Murder On The Menu: A Romantic Comedy Culinary Cozy Mystery (A Celebrity Mystery) (9 page)

“The police must have left the door open,” Jack reasons. “So, let’s have a little look around, shall we?”

There’s some paperwork out on the coffee table in front of the leather sofa and Jack crouches down to read through it. I walk over and spot some more copies of the new promotional bits from the designers for the restaurant. “You know, that flyer we saw downstairs, the one on the noticeboard about the campaign, maybe Armand got the same designers to do that who are working on the new stuff for the Veggies.”

Jack nods. “Could be. Let me have the details and I’ll give them a call tomorrow. Pretend I’m his assistant and ask them some questions.”

We circle the flat, Jack working anticlockwise and me clockwise until we meet in the kitchen. The pristine, designer kitchen. All grey shaker style with soft-close cupboards and a fancy blue Aga. It’s surprisingly feminine. I’d have thought Armand would have chosen glossy black cupboards and a high tech modern cooker.

At the same time we both turn to face the two doors on our right.

“Bathroom and bedroom?” Jack says, more statement than question.

“Must be.” The thought of venturing into Armand’s bedroom makes me feel nauseous. I hold back and Jack looks at me. In an instant he must see my reluctance and understand the reason for it.

“I’ll check these rooms out.” He pulls off one of his black leather gloves and hands it to me, along with a spare torch from his pocket. “Want to help me out? Put this glove on and have a rummage through the kitchen drawers and cupboards.”

I take the glove and slip it on. It’s warm and smells of citrusy aftershave. As Jack disappears behind one of the doors, I begin my own search. I open the top drawer on a unit of three and am met with a jumble of things. This must be Armand’s junk drawer. We all have one of those. There’s a bunch of envelopes, most of which appear to be bills. Nothing significant. Opening a cupboard next, I find a box and gently pull it out. Inside is a wooden photo frame. I lift it up and turn it over to see if there’s actually a photo inside it. There is. It’s of a woman. The image is black and white and gives her a glamourous movie star air. She’s blonde, her hair done up in an elegant chignon. Her face perfectly made up. It looks like one of the portraits done in professional studios where they miraculously gloss over all your imperfections and make you look like a catwalk model. Who is this vision of beauty and sophistication? With the image in black and white, it makes it tricky to date. It could have been taken yesterday or it could be years old. Then I spot the bits of paper at the bottom of the box. Postcards, theatre tickets, menus pinched from restaurants. It looks like a box of mementoes. Does this suggest Armand was a romantic? Do all of these things relate to his wife Bryony? Even though they’re separated, does he keep his memories of when times were good for them, tucked in this box?

“Found something?”

Jack’s voice makes me jump, and I almost drop the frame. He comes and stands close to me. Very close. Looking at the photo from over my shoulder.

“Know who she is?”

I shake my head. “I can’t even judge how old the photo is.”

“Have you ever met the woman Armand is married to?”

“No. She’s never visited the Veggies as far as I know.”

“Right. Let’s keep looking then.”

Glancing at the clock ticking loudly on the wall, I realise we’ve been checking around the place now for more than half an hour. I really think we should get going.

And that’s when I hear a car pull up. Scooting over to the window, I spot a couple of men get out of a vehicle parked outside the restaurant and walk straight for the front door. My already sky high anxiety hits stratospheric levels. Who are these people?

“Jack!” I hiss, trying to get his attention. He’s gone back into the bedroom.

In a second he’s at my side again. “What is it?”

I lean back from the window so he can look outside. “Who are they?” I ask.

“Police I’d say. Plain clothed. Senior officers. Guess they want to look the place over again.”

“And we’re stuck up here! What are we going to do?” Frantically I look around us. “Hide?”

Jack steps back from the window and shakes his head. “No. Don’t panic. They might not even come up here. Probably just want to visit the scene of the crime.”

“But what if they do?” I say, grabbing at his arm. He might not be fazed by the situation we find ourselves in but I’m completely freaking out. “We’ll get caught!”

“Doesn’t matter. I’ve got it covered.” He lightly touches a hand to my cheek. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

I want to find his words, and his touch, reassuring but fail to. “And what about you? You’re already suspended. You might end up getting fired.”

“I won’t,” he replies with an unshakable air of confidence.

The unmistakable sound of footsteps echoes up the stairs. Footsteps coming in our direction.

“They’re coming up the stairs!” I shriek moments before our visitors walk into Armand’s flat, flicking on the light switch as they do so.

Sugar.

It was bad enough being on the suspects list.

Now I’m going to get arrested, too.

CHAPTER TEN

Before the men can speak Jack barrels towards them, an indignant expression on his face. “What the hell are you doing here?” he demands. “I said I wanted to conduct a private search of these premises. Private as in no other officials barging in and distracting me and messing things up!”

One of the men steps forward. “Who are you?”

