Dead to the Last Drop Read online

  “I hate bullies,” he said simply. “And I can spot them a mile away. When I was growing up, some bully or other would come at me within the first week at any new school. I was lucky, though. I learned how to deal with them. Abby didn’t.”

  “Not everyone has your courage, Stan, especially when you have to live with a bully every day.”

  “Like you, Ms. Cosi?”

  “Me?”

  He nodded. “The situation you’re in with that obnoxious chef of yours.”

  I blinked, speechless for a moment.

  Stan leaned across the table. “Sometimes, ma’am, you don’t have to stand up to them. Not when a bully is too damn big. Think tactically. That’s what this country was founded on. When you can’t win toe-to-toe, you flank them. Surprise them. Knock the legs out from under them.” He spread his hands. “Hey, it worked for me. I’ll bet it will work for you, too.”

  While Stan drained his cup and blithely began drumming the table to a tune in his head, I sat back to consider his words.

  Chef Tad Hopkins was a bully. A bully with an ironclad contract. I’d been going toe-to-toe with him. But to beat him, I would have to outsmart him.

  “You know, Stan, Gardner was right about you. For a near-blind guy, you see an awful lot.”

  “Thanks, Ms. Cosi,” he said and popped the last cookie into his mouth.

  Forty-one

  AN hour later, I turned the floor over to Tito and Kimberly. Then I risked my neck by poking my head into the kitchen—praying Chef Hopkins wasn’t around to chop it off.

  “Pssst . . . hey,” I whispered to the only person in the room. “Where is Hopkins?”

  Luther Bell turned away from chopping vegetables to jerk his head in the direction of the chef’s office.

  Perfect.

  I stepped through the doors and joined Luther at the counter.

  “I want to get the chef out of that room in a hurry, quickly enough that he’ll forget to lock the door behind him.”

  Luther turned his eyes toward the ceiling. Finally he snapped his fingers.

  “I got it. A faulty microwave will put Chef Tad in a panic.”

  I made a face. “That says a lot about his cuisine. None of it good.”

  “I know,” Luther said. “Practically all of tonight’s menu comes wrapped in plastic, but that should help you.” He leaned close. “The microwave acted up last week and I fixed it without telling him. I was afraid if the chef found out he’d throw one of his hissy fits.”

  “You know how to fix a microwave?”

  “I know how to change a breaker. The problem was in the basement fuse box.”

  “Could you break it again? Pretty please?”

  Luther grinned. “Anything for you, Clare Cosi.”

  * * *

  A half an hour later, I was peeking through the swinging doors, waiting for my moment to pounce. Luther threw me a wink before rushing toward Chef Hopkins’s closed office door at the back of the kitchen.

  “Chef! Chef!” He knocked frantically.

  “What do you want?” demanded the muffled voice behind the door.

  “Bad news,” Luther called. “The microwave is on the blink. I can’t turn it on. It won’t power—”

  He didn’t even finish his sentence before Chef Hopkins burst out of his office. “What do you mean it won’t work? It was fine an hour ago. Show me!”

  Luther led Tad to the microwave, where the pair fretted over the machine for a few minutes. Finally, Luther suggested the problem might be the fuse box in the basement.

  “Go fix it,” Tad barked.

  “Me?” Luther shrugged and spread his arms. “I wouldn’t know where to start.”

  “Fine!”

  A moment later Tad pushed through the swinging doors, the Village Blend’s toolbox in hand. He was in such a panic that he didn’t even notice me jumping clear. As Chef Hopkins descended the basement stairs, I slipped into the kitchen.

  “You’ve got three minutes. Five, tops,” Luther cautioned. “And I can’t warn you because he sent me out to bus tables.”

  “That’s not your job!”

  “Just go!”

  I nodded my thanks and hurried to the back of the kitchen. Inside Tad’s office, I closed and locked the door. Suddenly I felt giddy. The fact that I didn’t even know what to look for was thrust aside by the sheer triumph I felt at getting this far.

