[SS01] Assault and Pepper (6 page)

The Market family enveloped me. The dim sum seller, the produce hawkers, the ancient Chinese lady who teases small children by chasing their feet with a paper snake on a string. The guys who throw fish, the doughnut makers, the men who run the newsstand.

“We’re not sure what happened,” I repeated over and over. “But we’re fine. Thank you.”

The questions, the sad eyes, the expressions of concern for Doc and for me were proof that the Market—a city within a city—is by and large a safe place peopled by folks who treat each other as family.

I left the Market at First and Pike, near where Rachel the brass pig, the flying fish, and the Market’s iconic clock and red-letter sign welcome one and all. (The pig was modeled on a real sow who lives on Whidbey Island. I was there the day she was brought to the Market to see her namesake. Fortunately, donors were more impressed than she was.) As I strolled down First Ave, my throat swelled with love for my city. I left after college, spending a year and a half in California. But as much fun as it had been to share a two-bedroom apartment with three other girls in a complex where rats darted across the sidewalk from one ivy-covered patch of “garden” to another, or to get hassled by pale, scrawny guys who swore they’d be software millionaires in six months every time I tried to relax by the swimming pool, I preferred the gray and the rain.

The comforts of home.

I passed the Seattle Art Museum and peered up at the
Hammering Man
sculpture. At nearly fifty feet tall, his arm moving up and down all day—resting overnight and on Labor Day—he’d raised a few eyebrows when first installed, but quickly become a symbol, along with the Space Needle and the troll under the Fremont Bridge, of the city’s quirky creativity.

To my right, the Harbor Steps led first to Western, then on down to Alaskan Way, aka the waterfront. The western edge of the world glistened as tour boats and ferries came and went. The giant Ferris wheel turned. In the working part of the harbor, colossal orange cranes plucked containers off the big barges like chopsticks picking up grains of rice.

On my way to Pioneer Square, I thought more about Doc. How long had he been in Seattle? What brought him here? Seattle is a city of people from all over—families like Kristen’s and my mother’s, who have been here for generations, are rare. Some folks, especially Easterners, chose the Pacific Northwest because it’s as far as you can go without leaving the lower forty-eight. Some came for the tech industry and, before that, for aerospace. Others came for the vibrant arts scene—from the funky to the sublime. Some came for the coffee and some for the wine.

Where had Doc fit in? What, as Sandra had asked, was his story?

Would we ever know?

Another question: Why hadn’t I told Spencer about Tory’s encounter with Doc? Respecting her privacy—or his? Who cares if he violated the city’s ordinance against aggressive panhandling? The man was dead.

If it turned out—and it wouldn’t, I told myself—that Doc’s death was not natural, then I’d speak up.

Till then, keep mum and carry on.

Our graphic designer’s studio is in a historic building at First and Cherry, with limestone columns and arches, and a red brick facade. The Great Tunnel project, the same one changing my own neighborhood inch by inch and foot by foot, had triggered the eviction of more than a hundred artists from an old warehouse badly damaged by the 2001 Nisqually earthquake. A dozen modern-day pioneers had seized on this building and pooled their relocation funds to redevelop the space into artists’ studios.

Like Cher and Oprah, Fabiola uses only the one name, artfully emblazoned on the wall opposite the elevator in two dozen different styles, fonts, and colors. Different materials, too: a cobalt blue lighted sign (LED—clean and green); a mosaic of broken china; paint on canvas; hammered tin; barbed wire. Narcissistic as the display might seem, it sends the message that this woman can work in any medium the project might warrant.

And she is her own best advertising. Today, she’d piled her dark hair, mahogany highlights glinting, on top of her head and speared the ’do with an oversized pair of emerald green glasses. Frames only—no lenses. Her blue-and-white floral print blouse sported a Peter Pan collar that reminded me of my grade school uniform, and short, cuffed sleeves trimmed with gold buttons that could have come off an old naval officer’s jacket. Her above-the-knee skirt—cobalt blue with white dots—swung when she walked.

We all know someone who seems to embody our own aspirations with creativity, flair, and confidence. But then we catch a glimpse—an unguarded expression, a fleeting look that barely registers—and we’re reminded that none of us is always perfectly sure of every move we make. I know that about Fabiola, and love her even more for it.

“Trade you shoes,” I said. Cherry red leather Mary Janes with three straps and a narrow toe, and the littlest stacked wooden heel.

“Reecie,” Fabiola said, peering at me through the photos and designs clipped to a wire clothesline strung above her long, scarred white worktable, “play a little. Give your shop a new leash on life.”

