Murder and Marinara (23 page)

A
s the sound blared around us, my stomach clenched in fear. “You need to slow down, Sofe. We're getting pulled over.”

“I see that,” she said calmly. Putting on her signal, she braked gradually and eased the car over to the shoulder. The squad car pulled behind us, its siren off but the lights still flashing.

As we sat on the side of the road, our faces reflected in the squad car's blue and red lights, I turned to my sister-in-law. “Did you say we're Thelma and Louise? Because I'm thinking Lucy and Ethel.”

She patted my arm. “Don't get hysterical, and please open the glove box. There's a plastic folder with my registration and insurance card in it.”

I had to press the button a number of times, but finally got it open, only to have a bottle of nail polish fall out. “You have nail polish in your glove box?”

“It's for emergencies. Can you find my papers, please?”

My hands were still shaking as I held the folder out to Sofia, but she shook her head.

“Just put it on the seat next to me. I need to keep my hands on the wheel, Vic. And you shouldn't make any sudden moves.”

“Sudden moves? I couldn't move if I wanted to.” I stared into the rearview mirror. “Why doesn't he get out of the car? He wants to torture us, right?”

“The officer probably has to check into headquarters, maybe run my license through his computer system to make sure the car's not stolen or to see if I have any priors.”

“‘Priors'? Like in arrests? I don't know how you can be so calm about this.” I took my eyes away from the mirror and tried to stare straight ahead. “You watch for him; I can't stand it. Think if we mention Danny's name, he'll go easier on us?”

“Probably not.” She flicked her eyes to the mirror and suddenly did a strange thing. She smiled. I could hear the cop's boots crunch on the gravel as he got closer to the car. I gulped and risked a look. And then I finally exhaled.

“Good evening, Officer.” Sofia rested her chin on her hand and batted her eyes at the handsome cop who leaned in her window. “You know, I never could resist a man in uniform.”

“Just what the hell do you two think you're doing?” my brother barked.

“Oh my God, Danny! We were scared to death,” I said. “Did you follow us?”

“I did not follow you. I
had
you followed.”

“Nice, Dan.” Sofia's voice was petulant. “You have your own wife and sister tailed like criminals.”

“Trespassing, my darling, is a crime,” he said through his teeth. “And you're damned lucky you weren't arrested tonight.”

“That's what I tried to tell her!”

My brother shot me a look. “You're not making this any better, sis.”

Sofia gazed at Danny and ran a finger down his forearm. “What
would
make it better, honey? Would you like me to lean over the car so you can pat me down?”

My brother closed his eyes, probably to rid himself of the mental picture of his wife's perky little butt perched over the back of his police car. He slowly lifted her hand from his arm. “There will be no need for a body search, Sofia.”

She winked at him. “Maybe another time, then?”

I elbowed her in the ribs. “You wanna take it easy there, Miss Firecracker? He's already pissed off.”

“You bet I am. Now, here's what's gonna happen: You two are going to get back out on Route 71 and drive the hell home. You are going to stop playing detective—”

Sofia thrust her finger in Danny's face. “You started it.
You're
the one who told her about the broken blood vessels in his eyes.”

Danny slowly shifted his glare to me, and I smiled weakly. “She wormed it out of me.”

“That was my mistake. But it's enough now; I mean it. You head back to Oceanside and quit nosing around.” He eyed his wife. “And make sure you drive the limit, Sofia.”

“Wait, Dan,” I said. “I think Sutton's eyeing Tim for this. She implied the restaurant could be shut down, and—”

He hunched down at the window, and when he spoke he sounded like my brother and not a policeman. “I know that, Vic. It doesn't look good for us. Now will you two please go home?”

I reached across Sofia and gripped Danny's arm. “We'll go. I promise. Just listen for a minute. For one thing, Gemelli had a reason for wanting Parisi out of the way; so did his wife.”

“And the girlfriend,” Sofia added.

