Drowned Vanilla (Cafe La Femme Book 2) (6 page)

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My ice cream-making experiments, on the whole, were a lot more successful than my mystery solving. I made one batch every night, served it up via the Specials Board the next day, and sold it until we ran out.

Ginger honeydew, lime green tea, triple salted caramel and cherry cheesecake were all super popular. I never quite got evil enough to serve up the raspberry vinaigrette, though I did manage to pull off wasabi avocado. Well, opinions were divided as to whether I pulled it off, but I feel pretty secure about it.

I still hadn’t perfected the vanilla. Which was annoying, because everyone kept requesting it. I had put up a Tabitha’s Ice Cream suggestion box: vanilla, french vanilla and vanilla bean were the ones that turned up most often. They weren’t even in Xanthippe’s handwriting, which cannot be said for many of the other suggestions, including ‘screwdriver’ and ‘crunchy frog.’

Vanilla was hard.

‘Why’s it French Vanilla anyway?’ Stewart asked one quiet evening at my place. I came home from a long day at the café to find him playing
MarioKart
with Ceege. Then, after Ceege fell asleep on the couch because he’d pulled three all nighters in a row, Stewart came into the kitchen and sorted the suggestion slips for me while I made a batch of lemon meringue gelato.

I was pretending I hadn’t noticed that Stewart had slipped in three extras that all read ‘triple espresso, hold the ice cream’. ‘Is there something particularly French about vanilla?’ he went on. ‘Or is it a thing that fancy ice cream makers say tae make it sound less boring?’

‘That’s what I always thought,’ I said. ‘Before I started researching it. It’s America’s fault.’

‘Doesnae surprise me in the least.’

‘All these fancypants people in Philadelphia became obsessed with ice cream, and hired French chefs to make it for them. Thomas Jefferson imported the vanilla from Paris during the French Revolution rather than getting it directly from Mexico or the Caribbean like a sane person. They called it French for snobby reasons. Also to distinguish between French ice cream which had egg in it, and Philadelphia ice cream, which didn’t.’

Stewart grinned at her. ‘Yer like an encyclopedia of dessert.’

‘I’ve been called worse.’

I’ll admit the trouble with me creating the perfect vanilla ice cream was that, despite all my deep and committed research, I still couldn’t buy the concept that vanilla was interesting.

The
story
of vanilla was fascinating. Pirates and smugglers and slaves and orchids — brilliant stuff. Worthy of a good old bodice-ripping adventure story.

But the flavour itself bored the pants off me. Every time I started on vanilla I’d get the itch to add a touch of cinnamon or chilli chocolate and before I knew what I was doing, it wasn’t vanilla any more. Or at all.

Lemon meringue on the other hand … now that was a flavour I could get behind. Tangy sour scoops of dark lemon sorbet, surrounded by a creamy concoction of broken meringue pieces and something vaguely vanilla-ish as garnish. But only vaguely.

A cop out, maybe. But it was a delicious cop out.

‘Much response to the French Vanilla story on the blog?’ I asked him.

‘Aye,’ said Stewart, binning several requests for banana-related ice creams (he had a moral objection to them — I’d always suspected he had depth) and pushing the pile of Stewart-approved slips in my general direction. ‘Turns out The Gingerbread House has a massive local following. Girls, mostly.’

‘Girls?’ I said in surprise. ‘I thought it would be more…’

‘Dirty old men? And fourteen-year-old boys? Aye, I thought so too. Turns out that — Ginger taking her top off nae withstanding — most of the appeal isnae the sex. People watch them for entertainment. Listen to their conversations. The whole storyline where Melinda got knocked up by her ex and decided to have the baby on her own practically melted their server. It’s like a cut price
Big Brother
. And…’ he hesitated.

‘Spit it out, Stewart,’ I told him. Before the Bishop thing reared its head, we were excellent at being honest around each other.

‘They earn their money wi’ subscriptions. Highlights of the week are available on the site tae all viewers, but only subscribers get access via the live feed. D’ye remember they said they might lose subscribers without French Vanilla? Because she had her own fan following? Well, since the investigation intae her disappearance began, their subscriber numbers are up 20 percent.’

‘Wow,’ I said. I took a mouthful of sour lemon and puckered my mouth. Possibly too sour. ‘Wow,’ I said again. ‘So they benefited financially from their housemate going missing?’

