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“Sure,” he said without reacting. But when he sliced a generous portion onto a piece of black and gold rimmed china and placed it in front of me, his eyes were bright with anticipation. “Let me know what you think.”
“Fancy plate,” I said.
“Why save the good stuff for special occasions?”
I forked a piece of the pie-shaped slice and pronounced it heavenly. If I hadn’t had plans to meet with Suzie and Steve in the next hour, I would have asked for seconds-even after this generous first serving. The quiche was so good, in fact, it was all I could do not to request a sample to take home to share with Mom and Nana. “You’ll have to give me this recipe,” I said.
“Already on our books.” He smiled, and it dawned on me what an unusual sight that was. “I plan to include it…” Stopping himself, the smile faded. “I should say, I pla
I patted his hand. He flinched but didn’t pull away.
“Well, that’s just another reason why we need to work hard at getting back into the kitchen. I don’t see anything in Minkus’s dietary profile that could have had such disastrous consequences, do you?”
Bucky had started to clean up the area and I marveled, again, at how pristine the place was. At the White House, when we were in the midst of preparing a state di
“You know,” I said, “we read over the rest of his dossier but we really didn’t digest it.”
He half turned. “What do you mean?”
“Here, for instance.” I pointed. “Minkus was appointed to his position during the prior administration. He worked hard to make a name for himself as a terrorist fighter. But he also held a position as a counterintelligence liaison to China.”
“So?”
“So isn’t that a little weird? Kind of a strange combination, I think.”
Bucky didn’t seem as interested in my musings as he was in putting his quiche away. “Who appointed him to the liaison position?” he asked.
“Don’t know. Obviously there’s a lot in his file we wouldn’t have access to. They only provided us this top-line information. Stuff that anyone could probably find in an Internet search, if they knew what they were looking for.”
“Hmph,” Bucky said, bustling around the kitchen as I pored through the file.
I mused aloud. “And what about Phil Cooper?”
“That’s the guy who reported to Minkus, right? Another security official.”
I pointed again, but Bucky just worked around me. “Exactly. Cooper worked for Minkus for about two years. It doesn’t say much here about him, except to mention that he’s part of Minkus’s staff.”
“You’re not thinking Cooper killed Minkus just to get his job?” Bucky scowled. “People don’t usually do that. At least not in the real world.”
Almost word for word, Bucky had just echoed Tom’s sentiment.
“What about China?” I asked. “Didn’t they just have that double-assassination in Beijing? The one that’s been in all the headlines.”
Stopping mid-stride on the way to his stainless steel double refrigerator, Bucky cocked his head. “Yeah. Wasn’t that the day after Minkus died?”
“Do you think it’s related?”
“Like… some Chinese official sneaked poison into Minkus’s food? Yeah. Sure.”
“Think about it. According to rumors, the Chinese had insider spies in the United States. Maybe Minkus discovered who that spy was who was selling our secrets. Maybe a Chinese operative got to Minkus before di
“An operative.” Bucky snorted. “You sound so official. Like a character in a movie, figuring out a global conspiracy.”
Put like that, it sounded ridiculous. I felt stupid for seeing patterns where there were none. For suspecting people like Phil Cooper when I had no reason to do so. I closed the file and placed both hands on top of it. “You’re right,” I finally said.
Wiping his hands after putting the food away, Bucky shrugged. “If someone did get to Minkus before di
Oh God, I thought. The killer kitchen.
Sufficiently full from my healthy helping of quiche, I nonetheless headed to the studio where Suzie and Steve filmed their SizzleMasters television shows. I hoped for two things: that whatever they served would be light, and that the newshounds who had been staking out their home had given up. After my day of interruptions, the last thing I needed was to deal with the media.
The directions they’d provided were perfect and I pulled up to the studio five minutes early. From the outside it looked like a typical industrial building, but once inside, I felt as though I’d just stepped into someone’s home.
“Ollie, thank goodness,” Suzie said, giving me a quick hug hello. Hugging her was like being enveloped by a favorite aunt, all soft and smooshy, and smelling like White Linen cologne.
“How are you doing?” I asked. “Were you able to lose the reporters?”
Suzie was the type who didn’t understand the principle of “personal space.” She held my hand as we meandered through a waiting area that felt more like a cozy living room: two softly glowing lamps, red walls, jewel-toned accents. “Thank you so much for helping us out,” she said, her face close to mine. “I thought Steve was going to lose it.”
“Lose what?” he boomed from behind a thick wall. The side door was open to the filming portion of the studio and I stepped in and then up onto the raised portion, blinking into the high illumination.
This room was peculiarly lit. While the stage area was hyper-bright, the audience section was dark. I could make out rows of seats, rising toward the back of the studio, guaranteeing everyone a good view. From the looks of it, there were six rows in two sections. Maybe a dozen seats per row. Things sure looked bigger on TV.
“We’re keeping the lights off in the outer portion so that no one knows we’re here,” Suzie said as though I’d asked the question. She squeezed my hand. “I’m so glad you were able to come.”
Her voice held a strange quality. Not relief. Not a shared understanding of what we were all going through.
“Is there something else going on I should know about?” I asked
They exchanged a look. Suzie let go of my hand. “Like what?”
I gave an exaggerated shrug. “Nothing. Anything. I’m just trying to make sure you haven’t been bothered any more.”
“No,” Suzie said, leaving my side to tend to a pot on the stove. She kept her back to me. “Everything has been really quiet since we got here.”
“So your filming went well?”
“Very,” Suzie said.
Steve nodded. He stood in front of the central countertop, which faced the cameras. A large overhead camera pointed down, the better to show the folks at home precisely how items should be prepared. Before him was a heaping mound of grilled vegetables-peppers, onions, zucchini, mushrooms. I wondered how many people they were pla
The two of them worked at their stations with their backs to one another. Very straight, very tense backs. The pressure in the room was so thick I could swim in it.
“So why here?” I asked.
Steve lifted his head, but his eyes didn’t focus. “Hmm?”
“Here? You mean at the studio?” Suzie spoke over her shoulder. “Oh, we just thought you’d like to see it.”
“Come on, guys,” I said to their backs. “Something doesn’t smell right and I can tell you it isn’t the grilled portabella.”