“And we've been so focused on the food,” I continued. “But maybe he was poisoned another way. Like through his medicine. Either of the women, or Gemelli, or even somebody we don't know about yet could have had access to his medicine bottle and . . .” My voice trailed away as my brother shook his head.

“Listen, you're not coming up with anything that law enforcement isn't already investigating.” He gently loosened my hand from his arm. “And just having this conversation could cost me my career. You know that, don't you?”

“We're sorry, baby,” Sofia said, closing her hand over his.

“I'm sure,” Danny muttered, pulling his hand away.

“We are, Dan,” I said. “We never wanted to put you in this position.”

“Then the best thing you can do is go home and forget about all this,” he said.

Right. With Nonna and Nina LaGuardia breathing down my neck? With the future of the Casa Lido hanging in the balance? And I couldn't help voicing my biggest worry. “But what about Tim?” I asked.

“Tim?” My brother straightened up and adjusted his cap, the picture of law and order. “Tim needs a good lawyer.”

•   •   •

I sat out on my deck the next morning, holding coffee I wasn't drinking and a newspaper I wasn't reading. And there was no use trying to write, as my thoughts were consumed by the case. It was time to take stock. There were no test results as yet for Parisi's death. And even if there were, Danny was in no position to share that information. Based upon what Sofia and I had found out about
Digitalis
, it was high on the list of possible toxins used to kill Parisi. If either Angie or Emily had tampered with his heart medication and he had taken
Digitalis
instead of his beta blocker, that might well have caused his death. However, there was also a pretty foxglove plant sitting right in the Casa Lido garden, giving anyone in the restaurant that day access to it. And while I had ruled out Tim as a suspect, Regina Sutton certainly hadn't.

That left Cal and Mr. Biaggio and narrowed our field of suspects to four: the two women, Cal, and Mr. B, with the outcome contingent on how that toxin got into Parisi's system. Mr. B and both women had clear motives, but what about Cal? If that garden bench was Cal's work, that would signify a connection to the Gemellis, but would it necessarily follow that Gemelli Senior had hired him to kill Parisi? How would Gemelli have known the producer would show up at our restaurant? Unless Cal called him . . . ? The timing would be tight, but just possible. Still, I kept coming back to Mr. Biaggio or one of the women.

Thus far Emily Haverford hadn't returned my phone call, and I suspected I wouldn't be hearing from her at all. Then why come see me in the first place? To satisfy her curiosity about where her lover had died? To find out how much I knew? Or to throw suspicion on Angie?

I took a sip of my cold coffee and leafed idly through the paper. I hadn't seen the
Asbury Park Press
in a while, and I wondered if there were any stories about the dead producer. There were articles about the governor's upcoming visit, an annual fishing tournament, the county college graduation, and a piece about tourism at the shore. Thankfully, there was nothing about Gio Parisi's death. I set my coffee down on the deck, and a coupon insert slid from my lap.

It was a circular for Drug World, a statewide chain with several stores in the shore area. I was about to tuck it back into the paper when my eye was caught by a photo of a woman in a lab coat. The caption read, “Our pharmacists are part of your family.” I tilted the paper out of the sun's glare and squinted at the image. The woman was middle-aged, with shoulder-length brown hair and long bangs. Even in the tiny mug shot, the startling blue of her eyes jumped from the page. The hairs on my forearms stood up, and I let out a small gasp. Cut the hair and dye it blond, and she'd be a dead ringer for Emily Haverford.

M
y fingers burned to call Sofia immediately, but she had classes on Saturday mornings; I had no choice but to work on my own. I brought the circular inside, flattened it out on my kitchen table, and stared at the woman's image. While the hair was different, she couldn't hide those bright blue eyes. If my hunch was right, the woman calling herself Emily Haverford did not work in human resources but was, in fact, a pharmacist. How easy for her to tamper with Parisi's medication! And with such an intimate connection between them, she likely knew about his heart condition and the medication he took for it. Assuming, of course, that he was poisoned through his meds and not his food.