‘Aye, tha’s my thinking. ’Course, I have a nasty suspicious mind.’

‘Yes you do,’ I told him, and made him taste the lemon. ‘But that doesn’t mean you’re wrong.’

‘Wrong about what?’ Xanthippe asked, strolling into the kitchen just as Stewart made a horrible face about my lemon sorbet. ‘I love how you’re too original to make ice cream flavours that people actually like, Tish.’

‘Hush, vanilla-lover,’ I said to her. She looked nice. Suspiciously unlike a hired assassin, which is to say she was actually wearing a plum-coloured top instead of something black or so-navy-blue-that-it-might-as-well-be-black. ‘Going somewhere special?’

‘Just dropping over to Ginger’s,’ she said casually.

Stewart and I looked at each other.

‘By Ginger’s you mean the house that is wired for image and sound, where every move you make is documented and broadcast to nearly four hundred paying customers, with edited highlights available to the entire web and averaging about 10,000 unique visitors per day?’ I asked, to clarify.

Xanthippe gave me a look. ‘That’s the one.’

‘Ye wouldnae be planning tae discuss the missing person case tha’s provided them with a substantial increase in their hits and paid subscription o’er the last week?’ Stewart asked, stealing some of my cracked meringue cream to take the taste of lemon away.

‘The subject might come up. While we’re hanging out socially. But I don’t work to a script.’ Xanthippe folded her arms. ‘If you have something to say, just say it.’

I didn’t say it. I thought really loudly about how it seemed convenient that she and ‘Ginger’ were getting along so well, and how regular visits from Xanthippe to The Gingerbread House couldn’t help but keep the online viewers thinking about the missing person case. But Xanthippe was too smart to be used like that, wasn’t she? Maybe she was playing them. Maybe there was a plan.

And it was really obvious that she wanted me to ask her what that plan was. I am not exceptionally good at doing what other people want, if it’s not a specific customer-is-always-right scenario.

So I said nothing. I exchanged innocent glances with Stewart, and then stole back my meringue spoon, rapping him over the knuckles with it. ‘Have a nice night, Zee.’

We sat in silence for a few minutes after she left. Stewart and I never used to do awkward silences, but recently we’re becoming expert at them. ‘So,’ he said finally. ‘Have ye subscribed tae the live feed yet?’

‘Of course not,’ I said sternly. ‘That would suggest a morbid fascination with something which is none of my business.’

‘Aye, right.’

‘Ceege, however…’

Caught off guard, Stewart laughed. ‘Does Ceege know he’s a subscriber?’

‘He’ll find out about it when he gets his credit card statement.’

Served him right for falling asleep in front of the Playstation. Honestly, that boy had to get out more. Though at least gaming with Stewart felt like a slight improvement on him staring at a computer all night, every night. Was he coming out from his black cloud, perhaps?

‘Yer a bad person.’ Stewart beat me to Ceege’s chair, settling into the scary butt grooves with a smug look on his face, and leaving me to lean over his skinny shoulder if I wanted to see what was on the computer.

Which I did, of course. Not leaning over his shoulder would have meant something I totally didn’t mean it to mean. Or anything. My hair brushed his shoulder as he found the website. ‘You don’t really think…’ I said.

‘That French Vanilla was an elaborate plot device used tae spice up their reality web series? It’s worth considering.’

Yes, yes it was.

‘Ye figured that out yerself, though,’ Stewart went on.

‘Obviously.’ If we were considering sinister possibilities, I could also start wondering whether Melinda and Ginger had locked dear little Vanilla Girl up in a cupboard somewhere to boost their income.

Stewart flicked around the site, figuring out how the live feed worked, checking in on the different rooms in the house. ‘They dinnae have one in the bathroom,’ he reported.

‘Ew. Thank goodness for that.’

Ginger was in the kitchen, making something that looked like pasta. Melinda sat on the couch, reading baby magazines on her iPad.

‘Want sound?’ Stewart asked.

I moved away from the screen (and him), settling on the couch so I still had a view of the computer, but not quite so intimate. ‘This feels wrong.’

‘It’s nae like they dinnae know people are watching. People are supposed tae watch.’

Libby and Melinda were so relaxed. How did they do that? It made me feel all scratchy, like bugs were crawling on my skin. Even if they were inviting it, it was so voyeuristic.

