of the season.”
“But two days ago you yourself told the staff she’d left on a family emergency. We assumed she’d be back.”
Papas shook his head. “That was a lie that David made me pass along to everyone because he didn’t want anyone else in his employ to know he’d fired her. David loves to be loved, you know. But at times he can be an indiscriminate bastard.”
It was now my turn to fall silent and stare. “Do you know the reason for Prin’s dismissal?” I finally asked.
The manager shook his head. “No. David doesn’t like to be questioned, Ms. Cosi—surely you’ve seen that side of him.”
With that, I couldn’t argue.
“I have worked for two decades in restaurant management,” Papas continued. “And I do find that the stick gets much better results than the carrot. But I would never have fired Prin. Not when we’re so shorthanded.”
I nodded, not quite sure what to say.
“I’d appreciate your remaining discreet with this information,” Papas pointedly added. “The only reason I’m telling you is to stop you from wasting time pursuing Ms. Lopez. Now you know there’s no reason to call the girl.” Papas glanced at his Rolex. “I have to go.”
After the manager departed, I took a deep breath and made use of the espresso machine in front of me. What I badly needed at the moment was a shot (excuse the pun).
Last night, I found out that Treat Mazzelli was secretly bedding every girl on the Cuppa J wait staff—Prin Lopez being one of the first to get shagged and dumped. Now I find out she’s been dumped a second time in the middle of the busy Hamptons season by David Mintzer himself.
If that wasn’t enough to make a girl a little angry, I didn’t know what would be. But how angry? As I sent whole beans of our espresso blend through the grinder, then tamped, clamped, and extracted the essence of the beans into a shot glass, I considered this question.
I’d found Prin to be a consummate professional on the job. But Suzi Tuttle maintained the girl had one hell of a temper off it. I remember an animated story Suzi had told in the break room about how Prin “went totally postal” at a Hamptons nightclub. A pretty hostess from a Southampton restaurant dissed Prin in some way at the crowded bar. The fight escalated from verbal to physical, with Prin pulling handfuls of the girl’s hair out. The bouncer had to be called in to stop it and ejected them both.
It was very hard for me to believe that Prin herself would have gone “totally postal” by stalking and shooting Treat Mazzelli—whether she’d been trying to get revenge on Treat himself, or David, or both of them. It was equally hard to believe she may have persuaded some gangbanger friend from her South Bronx neighborhood to do it.
But Prin’s firing was unexpected, and I wanted to talk to her. I downed the espresso, absorbing the rich, warm, nutty essence of the darkly roasted Arabica beans in one fortifying hit. Then I dried my hands and went back to the break room. An employee schedule was posted on the wall next to the door. Next to Prin’s name was a cell phone number. I dialed it and got a voicemail message.
“Prin? It’s Clare Cosi, from Cuppa J. Would you please call me? It’s a matter of extreme importance.” I left the number of my own cell phone and hung up, wondering if Prin would even bother to return my call.
While I was in the kitchen, I decided to get started restocking the milk, cream, and half-and-half at the coffee bar. I checked the standing refrigerator near the dessert prep area and saw three gallons of milk, two of cream, and no half-and-half. I headed for the walk-in stainless steel refrigerator. I opened the thick, insulated door and stepped into the chilly steel box, which was nearly as large as a bedroom in my Manhattan duplex above the Village Blend.
A single bare bulb illuminated the interior, which smelled like a butcher shop—a not-unpleasant mixture of cheese and preserved meat. Shanks of dry-aged beef hung from hooks in the ceiling above, wheels and squares of imported and domestic cheeses. Boxes of green leafy vegetables, all of it produced locally, were stacked in the corner next to bags of onions, shallots, and several types of potatoes. Bundles of garlic hung from hooks on the wall, near slabs of bacon, aged prosciutto, and chorizo.
Several stacks of plastic containers stood in the corner—all of them empty. Clearly, David’s July Fourth party had drastically leached the restaurant’s supplies. Unless we got a hefty delivery of dairy products in here, pronto, our impressive array of latte drinks would be off the evening’s menu.
Rather than wait for Papas to return, I headed for his office. The manager’s inner sanctuary was untidy, but the vendor list was where I remembered seeing it a week ago, when Papas last called me in for a micromanagement session.
I found the number for Cream of the Lakes Dairy and used Jacques Papas’s phone to make the call.
“Dairy. This is the dispatcher,” a male voice said gruffly.
“Hi. I’m calling from Cuppa J in East Hampton, on—”
“Sure, sure. I know the place,” the dispatcher said, suddenly friendly.
“I was wondering if you’d made our dairy delivery for today?”
“Let me check…Ah, here it is. My guy was there at nine. Mr. Papas ordered three gallons of milk, two gallons of cream, and sixteen dozen eggs.”
Great. “Look, apparently there’s been a mistake. We’ve got no inventory here on dairy for the weekend and we need a lot more. At least twenty more gallons of milk, ten of half-and-half, and ten of cream.”
“No problem, Ma’am. We’ll get it out there in an hour.”
“Thank you so much.”
“Not a problem. You want me to bill this on the fifty-ten plan, too, right?”
“Excuse me?”
“The extra ten percent. We take fifty percent up front for deliveries, and we get the other fifty percent—plus ten—at the end of the season.”
“I, uh…suppose that’s…okay,” I replied, not knowing what else to say.
“Great. Just ask Jacques about it if you have any questions,” he added, clearly sensing my confusion. “He’s the one who worked it out.”
I hung up, even more confused.
Why, I wondered, would David Mintzer sign off on such a terrible arrangement? He had more than enough capital to pay for all of his deliveries on time. Even if he’d wanted to delay payment via a credit plan, there were certainly better interest rates out there than ten percent.
The more I thought about it, the fishier the deal sounded. David would not have signed off on such a deal, but the man at the dairy didn’t mention David. “Ask Jacques,” he’d said.
Clearly Papas was up to something—but what? Embezzlement?
I checked my watch. Papas had been gone only thirty-five minutes, so I figured I had time to do a little sniffing. I began searching through the mess on his desk, hoping to find the blue book he constantly carried. I fumbled through a week of piled up newspapers without success. Next I decided to go through the drawers in the man’s desk.
The first one I opened contained personal items—toothbrush and toothpaste, several bottles of very expensive cologne, a hairbrush, and so many men’s hair care and styling products I expected to find a tiny Vidal Sassoon in there with a pair of scissors. The second drawer contained stationery, envelopes, pens and pencils, and a stapler. The third drawer was locked.
Before I could look any further, however, Papas’s angry voice shattered the silence.
“What are you doing in here?”
“Oh, hi, Jacques, I, uh—”
“Who gave you permission to come in here?”
“I had to call the dairy. We were out of half-and-half, and far too low on milk and cream.”
Jacques Papas’s nostrils flared as he stared at me, obviously seething.
“Since you weren’t here, and we needed the supplies, I found the dairy’s number and placed the order myself,” I continued. “The dispatcher was very nice. The truck will be here within the hour.”
My words seemed to calm the man. He nodded. “You should have told me you needed supplies before I stepped out. I would have placed the order.”
“I didn’t know until I checked the walk-in. And I didn’t want to trouble you.”
