So I couldn’t blame Inspector Lee too much for her snippy remarks; the fact was, we did tend to meet under gruesome circumstances. But I liked her, and I was sure that underneath her prickly surface, she liked me, too. We had similar tastes in Szechuan food and good wine. I coveted her trench coat and most of the shoes I’d seen her wear. We should’ve been great friends, had even planned to meet for a glass of wine sometime, but murder kept getting in the way.
While Derek and Inspector Jaglom spoke in quiet tones over by the row of booths along the wall, Inspector Lee pulled out her notepad and focused on me. “I’ll just get some of the preliminaries out of the way so we can move on to the main event.” Flipping through the pad, she came to a clean page and began to scribble something on it. “So, tell me about the dead body in the kitchen. Male or female?”
“Male. Baxter Cromwell. He’s the owner of this restaurant.”
She gasped. “The bad boy chef? He’s dead?”
“Yes.”
“Crap,” she muttered. “That’s gonna bring out the bloodsucking paparazzi.”
I was surprised she’d ever heard of Baxter, let alone expressed distress over his demise. But I supposed even cops watched the Cooking Channel. Bad Boy Chef was the lame title they’d chosen for Baxter’s cooking show, but it suited him and it had made him famous.
I hadn’t even considered the fact that Baxter was a celebrity and the news of his murder would be broadcast around the world. Part of me wanted to begrudge Baxter his fame because he’d been such a louse to both me and Savannah, but then I thought of him lying dead in the kitchen and my resentment faded. Slightly.
“Please don’t tell me you liked him,” I said.
Lee thought about it. “It was a good show and he was entertaining enough. But he thrived on creating confusion and distrust among his contestants. I could see how someone might learn to hate him enough to kill him. Did you know him?”
“Yes. And he was as big an ass as you can imagine.”
Lee stared up at me through narrowed eyes. “So did you kill him?”
“Of course not,” I said, scowling. “Why would you even ask that?”
She shrugged. “I’m a homicide cop and a murder has just happened, so I ask. That’s why I’m here, right? Because there’s been a murder. What I can’t figure out is, why are you here? Is this how it’s always going to be, Wainwright? Murder happens and you show up?”
“No!” And there went my blood pressure. “I stayed because my sister found the victim lying in—”
“Get off her back, Jan,” Jaglom said, elbowing his partner’s arm. “Let’s get down to business.”
“That’s what I’m doing, Nate,” she said mildly, and craned her neck to get a better look at Savannah for the first time. “Your sister, Wainwright?”
I frowned at her sudden interest, but it was my own fault for mentioning Savannah. “Yes, my sister. And she didn’t kill Baxter, either.”
Lee raised an eyebrow at my snarling tone, but it was too darn bad if she took offense. I wasn’t about to let her browbeat Savannah to tears.
“Savannah,” I said briskly, since she’d zoned out again and I needed to get her undivided attention. “This is Detective Inspector Lee, the homicide detective I was telling you about.”
Savannah’s eyelids fluttered as she brought the world back into focus. She blinked at the cop and quickly hopped off the barstool. Holding out her hand to shake the inspector’s, she said, “I’m so happy to meet you. Brooklyn has said so many nice things about you, and I’m as confident as she is that you’ll find Baxter’s killer and bring him to justice.”
Inspector Lee was clearly bemused by Savannah’s enthusiastic greeting. My sister shook her hand firmly and energetically, and I could see a tiny portion of Lee’s cynical outer coating melt in the face of Savannah’s positive vitality.
Lee finally pulled her hand away and tried to regain her command over the situation. “Ms. Wainwright, I’d like to ask you a few questions about your relationship with the deceased.”
“Of course, yes, please ask me anything,” Savannah said. “I’ll do anything I can to help you.”
“Inspector,” I interjected quickly, “you don’t know my sister yet, but believe me, she didn’t have anything to do with Baxter’s death. Really, she doesn’t have enough killer instinct to swat down a fly.”
“Flies have just as much right to life and happiness as we do,” Savannah said.
Ugh. No they don’t, I thought.
Lee’s eyebrows popped up, and then her eyes narrowed skeptically as she turned and looked at me.
I just smiled and nodded. “Yeah, she’s for real.” After all, we were talking about the girl who had once become a fruitarian to protest the senseless killing of vegetables.
“Carrots have feelings, too,” had been Savannah’s battle cry back in the day.
Now as a chef, she was willing to slaughter baby carrots and squash and onions left and right. And yet, there was still no way she would ever hurt another human being. It wasn’t in her fiber. But Lee would have to ask the questions, anyway. I had faith that she would come to the same conclusion soon enough.