“It had to be the pills,” I said aloud. “It's the most logical scenario.”
And the foxglove would be what—a coincidence?
“Shut up,” I told the voice in my head, and I got down to work.

Since the circular helpfully listed all the Drug World stores in Monmouth and Ocean Counties, I didn't need to drag out my computer. But I got my story ready: I was a faithful Drug World customer who was wondering where her favorite pharmacist had been transferred. I couldn't remember her name, but she was a petite woman with brown hair and pretty blue eyes. Could anyone there give me her name or the store where she could be reached? I grabbed my notebook and pen and got started on my first call.

I worked my way through the four Monmouth stores with no luck, slowly realizing that I might have to call every Drug World in the state before I tracked Emily down. The fact that her cell phone carried an Ocean number didn't necessarily mean she lived in this area or had worked here. This was going to take longer than I thought. I trudged upstairs, settled in at my desk, and turned on my computer. The Drug World Web site included a store locator, but where to begin? Sofia had said that Parisi had a house in north Jersey; there was a lot of money in Bergen County, so that seemed the place to start. I was on the last Bergen store, waiting for the voice menu I now knew by heart, when a cheerful young woman finally answered.

“Hi, this is Kristen at the pharmacy desk. May I help you?”

“I hope so,” I said, launching into my story.

“Oh, you're looking for Sarah Crawford.”

Yes!
I had a name at last. “Of course, Sarah. Now I remember. Does she still work there?”

“Not for a couple of years. Last we heard, she was engaged. Her fiancé used to come into the store. That's how she met him.”

“Oh,” I said, trying to sound disappointed despite my excitement. “I bet she's married by now. I wonder if I've lost my pharmacist.”

The young woman giggled. “Are you kidding? If I snagged a rich guy like that, I wouldn't work either.”

A chatty one. Thank you, Lord. “Well, good for her,” I said. “So did you ever meet him?”

“Nah, but I saw him a few times. He reminded me of somebody from
The Sopranos
. Not Tony, but the other one.”

The other one
could have been any number of thugs in Italian designer suits, but the description sure fit Parisi. “Well, thanks a lot, Kristen,” I said. “Listen, I don't suppose you'd have her number?”

“No, sorry.”

“That's okay. Thanks for your time; I really appreciate it.”

I certainly did. Even if Kristen couldn't supply me with a phone number, I had a name and crucial information. Emily/Sarah had not only known about Parisi's medication, but she had likely
dispensed
it. And according to Kristen, Parisi had been more than Crawford's customer—he'd been her fiancé as well.

A computer search for Sarah Crawford yielded two addresses for her, one in north Jersey and a more recent one in Ocean County. Not so coincidentally, she was listed as Sarah
Emily
Crawford. Had she followed Parisi to the shore when the show started filming here?
The Jersey Side
had already run for a season, and she'd left the Drug World pharmacy about two years ago. The timing seemed right. But Parisi and Angie had been married about two years. Had Parisi been living a double life himself—engaged to one woman but actively courting another? Maybe Emily/Sarah had simply bided her time until she could take revenge on the man who dumped her for a younger woman. And she had obscured her identity to do it. As Sofia pointed out, she had something to hide. And I was beginning to believe that
something
was murder.

•   •   •

I hopped on my bike to ride into town, but not to the restaurant just yet. With only a day to go before Nina LaGuardia would be pounding on my door for an interview, I needed every minute. How would we close in on Sarah Crawford? If I had to, I'd show up at Sutton's office and present my theory, consequences be damned. And while I didn't relish facing the tiger in her den, I'd still rather deal with her than an angry Nonna. I locked the bike on a rack along Ocean Avenue and hurried to the Shell Café, where I was due to meet Sofia for lunch.

