Too Many Cooks (3 page)

For the first time that day, Paavo smiled. It felt good, he discovered, damn good. It felt good to be back at work, to have a partner, to be going out on a case.

Angelina Amalfi set up
the ironing board and plugged the iron into the socket in the kitchen. Normally, she never ironed. That's what dry cleaners were for. But the silk dress she planned to wear had gotten crushed in her closet, and she wanted to look perfect for Paavo tonight.

Not only had this been her first day on a new job, it was also Paavo's first day back at work after a long recovery. They had lots to celebrate. Or sort of celebrate. It'd be more of a party if her job were a better one and if his were less dangerous. Or if he'd let himself recuperate just a little longer. She didn't believe he was as well as he'd insisted he was.

If she could have wrapped him up in a cocoon and kept him safe, she would have done it. But he wouldn't be happy. And then neither would she. She felt as if they waltzed around their future while their hearts and minds played a fugue; it might be the same song, but it sure wasn't in sync.

Paavo once told Angie that the old saying, “It's better to have loved and lost,” was hogwash, and he preferred to live with indifference rather than loneliness. Yet the way he looked at her, the way his eyes followed her as she walked around a room, or turned her way even if he was supposed to be conversing with someone else, told her more about how he felt than words ever could. Once, he even told her he loved her. Of course, it was after he'd been shot and nearly died, and he
was
in the hospital, all doped up with painkillers. Nevertheless, he'd said it.

Someday, she'd get past his reserve and caution. Someday he'd open his heart and truly let her in. That kind of love was worth waiting for.

Now, if she could only learn a little patience.

Loud and lusty, she sang an old Ethel Merman song about having rhythm, music, and her man. She was every bit as off key as Ethel at her worst, but Angie didn't care, shimmying and singing her way into the bedroom to pick up the clothes hanger holding her wrinkled silk dress.

There was a knock at the door.

Now what? she thought. Still holding the dress, she crossed her living room to the door of her Russian Hill apartment and peered through the peephole. Making sure her short pink-satin robe hadn't fallen loose, she pulled open the door.

“Hi, Stan.”

“Hi, Angie.” Without waiting for an invitation, Stanfield Bonnette, her neighbor from across the hall, walked in. Stan considered himself an up-and-coming bank executive. The more she got to know him, the more Angie considered him lucky to have any job at all.

She headed for the kitchen and he followed. “You busy tonight?” he asked.

She put the dress on the ironing board. “No. I'm ironing a silk dress to sit around and watch
Married with Children
.'”

“Guess you got a date?”

She licked her finger and touched the soleplate of the iron. No sizzle. “Good guess.”

“You're not still seeing that cop, are you?”

She glared at the iron. Now what was she supposed to do? “He's a homicide detective. There's a difference.”

“Not much of a one if you ask me.”

“I didn't,” she muttered. “Damn iron.”

“Time for a change, Angie.”

“The iron?”

“The cop. Drop him.”

She touched the soleplate again. It was cold. “I've had it! No more!”

Stan glanced at her with surprise and approval. “Well, it's about time! Good for you! I knew I could convince you that he was all wrong for you—”

“Not
him
, Stan.” She yanked the cord from the wall. “This stupid iron. It only works when it wants to.” She opened the garbage chute and dropped the offending appliance in. “
Arrivederci
, baby.”

“You know, you really should think about recycling—”

A disembodied “Oh!”—almost a yelp yet distinctly human—echoed from the chute.

Stan threw his arms around Angie, more to seek than to give protection, she was sure. “Oh, my God!” he cried. “What's that?”

“I think I know.” Angie wrested herself free, opened the chute, and stuck her head in. “Mrs. Calamatti!” she shouted, then listened as her voice echoed down the chute. “Is that you down there?”

“Who's that?” The thin, reedy voice sounded like something coming from the center of the earth.

“It's Angie.”

“Oh, Angie! Someone just tried to kill me!”

“Are you hurt?”

“I don't think so.”

Angie glanced back at Stan and shook her head. “Are you
inside
the dumpster?”

“Of course, child.” The voice was old and quivery. “The Depression. Got to be ready.”

Angie put her hand against her forehead. “If there's a Depression,” she said quietly to Stan, “she could sell her diamonds and keep living well for forty years!” Angie stuck her head back in the chute. “You could get hurt. Now climb out of there and go back upstairs!”

“Be prepared, Angie!”

“Will you broads shut up?” A man's voice from somewhere along the length of the building bellowed out at them.

Angie jerked her head out of the chute, her face on fire. “Good night, Mrs. Calamatti,” she cried, using the chute one last time.

