Free Dying for a Taste by Leslie Karst

sunset with.
    As I pumped up the coast, I felt the transformation in my body. Where just a moment before I had been in high spirits, euphoric almost, I was now back to where I’d been when I’d left my dad’s house, tears once again forming.
    Damn these hormones and the violent mood swings they cause .
    Not that I didn’t have good reason to be down, of course. Letta had also loved this place. Never again would she get to gaze in wonder at the brown pelicans soaring up the coast in bomber formation, or hear the sea lions’ hoarse barking as they lazed on the rocks offshore, or watch the packs of dogschasing each other and romping in the surf down at Mitchell’s Cove.
    Making a snap decision, I made a U-turn and headed back the way I had just come. The attempt to clear my brain obviously wasn’t working, so I figured I might as well do something productive—like checking out Letta’s office. Maybe there was something there that could shed light on why the hell she was murdered. And it was a good time to poke around Gauguin. The prep cooks wouldn’t show up until midafternoon, so I’d have the place all to myself. Fortunately, I’d gotten a key to the restaurant from Javier the night before and had put it on my key chain.
    I wheeled my bicycle around the side of the building and unlocked the door I had been trying to peer through just three mornings before. Leaning the frame against the garde manger sink, I closed and locked the door behind me; removed my sunglasses, helmet, gloves, and cycling shoes; and set them down on the floor in a heap.
    I looked around. Although it had felt fine being in the crowded dining room the night before, it was unsettling standing alone in this room, where it had happened. There was the counter where her purse and the teapot and cups had been sitting. And there , on the floor, was where she had been found, Javier’s bloody knife beside her.
    Shaking off the wave of nausea that was starting to overtake me—I really should’ve had some preride breakfast—I padded in my wool socks up the stairs behind the reach-in refrigerator and around the corner into Letta’s office.
    This had been her sanctuary: her escape from irate customers who’d neglected to make a reservation, from brokenhollandaises and shorted meat deliveries, from back-of-the-house squabbles. The wood-paneled room was dominated by a large oak desk. On it sat a lamp made from what looked like a ceramic Chinese vase, a red Bakelite telephone, an old-fashioned adding machine, a small carved-wood tiki, and four neat stacks of papers.
    The police must have already been through all this, I figured. No way would Aunt Letta have had the papers so organized, in such precise piles. Tidiness had never been one of her virtues.
    I sat down in the chair, a sturdy oak piece to match the desk, and flipped through the pile closest to me: invoices and bills. The next one consisted mostly of files of employee time sheets. Another was tax returns.
    Ugh. I was going to have to start dealing with all this pretty damn soon. Or get someone to do it for me. Letta must have had an accountant or bookkeeper who could help me get up to speed and maybe even take over a lot of the paperwork, at least for a while.
    But I wasn’t going to think about that right now. I picked up the last stack: a few food-related articles and a bunch of trade magazines.
    Next I pulled open the desk drawers and rummaged around. Two were empty; the paperwork on top of the desk must have come from those. Another was full of office supplies: pens and pencils, yellow stickies, paper clips, Wite-Out, tape, and a stapler. The last was equally disappointing: Gauguin stationary and envelopes, unused manila folders, and accordion files. Damn . I slammed the drawer shut.
    What about her computer? That might have something on it. I knew she had a laptop that she brought from home to the restaurant when she was here, but it wasn’t in the office.
    Duh! Of course the cops would