Topped Chef A Key West Food Critic Mystery (20 page)

“How’s her cooking?” Connie asked.

“Her food was okay,” I said. “Nothing that would win a prize today.” I thought for another minute. “Buddy Higgs is into molecular gastronomy.” Sam looked puzzled. “It’s complicated,” I told him. “Nothing ordinary people want to eat.” I frowned. “But I don’t know enough about Buddy personally to be able to say whether he’d sabotage someone else to get ahead. And Randy seems sweet, but he wants to win as much as anyone.”

Not as much as anyone, I thought, remembering our conversation in Aqua. More.

“I always wondered who’d be willing to go on reality television,” said Mom’s beau. “You have to be prepared to make a complete fool of yourself in public.”

“Tell me about it,” I groaned, reaching for the fried rice.

After I’d polished off every bite of the Chinese food and we’d signed off with my mother, I whipped out my smartphone to show the pirate wedding photos to Connie and Ray. “Of course this is totally your call,” I said, “and as the maid of honor, I will do anything you ask of me. But I think these people look a little silly.” Not a little silly, a lot.

Ray took the phone and flashed through the pictures. “Ahoy, matey,” he boomed to Connie in a resonant pirate voice, “wilt thou be my wench for life?”

She did not laugh.

“Okay, okay, I bow to the wishes of my bride. Buy a gown and whatever you want me to wear—I won’t complain.”

She threw her arms around him and kissed him on the lips. “Thank you! I swear you won’t look like a monkey. And I’ll stick to the budget.”

“I got some great ideas for the reception, too,” I said. “I’ll make the key lime cupcakes tomorrow and see what you think.”

“I hope you don’t mind that your mom got involved,” Connie said, talking fast. “She started asking me about the plans and I panicked a little about how much there is to do. And it makes me feel less bereft to have her interested.” She paused. “I miss my mother so much.”

“It’s fine,” I said. “She loves a project. And she’s so thrilled about you and Ray. And there’s certainly enough of her to go around—I’m happy to share.” We hugged, both a little teary-eyed, and they headed up the dock.

“I’ll clean up,” I said to Miss Gloria, who looked worn out.

“I love your family,” she said. “Doesn’t Sam seem like a perfect match for your mother?” She sighed a big happy sigh and went off to bed. It was hard to stay annoyed with a mother whom everyone adored.

Once I’d cleaned up the dishes and cleared away the trash, I stretched out on Miss Gloria’s living room floor to rest my back. Between the memorial service and my phony visit to the gym and the stress of the tasting disaster, every disk and nerve in my spinal cord was crying for mercy. Imagine how I’d be feeling if I’d actually exercised. I eased the phone out of my back pocket and put a call into Deena.

“No real news here,” she said as soon as she answered. “The woman is in fair condition in the ICU, getting flooded with IV fluids. The police packed up every bit of food we had on the set to run tests, but it could be days before we have an answer.” She sighed. “And as you well know, the hundred-fifty-a-plate fundraiser is set for tomorrow. We’ve already had calls from people wanting refunds or wondering if the event will be cancelled.”

“What’s Peter saying?” I asked.

“A lot of words that wouldn’t be fit to print. Basically, he’s crazed. That’s the only way to describe it. As long as no one dies, he thinks we can edit the tape
we’ve got and save the episode. If we don’t go forward with the final leg, he loses three-quarters of his camera crew because they are committed to other shows next week. Plus I have to go back to the office on Monday. Chad has a big, ugly divorce trial coming up and there’s no way he can spare me longer than that.”

“We have to finish then,” I said. “Do you think anyone checked the trash cans around the Westin? Is it possible that someone subbed a tainted ingredient into the mix on the counter—and then when the woman fell ill, switched the bad stuff for the good?”

“You could come up with a thousand scenarios,” Deena said. “But why? Why ruin the show?”

I hung up and texted Torrence, asking him to call me tomorrow. Then I considered getting back on my scooter to buzz over and check the trash cans around Mallory Square. That idea lasted about ten seconds as I pictured myself sorting through all the nasty garbage from tonight’s sunset celebration, in the company of one or more hungry homeless folks. Instead I went off to bed.

17

“I love you,” Elizabeth said, and I started to cry all over again.

In the oven, the chocolate soufflé began to burn.

