Death of a Crabby Cook (2 page)

And Aunt Abby was supposed to be the crazy one?

I parked my recently purchased convertible VW Bug in her driveway and headed around to the side yard, where she kept the Airstream. A Disneyana fanatic, Aunt Abby had decorated the interior of the rig with friends of Walt. I wiped my feet on the Grumpy doormat, checked the Cheshire Cat clock on the wall inside, and dropped my purse on the sofa bed, which was covered with a Minnie Mouse throw.

Still depressed from the job news, I changed out of my black slacks and red blouse into khaki pants and an ironic “Life Is Good” T-shirt and lay down on the Tinker Bell comforter in the bedroom for a quick nap. As I dozed off, I hoped to dream up some ideas for extra cash until my fab book deal came through. With pending unemployment benefits meager and short-lived—and car payments coming due—I had a feeling food truck leftovers would be my staple for the next few months.

•   •   •

The theme song from “It's a Small World” woke me from my nightmare—something about eating a poisoned apple. Probably heartburn from overdosing on sweets and coffees. I knew the call was from Aunt Abby. Dillon had programmed personalized ringtones to alert me to some of my callers' identities. That way I could ignore my ex-boyfriend, who hadn't given up on getting back together. His tune was appropriately “Creep” by Radiohead. I fumbled for the phone, saw Aunt Abby's dimpled, smiling face on the small screen, and answered the call.

“Come in the house,” she commanded. “I want you to taste something.”

I checked the Cheshire Cat clock on the wall: four
p.m. I'd slept for more than two hours! Craving another brownie, I fluffed my bed hair, then stepped out of the Airstream and walked across the patio to the back of the house. I entered the dining area through the sliding glass door and called out to her.

“I'm in the kitchen,” she yelled back. Passing through her cozy family room, I headed for her favorite place in the house and found her busily rolling small balls of dough in her hands. Basil, Aunt Abby's long-haired Doxie, wagged her tail at my aunt's Crocs-covered feet, no doubt hoping for a dropped morsel.

“I saw your car. You got off work early?” Aunt Abby asked. She'd changed out of her cafeteria-lady apron, khaki pants, and white T-shirt into a pink athletic suit that clashed with her curly red hair but matched her pink lipstick perfectly. The ensemble was covered by a “Cereal Killer”–emblazoned apron.

I nodded and glanced around for something to eat.

“Everything all right?” As a former cafeteria worker—she preferred the term “food service chef,”
never
“lunch lady”—she often bragged she could make sloppy joes for five hundred. Only problem was, she had trouble cooking for fewer than that. At the moment, it looked like she was preparing enough dough balls to feed the San Francisco Giants and all of their fans. I leaned over and inhaled a whiff of her current experiment.

“What is that—a cheesy cake pop?” I asked. I spotted a rigid foam block filled with round balls held aloft by lollipop sticks. Before she could stop me, I popped one into my mouth.

It took only one bite to realize this was not the cake pop I'd been expecting.

“Blech!” I said, spitting the contents of my mouth into the sink. “What
was
that?”

“A Crab Pop,” she said, grinning at my reaction. “My specialty for tomorrow's festival. They're tiny cheese biscuits filled with crab and dipped in white cheddar cheese.”

“Good grief!” I fanned my mouth as if it were on fire. “I need an antidote!”

“For goodness' sakes, Darcy, it's not that bad. I thought you liked crab.”

“I do, but not as a surprise when I'm expecting something sweet!”

“Have a brownie. They're over there.” She nodded toward a foil-covered plate on the counter.

I picked up a square and stuffed it in my mouth as if it were chocolate crack. “That's more like it,” I said as soon as I'd swallowed the delicious, chewy mass.

“So, now, tell me,” Aunt Abby said as she continued inserting lollipop sticks into the newly formed balls. I tried not to watch. “Why were you home early? Rough day of restaurant reviews?”

I decided to get it over with and tell her the truth. “You could say that. The
Chron
laid me off today. I've been reduced to a stringer.” Another wave of anxiety swept over me as the reality of the statement set in.

Aunt Abby stopped what she was doing and looked at me sympathetically. “Oh, Darcy. I'm so sorry.” An instant later she perked up again. “But you know what they say: ‘When your soufflé falls, turn it into a pancake.'”

