Something's Cooking (5 page)

The staircase felt unnaturally cold, and she hurried down it. A strange echo made it sound as if someone was following her.

She reached the warm, sunny street and pulled the door shut behind her just as Rico drove the Ferrari around the corner toward her. She smiled, realizing that Rico, like most men she knew, had taken the opportunity to drive her Ferrari, even if only around the block a few times.

He pulled the car to her side and she jumped in.

She wasn't sure why she turned around just then, but she looked back at the
Shopper
building and saw the side door slowly closing. She could have sworn she'd shut it as she had left. She must have been mistaken.

“
I just read
your lady friend's food column, Paavo,” Matt said with a chuckle two days later. “The things she can do with persimmons! And those recipes—she's a regular Lucrezia Borgia. I think you should turn this case over to Vice.”

Paavo gave the big, blond detective a cold stare. “When did you turn into Milton Berle, Kowalski?”

“Skin a little thin, there, Paavo?”

“Tough as ever, Matt.”

“Good. I'd hate my partner going soft on me. Guess that means the boys are wrong when they say you've enrolled in a French cooking class.”

Paavo shut his eyes as Matt, still chuckling, walked off to get coffee. Between revolting recipes, dynamited dishwashers, and bashed birds, he had been the brunt of Homicide's jokesters for almost a week, and he was sick of it.

The most sickening part was that he wasn't any further along in solving the case than when he had started. He had gotten a jolt when one of the top chefs in the city was murdered. But hours after the murder, the chef's jealous male lover confessed. So much for the murder theory Paavo was developing about a crazed food-fanatic.

In the meantime, Matt was doing most of the legwork on Sammy Blade's death, and also getting nowhere. As expected, they found that Sammy had frequented the seamier parts of the city. The investigation came down to walking around neighborhoods, finding his cronies, and trying to find out something useful—anything. They spent a lot of time sifting through the meager reports and the few leads they had, hoping that something new would strike them, but nothing did.

Each afternoon since the bird incident, Paavo had found himself in Angie's neighborhood with a legitimate reason to stop at her apartment for a few minutes. But there were no more leads, and no more threats. Chief Hollins began to question the car episode. Was someone trying to run her down, or was she just overly nervous? Was the pigeon sent by someone who meant her harm, or just some sicko who read the newspaper article?

Paavo had checked everything from her bank balance to the schools she had attended to her friends, relatives, colleagues, boyfriends—there had been plenty of them—and neighbors. He even knew when she had last been to the dentist.

Angie was the youngest of five daughters of
Salvatore Amalfi, an Italian immigrant who had started out with nothing but had worked hard and amassed a fortune from shoe stores and San Francisco real estate. Seven years ago, the Amalfis bought a twelve-room estate in Hillsborough.

The story was a Horatio Alger dream come true. Despite Paavo's skepticism, he found no hint of falseness anywhere. Neither could he find anything in Salvatore's wheeling and dealing that might have led to a death threat against the youngest daughter.

Angie was liked by most of her acquaintances and coworkers and was considered cheerful and easygoing, though some saw her as a bit of a dilettante, taking nothing very seriously. Her father, one friend told Paavo, would have given her the world had she asked, but she had never figured out what to ask for.

She expected a lot from friends, but she was also generous and, everyone conceded, gave as much or more than she received. In short, she wasn't involved with drugs, drink, or porn; had no burning desire for money, fame, or success; was neither megalomaniac, schizophrenic, nor manic-depressive; had only a passing interest in politics and oddball causes; and was not into deviant anything.

So why in the hell did someone want to kill her?

Paavo hoped Hollins was right—that this case was more nerves and imagination than danger—but as Paavo reviewed the evidence, he knew that if he overlooked anything, his error might make it
easier for someone to get at Angie, and he couldn't let that happen.

Still, he had other, bigger cases. Finally, Hollins said he didn't want Paavo spending any more time on the Amalfi case unless he had a good reason to.

On this day, he ran out of reasons. She had Joey and Rico to protect her, nothing new had happened, and there were no new questions he needed answered. So he stayed away.

If she needed him, she'd call.

She didn't.

He should have been glad.

He wasn't.

He stormed around the office all morning and spent the afternoon apprising anyone who wandered too near of their many shortcomings.

When his shift ended at six, the other detectives breathed a sigh of relief.

He got into his car and revved the engine. Home seemed too quiet. If he went to Angie's place, though, he'd probably just stand around, first on one foot, then the other, feeling like a damn fool and not knowing what to say or how to explain why he'd shown up. He should go home.

