All the President’s Menus (15 page)

He was right. I was futzing when I should have been relaxing. “My coping mechanism for nerves, I guess.”

With the Gruyère between his thumb and forefinger, he used the rest of his fingers to point to the chair opposite his. “Sit,” he said. “You always tell me that it helps to talk things through.”

He was right. I’d learned that from working with Gav.

The happenings from over the past week had been racing through my brain, and had jumbled atop one another to the point where I couldn’t see where one ended and another began.

“Good idea,” I said. “If we start with when they first arrived—”

I stopped short.

“What?” Bucky asked. “Did you figure it out?”

“The chocolate,” I said. “I meant to move it.”

I could tell from the look on Bucky’s face that he didn’t know what I was talking about.

“This morning,” I said, “I told you that Gav offered to have some of the chocolate tested for me, too. But I was talking about where I’d hidden it when the Saardiscans walked in.”

“You think they heard?”

I bit my lower lip. “I can’t be sure. I’d intended to move it to a new hiding place, just to be safe. In all the chaos, however, I didn’t have a chance.”

Bucky gestured toward the stairs with his eyes. “Go,” he said. “You won’t be able to relax until you confirm it’s still there.”

“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”

I tried to ignore the deep pulse of anger building in my chest as I made my way back to the B-M–level dressing room. The chocolate was gone. Gone from what had been—to my mind, at least—an unequivocally secure hiding spot, the substance no longer offered a chance for answers. On the contrary: Its sudden disappearance created more questions.

Frustration weighing on me, I tried to picture what had happened to the small covered cup. Tried to come up with an innocuous reason for it having been moved. But I came up empty. Just like the shelf behind the Brussels sprouts.

My hands clenched into fists as I started down the stairs, eager to share the news with Bucky. I’d left him alone far longer than I’d anticipated. He’d understand, of course, once he heard the reason why.

Turning the curve in the stairwell, I was about to launch into an explanation for my delay, when I halted, mid-step.

“Margaret,” I said.

She and Bucky were seated at the small table. “Look who joined us, Ollie,” Bucky said with a pasted-on smile. “I guess we’re not the only people who know about this hiding spot.”

I continued to make my way down, but at a much slower pace. “I guess not.”

“Hello, Olivia,” Margaret said. Her tortoiseshell glasses were perfectly placed on her tiny nose, but she adjusted them just the same. “I hope you don’t mind me crashing your lunch.”

I pulled up another chair from a nearby table. “Not at all,” I said, lying through my teeth. I glanced down at the halved, crustless-bread sandwich she had before her. She’d centered it on an open napkin and, from the looks of it, had taken only two tiny bites. On another napkin she’d laid out a cellophane-wrapped package of carrot sticks. Next to it, a store-bought brownie.

She lifted half the sandwich and took a dainty bite. I guessed it was Braunschweiger.

“Looks delicious,” I said. I wasn’t lying. It had been years since I’d had what my mom called a liver sausage sandwich, and—despite the bad press the meat had garnered over the years—the smell brought back memories of childhood.

She gave a disinterested shrug, chewed the bite in six seconds flat, and took a sip of water. “Bringing my lunch saves a few dollars. It’s expensive to eat out every day.”

“Have some cheese,” Bucky said, pushing the platter toward us.

Disappointed that I wouldn’t be able to bring Bucky up to date until we were alone again, I sighed, and began helping myself.

Margaret patted her lips with yet another napkin. “Have you heard anything more about the dead guy?”

“Kilian?” I said, feeling oddly protective.

She gave a little smirk. “Unless there’s more than one dead Saardiscan today.”

Bucky chimed in, “We haven’t heard anything more. Have you?”

She took another bite—her pinkie fingers aloft—and shook her head.

“How do you like working for Sarge—er—Mr. Sargeant?”

Bless Bucky for keeping the conversation going.

She smiled for the first time. A genuine smile, all the way up to the eyes. “He’s the best boss I’ve ever had,” she said with absolutely no guile whatsoever.

“How long have you been in the workforce?” I asked.

She missed my sarcasm and, confused, answered, “All my adult life.”

