It was well past the noon rush before Kate finally had time to think about lunch. She heated up some of the leftover kreatopita. Magically, the minute she opened the warm oven door Oliver trotted down the stairs.
“You have a good nap? Guess what? It’s lunchtime. Way past lunchtime. But I’m betting your nose told you that. First, though, we let this cool,” she said, lifting the pie protectively to a rack at the back of the counter. “Trust me on that one.”
The phone rang. Reflexively, Kate grabbed it.
Oliver let out a soft whine.
“I know, I know,” she said, covering the receiver. “But business is business. More puppy toys and big tubs of peanut butter.”
Oliver licked his chops.
“The Cookie House, this is Kate,” she announced brightly into the phone.
“Kate, it’s Annie Kim. Listen, I’ve been poking around, and I think I might have found something interesting.”
“Have you had lunch yet?”
“No, and don’t tell my moms,” Annie whispered into the phone. “She’ll freak.”
“You’re not a vegetarian, are you?”
“Not in this lifetime.”
“In that case, come on over. The lunch crowd is gone, Oliver’s here, and I’ve got a meat pie you’re going to love.”
“Oh man, this is good,” Annie said. “Moms makes something similar. She calls hers a ‘hand pie.’ But the crust is different. And I really like the hamburger in this. What did you say this was?”
“Kreatopita. Or, at least, my dog-friendly version of it.”
Annie smiled. “Yeah, the little guy really likes it, too.”
They both looked down at Oliver, who was going to town on his own piece. His tail wagged furiously, and the paper plate in front of him was nearly clean.
“So what did you discover?” Kate asked when she could no longer contain her curiosity.
Annie swallowed, smiled, and cut off another bite with her fork. “The drug that killed Stewart Lord and Muriel Hopkins? I already told you guys and the police that Sam didn’t have access to it. At least, not from what I’ve seen. The truth is, I can’t even find anyone Sam knows who took it. And that’s on the QT.”
Kate nodded, devouring another morsel of pie.
“But there’s a guy in Lord’s office who takes it regularly. Re-upped his monthly prescription on the eleventh of last month. But he came in and bought another month’s supply on the sixteenth.”
“That was the day Muriel died,” Kate said.
Annie nodded, taking another forkful of the savory pie. “I had to call in a few favors. And, frankly, I’m not sure it’s strictly ‘legal,’” she said, using air quotes. “But I had his pharmacist examine his usage patterns. Regular as clockwork. The guy’s been taking the stuff for years. Never ‘spilled’ pills or ‘lost’ a bottle. And trust me, as a pharmacist, you see plenty of that. But he has a routine. He usually picks up the new prescription the weekend before the old one runs out.”
“Everybody runs errands on the weekend,” Kate said.
“Exactly,” Annie seconded, neatly helping herself to another slice of meat pie. “He takes one pill a day and should have finished his old batch on Tuesday, then started the brand-new bottle on Wednesday. Instead, he’s back to the drugstore on Thursday saying he’s all out of meds.”
“Who is he?” Kate asked. “Or can you tell me?”
“Technically, HIPAA regs prevent me from sharing anything. But just between us, I’m calling Ben and telling him he should take a much closer look at Stewart Lord’s company attorney.”