Murder for the Halibut Read online

“Pretty cocky, don’t you think?”

  Jordan took a moment to study him. She was five eight, and Stefano towered over her, looking more like an athletic trainer than a man who spent hours in the kitchen creating five-star meals. In cargo shorts and a green and blue muscle shirt, he was what Jordan classified as serious eye candy. Curly dark hair that fell to his shoulders accentuated his smoky brown eyes and angled cheekbones. He probably used the playful matching dimples on either side of his generous mouth as a beacon to lure unsuspecting females.

  Quickly, she looked away, reminding herself she already had a drop-dead gorgeous Italian Stallion who could lure her in anytime he wanted. Unfortunately, he was deep undercover fighting drug dealers in El Paso.

  Her overt attempt to put distance between her and Stefano didn’t seem to bother the guy. He arched an eyebrow, as if reminding her he always got what he wanted.

  “I’m cooking my signature halibut dish tomorrow, and I guarantee you won’t have to think twice about who’s the best chef here.”

  “If you’re as good as you think you are, why not throw out a line and get fresh halibut? You never know when those points might come in handy.”

  A how-stupid-are-you look crossed his face. “Halibut like cold water. They’re fished in places like Alaska, not in the Gulf. I made sure everything I needed was sent via overnight delivery when I heard about tomorrow’s little show.” He straightened two fingers to give her another peek at the cigarette back in his hand. “Until then, I have some free time, and the concierge is hooking me up with the good stuff. Tonight could be the night you and I really get to know each other.”

  “Hey, Stefano.”

  Both Jordan and Stefano turned to see a much smaller man approach, sporting a gray fisherman’s vest and a Yankees ball cap. About five seven, the newcomer had jet-black hair with matching eyes.

  “I snagged the best rod for you. Come on.”

  “No can do, Phillip. I’m gonna hang out with—” He turned toward Jordan. “What did you say your name was?”

  “Jordan McAllister,” Phillip answered, sending daggers her way before turning his attention back to Stefano. “You don’t have to fish, but let’s grab a couple of beers while you watch me reel them in.” He moved closer to whisper, “Beating you tomorrow will require all the extra points I can get.”

  Before Stefano could open his mouth to reply, Phillip tugged on his arm, but he couldn’t budge the bigger man. “I told everyone you’d tell us a few of your funny stories about working with Dean Sterling at the Palace Hotel.”

  Being the center of attention must have appealed to Stefano because he shrugged and allowed Phillip to drag him over to where the others were getting ready to throw out their lines.

  “I’m looking forward to seeing you later, Jordan,” he said over his shoulder.

  Like that’s ever gonna happen in this lifetime.

  Finally alone, Jordan discovered that while she’d been bantering with Stefano, the nausea had disappeared, and she was beginning to feel a little mellow. Rosie had warned her that the patch contained a drug that made you feel like you were floating in the clouds.

  Truth be told, it wasn’t an entirely bad feeling. Without her precious Ho Hos, she needed all the help she could get today. The chocolate treat from Hostess was the only thing that calmed her down when she was stressed. She’d read that chocolate elevated endorphin levels, but she didn’t need some scientist sitting in a lab somewhere to convince her of that. Usually, all it took was one chocolate “Prozac” to talk herself off the ledge—two to guarantee it.

  Staring out at the water, she watched the blue waves ripple and gleam, and her eyelids suddenly felt heavy, as if a great weight were pulling them shut. She’d kill for a comfy recliner right now. Smiling to herself, she was even starting to think judging the cooking contest wouldn’t be so bad.

  “Jordan, I want to introduce you to the contestants,” Michael called out, splattering her bubble of self-confidence like a water balloon thrown from a second-story window.

  She put on her game face and headed in his direction, certain the chefs would sniff out a fast-food queen from a mile away.

  “You feeling better?”

  “Much.”

  “Good.” Michael slipped his arm in hers and dragged her over to a fortyish-looking man dressed in yellow Nike shorts and a matching shirt. A second look verified his baseball cap, shoes, and watch were all color coordinated—bright lemon.

  Who wears a matching watch?

  “Jordan, this is my boss, Wayne Francis. He’s the one who organized this entire trip and chose you as one of the judges.”