  Now for the hunt!

  The chef’s office was cluttered and windowless, and the stark overhead light cast deep shadows. Like much of the newly renovated kitchen, the space smelled of fresh paint.

  A printer was perched on the corner of Tad’s desk, but most of its faux-cherrywood surface was buried beneath old Jazz Space menus, scribbled notes, and numbers on Post-its. I riffled through a stack of clips from the Washington Post and the Georgetown Current, a community newspaper. Tad collected ads for other restaurants, foodie reviews, even a few recipes.

  I checked his laptop next, and found it locked. Apparently the chef’s paranoia extended pretty far, which signaled to me he had something to hide.

  I attempted to decipher the notes, but they were a jumble of meaningless scrawls and unidentified phone numbers. The desk drawers were unlocked, but contained only office supplies. I hunted up the trash can, but it was empty.

  Heartsick, I realized I’d come up empty.

  What did you expect, Clare? A cashier’s check marked “profit from stolen sea trout”? A photograph of the mysterious Eastern European man with his name and address scrawled on it?

  With time running out, my eyes drifted back to the printer. A quick glance at the control panel and I felt hopeful again.

  A print memory!

  I powered up the machine and found two jobs stored in the microchips. I selected them both and pressed Print.

  The first page was a guest list, forty-plus people on it. Many of the names had a culinary restriction or food allergy noted in red ink.

  The second page was the purloined letter, the Maltese Falcon, and the map to Treasure Island all rolled up in one little piece of paper. That printout was my transit paper to Nirvana, and Tad Hopkins’s one-way ticket to Palookaville.

  My bliss ended when I heard the click of a key in the lock, and then the office door opened.

  Forty-two

  I whirled to face a livid Tad Hopkins, his stocky frame filling the doorway. He clutched the toolbox in one hand, and waved a Phillips-head screwdriver in my face with the other.

  “What the hell are you doing in my office?”

  I was cornered in that tiny space, and I probably should have been scared. But I’d been intimidated one too many times by this gastronomic gadfly, and I was too angry to back down now.

  “What am I doing here?” I flashed the catering menu I’d printed out. “I’m busting you. That’s what I’m doing . . . Chef.”

  “What is that you’re waving around?”

  “The menu for the event you catered—with my sea trout!”

  The toolbox clattered to the floor.

  “I may not be familiar with the DC penal code, but in New York, fifteen hundred dollars’ worth of pilfered seafood qualifies as fourth-degree grand larceny.”

  Hopkins still gripped the screwdriver, which he used to drive home his point. “You’re deluded!” he bellowed. “Prove I stole your precious fish! You can’t.”

  “That’s the beauty of it. I don’t have to.”

  As he began to sputter, I knocked his arm aside and slipped around him. When I was through the door, he turned to face me again.

  “You’ve got nothing, Cosi!”

  “I’ve got this!” I pointed to the beautiful typeface at the bottom of the menu.

  “‘Service provided by Tad Hopkins of Reston, Virginia,’” I read aloud. “And look at the date.”

 
“Get out of my kitchen—”

  “Contracts cut both ways, Hopkins. And you signed on for two years of exclusive service. Exclusive. This piece of paper proves you violated the exclusivity clause on your contract. That means you’re fired.”

  “But—”

  “There are no buts. Now”—I couldn’t wait to say it—“you get out of my kitchen!”

  “You are a total BITCH!” he shouted.

  “And you are a CAUGHT FISH! And an embezzler. So get out!”

  “Fine, I’m going. But you’ll hear from my lawyer!”

  “Glad you have one,” I shot back. “Because if you make any trouble for Madame or this business, I’ll report the theft of my sea trout to the Metro DC police. It’ll be easy. Half the force was in here for coffee this morning! So sure, you can sue us—from jail!”

  Our civil war had drawn a crowd. Tito and Kimberly had poked their heads through the swinging doors, and Luther stood gawking in the middle of the kitchen, gripping a plastic tray full of dirty glasses.

