"If someone didn't kill her, what happened?" asked Connie when I returned with bowls and spoons. I took a tiny taste of the mold to be polite.

"Delicious," I told Miss Gloria with a smile. "The lady at her bed-and-breakfast wondered if she was a big drinker," I said. "It's possible that she got up on the railing for some reason and then slipped and fell. Or it could have been a suicide."

"Is there any evidence for those possibilities?" Connie asked. "Sounds unlikely that she'd climb up on the railing, doesn't it?"

"And she didn't seem sad to me," Mom said. "She was a marvelous chef and writer-at the height of her career."

"So different on the outside from Jonah Barrows." I described the highlights of what I'd read in his memoir earlier today-the rough upbringing, the lovers, the rivals, his sharp opinions about everything.

"They both had difficult upbringings, but for different reasons. Yoshe's parents emigrated from China," Mom said. "She took the legacy of that hard life, the heart of her Chinese family, and parlayed it into something truly memorable and universal."

I got up to clear the table, stacking the bowls and carrying them to the sink.

"Don't you have a dinner to get to?" Connie asked. "I'll help with the dishes."

"Never you mind. You'll have enough of that as a married lady." Mom stood up and squeezed her shoulders. "What are you wearing?" she asked me, her eyes lighting up like this might finally be the moment I'd emerge from my unfashionable cave and snag a husband myself.

"Basic black," I said.

"At least borrow my chunky turquoise necklace," she called after me as I disappeared into my-our-bedroom. "It will give your outfit a focal point." As though she were an interior designer and I were the empty room.

My phone rang as I was getting ready. Bill. "Have you talked any more to Eric?" he asked after a halfhearted stab at pleasantries.

"I tried," I said, pulling a black T-shirt over my head and shaking out my hair. "Did he tell you I dropped by his office this morning?"

"He's saying nothing," Bill said.

I put my cell on speakerphone so I could fasten my earrings and apply a little mascara.

"He came home and took the dog out. I'd made a special dinner, but he hardly ate a thing. Said he had another, quote, migraine and went to bed in the guest room. But when I was at the dog park earlier today, one of the other small dog owners told me there's a rumor circulating that Eric may have been the last person to see Jonah alive."

"Who would even know enough to say that?"

"You don't really need facts to make wild guesses on the Coconut Telegraph," Bill said. "But why won't he talk to me about any of this?"

It was hard to know how to rea.s.sure him because Eric's behavior was so far out of character. "Call me the minute you hear anything," I told him. "We're here for you." I made a smooching noise and signed off.

I kissed Mom and Connie and Miss Gloria and gathered my helmet, purse, and a little notebook. I needed to keep my eye on my career ball and not get entirely distracted by the world going to pieces around me. Connie followed me out to the dock.

"I hope you're okay with me and Ray," she said shyly. Since Chad dumped me last fall, she'd heard me moan about my single state as a slew of our college friends announced sequential engagements over the holidays.

"Of course I am!" I flung my arms around her. "I couldn't be happier."

She grinned, looking mischievous. "'Cause I want you to be my maid of honor. It'll be a small wedding and very casual," she added quickly. "Flip-flops on the beach at Fort Zachary Taylor Park."

"Phew," I said. "No pouffy pink bridesmaid gown that makes my b.u.t.t look like an anvil? It would be an honor."

She started up the finger toward her houseboat and then came a few steps back. "I heard something from Ray about Bransford. He heard it from one of the other artists at the Studios of Key West. It might explain why you're finding him a little p.r.i.c.kly. I wasn't sure whether you'd want to know."

I nodded, my heart sinking. He had another girlfriend? A wife? A man friend? "Definitely. Secrets are toxic." Per Eric, who was now apparently keeping a whopper.

"Bransford was married when he started out as a rookie cop in Miami. They had a particularly ugly divorce-they had to go to court to get it resolved."

"That's brutal. Who was the unreasonable party?"

Connie shrugged. "Unclear. After that, he moved down here to the island. Ray suspects he's never really gotten close to a woman since. So be forewarned."

Another mantra from Eric: All of us are wounded somehow in the course of our lives. But some of us are better than others at licking those wounds and rebounding.

13.

Who goes after her lover with a paring knife? She was completely unbalanced. She did teach me how to cook.

-Allegra Goodman Connie's news about Detective Bransford's disastrous romantic past swirled through my brain as I raced across the island, late for the fancy foodie dinner. How did a person establish a normal relationship after a lousy divorce? My own father had managed it, my mother not so much. Where did you find the optimism to start over? Was I the first woman Bransford considered dating since he split from his ex?