My aunt was full of these crazy food sayings. Maybe that was one of the things that had driven my family members crazy.

Without missing a beat, she continued. “So why don't you come work for me part-time? The food truck business is getting busier every day, what with all the local festivals popping up. There's practically one every weekend.” She counted them off. “The Ghirardelli Chocolate Festival is right around the corner. Then the Gilroy Garlic Festival, the Santa Cruz Fungus Festival, Isleton's Spam Festival, Oakdale's Testicle Festival—there must be over two dozen of these fests every year. And I could really use the help. Especially since Dillon has been leaving me in the lurch so often. I'll definitely need you tomorrow at the Crab and Seafood Festival. They're expecting a hundred thousand hungry people at the two-day event.”

“As long as you're not serving any oysters,” I said.

“Oysters are actually good for you,” Aunt Abby said, shaking her head at my resistance to all things mollusk related. “They're full of zinc, iron, calcium, vitamins. They boost your energy. And your sex drive.” She raised an eyebrow at me.

That's all I needed, a boost to my sex drive, after being boyfriendless for months.

“Just the thought of eating something that slimy is disgusting.”

“You don't have to eat them raw,” Aunt Abby said, shaking her head. “You can eat them smoked, boiled, baked, fried, steamed, or stewed.”

“No, thanks. I will not eat them baked or fried. I will not eat them stewed or dried. I do not like oysters or clams. I do not like them, Sam-I-Am.”

“Chicken,” my aunt said.

“I'll eat chicken,” I replied, “but I refuse to swallow anything from the mollusk family. Besides, I heard oysters
can contain bacteria.” I pulled out my cell phone and asked Siri to call up “death by oysters,” then read aloud an excerpt from the site.
“‘In the past two years, thirty-six people have died after consuming oysters.'”

“You're talking about Gulf Coast oysters that get warm and spoil quickly,” Aunt Abby said. “We don't have that problem here in the cold San Francisco Bay. But don't worry. I'm not making anything with oysters. Just crab.”

“You know I'm not much of a cook, Aunt Abby,” I said. “Besides, I'm planning to write a cookbook using recipes from food trucks and festivals. That should keep me busy for a while.”

Aunt Abby raised that damn questioning eyebrow again. It was her signature look. “Darcy, you just admitted you don't cook and you're planning to write a cookbook?”

“I'll admit the art of cooking eludes me. Eating, on the other hand, is one of my passions.” It was true. I read food magazines and cookbooks as if they were romance novels. “And writing a book filled with popular food festival recipes doesn't take any culinary talent.”

“Maybe not, but what are you going to do for money until your book is published?”

I slumped down onto a kitchen stool, feeling the lump of chocolate in my stomach turn to raw dough. She was right. I needed money. Now. I shrugged. “Work for you, I guess.”

“Work for who?” rumbled a low voice from behind me.

I turned around to see Aunt Abby's son, Dillon, looming in the doorway. He towered over his five-foot-two
mother. He was dressed in a threadbare “Zombies Ate My Sister” T-shirt and ridiculous Captain America flannel pajama bottoms. His curly dark red hair was in desperate need of a comb and some gel and scissors, and the two-day growth of stubble on his face looked more like an oversight than a fashion statement. He pulled a box of Trix from a cabinet and poured some directly into his mouth, dropping several colorful balls on the tile floor. They were quickly lapped up by Basil, who always acted as if he were starved.

“I asked Darcy to help us out in the food truck,” Aunt Abby said.

“Wait.
What?
” Dillon said, his open mouth full of fruity colors.

I didn't relish the idea of working with a slacker like Dillon either, but I didn't see much choice.

“Well, you keep disappearing,” Aunt Abby said to Dillon. “And with Darcy's help, maybe we can get ourselves on that TV show
The Great Food Truck Race
and win fifty thousand dollars.” Her bright eyes twinkled.

Yeah, right.

“Seriously,” she continued, after seeing my disbelieving reaction. “My business is booming, thanks to all the work Dillon has done promoting us on Twitter and Facebook and those other sites. Right, son?”

“Yeah, but—” Dillon began, but before he could finish, the doorbell rang.

“I'll get it,” Dillon said; then he lumbered out of the kitchen for the front door, still holding the cereal box.

Seconds later, he yelled out, “Mooooom!”