You can never be sure whether she’s fracturing a cliché on purpose or not. I’m not even sure Fabiola is the name her mother gave her, but no matter. She’s fab, regardless.

(I don’t use the name my mother gave me, either. Even my mother doesn’t use it. I like to think she’s forgotten it.)

“We’ve been over this,” I said, settling on one of the industrial-look metal stools designers favor. “The change in ownership was a serious big deal. I can’t risk messing up our image or the old customers, especially the irregulars, won’t know we’re still the same Seattle Spice Shop.”

Especially now. My encounter with the Texan tourists reminded me how critical—and fragile—familiarity is to casual customers.

“But you’re not the same. You’re young and hip and your packaging should reflect that. Not look like a state tourism office campaign from the 1970s.”

The collage of mirrors on the far wall reflected my scrunched-up face, broken into bits and reassembled into a not-quite-recognizable, cubist-style whole. Fabiola and I replayed this debate with every design project. When to move away from the shop’s old identity? How quickly, how completely to give it my own stamp? Jane had taken many of the shop’s artifacts with her, and I’d rearranged, adding new furnishings and décor. More than one customer had been briefly confused, not realizing we were still the source they’d relied on forever until they recognized Sandra and tasted our distinctive tea.

Wasn’t it about time to complete the Spice Shop’s makeover with a new logo?

“Okay. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

“Yes!” She turned to the shelves beneath the mirrors, skirt twirling, and drew a fuchsia file folder from a stack. Expression somber, she raised it in both hands like a State Department security briefing book, or the communion host at Mass. She set it on the table, opened it dramatically, and spread out a cascade of images.

New labels for the tins were just the start.

She’d given us a crisp, graphic view of the Sound with the giant Ferris wheel and the mountains beyond, in primary colors accentuated with emerald green. A bold sans serif font that looked like an engineer’s block print with a forward lean, as if it were in a hurry, proclaimed
SEATTLE
SPICE
SHOP
.

“We’ll use that font for your website and all your printed material.” That meant business cards, recipe cards, and shelf-talkers, which describe each herb and spice and suggest a few uses.

She’d even redesigned our aprons, and the stamp we use on our paper cups.

At that, I lost it. A rebirth, a death, a year of change. Two years plus of change. I couldn’t explain my blubbering, but Fabiola isn’t one to mind tears and snot.

What did I owe the past? What did I owe myself?

“Okay. I’ll do it. The whole shebang. To celebrate my first anniversary in the spice biz,” I said, rummaging in my bag for a tissue and finally spotting a box on Fabiola’s shelf.

To celebrate another step in running my own life.

“Celebrate yourself.” She raised one foot in her chic Mary Jane. “They’re on sale. The shop’s right around the corner. Tell ’em I sent you.”

Ten minutes later, I strolled back up First Avenue with Fabiola’s file folder in my tote, next to my comfy black climbers, and tutu pink Mary Janes on my feet.

Change your shoes, change your life.

The Travels of Marco Polo introduced Europeans to Oriental spices, but many doubted his eye-popping tales. Not Christopher Columbus, who carried an annotated copy on his own travels.

At lunchtime, the Market hops. That’s when office workers swing by to grab a slice of pizza at DeLaurenti’s, a sandwich at Three Girls, or a guess-what at Piroshky-Piroshky. Then they pick up produce, fish, meat, and cheese for the evening, and the seasonings to make it a meal.

We hum extra loud on Thursdays and Fridays. When people have more time to cook—say on the weekends—they want to be more adventurous. And at the Spice Shop, “Adventure” is our middle name.

Or it would be when we had our new labels.

I tossed my tote and Fabiola’s file on the desk in the coffin-sized office, snatched up my apron, and joined the crew on the shop floor.

“Move those to the front counter, where customers can enjoy them,” I said at the sight of a giant bouquet of sunflowers stuffed in an old pickle jar on the mixing table.

“Nope. Those are for you,” Kristen said, a glint in her gray-green eyes.

I reached for the flowers. No card.

“Mr. Howard brought them by,” she said, wiggling her eyebrows and her hips at the same time. “Hoping to catch you.”

A faint warmth crawled up my cheeks.

“Go sell something,” I said, waving my hand. Embarrassed about a boy in front of my BFF, at forty-two? Heck, yeah. Never too old for that. I slid into the nook to admire the flowers before retreating to the office to make a quick call. Or rather, to leave Alex a quick happy voice mail.