More likely, seeing as how he was handsome, accomplished, and single, he'd made other forays. And maybe gotten derailed by his memories and the knowledge of what could be lost, and how much he had paid emotionally by getting close. Maybe like my father, he was resigned to paying alimony for life. Which I had to admit had always bothered me a little about my mother.

Or maybe I was overreading everything. Maybe the whole theory was bull-hooey.

As I approached the ocean side of the island, I could hear the waves rolling in, and the grace notes above that-tinkling gla.s.ses and laughing guests. Louie's Backyard appeared down the block, a pink-sided building with white trim and white lights wound around the small property's palm trees. I parked, removed my helmet, finger-combed my hair, and then went inside, feeling flutters of anxiety about the night ahead.

A slender hostess with almond-shaped eyes and a deep tan directed me up the stairs to the outside deck. The second floor opened over the restaurant below, which was dotted with green umbrellas, its weathered wooden furniture packed with diners. To the right of the bottom floor, a woman with three black dogs threw tennis b.a.l.l.s into the dark sea off a tiny beach. I could hear the splash as the dogs burst through the surface of the water and then barely make out the black dots of their heads as they swam. I'd seen this view before, but still it was glorious-one hundred eighty degrees of Atlantic Ocean. The lights of the White Street Pier sparkled off in the distance, marking the sad terrain of the AIDS memorial. Key West had been hit hard by that pandemic.

Five tables seating eight had been laid out perpendicular to the water. As the wind died down to a whisper, the voices eddied louder. I picked out the deep ba.s.s of Dustin Fredericks, Olivia Nethercut's husky alto, and Sigrid's piercing soprano. There was no way to judge how much these folks tended to drink at a social gathering, but most of the dinner party appeared to be on their way to sloshed. And maybe to be fair, the drinking was a by-product of two deaths in one weekend. Certainly my head was throbbing with all I'd seen and heard.

A black-haired waiter offered me a flute of champagne and I floated to the nearest group of guests, none of whom I knew. It didn't take long to realize that two writers were dominating the conversation, still playing to their conference audience, telling funny stories about food in their lives. But the anecdotes felt brittle and flat and the attention of the listeners was drifting.

I moved on to another cl.u.s.ter of guests, including Olivia and Sigrid, where the talk was all about Yoshe's death. It sounded like many of them had squirmed under Bransford's crime-fighting microscope today. His questions seemed to have centered on whether her friends and a.s.sociates would have described her as depressed or morose. Did she have any personal problems they were aware of? In other words, did she take her own life?

A tall blond woman clinked a fork against her water gla.s.s and asked us to take our seats. I found my place in the middle of the second table, identified by a name tag written in fancy calligraphy. Olivia Nethercut took the seat beside me, offering a quick smile that gave the impression she still had no idea who I was. Dustin remained standing as the blonde clanged her gla.s.s again.

"I'm pleased to introduce Christine Russell, who will be your hostess this evening," he explained. "We are delighted that you chose to partake in one of our special dinners. I wish I could stay because the menu looks incredible." He sighed. "Unfortunately, duty calls and I must make appearances at the other dinners taking place around the town tonight. Bon appet.i.t!"

"Thank you," Christine said as he left the room. "We'll be enjoying a pairing of wine with each course of dinner. These wines hail from the Dennis Jensen Vineyard, down the road from Solvang, California, a town most famous for the movie Sideways. After tonight, I trust you'll remember our wines rather than the movie." She waited for the polite laughter from the guests to die down. "I'll describe each of them as the night progresses, leaving time to answer any of the questions I've neglected to cover."

I groaned inside. I could listen to descriptions of food forever, but someone droning on about how long a wine sat in a cherry-flavored oak barrel shaped like a mushroom bored me to weeping.

"Boring," said Olivia, snorting softly. She unfolded a white napkin edged in white crochet and spread it across her purple pants.

"I'm Hayley Snow. We met in Santiago's Bodega?" I said, not wanting to go through the embarra.s.sment of having her fail to recognize me. Again.

"Of course," she said, vague recognition finally crossing her face. "I'm so upset about the news of poor Yoshe-my synapses just aren't firing clearly. One day we're having a lovely time visiting a tropical island and the next-two of my colleagues are dead." She chopped a finger across her neck, shiny pink nails flashing, nearly knocking over my winegla.s.s at the finish. "I can hardly think or talk about anything else."

"Horrible," I agreed, noticing her struggle to keep her lips from quivering. "Did you know her well?"

"All of us food writers are on the speaking engagement circuit together," she said.

"There's a food writers' circuit?" I asked.