“Who am I?” Jack repeats. Then, with more force this time, “WHO AM I?”

“This is a crime scene, authorised personnel only,” the man says, clearly not fazed by Jack’s rant.

“I am authorised personnel,” Jack retorts, glaring at the man. “Why else would I be here? More to the point, why the hell did they allow you lot to come down here when I’d specifically said…?”

The man holds up a hand. “Look, can I get your name and see your ID, sir? Then we’ll get this sorted out with the guys back at base.”

I have no idea who ‘they’ means or where ‘base’ is but I keep quiet, pray I don’t get arrested, and wait to see what Jack’s going to say and do about the requested ID. He reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a slim leather wallet and opens it, flashing the contents of it at the officers.

“Special Agent Jack Smith,” one of the guys reads from the card.  “I had no idea they’d called in the specialists.”

Jack flips the wallet closed and tucks it back in his pocket. “Yeah, well, they have. The victim being a celebrity means this case is high profile and they want people solving it, and fast. People who know how to tackle this kind of thing.”

“Of course,” the man says. He looks over to me, raising a questioning eyebrow as he does so. “And the lady?”

“She’s an employee of this restaurant and is helping me with my search and enquiries,” Jack immediately responds. “As I requested.”

“Name?” the man asks, clearly not ready to leave us to our ‘specialist’ investigating just yet.

I open my mouth to speak, but Jack is quicker. “She’s been extremely helpful with this case. I’ll be putting all the details in my full report which I’ll file through my division as soon as I’m done here. Which will be a hell of a lot faster if I can be left to get on with my job.”

The man looks from me to Jack, and I begin to think he’s not going to buy all of this. Eventually he nods at both of us and turns, moving towards the door. “Let’s get out of here,” he says to the other man. “We’ll come back later.”

“Fantastic, thanks,” Jacks says tersely.

In the doorway one of the men pauses and turns back to face us. “Why were you conducting your search in the dark by flashlight?”

Ahhh. Busted.

“Because we were being discreet. I didn’t want to cause concern or attract attention amongst the locals. I think they’ve been through enough already, don’t you? A little place like this and someone gets murdered, it’s traumatic for everyone. If they had spotted lights on in a dead guy’s flat, well… they might have panicked about what was cracking off now.”

I stand perfectly still, not daring to breathe.

The man nods and leaves the room. I continue to hold my breath until I hear the slam of the front door downstairs and the sound of a car starting up. Jack, however, strolls to the window. Presumably to check that all of the men have indeed got into the vehicle and left.

“Have they all gone?” I ask in a whisper as I hear the car pull away.

Jack nods. “Yeah. I think we should get out of here sharpish though. They’ll get my ID checked out. That guy in charge wasn’t entirely convinced about my credentials, I could tell.”

He starts to walk for the door of the flat, and I scurry after him. “You mean when he checks out the ID, he’ll find out there’s no such person?”

“Yeah, there’s probably a special agent called Jack Smith somewhere along the line, but it’s doubtful he’s been authorised to work this case.” He clatters down the stairs and heads back towards the kitchen.

“So that was a false identification?” I ask the question even though I know the answer.

Jack holds the door open for me to follow him through to the kitchen. “All I’ll say is that the less you know the better.”

“Was it pulling stunts like this which got you suspended?”

He stops in the middle of the kitchen and flashes me a cheeky grin. “No. Worse than that. Much worse.”

I try not to let my imagination run riot about the kind of things he did to get himself suspended. I just hope getting him involved in the investigation into Armand’s murder isn’t a huge mistake and he isn’t going to land me in jail rather than help to keep me out of it.

“Now what?” I hiss once we’re back in the car park and, thankfully, on the way to retrieve Daisy.

“Now you go home and try to get some sleep. I’ll continue with my investigative digging and see if I can come up with anything to point us towards who stabbed your boss.”

Like a gentleman, which I very much doubt he is, he walks me to Daisy and stands close by while I unlock her and climb inside. All of the time he’s glancing around us, obviously on alert.

“OK?” he asks, leaning down to speak to me through Daisy’s now open window. I nod and start her up. “Go straight home. Do not stop anywhere,” he instructs.

Yeah, right, like I had any intention of going anywhere other than home. I want to be back at Eskdale, the doors all locked and bolted, sitting on the sofa, wrapped in a blanket with a large glass of wine in my hand. Or maybe brandy. Then I remember the power is off and I’ll be all alone up there in the dark. With only my scary thoughts for company. Briefly I contemplate asking him to join me at the farm but tell myself not to be such a wimp. Everything will be fine. Whoever murdered Armand was targeting him and him alone. It’s not like there’s some serial killer on the loose.

Is it?