She was already waiting, shifting impatiently in her chair. “I ordered us salads, Vic, if that's okay. I only have a half hour before I need to get back.”

“Sorry, but wait till you hear what I've got.” I slid into a chair, took a sip of water, and recounted the Sarah Crawford story from start to finish, while Sofia interjected with various “oh my Gods” and “get outs.”

She sat back in her chair and crossed her arms. “So I was right about that wench.”

“Maybe. The girl at Drug World told me she'd left almost two years ago. But that doesn't mean she's not at a different pharmacy somewhere and still dispensing Parisi's medication. Here's what I'm thinking: Either on the evening before or on the morning of his death, Emily/Sarah switched his meds. Then she gave herself an alibi by calling a meeting with Angie and picking a public fight.”

“Assuming she was still Parisi's pharmacist.” Sofia frowned slightly. “But that would mean she was also the intruder. That she was the one who locked you and Tim in the pantry and stole the garbage.”

“The garbage!” Suddenly my beautiful theory was showing its ugly seams. “I didn't even think about that. If she used pills, what could possibly be in the garbage that was incriminating?” I groaned. “Please don't tell me this is another dead end.”

“Hang on,” Sofia said. “Let's think this through.”

At that moment the waitress set our salads in front of us, but I didn't have much of an appetite. I stared at the pile of leafy greens, which seemed to be saying,
C'mon, Vic. You know how he died.
“What is there to think through, Sofe? If Emily/Sarah killed him via his pills, what could she have wanted from the trash?” I speared a few salad leaves but couldn't quite get them to my mouth.

Sofia, who had no such trouble digging in to her lunch, took a big bite of her salad and then pointed her fork at me. “Well, how about an empty pill bottle? There'd be a label with her name on it.”

“True. And if she'd been planning this for a while, wouldn't it make sense for her to wait to switch it until he had only one pill left?” Cheered by that thought, I started to feel the tiniest bit hungry.

“It's not a bad theory,” Sofia said. “But it's based on two assumptions: He was down to his last pill and he threw the empty bottle away in the restaurant.” She paused and set her fork down. “Or that she
thought
he did.” Her voice grew excited. “Don't you get it, Vic? It doesn't really matter if there was something incriminating in the garbage, but only that the murderer
thought
there was. She might have been trying to cover her tracks. Then she came to see you to see how much you knew.”

“Maybe,” I admitted. “But if she locked Tim and me in the pantry, how would she know the layout of the restaurant?”

“She could have been there before. It's possible, right?”

“I don't know. Is it possible? Sure. Is it likely? Not so much.” I pushed my salad around on the plate. “Remember when you're a kid and working on a jigsaw puzzle? And there's that piece that doesn't quite fit, so you force it in? I think that's what we're doing right now.”

“Still,” she said, “we're close, SIL. I know we are.”

I shook my head. “Not close enough. I have to have something for my pal Nina by tomorrow.” As I thought about our Emily/Sarah theory, I once again had the sensation of a fly buzzing around the edge of my consciousness. What was it? I looked down at my half-eaten salad. Did it have to do with Parisi's lunch? Was it in what Sofia said about the pill bottle and Sarah covering her tracks? The buzzing grew louder as the image of the boardwalk rose in my consciousness—was there something from my date with Cal I should be remembering? But the buzzing stopped, and the thought flew away.

We paid our bill and walked out together, still talking about Sarah Crawford. Just as we got to the bike rack, we heard a voice behind us.

“Victoria! How are you?”

We turned to look into the weather-beaten face of Anne McCrae. “Oh, and your sister-in-law is with you. How nice.” She was smiling, but her eyes were not. “You Rienzis do stick together, don't you?”

I put a hand on Sofia's arm before Miss Firecracker went off in the middle of Ocean Avenue. “We do, Anne,” I said.
Which is why there won't be a Starbucks opening anytime soon, Your Honor.
But I stuck to a safe subject and one close to the mayor's heart—tourism. “Isn't it good to see the town come alive again?”

