Courting Disaster (4 page)

“We love you, too, pal,” Yosh said. “Just like Nona.”

Calderon gave a one-fingered salute, then turned
to Rebecca. “Want to join me? I can give you pointers on your case. You've never had a floater before, have you? Wait till you hear what salt water does to the body, plus all the little creatures that live in the water. They're pure eating machines. It's gross.”

“Screw that,” she said, and went back to her computer.

Calderon shrugged and left the room.

There was silence as Yosh eyed his friend and partner sympathetically, then Paavo said quietly, “I don't even want an engagement party. I didn't know such a thing existed until Angie's mother mentioned it. I expected Angie would have a zillion bridal showers, but grooms never show up for those. I figured I'd have a stag party for the gang and that's it.”

“Too bad she won't elope,” Yosh said, commiserating.

“Elope? Hell. We still haven't settled on a date or place for the wedding. I know it'll be more than a year off. She'll need that much time to prepare.” Paavo looked grimly at his partner. “Yosh, tell me. Is this the biggest mistake I've ever made in my life?”

Yosh laughed. “The secret is, pal, try to ignore it. Nancy loved it when we got married—all the planning and the decorating. The biggest problem came when she had to decide who was invited to the wedding and who wasn't. That's when things got really vicious. The trick, I learned, is to just say, ‘Yes.' Whatever Angie comes up with, whatever she says, you respond, ‘Yes.' That way, you don't
get in trouble if anything goes wrong; you don't get irritated when she changes her mind; and you don't think about it. Period. Got it?”

“Just say, ‘Yes'?” Paavo sounded skeptical.

“Exactly.”

“Maybe we need to get a beer at Nick's, too,” Paavo said.

“
Yes,
” Yosh replied. “There. See how easy it is?”

Paavo grinned. Neither of them ever drank while on the job.

Just then, his phone rang. When he answered, all thoughts of parties, laughter, and fun flew from his head.

The caller was the man who detested him more than anyone he'd ever known, including hardened criminals he'd sent to the big house for murder. Paavo had no idea why he was calling. He never had before; the two barely talked when in a room together.

With more than a little trepidation he listened to the voice of Salvatore Amalfi, Angie's father.

 

“Paavo was no help at all.” Angie dropped her cell phone into her purse as she walked beside the beach at Aquatic Park toward Fisherman's Wharf for Stan's long-overdue lunch.

“He knows it's in good hands,” Stan said. “Why should he get involved?”

“Why?” Angie couldn't believe the question. “He should be enthusiastic and curious about his party. He's engaged, too!”

“I know a good spot for lunch,” Stan said, clearly not wanting to comment on Paavo and engagements. “A Greek place called Athina. I just
discovered it yesterday. The owners are fishermen and the fish is the freshest in the city…or so they say.”

“Don't they all?” Angie murmured. “But I love trying out new restaurants.”

As they walked, Angie continued to plot and scheme about ways to discover more about the engagement party. She had only eighteen days left.

Stan tuned her out as they neared the restaurant. He didn't know why, but his steps grew lighter. It couldn't be the beautiful woman who—he hoped—worked there, could it? He wondered if she was still troubled and upset. He understood feeling that way. He could offer help, advice, sympathy—whatever she wanted, come to think of it.

Angie didn't look thrilled as they turned down the ugly side street. “No wonder I never noticed the restaurant.”

Not only was the building small and dingy, but Stan now realized the windows could use a good scrubbing. Of course, the area's constant barrage of fog, car exhaust, and seagull droppings meant that keeping the windows clean required almost constant vigilance. Maybe that was why the owners had apparently given up and stopped washing them some years ago. Why bother?

Stan could appreciate that.

Inside were two other customers.

The waiter, the same young mustachioed fellow who had served Stan the day before, led them to a booth. Stan glared at him. What kind of monster was he, treating a woman so badly?

The waiter basically ignored him and gave
Angie a long discourse on Greek wine. She opted for ouzo at the end of the meal, served Greek-style over ice with a splash of water. The waiter looked well pleased.

Stan ordered a Bud Light.

Angie studied the menu. “If the food is good, I should write a review of it. Maybe
Haute Cuisine
will publish it as a change of pace from Nona's vitriol. She never met a meal that pleased her. No wonder she's so skinny.”

The waiter brought Stan his beer, and Angie a San Pellegrino. “I couldn't help but overhear,” he said with a cocky waggle of his head. “You're a restaurant reviewer?”

