Lori Avocato - Nip, Tuck, Dead

After several minutes of Miles’s instructions on how to revive a dying pan of pork gravy, I searched through the kitchen for his suggestion of a strainer. Everything I found had holes that looked way too big for what I needed. The tiny clots of flour would just pass right through.

Wait. I had visions of working the renal unit back in my nursing days and thought about straining for kidney stones. Now a kidney stone was the size of an uncooked piece of rice that tried to pass through a piece of spaghetti-uncooked too. So that theory might apply here.

Maybe my nursing skills really were still useful.

I looked around the kitchen and found the only thing that seemed plausible to use. Mother’s white dish towel. Had to be cotton. Had to be clean as a whistle since it was in the drawer, and had to be dye-free since it was white.

I draped it over a bowl in the sink, poured the mess of clots into it, and stepped back.

“I’m guessing your family wants to eat this century.”

I swung around to see Jagger only inches away, looking at my invention.

“Dinner will be served in a few seconds.” I turned away and looked at the gravy.

Not one clot had budged. It seemed rather thick.

“Damn it, Jag-” I looked over my shoulder.

Once again my buddy had disappeared like the north wind.

After many minutes, which, of course, there at 171 David Drive felt like years, I threw in the towel. Literally. I threw the entire mess into the garbage and decided I was going to tell my folks that gravy had way too much fat in it and their cholesterol levels might skyrocket if they ate it, so I was cooking “heart healthy” tonight. Gravyless pork.

It looked naked on the serving platter.

I sucked in a breath, blew it out as if that would give me more courage, and started to shout, “Dinner is-”

“Going to be in five minutes,” Jagger finished from behind.

I swung around to chastise him when I looked at his hands.

Two cans of pork gravy.

Before I could think, I swung my arms around his neck, winced when the gravy cans poked into my chest but managed a smack of thanks on his lips…that I will always remember.

Mother tried to cut her meat using her cast-covered arm and following my instructions. She managed to get most of it cut since it was so overdone the pulled pork fell off the bones. I kept encouraging her to do things herself, knowing that I couldn’t stay any longer than tomorrow.

Thank the good Lord.

Daddy did his best to help, and before the meal was done and Uncle Walt had taken his usual nap at the dining room table, Stella Sokol had gone from wounded martyr mother to accomplished pink-cast-covered heroine who could care for her family despite rain, sleet, snow or fractured humerus.

You go girl!

And I could go too.

Buzz. Buzz.

Mother, who was reaching for another helping of my “gravy,” looked at me. “None of those phone things at the table, Pauline. Where are your manners?”

The hours I’d slaved over the meal got to me. “I have perfect manners, Ma, but this is business.” I got up, took my phone and went toward the hallway. “Hey, Adele. What’s going on?”

Jagger must have heard me talking because before Adele could tell me about her daughter coming to town, he was at my back.

“So, chéri, you must meet Lilla. She is a darling-most of the time.”

I smiled to myself. “I’d love to. And about Mrs. Wheaton-Chandler?”

Silence.

Damn, Fabio probably had the cheapest phone service available. “Adele? Adele?”

“I am here, chéri.”

“Oh, thought I’d lost the connection.” I turned my shoulder away from Jagger to give him the hint that this was a private conversation. Too eager to hear what Adele had to say, I didn’t want to argue with him right then. “So? What do you know about Olivia Wheaton-Chandler?”

“She didn’t exist twenty years ago.”

“Excuse me, Adele? Excuse me? Olivia Wheaton-Chandler did not exist twenty years ago? What does that mean?”

My gut told me I knew exactly what it meant, but I wanted to-no, needed to-hear it from Adele to make it more real.

As if I wanted that monkey wrench in my case to be real.

If Mrs. Wheaton-Chandler had no record of living in Newport, then what about Lydia? Where did she come from and what the hell was going on?

“Adele, I can’t wait to meet Lilla. I’ll be there in a few minutes. You mean Mrs. Wheaton-Chandler didn’t live in Newport twenty years ago?” Okay, I told myself, that is really reaching for straws, but I’ll go for it.

“No. No, chéri. There is no record for her anywhere. Not in Newport or any other state.”

I felt Jagger’s breath on my neck, ignored it as best I could, and yes, it took a Herculean effort, but I managed to say, “What about overseas? Maybe she’s foreign?”

Another pause.

Great. I half expected Adele to set up another roadblock in my case with some other tidbit of info that she’d gleaned about the woman. Actually, I really didn’t know if Olivia had anything to do with my case.

Only going on my nursing premonition abilities and gut instincts.

“Adele?”

“Adele is very thorough, chéri. She always checks foreign and domestic before reporting to any of the investigators.”

Oh, no. I had Adele back to her old habit of talking about herself in third person. When we first met, I found it kind of eerie, but now I was used to it. At first I thought it distanced us, but now I accepted it as friendly…yet odd. “I am so sorry, Adele. I didn’t mean to insult you. You know I think the world of you. Hey, have you eaten yet?”

“No. Lilla and I were going to go out as soon as Fabio rolled himself in, but the sheet hasn’t shown up yet.”

I loved the way she called Fabio the “sheet” instead of the “shit.”

“Sit tight. I’m coming over with food.” I clicked my phone shut and turned, smacking right into Jagger. Before I could apologize or yell for his invading my space, he looked at me.

“Interesting. Very interesting,” he said.

I hurried into the kitchen with no idea what the hell he was talking about, but figured it was the thing about Olivia since Jagger surely had eavesdropped on my entire conversation.

Good. Maybe he could be of help.

I’d learned early on in this profession not to be too proud to use him.

For work, that was.

And it sure was easier taking his suggestions for help when I thought I was using him.

After I’d made sure my entire family was set, including a few more lessons on using a pink cast for Mother, I had thrown together some pork sandwiches for Adele and Lilla.

Jagger had sat on the counter stool watching the entire time.

Good for him, and even better for me since it was a good lesson in ignoring him or anyone else so that I could concentrate. Okay, I was concentrating on pork, but I figured I could transfer the newly learned skill to my investigating.

I really couldn’t wait to get back to work!

It was a comforting feeling to know that I loved my job that much, and no way was I going to let the notion that I partly wanted to leave 171 David Drive so very badly interfere with that thought.

On the way to Fabio’s, Jagger and I exchanged very little words. I had been thinking more and more about what Adele had said about Olivia. Where the heck had she come from if Adele, snooper extraordinaire, couldn’t find out?

“So, what are you thinking?” Jagger asked.

“Hm?” He’d taken me by surprise, and I wasn’t ready to discuss any of the case with him anyway. Truthfully, that was because I had nothing to discuss. Damn.

“I asked what you were thinking.”

“In general?”