Bucky sent me a look of amusement. “What makes him such a great boss?” he asked.

She put her sandwich down. “The man understands rules,” she said. Raising her fingers and wiggling them, she continued. “Of course, that’s to be expected here. Which is why I really love my job. So many people nowadays believe rules don’t pertain to them. I’m tired of it.”

“Where did you work before this?”

“I served as assistant to a high-ranking senator.” Her eyes took on a conspiratorial glow and she leaned forward. “The man was utterly disorganized and forever making excuses. I’m happy to be away from him.” Raising the napkin on her lap to pat her lips again, she added, “I’d rather not say who.”

“No problem,” I assured her. “We wouldn’t want you telling stories out of school.”

“If there’s one thing people can say about me it’s that I’m trustworthy.”

“I know,” I said sincerely. She’d helped me out several months ago when a situation had developed with national security at stake. From what I could tell, she’d never spoken a word of it to anyone, beyond those who needed to know.

“Has Mr. Sargeant gotten in touch with the Saardiscans about Kilian’s death?” I asked. I carved a slice out of one of the apples and popped it into my mouth.

She’d finished half her sandwich. “He did,” she said. “They were appalled, of course.”

“Do you know if there are any plans to recall the rest of the team?”

She’d taken another little bite, and shook her head instead of answering.

“Maybe they haven’t had time to make that decision yet,” Bucky said.

Margaret swallowed. “You mean cancel the visit? Oh, no. They definitely talked about that. The visiting chefs are staying at least until Ms. Freiberg’s visit.”

“That’s still on, too?”

She nodded. “Mr. Sargeant was curious as to whether they would cancel this portion of Ms. Freiberg’s trip, but his counterpart in Saardisca said that there would be a revolt in his country if she wasn’t allowed to complete her itinerary.”

“I’m surprised,” I said.

Bucky nodded. “Me, too.”

Margaret hastened to add, “The Saardiscan official said that a final decision would depend on how Kilian died, of course. Right now they’re assuming natural causes.” She looked at me and then at Bucky. “You don’t think differently, do you?”

“Not at all.” Bucky answered so quickly that Margaret’s eyes narrowed.

“What aren’t you telling me?” she asked.

“Not a thing,” I said, striving to keep this conversation from spiraling into speculation. “We’re still reeling from the shock of Kilian’s death, and while the kitchen is undergoing maintenance, Bucky and I came here to discuss what to do next.” I directed my attention to the knife and apple in my hands. “We’re going to run into problems for Ms. Freiberg’s visit.”

Her eyes lit up. “Problems?”

“Don’t get me wrong, the biggest thing on my mind right now is Kilian’s family. They’re going to be devastated. But I can’t neglect my duty here, and with Marcel out and now Kilian removed, we don’t have a pastry chef. I hope Peter brings back one of Marcel’s assistants. Unless he does, I don’t know what we’re going to do for dessert for the candidate’s visit.”

Wrinkling her nose in a way that pushed her glasses tighter against her face, she asked, “You mean that with all your experience, you can’t come up with a suitable dessert?”

Bucky and I exchanged a glance. “Of course we could ‘come up’ with something,” I said, with a little snippiness in my voice, “but there are two things to keep in mind. One, dessert is not our forte. The expectation is that every single person who visits the president for dinner will be treated to the best we have to offer. Bucky and I can whip up amazing dinners, and our desserts would be fine, but not . . . not . . .”

“Masterpieces,” Bucky finished. “And the second thing, if you don’t mind me jumping in here, Ollie, is that we simply don’t have the staff to pull this off. Dinner will be enough of a challenge without Cyan here. To maintain our standards and create a dessert—an endeavor we’re not accomplished in—would be asking for trouble.”

Margaret took a prim sip of her water. “Sounds to me as though somebody—or a couple of somebodies—have gotten too big for their britches.”

Bucky’s face turned as red as my apple. My hand shot out beneath the tabletop and I grabbed his arm, squeezing to keep him from exploding.