He pulled his car out of the parking space, made a U-turn, and headed north toward Russian Hill.

 

Angie glanced once more at the clock on the desk as she sat at the computer. It was 6:03.
Inspector Smith had come by every day up to now. Where was he?

She frowned. Truly, she'd been cooped up too long if she cared where the human ice chest might be. He was so cold and bossy. He never smiled, and the temperature in the apartment dropped at least ten degrees whenever he walked in the door. If he stayed away, she should shout
Hallelujah
.

She was weary from working on the book she felt obligated to write. What else could she do with B.A.'s in both English and history? She stretched and rubbed the back of her neck, and then went into the living room to see Rico. He lay on the sofa, feet up, watching highlights of last weekend's football games on a cable station.

“Any word from Joey?” she asked.

“Uh-uh.”

“I expect he'll be here any minute.”

“Yeah.”

She joined Rico watching the T.V., hoping America's favorite sedative would numb the aching frustration of not knowing who was after her or why. She'd gone over, again and again, all the bad things she'd done in her life, like breaking theater dates after the tickets had been purchased, or accepting a date with a man she knew another woman had her heart set on. But these weren't exactly heinous crimes. She couldn't think of any weird or scary character interested in her. Once her father had to tell a love-struck high school classmate to stop hanging around their house or he'd break the kid's legs, but other than
that, she hadn't attracted any troubles. Surely no one could object to her food column or her San Francisco history. Her last three magazine articles had been guides to restaurants, and she had only mentioned places she
liked
. Upon reflection, she realized her life had been pitifully dull.

The police were no closer to finding out who had sent the bomb, or the pigeon, or who had chased her with the car, than they were right after these incidents first happened. Maybe it was time to let Rico and Joey go and return to her normal way of life. Did she dare?

A half hour later, there was a knock on the door. She knew that brisk, no-nonsense knock—Inspector Paavo Smith coming to call. “It's the Inspector,” she said, her voice lilting as she hurried towards the door.

“Maybe he found Joey,” Rico said as he struggled to raise his bulk off the sofa.

Angie opened the door and looked up at Paavo. “He's alone.”

“Expecting someone?” He brushed past her into the living room, as she leaned out the door to peer down the hallway, toward the elevator.

She shut the door and turned to face him. He was dressed as conservatively as usual, his frown as deep as ever, and his eyes sharp, questioning, and analytical. Yet she had to admit that she did feel a whisper of pleasure at seeing him again. Maybe even more than a whisper. “We were hoping Joey was with you.”

Paavo's gaze grew wary as he looked from
Angie to Rico, who now stood beside the petit point sofa. “What's wrong?” His voice was low.

“Nothing, Inspector,” Rico answered.

“I'm so sorry,” Angie said softly, twisting her hands together.

“About what?” Paavo's gaze leaped from one to the other.

“Everything! It's Rico's daughter's birthday. He should be home now. With his family. Instead, he's stuck here because of me! Joey was supposed to come by early instead of his usual ten o'clock, so Rico could leave.” She sighed. “I guess Joey forgot.”

“The wife'll understand,” Rico said. “She knows Joey ain't got too much on the noodle. And I can't leave Miss Angelina here alone.”

Angie sighed. “I'd just be alone a few hours. Nothing has happened in three days. Nothing's likely to now, is it?”

“I don't know,” Paavo said.

Some detective, she thought.

Paavo regarded them both, his mouth a thin line, downturned at the edges. “Get out of here, Rico. I'll stay.”

Angie felt herself blanch at the thought, and at his expression. He looked like he had just volunteered for
kamikaze
duty. “I'm sure you're too busy. I'll be just fine alone.”

“I'll stay,” he repeated, even more crisply.

Angie spun toward Rico with a glare. He caught her eye and her meaning, then turned to the inspector. “You don't have to, Inspector. It's my job.”

Paavo glanced at his watch. “I'm off duty. I stopped here on the way home.”

Her mind was in a whirl. If Joey didn't arrive until ten o'clock, whatever would she do with the man? He was cold and aloof and seemed to be constantly analyzing her motives and her words. They had nothing in common, nothing to talk about. The idea of having him there with her for hours made her stomach knot. “I can stay alone, really.”

“No.”

She gaped at him, not believing his bossiness. She wasn't used to hearing the word “no” like that. But before she could respond, Rico jumped up and put his jacket on. “Okay, Inspector, if you say so. Thanks.” He lumbered out the door.