“I'm coming!” she yelled back. “That boy. Can't he even sign for a delivery?” She wiped her hands on a
towel, untied her apron, primped her curly hair, checked her lipstick in the microwave oven reflection, and headed for the door.

Moments later Aunt Abby returned to the kitchen. Her Betty Boop smile drooped, the color had left her Kewpie-doll face, and even her pink lipstick seemed to have faded. Dillon appeared behind her, frowning.

“Aunt Abby?” I asked. “What's wrong?”

“That was the police,” Aunt Abby said, sounding dazed and staring at her clasped hands.

“The police?” I repeated. “What did they want?”

She shook her head. “I'm not sure. They want me to come down to the station with them.”

I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. “Why?”

Aunt Abby looked up at me but her eyes were unfocused. “Oliver Jameson is dead.”

“What?!” I blurted when I heard the news.

Aunt Abby shook her head woefully, her perky curls barely bouncing. “I don't know why they want to talk to me, but there are two cops waiting outside to take me to the station.”

I flashed back tp the scene I'd witnessed earlier—and the knife my aunt had been wielding in her hand.

Uh-oh.

“Mom?” Dillon said, staring at his mother.

Aunt Abby shifted her glance out the kitchen window. “Oh, I . . . may have said something to Oliver Jameson that could be taken as a threat.”

“Like what?” Dillon asked, his mouth hanging open.

She shook her head. “I don't know. Something about a knife . . .”

She'd been so furious with the chef from Bones 'n' Brew that she'd actually threatened him with that ginormous kitchen knife.

“Mo-om!” Dillon whined, his face looking whiter than his usual indoor pallor. “A knife? Seriously? You didn't hurt him . . . did you?”

“Of course she didn't!” I answered for her.

Another impatient rap at the door interrupted me from defending her further.

Aunt Abby shook her head. “I told the two officers to give me a few minutes so I could change clothes. I can't wear this loungewear to the police station. And my hair's a mess. I need to freshen up.”

I could tell she was trying to keep her tone light, but her voice cracked, giving away the stress that lay beneath the surface.

“I'll need my purse . . . and a sweater . . . maybe a bottle of water . . . and a snack. . . .”

My aunt was rambling. She was probably in shock. I wrapped an arm around her.

“Don't worry, Aunt Abby. Dillon and I will go with you.”

“Darcy, they're not going to let us ride in the cop car with her,” Dillon said, the voice of doom.

“We'll take my car and follow her,” I said, then asked Aunt Abby, “Did the police say when Jameson was killed?” I wondered if she had an alibi for the murder. Hopefully she was in her School Bus serving comfort food to the city's starving citizens.

“I don't know. . . . He must have been killed sometime after I . . .” She hesitated.

“After that fight you had with him?” I said, finishing her thought. “But I took you back to your bus and you stayed there the rest of the day, right?” I turned to Dillon for confirmation, hoping he'd shown up after I left.

Dillon shot a look at his mother that told me all was not well in food truck land.

“Dillon! You
did
come back, didn't you?”

He nodded, but there was something he wasn't telling me. And then it dawned on me.

“No!” I said, glancing back and forth between Aunt Abby and Dillon. “Aunt Abby! Tell me you didn't leave the bus after Dillon returned.” I could feel the adrenaline rushing through my body and grew more alarmed.

Aunt Abby pressed her lips together, then shrugged. “After Dillon came back, the lunch crowd had died down, so I told him to hold the fort while I . . . did a few errands.”

“What errands?” I heard myself sounding more and more like a police interrogator. Why didn't I just throw in
“Do you have an alibi for the time of the murder?”

“Just stuff I had to take care of,” she said simply.

“Mo-o-om?” Dillon said. His concern for his mother was evident in his rising voice and furrowed brow. “You went over there and saw him again, didn't you!”

“No! . . . I mean, well, not exactly. . . .” Aunt Abby looked away.

“Who? What are you talking about?” I asked, confused.

“What do you mean, ‘not exactly'?” Dillon continued, ignoring me.

“Well, I might have gone to the restaurant, just for a minute. . . .” Aunt Abby said.

The restaurant? Uh-oh. “You went to Bones 'n' Brew?” Had my aunt gone over there to confront Oliver Jameson again? Not good. “Why? What were you thinking?”

“I was . . . looking for something,” she said evasively.

“What could you possibly have wanted from Bones 'n' Brew?” I asked.

