Poisoned Soil: A Supernatural Thriller (20 page)

Nick had made it sound so easy. So seductive. And he was so persuasive, partly because he was willing to pay a lot to get the real thing, not the inferior industrial version that other restaurants were able to get. Once the USDA had approved the process of allowing some Spanish hams to be imported they had basically been ruined. Sure, they had the name Jamón Ibérico and were quite good compared to American hams, but comparing them to his father’s hams was like comparing drug store champagne to a bottle of vintage Louis Roederer Cristal. Both could claim to use the champagne method, but one taste of the latter would uncloak the former as mere toilet water. Nick wanted the absolute best for his restaurants and for his new 50-Forks club, and he was willing to pay for it to be made the right way. The way his father and his father before him made it, not the way the USDA would have it cooked and salted to death. But he needed an accomplice...
someone to do the dirty work
, Blake now realized. And Blake was only too eager once Nick did the math for him. Now, Blake began to do the math once again as he drove south, paying no attention to the SUV that had pulled into the lane behind him and now followed him.

I’ve got 200 hams hanging now, about fifteen pounds each. That’s 3,000 pounds. Nick will pay me seventy dollars a pound when they’re ready, that’s just over $200,000, not counting the other parts...the shoulders, bellies and so on. Half the hams are ready now but they won’t all be ready for another six months at least. I gotta get Nick to take everything now, or maybe take some to other chefs
... Blake was immersed in his thoughts as he approached the Tallulah River. Delivering hams for the 50-Forks dinner was just the beginning. Nick wanted hams cured the way his father had done it and on a regular basis. And he wanted to make sure that no other chef had access to those hams, those rare black-footed pigs. Blake exhaled as he tried to figure a way out of having to continue working with Nick.

He glanced in his rear view mirror and saw a rack on the top of the car behind him. Blake looked more closely to see that the rack was actually the lights of the sheriff’s vehicle. Instinct forced him upright. He corrected his posture and lifted his left hand to the wheel at the 10:00 position to face his right hand in the 2:00 position. He caught his breath and didn’t exhale, his throat instantly parched.
What the hell do they want?

The car stayed on Blake’s tail about one hundred yards back, keeping its distance precise. Blake slowed a little and continued south. The sheriff’s car slowed to match Blake’s speed and stayed behind him. A trail of cars now followed the sheriff’s car as no one dared pass, even though Blake was now driving five miles per hour under the speed limit. He looked at his speedometer and pushed the accelerator slightly, increasing his speed to fifty-five. The train behind him kept pace.

Blake saw the fog rising from the Tallulah gorge ahead of him indicating that he was close to crossing the bridge, where he would leave Rabun county and enter Habersham County, out of the sheriff’s jurisdiction.
JUST GET OFF MY TAIL!
Blake screamed to himself. His pulse was rapid and his face was flush as he tried again to calm himself.

What do I have to be afraid of? What have I even done? Even if something happened to those boys, how is that my fault? I didn’t do anything!

Blake tried all the logic he could muster, but his rational thinking was no match for his inner voice.

What about what’s in the back of your truck that you’re taking to Nick? How will you explain that if the sheriff asks?

In the mirror, the sheriff’s car zoomed closer, right on his tail now as the bridge approached. Jesus! Blake crossed the bridge and entered the fog. He slowed and turned on his lights as the fog thickened. Slowly, he began the winding ascent up and around Tallulah gorge. Blake exhaled as he passed the sign for Habersham County and flicked his eyes to the mirror. The fog lights from the sheriff’s vehicle stayed tethered to his truck, matching it curve for curve.

Jesus! What the hell does he want?
Blake thought about pulling over at a gas station, a tourist stop...any place. Instead he continued, concentrating on the road. He took one hand off the wheel, wiped the sweat from his palm on his pants, and then repeated with the other. Blake glanced down at his pants to see the momentary stain left by the sweat and looked back in the mirror. There was nothing there. No sheriff, no cars.

What the—

Blake couldn’t see where anyone had gone. The rapid curves and hills offered no more than a view of a hundred yards or so at many points without the fog. In the fog Blake was lost, alone. He just wanted out, to see that he was safe. He wanted Angelica, to be by her side. He admonished himself again for letting his life come to this.
That’s it...I’ve had it!
Blake pounded the wheel furiously.
I’m telling Nick that it’s over. I’m done with all this! This Sunday, I’m going to church with Angelica and getting some peace back in my life.

As he crested the last hill of Tallulah Falls, Blake accelerated out of the fog as 441 straightened. He drove the speed limit straight to Athens.

***

Vans and other vehicles crowded the parking lot of The Federal when Blake arrived at 11:02 a.m. Far more than usual, but then again this wasn’t a normal Friday morning for Nick Vegas. This was the day before his opening series of the 50-Forks dinners that would be held simultaneously the following day in ten cities. Nick would be the host chef in Athens at a private residence, since that was where the Food Channel camera crew would be. The dinner would be the first installment of a new Food Channel series called Underground Chefs and would air weeks later.

Blake backed his truck up to the kitchen entrance and walked inside. He knew his way around The Federal’s kitchen but always felt uncomfortable there. He passed the pastry prep area where dough was being rolled out and bread was being made, and continued walking into a sea of stainless steel. An orchestra of cooks...
chefs!
Chefs, sous chefs, assistants, line cooks, servers, and others without titles each attended to a task under the occasional direction of the conductor, the head chef. Pork bellies were being cured, fresh picked arugula was being sampled and inspected.