Angie stared after him. She had never seen Rico move so fast.

She followed him to the door and locked the dead bolt after him. The click of the lock was like an explosion. Slowly she turned around, then swallowed hard. Inspector Smith's presence seemed to fill the entire room.

The inspector walked
over to the sofa. “May I?” His fingertips lightly touched his gray sports jacket.

“Please!” She was surprised that he asked. Did the man have manners after all?

He removed the jacket and laid it across the arm of the couch. He tugged at the knees of his slacks as he sat, then loosened his gray-and-blue-striped tie. With the jacket off, the conservative pale blue shirt and charcoal slacks would have appeared quite undetectivelike…except for the shoulder holster and gun.

Her eyes fixated on them. Trying to make small talk while glancing continually at Smith and Wesson just wasn't going to work.

She took a couple of sideways steps toward her telephone. “I could call my neighbor. You remember Stan Bonnette? Oh, of course, he told
me you questioned him one day. If he's home from work he can stay with me until Joey arrives. Or I can stay at his place.”

Paavo leaned back against the sofa, his hands folded on his stomach. He stretched out his long legs in front of him, then crossed them at the ankles. He didn't say no. In fact, he didn't say a word as Angie babbled on and on, but the look he gave her said it all.

She left the phone and plopped down on the chair. The inspector was staying.

The clock in the VCR showed 6:55. Only three hours and five minutes to go.

He gazed at her expectantly but said nothing.

He's doing this to torment me, she thought.

“Since you're here,” she began, soliciting a look of interest, “would you like some dinner? I haven't eaten yet myself.”

“It's not necessary.”

So he could talk! “I'm an excellent cook.” Why in the world did she say that? The words were barely out of her mouth when she regretted them.

He hesitated. “Well—”

“Right, forget it. I'm sure you aren't supposed to fraternize with clients.”

“You're not a client, Miss Amalfi,” he said.

“I'm not?”

Suddenly he grinned, an honest, eyes-crinkling-at-the-corners kind of grin. If she hadn't been sitting, she was sure she'd have fallen over. She didn't think the muscles in the man's face could even
move
that way but were stuck in a
perpetual scowl. Now she found that not only could he smile, but she liked what a smile did to his face. Liked it a lot. She felt her cheeks grow a little warm at the thought, which was silly. No woman blushes just because a man smiles at her! It was embarrassing.

She cleared her throat. “Call me Angie.”

His eyebrows lifted slightly.

Her mouth formed into a silent “Oh” and she put her hand to her forehead. “God, where's my head! You've probably got a wife and kids and a dinner waiting for you at home. I'm sorry!” She felt her blush worsening. “You just seem so single—I mean, I guess because you come here alone, but—”

“I am single.”

“—I should have realized that your off-duty life…You are?”

He nodded.

She jumped to her feet. “In that case, you've got to eat here. I know all about single men's diets, and I know you simply do not eat properly.” His eyes widened with bemusement, but she ignored his look and continued. “Let's cook something Italian, okay?”

His brow knitted. “Opening a can of Chef Boyardee's about my limit.”

“Is that a joke, Inspector?”

“I'm afraid not.”

She laughed. “With a name like Paavo Smith, I guess I should have expected that answer. What kind of a name is Paavo, anyway?”

“Finnish, the equivalent of Paul.”

“Hmm.” She studied his face, the high cheekbones, piercing light-blue eyes, strong nose, nicely shaped mouth. Paavo. “I rather like it.”

He shifted uneasily, and the tone of his voice turned formal and businesslike again. “What were you thinking about cooking?”

“No third degree tonight, Inspector.” Angie grinned. “Come on, let's see what I've got.”

Paavo followed her into the kitchen and rolled back his shirt sleeves as he sat on a stool at the counter. Angie handed him a beer before she took out flour and eggs to make linguine and plugged in her pasta machine.

As she began to add the ingredients, he wanted to learn all about the machine, and she explained how it worked. By the time the first inch of linguine noodles oozed from the opening, Angie saw that the stern lines of his expression had eased and the stiff set of his shoulders had relaxed.

Angie, too, found that for the first time in days she was able to put her anxiety aside. As the machine spewed out the noodles, she found herself telling Paavo about growing up in San Francisco, about her large family with four older sisters, going to Vassar to get away, spending a year at the Sorbonne, another year in Rome, and yet another year in New York City.

“Then, last year,” she said, “I came home.”

“Why was that?”

“I found I missed my family, this area, the way of life here. I wanted independence, but once I had it, it wasn't enough.”

