A Sheetcake Named Desire (18 page)

I glanced at the card, shuddered at the sight of Dmitri grinning wolfishly from a small picture in the corner, and shoved it into my bag. “Don’t hold your breath.”

“Don’t wait too long. Zydeco’s value is dropping by the day. I heard you’ve had some trouble with your bid for the Carleton Technologies project. That’s too bad. Whoever wins the bid also wins a full spread in
Extreme Cakes Magazine
. I’m sorry Zydeco won’t get a chance at that.”

I was tempted to use my muffuletta sandwich to wipe the smirk off his face, but there were more important things to think about. “Who did you hear that from?”

“That’s not important, is it? What
is
important is that you aren’t going to be able to bid against me for this job. That’s too bad. I was looking forward to the competition.”

Liar. He was thrilled. I could see it in his eyes. “Well, don’t let it get you down,” I said. “We’re not out of the running yet.”

He laughed out loud at that. “You’re determined. I like that.”

“Oh good. That’s what I live for.” He’d relaxed enough to let me slip past him, so I did.

“Ask Miss Frankie about that offer,” he called after me. “Talk some sense into her. I’d hate to see her get in over her head after you leave.”

I ignored him and kept going, straight out the door and onto the sidewalk. I was both irritated and a little frightened. Not only did we have a saboteur at Zydeco, but we apparently had a leak, too. Is that why Dmitri was wandering around this neighborhood? I was convinced that he’d followed me into the market, and that made me nervous. Why follow me? I couldn’t do anything for him.

I was back out in the afternoon heat, but for once, I barely noticed it. I had too many questions racing through my head. I looked around for a place to eat and spotted a couple of sagging picnic tables in the shade, so I carried my lunch toward them.

I’d have been more comfortable in the air-conditioned lunchroom at Zydeco, but I’d spent so much time with other people lately I needed a little solitude and a chance to regroup. Besides, maybe Dmitri hadn’t met with his informant yet. Maybe I could watch and figure out who was selling Zydeco down the river.

Dmitri Wolff’s offer to buy Zydeco and Miss Frankie’s suspicions about Quinn and the staff kept skewering me whenever I let my mind wander. Someone who knew about the missing design had leaked the information to Dmitri, but I was having trouble believing that any of the staff could have done it.

Quinn? I could believe anything of her, but she hadn’t known about the missing design—had she? And I still couldn’t come up with a motive for her. It seemed to me that she lost more than she would have gained by Philippe’s death.

I again considered the possibility that Philippe had been the victim of a random act of violence. But that missing cake design, the sabotage, and now the leak of information made that seem doubtful. No, I was convinced the killer must’ve been someone Philippe knew—but who?

Frustrated by my lack of answers, I turned my attention to the sandwich. The bread was perfect, crusty on the outside, soft on the inside. It had soaked up the flavors of the olive spread so that every bite filled my mouth with earthy flavors. Capers and olives provided texture, and the smoky mortadella, ham, and Genoa salami added robust flavors and complexity. The creaminess of the mozzarella and provolone pulled everything together so that it was pure heaven in every bite. I polished the whole thing off and slurped down the rest of my Coke while I waited. A few minutes after I sat, I saw Dmitri scurry out of the market, walk half a block in the opposite direction from Zydeco, and roar off in a small black car.

Well, damn. So much for my grand master plan to catch the saboteur red-handed.

Twenty-one

My conversation with Dmitri nibbled at the back of my mind for the rest of the afternoon. Since we couldn’t find the missing design, I spent a couple of hours working on a new design for the bid. Maybe I could come up with something good enough to win. Maybe not. I only knew that I couldn’t just sit back and let Dmitri walk away with the job.

Unfortunately, my design skills were rusty, and I spent most of the time second-guessing myself. As a result, I was in a sour mood by the time I got back to Miss Frankie’s. She’d asked me to meet her at the house at three, to accompany her to the funeral parlor. The fact that she hadn’t told me about Dmitri’s offer to buy Zydeco rankled. I hate being blindsided, and I resented her for allowing Dmitri to get the drop on me. She should have told me about the offer—and if she trusted me, she would have.

I told myself to swallow my feelings at least until we’d finished at the funeral parlor. No matter what she’d done, this wasn’t the right time to start an argument.

I parked in the driveway and let myself in through the kitchen door, where I found Miss Frankie and Bernice at the kitchen table on either side of a pitcher of sweet tea.

Miss Frankie looked perfectly put together. Every hair was in place and held there with a heavy application of Aqua Net. She wore a linen pantsuit in a shade of olive drab only she could pull off, and I was pretty sure the sensible white sandals on her feet had been serving time since the Nixon era.

Bernice smiled up at me. “She’s all ready to go,” she said, with a nod toward Miss Frankie. “I thought she could use a little company, considering what she’s fixin’ to do today.”

“That was very thoughtful,” I said, forcing a smile I didn’t feel. To Miss Frankie I said, “I hope I didn’t keep you waiting.”

