“We work nights.”

“That makes it worse.” She walked into the kitchen.

Emilio Carter, the estate’s head chef, stood beside a counter covered with untouched silver trays. He was a broad man in his early sixties with a gray mustache and the wounded pride of someone who’d once commanded one of Manhattan’s finest hotel kitchens.

“Those are being thrown away?” Hannah asked.

“Mr. Vale didn’t come down.”

“And the staff?”