Dread on Arrival by Claudia Bishop Read Free Book Online

the wall. So what if the prep table was battered from years of being whacked by butcher’s knives? So what if the twelve-burner stove was dulled and scratched? Who needed spiffy new Viking stoves in a multimillion dollar building like the academy? It was shabby, but it was home.
    “There’ve been some burglaries, too, while I was away?”
    “Oh, yeah. I forgot to tell you about that.” Meg ran her hands through her short dark hair, leaving a trail of goo. “No big deal, from what I hear.”
    “They may not be a big deal to you, but it sure looks like Carol Ann is trying to work up a law-and-order platform.”
    “Phooey on Carol Ann.” Meg finished the roux, edged past Elizabeth Chou to put the pan at the back of the twelve-burner stove, then disappeared into the pantry. She reappeared with a pound of bitter chocolate and handed it over to Bjarne. “She’ll never get elected. Everybody hates her.”
    “Everybody’s scared of her,” Elizabeth Chou said. “And I don’t even have a dog, like Max, that she can arrest now that she’s animal control officer. When she was tax assessor, I didn’t have a house she could tax, either. I’m still scared of her.”
    “Well, don’t be,” Meg said. “Forget about Carol Ann. She’s a nitwit. Any time we spend talking about Carol Ann Spinoza is time lost forever. None of this has anything to do with us. How’s that tapenade coming along?”
    Elizabeth looked at the pile of tomatoes on the cutting board. “I forgot about the tapenade.”
    “See? You were way too caught up in gossiping about Carol Ann. Move, move, move!”
    Kathleen Kiddermeister, the Inn’s head waitress, bustled in with her notepad held aloft. “Both dinner sittings are fully reserved,” she said. “I don’t know if we’re going to have a problem with walk-ins or not.” She bustled out again, the double doors to the dining rooms swinging in her wake.
    “Jeez,” Meg said. “I hate to turn people away. Maybe we ought to think about full service in the lounge for real, Quill.” She grinned, suddenly. “Nice to have this kind of problem, isn’t it? But with the Ancestor’s Attic people doing the show here, we’re bound to get some major word of mouth going, and we’ve got to look to the future.” She grabbed a fistful of leeks from the sieve in the prep sink and began to peel them with manic energy. “If we go ahead with the expansion I can turn twice the number of tables we’re turning now.”
    Quill set the rocker going, resisting the impulse to run upstairs. Jack was still asleep, and she’d learned to her cost not to wake him up. She’d give herself ten minutes of downtime here in the kitchen, and then she’d get back to work. And she wouldn’t think about how nice it would be to go upstairs, cuddle his warm and sleepy little body next to hers and drift off herself. “You’re already working six days a week, and half the time you don’t even take your Monday off. You’re not serious about expansion.”
    “Why not?”
    There was a challenging set to her sister’s shoulders.
    “I mean it’s certainly a possibility,” Quill said cautiously.
    “Ha. I know you too well, sister. That’s the classic Quilliam brush-off. You got it from Dad. Listen.” Meg waved a leek at her. “We give Bjarne a raise …”
    “That is a very good idea,” Bjarne said from his post at the stove. “Even if we do not expand, it is a good idea to give me a raise.”
    “Me, too,” Elizabeth said. “My rent’s going up next month.”
    “And we hire a couple of really good people …”
    Quill threw up her hands. “Where are we going to find these really good people?”
    Meg glanced from side to side, then said in a whisper, “I think a couple of people at Bonne Goutè are ready to jump ship.”
    Quill stopped the rocker. “You’re kidding me.”
    “Nope. I know it for a fact. Rather,” she added with a conscientious air, “I’m pretty sure they’re ready to, if the offer’s