That’s when I realized that appearances can be deceiving. Miss Frankie stood unsteadily and offered me a thin-lipped smile. “Don’t you worry for a minute, sugar. Bernice and I have been reliving a few memories.” She headed for the door, wobbling a little as we walked out to the driveway. Beneath the floral scent of her perfume, I caught a whiff of something decidedly
un
flowery. If I didn’t know better, I might have guessed that she’d been nipping at the bourbon in the butler’s pantry. Bernice seemed to be suffering from the same affliction.

As I followed them out the back door, I worried a little about how to keep Miss Frankie from getting behind the wheel. As it turned out, I didn’t have to worry. She dropped into the passenger’s seat of her car and turned a half smile up at me as she passed over the keys. “I’m not in any mood to deal with traffic today, sugar. You’ll drive, won’t you? I just want to ride along as a passenger.”

“Absolutely.”

“Bernice has agreed to come along as moral support. You don’t mind, do you?”

I served up a smile as Bernice slid into the backseat. “Of course not. Whatever you want.”

Miss Frankie leaned her head against the seat with a deep, resigned sigh, and I decided not to concern myself with her level of sobriety—which may have been my first big mistake of the afternoon. But the woman was grieving. Her husband was gone, and her only child had just been murdered. Difficult as this situation was for me, I couldn’t imagine what she must be feeling. Few things in this world are as unnatural as having to bury your own child. We were on our way to pick out his coffin and discuss funeral arrangements. If she needed a little liquid courage to help her get through the next couple of hours, who could blame her? After the day I’d had already, I was tempted to join her.

Miss Frankie directed me into traffic, and Bernice pointed out items of interest as I drove. I found myself constantly surprised by the differences between the arid landscape of New Mexico and the lush green of New Orleans. Even the sky felt different here. The sun beat down on the city from high overhead, but instead of the clear dark blue I was used to, the sky here was pale and languid, its color muted by the moisture in the air.

We drove past old cemeteries filled with seemingly endless rows of aboveground tombs and mausoleums and sped past thick stands of trees and dense green undergrowth that blotted out the city for a moment before giving way to civilization again. Coming from a place where water is an import, I was fascinated by the fact that a new body of water shimmered around every curve in the road even though I imagined half-buried alligator eyes peering at me from almost all of them.

We passed neighborhoods still bearing the scars of Katrina and others that looked as if they’d relocated somewhere safe during the storm. After a while, Miss Frankie pointed out the funeral home, and I pulled into a large parking lot in front of a spacious building. It was set well back from the street behind a neatly trimmed lawn, looking like an oasis of calm in the middle of the busy city, until I spotted a hearse parked next to a side door, and reality whacked me like a two-by-four. I could tell from the look on Miss Frankie’s face that it had taken a swing at her, too.

I turned off the engine, and Bernice climbed out of the backseat, but Miss Frankie didn’t move. She sat with her hands clasped tightly in her lap and a look on her face that almost tore me in two. I sat with her until the heat became unbearable inside the car—roughly two and a half minutes—then said, “Miss Frankie, I know this is going to be difficult. I can’t even think about how hard this must be for you. But we can’t sit out here in the car or we’re going to expire ourselves. This can’t be healthy.”

Her gaze flickered up to mine and her lips curved sadly. “Oh, sugar, of course you’re right. I’d just give anything not to have to do this.” Tears filled her eyes and dropped onto her cheeks. She sighed—a sound filled with such sadness it put a huge, painful lump in my throat.

With a flick of her wrist, she pulled a snowy-white handkerchief from the pocket of her pantsuit and dabbed at her eyes and cheeks gently, effectively removing the evidence that she’d ever been anything but cool and pulled together. Which only proved how she’s made of something I’m not. Once I start crying, it’s not a pretty picture, which is why I try to avoid doing it. A white handkerchief would never be able to keep up with me, and there’s no dainty removal of the tears, either.

I rounded the front of the car, and Bernice offered Miss Frankie a hand as she stepped out into the heat. My hair had turned into a giant Brillo pad, and sweat poured down my face. Neither Miss Frankie nor Bernice seemed to even notice the humidity.

I urged both women toward the air-conditioned building, eager to get inside before I melted. The glass door swung open as we approached, and a short, middle-aged man with a bad comb-over and even worse teeth bent slightly at the waist as we walked past him. He introduced himself as Sawyer Biggs and asked if he could be of assistance; I deferred to Miss Frankie. After all, Philippe was her son. But she didn’t answer, so I glanced her way and found her putting the handkerchief to work again.

“I’m Rita Lucero,” I said, shaking the hand Biggs offered. “My mother-in-law and I need to make some funeral arrangements for my . . .” I hesitated for a moment and then took the path that would require the least explanation. “For my husband.”

“Yes. Of course.” Biggs ushered all three of us into a bland office filled with bland furniture and spent a few minutes offering condolences and pulling out the forms required to lay Philippe to rest. When he deemed us adequately consoled, he dug a pen from a drawer and got down to business. “Let’s start with the basics. What was your husband’s name?”

I shot another look at Miss Frankie, but she seemed perfectly content to let me keep going. Taking a steadying breath, I answered his question, and we moved on to date of death and other information he needed to make the proper arrangements.