  The station manager extended his hand. “Nice meeting you. Dwayne Egan speaks highly of you.”

  She nearly swallowed her tongue at the mention of her boss at the newspaper. Egan spoke highly of her? Never once in the six months since he’d handed over the reins to her column, the Kitchen Kupboard, had he even hinted she might be doing a bang-up job. Even though Jordan’s trick of slapping a fancy Spanish or French name on Rosie’s casserole recipes and passing them off as gourmet specialties had doubled the newspaper’s sales, the old cheapskate was probably afraid she might ask for a raise if he commended her in any way.

  So the bugger talked nice about her behind her back. She filed that little tidbit on her mental laptop to use when it was to her advantage.

  “Michael has only nice things to say about you, too, Mr. Francis.”

  “Call me Wayne.”

  “Best boss I’ve ever had,” Michael chimed in before introducing the only other women on the small fishing trawler. “Jordan, this is Casey Washington. She’s one of the sous chefs at Hirasoto’s Steak House in Fort Worth,” he said of the first one. Then he pulled the smaller woman forward. “And this is Marsha Davenport, who interns at the steak house. It’s unusual to have two chefs who work together end up competing against one another, but they were both chosen in our statewide search.”

  Jordan shook hands with both women, noticing how much firmer Marsha’s grip was, despite the fact she looked to be ten years younger and fifty pounds lighter than Casey.

  Dressed in cutoffs and a T-shirt that allowed a peak at a perfectly flat abdomen, Marsha could have passed for a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader. Sun-streaked hair cut in a stylish bob framed her delicate face, bringing out the green-blue of her eyes.

  Casey, on the other hand, looked to be in her early thirties with mousy brown hair and equally dull hazel eyes, heavily made up in a multitude of various tones of blue eye shadow. Wearing a pair of frumpy black capris that begged for an iron, and an oversized green T-shirt that read NEVER TRUST A SKINNY CHEF, Casey swiped a pudgy hand across her brow to mop up the sweat threatening to drip into her eyes.

  “You might as well meet them all,” Michael said, waving over the other three contestants.

  “I met Phillip and Stefano earlier,” Jordan said, not looking forward to another go-around with the flirty Italian chef, who winked at her when he walked up with the other two.

  Michael pointed to a tall Hispanic man, who extended his hand. “Meet Luis Herrera. He hails from San Antonio where he oversees all the food at La Cantina on the Riverwalk.”

  “Nice to meet you, Luis.”

  “The pleasure is all mine,” he said in heavily accented English. Bending forward, he brought her hand to his lips.

  Every part of Luis’s six-foot-plus frame not covered by clothing was decorated with tattoos, most of them dragons. From the way he narrowed his eyes Stefano’s way, Jordan detected some seriously bad blood there, although Stefano didn’t seem the least bit rattled.

  First chance she got, she’d get Rosie to check into that. Her friend had a knack for finding out intimate details from perfect strangers. Something about her made people blurt out the most outrageous stuff. Like the time a man she’d met in the produce section of the Piggly Wiggly told her his pipe hadn’t worked since his prostate was removed, and he hadn’t had sex in over a year.

  Like sh
e was a plumber and could do something about it.

  “There’s one more contestant, but he’ll join us on the ship tomorrow,” Michael continued. “His wife delivered their first child yesterday, and he stayed in Dallas an extra day to help out until her mother arrives later today.”

  “So is everyone ready to fish?” The captain moved away from the wheel. “I’m Johnny, and my first mate is Mo. We’re going to show you how to catch enough fish to feed the entire cruise ship tomorrow. You’re looking at some of the bluest water on this planet.” He chuckled. “Okay, I may be exaggerating a little, but you will catch some pretty big fish out here.”

  “Like what kind?” Marsha asked, straightening her back to give everyone an up-close-and-personal look at her assets through the thin T-shirt.

  “Groupers. Snappers. You name it. Mo and I will be available to help reel in the big ones. And they can get really big.”