“I understand how this must look to you, Margaret,” I said, doing my best to ignore Bucky’s splutters of indignation. “As a person who has no knowledge of our industry, all this must sound like excuse-making, or professional high-handedness. All my assurances to the contrary won’t make a difference to you. So I won’t even try.” I’d let go of Bucky’s arm and now used my other hand to pat hers. “It’s a wise person who can expand her mind enough to appreciate another’s challenges, even when they differ from her own.”

It took her a half second to understand that I’d mocked her. In the heartbeat in between, I turned to Bucky. “You ready? The cleaning staff should be out of the kitchen by now.”

He was already on his feet, gathering up our leftovers. “On it, chief.”

“My, my. You admit you lack the talent necessary to prepare the full dinner.” Margaret’s lips pursed. “I’ll be certain to let Mr. Sargeant know about these shortcomings of yours.”

A deep, genuine burst of laughter blasted out of me, and I could tell she hadn’t expected that. To be honest, neither had I. “Don’t bother. Peter Everett Sargeant is the one person in this world who’s fully aware of all my shortcomings. Trust me, he keeps a list.”

She returned to her liver sausage sandwich.

Bucky and I had our arms full. “Let’s go,” I said.

We were back upstairs in the Center Hall when Bucky glanced over his shoulder to make sure we wouldn’t be overheard. “Good for you, boss. Where does she get off telling us our jobs? I’d give her one day—no, one hour—in the kitchen. She’d be reduced to a useless puddle of whining goo in no time.”

My hands were too full to do more than wave my fingers, dismissing him. “I probably should have kept my mouth shut.”

“I disagree. It wasn’t like you were rude. You were almost polite in pointing out what a fool she was to make judgment calls on topics she doesn’t understand.”

I wasn’t regretting standing up for myself and Bucky, but the realization that I’d caused Margaret to go on the defensive bothered me more than I cared to admit. “My goal wasn’t to belittle her; it was to open her eyes.”

He stopped in the middle of the hall. “Why do you care, Ollie?” He shifted his weight. “She was clearly intent on belittling
you
. Which is something Sargeant did for years until you turned him to the dark side.” A corner of Bucky’s mouth quirked up. “Or, I suppose in this case, we’d call it the light side.”

I stopped walking, too. “I suppose that, somewhere deep inside me, I realize that I don’t want to be part of the negativity in this world. There’s too much of that. Why demean someone when perhaps the only reason they’re attacking is because they don’t understand? Why not use that moment to teach, to help open their eyes?”

“You tried,” he said. “She took it wrong.”

I shook my head. “No, this was my fault. My tone was condescending and that little pat on her hand didn’t help.” I was angry with myself for stooping to that level. Starting for the kitchen once again, I said, “Next time I’ll try harder.”

He followed me. “Ollie, you try harder than anyone else I know.”

The cleaning crew was dispersing as we arrived.

“Looks wonderful,” I said to them. “Thank you.”

The team leader walked me through the steps they’d taken and, once I was satisfied, they left.

“Hey,” Bucky said. “We never got the chance to talk about Cyan because Margaret showed up while you were moving the chocolate.”

I plunked my stuff down on the glistening countertop and shot Bucky a furious look. “Yeah, about that,” I said.

“Uh-oh.”

“It’s gone. Completely disappeared from the top shelf, where I’d left it.”

“Maybe someone moved it?”

“First of all, nobody uses that refrigeration unit but the kitchen staff.” I shook my head. “Still, I thought the same thing—maybe it had been moved. That’s why it took so long for me to get back downstairs. I started looking for it. I looked under things. I looked behind things. Nowhere.”

“You think someone took it? Deliberately?”

I held my hands up. “I hadn’t remembered to retrieve the chocolate until after we’d asked the cleaning crew to come in. It occurred to me that—unlikely though it might be—one of the team members may have thought it was garbage and tossed it.”

“They know better than to do that.”

“I know, but I asked them anyway. To double-check.”

“And?”

“I talked with all four of the crew,” I said. “No one threw anything from refrigeration away. No one even remembers seeing the demitasse cup.”

“So . . .” he began, “either one of the cleaning crew is lying, a staffer from another department snuck in and took it, or . . .” He let the thought hang.

I nodded. “Or one of our Saardiscan friends has something to hide.”