As Biggs and I went over the details, Bernice whispered softly to Miss Frankie, who stared straight ahead, occasionally lifting the handkerchief to blot away a tear, but otherwise remaining uninvolved and almost catatonic. I felt a little uncomfortable being left to sort through the details of Philippe’s funeral, and that only added to the irritation I felt with her for keeping secrets from me. But for a while at least I’d known Philippe better than almost anyone else, so I swallowed my irritation and answered every question Biggs asked.

Occasionally, after some elderly relative or acquaintance passed away, Philippe and I had talked about the things we’d want the other to arrange when the inevitable day arrived for us. I’d put in an order for pink roses, a silver urn, and Aunt Yolanda’s
arroz con leche
served to friends and family when they gathered afterward to eat. Philippe had expressed a preference for cherrywood, a traditional burial, and “Smoke on the Water” playing as the pallbearers carried him from the church.

I didn’t know how Miss Frankie or Sawyer Biggs would feel about Deep Purple, but I did my best to make choices I thought Philippe would have liked. We agreed that Miss Frankie and I would write the obituary later that evening, and I’d drop it by the mortuary the next day. Sawyer promised to forward our preferences to the florist and take care of a few other details so we wouldn’t have to worry about them. With Miss Frankie on autopilot, I was relieved to let him take over.

Eventually, the only thing left was picking out the casket. I should point out that I hate coffins. I’ve hated them ever since I saw the bodies that once belonged to my parents lying inside a couple of them. I was only twelve when Aunt Yolanda made me stand in front of those horrible boxes to say good-bye. She’d encouraged me to kiss my parents on the cheek, believing that I’d regret it later if I didn’t. But I knew my parents weren’t in those boxes. They’d flown away somewhere beautiful. The image of my mother running through some heavenly meadow into the arms of my handsome father had sustained me for years. I hated anything that reminded me that their bodies had been buried in the cold, hard ground.

Once again, we rose to our feet, and once again, Miss Frankie swayed slightly. Bernice hurried to her side, keeping up the soothing monologue as she steered Miss Frankie back into the foyer. Miss Frankie looked pale and wan and fragile, and she leaned on Bernice as we walked, but she smiled at me with both gratitude and affection.

So you can see why I wasn’t worried about anything but getting out of that room as quickly as possible. And, of course, making sure Miss Frankie didn’t collapse. I was still concerned about her emotional state, and when I got close enough, I could still smell bourbon on her breath.

We followed Sawyer Biggs up a wide, curving staircase to a large room filled with several different models of caskets. The sight of them made it hard for me to breathe, and I worried that Miss Frankie was going to collapse on the spot.

Sawyer began his spiel, pointing out the various types of wood and metal and citing the benefits of bronze fittings versus those made of steel or plastic. I didn’t want a sales pitch. I just wanted to find a cherrywood coffin, hand over Miss Frankie’s credit card, and get out of there before my memories could catch up with me.

“This here is a lovely model,” Sawyer said, gesturing toward a black coffin with stainless steel handles. “And fairly reasonable in price. We call this one the Captain. That one over there is slightly more expensive. You’re still looking at stainless steel handles, though, which keeps the cost down. You’d never know it, would you? Looks just like brass.” He did a little Vanna White thing with his hands, directing our attention to a coffin labeled “The Admiral.”

“And, of course, we have a large selection of head panels.” Sawyer gestured toward a wall where a handful of quilted and embroidered pieces hung above a catalog that I assumed contained other options. “Was your loved one in the military?”

I shook my head and stifled a hysterical giggle at the thought of Philippe in the armed forces. He’d never been a rule follower unless the rule was one of his mama’s.

“He’d have been a handsome soldier,” Bernice said, with a little sigh. “But that wasn’t his way, was it?”

“In that case, might I suggest one of these selections?” Sawyer put one hand on the catalog and curved his lips in the perfect semblance of a smile. “I’m partial to the praying hands myself. They’re a lovely touch. Although ‘Going Home’ is a popular choice.” He indicated a velvet panel sporting three doves flying in formation while a fourth peeled away from the others, right over the tastefully embroidered “Going Home” motto.

Ummmm . . . no.

The smell of funeral flowers, that odd mix of carnation and rose, came at me from somewhere, and I felt my head begin to swim. “Cherry,” I choked out. “He wanted cherry.”

“Cherry is a lovely choice,” Sawyer agreed. “We have the Commander over there. Or, if the dearly departed was ecofriendly, you might want to consider one of our green models. Perhaps you’d be interested in our polished-bamboo version, or this one here, made entirely of extra thick cardboard. Durable. Comes with these handy die-cut handles.”

I think I gasped. Or maybe I choked. I’m not sure.

Sawyer Biggs didn’t seem to notice. Miss Frankie made a sound, and I turned toward her just in time to see her shake off whatever had been keeping her quiet since our arrival. Her eyes flared to life, and color flamed in her cheeks. “Stop right there, Mr. Biggs. I will not be laying my only son to rest in a
cardboard
coffin, like some family pet in a shoebox.”