Back on the floor, I tended to customers. “That’s going to be a spicy dish,” I told a twenty-something in a splashy red-and-yellow print dress carrying a recipe torn from a magazine. I grabbed a book on Indian cooking and flipped to a page showing bowls of creamy, herbed yogurt. “Cool it down by pairing it with a raita, a dipping sauce for fresh pita bread or pita chips. It’s easy: grated cucumber, yogurt, chopped mint, and a touch of cayenne and cumin.”

“Won’t the spices make it hot?” Her long blond hair brushed her upper arm as she tilted her head.

“Use just enough for flavor, not enough for heat. With so much cayenne and cumin in the stew, putting a little in the raita will tie the two dishes together. You can get fresh mint from Herb the Herb Man across the street.” Herb, another Market regular.

“Lord love the new cooks,” Sandra said a few minutes later as our customer left through the side door, the raita recipe scribbled on a card tucked inside her shopping bag.

“First meal for her boyfriend’s parents,” I said. “If they like it, we’ll be heroes.”

The deli manager at DeLaurenti’s had delivered a mouthwatering assortment of sandwiches, meats, and cheeses, refusing to let me pay. Tragedy evokes generosity. I poured a tall glass of iced tea, returned to the mixing booth, and pondered my choices.

Not for long, though. I was starving.

I’d finished a mini roasted pepper, basil, and mozzarella panini and was contemplating a second when Reed pointed out that the CSI unit had returned to the corner outside.

What now?
And what about the makeshift memorial? By this time of day, the street men would have scattered to the park or their favorite panhandling corners. I doubted Sam would want this one today.

Sam
. The hat.

Whoa, Pepper
.
You’ve got enough to do without asking questions here
.
Let it go
.

But I got all fired up again when I saw the bike patrol officer standing guard over the CSI unit. They could do the job themselves without the ever-watchful eyes of one Officer Thomas Allen “Tag” Buhner.

He was there to watch over me and I was tired of it.

But snapping at him wouldn’t make him behave. It would only convince him I’d gone over the edge and needed his intervention.

So I flashed him the smile I use to mollify difficult customers. “Hello, officers. Can I help you with anything?”

“Stay out of their way, Pepper.”

I wasn’t in their way
. “Aren’t the flowers lovely? Doc hadn’t been part of the Market community long, but . . .”

A CSI detective brushing print powder on the door frame turned her head toward me. “They’re no trouble, ma’am. We just need to redust a few prints.”

I peered a little closer and noticed several other spots she’d redone on the front and side walls of the building.

“Does that rough finish interfere with your impressions?” The salmon pink stucco is one of my favorite features of the building. Art Deco with a Northwestern flair.

“Pepper—” Tag said, his tone a warning.

“Yes, ma’am, it does. The more uneven the surface, the harder it is to get a clear print. We’re redoing all of these, then we’ll take them back to the lab. We should be able to get you back to normal soon.”

“Thanks.” I could practically feel Tag breathing down my neck. “And when will I get my keys back?”

“Not my call,” she said. “But I can’t imagine it will be too long.”

“Thank you. This has been a pain in the—an ordeal. I appreciate how helpful you’ve been.”
Unlike you, Officer Buhner.
I walked past said Officer Buhner and strolled up Pine Street to my back door.

A few minutes later, the CSI detectives came in to print all the employees, me included, “for elimination purposes.” I watched as they rolled each finger and palm, and noted every staffer’s contact info. Happily, it didn’t take long and customer traffic was light.

“I’m taking spice samples up to Laurel. Meanwhile, take a gander.” I laid the fuchsia folder on the mixing table, next to the empty sandwich tray. “From Ms. Fabiola. Labels, and a whole lot more.”

“Oo-ooh,” Kristen said. “You finally said yes?”

She made it sound like a marriage proposal. “I haven’t said yes to anything yet. Just tell me what you think.”

“Yes, ma’am,” she said, smirking.

“Smart-ass.”

I left the shop and had almost reached First when I heard the wheels behind me.

“We need to talk,” Tag said, handlebars wobbling as he kept the bike in balance.

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Yes, we do.” He was on foot now, wheeling beside me as the light changed and I crossed the street. “Alex Howard came by while you were out.”

I didn’t ask how he knew. That flush returned to my cheeks.

“He’s trouble, Pepper. Stay away from him.”

“What do you know about it?” I whipped my head toward him before he could respond. “That was a rhetorical question. Don’t answer.”

“I know some things you don’t. And it’s not good, Pepper. You’ll only get hurt.”

And he knew all about hurting me. His wide rubber bike tires made a soft whirring sound on the concrete sidewalk. A young couple coming toward us dropped hands and stepped apart to let us through.

