Curried Lobster Murder: Book 14 in The Darling Deli Series (10 page)

The five remaining contestants shared a wary look between themselves. The sure knowledge that one of them wouldn’t be there tomorrow set them all on edge. Moira, thanks to her victory in the last round, was the only one safe from the possibility of being disqualified, but the pain she was suffering took away any relief that knowledge might have brought her.

“Today will be similar to yesterday’s challenge in that you will have a specific list of ingredients to use, but with a twist. You will each be responsible for choosing one ingredient, and you must do so without knowing what ingredients the others are choosing. This will give us a list of five randomly chosen ingredients that you each must use to create a unique dish. And you will only have half an hour to finish cooking it.”

A few groans rose from the gathered group. Thirty minutes would be hard to achieve at the best of times. This challenge seemed like a disaster in the making to Moira. She resolved to choose the simplest ingredient that she could think of, and could only hope that the others would do the same.

“Please separate to your stations,” Charlie said. “Each of you will find a pen and a piece of paper waiting for you. In a moment, I will ask you to write your chosen ingredient down, and I will come around and collect the papers. No talking, please. Nadine, you’re responsible for choosing the meat. Hector, choose a spice. Moira, choose a fruit, Sofia and Michelle, you both choose vegetables. Are you ready? Go.”

The deli owner stared at the blank sheet of paper in front of her. She had to choose a fruit that they would all have to include in their dishes? She could hardly even think straight past the pain and nausea. Why hadn’t she taken more of the pain pills before leaving her room?

Come on, what fruit goes well with a lot of different things?
she thought.
Hmm… a tomato is technically a fruit, isn’t it?
Wondering if she would be able to get away with it, she scribbled
tomato
on her piece of paper and folded it up. When Charlie came by, she handed it to her without a word.

“All right, you’ve all chosen,” she said a moment later once she had made her circuit to each station. “This is the list of ingredients that must be included in your dishes. Trout, rosemary, tomatoes, okra, and zucchini. That doesn’t sound too bad, does it? Now remember, points for creativity. And… begin.”

Moira breathed a sigh of relief as the buzzer rang. The ingredient list really wasn’t too bad. If she could actually think straight, she was sure she could come up with a unique and tasty dish utilizing those ingredients. As it was, since she couldn’t be disqualified this round anyway, she decided to go the simple route and just make baked trout with a mixed vegetable side. While she was cooking, she would keep an eye on her fellow contestants and see if any of them were acting suspicious.

She got the trout in the oven first, then turned her attention to the vegetables, shooting surreptitious glances over at Sofia, who was to her immediate right. Last night, when the food poisoning or regular poisoning had been at its worst, she had been convinced that Antonio was the one responsible for all of this. He could easily have slipped something into her food or drink while they were eating, and he could have done the same to Daphne when they ran into each other the evening that the other woman had gotten sick. In the morning, however, when things were clearer, she realized that it could have been anyone. Just because Antonio was the most obvious suspect didn’t mean he was the only one with a motive. Just last night, Sofia had told them how desperate she was for the money. She didn’t want to believe that the friendly young woman who seemed to get along so well with Candice could be trying to get rid of the other competitors, but she knew that ignoring a potential suspect would be more than just foolish… it could be dangerous.

She spent so much time focusing on signs of suspicious activity from Sofia that she was shocked to hear Charlie give the five-minute warning. She opened the oven to take the trout out, and bit back a curse. It had been left in too long, and while it wasn’t quite burnt to a crisp, she knew that there was no way the overcooked piece of fish would win any prizes that evening. Happy that she had her immunity to lean on, she did her best to make the plates of food look nice, then followed the other contestants out onto the ballroom floor.

Considering how things had been going for her so far during the challenge, Moira shouldn’t have been surprised to hear her name called first. She knew she couldn’t be disqualified, but she still felt a hot rush of shame as the judges tore apart her dry, flavorless dish. She hadn’t tried, and she knew it. She was too distracted by the fact that someone had tried to take three of the contestants out of the game, and had already succeeded with two of them. She was desperate to find out who was responsible before someone else got hurt, and she didn’t know who she could go to on this ship. Who could she trust, other than Candice? There was no way she wanted to involve her daughter in this. As far as she knew, the ship didn’t have any sort of police or law enforcement beyond a few security officers, and she didn’t even know if she could trust them.

What if all of this is for the contest?
she thought suddenly.
Before Daphne got sick, we were talking about how everyone was so much nicer than we were expecting. What if people were
too
nice? Competitions like this thrive on drama. Even though this is just a small time cooking competition that’s only shown on this cruise ship, I bet Damien still makes a lot of money off of it. Passengers pay to be entertained while they’re here, and people getting along and supporting each other doesn’t make for good entertainment… but people getting poisoned and killed definitely does.

She realized that everyone was staring at her. She must have been standing there silently for half a minute while she had her epiphany.
Maybe I took a few too many pain pills
, she thought.

“Sorry,” she muttered, addressing the judges. “I’m not feeling good. I think maybe I have what Daphne has.”

She watched the three judges carefully, hoping for a sign, some flash of guilt, anything that would tell her that she was on the right track. Nothing.

“Maybe you should go back to your room and lie down,” Damien suggested gently. “You do look rather pale. You won the last challenge, so you don’t have to worry about being disqualified from this one.”

“Okay… I think I will do that,” she said. “Thank you, and sorry about the trout.”

