I have any spare kitchen utensils anywhere, something I could use on him? He shoved me into the van on my stomach. But at least he relinquished his death-grip on my thumb. I reached under the seat with my numb left hand. Nothing, of course. “Hold on,” I called. “Just a sec.”

  He yanked back on my legs so violently that I thought I would break in two. I landed half in, half out, and on my side.

  “Help!” I screamed. I had no idea if the doll people were even within earshot. “Somebody! Help!”

  Chris picked me up by the waist and threw me on my back on the passenger-side seat. Then he flung his whole, heavy body on top of me. His fleshy hand clamped over my mouth. I kicked wildly. But with him on top of me and outweighing me by a good one hundred and fifty pounds, I had zero leverage.

  “Shut up!” he breathed. His hand tightened on my throat. Panic shot through me. He was going to strangle me. I’d never see Arch again. Or Tom. I thrashed wildly. Chris’s hand slipped off my throat. The glove compartment banged open.

  Marla’s bag of drugs fell onto the van floor.

  Oh God, help me, I prayed as I strained under Chris’s weight. I groped desperately. Keep calm, keep calm, keep calm. I reached into the bag, found nothing, scrabbled around frantically. Then my fingers closed over what I sought. I popped off the needle cover.

  Chris had grabbed my throat again. He squeezed. With every ounce of strength I had left, I stabbed him with Marla’s hypodermic of Versed. I pushed down on the plunger, hard.

  Stunned, Chris squealed with pain. His hold on me relaxed momentarily. He screamed again and hauled back to tear the needle from his body. I scrambled through the open door. By the time I was outside, Chris was stumbling dazedly down the parking lot, toward the LakeCenter and his car.

  I watched him, open-mouthed, gasping for breath. Was he going to just … take off? Was he so big that a dose of a superpotent tranquilizer had no effect on him? He faltered, appeared to trip, and then staggered forward.

  “The Babsies!” I screamed at the large group of beautifully dressed women who were sashaying across the lot toward the LakeCenter door. “That big blond man! He’s stolen them!” I pointed at Chris. He turned to stare open-mouthed at me, not comprehending. He was slowing down, no question. But he was only twenty feet from his car. “The Babsies!” I shrieked again at the women, gesticulating wildly. “That man knocked out the guard! He’s going to take the dolls!”

  The women started to trot. Chris gaped at them. Then he tur
ned and floundered toward his vehicle. The women picked up speed.

  “No, no!” he cried as the first doll collector attacked him. “No!” I heard him shout when two more women jumped on him. Bellowing in astonishment, he staggered forward. Then, under the onslaught of furious Babsie protectors, he fell to his knees.

  I walked shakily back to the LakeCenter to call the sheriff’s department. Chris Corey wasn’t going anywhere.

  Chapter 29

  Tom, as it turned out, had been up at his cabin. Empty since high creekwaters had flooded the first floor with two inches of water, unrented since Arch, Tom, and I had spent several weekends scraping off dried mud, the cabin now awaited a professional interior paint job. When Tom drove up and parked half a mile away, then used a little-known path through the woods to approach the place from the back, he had a hunch that the cabin held a squatter—one of the very few people who knew about the flood damage and the time we’d spent cleaning the place up. Unfortunately, John Richard hadn’t figured that Tom would be able to take him so easily. By the time Tom arrested the Jerk again, Sergeant Beiner had appeared at the LakeCenter and arrested Chris Corey.

  That night, Chris confessed to the murder. He had wanted to end the torment of working for Suz Craig. He remembered how John Richard had attacked me; he had waited for the right time—the silly monthly anniversary. He had stolen the ID bracelet when John Richard was helping a woman with an induced delivery that had been scheduled—and approved—by ACHMO. Finally, he had written the bonus-denial letter. The drug screen on Suz’s body fluids indicated that she, too, had been the recipient of a high-potency tranquilizer: morphine. Once Chris had primed John Richard to beat Suz, all Chris had to do was go to Suz’s door pretending to be distraught and wanting to talk things out. He’d offered to treat her contusions, then he’d given her a shot much like the one I’d given him. He’d waited until the bruises from John Richard appeared. Then he’d killed her by whacking her with the carpet-covered, solid-metal scratching post. Finally, he’d laid her in the ditch, with the bracelet as the nail in John Richard’s coffin. And then he’d gone back to pretending to be a helpful, sympathetic guy, complete with a fake cast.