“Yes.” She flashed him a wide smile. “Freelance.”

“How great.” He sounded impressed. “What's your name? Maybe I've read some of your columns.”

“Angelina Amalfi,” she said. “It's been a while since I wrote anything, however.”

“Too bad. Will you critique this restaurant?”

Angie tried to look woeful. “Now that you know me, I can't. It would give the cook an unfair advantage.”

He threw up his hands. “Pretend I never said a word!”

“Don't worry about it.” She laughed. “I'm not sure I'll go back to reviewing, anyway. It can get rather tedious.”

“I'd read any review you wrote,” he said, ogling Angie and doing all he could to ooze charm. “Just observing you here for a moment, I can tell you're a person of good taste.”

Stan was ready to barf.

“Why, thank you.” Angie was pleased by the compliment. “That's very nice.”

“If you write a review, be sure to mention that Tyler Marsh is the best waiter in all of Fisherman's Wharf. By the way, you can call me Ty.”

Stan didn't care what the sleazy, unctuous jerk's name was. He only wished he'd go away.

“Maybe I should simply write a review of the wait staffs in the area,” Angie said with a smile, “and forget the restaurants.”

Tyler glanced at the stout, gray-haired man sitting on a stool by the cash register and glaring at him. He must be the owner, Stan thought. If so, he should tell his employee to get back to work.

“I know a number of small but excellent restaurants in the city that would do well with a little publicity from someone like you.” Tyler leaned near Angie with a cock of the head toward the scowler. “Just don't tell my boss that.”

Stan turned away from the mutual admiration society and looked around the restaurant, wondering if the woman he'd seen on the dock the day before was working here now.

“Are you ready to order?” Tyler asked.

Angie ordered a light lunch of dolmades—grape leaves stuffed with rice and lamb—and a salad of feta and kalamata olives. She couldn't pass up baklava for dessert. Stan ordered chicken gyros. Tyler lifted an eyebrow, obviously remembering his same order the day before.

Their lunch was almost ended when Stan looked up and saw a brown-haired woman. Her back was to him, and she was wiping down a recently vacated table to ready it for the next patron.
Her hair formed a thick braid down her back, and it seemed to be the same shade as the woman's on the wharf. Was she the one he'd been waiting for?

He put down his sandwich and stared, his heart doing handsprings.

She'd just about finished when, whether out of curiosity or because she felt his gaze on her, she peered over her shoulder.

It was her. He smiled.

Her returning smile brightened her face, just as it had the day before. He didn't know when he'd ever seen anyone more radiant. She was breathtaking, with sparkling eyes and full lips spread wide.

He was vaguely aware that Angie's head swiveled in the waitress's direction even as she continued chatting to him about possibly writing up some restaurant reviews, but he didn't care.

This time,
he promised himself,
this time I'm going to talk to her.
Determination filled him, and he felt ready to burst with anticipation.

Then she turned around.

The smile dropped from his face when he saw her body. Only because her shoulders, arms, and even legs were thin had he not noticed from behind, or out on the wharf when she was covered with that tentlike parka: she was pregnant.

Considering how slender she was, and how round her belly was, she was not only pregnant, but
very
pregnant. Like…ready-to-give-birth-any-moment kind of pregnant.

She wore no ring on her left hand, but then, she might not wear one considering the kind of work she was doing.

A frown touched her brow at his shocked reac
tion, and at the same time, her gaze jumped to Angie, who was still talking. The diamond engagement ring on Angie's finger sparkled.

Just then, a Mediterranean-looking fellow in his late thirties or early forties, medium height and build, with curly black hair, hazel eyes, and olive skin, stepped out of the kitchen. He wore an apron that reached from his waist to his knees, and was wiping his hands on a blue-striped rag. His dark scowl met that of the waitress. She saw him, and hurried to finish wiping off the table.

One last time, the waitress glanced at Stan, questioning and troubled, before she scooped up the tray of dirty dishes and hustled back into the kitchen. The fierce-looking man in the doorway placed a hand against her back as if to hurry her along, his eyes making a penetrating sweep over the dining room before he followed.

Stan realized she must have thought he was engaged to Angie, yet eyed and smiled at other women. But then, she was pregnant, so where was the man in
her
life? Was it the waiter she'd argued with? Or maybe the cook who had touched her so possessively? Or someone else? If so, why had she smiled that way at
him
? She had some kind of nerve, to look disdainfully at him considering her circumstance! What was wrong with the woman?