  As embarrassing as it was to have an audience, I was thankful for the witnesses. For one thing, it kept Chef Hopkins from taking a swing at me. I could see his fists clenching. Honestly, the man looked angry enough to kill.

  Maybe my employees prevented my murder. Maybe not. But the presence of eyewitnesses didn’t stop him from making more ugly threats.

  When Hopkins was finally gone, I leaned against the wall. My knees were wobbly and I felt like a hundred bats were battering my chest, trying to get out.

  “You okay, boss?” Luther asked.

  “All in all, I feel pretty good, Chef.”

  “Chef?” Luther looked around. “I’m sorry, but Hopkins is gone.”

  “I know. I’m addressing you.” I faced him. “Because you are now in charge of our kitchen, Chef Bell.”

  He swallowed hard. “You’re sure you’re not confusing the CIA with the CIA?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Tad Hopkins graduated from the Culinary Institute of America. My experience with the CIA was in its federal cafeteria.”

  “I know. And I can’t wait to get rid of Tad’s menu and put yours in its place. More importantly, our customers can’t wait, either. We’ll talk about your new work hours and salary in the morning.”

  Forty-three

  “HELLO . . .” My eyes were still closed, my ears barely open.

  “Clare, did you see it?”

  “See what?” I rasped into the phone while glancing at the bedside clock. All I could make out were blurry numbers.

  Last night, Mike and I celebrated the vanquishing of Hopkins the Horrible with a full bottle of champagne, my irresistibly festive Cherry and Port–Glazed Pork Tenderloin (wrapped in bacon), and my light and lovely Chocolate Kahlúa-Cream Whoopie Pies—not to mention a night of making whoopee. (Okay, I mentioned it.)

  This decadence wasn’t negligence on my part. I was supposed to have the morning off. Gardner had agreed to open the coffeehouse for me. Then he planned to crash until a few hours before our Jazz Space showtime.

  So why is he calling at the crack of 7:15?

  “Don’t tell me we’re having trouble with the gas lines again.”

  “No. I sent a link to your smartphone. You need to check it. Now.”

  I sat up.

  Whoa, too fast . . .

  While the room spun, I vaguely registered Mike’s big, warm body, softly snoring next to me. As quietly as I could, I threw off the covers, tied on a robe, and moved into the master suite’s sitting room.

  Tapping the phone screen, I followed Gard’s hotlink to The District, a website devoted to the Washington, DC, social scene.

  The news was right there on the home page:

  FIRST DAUGHTER “ABBY LANE” JAZZES THINGS UP IN GEORGETOWN!

  Suddenly my legs had all the strength of wet noodles. As I sank onto the sofa, Gard informed me—

  “I heard the news on the radio. They claimed their source was The District website, and that’s where I found the pics and video—”

  “Video? They have video!”

  I tapped the headline and up came the smartphone snaps of Abby playing at last Wednesday’s Open Mike, along with a short digital recording. The sound quality was poor, but I recognized a few bars of “Cool Reception.”

  The post claimed the Village Blend, DC, provided the “publicity” materials. It listed tonight’s showtime and our address, making it look like we’d released the news ourselves.

  “Who did this?!” Gardner wailed. “Do you think a fan figured out Abby’s identity and thought they were helping us?”

  “It’s possible . . .” I played the video again and noticed a dark image flash into the frame. A quick rewind and pause revealed the guilty party’s thumb—and his all-too-familiar thumb ring.

  “That Son of a Bunny!”

  “Clare?”

  “Tad Hopkins did this!”

  “Are you sure?”

  I squeezed my eyes shut, recalling yesterday morning’s argument at the espresso bar—right before Abby drove me to the White House, where I promised the First Lady that her daughter’s identity would remain a secret.

  “Hopkins boasted to me that he found a way to attract customers to our Jazz Space. ‘They’ll come,’ he said, ‘because I figured out how to get buzz even if you can’t!’”

