nostalgia. As I looked around the bedroom, I couldn’t summon any of the regenerative magic of my family. Today as I sweltered in the late August heat, the place felt like a mausoleum.
I sat on the edge of the bed and rifled through the pile of magazines and papers on Leland’s marble-topped nightstand. It looked like he had taken to transacting some of his business from bed, instead of his office. The top piece of paper was a two-month-old bill from the company that made our labels. No doubt unpaid.
I pulled the wastebasket next to me and began tossing things. He’d obviously continued investing in what Eli called his “fly-by-night” scams. With money we didn’t have. The first one involved a soon-to-be-created tax haven off the coast of Central America. Some guy who called himself Prince Larry was building a pontoon island called “Heaven.” Reading between the lines, it would be a no-questions-asked place to park cash that couldn’t show up on a tax return or a set of corporate books. That would be in addition to the research center devoted to the study of eternal youth. First, though, the prince needed a little seed money to get going and Leland was one of the lucky ones to appear on his radar.
Another brochure advertised lunar real estate. Eli hadn’t been kidding. A group of Florida developers claiming to be affiliated with NASA were selling plots of land on the moon. They were currently seeking investors in the “preconstruction phase.”
I tossed the prince and the lunar condos in the trash along with a few other gems, but kept a folder called “Blue Ridge Consortium.” Inside was a single sheet of paper—a letter called “Preserving Our Heritage, Protecting Our Wilderness.” It was addressed “Dear Heritage Friend.” It, too, was an appeal for money.
“All donations to the Blue Ridge Consortium will allow us to continue buying land for the purpose of turning it into parkland. This land will never be developed,” the letter stated. “It will be your legacy to your children and your children’s children. We cannot allow the natural beauty of our region to be paved over to make way for shopping malls and condominium developments. Your generous donation will continue to preserve a region of great historic significance.” It was signed by Nate Midas, who was appropriately named. He owned a media conglomerate and had a stable full of prize-winning horses over in Upperville.
The minimum donation was $10,000. Depending on the size of the contribution, the organizers wanted to express their thanks. An all-expense-paid weekend at the Greenbriar. Box seats at the Kentucky Derby. Four days and three nights in Vail during ski season. A week in Tortola at a private villa. It was a safe bet we weren’t members of the consortium.
I could see through the paper that there was writing on the back so I turned it over. Doodling.
Mason’s name, with an elaborately embellished box around it. Two phone numbers at the bottom—outside the box—neither of which I recognized.
I reached for the bedside phone and dialed the first number. After a few rings an answering machine kicked in.
“Hi, it’s Sara. I’m not here. Leave a message and have an awesome day. Here’s the beep.” A singsongy girlish voice like a teenager. If she’d written the message, there would be little hearts instead of dots over the i’s. I hung up.
The second number rang half a dozen times then someone answered.
“Gas-o-Rama, whacanidoforyou?” He sounded Hispanic.
“Uh, nothing. Sorry, wrong number.” A gas station.
Whatever Leland had been up to before he died, he hadn’t left any obvious clues about who wanted to buy the vineyard. I reached in the pocket of my jeans for the little key Fitz had given me. I’d been carrying it around like a talisman, trying it out on anything in the house with a lock on it. The mantel clock in the parlor. The elaborately carved chest with its mother-of-pearl inlay containing the Bessette family silver in the dining room. Even the old bread box.
It would be just like my mother to leave whatever the key opened here in this room and Leland to never find it. I walked over to her mirrored dressing table, pulling open the drawers. They were empty. The drawer and cabinet of her matching bedside table were also empty. Under the bed was a different story. Besides the now- familiar basketball-sized dust bunnies were more newspapers and magazines. I used my cane like a hook and pulled some of them out so I could see them. Old copies of the
The magazines needed to return to utter darkness where they came from—or some gutter—but when I tried to shove them back under the bed, something blocked the way. I knelt down and pulled out a shallow box that probably once held a case of beer but now was filled with papers.
More bills, these from months ago. Also a copy of the
The jailed winemaker was not Quinn but a man named Allen Cantor, who had been the senior winemaker at Le Coq Rouge Winery in Calistoga, California. He’d been adulterating wine—with tap water, no less—and selling it under a different label to distributors in Eastern Europe and Russia. He’d gotten away with it for several years, making millions of dollars under the table, until someone analyzed a bottle of Chardonnay at a competition. The Homeland Security people got involved, suspecting possible bioterrorism and instead they uncovered fraud and embezzlement. Assistant winemaker Paolo Santori had not been charged, but the owner, Tavis Hennessey, fired him anyway.
Cantor’s personal financial records showed a man who was heavily in debt and on the verge of declaring bankruptcy. Authorities suspected he’d merely moved money to an offshore bank and were pursuing the matter. A photograph taken in the wine cellar of Le Coq Rouge showed Tavis Hennessey, Allen Cantor, and Paolo Santori in happier times with their arms around one another’s shoulders. The last sentence quoted Hennessey who said he expected to close the winery.
Though he had a ponytail back then and he wasn’t wearing a Hawaiian shirt, it was clearly Quinn. I called directory assistance and got the phone number for Le Coq Rouge. An automated voice announced, not surprisingly, that the number was no longer in service. There was no forwarding number.
How long had Leland known about this? Had Quinn given him the article himself, been up front about his past? Had Leland decided to hire him, anyway? Someone with this kind of dicey background wouldn’t bother Leland in the least. Hell, people like that were his business partners. They probably got along like a house on fire.
It was also possible Leland hadn’t known anything about this. Maybe Quinn caught a lucky break when his new employer skipped the background check in a rush to find a winemaker after Jacques’s sudden departure. Obviously, though, Leland found out somehow about what happened in California.
Then what? Had Leland threatened to expose him? Dismiss him? In that case, Leland’s death had been convenient, even helpful, for Quinn. Not to mention he’d freely admitted going back to the Merlot block and cleaning up all traces of what had happened, even down to looking for the bullet that had killed Leland. Out in the vineyard this morning he’d tried to bully me, saying he was going to run things his way, listening to my opinion but doing what he pleased. With Leland out of the picture, Quinn probably figured now he had carte blanche, with no one to stop him from doing just that.
Which meant he, too, had a motive for murder.
Chapter 14
The phone rang while I was still holding the newspaper.
It was Dominique and she sounded elated. “You’ll never guess what Quinn has done.”
“I can’t imagine.”
“He went by the sheriff’s office this morning. They’re taking down that yellow tape. Can you get over here? We’re moving the buffet and the wine-tasting back to the villa. Isn’t that great?”
“He’s full of surprises, isn’t he?” So Thelma had been right about his whereabouts. “Give me twenty minutes.”