“Good night, dear.”

Angie shut the chute door. Stan was still hovering over her shoulder. “I didn't know sound could do that.”

“Didn't you ever see the old Don Ameche movie? The one where he invented the telephone?”

“No. I don't do black-and-white.”

Angie tried not to think about it. “Why don't you go check to be sure Mrs. Calamatti gets back to her apartment in one piece?”

“Sure thing. I'll just give her some time to get there on her own, first.”

Angie took the dress off the ironing board. “I'd better change. I'm going to have to figure out what else to wear.” She stepped out of the kitchen, glancing from Stan to her front door by way of a hint.

“Don't worry about me. I'll go see to Mrs. Calamatti soon.” He opened the door of her refrigerator. “Ah! Leftover lasagna. I love your lasagna, Angie.”

“Take it.” She waved her free arm in the air as she went off to the bedroom. As she passed the bathroom, she got an idea. She went in, spun the shower faucet to the highest setting for hot, turned it on full, then hung the dress nearby, where it'd catch a lot of the steam.

As she stepped out of the bathroom, she looked down the hall to see Stan seated at her mahogany dining room table, a plate of lasagna and a glass of cabernet in front of him. She walked to the doorway and stood there silently, watching him.

He turned, as if feeling her stare. “Oh. I forgot to tell you. My microwave is on the fritz.”

She glanced at the digital clock on the VCR. “Oh, no!” she cried.

“It's not that bad, Angie. I'm sure there are plenty of good microwave repairmen around.”

“No, Stan. The time.”

“Oh. How much longer until Dick Tracy arrives?”

“That's just it! He should have been here fifteen minutes ago.” She began to pace.

“Fifteen minutes is nothing.”

“He's always been punctual before.”

“Isn't he back at work now, though?”

“Yes. That's just the problem. It's dangerous. Maybe he got hurt and that's why he's late.”

“Don't worry.”

“I've got to worry.”

“Got to?”

“It keeps people safe. I learned that from my grandmother. We had a big family, and it was her duty to worry about all of us. She scarcely had time to sleep, poor woman. It worked, though.”

“Angie, that's just superstition.”

She glanced at the clock again, then bit her bottom lip as she clutched her elbows and walked back and forth across the room. “My God, Stan, don't you think I know that? I wasn't born in the Dark Ages.”

“Then relax.”

“I can't. Don't you see? I know it's superstition, but if I stopped worrying and he got hurt, I'd never forgive myself.”

Stan looked blankly at her and poured himself another glass of wine.

A half hour later, Angie sat on the yellow silk Hepplewhite armchair, her feet up on the Queen Anne coffee table. Worrying was exhausting. Maybe she'd have to rethink this new relationship.

A loud knock sounded at the door. She knew that knock. Cops, she thought, hurrying across the room. Sounded as if he'd come to make a drug bust.

She swung open the door. It was Paavo. Soft blue eyes took her breath away and made her heart beat faster. Her gaze raced over his gray sports jacket,
black slacks, and pale blue shirt, the same shade as his eyes, then zeroed in closer for any signs of fatigue after his first day at work.

His face was thin, but then it was always thin: his nose highly arched, his brows straight, his eyes intense. Relief, coupled with a pulsating excitement at simply being with him, hammered through her. “You're late!” she cried.

He cocked an eyebrow as he strolled in, the room seeming to shrink in his presence. His gaze pointedly took in her mid-thigh-length robe, then traveled to shapely bare legs and little pink-polished toenails peeking out of the open toes of her fluffy slippers. He shifted his eyes to Stan, who was holding a glass of wine, then back to Angie. “I see you had help keeping your vigil,” he said to her. “Am I interrupting something?”

Her whole world seemed to tilt at the smooth, graceful way he glided into the room, at the cool, arch look he gave her now. God, but she was crazy about him! “He's jealous, Stan,” she said, and smiled. “Isn't he cute?”

Stan blanched.

So did Paavo.

“He's a regular little
fuzz
ball,” Stan replied.

“Did you like the flowers I sent?” Angie asked Paavo, ignoring Stan.

“They were…thoughtful,” Paavo replied.

“I loved the hyacinth—deep, mysterious, intense.” She grinned. “Like you.”

“Go on, Angie,” Stan said. “Everyone knows he's the petunia type.”

Paavo turned toward Stan and gave him a sharp glare. “Stan Bonnet, as charming as ever.”