“Is lecturing me really a good use of the taxpayers’ money, Tag? Shouldn’t you be out doing something productive? Like solving crime?”

“Spencer and Tracy are on it. And don’t harass the CSI. They’ll release your crime scene when they’re good and ready.”

I stopped on a dime. “
My
crime scene? You do think it was a crime, don’t you? Doc’s death, I mean.”

Dang, I hated that self-satisfied look on his face.

“Why?” I went on. “He wasn’t shot or stabbed. There would have been blood. Yeah, there are other methods, but what about the scene makes you think—”

“You know I can’t tell you that. Police business.”

For half a second, I had actually taken him seriously. For a nano-blink, I had thought he was expressing genuine concern for me. But Tag Buhner wouldn’t know genuine if it bit him in the extremely fine, tight ass.

“Why did I even imagine you cared? I haven’t owned the shop a year but you want me to be a failure. Will that make you feel better about cheating on me?” I hitched my bag higher on my shoulder and marched forward.

“Pepper, wait,” he said. “It’s not like that.”

It was exactly like that. And I wasn’t going to wait around for him to prove it once again.

•   •   •

“SO
nobody knows who he is?”

I swigged my strawberry lime soda, the sharp fizz striking my nostrils and threatening a sneeze. “Somebody, somewhere. But not in the Market.” Laurel and I sat in the front window of Ripe, her gourmet deli on the Fourth Avenue side of the former bank building still known as “the box the Space Needle came in.” In the nine years I’d worked in its upper reaches, I’d probably drunk or eaten something of hers, eat-in or take-out, three or four days a week.

“It’s an injustice,” she said. “In our so-called civilization, how can people fall through the cracks?”

“SPD will figure out who he is. Homeless doesn’t necessarily mean anonymous.”

“I’m sure you’re right and he died of natural causes.” Her voice said she wasn’t sure at all. “But the family deserves to hear from someone who knew him.”

Laurel’s husband, Patrick, had been shot and killed two years ago when he heard a noise and stepped outside to check on it. Laurel and their teenage son, Gabe, had been away on a school field trip. A neighbor found the body. No arrests were ever made, but officials seemed to think the murder was linked to a corruption case Pat had handled as an assistant federal prosecutor. Laurel sold their Montlake jewel box and bought a houseboat on Lake Union, desperately needing change but not wanting to completely uproot Gabe. He’d taken to the boat like, well, a duck to water. So had she.

People tell you not to make a major change right after a major loss, but Laurel and I were both proof that conventional wisdom isn’t one size fits all.

Her meaning took a moment to sink in. “But I didn’t know him,” I said. “Not really. Besides, SPD has a team that notifies the family. If they’re in another city, the police request a notification by local authorities. It’s routine.”

“‘We’re so sorry about your father/your brother/your son. He was a bum, he had it coming.’” Laurel’s long, curly, gray-brown hair was tied back, as always when she worked, but a tendril had escaped. She shoved it behind her ear.

“They didn’t treat you like that. They won’t treat Doc’s family like that.” Laurel and I had known each other casually for years, but after her husband’s murder, I’d offered her an unjudging ear. She’d ranted and raved—still does, occasionally—but despite her freewheeling opinionating, I could scarcely imagine her pain. She’d hinted a time or two that someone higher up might not want the case solved, might not want a trial and all that it could expose, but I’d been married to a cop when it happened and she hadn’t spilled the details of her doubts. In truth, I didn’t want to know. I like believing that most people are good at heart and do the right thing.

“My bad luck he died on my doorstep, but that doesn’t make me responsible for bearing bad news.”

Her dark brown eyes glistened and she wrapped her strong fingers around my wrist. “Don’t leave justice to the system, Pepper. It’s too important.”

We locked eyes and I sighed, hoping I wouldn’t regret what amounted to a solemn promise. “Change of subject. Dish the dirt on Alex Howard.” She knew I’d had dinner with him a couple of times and gotten all starry.

“He’s big time. His restaurants are booked weeks out. He gets the celebrity photo shoots and the rave reviews.” She gave me a crooked grin. “He’s wickedly good-looking. But I can’t say we run in the same circles.”

“So why is Tag warning me off him?”

“It’s Tag. Do you need a reason?”

I picked up my bottle. “Seems like more than not wanting me to date. But maybe you’re right.”

Someone called her name from the kitchen and she slid off her stool. “Trust me, I’m right. About Tag, and about Doc. You make sure those detectives tell you when they find out who his family is so you can get in touch. Nobody ever regretted going out of their way to be kind.”

Famous last words.