I could of course justify it by saying I was looking out for Xanthippe. Yep, that was the reason. Nothing to do with being a nosy person at all.

My phone rang and I felt guilty the second I saw Bishop’s name come up. Really, I had to stop doing that. I was perfectly entitled to spend the evening with a friend, watching women through webcams and speculating about an unsolved crime.

It wasn’t like Bishop was my boyfriend or anything.

‘Hey,’ I said in my best innocent voice. ‘What’s up?’

Stewart, darting a look at me (ha, he knew my innocent voice meant trouble), stood up and went to get some more coffee, or something equally discreet.

‘Wanted to let you know I have to stay late after all,’ Bishop told me. (How much did I suck for forgetting we had vague plans tonight?)

‘I’m sure I can think of something to do. I have a new ice cream flavour to play with.’

‘Aren’t you sick of ice cream yet?’

‘That’s the silliest question you’ve ever asked me.’

My attention was diverted by the computer screen. Xanthippe had arrived at The Gingerbread House already — hardly surprising, as the place was a five minute drive away.

‘So I can trust you not to get into any trouble left to your own devices?’ Bishop asked, only half serious.

‘Mmmhmm,’ I said. The second he hung up, I was going to turn up the volume on the computer. I really wanted to know what they were saying. ‘I’ll probably just read up on the history of artificial vanilla chemicals. Throw things at Ceege. The usual.’

Spy on Xanthippe, spend the evening with Stewart, eat lots of ice cream. None of those things counted as getting into trouble. I wasn’t lying to him at all.

I could probably get off on a technicality.

7

GINGERBREAD FORUMS: Q&A

KrazeeKween:
Cherry, I love your hair so much OMG! Where do you get it done?

Cherry_ripe:
Hey KK. I always go to Tresses in Nth Hobart, but I haven’t had any colour put in since I got pregnant, so that’s all natural!

Ishtaa1988:
question for all of you, are you really super close friends like you seem, or do you secretly hate each other?

Gingernutz:
well I hate everyone. Of course I can only do it between 2am and 4am when Cherry and Vanilla are sleeping

Cherry_ripe:
*smacks Ginge*

Gingernutz:
heeee *sticks out tongue*

French_vanilla:
I think it would be horrible if we weren’t friends. Not just living together … living with someone you don’t like SUX.

Gingernutz:
yeah, and why else would we put up with Cherry blubbing through daytime soaps + throwing up all the time? If she wasn’t super sweet, we’d have kicked her to the kerb months ago omg!!

French_vanilla:
totally. Also, Ginger snores.

Gingernutz:
I do not. U pick your teeth.

French_vanilla:
only when you’re there.

Gingernutz:
*hits with pillow*

French_vanilla:
*hides behind pregnant lady*

Cherry_ripe:
Children, behave! People are watching us!!!

Gingernutz:
they ARE?

This was dull. Seriously. Xanthippe was having dinner with two women. They were chatting. Eating pasta. All very pleasant and innocuous. They hadn’t even mentioned French Vanilla yet, or poor old Annabeth.

Stewart and I were playing tiddlywinks. And no, that’s not a euphemism.

‘How can she hae covered everything?’ Stewart asked, lying on his stomach on the floor to get the best angle to flip the big red tiddlywink into the bowl. ‘Her real identity. She must hae left some trace of it. She lived with them for wha’, nine months?’

‘It was deliberate,’ I said. ‘Must have been. Xanthippe has the entire contents of French Vanilla’s computer on her laptop — there was nothing worth looking at. A half finished novel, a few months of browser history, mainly related to The Gingerbread House site. Nothing personal. She used webmail only, and we don’t have her passwords.’

‘Tha’s suspicious,’ he said. ‘The neatness. Almost as if she was expecting tae leave her computer behind.’

‘We’re back to her being a fake, then?’

‘She was always a fake. But who else was in on it wi’ her?’

I held up my hand to quiet him. Xanthippe had finally steered the conversation around to topics relevant to our interests. ‘So have you heard anything about French Vanilla? Your French Vanilla, not that poor kid who died.’

‘That’s my girl,’ I said cheerfully, relieved. Xanthippe was not falling under the sway of the seductive new webcam friends. Xanthippe was on the case.