Stan took a quick step backward, nearly stumbling over his own feet. “Bonnette,” he squawked. “And I know when I'm not wanted.” He lifted his chin and, still holding on to his wineglass, left the apartment.

Paavo looked at Angie as if she were crazy. “Whatever do you see in that guy?”

She walked up to him and put her arms around his neck. “He asks the same thing about you.”

Paavo spanned her waist with his hands, then drew her closer to him, feeling the soft warm curves of her body press against him in all the right places. “And what do you tell him?” he murmured as his hands slid over her robe's smooth fabric. She eased herself closer.

“I say I'd never tell.”

The delicate scent of roses that touched the air whenever Angie was near enveloped him now, and the unrelenting need that kept him coming back to her again and again, even though every bit of logic and rationality he could muster told him he was crazy, filled his senses. It was one thing to tell himself, while in that cold gray crisis center otherwise known as the Hall of Justice, that she shouldn't be a part of his life, but quite another when he held her so close.

His hands slipped under the neckline of her robe, feeling the silken creamy skin beneath it, and he knew that once again he was lost. He reached for the knot of her kimono's sash.

“Wait.” Despite the tremble of anticipation that rocked her, she knew they were already running late. “I made reservations for dinner, and we should leave soon. Wielund's is an incredibly popular restaurant, all but impossible to get into, unless you know the owner like I do.”

He said nothing, but everywhere his eyes touched, her skin tingled, and they touched everywhere. Even as her words still rang in the air, her fingers found his tie, loosened it, then slowly pulled the shorter length of it through the Windsor knot.

He looped the sash of her robe around his hands and pulled her toward him, then bent his head to hers. “Wielund's,” he murmured, his voice low and husky, his lips nearly brushing hers as the thin edge of his restraint dissolved, “can wait.”

Yosh had been right
about the guy popped between the eyes: the old lady was a crack shot when pushed. That had been an easy call, open-and-shut. But as the week rolled on, so did the count of sudden demises: two stabbings, a cabby snuffed during a botched robbery, and a suspicious suicide—or at least suspicious to Paavo, who just didn't believe in suicidal drug dealers. Big-city life in all its glory.

“Does it feel as if you've never been away, Paav?” Rebecca leaned against the edge of his desk.

“Almost. Some things'll never be the same, though.”

Rebecca glanced at Matt's desk, where Yosh chewed a pencil and puzzled over writing out a report; then she gazed back at Paavo. “We missed you around here, you know. Now we should be able to get on with solving some of these trickier cases.”

Calderon slammed his desk drawer shut and stood, his lips forming a bitter curve. “Nothing tricky about these cases, Rebecca. Just look for the dumbest and
meanest guy around the corpse. If that one isn't the murderer, then it's the dead man's nearest and dearest. Always works that way.”

“Sometimes you can't find a friend of the corpse. And you can't find anyone dumb or mean, either.”

“Nobody's that empty.”

“I had one that was. Sheila Danning. I'll never forget her.”

“What case was that?” Paavo asked.

“Me and Never-Take-a-Chance Bill were investigating it while you were in the hospital.”

“I remember that case.” Calderon slid his gun into the holster he wore at his back. “She bought it in Golden Gate Park, right? Strangled, raped, the usual stuff.”

“Real usual,” Paavo sneered.

“What was strange was we couldn't come up with a line on her,” Rebecca said. “No one really seemed to know her. She lived in a studio apartment out on Ingleside and worked as a cocktail waitress at a fancy bar and restaurant called La Maison Rouge. We found her parents in Tacoma, but she'd walked out on them and they hadn't heard from her in over a year. That was it. We figured she was just an innocent victim. A random thing—she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Still, it bothers me that we couldn't come up with more.”

“That must have been your first or second case, right?” Paavo asked, remembering she'd been promoted shortly after he'd been shot.

Rebecca nodded. “The first.”

Paavo rubbed his chin. “How old was this Sheila Danning?”

“Twenty.”

“New in the city, no friends?”

“Fairly new.”

“How long had she worked at La Maison Rouge?”

“About three months.”

Paavo gave her a sharp glance. “Three months and none of them could tell you a thing about her?”

Rebecca shrugged. “We came up empty.”

That didn't make sense. Women with enough looks and personality to be hired as cocktail waitresses were usually outgoing and friendly, unless there was something very strange going on.

“Don't file it away as unsolved yet.” Paavo said. “Something still might fall into your lap and tie it all together.”

“And if it doesn't,” Calderon said, his arms folded and his legs wide and rigid, “nobody'll remember for long that you screwed up on your first case. Look at Paavo. He's screwing his
last
case.”

