Tom pushed the laminated menu away with a grimace. “Nah.”
“Just coffee,” I said to the waitress who appeared at our table.
“You got it.” She turned both our mugs upright, poured, and collected our menus.
“So, what’s up?” I asked when she was gone.
Tom stared down at the dark brew in his mug, like the coffee had said something nasty to him.
Uh-oh,I thought. I didn’t like the feel of this. The look on his face made my heart pound faster, and my neck sweat. I thought if I came up with a witty comment I might relieve the tension, change the subject. But I couldn’t come up with anything.
In the three heartbeats it took him to raise his eyes again, I thought how odd it was that I’d been singing his praises yesterday, so confident that his helping my mom and nana was proof he was willing to take our relationship to a new level. I was so sure we were moving forward. And now it felt more like he was about to break up with me.
“This is going to be hard, Ollie.”
I didn’t think my heart could stand it another moment. It banged so relentlessly I put a hand to my chest to keep Tom from hearing it thud. What had happened? What had changed since yesterday? His eyes provided no clue.
“What’s going to be hard?” I managed to ask. My voice cracked. I hoped he didn’t notice.
He opened a little creamer and poured its contents into the mug. I kept mine black because I didn’t trust my hand not to shake when I grabbed a creamer for myself. I swallowed, my throat starchy-dry. “What are you trying to tell me?”
His brow furrowed and he stared down at the coffee again. Neither of us had taken a sip yet, and when the waitress breezed by with pot in hand, she didn’t even slow at our table.
“Craig,” he said.
“Craig?” My heart skipped. Had I misheard him? “Craig Sanderson?”
He nodded.
“What does Craig have to do with us?”
“Us?” Tom looked up. “Nothing.”
Now I was confused. “Explain.”
“Craig put me on this Minkus death investigation.”
“That’s a bad thing?”
“We’ve all been assigned a specific angle.”
I waited.
“He’s assigned me to you.”
I didn’t understand why Tom was so upset. “You know I didn’t do it, right?”
That got the first smile of the day. “Of course.”
“Well then, your job is done. Whatever you need from me, you’ve got. I’m going to be the most cooperative subject you’ve ever known.”
As I spoke, my smile grew. Tom’s didn’t. “You don’t see the problem, do you?”
I shook my head.
“Craig has made me responsible for keeping you out of the investigation.”
“That doesn’t make sense. If they think Minkus died because of something I served him, then I’m part of this investigation already. How can he keep me out of it?”
“Okay, maybe I misspoke. You can’t exactly be kept out of it, but he wants your efforts controlled. That’s my job. I’m supposed to make sure you don’t get involved in this investigation yourself.”
“Now, why would I do that?”
Tom shot me a look of exasperation. “Ollie, look at your track record.”
“I never intended-”
“Uh-huh,” Tom said, interrupting my lame attempt at defense. “That’s exactly the point. You make us believe you’re all innocent and out of the loop and then-bam-you’re at the very center of a major conspiracy.”
“That was an accident.”
“Both times?”
We were silent a moment. Tom took a breath. “We will be asking for your help. There’s no way we can proceed without your cooperation.”
I made a “Duh,” face, but didn’t say anything.
“Craig’s exact directive is that I’m to act as liaison between the Secret Service and the kitchen. I need to be aware of every single thing you do.”
I started to speak, but Tom held up a hand.
“The reason he picked me,” he said, reading my thoughts, “is because he thinks that if I’m in charge of you, you’ll actually cooperate this time.”
The waitress came by, pot in hand, again. She eyed our untouched cups. “You two positive you don’t want something else?”
We assured her we didn’t and as soon as she turned away, I added cream to my coffee and took a sip. It was something to do. And it gave me a moment to think.
Tom drank his, too. Bolstered, either by the interruption in what had become a tense conversation, or by the coffee, he sat up straighter. “Craig knows you had nothing to do with Minkus. We all know that. But that doesn’t mean we can skate when it comes to your investigation. We have to follow every lead, have to take every step-just as if you were a true suspect. If we don’t, we’ll get raked over the coals.” He held the mug in both hands and stared at me. “But the real reason Craig is doing this is because he doesn’t want you involved.”
I nodded.
“I mean, not at all.”
“Okay,” I said. “Done.”
He waited a moment, then took another sip of coffee. “You promise?”
“Of course,” I said.
“Do you have any idea what this means to my career if you don’t stay out of it?”
I didn’t understand why Tom was getting so worked up. He and Craig were friends. “I’m sure he wouldn’t-”
“Craig has made it clear that if you get involved in this-like you have in the past-I will be dropped from the PPD.”
“He can’t do that.”
“The hell he can’t. He’s my immediate supervisor.”
“I mean, he can’t make you responsible for someone else’s actions.”
Tom slowly shook his head. “Yeah, well, tell him that.”
My fists were bunched and I saw Tom’s gaze stray past them, before he met my eyes. “I know you don’t mean to get into trouble…”
“I haven’t gotten in trouble,” I said, my voice rising. “In fact, I’d say I’ve helped when no one else could. And I’ve even saved a few lives along the way, too.”
His hands came up, but my anger refused to be abated. “Just how, exactly, does Craig think to keep me out of this? For crying out loud, Tom, I work in the kitchen at the White House. And when a guest dies after eating one of my meals, you bet I’m involved.”
Tom grimaced. “Shh!”
I lowered my voice. Too late, people around us had perked up. An avid eavesdropper myself, I recognized the body language. “All I’m saying is that Craig would be an idiot to refuse to use me as a resource.”
“I told you. He intends to do just that.”
“Now I’m confused.”
“It gets complicated.”
“Because officially”-I raised my hands to make quotation marks in the air-“I’m a suspect?”
“That’s right.”
“That’s a crock.”
We both took long sips of coffee. The waitress waited across the room, pot in hand, eyebrows raised. When I looked at her, she turned away and set about filling mugs at another table.
After a few tense moments of silence, I asked, “What about Suzie and Steve?”
Tom blinked. “Who?”
“The SizzleMasters. Remember, they were in the kitchen that day.”
“You suspect them?”
I thought about it. “Not really. But my point is that we had a camera rolling most of the day. It would be enormously helpful if I could review it.”
“Not gonna happen.”
I waited for him to say more, but he didn’t. “This is so wrong,” I finally said.
“It’s only temporary.”
“It’s still… wrong.”
When he looked at me, I was taken aback by the alarm in his eyes. “Ollie, don’t get involved. Unless the directive comes from me. Or Craig. Please. I know how you are. I know how you want to fix things. You think you’re helping, but-”
With an almost palpable snap, hot anger shot furiously into my chest and spouted out my mouth. I couldn’t stop myself. “I have helped. I do help.”