entering. Have your look around, then let’s get out of here.”
I flipped on the lights and Pépé whistled. “Nice, isn’t it?” I said.
“Someone spent a lot of money.”
“Look. The Washington bottle,” I said. It was in a small alcove above the bar on its own, caught in the soft wash of a low-wattage spotlight. “So Nicole didn’t get it, after all. I guess Jack or Sunny must have moved it back here after the break-in.”
“Let’s go see where you found the Latour,” Pépé said. “And then I think we should leave.”
The tiny twinkling spotlights shining on the dark walls and slate floor made the place seem moodily theatrical. We walked past the stair-stepped freestanding wine racks to the rows of shelves and their floor-to-ceiling racks containing bottles of wine. I led Pépé down what seemed like endless mazelike rows until we came to the Bordeaux. The jeroboams were in a separate location since they didn’t fit in the standard racks.
I pointed to an empty space next to a jeroboam of Latour. “I bet Shane took it from here.”
“Okay,” he said. “Now we go to the sheriff.”
The sound of the front door closing—loudly, as though a blast of wind caught it—sent my heart into my throat. Pépé’s eyes met mine and he put a finger to his lips.
“Stay here,” I whispered. “It’s probably Jack or Sunny. I’ll say the door was unlocked and tell them about the auction papers.”
I walked around the corner and stepped into the light pool of a small spotlight.
“Well, well. What are you doing here, Lucie?”
Shane Cunningham stood in the doorway, dressed as though he’d been out riding. He was holding a hunting rifle and he did not look pleased to see me.
Chapter 27
“I came by to see Sunny,” I said. “There was no one at the house so I checked here. It was unlocked so I came in.”
“That’s odd.” He came into the room and closed the door. “I was here earlier working on the inventory and I know I locked up. Sunny’s got a meeting in Charlottesville and Jack is at the store. Sorry about the gun, but I thought maybe whoever broke into the place the other night had come back. Didn’t mean to scare you.”
I laughed, giddily relieved at the reprieve. “Don’t apologize. Sorry I scared you, too.” I walked over to the marble and redwood bar where I’d left the folder. “I brought this for Sunny—”
“What the hell’s going on here?” The door opened once again. Jack Greenfield seemed to block all the available light coming from the outside. He looked from me to Shane and the rifle and his eyebrows knitted together. At that moment I knew he was guilty of something because he looked like the devil himself.
“Good God, Shane. What are you doing with that?” Jack stared hard at me as though I’d somehow let him down and shook his head. “Why did you come here, Lucie? Why couldn’t you have stayed out of it?”
“Shut up!” Shane said. “Shut up, you fool.”
For a moment no one spoke. Jack looked at Shane and the light went out of his eyes. “How was I supposed to know? You’re standing there with the goddamn rifle.”
“And you’re supposed to be at the store. She was here when I arrived. I told her I thought whoever broke into the place the other night might have come back.” Shane raised his rifle like a club and said to me, “You don’t know what you’ve just done. Jack’s right. You should have stayed out of it.”
“Stayed out of what?” I said. My hands were slick with sweat and my legs were shaking. I leaned on my cane for support.
“She knows,” Shane said to Jack. “Or she wouldn’t be here.”
“Now what do we do?” Jack asked.
Shane shrugged. “I can make it look like an accident.”
“Like Valerie?” I pointed to the Washington wine. “You killed her and Nicole for that bottle of wine? Or was it because of the Dorgon and what your father did during the war?”
At the mention of the Dorgon, Jack came inside the room, slamming the door. “What about the Dorgon?”
“Nothing. I got rid of it.” Shane looked Jack in the eye with the smooth assurance of a practiced liar.
“No, he didn’t. The bottles are in the pond in your backyard,” I said. “The labels floated to the surface.”
Shane blinked rapidly and twirled a finger by his temple. “She’s crazy. The wine’s gone.”
“You bastard,” Jack said.
“What did Valerie find out about the Dorgon, Jack?” I asked. “That your father was no hero during the war? That he didn’t really help the French winemakers protect what was theirs so the Nazis wouldn’t confiscate it? He stole and looted just like the others, didn’t he? Maybe worse.”
Jack picked at something imaginary on the sleeve of his expensive blazer. When he looked up, his face was filled with rage. “You have no right to judge. What choice did my father have? You don’t understand…none of us do. None of us were there. He did what he had to do.”
“Then why did you tell Sunny the wine was a thank-you gift from someone your father helped?” I asked. “Someone grateful for his bravery and courage.”
He closed his eyes. When he opened them, they were haunted by betrayal. “Because that is what he told me. Because I believed he was a good man who tried to help others.”
Whether Jack’s father genuinely believed he was acting as a patriotic soldier for the Fatherland obeying Hitler’s orders, or whether he’d been one of the thousands of Nazi soldiers who plundered and destroyed the vineyards of France was something I was sure he’d already answered for when he met his Maker. But he’d heaped even more shame on what he’d done because of the lies and the myth he’d perpetuated so the son believed that his father had courageously risked his life by defying his superiors, that he’d been a man of conscience, and that the bottles of wine he brought home were gifts in tribute to his heroism.
Instead it was the spoils of war. Blood wine.
“What did Valerie tell you?” I asked.
“None of your business.”
“Your father did something to the family who owned the vineyard, didn’t he?”
Jack shrugged. “He was ordered to confiscate the property. The wine was needed for industrial alcohol. It was near the end of the war. We had nothing. And the château became a hospital for our soldiers.”
We. Our. I flinched at his use of pronouns. “What happened to the family who lived there?”
Another shrug. “They were Jewish.”
“Your father sent them to the camps?”
“I have answered enough of your questions.”
Somewhere behind me, Pépé was listening to the son of a man who had fought against him during the war. I wondered if he was remembering his missions through France, leading those who needed to get to safety while Jack’s father condemned a family for the unforgivable sin of their religion.
“Valerie tried to blackmail you. She was broke and she needed money so she came to you and threatened to tell what she knew and humiliate you. You needed to get rid of her and you tampered with her car.” I glanced at Shane. “Or someone else did.”
“I don’t need to listen to this,” Jack said. “And you don’t know what you’re saying.”
“You killed Nicole, too. Valerie talked to her before she died, so Nicole knew something was up.”
Jack glanced scathingly in Shane’s direction. “Nicole was a greedy young woman who stupidly tried to profit off her friend’s…misfortune.”
“Not so stupid she didn’t help you set up your phony robbery,” I said.
I caught the surprised look that passed between them. “She didn’t set up anything,” Shane said.
“Then who did?”
They were silent and that’s when the pieces fell into place. Or at least some of them. “