And what was wrong with him that he felt so disappointed, as if all the sunshine had gone out of his life?

“Stan?” Angie called. “Stan, are you listening? I try to think about other things, but my mind keeps reverting to the engagement party! I just don't know what to do anymore.”

“Let's go, Angie,” he said, so flummoxed he forgot that she was the one who promised to take him to lunch, and he threw money on the table. “You need to get home so you can concentrate better.”

“Maybe you're right. Wait, what about my ouzo?”

He didn't answer as he helped her from the chair and hurried her out of the restaurant, leaving Angie to wonder what in the world had come over him.

The next morning, Angie was sipping her morning coffee and reading the newspaper about the murder of Shelly Farms, who she was shocked to learn had really been named Sherlock, when the phone rang. As she reached for it, she couldn't help but think anyone named Sherlock probably would grow up with either great compassion for those who had misfortunes from birth, or would become a serial killer.

“Hello, this is Diamond Pastry,” said a very slow-talking woman with a high, nasal voice. Angie was about to laugh—it had to be her friend Connie imitating Ernestine the Operator:
One ringy-dingy.
Before she could say anything, the woman continued, “Is this the Amalfi residence that ordered the purple cake?”

Angie's throat closed so tightly she could barely squeak out the words. “Purple cake?”

“Uh…sorry to bother you, ma'am, but we're here at Diamond Pastry—”

“I know, I know. Tell me about the cake. Is it a
big cake? Like…an engagement-party-size cake?”
Please, God, don't let Serefina have ordered a purple cake for me.

“You see, ma'am, the lady who ordered, the phone number got wiped out when a big blob of chocolate frosting dropped on the order form. Not that we usually toss around chocolate frosting…well, sometimes. But I don't want you to get the wrong impression of our bak—”

“Don't worry about it!” Angie jumped to her feet, clutching the phone tight. “Is the cake for a party on May fifth?”

“Uh…oh. You won't believe it, but the other baker just found what we need. Everything's okay now. I'm so sorry to have disturbed you, ma'am.”

“Wait!” Angie shrieked. But the connection had already been broken.

It couldn't have been Serefina, Angie told herself as she paced back and forth across the living room. There were lots of Amalfis in the city. Oodles of them. Some weren't even relatives.

Any one of them could have ordered a purple cake for a variety of reasons…couldn't they?

She pressed a hand to her forehead. What if her engagement cake was purple? What if the entire décor for the party was purple? Her beautiful Dior dress was yellow.

Yellow and purple together would remind people of Easter—and she'd end up looking like a baby chick!

She collapsed onto a chair, stricken. The only solution was either to find out what color her cake was, or to change the dress to be on the safe side.

Using the caller ID feature on her phone, she
saw that the pastry shop was listed as “PRIVATE.” Odd. Nevertheless, she hit the redial button and got the same slow-talking woman. “Diamond Past—”

“This is Angie Amalfi. Can you tell me—did my mother, Serefina Amalfi, order the purple cake? Is she your customer?”

“Uh…I don't know. I don't think I can tell you, anyway.”

Angie really hated this privacy mania. “Can you tell me if it was for a cake on May fifth?”

“I'm sorry, ma'am, but I just don't remember the date. I can tell you that it was a big cake. Real big. And it has big yellow flowers on it. They take time with all the petals—”

Angie hung up. Yellow flowers? Her worst fears were coming true. The good news was that the flowers would match her dress.

The bad news was that her party was going to look like a giant Easter egg hunt.

 

Paavo walked into Moose's Restaurant. Slightly upscale and with Italian cuisine, it was on Washington Square in North Beach, catty-corner to St. Peter and Paul's Church where Angie went to mass.

The maître d' asked if he was there to see Mr. Amalfi, and when Paavo answered in the affirmative, he was led to a private room in the back. Either Salvatore didn't want to be seen with him, or didn't want to be seen, period.

He had no idea what this meeting was about. More than once, a bribe to break the engagement crossed his mind. He hoped he was wrong.

“Sal,” he said, holding out his hand.

