Cooking Up Murder (6 page)

I slid the beam along the hulking shape and saw that what I'd mistaken for a black trash bag was really a black coat. Leather.

Drago was still inside it. He was sprawled on the pavement, one hand clutching at his chest. His face was pale, covered with sweat, and contorted with pain.

Four

"ANNIE?" EVE LATCHED ONTO MY ARM SO TIGHT, I
knew I'd have bruises by morning. Her breathing was fast and shallow, her eyes wide. "Is that what I think it is? Is it who I think it is? Is he--"

I swallowed hard and reminded myself not to go bonkers. That wouldn't help anybody. Besides, it looked like Eve was on the edge of bonkers herself. And that was plenty for both of us.

I skimmed the light over the body on the pavement. "It's what you think it is," I told Eve. "It's who you think it is. I don't know if he's--"

Once upon a very long time ago, I had thought about being a nurse, and I'd done some volunteer work at a hospital. It was the summer between my junior and senior years of high school. Like I said, a long time ago. But some things you learn you never forget.

I bent and felt for a pulse the way I'd seen the nurses on the floor do it. "It's weak, but it's there," I told Eve. I looked over my shoulder at her, my own panic forgotten in light of the fact that now I knew that we had to act, and fast. "Call 911."

"Call?" In the gloom, I saw the whites of Eve's eyes. She blinked, stunned and afraid. "Maybe we should just get out of here, huh? Beyla said she was going to kill him, Annie. And it sure looks like she tried." She darted a look around the dark back lot. "What if she comes after us?"

It would have been easy to buy into the argument and the panic. Except that we didn't have time for theories, especially ones as goofy as that one.

I made sure to keep my voice level and my words neutral. What Eve needed right now was reassurance. Like it or not, the only place she was going to get it was from me.

"Nobody's coming after anybody," I told her. "No matter what she said, Beyla didn't do this." I glanced over to where Drago lay. "I'm no expert, but I'd say that it looks like he's having a heart attack. And she couldn't have caused a heart attack, could she? We can't run off and leave him, Eve. We need to help him. Give me your phone."

My words didn't penetrate, and I cursed Eve for being hypersensitive and myself for leaving my own cell phone at home. Except for my mom and dad down in Florida and my brother, Larry, out in Colorado, no one ever called. The way I'd figured it, there was no way I'd need my phone at cooking class.

I'd figured wrong.

"Phone," I said again, slower this time so she'd get the message. "He's still alive, Eve. But he's not going to be if we don't do something and do it fast. We've got to call an ambulance. He needs help. Now."

"Help. Right. Gotcha!" Eve shook herself out of her daze. Her hands trembling, she patted down the side pockets of her khaki skirt. "Not here," she said. "Left my phone in the car."

"Then maybe you should go get it?"

"Get it? Yeah."

But Eve was rooted to the spot.

"Eve!" I didn't want to do it, but I didn't have a lot of choice. I raised my voice. "Eve, go to your car. Get your phone. Call 911."

"Call. Yeah." She nodded. But she didn't move.

"All right. Give me the keys." I held out my hand. "I'll get the phone and make the call. You stay with the dying guy."

"Dying?" When she turned them on me, Eve's eyes were filled with tears, and her face was as ashen as Drago's. "You mean, you think he's gonna . . ." She swallowed hard. "I couldn't stay here. I mean . . . I would but . . . but what if you're not back and . . . what if he . . . I mean . . . I couldn't. I--"

"Right." I grabbed her shoulders and turned her to face the street where we'd parked. "Then go get your phone."

"Phone. Yeah. Right." She took off toward the car.

With that taken care of, I concentrated on Drago. And Drago . . . well, he wasn't doing well.

"Drago?" I knelt on the pavement, afraid to get too close to a stranger, but reluctant not to offer what comfort I could to a fellow human being in need. With one finger, I gave him a little nudge. He groaned, and I figured it was a good sign.

"Drago, my name is Annie. My friend Eve went for her phone. We're going to get somebody here to help you."

His eyes flickered open. His gaze wandered aimlessly, to the building where Tres Bonne Cuisine was housed, to the stars that twinkled in the navy blue sky above our heads, and finally to a tree just over my left shoulder, near where Eve and I had taken cover so that Beyla and Drago wouldn't see us as we watched them argue.

Just thinking back to everything we heard and saw made a chill race up my spine.

It turned to ice when Drago's gaze fastened on me.

He groped for my hand, and when he found it, he hung on like there was no tomorrow. For all I knew, for Drago, there wouldn't be.

"Al . . . bas . . . tru." His voice was no more than a breath, and it was even more heavily accented than Beyla's.

"Alabaster?" I wondered if it was the name of his favorite dog. Or his wife. Or if he had some weird lapidary thing going on. "Is that what you said? Alabaster?"

"Alba . . . stru." He didn't so much speak the words as they leaked out of him on the end of a sigh. He reached up and touched my cheek.

His hands were icy. I jerked back, startled.

Just as quickly, I felt as guilty as hell.

Human being in need, remember?

I told myself to get a grip and pressed Drago's clammy hand between both of mine. "Alba Stru? Is it someone's name? I don't know any Alba Stru, but I'll tell you one thing, Drago, I'll find her if that's what you want. When you're better. Right now, though, you don't need to worry about that. We're getting help. You just hang on--you're going to be all right."