A local cheese maker had just come in with her assortment of cheeses for the Saturday dinner and the ensemble gathered for a team tasting. Yellow paste oozed from the white mold, raw-milk Camembert when the sous chef sliced into them, each cast member oohing and ahhing at the flavor, using descriptive phrases like “I can really taste the farm” and “it has the slightest essence of chocolate and lemongrass.” The cheese maker, chasing fame in her own right, Blake reckoned, explained it was due to her farm’s unique terroir. The chefs all nodded knowingly, as did the servers who would no doubt pass on that vague expression to diners so that they could feel better about parting with so much of their hard-earned money. Or inherited money, perhaps. Blake snorted to himself and continued walking. He saw two young busboys that weren’t too busy and asked them for help. He watched them hoist several large coolers from the back of his truck and pack the contents into the walk-in coolers before returning the collection of coolers to Blake’s truck. With the delivery unloaded, Blake strolled through the kitchen he knew so well to look for Nick.

“Can you tell me where Nick is?” Blake asked one of the sous chefs.

“Last I saw he was sitting at the bar.”

Blake walked through the double doors and into the rear of the dining room. Past the plastic palm tree, he could see someone sitting at the bar talking on his phone. It was Nick. Blake walked around the perimeter of the room to approach. Nick saw Blake approaching. He buried his smile and ended the call.

“Blake,” Nick said, looking at his Rolex. “What’s up?”

Clearly, Nick had either no time or no interest for small talk, for an unscheduled visit.

“I need to talk to you for a minute,” Blake said.

“Look, it’s a bad time—”

“It won’t take long,” Blake interrupted.

Nick stood and crossed his arms in front of him.

“What is it?”

Blake drew a deep breath and prepared to go down the list he had practiced on the ride down the way a pilot might check items off a pre-flight checklist.

“I just dropped off your centerpiece for tomorrow night’s dinner,” Blake began. “I delivered the cured hams you needed on Wednesday and FedExed the others to the other nine restaurants on the same day.”

“Yes, I know,” Nick said. “I’ve spoken to the chefs.”

Blake took another breath. “Nick...” Blake paused.
What do I want to say? What am I trying to say?

“Blake, let’s talk some other time. I have a ton to do before tomorrow.”

“No!” Blake said, surprising both himself and Nick with his assertion of authority. “I mean...Nick, I’m done. Finished. I need to deliver
everything
to you as soon as I can. Everything. I’m done with all this.”

Nick surveyed Blake, trying to detect what might be the problem so that he could choose the best response from his arsenal. He cast a line into the water. “What’s wrong, Blake?”

“I’m just done, Nick. I can’t do it anymore. My own wife doesn’t even know what I’m doing!”

Nick saw his opportunity to take control and began to assert himself. “And
why
is that, Blake?”

“BECAUSE, Nick,” Blake began and then quieted his voice. “You know why. It’s illegal. Everything I’m doing up there. The animals weren’t taken legally and the meat
you
had me cure for you hasn’t been inspected. And, it’s not even my land! You know that! I didn’t want Angelica to have anything to do with that!”

As he stopped talking Blake realized he had blurted all of that naïvely, as if talking to himself alone in the car, something that had become habit. Nick said nothing. He kept his arms crossed and stared Blake down. Blake dropped his eyes and continued.

“It’s over. Half of the hams are ready. I’m sure the others are good to go too,” Blake said, “since they’ve been curing for a little over a year now.”

“That’s no good, Blake. They have to go through that second cool autumn and winter to fully develop, that’s crucial. I’ll take the hams when they are two years old, just as we agreed,” Nick said. “And not a moment before.”

Blake stood tall and prepared to call Nick’s bluff. “Fine. Like I said Nick, I’m done. Take them now or...I’ll offer them to someone else.”

Blake hadn’t meant for the demand to sound as threatening as it did, but it was too late now. Nick grinned slightly, slyly. He sat down on a barstool and appeared so relaxed, so completely at ease. He reached his arms forward, interlocked his fingers and cracked his knuckles as they pushed out toward Blake.

“You know, Blake,” Nick began, “now that I listen to you describe what you’ve been doing, wouldn’t that be considered a violation of the Federal Meat Inspection Act? It’s just like that farmer in New York that got caught selling meat last year that wasn’t inspected, isn’t it?”

“Nick, you know what we agreed to! I’m selling you
live
animals, not processed meat. You don’t need a permit or inspection to sell live animals. We agreed that I would cure the meat for you as a
friendly
service, but you bought the live animal and that’s not a violation,” Blake said, but not as confidently as he would have liked. The truth was he didn’t know how the laws would be interpreted, and didn’t want to find out.

“Hmm...maybe you’re right, Blake. Except...I’m not sure the USDA would agree with you on that if they were to come in and ask us who we got the meat from. Oh sure, we’d probably tell them what you just said, but then again we as the restaurant wouldn’t have any culpability. The responsibility for knowing and following the law is on the one who
sells
the meat. That’s you, Blake. And that’s what happened to that farmer in New York who sold meat that wasn’t inspected. Let’s see he’s doing, what is it...eight years behind bars now, on top of the quarter million dollar fine they laid on him. Lost his house and his wife.”

Blake listened and thought of how to respond to Nick’s thinly veiled threat, but Nick continued.

“All I do is just write the check to you, Blake. Never checks larger than $5,000 at a time, just as you requested.”

Blake clenched his jaw.

“Of course, the authorities don’t come in and ask questions too often,” Nick said, “but you never know when someone may make an anonymous call and a health inspector will show up here or a USDA investigator will show up at your place. By the way, if the inspectors ever do visit you, where’d you get those pigs from anyway? I suspect they’d want to know about that too.”

Nick knew full well where he got those pigs, but, as if it had never dawned on him before, Blake realized that Nick had nothing to do with it other than planting the seed to germinate in the fertile soil of Blake’s greedy mind. It was Blake who had found Savannah locals to trap the descendants of Spanish pigs for him for next to nothing. They were all too happy to make some money doing it.