Chicken Soup & Homicide (13 page)

"Good for you," Amy said. "I'm glad to hear his plan backfired. I guess he really pissed someone off last weekend."

"Yup." He raked his hand across his dark goatee. "I felt like I was going to die from whatever he put in that shrimp. Yet I can't get that wannabe bad-ass detective off my back even though he saw me on surveillance footage going in and out of the bathroom most of the afternoon. I was too busy puking my guts out and trying not to keel over to kill Chet, even though the thought did cross my mind. So, has the detective been bugging you too, my fellow competitor?"

Carla closed her eyes. So Amy was right. Pitts was imposing his obnoxiousness on others. But why didn't she feel any better?

Amy pointed at Carla. "Me, her, Sophie…we've all been targeted in his confession-hunting expeditions. I think he is literally trying to scare someone into saying they did it, regardless if it's true, considering his tactics. It feels like he's playing a game of pin the homicide on whoever is convenient, no truth or evidence required."

Jake chuckled. He turned and looked at the kitchen. A giant window let diners see the chefs in action. "I need to get back to work. Thanks for stopping in, and good luck getting Pitts off your backs."

As the chef walked away, Amy tapped the edge of the menu on the table. "See. I told you Pitts is looking into other people. Don't let him keep messing with you. Ignore him and get ready for that romantic rendezvous with Shepler. Aren't you glad that he's bugging other people?"

"No. Pitts is determined to keep messing with Bruce, courtesy of my temper, while he pecks away at the other suspects. His vindictive little hobby witch hunt is causing trouble with us, and I don't know if our relationship can handle it. It's not fair that a lapse of judgment in my past is causing problems with Bruce's career."

Amy sighed so hard the gust of breath pushed her abandoned menu across the table. "Pitts is causing trouble as a diversion to keep attention off of his poor detective skills. I'm trying to figure this out as quickly as possible, but it's turning into a question of who hated Britton the most. And I haven't found many people that liked him."

After having a very interesting and tasty lunch with Carla, Amy returned home. She punched the button on the garage door opener clipped to her car visor. As the door slid up, she did a gyrating, seatbelt-restricted happy dance. Alex was home. Now that she was done searching for murder clues for the day, she could spend some time luring her husband away from his mistress, Quantum Media.

When she made it into the house, it was no surprise that he was holed up in his office. She tapped on the open door as she walked into the bookshelf-lined room. French doors opened into the backyard, but that area currently looked like the arctic tundra. The view was much more appealing in the summer when the flowerbeds tracing along the fence line were a riot of colors. Not that the view did much for him. His desk was positioned so his back was facing the doors. When Alex looked up from his computer screen, she smiled. "I'm so happy you're home. How does spaghetti sound for dinner? Maybe puttanesca or spicy tuna sauce? I'll start making it now. Then we can enjoy dinner together and catch up a bit afterward."

He stared at her like she had sprouted antennas and turned lime green. "I can have a quick dinner with you, but I'll need to get back to work."

"But all you do lately is work." There was nothing like starting the evening out with a whine course. Her squeaky, childish tone even annoyed her.
Pull it together, Ridley. Keep your eye on the prize.
"You're obviously stressed out from work. A grumpy detective is circling me and my friends like a vulture. You and I could both use some R & R."

More staring from Alex, when what she really wanted was for him to close his laptop and wrap his arms around her. Instead of snuggling, he sighed. "I'm sorry. I know discovering another body must've been horrendous for you. I guess I didn't realize there was anything going on with the police. Isn't Bruce handling the case?"

It was her turn to sound like an air mattress with a leak. She had told him what was going on, that Shepler had been taken off the case, but apparently the information hadn't sunk into his overcrowded mind. "No. I told you Carla used to date the chef that was killed, so Shepler had to remove himself from the case. Since she doesn't have an alibi, his replacement is trying to pin the murder on her and causing all sorts of problems at the station with Shepler."

"I'm sorry. Sounds like they're having a rough time, and I know you want to help. If you've been snooping around while I'm working, please be careful. I don't want the police or the killer coming after you. Bruce can help Carla prove her innocence."