Drago gasped from the pain. His breaths came quicker, each one a little more shallow than the last.

Where he found the strength, I don't know, but he pulled his hand from mine. He groped for the breast pocket of his coat, and when he brought his hand out again, he had a piece of paper clutched in his fingers.

"This . . . important. You will see." He pressed the paper into my hand, and I glanced at it. It was a receipt from a restaurant called
Bucharest
. Important? It didn't seem likely, not unless Drago was counting calories and wanted to prove he had a sensible diet.

I turned the receipt over. Scrawled on the back side was what looked to be an address. But what did it mean?

I was just about to ask when Drago moaned. His body convulsed. I shoved the paper into my jacket pocket so that I could hold his hand again. I squeezed his fingers, and he took a sharp breath, holding it in a long time. Then, with a sound that reminded me of the murmur of wind through the trees, he slowly let it out.

It disappeared into the night air, and on the end of it, Drago went still.

"Drago?" I rubbed his hand between mine.

No response.

"Drago, can you hear me?"

I was talking pretty loud, but he didn't respond.

"Drago, you've got to hang on for just a couple more minutes."

I looked into the eyes that were open and staring right through me, but there was nothing happening behind them.

"Drago?"

I don't know how long I knelt there beside his body. I don't even know if I cried. I do know that I felt helpless.

It wasn't until I heard Eve come huffing and puffing into the lot that I leaned back on my heels.

"Too late," I said, glancing up at her.

Eve's expression fell. "What do you mean, too late? I called 911. They're on their way."

As if on cue, we heard the distant sounds of sirens. They got closer, and before we knew it, the area behind Tres Bonne Cuisine was awash in pulsing red light.

The paramedics were gems. They moved in and moved us back so they could get to work administering CPR. When that didn't work, they shocked Drago with one of those portable defibrillators. But the whole thing went on too long. Five minutes. Ten. Fifteen. I knew it wasn't a good sign, even before I heard one of them say something about "no use."

At some point, I realized Eve was crying. I put an arm around her shoulders and together, we watched the flurry of activity and the expressions of the paramedics that started out with so much intensity melt into despair and then resignation. Through it all, I felt drained and strangely ghoulish.

Was it right for us to stand there and watch?

Should we have minded our own business and gotten on with our lives and left these men to their work?

Was there anything we could have done? Anything that would have changed the outcome? Anything that could have kept poor Drago from . . .

"I'm calling it." Wiping one hand across his forehead, the paramedic in charge backed away from the body.

I gave Eve's shoulders a squeeze. "You're shivering."

She sniffed and scrubbed a finger under her nose. "I've never seen anybody die before."

"No. Me, neither." Technically, of course, Eve hadn't seen Drago die, but I wasn't about to argue. In this case, close definitely counted. "It's so sad. Dying in a parking lot with nobody around but strangers."

"Beyla probably planned it that way," Eve murmured.

I rolled my eyes, but I couldn't be too hard on Eve. Though she tried for a tough-girl exterior, I knew that right below the surface, Eve was as soft as a marshmallow. Wild theories or no wild theories, just being this close to death--even the death of a man we knew only in passing--was bound to throw her for a loop.

"Beyla had nothing to do with this," I reminded her. As they laid a white sheet over Drago's face, I remembered his last, labored words.

A couple of the paramedics went back to the ambulance to get a stretcher and I hurried over to the head paramedic, whose nametag identified him as Sean. He was a muscular guy with a serious face and buzz cut. He had a clipboard in his hand, and was filling out a report.

I stepped around the white sheet and the shape beneath it. "He was asking for someone," I said. "A woman, I think. Are you going to be able to find out--"

He put a hand on my arm. "You were here, right? You're the one who called us?"

"That was me." Eve moved up behind me. "I did do the right thing, didn't I?"

Sean stepped back and looked Eve up and down. "Oh, yeah. You did great. It takes one amazing woman to keep her head when something like this is happening."

"It was nothing." Eve sighed. "I just couldn't stand by and watch another human being suffer and not take action. You understand. I'm sure you do. I know that's exactly why you chose your noble profession."

I figured I had to put an end to things before the flirtation got out of hand.

"Let's not forget Alba," I exclaimed. They both looked at me like I was nuts. "Alba. The woman Drago mentioned right before he died."

Sean checked his clipboard. "Drago. Yeah, Drago Kravic. That's the name on the driver's license in the guy's wallet. I'm a little mixed up. You knew the deceased?"

"We don't." Eve piped up before I could explain about the cooking school or how we'd heard Beyla and Drago argue. "He told us his name. Right before he breathed his last," she murmured, heaving another sigh. I turned to her in disbelief, ready to protest, but she gave me her best
keep your mouth shut--or else!
look, and plowed ahead. Luckily, Sean was still looking at his clipboard. "We didn't know him at all. We were just walking through the parking lot and there he was. It was . . ." She blinked rapidly. "Well, I don't know if I'll be able to sleep tonight."

"Maybe Alba won't either, when she learns the news," I suggested. I turned to Sean. "Alba Stru. I think that's the name he mentioned. Will you be able to find her?"

He consulted the clipboard again. "We found his wallet. That means we've got all his vitals. Name. Address. Phone. If this Alba is next of kin, you can be sure we'll find her. In the meantime . . ." He signaled to his crew, and they lifted Drago's body onto the stretcher and slid it into the ambulance. Sean gave a wave as if to say that he'd be right there.