There aren’t many properties on the road between the village and the farm, but the few properties which are scattered along the way all, I’m pleased to see, have lights flickering away in their windows now. That means the power is back on, and much sooner than expected. Phew. That’s a huge relief. It’s also taken the scariness factor down a notch or two. My nerves are still all of a jitter though, so I park Daisy as close to the back door at Eskdale as I can and almost leap from her and into the farmhouse. I’ve only had time to pop the kettle on for a restorative hot chocolate and a comforting hot water bottle when the phone rings. I grab it, worried it might be Jack telling me something is wrong. Well, even
more
wrong than it was before. “Hello?”

“Hi, Lizzie.”

“Stella! How are you?” The voice of my best friend from London reaches down the line and goes some way towards soothing my nerves. Stella is a part of my old life, but a good part. She’s like the sister I never had. We became friends in London but found out, amazingly, we’re both from Cumbria. Her parents still live up here, in Carlisle, about an hour away from Eskdale.

“I’m brilliant,” she enthuses, making me smile and dissolving a teeny bit more of the tension inside of me. “Great news, David and I are coming up to Cumbria for the weekend. We need to see my parents about something anyway and we’d love to come and stay with you and have a look around your grand residence.”

“Grand! You know it’s a wreck, Stella.” Stella, busy with her job, hasn’t had chance to visit yet. She works for a big bank, one of those with a posh name, years of history behind it, and astronomical bonuses for those who put in one hundred hour weeks. 

“Yeah, I know, but it’s still a detached house with loads of land which is all yours. Gosh, I’d be so excited if it was me that had inherited the place.”

Stella’s obvious excitement is contagious and a very welcome distraction. “Would you? Really? Surely you wouldn’t give up your high-flying career to come and live in the middle of nowhere.”

“Well, not just at the moment,” she edges. “But maybe, before too long. David and I might want to jack it all in and become self-sufficient or something.”

Somehow I can’t picture Stella, all designer clothes and weekly visits to the salon, as being the self-sufficient farming type. “You do remember how far farms are from things like designer clothes shops, don’t you?”

“Of course! David thinks that would be a good thing – stop me spending loads of money every month on designer bags and shoes!”

“Well, he does have a point there…” I agree.

“So? Is it all right if we come up and stay with you this weekend?”

“Yes, absolutely,” I reply, pushing aside the fact I’m in the middle of a murder investigation. “I’m looking forward to it already.”

“Oh good. I thought it should be OK. I mean, not much happens up there, does it? You’re probably suffering from perpetual boredom.”

Ah. Right. Ask Stella when the new season must-have designer handbag is out and she’ll know to the hour. As far as general news goes, she doesn’t tend to follow world events. Or even UK events.

I clear my throat. I really should tell her. “I take it you haven’t heard.”

“Heard what, sweetie?”

“About the murder.”

There’s a beat of silence, and I wonder if we’ve lost the connection. “Stella?”

“What murder?” she asks, her usually effervescent tone now sombre.

“Well, you know I said I’d got some waitressing work at a local place run by a celebrity chef?”

“Yes, the Vegetables.”

“Close. It’s known locally at the Veggies. The chef patron is Armand Seville, the guy who won the big Culinary Cook Off competition on TV a year or so ago.” What am I saying? Stella rarely watches TV, she won’t know the show at all. “Anyway,” I push on, “Armand has been murdered. Stabbed in his own kitchen at the restaurant late one night.” I neglect to mention I was the last one to leave that night and that I’m on the police suspects list. I think I should probably break the news to her in stages.

“Oh my goodness! Who found him?” she gasps.

“One of the cleaners when she turned up the following morning. It’s all totally horrible. It’s probable that the killer was specifically targeting Armand for some reason, so it’s not like we’ve got a serial killer on the loose up here but even so, everyone is in shock and can’t believe something like this could have happened.”

There’s more silence on the other end of the line and I wonder if Stella, in light of my revelation, is about to change her mind about visiting me this weekend. “Stella?”

“I’m speechless,” she replies. “I mean, it’s all dreadful stuff and everything, of course it is, but… well, I’m just thinking, you left London to get away from trouble and were in search of a quiet life and then this goes and happens. Not just a murder, which is bad enough in itself, but the victim is your boss, you knew this man.”

I swallow and nod, which is ridiculous because, of course, Stella can’t see me. “Yes,” I say, eventually finding my voice. “So, have I scared you off visiting or not?”

“Of course not,” she replies, though I think I still detect an uncertain tone to her voice. “We’ll be there. You can tell me all about it over a bottle of wine.”

“And what about David, you said he was coming up too, right?”

“Oh, David can read or watch TV while we have our catch up. He’ll be fine. Look, I’m sorry but I’ve got to go. I’ll see you soon and take care won’t you?”

“You too. Bye, Stella.”

David and Stella have been together what seems like ages but, in reality, is probably just over eighteen months. They’re well suited. He works at the same bank and is a decent guy who adores Stella. Much as I’m looking forward to seeing them again, I know that there’s a good chance we’ll end up reminiscing about the past and why I left London and that’s something I’m definitely
not
looking forward to.