“Something,” Aunt Abby said. “Anything to shut him
up and get him to leave me alone. I was tired of him hassling the food truckers, especially me. I figured if I could find something to hold over his head, maybe I could get him to back off.”

I dropped my head in my hands, stunned at this possibly incriminating news.

Dillon frowned. “Like what?”

“Like some health or safety violation . . . or rat poop. Bones 'n' Brew has been around practically since the 1906 earthquake. It's got to be riddled with violations. I figured Jameson was probably paying some government official to look the other way so he could stay in business all these years. I thought he might even have hired someone to help him pester the food trucks. So I went to his place to look for something I could take to the authorities.”

I shook my head at how naive she'd been. The police could arrest her for any number of reasons—illegal trespassing, corporate spying, theft. Who knew what the SFPD would throw at her?

In addition to possibly murder.

A question flashed through my mind: Where had Oliver Jameson been killed?

This time there was a pounding, not a knocking, on the door. A voice called out, “Mrs. Warner?”

“I'll be right there,” she called back in a singsongy voice. “I'd better get my things.”

We followed her into the bedroom, where she picked out a pair of yellow slacks and a ruffly yellow blouse covered in a floral print. Completely inappropriate for a visit to the San Francisco Police Station.

“Did you see him?” I asked my aunt as she stepped into her bathroom to change.

“Who?” she called out.

“Oliver Jameson!” Dillon and I said together.

“Oh no. He wasn't around. At least, not at first. That's why I went when I did. I saw him leave, so I sneaked in the back door, through the kitchen.”

Great. There would be witnesses in the kitchen who could confirm she'd been on the premises.

Aunt Abby appeared in the bathroom doorway, dressed, her hair fluffed, her lipstick fresh.

“Did you steal anything?” Dillon asked.

“No! Of course not!” She picked out a sweater from her closet.

“Did you touch anything?” I asked.

“I don't think so. . . . Maybe . . .”

“Mom, think! Did you go anywhere else besides the kitchen?” Dillon demanded.

“Just his office . . .” Aunt Abby headed down the hall.

I rolled my eyes and pictured my aunt in an orange jumpsuit. No doubt it would clash with her red hair. I steadied my panicked voice. When we reached the foyer, I whispered, “What did you do in his office, Aunt Abby?” I didn't want the cops on the other side of the door to hear.

She shrugged again. “I just looked through a few of his desk drawers and some of the papers on the desk, that sort of thing. I didn't steal anything, honestly.”

Stealing something was the least of my worries. Her fresh fingerprints would be all over Oliver Jameson's office.

“So did you find anything?” Dillon asked.

Aunt Abby grinned. The sparkle returned to her eyes. “Well, as a matter of fact, I found a folder hidden under
his leather ink blotter, but I didn't get a chance to look inside because I heard a commotion coming from the hallway, so I hightailed it outta there.”

“Did anyone see you?” Dillon asked.

“I went through the office window. It opens onto the back alley.”

I tried to shake away a vision of my aunt Abby crawling through a window like a common burglar.

“That's it?” I asked.

“I think so,” she said.

“Mrs. Warner,” a megaphoned voice announced on the other side of the front door.

Aunt Abby unlocked the door and swung it open. She smiled sweetly at the two uniformed officers.

“Dillon and I will follow you to the station,” I said to her.

She turned to me and whispered, “You'll take care of Basil if anything happens?”

“You'll be fine,” I said, trying to reassure her. “You'll be seeing Basil in just a little while.”

She blinked a couple of times, then headed out the door.

I eyed Dillon's sleepwear and he got the message. He ran to his room to change.

I stood watching as the two officers escorted my aunt to their waiting car. At least they hadn't handcuffed her. I thought about calling a lawyer, then told myself the police would quickly realize my aunt couldn't have committed any real crime—like murder—and would let her get back to preparing for tomorrow's Crab and Seafood Festival.

Now who was the naive one?

•   •   •

The San Francisco Police Department is located in one of the seamier parts of the city. Luckily the area is crawling with cops, so I didn't feel particularly threatened by the alcoholic, homeless, and mentally deranged characters passing by. Since cutbacks had closed many of the rehabilitation centers, homeless shelters, and mental hospitals, the streets and parks seemed to be the only places left for those who weren't in the mainstream. Once again I felt lucky to live in Aunt Abby's RV, or I might have found myself in a similar situation.