That was cold. What was going on with her husband? Where did the fun and compassionate man she fell in love with go? It was like the brutal winter had frozen those characteristics, leaving her married to a robot. "Too late on one of those things. The detective is eying me as a suspect now."

"What?" He stood. His leather chair spun from the movement. The arm smacked into the edge of his desk. "Why didn't you tell me this?"

Amy stiffened. "When have you given me the chance to tell you? If you are home, you barely speak to me."

"I'm so sorry," he whispered as he crumpled back into his chair.

An argument was not what she wanted when she saw that Alex was home. Maybe a bit of steam would help work out some of the wrinkles. When Alex rested his forehead on his hands, she moved around the end of his desk to stand behind him. He groaned as she slid her hand over his chest and bent to kiss the back of his neck. He leaned back in his chair and pulled her onto his lap. He slipped his hand under her sweater as his lips pressed onto hers. They made out like horny teenagers for a few minutes until he whispered, "I can't do this."

The statement brought the snog fest to a jolting end. "Why? I want you. No…I need you right now. I miss you."

He rested his forehead on her shoulder. "I miss you too. But I need to get this work done. I'm the head of a company with close to 100 employees. A lot of people are depending on me to come up with their paychecks, and I need a healthy company to do that. I would love to stay here, but I can't ignore a crisis and disappear with you, no matter how much I want to."

Amy blinked back tears. "The whole point of working hard is enjoying the rewards. You're the owner of the company. Delegate some of the pressure off of yourself."

"I wish it was that easy. There's nobody that I can delegate this stuff to. There's too much work and not enough employees. We're working on hiring a couple people, but that doesn't help at this moment." He ran his fingers through the rust-colored ringlets on the top of his head. The fact that his hair had grown out enough to curl was a testament to how busy he was. He couldn't even find the time to stop at a barber for his usual near military-style buzz cut. His laptop dinged, indicating a new e-mail had arrived. He read the message around her as she climbed off his lap. "I need to head to the office right away. I'll just grab a couple of those muffins you made this morning for my dinner. Sorry, sweetheart. I really wish we could continue this."

An hour later, Amy plopped onto the corner of the overstuffed couch in the living room. She tugged the wool afghan over her legs while keeping the bowl of cheesy scrambled eggs out of Pogo's reach. He had been much more excited than she was about having eggs for dinner. He danced in circles beside the couch while keeping his eye on the prize bowl hovering above his head.

A documentary about contemporary furniture designers played on the television as she dug into the eggs. They were dry and rubbery. It was official. She was having a horrible, awful, despicable day. Scrambled eggs were one of her specialties. Most people could make edible versions of the dish but often with a texture that resembled chewing gum. Hers were always moist and light. Always. No matter if she was sick or adding a bit of extra salt to the eggs by dripping tears into the pan. Scrambled eggs were her cooking superpower. And she had ruined them.

No matter how much she despised admitting it, she was following Pitts around, talking to people he had already freaked out by insinuating they had murdered Britton. She was trying to figure out the murderer but didn't seem to be making any headway. And Pitts was either just as confused or had a weird way of cracking cases. Her stomach growled, but the eggs had lost their appeal. She set the bowl on the floor. As she listened to Pogo slurp up the unexpected treat, she wondered what it would be like facing down a law enforcement monster without her husband by her side for support.

Amy systematically ran the tip of her spoon through every sour cream heart she had made on the surface of the carrot soup. She had made chains of hearts on both bowls of soup, hoping to get Carla in a romantic frame of mind over her upcoming romantic rendezvous. Destroying the symbols of love on her lunch made her feel better about getting snubbed by Alex. The garnish didn't seem to be helping perk up Carla either as she finished her tirade about Detective Pitts. "It feels like he's made breaking us up his job, instead of finding the real killer."

"I know how it feels to watch something important falling apart when there's nothing you can do."

Carla's head snapped up from staring at her bowl. "What's happening? What's falling apart?"