Olivia nodded. "A group of us were at the Greenbrier last fall-not Jonah, of course-he would have been too big for something like that." She made air quotes with her fingers around "too big." "I had the most heavenly spa treatment involving a salt rub and a big hose. But anyway, don't let me drone on about that silliness. The point is, we know one another. As much as you can know someone from watching them yakking onstage or drinking coffee in the greenroom before an event or wine in the bar after."

She paused. Maybe realizing her description was on the harsh side?

"Yoshe was an exceptionally talented cook and writer. Not in the realm of Julia Child or Jonah Barrows, but definitely top tier. It would seem she had a lot to live for, but one never really knows...." She c.o.c.ked her head. "I haven't seen you around much."

"I'm very new to this business," I admitted. "I was hired as Key Zest's food critic right before the holidays, so I'm still getting up to speed. It's been amazing to spend the weekend with all of you guys." I swallowed my last half inch of champagne, hoping I wasn't chattering stupidly with anxiety and especially wishing I'd quit mentioning my neophyte status.

"So you didn't know Miss King?"

"Barely-my mom and I did have lunch with her yesterday. Mom was a big, big fan. Sigrid Gustafson joined us too." I tipped my head to the end of our table where Sigrid was slathering b.u.t.ter on a piece of bread and loudly describing her recipe for kick-b.u.t.t goulash. Her tips included browning the cubes of meat in a full stick of b.u.t.ter-never olive oil-adding extra onions and garlic, and simmering for hours.

"That must have been telling," said Olivia. "Get those two women together, and the compet.i.tive juices fly."

"Thinking back, there was some talk about the fat content of each dish Sigrid considered ordering," I said. "Yoshe tried pretty hard to steer her toward a salad."

"And that would make Sigrid certifiably loony," said Olivia, sotto voce. "She's been on every diet known to mankind and some you've never heard of. And still she's big as a house. And trust me, those caftans don't disguise anything. She couldn't stand the fact that Yoshe seemed to eat so much and stay so slender." She patted her own plywood-flat belly. "And Yoshe's books sold much better than hers too. Have you read her novels?"

I shook my head. "I read the first one, but I haven't gotten to Dark Sweden."

"Two words," Olivia said. "Deadly. Tedium."

A trio of waiters circled around us to fill our second set of winegla.s.ses with a white wine and deliver the first course. "Stone crab with Iberico ham and calamondin," the second waiter muttered as he set the plate in front of me. I had no idea what the last item was, but I certainly wasn't going to inquire within earshot of Olivia Nethercut. I already felt like a food nincomp.o.o.p in her company.

"We are pouring you our signature sauvignon blanc," said Christine the wine maven. "See if you notice the penetrating aroma of melon, and lemon verbena, which is grown in the field next to our vineyard."

I kept my gaze pinned on my plate to reduce the chance I'd roll my eyes and embarra.s.s myself by snorting with laughter in front of the other diners, who seemed to be taking the wine talk more seriously than me.

"This particular sauvignon blanc is aged for seven months in French barrels, which adds a gentle oak integration to the wine. We chose it to complement the stone crab, of course."

The room fell mostly silent except for the sc.r.a.pe of forks on heavy-duty china. I gobbled the crab and the Spanish ham, determining that calamondin must be a kind of citrus with a fancy name. The combination was delicious and the wine wasn't bad either.

Olivia laid her fork on her plate and patted her lips with her napkin. "Did the chiseled detective call to inform you about Yoshe's death as well?"

I startled, then smiled at her description of Bransford. "'Chiseled' is a good word," I said, thinking it applied to both his chin and his body. "But it was much worse than that. My mother and I discovered her body."

"No way," said Olivia. She touched slender white fingers to her throat, which pulsed like a captured bird.

I nodded, taking a gulp of wine and feeling again the horror of that moment, as that colorful pile of rags had come into focus. "It's true. And the police were pressuring my mother pretty hard, poor thing. She was absolutely devastated when we spotted Yoshe on those rocks." I shivered and nodded to the waiter who'd circled around the table with another bottle of wine. "Mom came down for a vacation and instead she stumbled into the middle of a murder investigation."

"Murder? I heard it was suicide," Olivia said, her eyes widening.

"What do I know, really?" I said. "But it wouldn't have been easy to throw yourself over that railing. Though I suppose she could have stood on a chair. In that case, the cops would have found the chair positioned on her balcony." I shuddered. "If that's true, imagine how desperate she would have been feeling."

Olivia turned a little more pale-it must have felt dreadful to have a colleague in that much distress and have noticed nothing.

I added quickly, "But I can't say what avenue the cops are pursuing."