Dillon and I pulled up behind the police car and waited for Aunt Abby to get out of the backseat. In her yellow outfit, right down to the matching Crocs, she stood out among the people who frequented the police station. With her eyebrows neatly redrawn, her eyelids coated with a shiny yellow shadow, and her lips painted bright red, she was more suited to a clown party than a police visit.

To my surprise, Dillon had managed to find a pair of semiclean jeans, ripped only at the knees, an old, once-white T-shirt that read “Occupy Wall Street,” and rubber flip-flops. It was actually an improvement on his usual fashion statements. His dark curly hair sprung out from his head and hung over his eyebrows, obscuring his dark green eyes.

As for me, I'd changed into something simple, subtle, and professionally casual—black jeans and a tan shirt. Someone had to look normal in this family.

We were escorted through the metal detector, which we passed with flying colors, after dropping off our cell phones, loose coins, and other metal accessories.

So far, so good.

Next we were shown into a waiting room, while the uniformed officer who had driven Abby asked the desk sergeant to call someone named Detective Wellesley Shelton.

“Know any good lawyers?” Dillon whispered to me. Without his cell phone to hold, he kneaded his fingers and fidgeted nervously. I rarely saw him without some kind of electronic gizmo, even when he was eating.

I glanced at Aunt Abby. Dillon's question was valid. Aunt Abby was about to be questioned in a murder investigation, and as far as I knew, she didn't have an alibi or an attorney.

The only lawyer I knew was an old guy who had handled my parents' divorce. Before I could come up with other possibilities, a tall, stocky man in a dark suit opened the door. He was African American, around fifty or sixty, I guessed, judging by his curly salt-and-pepper hair and graying mustache. He wore glasses, an SFPD lapel pin, and several gold rings on his fingers, except on the ring finger of his left hand. For some reason, I just notice these things.

“Ms. Warner?” he said in a smooth, low voice.

We all stood up from the bench where we'd been asked to wait. The detective looked at my aunt, flanked by her makeshift bodyguards.

I reached out a hand and took the lead. “I'm Darcy, Abby's niece. This is Dillon, her son. We're here for support.”

He hesitated, looked us up and down, then shook my hand and said, “Fine by me. Ms. Warner?” He reached over for her hand; she smiled at the imposing detective
and daintily shook his hand. “I'm Detective Shelton. Will you follow me, please?”

The detective held open a door to let us pass, then led the way to an office at the end of the hall. Three desks filled the small room, all empty. I noted the time on the wall clock—it was after five p.m. No doubt the other officers were done for the day. It looked like lucky Detective Shelton was in for some overtime.

“Have a seat.” He gestured for my aunt to sit in the sturdy wooden chair opposite his desk. Dillon and I scavenged a couple of folding chairs that leaned against a wall.

“Thanks for coming, Ms. Warner,” he continued. “As the officers told you, the owner of a restaurant across the street from the food trucks at Fort Mason was murdered this afternoon. A witness mentioned you had an encounter with the deceased chef earlier today, and I wondered if you might have seen or heard something that would help us. If you don't mind, I'd like to ask you a few questions.”

From his soothing tone, I felt like we were meeting with a family counselor rather than a police officer. His Barry White voice was gentle and relaxed, and it was obvious he was trying to put my aunt at ease. My first thought was that it was some kind of police trick. Where were the tough interrogators I'd seen on
Criminal Minds
and
NCIS
, or even that chick on
The Mentalist
?

“So, Ms. Warner—”

“Please, call me Abby,” my aunt said sweetly, batting her heavily mascaraed eyelashes. “Everybody does. Being called Ms. Warner reminds me of my high school cafeteria days, and believe me, I'd like to forget about those
years.” She flashed him a toothy, candy apple red smile. The woman couldn't help herself!

“All right, then. Abby.” He flipped open a notebook and held a pen at the ready. “How well did you know Oliver Jameson, the owner of Bones 'n' Brew?”

“Not that well,” Abby said, sounding sincere as she shook her headful of curls. “I mean, we were both in the food service business, but he owned that aging dive across the street and I operate a nice clean food truck, a school bus, actually. Converted. I call it the Big Yellow School Bus—a kind of play on words. The name Bones 'n' Brew is just crass, don't you think?”