‘That’ll be fine, thanks. Have you worked here long?’ he asked.
‘I’ve been here about a month. I’m from out of town – Oklahoma. I came here six weeks ago, got a great apartment only twenty blocks from the beach and this is the first place I applied for a job and they asked me to start the next day. I was so jazzed. It’s so perfect here.’
‘You’re an actress, right?’
‘Yes! How’d you guess?’
‘You look like one,’ Stratton said, radiating flattery. You could throw a stone anywhere in Los Angeles and hit a wannabe thespian. They arrived in Tinsel Town by the thousands every year from all over America and the world, looking for stardom, but only a handful ever succeeded in scraping even a meagre living from it.
‘Thanks,’ the waitress said, practically bursting with joy at having her talents recognised. ‘Are you in the business?’ she asked.
‘No. Nothing as glamorous, I’m afraid. I’m an accountant – for the company that owns this restaurant, actually.’ The night of his reconnaissance Stratton had read the blurb at the front door that described the chain of restaurants dotted around the city, all owned by one corporation. ‘I’m quite new, too. I’m gradually doing the rounds of the restaurants, you know, getting to know them.’
‘Oh. Shall I tell the manager you’re here?’
‘Do me a favour and keep it to yourself until I’ve finished my meal,’ Stratton said, lowering his voice. ‘I’ll pop into the office once I’m done. I want a quiet lunch.’
‘Gotcha,’ she said, tapping the side of her nose and winking. ‘I’ll go put your order in.’
As the waitress walked away back into the restaurant she was beckoned by someone at Ardian’s table. Stratton watched as she walked over to them, replying to whatever she’d been asked. A hand reached out to pat her bottom but she sidestepped to avoid it and from that point on appeared to have difficulty maintaining her smile. A moment later she nodded and, looking flushed, walked over to a computer console where she typed in her orders, pausing a moment to compose herself as if she had been through a small trauma.
Stratton snapped off a piece of breadstick, dipped it in the olive paste and ate it while a distant siren broke through the sound of the beach traffic. Seconds later a police car speeded down the boulevard and off into the distance.
Stratton picked up the Gucci carrier bag, placed it on his lap and opened it. Inside was a plastic resealable sandwich bag containing what looked like spaghetti soaked in a light transparent oil. Inside another clear wrapping was a tiny white plastic moulding the size and shape of a thimble. The waitress came back onto the patio, carrying a tray. He closed the top of the Gucci bag as she placed a bowl of spaghetti bolognese and a small dish of freshly grated parmesan cheese in front of him. Then she held out a large wooden pepper grinder.
‘Black pepper?’ she offered as she aimed it over his meal.
‘No, that’ll be fine, thanks.’
‘Can I get you anything else?’ she asked.
‘I’m good.’
‘Great. Let me know if you need anything.’ She beamed again as she picked up the empty tray, turned on her heel and walked away.
Stratton opened the carrier bag, took out the sandwich bags and carefully opened the seal on the one containing the spaghetti, which was in fact SX cortex or detonation cord in a light machine oil. The oil played an important part in giving malleability to the plastic explosives. Stratton opened the smaller bag and removed the plastic component. Then he took one of the lengths of cortex, dabbed its end with his napkin to remove the oil and pushed it into a hole in the plastic component that was designed to grip it. He then scooped the bolognese sauce onto a side plate, forked some of the spaghetti into the Gucci bag, replaced it with the spaghetti-like cortex, mixed that with the remaining warm spaghetti to blend it in and slipped the small plastic device underneath to conceal it. Then he poured the bolognese sauce back on top. After tidying it up, cleaning the rim of the bowl with his napkin and sprinkling a little parmesan on top it looked as neat as when it had first been placed on the table.
Stratton looked for the waitress. She was near the entrance, talking to the hostess. He raised a hand. The hostess noticed him and nudged the waitress who headed towards him as he put the sandwich bags into the small carrier bag which he then folded and pushed into a trouser pocket.
‘Is everything okay?’ the waitress asked as she entered the patio.
‘I haven’t even tasted it yet. I wanted to ask you something. Do you know those gentlemen at that table in there?’
She glanced over to where the Albanians were sitting and her smile waned. ‘Those guys? I don’t know them but they’re regulars,’ she said, as if regretting that was a fact.
‘One of them is a Mister Cano – Ardian Cano.’
‘Yeah, he’s in here at least twice a week.’
‘He’s a bit of a handful, isn’t he?’
‘That’s an understatement,’ she said. ‘They’ve got a lotta hands, though. He a friend of yours? Because if he is I’d like you to ask him and his friends not to be so rude—’
‘He’s no friend of mine,’ Stratton said. ‘In fact, he was down at the Water Grill the other day,’ he went on, naming one of the chain of restaurants downtown. ‘He implied that some of the food was not up to scratch, notably the bolognese sauce.’
‘He never said anything to any of us, as far as I know,’ the waitress said, looking bemused.
‘It wasn’t a formal complaint,’ Stratton said, making light of it. ‘It was just something he said in passing. Anyway, I’d like you to do me a favour. Would you give this dish to Mr Cano, tell him it’s with the comp liments of the house and that we would very much like his expert opinion on it. You see, I think he perhaps had a one-off bad dish that day and this way we can get a firsthand comment from him. What do you think?’
‘Sure.’ She shrugged. ‘Personally I think he’s a pig and wouldn’t know bolognese from dog food. But you’re the boss.’
‘I’m not anyone’s boss – I’m just following orders.’
‘Whatever.’ She smiled. ‘I’ll give it to him.’
‘Thanks,’ he said as she picked the dish off the table.
‘But if he touches my butt I’m gonna pour it over his head.’
‘Not this time,’ Stratton said in a pleading manner. ‘Just this once be nice – if he touches you I promise he’ll never do it again.’
‘Sure?’ she asked.
‘I give you my word,’ Stratton said with undiluted sincerity.
‘You got it,’ she said and walked into the restaurant, carrying the dish.
Stratton quickly wiped everything that he had touched, the glass, dishes and cutlery. Then he stood and walked around the table.
The waitress placed the bowl on the table as she explained to Ardian what Stratton had asked her to.
Stratton took a device the size of a matchbox from his pocket and pushed a button on its face: a tiny red LED light flickered. As he walked through the doors into the restaurant he pushed the button a second time and the LED light turned green. He put his hand with the device in it in his pocket and glanced over at Ardian who was looking between the bowl and the waitress as she answered a question. Stratton slowed to a crawl as Ardian looked down.
Stratton’s thumb lightly touched the button on the device but he was unable to initiate the process yet. There was enough SX in the bowl for the blast to cause Ardian serious injury but the waitress was too close. Explosives had two distinctive, destructive characteristics: blast, which was a combination of shock wave and rapidly expanding gases that disrupted tissue; and shrapnel, which was low-velocity matter. The cortex was purely blast but since it sat in a china bowl there was a high risk of shrapnel.
Stratton pretended to be looking at the various Italian country murals that covered the walls while continually glancing at Ardian who now moved the bowl towards one of his friends. The man leaned down to sniff it and they all laughed at something one of them said which appeared to disgust the waitress. Ardian reached for the bread bowl, took a roll, pushed it into his large mouth and chewed greedily as he talked. The bowl of spaghetti travelled to another of the men who dipped a fork into the sauce and inspected the texture before tasting it. The bowl was then pushed back to Ardian who pulled it under his face for another close sniff. Stratton’s finger stayed poised on the button: the waitress was still too close to escape possible injury.