  He pointed to three large coolers under the covered section in the middle of the boat. “There’s beer, wine coolers, water, and sandwiches if you get hungry. We’ll fish for two hours or so and then head back to Key West.” He turned and reached for the bottle of sunscreen Mo was holding out. “Cover yourselves with this, or I guarantee you’ll be sleeping standing up tonight.”

  After Casey got a wine cooler and a sandwich from the front cooler, she and Marsha set up in one corner while Luis and Phillip staked out the other. Grabbing two beers, Stefano made a beeline for the covered area and flopped down on a wooden bench.

  Although sitting in the shade appealed to Jordan, there was no way she’d deliberately position herself to be alone with Stefano again. Instead, she reached for the sunscreen and decided when in Rome…

  Selecting a pole, she hoped fishing was like riding a bike and she still knew how to do it. Soon, she and Michael were fishing alongside the others and having a blast. Thanks to the patch, she’d downed two cold ones and another sandwich without paying a gastrointestinal price.

  A little over an hour later, the guys had caught five decent-size fish each, and the girls were sneaking up on them with three and four respectively. Secretly, Jordan was pulling for her fellow females—even had a dollar bet riding on it with Michael.

  She was about to anchor her rod and get another beer when her line jerked, nearly pulling her over the railing.

  She screamed for help and held on with everything she had as Mo ran over with a gaff.

  Jordan laughed when Johnny appeared with a big net. “That’s a little ambitious, don’t ya think?”

  “You never know, missy.”

  He handed Mo the net and stood behind Jordan, putting all of his two hundred fifty or so pounds into reeling in the catch. When the fish broke through the surface of the water, fighting like a wildcat, Johnny jerked the rod just enough to lift it completely out. Mo put down the gaff and stretched his body over to capture the large fish in the net.

  “Whoa! That’s a mutton snapper, and if my eyes are as good as they used to be, this baby’s over twenty pounds,” Johnny said as Mo hauled it aboard.

  Johnny took the large hook out of the fish’s mouth with pliers from the tackle box and put Jordan’s catch in the holding tank. The commotion of landing the fish and the cheers that followed had enticed Stefano out of his shady hiding place, and even he congratulated Jordan.

  “Too bad you don’t get points for that,” Luis commented from behind her.

  “It would be a sin to let a good-looking fish like that go to waste,” Michael’s boss commented. “Whoever cooks snapper tomorrow in the flash-cooking elimination round can use it but can’t count it toward their own stash. If more than one of you wants it, we’ll have to draw straws.”

  Feeling giddy at having caught the biggest fish so far, Jordan reveled in the backslapping and the praises. She’d forgotten how much fun this sport was but was thankful she wouldn’t have to clean or cook the fish. Closing her eyes, she could almost taste her mother’s beer-battered fried fish and hush puppies.

  To this day that was the only way she could stomach fish.

  She opened her eyes in time to see Stefano choose a fishing pole and head toward the other two women, making no bones about his obvious interest in Marsha. With a little luck, Jordan thought, the tiny bombshell might just be the perfect solution to keeping the Italian Romeo occupied.

  Seizing the opportunity, she claimed his vacant bench in the shade and quickly felt the tension of the day slip away. The swaying of the boat as the waves lapped against the side lulled her eyes closed, and soon she was asleep. Something about the salty air and the hot sun got to her every time.

  Not to mention the three Bud Lights.

  She jerked awake when she heard what sounded like the scream of a wounded animal. Johnny and Mo ran past her to the front of the boat, and she jumped up and followed.

  On the deck, writhing in pain, Stefano swore like a true sailor. By now, everyone had surrounded him. With his back facing Jordan, she couldn’t see what was going on. Glancing at Casey, she mouthed, What happened? The unmistakable glint of pleasure in the woman’s eyes flashed only momentarily before she shrugged.

  “It was an accident. My line crossed over Marsha’s when he was helping her get the hook out of the fish she’d caught. When I jerked my pole to pull in my own catch, somehow it happened,” she said.

  Just then Stefano rolled over, still shouting obscenities, and Jordan got her first look at what was causing him so much pain.

  Protruding out of both sides of his right thumb was a large saltwater fishing hook.

  CHAPTER 2

  “Oh, hell no,” Stefano cried when he saw Captain Johnny donning rubber gloves and coming at him with a first aid kit and a pair of metal cutters. “At least not until I get some liquor into me.”