  Gardner cursed. “How did he know about Abby’s identity?”

  “Maybe he overheard the band talking, maybe the two of us.” I pounded the sofa cushion. “That’s why he refused to serve Luther’s specials tonight. He assumed once Abby’s identity was out, we’d be packed, and he wanted to showcase his own food!”

  “So what do we do? Kill the show?”

  “That’s up to Abby. We have to find out how she feels about all this. Sit tight. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes . . .”

  Cursing our former chef, Gardner and I ended our call.

  Almost immediately, the phone went off again.

  Between the bewildering news and last night’s bottle of bubbly, I was feeling disoriented. But seeing the name on my caller ID did more to shock me awake than a quad espresso down my throat and a bucket of ice water in my face.

  With a hard swallow, I lifted the phone.

  “Hello, Agent Cage . . .”

  Forty-four

  “YOU’RE a real piece of work, Cosi. You know that?”

  “I can explain—”

  “The First Lady is not interested in excuses from you—or more lies.”

  “I swear I didn’t want this to happen—”

  “But it did.”

  “Please just hear me out. Will you meet me at the Village Blend?”

  “I’ll be there,” Sharon Cage barked. “But not to hear explanations. And I’m not coming alone . . .”

  What does that mean?

  It sounded like she was planning to arrest me! But as ugly as this situation was from an ethical standpoint, what took place wasn’t against the law. All of our Open Mike artists signed publicity releases.

  Then she explained—

  “I sent Agent Sharpe over to your java joint for an eyes-on. He says a small group of journalists and bloggers are already lining up for Abigail’s show, which is thirteen hours away.”

  “Is The District website that big?”

  “No, but the wire services picked it up. Then the Drudge Report posted it. You’ve heard of the Drudge Report, haven’t you, Cosi? Two million visitors a day. Seven hundred million page views a month.”

  Give me strength. “Yes, I’ve heard of it.”

  “Believe me, we know how a story like this rolls out. Local radio has it now. Next the national morning cable shows will pick it up and then the networks. The White House Press Secretary is already scrambling for an official reaction.”

  �
�What should we do? Cancel Abby’s show?”

  “We should cancel. But Abby insists on performing, despite the publicity, and the higher level of risk, and do you know why? Because she doesn’t want to ‘let down’ her ‘new friends,’ which means my advance security team will be at your coffeehouse within the hour. I’ll see you there.”

  When Cage broke our connection, I snatched fresh slacks and a blouse from the closet, and sat down on the edge of the bed to dress.

  That’s when I felt a strong arm wrap around my waist.

  “Hey!” I protested.

  “Hey, yourself,” Mike countered. “You’ve got the morning off. What are you doing?”

  “Getting dressed.”

  Suddenly I was tugged backward onto the bed, and gently but forcibly pinned to the mattress. Mike’s sandy hair was mussed from sleep, and his beard stubble sandpaper-rough as he nuzzled my neck. Then he lifted his head and gazed down, those cobalt eyes still able to cut the breath from my lungs.

  “I thought we were going to have breakfast—in bed.”

  “I’m sorry; I can’t. Not now. How about a rain check for tomorrow morning?”

  I moved to peck his cheek, but the wily detective made our lips meet instead and a heated kiss followed.

  “Man,” he growled, “I’m hungrier than I thought . . .”

  With regret in my touch, I cupped his cheek. Then I squirmed out from under him.

  Mike sighed. “Do I at least get an explanation?”

  “There’s an emergency at work. And I better tell you about it because I don’t want you to be shocked when you find out.”

  “Shocked?” Rolling onto his side, he propped his head on one elbow. “This I’ve got to hear . . .”

  As Quinn watched me dress, I boiled down the crazy events that had happened to the two major points: (1) The President’s daughter had been playing anonymously at our Jazz Space Open Mikes since we opened and (2) The news got out about her headlining tonight.