Angie's father stood, and the two shook hands warily. Sal was nearly six feet tall, but thin and somewhat frail due to a heart condition. His hair was gray, and he had a small gray mustache. His eyes weren't the dark, rich chocolate brown of Angie's, but were lighter with flecks of green. When he spoke, he had a slight Italian accent. “Thanks for coming,” Sal said. “Sit. I told the chef to bring out a few of his specialties. Whatever he thought was good. Is that okay with you?”

Paavo could see that Sal didn't want to waste time ordering. “Sure,” he replied.

“Wine?” Sal asked.

“No, thanks. I'm on duty.”

Sal scowled. “What, you don't drink?”

“Not when I'm on duty,” Paavo repeated.

Sal beckoned the waiter. “A bottle of a nice chianti,
per piacere
. And?” He glanced at Paavo.

“Water's fine,” Paavo replied.

“Perrier?” the waiter asked.

Paavo nodded. Sal looked disgusted.

As the waiter turned, Sal called, “I said I want wine that's ‘nice'—not the most expensive.” He glowered in Paavo's direction. “I'm the only one in the family who knows the value of a dollar.”

Paavo's jaw tightened. Was this going to be about money? How he didn't make near enough to support Angie in the style to which she was accustomed? “Angie and I have reached an agreement about money,” he said firmly.

He had to wait for Sal's answer as a different waiter brought out sourdough bread and salad,
and then the first reappeared for Sal to okay the wine choice.

When they were alone again, Sal said, “Yeah, I know you and Angelina don't talk about money—you got nothing to talk about, right? Anyway, you got it wrong. I didn't ask you here to flap my gums about the two of you. There's nothing more to say. You both made that clear to me. I'm just the father. Why should I count, long as I pay the bills, right?”

Paavo chomped down hard on his tongue, but was rapidly losing the battle with himself.

“Anyway, you treat her good, keep her happy,” Sal said, “and we'll be all right.” Despite the words, his tone dripped with doubt over Paavo's ability to do that.

“Fine.” Paavo's word was clipped and cold.

“This is something else,” Sal continued. “Police business. Eat, then we'll talk.”

The meal was silent and tense. Paavo recognized that the veal scaloppini and pappardelle with porcini mushroom sauce were excellent, but they could have been cardboard and fell in a lump in his stomach. Sal only nibbled at his food, finally pushing the plate aside. “Look, Smith, I got a problem.”

Paavo put down his fork, ready to listen.

“I guess Angelina told you I have managers to run my stores nowadays. I'm president of the family corporation, so I go check on them from time to time.”

“Angie's told me,” Paavo said. He knew all about Sal's string of shoe stores in shopping malls and downtown areas throughout northern California.

“I got a problem with one of my managers.” Sal dropped his gaze.

When he didn't continue, Paavo considered the situations that result in “police business,” as Sal called it. “Are you talking theft? Embezzlement?” he asked.

Sal shook his head. “I wish. It's worse. Lots worse.” He caught Paavo's eye. “It's love.”

Paavo felt the blood drain from his face. “You aren't saying that you and this manager—”

“No! God, no!” Sal exclaimed. “Hell, I never even liked her all that much.” He took a sip of wine. “She called me, one, two times, with questions about the store. So, I answered. Then she says she wants to meet about the store—ways to improve profit. Her store's doing fine, but what's wrong with making more money, right? I had lunch with her a couple times. Then they started.”

Paavo's brows crossed. “They?”

“Phone calls, letters.”

Paavo studied him, trying to figure out exactly what this was about. “So this employee, a store manager, has a crush on you?”

Sal nodded. “I have to break my goddamned neck every day to get out to the mailbox before Serefina does.”

“Serefina doesn't know?”

“Hell, no! And I don't want her to, understand?” He glared, then folded his hands, his discomfort at having to tell this to Paavo evident with every painful gesture.

“Tell me about the woman,” Paavo said.

“Her name's Elizabeth Schull. When she first called, it was kind of flattering—I'm an old man,
been married over forty years. She's a young woman. Well, young compared to Serefina. Or me.” He drew in his breath. “But she's making my life hell. Serefina wants to know why the line goes dead so often when she answers. I told Elizabeth to stop calling. When she didn't listen, I said I would fire her.” His voice dropped low. “She said I wouldn't dare.”

“A threat?”

Sal nodded, watching, expectant.

Others had gone to Paavo with similar stories about threats. They never liked what he had to say. He knew Sal would be the same. “It's not illegal to threaten people. There's nothing the police can do about it. Your attorneys can come up with a good case to fire her, though. She's harassing you. Why not just do it?”