  “That’s not a good idea,” Johnny explained. “Not to mention that it’s against my policy for treating an injured client.”

  “I don’t care anything about your stupid policies,” Stefano yelled. “You’re not coming anywhere near me with that big metal thing until I get a couple of shots into me.”

  The captain looked up at Michael’s boss to see how he wanted to proceed. Clearly, Stefano was not about to let him take out the hook until he got alcohol.

  “Get him a drink,” Wayne said to Johnny before turning back to the captain. “It’s on me if anything goes wrong.”

  When Mo returned with a bottle of whiskey, Johnny poured a double shot and handed it to Stefano. “Drink this and then hold your breath while I get it out.”

  He waited for the injured man to gulp down the drink. When the last drop was gone, Stefano shut his eyes, took a deep breath, and held it. Johnny cut the line right below where it protruded from Stefano’s hand and then grasped the hook. Using the pair of metal cutters Mo handed him, he cut off the barb. With one big pull, he removed the remaining hook from Stefano’s thumb, and a fountain of blood spurted. Quickly, Johnny reached for a clean rag from Mo and pressed it against the puncture wound.

  “Damn it to hell,” Stefano shouted. “That hurt worse coming out than it did going in. I need another shot of that cheap whiskey.”

  After getting a nod from Johnny, Mo went to the back of the boat and opened a locked compartment on the side. He pulled out a half-empty bottle of Johnnie Walker Red and refilled the shot glass before hurrying back to Stefano, whose vocabulary was now laced with every kind of obscenity known to mankind.

  “I knew you were hiding the good stuff.” Stefano threw his head back and chugged the liquor.

  The movement was just enough to knock Johnny’s hand off the wound, and the blood again spurted. Getting a first look at the wound and his own blood, the injured chef moaned softly before his eyes rolled back into his head. He fell back on the deck, thumping his head in the process.

  “Get the smelling salts,” Johnny shouted.

  The others stood over Stefano while Johnny replaced the old rag with a clean dressing to stop the bleeding. Mo passed the ammonia stick under Stefano’s no
se, and after a few seconds, Stefano gasped, his eyes fluttering open.

  “Lie still, matey, unless you want to pass out again,” Mo warned.

  Stefano looked around, his eyes honing in on Casey. “You’ll pay for this, slut.”

  “It was an accident, you jerk.” Even as the words left Casey’s mouth, her eyes sent an entirely different message. “If I wanted to hurt you, I would have used something a whole lot better than a hook.” She held up a filet knife from the tackle box. “Like this.”

  “Relax, man. It’s not too bad,” Johnny reassured him after pulling the dressing back and inspecting the wound closely. “You’re gonna need a tetanus shot when we get back to Key West. A round of antibiotics, too. There’s always the danger of flesh-eating bacteria from saltwater fish.”

  Stefano’s eyes were still closed, so Jordan assumed he hadn’t heard that last part, especially since he didn’t resume his tirade at Casey.

  “Okay,” he mumbled.

  Who wouldn’t be okay after four straight shots of Scotch? Jordan thought, eyeing Casey, who was getting her line ready to recast as if nothing had happened. She decided the jury was still out on whether or not this really was an accident.

  A sneak peek at the rest of the group still congregating around Stefano verified Casey wasn’t the only one who didn’t seem all that broken up about the injury. Luis Herrera wasn’t even trying to hide his grin. Jordan made a mental note to sic Rosie on him as soon as she could. She’d find out what was up with his attitude.

  Mo and Johnny helped Stefano to his feet and led him to the shaded area where he slumped on the bench, obviously feeling no pain at the moment. After Johnny pulled the anchor, he revved up the Sea Shark’s engine and headed back to port.

  Casey made her way over to Michael and Jordan, a half grin still on her face. “And then there were five,” she snickered. “Guess you won’t need to eliminate one of us tomorrow at the Greased Lightning Elimination Round.”

  The gang was already at the hotel waiting in Jordan’s room when she and Michael returned.

  “Catch any fish?” asked Ray Varga, the oldest among her fellow residents at Empire Apartments, when he saw her.