“What is enough, Angie?”

His elbows were on the counter, and he leaned forward, watching her every move. She glanced at him a moment, then shook her head, embarrassed to admit her lack of ambition, her drifting through life this way. “I wish I knew,” she whispered.

“Your writing?”

“Perhaps. Someday, I'm going to tackle a project that's really close to my heart. But I'm not ready for such a task yet. I'm afraid I'd just botch it up. Right now, my food column gives me discipline and responsibility, and the magazine articles keep me involved in current events and interests, and the history gives me a sense of time, place and scope. I need to learn all that.”

He studied her. “That's very wise.”

She shrugged and gave him a half-smile. “Or maybe it's a nifty justification for fooling around, Inspector Smith.”

His gaze softened. “I don't think so, Miss Amalfi.”

“Lots of others do, though.”

“It's what you believe that's important.”

She felt her face grow warm from his words and the way he looked at her, and she quickly spun around to the stove to check on the large pot of water. She couldn't understand it. She hadn't blushed since she was fourteen, and now it'd happened twice in one evening. This was no time to take on that hideous trait again.

“Ah,” she cried, “water's boiling.” She put in the noodles. “The linguine can cook while I make a nice mixture to pour over it.”

She began rummaging through her cupboard. “I could do a plain old cheese sauce, but I thought…Ah! Here they are.” She pulled out a small tin of anchovies.

“Cheese is fine, Angie. Don't go to any trouble.”

“What's the matter, Inspector? Doesn't anchovy in your pasta appeal to you?” The man looked a little pale. “Hmm, I bet you even pick it off pizza.”

“No. I never put it
on
pizza.”

“Trust me.”

She opened the tin, minced two anchovies, and then put a coat of olive oil in a big frying pan. Over low heat, she sauteed them with a couple of cloves of garlic and a few sprigs of parsley, then added a pinch of crushed red pepper and basil. Last, she added a half of a can of pitted black olives. Paavo watched her every move.

As she chopped and stirred, she tried to get Paavo to talk a little about himself. All she learned, though, was that he, too, had grown up in the city. But he had lived in the Mission District—an old, tough neighborhood, far different from the stylish Marina District of her childhood. She listened closely to everything he said, every intonation and nuance, trying to glean insight from the few words he spoke. The man was a mystery to her. One of the biggest parts of the mystery was why she was so curious about him.

She liked mannered, genteel men who were worldly and polished—men who could toss out a
bon mot
or devastating put-down in the cleverest
of ways, men who lived in a world of elegance and took it as their due. A number of doctors, CEOs, and even a judge were among her coterie of suitors, and she thought them all just fine. Inspector Paavo Smith was completely different, and she didn't understand him at all.

While she drained the cooked linguine, she gave Paavo the job of stirring the olive-and-anchovy mixture and making sure it didn't burn. Angie chuckled inwardly seeing him there, the wooden spoon dwarfed in his hand, his eyes never leaving the pot. He was clearly a man who took his duty seriously. She was sure he gave no less attention to his stickiest cases.

Dinner was almost ready. Angie added the linguine to the pan, along with more olive oil, red pepper, and a quarter cup of grated Parmesan. As she tossed the mixture, Paavo stood behind her, leaning over her shoulder, watching intently.

“It actually smells good, and looks even better.”

“I can cook, you know,” she said, turning her head toward him. His face was only inches away. The sparkling blue of his eyes, the thick, rich waves of his hair, the clean, spicy scent of his aftershave reached her senses. Her breath caught at his nearness, and his eyes seemed to darken as they moved over her face. Flustered, she turned her attention to the linguine again.

He stepped away from her quickly, too quickly, she thought. He too had felt whatever it was that had passed between them, and he wanted no part of it.

 

The three hours they spent together went by quickly. Although Paavo was quiet, the few words he said were straightforward and honest, and he seemed to value her words, which she appreciated, because she loved to talk. As she warmed up a bit to his personality, so, too, did she come to appreciate his looks. She could have drowned in the blue lagoon of his eyes, and the couple of times she coaxed a smile out of him were well worth the trouble.

Paavo helped her clean up the kitchen after the leisurely dinner. For dessert, she took some tortoni out of the freezer. They hadn't even finished their espresso when Joey arrived. Angie smiled at him, feigning relief, while hoping her disappointment didn't show.

Paavo's presence, to her surprise, had made her feel warm and safe. Even after he had left, when she lay in bed, she thought about the man, not the inspector, and was comforted.