Page 61 of Sexy as Sin
“Nobody pleased but Fenella,” Aidan said darkly. “Two at a go. She would’ve been pleased about that. There was a fair bit of skirmishing over planning that dinner, by all accounts.”
The thin, watchful man across the table had kept his gaze on Brett. Now, he asked, “What’s your interest?”
Brett regarded him blandly and raised a shoulder. “Curious, that’s all. I haven’t been getting out much with this leg. Taking my entertainment where I find it.”
“You wonder if it was an accident after all,” the man said. “I’m trying to work out why you’d care. Aren’t you the Yank who’s here for the Coorabell development? Broke your leg falling off a rock?”
“Always got to be the cop,” Seamus told him. “You’re off duty, mate. And seriously?” he asked Brett. “You’re that wanker? We had a good laugh about that. Trust a Yank to fall off, we said, and then try to sue because nobody’d put a guardrail up to keep him off it.”
“That was me,” Brett said. “I’m not suing, though. My own fault.” He told the quiet man, “I wondered about the dinner, yeah. The caterers bought the mushrooms from a regular supplier, my girlfriend said, and it seems like everyone’s reputation has taken a hit they might not deserve. It made me wonder if somebody wanted to disrupt the event, or worse.”
“Pretty useless as a poisoning technique,” the cop said, his eyes more watchful than ever, “as nobody was really very ill, except the old lady. Digestive disturbance only.”
“Fenella trying to inherit the silver, you think?” Seamus asked. “Not bloody likely, sorry to say. Not that Calvin and Myra aren’t the salt of the earth, but nobody could call them flush. It’d be, what, a mass poisoning plot? What are you, some kind of conspiracy theorist as well? Or taking too many pain tablets, maybe. It’s Byron Bay. We don’t go around poisoning each other here.”
“Just murdering the occasional reputation,” Aidan said. “As deserved.”
“Ah, well,” Brett said. “Just a thought.” He hung around a while longer, listening to the talk about people he didn’t know, finished his beer slowly, then said, “Thanks for the company. Ready to go, Dave?” Dave hadn’t had a beer, which Brett appreciated.
In the car again, Dave studied him in the rearview mirror and asked, “Get what you wanted?”
“Yep.” Brett leaned back against the door and thought longingly about next Monday, when he just might, according to the surgeon, acquire a cane and move to recovery phase two. He was ready.
“You will have started some gossip about poisoning,” Dave said. “Michael Vanderhof won’t talk about it. The cop. He won’t put much stock in it either, though. Seamus will shoot off his big mouth, of course. I told you, mate. Imagine me with him for a brother-in-law. I won’t be taking him to the footy with your tickets, no worries.”
Talk was what Brett had hoped for, and right now, it was the best he could do. Had he thrown an innocent to the wolves, put the unpopular Fenella in the spotlight unfairly by helping start the idea that she could have disrupted her in-laws’ party, because she hadn’t been the star after all? Possibly. It was pure speculation, and he knew it, but gossip and speculation would help dim the certainty that it had been Willow’s fault. And it was such juicy speculation for what was, in essence, a small town.
It was probably unfair, but all was fair in love and war, and this was both.
“If this was a murder mystery,” Dave said, turning off the main street and onto the back road toward home, “and somebody did it on purpose, but it didn’t come off somehow? They’d be having another go now. Just saying.”
Willow stood at Nourish’s roll-up freight door, watched Amanda’s van turn the corner and disappear, and tried to ignore the sinking of her heart.
It was her event, and it had been her menu: a whole table’s worth of gorgeous, colorful “little food” ready to pop into the oven for a quick warm-up and then be plated and shown off. Zucchini, pea, and haloumi fritters with lemon dipping sauce. Grilled scallops with a remoulade sauce, garnished with watercress, sitting in perfect, creamy-tempting little round towers with a bit of golden crispiness at the top. Moist lemon chicken on sticks in a peppery rocket sauce. Tiny snapper and cabbage tacos wrapped in handmade corn tortillas, with cilantro and fresh salsa. Ribbon sandwiches made with farm-cured Bangalow ham. And then the sweets: custard tarts with blueberries, chocolate mousse in molded chocolate shells with a half-strawberry on the top of each, and mini cheesecakes with a dab of fresh raspberry sauce to finish.
All the flavors of an Australian beach summer, and it had all been her design. But instead of warming it, plating it, drizzling on the last bit of lovingly conceived, perfectly prepared sauce, and watching her food’s reception, she was standing in a dirty kitchen, loading the industrial dishwashers with prep dishes, scouring stainless-steel countertops, and feeling like Cinderella left home from the ball.
And then there had been the moment when Jamie had stood in the middle of the kitchen and, instead of loading trays onto carts for transport to the van, had said, “Crystal and I would like to talk to you both about getting paid extra for the extra work we’ve had to do since the day up at Coorabell. Not to mention being poisoned. I’ve spoken to Safe Work, and they said that coming in the next day after the poisoning wasn’t on. We should’ve been home resting. We deserve compensation for all of it, I think.”
Amanda said, tight-lipped, “Rubbish. You haven’t even done any overtime.”
“Safe Work don’t think it’s rubbish,” Jamie, entitled wombat that he was, shot back.
Willow bit back the retort that had risen to her lips and said, “I didn’t realize Crystal had been ill as well.”
“I didn’t like to say,” Crystal said. “It’s a bit embarrassing, isn’t it, having that kind of tummy disaster? I had no idea I’d actually been poisoned until later, of course, and there was so much extra to do, I just mucked in. I realize now, though, that I should have spoken up. That wasn’t really safe for our clients.” She sighed, and Willow thought for the hundredth time about how much she’d like to slap her.
“How ill were you, Jamie? You seemed energetic enough on the day,” she said instead, trying to figure out where to go with this. Ifhe’dbeen motivated to downplay his illness by noble purpose, she’d be more than surprised.
“I had a rotten time,” he said. “Worse than Crystal, though I didn’t realize I’d been poisoned, either. I just thought we’d both caught a bug. I got on with the job anyway, but one of you should’ve rung us all up and told us to stay home. That’s what Safe Work says. They say we should be filing a claim, and that we can do a complaint as well if we like.”
“But we’d rather not pursue that,” Crystal said. “It was all so confusing, wasn’t it? Nobody knew it was a poisoning except Willow, who was actually in hospital, and of course, youwereso ill, Willow, and it’s harder to judge when you’re vulnerable.”
Get stuffed, you sanctimonious little witch,Willow thought,and you too, Amanda, leaving me swinging in the wind.Jamie and Crystal had turned up looking well the next day. If they’d been as ill as she was, they couldn’t have hidden it, and they certainly wouldn’t have tried. She looked at her watch. “What I know is that we need to get the van loaded. We’ll talk about this when you come back. And Amanda’s already contacted Safe Work, of course.” She needed to separate her emotions from her business sense. Never her strong suit.
Amanda said, “I haven’t yet, because it was the weekend, we were in a rush, and as far as I knew, only Willow and Martina were ill. But of course I’m going to. For heaven’s sake, Jamie. You’re family. I’d think you’d remember that now. Of all thetimes.”
Willow wanted to say,Could we hire Martina and Beatriz to load the vans instead next time?She bit her tongue on that, too. Next time she and Amanda were alone, though, she was going to say it, and she was also going to check on whether Amanda had reported the illnesses. The last thing they needed was a fine. Time to get that login and password, too. She was tired of being a helpless reed in the current. It was well past time to take control.