“Nothing you can do?” Sal took the napkin from his lap and tossed it on the table. His words dripped with disgust. “I listen to some woman threaten me, my family, and you say I'm supposed to handle it myself? I thought you were a strong man, some big macho guy that swept my daughter off her feet. Now I see the truth.”

Paavo had just put up with more than he'd ever taken from anyone else. “Look, Sal,” he said, his voice a calm cover over a cauldron about to blow, “she hasn't committed a crime. I'll see what I can find out about her, talk to her, whatever. But I won't be doing it as a cop. Is that clear?”

“Clear as mud!” Sal bellowed. “Don't you want to know what she said?”

“Of course I do.” Paavo's jaws were beginning to throb from the gnashing of his teeth.

“She said, ‘I know what Serefina's up to, and I know all about your youngest daughter's engagement party.' Then she described Serefina's day to me, and Angelina's apartment building. She's watching them both.”

Paavo was astonished. “You actually think she might harm Angie or Serefina? That's a hell of a lot more serious than an employee having a crush on you.”

“Don't swear at me, Smith!” Sal said.

Paavo had had just about all he could take, Angie's father or not. “You've got to tell them. Warn them about her.”

“No!” Sal was firm, unmovable. “She won't touch them, but she can still make trouble. The last thing I want to do is ruin the happiness around my little girl's engagement party, even if it is to…Well, forget it. If we do this right, Serefina and Angelina won't have to know anything about it.”

Paavo leaned back in his chair, focusing on Schull and not on Angie's father's obnoxious personality. In his judgment as a professional police officer, not as a future son-in-law, he didn't like seeing this kept secret, and his cop instincts told him that Sal was being neither open nor honest about it. However, if the woman was as off-balance as he made her sound, she had to be kept away from Serefina and Angie no matter what Sal's problem actually was. He nodded, his lips tight. “I'll help.”

 

The North Beach area's Fior d'Italia had no Amalfi party, nor did the Washington Square Bar and Grill. The next restaurant for Angie to check on
was Moose's. As she passed St. Peter and Paul's Church, she went inside to light candles and say a prayer for loved ones and those seeking guidance about engagement parties.

As she stepped out of the dark church, the bright sunlight made it hard to see. She stopped and blinked, looking up and down the street a moment.

Parked at the corner was a car that looked amazingly like her father's. Sal Amalfi was the only person she knew who still drove a 1969 four-door red Lincoln sedan with red leather seats and a huge red steering wheel. Sal loved the car. It was the first one he ever bought straight off the showroom floor. It had everything he'd ever wanted, and he'd babied it completely. It ran like a dream, eight miles to the gallon. It used to get better mileage before the California Air Resource Board pressured him into adjusting it to take unleaded gas, but their computers went berserk every year that it came up for a smog check.

Every so often Angie or Serefina would take him out to test drive a Mercedes or BMW or even a Jaguar. He declared them all garbage—flimsy, poorly made, death-trap tin cans. Nothing compared to his own personal Sherman tank.

Maybe he'd like a new Hummer.

Angie eyed the car as she walked toward it. It had to be his. If so, what was he doing in North Beach? Her parents lived south of the city in the wealthy peninsula town of Hillsborough. Because of his heart condition, Sal rarely left home, and it was even rarer for him to drive anywhere, especially into San Francisco, one of the most congested cities in the nation.

Serefina, on the other hand, enjoyed driving her Rolls-Royce. If Sal was riding with her, however, he clutched the dashboard the entire time. As a result, they often hired a chauffeur to get them from one place to the other. That way they didn't have to worry about parking or Serefina's driving.

Angie stood beside Sal's car. He liked Moose's Restaurant. Perhaps he was there having lunch with a friend.

She should try to find him. Wouldn't he be surprised!

She was a few feet from the entrance when her father stepped onto the sidewalk. She waved and smiled. To her amazement, Paavo appeared right behind him.

Both men awkwardly watched her approach. They seemed to be leaning away from each other, which she dismissed as a weird perspective, or uneven sidewalks. She gave each a quick kiss. “What a nice surprise! My two favorite men right here together….” She stopped talking, expecting them to tell her why they were there.

Instead, Paavo said, “What are you doing here, Angie?” His voice sounded strangled, as if he were under some great strain.