Part 9 (1/2)
”If someone didn't kill her, what happened?” asked Connie when I returned with bowls and spoons. I took a tiny taste of the mold to be polite.
”Delicious,” I told Miss Gloria with a smile. ”The lady at her bed-and-breakfast wondered if she was a big drinker,” I said. ”It's possible that she got up on the railing for some reason and then slipped and fell. Or it could have been a suicide.”
”Is there any evidence for those possibilities?” Connie asked. ”Sounds unlikely that she'd climb up on the railing, doesn't it?”
”And she didn't seem sad to me,” Mom said. ”She was a marvelous chef and writer-at the height of her career.”
”So different on the outside from Jonah Barrows.” I described the highlights of what I'd read in his memoir earlier today-the rough upbringing, the lovers, the rivals, his sharp opinions about everything.
”They both had difficult upbringings, but for different reasons. Yoshe's parents emigrated from China,” Mom said. ”She took the legacy of that hard life, the heart of her Chinese family, and parlayed it into something truly memorable and universal.”
I got up to clear the table, stacking the bowls and carrying them to the sink.
”Don't you have a dinner to get to?” Connie asked. ”I'll help with the dishes.”
”Never you mind. You'll have enough of that as a married lady.” Mom stood up and squeezed her shoulders. ”What are you wearing?” she asked me, her eyes lighting up like this might finally be the moment I'd emerge from my unfas.h.i.+onable cave and snag a husband myself.
”Basic black,” I said.
”At least borrow my chunky turquoise necklace,” she called after me as I disappeared into my-our-bedroom. ”It will give your outfit a focal point.” As though she were an interior designer and I were the empty room.
My phone rang as I was getting ready. Bill. ”Have you talked any more to Eric?” he asked after a halfhearted stab at pleasantries.
”I tried,” I said, pulling a black T-s.h.i.+rt over my head and shaking out my hair. ”Did he tell you I dropped by his office this morning?”
”He's saying nothing,” Bill said.
I put my cell on speakerphone so I could fasten my earrings and apply a little mascara.
”He came home and took the dog out. I'd made a special dinner, but he hardly ate a thing. Said he had another, quote, migraine and went to bed in the guest room. But when I was at the dog park earlier today, one of the other small dog owners told me there's a rumor circulating that Eric may have been the last person to see Jonah alive.”
”Who would even know enough to say that?”
”You don't really need facts to make wild guesses on the Coconut Telegraph,” Bill said. ”But why won't he talk to me about any of this?”
It was hard to know how to rea.s.sure him because Eric's behavior was so far out of character. ”Call me the minute you hear anything,” I told him. ”We're here for you.” I made a smooching noise and signed off.
I kissed Mom and Connie and Miss Gloria and gathered my helmet, purse, and a little notebook. I needed to keep my eye on my career ball and not get entirely distracted by the world going to pieces around me. Connie followed me out to the dock.
”I hope you're okay with me and Ray,” she said shyly. Since Chad dumped me last fall, she'd heard me moan about my single state as a slew of our college friends announced sequential engagements over the holidays.
”Of course I am!” I flung my arms around her. ”I couldn't be happier.”
She grinned, looking mischievous. ”'Cause I want you to be my maid of honor. It'll be a small wedding and very casual,” she added quickly. ”Flip-flops on the beach at Fort Zachary Taylor Park.”
”Phew,” I said. ”No pouffy pink bridesmaid gown that makes my b.u.t.t look like an anvil? It would be an honor.”
She started up the finger toward her houseboat and then came a few steps back. ”I heard something from Ray about Bransford. He heard it from one of the other artists at the Studios of Key West. It might explain why you're finding him a little p.r.i.c.kly. I wasn't sure whether you'd want to know.”
I nodded, my heart sinking. He had another girlfriend? A wife? A man friend? ”Definitely. Secrets are toxic.” Per Eric, who was now apparently keeping a whopper.
”Bransford was married when he started out as a rookie cop in Miami. They had a particularly ugly divorce-they had to go to court to get it resolved.”
”That's brutal. Who was the unreasonable party?”
Connie shrugged. ”Unclear. After that, he moved down here to the island. Ray suspects he's never really gotten close to a woman since. So be forewarned.”
Another mantra from Eric: All of us are wounded somehow in the course of our lives. But some of us are better than others at licking those wounds and rebounding.
13.
Who goes after her lover with a paring knife? She was completely unbalanced. She did teach me how to cook.
-Allegra Goodman Connie's news about Detective Bransford's disastrous romantic past swirled through my brain as I raced across the island, late for the fancy foodie dinner. How did a person establish a normal relations.h.i.+p after a lousy divorce? My own father had managed it, my mother not so much. Where did you find the optimism to start over? Was I the first woman Bransford considered dating since he split from his ex?