She walked out of the banquet hall, upset with herself for getting so distracted while she was cooking. She had every intention of doing something to continue her investigation, but when she reached her room she made the mistake of lying down on her bed.
Just a quick rest
, she told herself. Then she closed her eyes, and let exhaustion sweep her away.

When she woke up, the light coming through her room’s one window was dim and gray.
I must have slept most of the day away,
she thought, horrified.
At least I feel better.
It was true. Whatever she had been suffering through for the last day seemed to have passed, and her mind was clear now that the pain and anti-nausea drugs had gotten out of her system. She still didn’t know what was going on with her and Daphne’s mysterious illness or Bobby’s death, but she was determined to find out.

David answered the video call only seconds after she clicked the little green icon by his profile picture. She saw her own kitchen in the background, and smiled at the thought of him and the dogs there.

“You’re not dead,” he said.

“Did you think I was?”

“Well, you didn’t answer my email, and you didn’t call me to let me know how the third challenge went. I admit it was a passing concern, especially considering the fact that during our last conversation you were fighting off the effects of either food-poisoning or poison-poisoning that you refused to see the ship’s doctor for.”

“I… can see how you might have been worried.” She heaved a sigh. “I’m sorry. Today was terrible. I ended up sleeping through most of it.”

“Do you feel better?”

“Yes.”

He smiled. “I’m glad. How did the challenge go?”

“I completely messed it up. I was too busy suspecting my fellow competitors of murder to even focus on cooking. My trout was overdone, and the veggie dish didn’t even have any salt in it. I’m a failure.”

“No, you aren’t,” he assured her. “You dragged yourself into the kitchen and gave it a shot instead of giving up. That’s gumption.”

“This whole trip is turning into a disaster,” she groaned. “Why can’t I ever just have a nice time without something bad happening?”

“Just take a deep breath, Moira,” he said calmly. “Everything is going to be fine. I looked up your judges and the other contestants. None of them have priors. That doesn’t mean none of them is the killer, but at least you know you aren’t sharing the boat with hardened criminals.”

“Or it means that whoever has been targeting the contestants is so good at what they do that they haven’t ever gotten caught.”

“I doubt that’s the case. I think chances are you’re dealing with someone who’s just getting a bit too competitive. I take it you still aren’t willing to drop out of the competition?”

“Not a chance,” she said firmly.

He sighed, but didn’t look surprised. “All right, let’s take this one step at a time. Do you know who won the challenge today?”

“No. I literally just woke up. I don’t even know where Candice is.”

“Okay. Well, when you find out, keep your eye on them. From a distance, of course. If the person who won isn’t the same person who poisoned you, chances are he or she will be the next target. Stay around groups of people, and for heaven’s sake, don’t go off on your own. I’ll keep doing more research on the contestants in hopes that I can dig something up. Moira… be careful.”

“I’ll do my best,” she told him.

She found Candice with Sofia in the closest buffet hall. She gave her daughter a quick hug, then sat down with them, declining the offer of food. She felt a lot better, but her stomach still wasn’t a hundred percent and she didn’t want to risk getting sick again.

“Sofia told me you weren’t feeling well during the challenge, so I thought I’d let you sleep,” Candice said. “I hope that’s okay.”

“That’s fine, sweetie. I feel a lot better now. The extra rest was probably good for me.” She turned her attention to Sofia. “Did you win today’s challenge?”

The young woman sighed. “No, I came in second place. That Hector guy won. Michelle got disqualified, and Nadine came in third. It’s just the four of us tomorrow. Things are really starting to heat up.”

“I bet,” Moira muttered. “Do you know where Hector is?”

“No, why?”

“I think…” She hesitated, unsure whether or not she could trust the young woman in front of her. Out of the remaining contestants, Sofia seemed to have the most motive to try to cheat her way into winning. From the sound of it, she really needed the money to keep her business running, and that might be enough to drive her to murder.

“I just wanted to talk to him,” she amended. “I might take a stroll around and see if I can find him. You two enjoy your dinner.”

She gave the two young woman a tight smile and left. If Sofia was innocent, then Hector might be in grave danger. On the other hand, if the young woman was guilty, then she might just have left her daughter with a murderer.

She was walking the main deck after twenty minutes of fruitless searching for Hector when she saw not him, but Antonio Cross. She paused, letting a strolling couple move ahead of her as she considered what to do next. All she had to go on right now was conjecture, and her list of suspects was a mile long. Should she take this opportunity and follow Antonio in case her original guess about him being the killer had been right, or would it be better for her to keep looking for Hector? What if Antonio led her to Hector?

She bit her lip, frozen in indecision. Just as Antonio was about to disappear around a bend, she leapt to follow him. Going with her gut had served her well in the first two cooking challenges; maybe it would serve her well now. There was no clearer suspect than the surly man who had been disqualified in the first round, and there was no way she could let him out of her sight until she knew for sure that he wasn’t going to try to hurt anyone.

She followed as far behind him as she could,
worried that if he knew she was there he might try to lose her… or worse, lead her into a secluded spot where he could ambush her. Luckily for her, it was still early enough that quite a few people were on deck admiring the stars and taking their time strolling down the walkway. It was easy to keep several people between them, and she doubted he would recognize her face in a crowd if he happened to look back.

Suddenly, unexpectedly, he sped up. Moira tried to follow him, but an older couple appeared out of nowhere in front of her and she had to stumble to a halt to avoid running into them. Muttering apologies, she inched her way past them, and let out a sharp sigh of annoyance. He was gone.

She hurried to the spot that he had disappeared and looked around, trying to guess a likely direction for him to have gone. Why did this cruise ship have to be so big and complicated?