"My marriage…I think." Amy twisted a strand of hair around her index finger. "I don't know. Alex is at work all the time now. Out-of-state trips every few weeks…he goes in early and gets home after I go to bed. I realize there are demands and sacrifices when you own a company, but this is crazy. I'm worried he'll end up with medical issues from all of the stress."

"I hate to ask this, but do you think all of the time away is because he's having an affair?"

Amy shook her head. "If he is cheating on me, he's hiding it well. I haven't found any evidence beyond his awful long hours away that would point to an affair. Then again, maybe my instincts are off right now. I can't even narrow down my murder suspect list to a manageable handful, let alone whittle it down to the killer so I can get all of us off of Pitts's hit list. I'm surprised I haven't had any complaints that my Parade of Desserts baked goods tasted bad. My cooking mojo is off. I ruined scrambled eggs last night." Amy took a deep breath. She just admitted that she wasn't thinking straight, even though Carla didn't realize the significance of the rubbery eggs. "Maybe there are all kinds of signs that Alex is seeing someone else, and I'm just missing them."

"You would know if he was cheating on you, in your gut, even if you don't find any physical evidence. Bruce is looking into a few leads unofficially. I'm sure he can figure out this murder mess we're all caught up in, if he can stay off of Pitts's radar. Forget about finding out who the murderer is. Take care of your marriage."

Amy stared out the window behind Carla. There was a black car parked across the road. White plumes of exhaust rose from its tailpipe. "Figuring out who really murdered Britton is better than sitting here wondering if my marriage is gasping for breath. Alex has told me several times nothing is going to change until he hires some new employees. There's no sense in having a meltdown until he finds more people."

"Sounds like you have a handle on it." Carla tapped her fingernail on the table. "Just remember, I'm here if you need to talk."

"How about we talk about your getaway with Shepler? Did you decide where you're going?"

Carla tilted her head from side to side. "There's supposed to be a big storm coming in tonight. We decided instead of heading to the west side of the state and wasting time driving through the snow, we'll just hit the casino in Detroit."

"Less time driving through storms means more time together in the hotel room. A brilliant plan." A person moved in the shadowy interior of the running car outside. "I think we should go upstairs. There's been a car that I don't recognize sitting in front of the house since we sat down to eat, and somebody is inside."

Carla glanced over her shoulder as she stood. "The black Impala?"

"Yes." She put her bowl, still full of soup that she had no appetite to eat, in the sink. "If you are warming up your car, why would you sit inside it?"

"You're right."

Amy pointed at the door that led out of the kitchen to the back hallway. "We can take the back way around to the stairs."

They hurried through the hall and sprinted up the stairs. Amy ducked into one of the spare bedrooms and emerged victorious a minute later with Alex's binoculars hanging around her neck. She motioned for Carla to follow her into the master bedroom. "There's a window in my closet. If we don't turn the light on, I don't think he'll be able to see us watching him."

Playing superspy was one way to forget about unpleasant marriage problems. In the walk-in closet she grunted as she shoved an antique dresser away from its place under the high, square window. Then she grabbed the step stool she used to stash out-of-season clothes on the top shelves, positioned it against the wall, and climbed up. Carla leaned against the doorjamb and closed her eyes as Amy stretched to see outside.

She turned the dial to focus the binoculars and stomped her foot. "You have to got to be kidding me. It's Pitts. What is he doing outside my house?"

"Following me."

"Or collecting evidence for his theory that I planned the murder and got you to carry it out. Two best friends having lunch together…I'm sure his twisted little mind can find some unique way to spin it toward us appearing guilty." Amy turned and leaned her back against the wall. Standing on the step stool, she looked Carla in the eye. "I think I'll go suggest a few better ways he could be spending his time."

"No. I'll call Bruce—"

"And start another testosterone-fueled war? Nobody needs that." Amy hopped off the stool and sprinted out of the bedroom. "Let's see how Pitts fares against a pissed-off woman with PMS."

"Seriously," Carla said as Amy ran down the stairs. "Don't do anything. Don't poke the troll."