More likely, seeing as how he was handsome, accomplished, and single, he'd made other forays. And maybe gotten derailed by his memories and the knowledge of what could be lost, and how much he had paid emotionally by getting close. Maybe like my father, he was resigned to paying alimony for life. Which I had to admit had always bothered me a little about my mother.
Or maybe I was overreading everything. Maybe the whole theory was bull-hooey.
As I approached the ocean side of the island, I could hear the waves rolling in, and the grace notes above that-tinkling gla.s.ses and laughing guests. Louie's Backyard appeared down the block, a pink-sided building with white trim and white lights wound around the small property's palm trees. I parked, removed my helmet, finger-combed my hair, and then went inside, feeling flutters of anxiety about the night ahead.
A slender hostess with almond-shaped eyes and a deep tan directed me up the stairs to the outside deck. The second floor opened over the restaurant below, which was dotted with green umbrellas, its weathered wooden furniture packed with diners. To the right of the bottom floor, a woman with three black dogs threw tennis b.a.l.l.s into the dark sea off a tiny beach. I could hear the splash as the dogs burst through the surface of the water and then barely make out the black dots of their heads as they swam. I'd seen this view before, but still it was glorious-one hundred eighty degrees of Atlantic Ocean. The lights of the White Street Pier sparkled off in the distance, marking the sad terrain of the AIDS memorial. Key West had been hit hard by that pandemic.
Five tables seating eight had been laid out perpendicular to the water. As the wind died down to a whisper, the voices eddied louder. I picked out the deep ba.s.s of Dustin Fredericks, Olivia Nethercut's husky alto, and Sigrid's piercing soprano. There was no way to judge how much these folks tended to drink at a social gathering, but most of the dinner party appeared to be on their way to sloshed. And maybe to be fair, the drinking was a by-product of two deaths in one weekend. Certainly my head was throbbing with all I'd seen and heard.
A black-haired waiter offered me a flute of champagne and I floated to the nearest group of guests, none of whom I knew. It didn't take long to realize that two writers were dominating the conversation, still playing to their conference audience, telling funny stories about food in their lives. But the anecdotes felt brittle and flat and the attention of the listeners was drifting.
I moved on to another cl.u.s.ter of guests, including Olivia and Sigrid, where the talk was all about Yoshe's death. It sounded like many of them had squirmed under Bransford's crime-fighting microscope today. His questions seemed to have centered on whether her friends and a.s.sociates would have described her as depressed or morose. Did she have any personal problems they were aware of? In other words, did she take her own life?
A tall blond woman clinked a fork against her water gla.s.s and asked us to take our seats. I found my place in the middle of the second table, identified by a name tag written in fancy calligraphy. Olivia Nethercut took the seat beside me, offering a quick smile that gave the impression she still had no idea who I was. Dustin remained standing as the blonde clanged her gla.s.s again.
”I'm pleased to introduce Christine Russell, who will be your hostess this evening,” he explained. ”We are delighted that you chose to partake in one of our special dinners. I wish I could stay because the menu looks incredible.” He sighed. ”Unfortunately, duty calls and I must make appearances at the other dinners taking place around the town tonight. Bon appet.i.t!”
”Thank you,” Christine said as he left the room. ”We'll be enjoying a pairing of wine with each course of dinner. These wines hail from the Dennis Jensen Vineyard, down the road from Solvang, California, a town most famous for the movie Sideways. After tonight, I trust you'll remember our wines rather than the movie.” She waited for the polite laughter from the guests to die down. ”I'll describe each of them as the night progresses, leaving time to answer any of the questions I've neglected to cover.”
I groaned inside. I could listen to descriptions of food forever, but someone droning on about how long a wine sat in a cherry-flavored oak barrel shaped like a mushroom bored me to weeping.
”Boring,” said Olivia, snorting softly. She unfolded a white napkin edged in white crochet and spread it across her purple pants.
”I'm Hayley Snow. We met in Santiago's Bodega?” I said, not wanting to go through the embarra.s.sment of having her fail to recognize me. Again.
”Of course,” she said, vague recognition finally crossing her face. ”I'm so upset about the news of poor Yoshe-my synapses just aren't firing clearly. One day we're having a lovely time visiting a tropical island and the next-two of my colleagues are dead.” She chopped a finger across her neck, s.h.i.+ny pink nails flas.h.i.+ng, nearly knocking over my winegla.s.s at the finish. ”I can hardly think or talk about anything else.”
”Horrible,” I agreed, noticing her struggle to keep her lips from quivering. ”Did you know her well?”
”All of us food writers are on the speaking engagement circuit together,” she said.