We worked our way through hogfish and shrimp steamed in lettuce, duck breast with capers and marrow, plus a chardonnay and a pinot noir. Our plates were cleared yet again and a fourth course delivered, along with gla.s.ses of red wine. "Braised oxtail with potato gnocchi," the waiter whispered.

"Our Insignia wine combines cabernet sauvignon, pet.i.t verdot, and merlot wines," said Christine. "The grapes are harvested early in the morning and soaked for five days. After that comes forty days of maceration and twenty-four months of aging. See if you recognize the hints of dark-roasted coffee and graphite."

Feeling slightly hysterical after a little too much wine and way too much ornate description, I choked back a rush of giggles. Who wanted to taste graphite in expensive wine? This dinner was, if nothing else, a good reminder to keep food jargon to a minimum in my reviews. I took a sip of the excellent wine and started in on the braised oxtail. Better than any beef stew I'd had in years. Even rivaled Mom's.

The woman across the table from me addressed Olivia. "Tell us more about your Bread for Kids Foundation. It sounds like such a marvelous idea."

Olivia laid her fork down and smiled. "Over the past few years I realized how much money gets poured into the high end of our food industry. For example, there are people who will pay forty dollars a pound for ham, or a hundred fifty bucks a head to eat out at a restaurant without blinking an eye." She said that with a straight face-we'd all paid close to that for tonight's dinner. "Shouldn't we make sure that some of this money trickles down to the kids who don't have enough to eat on a daily basis? It's that simple. A hundred percent of our income goes to feed children-and best of all, no politicians are involved." Laughter rippled around the table and she resumed eating.

"Sounds wonderful," said the woman who'd asked the question, and then excused herself to visit the restroom.

Olivia swirled one last fat lump of pasta through the deep brown gravy on her plate. "If they think it was really a murder, do they have any leads?" she asked me, the pale white skin of her forehead gathering into lines. "That detective wouldn't tell me much."

"Their technique is a little heavy-handed," I said. "Just because you were the last person to see the dead person alive doesn't mean you did her in."

She looked horrified.

"That sounded bad. What I mean is, they seem to be pressuring people who have nothing to do with the crime. First my friend Eric. And then today my mother. Actually I don't think they have a clue. But two deaths in one weekend-they must be related, don't you think?" Now I was really blathering-this was exactly what I warned my mother not to say. Even if I did think it was true.

"I can't imagine what those two would have had in common, other than food, of course," Olivia said. "Yoshe was controlling and particular and meticulous about how she dressed and spoke. You could tell she cooked exactly by the book. Jonah, on the other hand, threw in a dash of this and a pinch of that. And I doubt he ever spent a minute thinking before he spoke." Then an odd expression flitted across her face, but before I could ask anything else, Christine broke into our conversations again.

"For dessert and our final wine, we are asking some of you to switch places so you'll have a chance to experience the company of others at your table." She came around and tapped some of us on the shoulders and had us trade places.

After a few minutes of chaos, we were reseated with new napkins, plates, and cutlery. This time I found myself at the table next to Sigrid, who was holding forth on her own theories about the deaths of Yoshe and Jonah.

"I suspect both of them could have been killed by rabid fans," she said. "No offense to anyone here, of course."

She cackled with laughter and I fidgeted with my fork and shifted uncomfortably, thinking of the e-mails Jonah had rebuffed.

"I don't suppose the franchise he was talking about will get off the ground now," she said.

"The franchise?" I asked.

"Oh," she said, "it was an utterly plebeian idea. He wanted to take what's best about Key West cuisine and bring it down to the lowest common denominator."

"I didn't know him personally," said a woman across the table, "but that doesn't sound like a project Mr. Barrows would endorse."

Sigrid rubbed the tips of three plump fingers together. "Anything for the right price. Besides, Jonah was always trying to stir something up," she continued. "No wonder at all that someone had it in for him. He looked for whatever mattered most to somebody else and then stabbed holes in it. You should have seen the review he wrote on my first novel. My agent had to talk me off the ledge on that one-she's the one who helped me realize that a scathing review reflects a whole lot more on the person writing than the author of the book. And it turned out to be excellent publicity."

"Sure, Jonah loved controversy," said the man on the other side of Sigrid, a twig in comparison to Sigrid's spreading live oak. "But I wouldn't say the same about Yoshe. She was a lady."

Sigrid twisted the white napkin, her pink cheeks flushing darker. "She was no lady. She was simply more subtle than Jonah. Unless you were the target of her commentary, you might hardly notice how vicious she was." She put the napkin down, picked up her dessert fork, and plunged it into the apple praline tart that had just been delivered. "Nothing subtle about that."