—Vanessa Diffenbaugh,
The Language of Flowers

My heart was beating like a kettledrum as I parked my scooter in front of the We Be Fit gym the next morning. Couldn’t I have thought of an easier way to squeeze information from Mrs. Rizzoli? Like follow her to a coffee shop? A bakery? A diner? Anywhere but here.

Leigh, the trainer, was waiting for me inside the door, looking hungry as a German shepherd in front of his food bowl. She showed me where to store my helmet and backpack in the ladies room lockers at the back of the gym. Next she pointed out the cooler containing stainless steel bottles of water and had me choose a colored band to identify my bottle.

Nothing I couldn’t handle, so far.

I asked questions about the workings of several of the machines, but then I could tell from the steely flint of her blue eyes that I’d procrastinated a whisker too long. She herded me through a series of what were supposed to be regular warm-up moves that I’d never remember and then led me toward what she called a “TRX machine” at the back of the small gym.

“The rack,” I muttered. “I’ll be lucky if I don’t hang myself on this thing.”

“Let’s start with some push-ups,” she said, in a pleasant voice.

All she needed was a black hood and a mace.

“Isn’t that old-fashioned? I haven’t done a push-up since high school.”

Leigh just laughed and showed me where to place my hands on a bar eighteen inches from the floor. After eight repetitions, every muscle fiber in my arms was trembling.

“Two more,” said Leigh with an inscrutable smile.

As I finished the final grueling couplet, Mrs. Rizzoli and the friend I’d seen hugging her at the memorial yesterday bounced into the gym wearing tight, bright spandex. They went right to a nearby rowing machine where they were greeted by a male trainer with bulging muscles who looked like he’d just come from a photo shoot for
Muscle & Fitness
.

“Morning, ladies,” Leigh called.

I tried to follow their conversation but Leigh was killing me by placing ten-pound weights in my hand and forcing me through a series of squats, and then a return visit to the scene of the push-ups. When she finally granted me a short rest, I sank gasping to a nearby
bench, gulped a stream of water, and mopped my sweating face. Ten feet away, the two friends were zipping through a routine of weights and planks that would have brought me to my knees.

“We’ve got perfect weather today,” said Mrs. Rizzoli’s friend. “Even our old dog felt frisky this morning.”

“Nice,” Mrs. Rizzoli agreed, but without much enthusiasm.

“You had a fabulous turnout at the memorial service yesterday. How are you feeling?” the friend asked her.

“Honestly?”

The friend nodded.

“I would have liked to have killed that bastard myself,” Mrs. Rizzoli said. “But someone got to him first.”

The other woman looked at her like she didn’t believe the bravado. “You sound so angry. And sad.”

Mrs. Rizzoli’s lower lip quivered. For a moment, only the
click clack
of their weight machines broke the silence. “We’d been having trouble for a long time. You know that. But…” She choked back a sob. “The morning of the day he died…”

A tear leaked down the side of her face and splashed onto her bosom, darkening the purple stripe on her fashionable yoga top. Lucy brand. Expensive, I thought, my mind pushing away from her obvious pain.

The friend reached over to smooth a wisp of hair off Mrs. Rizzoli’s face. She tucked it behind her ear and nodded with encouragement. “Something happened the day he died?”

“Let’s try a plank on the exercise ball,” Leigh suggested to me. “Forearms on the ball and then straighten
your knees and draw your navel in tight. We’ll start with thirty seconds.” I stretched into the position, my arms quivering. It hardly seemed fair to say “we” when one of us was doing the work while the other held the stopwatch.

“He admitted that he’d been having an affair.” Mrs. Rizzoli barked out a harsh laugh. “Not that
that
was breaking news. Him being faithful—now that would have been worth a special marital conversation. But he admitted this new relationship had gotten more serious than he ever intended. It wasn’t his fault, of course. It crept up on him. He actually cried about not knowing what to do.”

“You’re joking,” said her friend.

“I wish,” said Mrs. Rizzoli. She picked up a couple of heavy-looking free weights and began to execute bicep curls, her muscles bulging gracefully with each rotation. “And then he told me how torn he felt and how he couldn’t bear to lose either one of us. Really, it was as though I should comfort him for getting in too deep with his girlfriend.”

