Crush

beneficial to your efforts. That’s all true.”

Benezra dug out his phone. He dialed, spoke with Nicholson, and did as Dixon instructed. He slid the phone back in his jacket. “He trusts me to do the right thing. Am I doing the right thing, Ms. Dixon?”

Dixon locked eyes with Benezra. “If you only knew.”

Benezra sighed deeply. “My PI found payoffs to Timothy Nance, Church’s District Director, in a private account. Two payments of twenty-five grand apiece. We think they came from Crystal Dahlia, which would make sense, but we’re not sure. And it seems the fifty grand was shipped out of the account a couple days later.”

“To where?”

“Don’t know. My PI hasn’t finished digging. It’s . . . sensitive work. We have to be very careful. But it looks like Nance was taking a bribe to influence government legislation regarding the minimum grape requirement for the AVA.”

Vail held up a hand. “Hang on a second. I’m not sure we can reach that conclusion. Those are pretty serious charges. Taking bribes, influence peddling. Corruption, graft.”

Benezra looked away. “Congressman Church is close friends with the director of the Regulations and Ruling Division of the TTB. And they administer AVA designations. Does that change your opinion?”

Vail raised her brow. Yeah, that’d change mine.

“Kind of strange for a man who’s thinking of running for governor to do something like this,” Dixon said.

“Governor?” Benezra asked. “That’s news to me.”

“How deeply involved is Church in all this?” Vail asked.

Benezra shrugged. “I couldn’t say Church is involved in any of this. Nance may’ve simply taken the money with the intent of convincing the congressman to talk with his buddy at the TTB. I wouldn’t be surprised if Church has no idea what Nance is doing.” He turned to face Dixon. “Can I trust you, Ms. Dixon?”

Dixon shoved her hands into her pockets. “I think you already have.”

Benezra nodded. “Fair enough.” He studied Dixon’s face, then said, “One of your law enforcement colleagues also appears to be involved.”

“Who?”

“Scott Fuller.”

“Involved, as in the AVA issue, the bribery?”

“His name came up, more than once. But I’ll leave it to you to look into it further. Fuller wasn’t the big fish, so I told my PI to first concentrate on Nance and Church.” Benezra tipped his chin back. “Now . . . the info you had to exchange?”

“Off the record,” Dixon said. “And not for publication. Fuller, along with a guy named Walton Silva and Nance, were involved in an arson plot. Fuller’s dead. Silva’s in custody. Nance is implicated, but free. I’m not sure that helps you much.”

Benezra considered that a moment. “I think it tells me this might be larger than we’d thought. We need to seriously consider turning this over to the Feds to investigate. Let them sort it out.” Benezra looked down at his watch. “I have to go, my ten thirty.”

Dixon extended a hand. “Thank you. This won’t go beyond us. From our end, anyway, we’ll keep you out of it. If you share this stuff with the Feds—and I do recommend you do that—they’ll obviously want to see everything you’ve got.”

Benezra nodded, bid them good luck, then walked back through the glass door.

VAIL AND DIXON headed to the sheriff’s department in silence, both working through the information Marc Benezra had given them.

“I kind of liked the guy,” Vail finally said. “He didn’t have to tell us shit.”

“Yeah, and what he did tell us . . . it kind of puts things in a different light. I’m now wondering about that arson. Silva and Nance lied to us.”

“If you were taking bribes, would you tell the police? Either that or Silva was kept in the dark and Nance and Fuller kept the money for themselves, figuring the promise about getting a post in a governor’s administration was enough for Silva.”

Dixon cocked her head. “Yeah, but that’s playing with fire. If Silva finds out they were taking money and not sharing it, he could get pissed and start talking.”

“Playing with fire?”

Dixon winced. “No pun intended.”

Vail shook her head. “I don’t think he’d start talking—not only would he blow his chance at a major career boost, anything he’d say would implicate himself. And for what? It wasn’t that much money, especially split three ways.”

Dixon tapped her fingers on the dash beyond the steering wheel. “People have killed for a lot less.”

“The jewel in this ring was the position they’d get in the governor’s administration.”

Dixon nodded. “Okay.”

“So,” Vail said, “let’s back up. Nance and Fuller are concerned with my determination to go public with a serial killer on the loose in Napa. It brings in the media. More Feds. More scrutiny. And that’s clearly something they wouldn’t want because it’d jeopardize their future careers. Not to mention the nice payoffs on the side.”

Dixon slid the car into a spot outside the sheriff’s department. “There might’ve been more money on its way. Could it be the stakes were even higher than we know? Maybe Benezra’s PI only uncovered one root of the tree. This may go deeper and farther.”

“Sometimes a hammer is just a hammer, Roxxann.”

“Either way, it still doesn’t get us closer to the Crush Killer. Unless that tree is freaking huge, and we’re missing more than we realize.”

Vail got that stab in the gut again. “I think that’s what’s been bothering me.”

FORTY-SIX

The rest of the task force was still in the conference room, making phone calls and tossing around theories. Coffee cups and crumpled lumps of paper littered the table. When Vail and Dixon relayed what they had just learned, they all leaned back in their chairs to digest it.

“Just when I think we’re on the right track,” Brix said, “something gets tossed into the mix that makes us rethink everything.”

“You guys come up with anything on Superior Bottling?” Dixon asked.

“Record’s clean,” Lugo said. “None of their employees have ever had any brushes with the law. No complaints with the Better Business Bureau.” He looked down at the pad in front of him. “Chamber of Commerce thinks they’re model corporate citizens. I checked with a bunch of my winery contacts—from growers to vintners—at Oakville Winegrowers Association, Rutherford Dust Society, Stag’s Leap Wine-grower’s Association, Oak Knoll Winegrowers . . . bottom line is, no one had anything bad to say about them.”

“What you’re saying is you didn’t pick up any dirt on the grapevine,” Vail said.

Dixon smirked. “That was bad.”

“And,” Mann said, ignoring Vail’s pun, “I checked with my TTB office. No federal violations on record.”

“Fine,” Dixon said. “Then let’s focus on what’s most likely to give us something.”

“I think we should at least go there, talk with them,” Vail said. “Shake the tree.”

“I agree,” Brix said. He walked to the front of the room and dug through some papers. Pulled out a page and handed it to Dixon. “Here’s some background on Cesar Guevara. But there’s something you gotta know. Silver Ridge uses them. So if you want me to hang back—”

“Why would you hang back?” Mann asked.

Brix put his hands on his hips. “All right, listen up. For those of you who don’t know, I’m a silent partner in Silver Ridge. My brother handles all of its business operations. I have no say in any of it—nor do I want to. For this very reason. Keeps things clean and simple. This hasn’t substantively affected Victoria Cameron’s investigation. Has it, Roxx?”

“No.”

“Anyone got any questions or concerns? Now’s the time.”