Chopping Spree

chocolate melted in my mouth and sent a flash of pleasure up my back. Forget aspirin—this was a real painkiller! Then I allowed the luscious coffee to roll over my tongue. My brain felt sharper, no question.

I frowned at my computer’s blank screen, then looked outside. The sky was turning. The brilliant white clouds had darkened, which promised more snow. I turned my back on that particular gloomy prospect, took another large bite of chocolate, cream, and berries, and washed it down with the rich coffee. Think, I ordered myself, as I surveyed the kitchen and my cooking equipment.

Which reminded me. What about my missing knife? Somehow, one of my new Henckels knives had ended up in Barry Dean’s gut.

I set aside my snack and typed, Who stole the knife? How? When?

But I knew the answer almost as soon as I typed it. Anyone could have slipped into the kitchenette while Julian, Liz, and I were busy with the crowd. Sneaking in through the service entrance, once the main doors were opened, shouldn’t have been too hard either, because at that point the security guards were inside the lounge.

There ought to be some way to determine…Wait. The lounge had boasted a multitude of cameras, all poised on the party. Cameras on the walls; cameras overhead. Plus, there’d been that videographer. Surely, one of those cameras had captured the knife thief sneaking into or out of the kitchen. Or had the knife made it to the buffet, say on one of the platters, and been snitched from there? When I visited the jail, I’d have to ask Julian if he’d spotted anything suspicious. And getting back to cameras, there should have been some hidden ones focused on the Prince & Grogan shoe department, right? Wouldn’t those videos show how Barry had died?

I finished the cake and put in a quick call to Tom. Hopefully, he’d sniffed out news of the investigation. Did being off the case mean being excluded from the progress of the investigation?

“Tom,” I said to his voice mail, “could you see if the cops got hold of the security-camera videos from the lounge, and from the P and G shoe department? Oh, and if you find out anything else about Julian’s case, would you please call?”

As soon as I hung up, the phone rang. I pounced on it. It was Marla.

“Goldy, what the hell is going on? Julian didn’t even know Barry Dean. I say the hell with waiting for another polygraph. I told Hulsey to get his investigators on this right away. I’m not pleased that Hulsey’s not dealing with Julian himself. He should have given you to Jackson.”

“I—”

“And what is it with you and Julian, guzzling all that caffeine? Don’t you know better than to drink so much of it?”

“Well, I’ll have to remember that,” I replied huffily, “the next time I cater a buffet for fifty on less than five hours of sleep, and can peer into one of my crystal balls to see that Julian will face a polygraph for a murder investigation that very day. Oh, and since you didn’t ask, I’m feeling just fine after being hit over the head.”

Marla rattled ice cubes, then gulped down something. It wasn’t even noon yet. I hoped whatever she was drinking was nonalcoholic.

She took a deep breath. “Sorry I yelled at you. You know how fond I am of Julian—I’m just scared, that’s all. Tell me what they’ve got on him, would you please?”

So I told her the little I did know, much of which she probably already had weaseled out of Julian or his lawyer. In addition to failing the polygraph, Julian had no alibi for the time Barry was murdered. He had also been accused—by whom, I still did not know—of being behind the wheel of the truck that had very nearly mowed Barry and me down. And worst of all, his fingerprints would no doubt show up on the murder weapon.

“No alibi? I’ll say I was with him.”

I shook my head. “No, I’m sure he was loading supplies and dirty dishes into my van, the way he said he would.” And speaking of vehicles, I wondered, where were Barry’s Saab and Julian’s Range Rover? Had the police impounded both vehicles?

“But,” Marla protested, “if I say he was with me, will they let him out of jail?”

“Funny thing about cops, girlfriend. They’re interested in the truth.”

“But we ought to be able to do something!”

“You could call Detective Sawyer, to see if they’ve impounded Julian’s car or Barry’s Saab. If not, get a couple of friends to take you to Westside, then find the Rover and drive it up to your place. Could you do that? Do you have keys to the Rover?”

“Absolutely. It was my sister’s car, remember? And I never throw anything away. How about Tom? Can he help?”

I retrieved a pie crust from the freezer side of the walk-in. I needed to keep cooking if I was going to stay even remotely rational. “They’ve taken Tom off the case, because there’s family involvement. Look, Marla, I’m going to look into this—”

“Well, thank God for something!”

“—but you can’t tell anyone what I’m doing. You can’t spill any details to your pals. If you do, Hulsey, the cops, and Tom will all have a fit. Now, tell me everything you know about Barry’s social life. Was there a Significant Other in the picture?”

She blew out air. “Of course. Barry was seeing Ellie McNeely, didn’t I tell you? Ellie hooked up with him the second she got that bank job. I heard it had become tres, tres serious. But Ellie had this suspicion that Barry was seeing somebody else on the side. According to her, Barry would go places and not tell her where he’d been. He wouldn’t show up when he promised. She’d see him at the doctor’s when he said he was skiing. She spotted him at the bank when he’d said he had an all-day meeting in Vail. And he skipped a dinner they were supposed to attend, claiming he’d been caught in a traffic jam west of the Eisenhower Tunnel. So I told her to hire a private investigator—”

“You did what?” Sometimes Marla’s meddling knew no bounds.

“Not too long ago, Ellie’s purse was stolen at the mall. Louis Vuitton, of course. It had her car keys in it. In her wallet, there was a picture of Ellie’s daughter, Cameron, standing beside the rear of their silver Lexus. The photo included the Lexus license plate, sorry to say. The thief found the car in the mall parking lot and tried to steal it, but instead rammed it into Barry Dean’s gorgeous old Mercedes. Totaled it, too. The Mercedes, not the Lexus.”

“What?”

“Is there an echo on this phone line? Didn’t Barry tell you why he had to buy that new Saab?”

“Not really,” I mumbled. Barry had mentioned his beloved old Mercedes had been wrecked. That was all. And I considered Ellie a friend. Why hadn’t I heard about all this? But I knew the answer, as usual. I’d been too busy catering. Finally, I said, “Sorry to be so skeptical, but if Ellie was mad enough to hire a private investigator to follow Barry because she suspected him of dallying, isn’t it possible that she faked the theft and drove her Lexus into his Mercedes herself?”

“Well,” Marla shot back, in the tone she used when the gossip became especially juicy, “there’s all kinds of speculation, of course. Maybe her bag was never stolen, but I wouldn’t sacrifice a Louis Vuitton anything to fake a theft. I’d claim someone had stolen some tote I got free with a perfume purchase. But the most prevalent theory is that that brat Teddy Fury swiped Ellie’s bag. Everyone knows that kid’s a klepto. The cops didn’t find Ellie’s LV purse when they discovered what was left of his stash of stolen goodies, though.”

“How do you know all these things?” I demanded, exasperated.

“Well, unlike you, I’m not spending all my time cooking. I’m eating lunch out and hearing all the latest. Or I’m hustling out for a bite after the midweek church service, where people go when they just can’t wait until Sunday for news. I go to the athletic club every day and wave my arms around, so I can please my cardiologist and catch up on more news that I missed at lunch or church. And when I’m not on the phone with you, I’m on with someone else, finding out stuff to share with you.”

I didn’t reply. I was still recovering from Marla’s revelations.

“So did Ellie’s P.I. find out damaging stuff?”

“Goldy, all I did was recommend that she hire someone. After all, Ellie’s older than