“That fat bastard,” said Mrs. Rizzoli’s friend.

“I don’t think I can do any more,” I whispered to Leigh.

“Almost there,” she said. “Ten seconds.”

“And the worst thing is, I did comfort him,” said Mrs. Rizzoli to her friend. “He’s off screwing another woman and I’m patting his hand.” She thumped the weights down to the floor. “And then I threw him out. Told him to go stay on his boat a few days—I needed some space.”

“You’d feel a lot worse if you’d acted angry and
mean and then he went and got himself killed,” said the other woman. “Do the police have any news?”

“Nothing,” said Mrs. Rizzoli with a shrug of indifference I knew she couldn’t feel. “I believe they’ve cleared me of suspicion because they can’t imagine I could have hoisted him up onto the rigging.”

Her friend grinned. “They haven’t seen what you can do in this gym. I have to run—I’ll call you tomorrow, sweetie.” She bussed Mrs. Rizzoli’s cheek and hurried off toward the locker room.

“That’s it for today,” said Leigh, snapping my mind away from eavesdropping and my own agony. “We’ll meet the same time next week? Or we can step things up and make it twice a week?”

“Same time next week. If I don’t die from lactic acid poisoning after this session,” I said, only half-joking.

Leigh chuckled and pointed to the aerobic machines, lined up to the right of the desk where I’d checked in. “You should stop on the way out and put in fifteen minutes on the treadmill. When you come next week, get here early and you can warm up the same way.” She patted her own flat stomach. “Good for the heart, lungs, and waistline.”

I was about to tell her I’d put in more time working out when my mother served Thanksgiving gravy from a can, when I noticed that Mrs. Rizzoli had moved over to the machines. She was pumping the pedals of a stair-stepper, her tanned shoulders and chest glistening.

“Great idea, coach,” I said with a smart salute. Then I headed to the stationary bike, thinking that sitting down might feel like heaven. But I could barely lift my leg over the center bar of the bike.

“It gets easier,” said Mrs. Rizzoli, smiling as she watched me struggle. “I promise.”

“I sure hope so,” I said, smiling back. I punched in fifteen minutes on the bike’s computer, at an easy level, the lowest. When asked for my weight by the computer, I shaved seven pounds off and began to pedal. “I’m awfully sorry about your husband.”

She startled, as though she suspected I’d been listening in on her private conversation. Which I had. I began to pedal the bicycle.

“Mr. Rizzoli and I were serving together as judges in the
Topped Chef
Key West competition,” I added quickly, hoping to correct the impression that I was a snoop for no good reason. “I’m Hayley Snow. I was hoping I’d get the chance to talk to you because some weird things are happening with the contest. It’s hard not to worry that they’re connected with his murder.”

She took a long drink from her stainless steel bottle and increased her speed on the stair-stepping machine. She was barely breathing hard, but perspiration poured off her body and soaked her lavender top until it turned deep violet.

“I know he made some political enemies. You can’t help but do that working in the public sector,” I blundered on. “If you take a strong stand, you won’t please everyone. But it does seem possible that there’s a connection to the TV show. For instance, Randy Thompson said something about having a bad relationship with your husband.”

“Oh, Randy was a pain in his patootie,” she said, her fingers flicking the idea of him away like a mosquito. “Half the time Sam told me he didn’t pay the rent on
his apartment and the other half he paid late. My husband finally had enough and gave him notice. I think he was supposed to get out by the end of the month.” She squinted and stared at me, her legs still churning on the stair-stepper. “You’re not suggesting he was angry enough to murder my husband? That seems a little extreme.”

“I’m not saying that, only wondering about the possibilities,” I said, sucking for air as my machine’s workout leaped up to a higher level.

“Who are you? Are you working with the police?” she asked.

“No, no. I work for
Key Zest
. Like I said, just gathering information. We all felt awful about what happened to your husband. And to be honest, we’re pretty scared, too. Could one of us be next? We have no idea.”

Her eyes narrowed as she studied my face. I tried to look open and trustworthy, at the same time I was panting. “Not Randy,” she said finally. “I don’t think so.” She shook the loose hair off her face and reset her headband. “Whoever did this was ruthless and powerful and very, very angry. To leave him like that?” She blinked away a sudden rush of tears and swabbed at her face with a towel.