“Or he got the information from the paramedic who listed the belt in his squad report,” I countered.
Amburgey backed away from the computer. He said coldly, “I’ll trust you to do something to ensure the confidentiality of your office records. Get the girl who looks after your computer to change the password. Whatever it takes, Dr. Scarpetta. And I’ll expect a written statement from you pertaining to the matter.”
He moved to the doorway, hesitating long enough to toss back at me, “Copies will be given to the appropriate parties, and then it remains to be seen if any further measures will have to be taken.”
With that he was gone, Tanner at his heels.
When all else fails, I cook.
Some people go out after a god-awful day and slam a tennis ball around or jog their joints to pieces on a fitness course. I had a friend in Coral Gables who would escape to the beach with her folding chair and burn off her stress with sun and a slightly pornographic romance she wouldn’t have been caught dead reading in her professional world she was a district court judge. Many of the cops I know wash away their miseries with beer at the FOP lounge.
I’ve never been particularly athletic, and there wasn’t a decent beach within reasonable driving distance. Getting drunk never solved anything. Cooking was an indulgence I didn’t have time for most days, and though Italian cuisine isn’t my only love, it has always been what I do best.
“Use the finest side of the grater,” I was saying to Lucy over the noise of water running in the sink.
“But it’s so hard,” she complained, blowing in frustration.
“Aged parmigiano-reggiano is hard. And watch your knuckles, okay?”
I finished rinsing green peppers, mushrooms and onions, patted them dry and placed them on the cutting board. Simmering on the stove was sauce made last summer from fresh Hanover tomatoes, basil, oregano and several cloves of crushed garlic. I always kept a good supply in the freezer for times like these. Luganega sausage was draining on paper towels near other towels of browned lean beef. High-gluten dough was on the counter rising beneath a damp dish towel, and crumbled in a bowl was whole-milk mozzarella imported from New York and still packed in its brine when I’d bought it at my favorite deli on West Avenue. At room temperature the cheese is soft like butter, when melted is wonderfully stringy.
“Mom always gets the boxed kind and adds a bunch of junk to it,” Lucy said breathlessly. “Or she buys the kind already made in the grocery store.”
“That’s deplorable,” I retorted, and I meant it. “How can she eat such a thing?” I began to chop. “Your grandmother would have let us starve first.”
My sister has never liked cooking. I’ve never understood why. Some of the happiest times when we were growing up were spent around the dinner table. When our father was well, he would sit at the head of the table and ceremoniously serve our plates with great mounds of steaming spaghetti or fettuccine or-on Fridays-frittata. No matter how poor we were, there was always plenty of food and wine, and it was always a joy when I came home from school and was greeted by delicious smells and promising sounds coming from the kitchen.
It was sad and a violation of tradition that Lucy knew nothing of these things. I assumed when she came home from school most days she walked into a quiet, indifferent house where dinner was a drudgery to be put off until the last minute. My sister should never have been a mother. My sister should never have been Italian.
Greasing my hands with olive oil, I began to knead the dough, working it hard until the small muscles in my arms hurt.
“Can you twirl it like they do on TV?” Lucy stopped what she was doing, staring wide-eyed at me.
I gave her a demonstration.
“Wow!”
“It’s not so hard.”
I smiled as the dough slowly spread out over my fists. “The trick is to keep your fingers tucked in so you don’t poke holes in it.”