Miranda Bliss - Cooking Up Murder

The rumbling noise Beyla made from deep in her throat was all the answer we needed.

“Look, we’ve got proof,” I told Beyla, keeping my voice down and my stance casual so that our fellow students wouldn’t think we were talking about anything more important than tonight’s Poultry and Game menu. “We’ve got an old newspaper picture that shows you at Drago’s gallery.”

Beyla’s hands stilled over her grocery sack. Her hesitation lasted only the blink of an eye, then she went right on emptying her bag. She pulled out a container of cream and set it on the counter.

“And we’re not the only ones who saw you in Old Town,” I added without mentioning Yuri’s name. There was no use tipping our hand that much. “You can deny it all you want, but we know that you were there.”

“And that’s not all.” Eve moved in close. “We’ve got the foxglove.”

“What?” Beyla’s face turned as white as the flour she was just pulling out of the bag. She dropped it back into the sack and yanked open the top drawer in her workstation. It was empty. Of course it was. I still had the vial of foxglove in my purse.

“You!” As if she knew which one of us was holding onto the purloined herb, Beyla’s gaze shifted from me to Eve and back to me, and I couldn’t help but think of that expression that starts out, “If looks could kill…”

Because if looks could kill, I would have fallen down dead right then and there.

Her temper so close to snapping that her entire body quivered, Beyla slammed the empty drawer closed and leaned in close, her voice low, her eyes on me. They were as steely as the blade of the knife that lay near her right hand. “You have no idea what you are dealing with,” she whispered. “Who you are dealing with. There are dangers, ones you do not understand. If you are not careful…”

When she grabbed for the knife, I automatically jumped back.

Beyla’s smile was sleek. She raised the blade to only an inch or so from her neck and made a slashing movement. “If you are not careful,” she said, “you might get hurt.”

I’m pretty sure I didn’t answer her. What can you say when somebody just about comes right out and threatens to slit your throat? I don’t remember walking away, either. That’s probably because I was frozen on the spot. Too scared to move.

The next thing I knew, Eve’s hand was on my arm and she was tugging me back across the room to our cooking station. When we got there, she let go of me, drew in a breath, and smiled.

“I think that went really well,” she said. “We got a rise out of her. That means we’re making real progress.”

WERE WE?

Making progress, that is.

It sure didn’t feel like it to me.

I knew that I, for one, was definitely not making progress when it came to my cooking. Maybe it was because every time Jim came around, gave me a smile, and asked how I was doing, my stomach got fluttery, my temperature shot up, and my mind wandered about as far from cooking as it was possible to get.

Maybe it was because every time I chanced a look her way, Beyla was glaring back at me, fingering that big ol’ knife with the big ol’ blade.

Good excuses?

Not really, but I liked to think that if I wasn’t so distracted-both by Jim and by the thought of a gruesome act of violence being committed on me-I might have produced something better than the dry-as-dust Cornish hen I pulled out of the oven. And the duck with orange sauce… well, it’s best not to even go there.

Of course, the whole time I was busy with the poultry from hell, my mind was racing.

“Maybe she really is innocent.” I halfheartedly made the comment to Eve as she was finishing the last bits of her duck. She’d given me a taste, and it was as delicious as it looked. “Maybe she’s just pissed because we keep bothering her.”

“Beyla?” As if I could be talking about anyone else. Eve shook her head. “No way. And besides, it’s not like we have any other suspects.”

I set down the fork I was using to poke my duck to see if there was any scrap of meat on its bones that wasn’t shriveled. “Except that we do,” I murmured. Before she could say what I knew she was going to say-that we still had one more recipe to try, and that I was literally throwing in the towel by not sticking around for the venison stew-I threw in my pot holder, took off my apron, and headed downstairs to find Monsieur Lavoie.

This time, I promised myself, I wasn’t going to let him weasel out of a heart-to-heart talk.

“You’re hiding something.”

Even I was surprised at the words that popped out of my mouth when I got downstairs and found him behind the front counter. But my instincts told me I was on the right track when Monsieur took one look at me and went as white as a ghost.

He forced out a laugh. Below the counter, his hands moved nervously. Even his smile was anxious-it came and went, limp around the edges. “You are talking crazy.”

It was the second time that night that I’d been called crazy. For all I knew, both Beyla and Monsieur Lavoie were right. But that wasn’t enough to stop me.

“Every time I try to talk to you, you avoid me. And what was that bit with the Dumpster? You weren’t just throwing something away, you were destroying it first. You’re up to something.”

“Up to?” Monsieur’s stare was blank, but I wasn’t buying any of it.

“Don’t pretend you don’t understand what I’m talking about. You’ve been as jumpy as a June bug ever since the first day of class, and just in case that doesn’t translate into French, June bugs are very jumpy. You’re jumpy now.”

Monsieur backed away from the counter. “No.”

“Yes, you are. Nobody hops around from foot to foot like that unless they’re uncomfortable about something. Nobody moves things around under the counter unless he’s trying to…

“You’re hiding something!” I never knew I could move so fast. I leaned over the counter as far as I could and snatched at whatever it was that Monsieur had tucked away under there.

Which was a great big container of seasoned salt.

The cheap, generic kind I’d seen at the local market: sixteen ounces for one ninety-nine.

I stared at the glass container of salt. I looked back to Monsieur, who was looking at me, his expression teetering on the brink of tears, as if he thought I’d just exposed some national security secret.

And the truth hit like a two-ton truck.

“You’re kidding me, right?” But I didn’t wait for him to answer. Instead, I reached under the counter again and found exactly what I feared I’d find.

A big spoon.

A funnel.

And empty Vavoom! jars.

How many different ways are there to say Feeling like a fool ?

For thinking that Monsieur ever had anything to do with Drago’s death. And for every single one of the jars of Vavoom! that had ever taken up residence in my kitchen cupboard.

I dropped back to the soles of my shoes, my mouth hanging open with disappointment and surprise.

“You’re repacking cheap seasoned salt! You’re marketing it as magical seasoning!”

“Magic is where you find it, yes?” I was surprised to hear a calm-almost resigned-tone to Monsieur’s voice. I guess now that he realized I was more let down than angry, he figured he could come out of the culinary closet. Or maybe he just knew he was trapped, and no amount of lying was going to convince me otherwise.

He shrugged. “Customers, they believe Vavoom! is special. A special thing, it needs a special price. Do you not think so?”

“Not when I’m the one paying that special price!” I thought of all the jars of Vavoom! I’d stockpiled, just in case there was ever a shortage and I was in danger of going without. I propped my elbows on the counter and dropped my head into my hands. “All this time, all you’ve been doing is trying to cover up your little shell game.”