“Yes! She works for David.”
“Think she was trying to kill herself?”
I blinked. “No…. I don’t know…”
I remembered how distressed she’d been the night Treat had been shot, and I realized it was possible.
Jim checked her mouth and throat for foreign objects. Then he began administering CPR. He was at it less than a minute when Colleen’s eyes opened. As she started sitting up, she began to heave.
Jim glanced at me. “She’ll be okay, once she empties her stomach.”
I held Colleen’s hair while she threw up all over my car—cosmic justice, after what had happened to the back seat of Breanne’s Mercedes. But I didn’t care. I was so relieved that she was alive.
“Jim, why did you ask me if it was a suicide attempt?” I whispered.
“Someone cut those hoses to the stove, Clare. It was either suicide or vandalism.”
Colleen held her head. “What happened?”
“There was a gas leak,” I lied. “Why were you in the restaurant?”
“Well, the truth is…I’ve been sleeping there for days,” Colleen said, “but don’t tell anyone.”
Jim snorted. “I think that ship’s already sailed.”
I silenced him with a jab of my elbow. “Colleen, why would you do that?”
She tried to stand up. I put a firm hand on her shoulder. “Stay still,” I commanded, wondering where the hell the fire department was. I still couldn’t hear any sirens. “Tell me why you stayed at the restaurant, Colleen.”
“The jerks running my share house raised the rates midsummer without warning,” she confessed. “I got angry. I didn’t want to give up every dime I made to those people, and I didn’t want to lose my job here, so I decided to sleep the rest of the season on the break room couch.”
I stared at her blankly. “How did you pull it off?”
“Oh, that was easy. I’d hide in the restroom until Jacques or the designated closer locked up every night, then I’d hide again in the morning when the chef arrived so no one would see me. And there were a few times Jacques had me close up—like the other night when he went to Bom Felloes’s party. Nights like that, I had the run of the place.”
On the highway, I heard the single blast of a horn. Scarlet lights flashed in the trees. The fire department was on the way, sans sirens. I realized only then that they ran silently so as not to disturb the wealthy residents of this exclusive community. Jim faced the road, slipping back into his shirt as he waited for the authorities to arrive.
“Colleen, listen to me,” I said. “This is important. Who closed up tonight?”
“It was Jacques. I thought he would never leave. He stayed in his office very late. But then I heard him lock up. I saw him from the break room window, driving away about two-thirty. I went right to sleep after that.”
The village fire truck rolled into the parking lot, lights flashing. A police car and an ambulance pulled in behind it. The doors opened and two paramedics leaped out and ran to us.
The fire chief and several firemen with oxygen secured the area and entered the restaurant. As Colleen was helped into the ambulance, I approached the police sergeant and introduced myself.
“This was no accident,” I said. “The gas lines appear to have been deliberately sliced, and the last person to have access to them—according to this young woman right here—was the manager of the restaurant, Jacques Papas. I believe he was trying to sabotage this place to cover up the fact that he’s been embezzling from the owner, David Mintzer, and some of the vendors.”
The officer shifted uneasily. “That’s a heavy charge, ma’am.”
“I know,” I replied. “But Colleen here was sleeping inside the restaurant. She can testify that Jacques was the last one to leave. And I came by tonight to take a look at the contents of his accounting book. I believe the deals he made with vendors were never approved by the owner and the result of those deals would have been the extortion of money by Papas.”
“We’ll need a statement,” the sergeant said.
“I’m happy to provide one,” I said, then I dropped the bomb. “I also believe Jacques Papas has been trying to kill David. I think Papas may have had something to do with the murder at David’s house on July Fourth.”
The sergeant swallowed hard. Clearing the crimes I’d just outlined was probably above his pay grade.
“Wait here, Ms. Cosi,” the sergeant said. “I’m going to put in a call to the Suffolk County police. Detective Roy O’Rourke is handling that case.”
Jim appeared at my shoulder.
“Think you solved your mystery?” he asked.
“I hope so.”
“You believe Jacques tried to burn down the place to hide his crime?”
I nodded. “Think it through. At the end of the summer, a bunch of vendors are going to be expecting the rest of their bills to be paid along with the ten percent Jacques had promised them. Blowing the place up would have created enough chaos to let him get away clean, jump a plane back to Europe—with the other half of those vendor payments. He was probably betting on David throwing in the towel and declaring bankruptcy.”
Jim rubbed his jaw, considering my words. “So why blow the place now? He could have continued running the scam through the rest of July and August.”
“I think that’s partly my fault.”
“How do you figure?”
“After Prin found out about his crooked deal, Papas was able to fire her without David getting wise. But then I got suspicious. Papas knew I was under contract, so he couldn’t fire me as easily as Prin. And he knew I was aggressively snooping around his office the other day…and just this evening, he stumbled upon me making a private call while looking over your photos from David’s party. I had to admit I was conducting an investigation. The man looked positively green when I told him. And speaking of green…I’m suddenly not feeling too steady…”
The world began to look a little fuzzy and I wobbled in place.
“Whoa, steady, Clare.” Jim put his hands on my shoulders. “Sit down.”
I sank onto my car’s front bumper, put a hand to my forehead. “I guess Jacques panicked. I made him worried and frightened that he was going to be found out. And because of that an innocent young woman almost died.”
“Come here.” Jim pulled me up against him, and I held on, my head alongside his chest, my hands gripping the corded muscles of his arms.
“I feel sick,” I muttered. “The gas—”
“It’s not the gas, Clare,” Jim said. “It’s the adrenaline seeping away, making you feel unsteady, disoriented. My old team leader back in the SEALs had a saying. It was true in combat, and I guess it’s true in life too.”
“What’s that?” I asked weakly.
Jim shrugged. “After the thrill, comes the crash.”
Twenty-One
I literally crawled out of bed the next morning, a hint of gas still tainting my palate. I threw a robe over my pajamas and shuffled downstairs to the kitchen. On the way I passed David in the great room of
Like me, David had been up most of the night. He’d been called to the restaurant to secure his property after the gas leak, and the fire department declared the premises off limits until the utility company could make repairs. I assumed David was on the phone doing just that.
Our collective lack of sleep called for desperate measures, I decided, and I reached for the canister holding the caffeine-loaded Breakfast Blend.
As the nutty, earthy aroma began filling the sunlit kitchen, David entered and slumped down into a chair at the big table with a long, dramatic sigh. “It’s going to be hell finding a new manager in the middle of the season.”
“Better no manager than someone like Jacques Papas,” I replied.
