The Merlot Murders

“I already know. Mason told me tonight.”

“I think it stinks.”

I made one more attempt to lever myself to a semi-sitting position. The aurora borealis was still going on inside my head, but I was lucid enough to figure out that we weren’t talking about the same thing. “What stinks?”

“Building a Civil War theme park. Here, of all places. It’s disgusting.”

“What are you talking about? The Blue Ridge Consortium offered to buy it, presumably to turn it into parkland, not theme-park land. Besides, who would want to build a Civil War theme park here, anyway? How dumb can you be to invent something when you’ve got the real McCoy?”

“That’s not what I heard,” she said. “Leland was approached by someone on behalf of a group of developers. They want to get in under the radar, get the land first. Then they’d work on bribing whoever they needed to in Richmond to get the zoning laws changed.”

“How do you know about this?”

“I’m a reporter. It’s my business to know.”

“Well,” I said, “it doesn’t matter anymore, anyway. The vineyard’s not for sale.”

“They’ll buy something else. You’re not the only fish in the pond.”

“The Blue Ridge Consortium will stop them, once they get wind of it. Besides, who do you know around here who’d like to have their farm back up on a theme park?”

“Don’t be naïve,” she said. “For enough money some people will do anything.” I opened my mouth to reply, but Kit shook her head. Quinn was walking toward us. She said in a low voice, “Don’t say anything about this. For once in my life, it would be nice to have a scoop and not get beat by the Post.”

I nodded as Quinn reached us. “Hector’s on his way. I found him talking to Eli when they were clearing up after the concert.” He leaned down and scooped me up. “Put your arms around my neck.”

He was settling me into the front seat of his Toyota when a black Corvette pulled into the parking lot and Hector got out.

“Stay here,” Quinn ordered, “while I talk to Hector.”

Eli said he wasn’t coming to any more festival events because of some deadline at work. At least, that was his story. Why did he change his plans?

“Do you still think Eli’s involved in this?” She read my mind.

“He wasn’t supposed to be here tonight. I want to talk to him.”

“About what? Maybe trying to kill you tonight in the barrel room? Come on, Lucie,” Kit said. “I think we ought to get Bobby over here.”

“Absolutely not…I need to talk to Eli, Kit. It’ll turn into a three-ring circus when Bobby gets involved.”

Quinn’s footsteps crunched on the gravel.

“Tomorrow,” Kit said. “I’m calling Bobby tomorrow. At least tonight I know you’re with Quinn.”

“Give me twenty-four hours. Then I’ll call Bobby myself. I promise.”

She nodded imperceptibly as Quinn said, “All right. It’s all set up with Hector. Why don’t we get out of here? We’ve got harvest again tomorrow morning.”

Kit left in the Jeep before we did, driving fast enough to churn up a cloud of dust. Her way of letting me know she was not happy with the way our conversation had gone. The Toyota started, sounding like a dentist’s drill that just hit something bad.

I leaned my head back against the vibrating seat. Who tried to kill me tonight?

Someone who knew his way around the winery and how to work all the equipment. Eli?

Not him. He was too concerned about any more “accidents” happening at the winery and what it might do to discourage prospective buyers. However much I stood in his way, he wouldn’t have picked the winery as a place for yet another murder.

Then who?

Quinn? He could have shut the power off, then gone back to the concert. Maybe Kit met him on a return trip to the barrel room, double-checking to make sure I was dead and his “concern,” as Kit called it, was part of the ruse. Now he was adamant that I go home with him, instead of her.

Hanging out at Mom’s Place watching Angela, he could have gotten to know Sara Rust. Sure. He could be a suspect.

And now here I was going home with him. Alone.

Maybe I’d just played right into his hands. 

Chapter 23

Quinn’s cottage was on the same dirt spur as Hector and Sera’s place, about a half-mile in the other direction. The last time I’d visited, Jacques lived there.

Quinn hadn’t left any lights on and, with the heavy tree canopy overhead, no ambient light permeated the woods. His cottage seemed smaller than I remembered, but perhaps it was the deceptive way places have of shrinking when memory is finally confronted by reality, as though you’re looking through the wrong end of the telescope.

He stopped the car. “I’ll come ’round and get you.”

“I can manage.”

“No, you can’t,” he said. “I found your cane on the floor in the barrel room. It’s got a big dent in it. You can’t use it the way it is. Hector said he’d try to straighten it out, but he’s not sure he can do it without breaking it. You got another one?”

“No.”

“Then sit still. I don’t need you falling on your face.” He sounded annoyed, more than anything else.

He nudged open the screen door with his foot and flipped on the light switch with his elbow. We were in the middle of the living room. It was as soulless as a hotel room. This was a man without a past or a present.

“You take my bed,” he said. “You’ll be comfortable there.”

“I wouldn’t dream of inconveniencing you.”

“The sheets are clean. I’ve been sleeping at the summerhouse. Or at Angie’s.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Nevertheless, I’d prefer to have you there.”

“In your bed.”

“I was thinking more in terms of you not being on the couch because it’s in a room with a door to the outside.”

“You think I might run away?”

“I think someone’s looking for you,” he said. “At least this way, they’d have to get past me first.”

He spoke in his characteristically blunt and unemotional way so it was hard to tell if he considered being my human shield as part of the maintenance responsibilities that came with his job or if he really cared what happened to me. Either way, his words were disturbing.

Quinn shifted my weight in his arms. “I need to set you down. My arm is going to sleep. Let’s get you into the bedroom.”

“I can walk.”

“You couldn’t even sit a while ago without getting dizzy.”

He carried me into the bedroom, a real monastic cell, and set me down on the bed.

“You want a drink?”

“What have you got?”

“Whiskey.”

“No wine?”

“I’ve got wine. You look like you could do with something stronger.”

“Carbon dioxide does that to me. Okay, then. Whiskey’s fine.”

The whiskey was somewhere in the living room. I could hear him rummaging around and then the sound of