Chapter 7 - The Boiling Point
The dinner progressed through three courses of roasted tenderloin and Chilean sea bass, but the tension along the north wall of the ballroom never dissipated.
Roz stayed by the dessert station, assisting the hotel waitstaff with plating. Carmela had taken her seat at the high table on the dais, flanked by Luca on her right and the Archbishop of Milwaukee on her left. Serena sat across from Luca, leaning forward every three minutes to whisper in his ear, laugh at some private joke, or place a manicured hand casually over his forearm.
Luca’s face was an unreadable mask. He drank sparkling water, nodded politely to the Archbishop, and whenever Serena leaned in too close, he subtly shifted his shoulder just far enough to break the contact.
At 9:15, the dessert service officially commenced.
The mini pies were an instantaneous, undeniable sensation. Wealthy matrons who normally lived on celery water and champagne were seen returning to the dessert station for second helpings of the bourbon pecan. A circuit judge from Waukesha loudly declared that the sour-cherry crumble was the finest thing he had tasted since 1978.
Carmela rose from the high table and made her way down the steps of the dais, leaning on her ebony cane. She walked straight to the dessert table, where Roz was restocking the banana cream display.
"The pastry is acceptable," Carmela announced loudly enough for the surrounding table of state senators to hear. "Better than the rubbish they serve at the University Club."
"Thank you, Carmela," Roz said with a small smile.
Serena appeared out of the crowd like a silver shark scenting blood. She had abandoned her champagne flute, her eyes fixed on the old woman with barely concealed malice.
"Carmela, darling," Serena said, her voice dripping with artificial sweetness. "Should you really be hovering over the sugar station? We all know how fragile your health has been lately. We wouldn't want another... embarrassing episode with the ambulance, would we?"
Carmela turned slowly, leaning both hands on the silver head of her cane. "The only embarrassing episode in this family, Serena, occurred two years ago when my grandson realized your pedigree came with an empty head and an overdraft notice."
Several guests nearby choked on their coffee.
Serena’s pale cheeks flushed a violent, mottled crimson. She took two steps forward, entering Carmela’s personal space with aggressive deliberation. "You miserable old hag. You think because your husband built this town, you can insult me? You’re an obsolete relic clinging to a family that has outgrown you. Luca doesn't want you here. Nobody wants you here. You’re just a nuisance who needs to be locked away before you embarrass us all."
Carmela didn't back down an inch, but Roz saw the tiny, frail tremor in the old woman’s hand against the cane. She saw the pale, papery skin beneath Carmela’s eyes tighten with sudden, vulnerable pain.
Roz stepped around the display riser.
"Step back, Miss Vance," Roz said, her voice dropping into a register that cut clean through the ballroom noise.
Serena whipped around, her eyes flashing with pure fury. "Stay out of this, you disgusting pig! This is family business!"
"Carmela is not your family," Roz said, her brown eyes burning like heated coals. "And you are speaking to an eighty-two-year-old woman who has more class in her clipped fingernails than you have in your entire hollow, starved body."
Serena’s mouth twisted into an ugly, venomous sneer. She leaned in toward Roz, her silver-clad chest heaving. "You think you can lecture me? Look at you! You’re a pathetic, fat loser who sells sugar to lonely old women because no man will ever look at you without wanting to throw up! You’re just a fat, miserable, pathetic—"
"Say fat one more time," Roz warned. Her voice was not loud; it was terrifyingly quiet, flat, and absolute.
Serena laughed—a shrill, manic bray of pure arrogance. "Fat! You’re a fat, disgusting—"
Roz didn't reach for a plate. She didn't reach for a napkin.
On the prep tray directly beside her hip sat a full nine-inch banana cream pie—the display centerpiece, laden with three pounds of rich vanilla custard, four sliced bananas, and a towering mountain of stabilized heavy cream dusted with Dutch cocoa powder.
Roz’s hands moved with the practiced, seamless efficiency of a woman who handled fifty pounds of dough before sunrise every morning.
May you like
She seized the tin with both hands. Her hips rotated. Her shoulders followed through.
The pie did not merely fly; it launched on a flat, violent trajectory across four feet of open air, striking Serena Vance squarely between the bridge of her nose and her collarbone with a wet, thunderous SCHWACK that sounded like a wet sandbag dropped from a second-story window.