Paavo's eyes met Calderon's as he slowly lifted himself from his chair. His voice was brittle as chipped ice, and the temperature in the room seemed to drop. “You want to make something of it, Luis?”

“Back off, Paav.” Rebecca placed her hand against Paavo's arm. “He thinks he's being funny. Let's go across the street for coffee.”

“Don't waste your time with him, Rebecca,” Calderon said as he put on his jacket and tugged at the cuffs of his shirtsleeves. “He don't know a good woman when she's…right in front of him.”

 

Angie double-checked the address. Eleven-ninety-nine Pacific Street was the upper story of an old San Francisco “flat”—one long narrow apartment, taking
up an entire floor and pancaked on top of another apartment of the same size. Both flats sat atop a garage and entryway. The street was located about midway down the southern slope of Russian Hill. That part of the hill didn't have the view of the uppermost area where Angie lived, but neither was it down near the bottom where the noise, crowds, and tourist traps of Chinatown lay. It was a sunny, pleasant neighborhood of narrow streets and alleyways, two-and three-story flats, corner grocery stores, and two cable car lines that meandered up and down the hills.

Angie rang the bell to Henry LaTour's place, and in a moment the door opened by itself. She stuck her head in the doorway. The small square entry led to a long uncarpeted stairway that seemed to go straight up to heaven. “Hello?” she called.

“Angie!” Henry bent low so she could see him at the top of the stairs, his hand still on the lever that opened and shut the door. “Come on up. We're waiting for you.”

Her high heels clanged as she hurried up the stairs. Halfway, she slowed down, looked behind her, and nearly lost her balance. It was two stories, nearly straight up, except for a few right-angled steps at the very top.

“I guess you don't have to worry about exercise, do you?” She was gasping for breath.

“Everyone says that. Keeps me young.” He gestured for her to follow him down the hall to a small living room in the front of the flat. “Here's something else that keeps me young. I still call her my bride, even though we've been married almost five years. This is my wife, Lacy.”

Angie stopped in the doorway. Seated on the sofa in front of the window, Lacy seemed to shimmer in a beam of sunlight like the stained glass of the young Virgin Mary being visited by the Angel Gabriel at Our Lady of Guadalupe church. Angie stepped into the room to see Lacy better, and immediately the image shattered. Her bouffant hair, about thirty years out of date, dyed bright auburn, was all swept toward the right ear, where it culminated in a wild upward-pointing fringe that must have been shellacked to stay in place. She wore a surprisingly tasteful (considering her hair), royal blue wool dress that must have cost plenty, and sported a diamond wedding ring that gave Liz Taylor's a run for the money. Her cheekbones were high and silicon-implant round, her nose small and straight, with arching nostrils, and her eyes sported a wide space between her eyelids and her highly arched brows. In short, she had the kind of face usually associated with a plastic surgeon's scalpel.

She stood and walked around the coffee table, her hands outstretched in greeting. “Hello, Angie. So nice of you to come to our home.” Her face scarcely moved, although she probably thought she was smiling. Her voice was modulated and accentless—as if she'd gone to a speech coach. Angie wondered if she shouldn't be on the radio program instead of Henry.

Their hands clasped. Covering Lacy's fingernails were three-inch-long acrylics with orange-red polish, so sharply curved she could have used them to climb a tree. Angie decided to rethink her own long nails. “Thank you, Mrs. LaTour. I'm happy to meet you.”

“Won't you sit down? We were just drinking some Aljuice. It's a scrumptious algae mix, one of my little
things to keep my Henry healthy. Would you like a glass?”

“No, thank you. I'm fine.”

“Herb tea?”

“Nothing, really.”

They all sat, Henry beside Lacy on the sofa, Angie in a chair facing them. Lacy folded her hands on her lap and primly crossed her ankles. “I'm very glad you were willing to come
here
to talk about the show, Angie,” she said. “It's so convenient for us.”

Henry reached over and patted his wife's hand. “I told you she was special.”

Angie wondered if they planned to give her a halo. “Well, the radio station doesn't have much room for meetings anyway.”

“Lacy and I were discussing the structure of the show,” Henry said. “We thought it could use some improvement.”

“Oh, really?” Angie could think of about five hundred ways to improve it, the first being to let her say a few words on the air.

“Not
too
many changes,” Lacy added, cocking her head toward Henry and batting her eyes at him. “Everything Henry does is nearly perfect.”