“Yes, indeed. The stores are busy, the parking spots are all taken, and the boardwalk is already buzzing with people. We're off to a fine start to the season.” She tilted her head. “Can the Casa Lido say the same?”

“Listen, lady,” Sofia exploded. “Stop circling like a vulture, okay? Because the restaurant is doing just fine—”

“Now, Sofia,” Anne said. “There's no reason to lose your temper.” She stepped back, as though Sofia might haul off and hit her. Which was not unimaginable. Then Anne smiled innocently into my sister-in-law's face. “Your business is booming. In fact, weren't you looking to expand your studio space, dear? You've got all your paperwork lined up and ready, I take it?”

Once again, I grabbed Sofia's arm on the chance she'd been too angry to miss the mayor's not so veiled threat. “Well, Anne,” I said hastily, “we've got to get going. It was nice seeing you.” I unlocked the bike and shifted it from its spot on the rack.

“Nice seeing you, too, Victoria,” she said, but made no move to leave. “By the way, how's your little investigation going?”

I stood holding the bike awkwardly. “Uh, I wouldn't say it's an investigation, actually . . .”

“No, of course not. That would be left to Reggie Sutton.”

Reggie?
It was hard to imagine the regal Regina with such a casual nickname. “Right,” I said.

“In fact,” Anne continued, “she just issued a statement to the press this morning.” She lowered her voice. “As a public servant, one hears these things, you know.”

“What was in it?” Sofia asked.

“Nothing too surprising,” Anne said. “That they have probable cause to treat Gio Parisi's death as a homicide. And that her office will begin interviewing persons of interest right after the holiday.” She looked at me and smiled. “So I would expect a phone call bright and early on Tuesday morning, Victoria. You did find the body, after all.” She snapped her fingers. “Oh, there is one other thing that may interest you.”

And you just remembered that. Right.
“Okay, Anne, I'll bite. What else did you find out?”

“Well, Chief O'Brien let something slip in the office yesterday.” She looked around quickly. “I probably shouldn't be telling you, but it's only fair that you should know.” She paused and then dropped her voice to a stage whisper. “It's looking more and more that Mr. Parisi died as the result of something he ate.”

Sofia and I exchanged a look, but neither of us responded to Anne, who smiled again and lifted her hand in a wave. “Bye-bye, girls!”

Still holding the handlebars of the bike, I watched her walk down the street, greeting townspeople and tourists cheerfully. “She probably offed him herself,” Sofia hissed, “just so she can open a stupid Starbucks.”

“Doesn't seem to so far-fetched now, does it?”

“Maybe not,” Sofia said, glancing at her phone. “Listen, I'm late. I've gotta get back. We can talk more later, okay?”

As I got on the bike, I wondered what there would be to talk about. If the police and the county prosecutor were pursuing poisoning of Parisi's food, his stomach contents must have revealed something crucial.
And please don't let it be a bunch of partially digested foxglove leaves.
In any case, my pill theory was receding like the tide, as was my prime suspect, Sarah Crawford. The fact that she was a pharmacist—
Parisi's
pharmacist—had to be important. But I couldn't make it fit.

I pedaled quickly along the bike lane, heedless of the weekend traffic around me. By tomorrow I'd be hearing from Nina LaGuardia. By Tuesday I'd be hearing from Regina Sutton. My time was running out. On impulse, I turned down Ocean Avenue. I'd go to the restaurant. I'd walk myself through the events of that day and re-create every action I took to help me remember something I'd missed.
C'mon, Vic. You've written this stuff. Every piece of it is in front of you. You just have to put it together
.

My heart racing from exertion and a surge of hope, I zipped into the driveway and dropped the bike in the lot out back only to find the kitchen door locked. I came around to the front, but that door was locked, too. And taped to the inside of the glass was a neatly printed sign:
CLOSED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE
.