Chicken Soup & Homicide - Culinary Competition Mystery #2

Chapter 7

(Carla)

Carla turned up the windshield defroster another notch. The fan was already roaring, but her car windows were fogging up as she sat in the parking lot. Even though she was still full from the breakfast Amy had fed her, she and Bruce were going to lunch. Or at least that's what they had planned on doing. He was late. She checked her phone. No messages. Hopefully, he had just lost track of time and there wasn't something important holding him up.

She stared at the entrance door of the police department, willing him to appear. A tap on the window beside her head made her yelp. Her phone clattered into the footwell. She leaned over to pick it up from the floor mat before it started short-circuiting from landing in a puddle of melted snow. While folded in half, she twisted to see who had startled her. Detective Pitts stood in the harsh midday sunshine, the collar of his black leather coat pulled up around his neck. Not the person she wanted to see. Ever again. He traced circles in the air with his finger to motion for her to roll down the window.

A breathtakingly cold gust of wind hit her in the face as she complied and asked, "What can I do for you?"

"I thought maybe you would like to come inside." He leaned closer and cracked a fake smile. With a little clown makeup, he could've passed for The Joker in a Batman movie. "To chat with me a bit about your murder case."

"I believe that would be your murder case."

He narrowed his eyes as he tilted his head. "Sorry, slip of the tongue. Why don't you shut your car off and come into the nice warm station so we can talk."

The station would be warm, but she had been there enough times to know it wasn't nice. The police department would begin construction on a new building in the spring. The current building had pea soup–green painted cement block walls. All of the furniture looked like it had been thrown away by a thrift store. Despite the shabby atmosphere, she didn't usually mind going into the station. To see Bruce. "You interviewed me yesterday. Did you forget to ask something?"

He straightened and stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets. "I've been talking to some witnesses to the little spat you had with Mr. Britton right before he was murdered."

The aisles at the expo had been packed. There were plenty of people that had seen her tell Chet off, from the foodie groupies waiting in line for a sample of Cornerstone's trendy gourmet offerings to the chefs who were serving the treats. "Chet always liked to be the center of attention. He never passed up on the chance to make a scene. He probably enjoyed our chat."

Pitts rocked back on his heels. "Some of the witnesses thought that you two seemed rather intimate. It looked like a lover's quarrel to them."

Carla involuntarily winced. At Bruce's suggestion, she had already told Pitts that she had dated Chet years earlier. "An ex-lover's spat. I thought I made that clear last night. Our relationship was over almost as soon as it began three years ago. Since then I've tried to avoid him as much as possible, but he was insulting my best friend. It was a low-handed way for him to try to win the showdown, and I called him out on it."

He held up his hands. "Okay. You say the relationship was over. Why don't you come inside and tell me more about dating him?"

"What are you doing?"

The question made Carla jump. Again. The scaredy-cat reactions needed to stop. Twitchy wasn't a good state to be in for a nurse. She'd been concentrating on keeping the wolfish Pitts at bay and hadn't seen Bruce walk up to the front bumper of her car. Pitts glared at the intruder. "I found out some new information and was asking your girlfriend to speak with me some more."

"I have been speaking to you for the last five minutes." Carla shielded her eyes from the sun with her hand and looked at Bruce. "I don't think there's much more to say."

Bruce seemed to grow a couple of inches taller as he took a step toward Detective Pitts. "Stop harassing my girlfriend."

Pitts shuffled a few steps backward as Bruce's shadow traced across him. At least he seemed intelligent enough to realize he would lose in a confrontation against an ex-marine. Pitts thrust his chin into the air. "Stop interfering with my investigation, or I'll turn you in to the chief again."

So much for the intelligence theory. He slid further away from Bruce. The snow under his shoes squeaked and groaned. Pretty much the same thing she felt like doing at the moment.

"Now, if you would excuse us," Bruce said as he reached through the open window and squeezed Carla's hand, "we're going out to lunch."

"Enjoy yourselves." Pitts sneered at Bruce. "You need to realize, I'm just trying to help you by interviewing your lady. Better to find out sooner than later that she's been cheating on you."