Angie hoped this meeting would be short. She didn't think her stomach could take much more. Besides, watching people drink green frothy stuff with black flecks in it reminded her of old monster movies—the ones where a mad scientist would drink a potion, sprout hair on his face and hands, and go on a rampage. Henry did sort of remind her of a mad scientist. And Lacy was a ringer for the Bride of Frankenstein.

“I'd be happy to do anything I can to help,” she said.

“The problem is,” Lacy began, “that Henry doesn't know what the calls are going to be about before he hears them. In such situations, he can easily misunderstand, or he has to just say any old thing until you're able to find an answer for him.”

“It really doesn't take that long,” Angie said. “And with the commercial breaks and all—”

“It doesn't sound good,”—Lacy took Henry's hand—“for my Henry not to have the answer right on the tip of his cute little tongue.”

His cute little
green
tongue.

Henry cleared his throat. “I agree. Chef Henri must be able to respond
tout de suite
.”

Lacy glanced at him. “Henry, dear, you don't need to speak French around us. Right, Angie? My big Pooh Bear is such a show off!”

He harrumphed and leaned back against the sofa, his lips pursed indignantly.

“Pooh Bear?” Angie regretted it the moment the words passed her lips. Some explanations were better left unspoken.

“That's what I call him. And it'll explain the new theme music we just picked out. Every show should have something distinctive.”

Angie refused the temptation of asking any more about it. “So, about finding the answers for Chef Henri, what does this mean?” she asked.

“What it means is, we want you to screen the calls before Henry takes them. You can find out what the callers' names are and what they want to ask about; then you find the answer and give it to Henry before he ever even says hello to them.”

Angie stared at her. Some shows, on bigger radio
stations, went to the expense of paying screeners to answer every call off the air—to make sure it wasn't a wrong number or a crank or whatever. But not KYME. The radio hosts took their own calls, for better or worse. “I really don't understand why I would need to—”

“It's just not right that poor Henry has to take these questions cold, with nothing but that silly time delay to bleep them off if anyone starts to say obscenities. I mean, really, how many people swear at cooks?” Lacy formed her mouth into a pout, her eyes darting from Angie to Henry and back again.

“Well…” Angie decided it'd be best not to reply, but from all she'd heard about the cook at Henry's restaurant, she suspected plenty of people wanted to swear at him just about every day, especially after being presented with the bill. “The problem is,” she said, “I've got to listen carefully to Henry's calls while they're happening. Many people start out with one question, but before you know it they've asked about something altogether different.”

Lacy jumped to her feet. “But that's not what's important!”

Her voice was shrill yet quivering.

Angie leaned back in her chair, looking up at the woman in surprise. “Not important? It seems to me that's the main part of what I do.”

“Now, dear.” Henry jerked on Lacy's arm, trying to get her to sit back down. “Let's not upset Angelina about this. Good help is so hard to find these days.”

Good help! He made her sound like a cleaning lady. Angie was ready to fly out of there, but she forced herself to be patient with them. She wanted this job, she could be good at this job, and if Henry would
ever let her say even one word on the radio she could prove it. It was more than a little ironic, she thought, that any Tom, Dick, or Harry from the greater Bay Area could call and be on the radio, but if she said anything and ruined the illusion that Henry's answers were popping full-blown from his head like Athena, she'd be canned. She bit her tongue and did her best to stay calm.

“Angie,” Henry said soothingly, “won't you at least give it a try?”

“But Henry, what happens when I'm busily talking to a future caller and the one who's on the air with you asks a follow-up question?”

“I'll just have to answer it.”

“Isn't that what got you in trouble the first time?”

Henry's face flushed red. “Trouble? What trouble?”

“God help us,” Angie whispered under her breath.

“Henry can do whatever he wants,” Lacy said, twisting her fingers. “And if he doesn't know the answer, he can simply take a station break. Right, dear heart?”

“Of course.”

Just then the telephone began to ring and Henry went into the hallway to answer it.

“So.” Lacy watched Henry leave the room, then stood and began to pace back and forth in front of Angie's chair. “It's all settled.”

“It's not going to work, you know.”

Lacy spun on her. “It'll work. Whatever Henry does works.”

“But—”

“Look, sweetie.” Lacy smiled and stepped closer, “I've been around a long time. Girls like you are a dime a dozen here, all looking for their big break in
radio. You come and go, thinking you know best. But I care about Henry and what's best for
him
.”

“But every day—”

“I know, I know. Every day he gets one or two tough follow-ups. What's that? Two hundred sixty a year. But each day he takes ten to fifteen calls. You screen them, and he looks good twenty-six to thirty-nine
hundred
times a year! I'd take odds like that any time. Wouldn't you?”