came outside carrying a silver tray with a Portmeirion teapot, matching dishes, a cloth-covered basket, and a pretty cut-glass bowl of summer berries.
Mick’s house, like mine, had been built on a hill where it commanded a spectacular view of the Blue Ridge. The former owner had taken advantage of the way the hill dropped off to a long vista of the Piedmont anchored by distant mountains and had put in an infinity pool—a swimming pool with no edge or rim on one side that gave the effect of water disappearing at the horizon, almost as if it were joining the sky. In reality it cascaded like a waterfall into a smaller pool below where it was pumped through filters back into the main pool. The effect always took my breath away.
Mick clicked off his phone and tossed it on the table, getting up and pulling me to him. He kissed me swiftly on the lips and held me so close I smelled horses and sweat, and a faint whiff of whatever his housekeeper used to wash his clothes. His arms tightened around me.
I placed my hands on his chest. He sensed the restraint and pulled back.
“What does it take for a girl to get fed around this place?” I asked. “You did promise tea.”
I hated that his easy sexuality could still knock me off balance—and that he knew it—the implied intimacy of lovers who had just gotten out of bed or the shower together. Mick was a man of angles and planes, nothing soft or yielding about him, both in his business dealings and his physical features. His face was fair and smooth shaven, but it had been burned brown by years in the Florida sun and wind whipped from riding fast horses while foxhunting and playing polo at dizzying breakneck speed. He looked lean and hard muscled, more like a rugged American cowboy than an English gentleman.
“I’ll feed you myself,” he said and grinned. “It’s good to see you, love. Thanks for coming by. Please …” He gestured to the table and two chairs.
We sat across from each other and, as if she had been waiting behind the boxwood hedge, the housekeeper appeared with another tray, this one with little bowls filled with jam and thick cream, a plate of lemon slices for the tea, a sugar bowl, and a small pitcher of milk.
“Do you fancy coffee?” he asked. “Or is tea okay?”
“Tea’s fine,” I said as he picked up the pot, nodding dismissal at the girl. “This looks lovely.”
“You look absolutely shattered,” he said as the gate to the pool closed and we were alone again. “Something wrong?”
“My grandfather and I had drinks with Charles Thiessman at his lodge last night. Or more like very early this morning.”
Mick smiled. “That gardener bloke drive you home, too?”
I nodded and our eyes met like a couple of guilty underage kids who’d conspired to get drunk as lords behind their parents’ backs. “I told him you and I had spoken about this California wine he talked you into buying. He seemed surprised we’d discussed it.”
What Charles hadn’t said was how much he had told Mick about Teddy Fargo, or Theo Graf, and about his obsession with learning whether black roses grew somewhere on the property. My guess was that Mick knew only what Charles believed he needed to know and nothing more.
“Truth be told, I was surprised he came to me with the information in the first place. Apparently he’s got loads of contacts in the wine world out in California.” Mick indicated the rose garden. “I think it was the connection with roses. This place in Calistoga is supposed to have quite the fabulous rose garden attached to it.” He gave me a lopsided grin. “Which probably explains why they call it Rose Hill.”
“He did mention the roses.” I stabbed a slice of lemon with a tiny fork. “Did he say anything specific about them to you?”
Mick didn’t answer right away. “About the roses? What do you mean?”
I stirred my tea. Mick was shrewd. I shouldn’t have brought up the subject if I didn’t want him to connect the dots.
“Nothing. I just thought he went to a lot of trouble getting my grandfather invited to this Bohemian Grove meeting and then indirectly arranged through you for me to accompany Pépé to California.”
Mick burst out laughing. “You’ve got this the wrong way around. Being invited to give one of the lakeside talks at the Bohemian Grove is huge, Lucie. The most important men on the planet belong to that club. Crikey, it’s easier to marry a royal and get yourself a title than it is to join that lot. I have friends whose fathers were still on the waiting list when they died—and I’m talking decades.”
“So you know about this Bohemian Club, too?”
He nodded. “Who doesn’t? I think it was Herbert Hoover who called their July campout ‘the greatest men’s party on earth.’ I’d cut off a limb to be a member, even with some of the boys’ own silliness that goes with it.”
He untucked the cloth that swaddled the breadbasket, releasing the warm, fragrant aroma of fresh scones.
“Did your housekeeper make these? They smell heavenly.”
He smirked. “Taught her everything she knows about English cuisine. Quick study, that Victoria.”
“Oh, so she had five minutes to learn, did she? ‘English’ and ‘cuisine’ don’t belong in the same sentence, you know.”
“You bloody frogs are all alike.” He made a face as he broke open a scone and heaped berries on it. “Think you invented cooking.”
“No, we just perfected it.” I drank some tea. “What about the silliness at the Bohemian Grove? Is Pépé going to have to put on a goofy hat or wear his underwear outside his trousers, like some fraternity hazing right of passage?”
“Nothing that unimaginative. There’s clotted cream for the berries, English clotted cream.” He passed me the bowl. “They’ve got this opening ceremony each year that could sound a little dodgy, if you didn’t realize it was just a bunch of lads letting off steam and bonding. The caveat is they’re the richest, most powerful men in the world. The club has a motto: ‘Weaving spiders come not here.’ Shakespeare.
“What do they do for their opening ceremony?”
“Oh, they dress in robes like monks and light some funeral pyre in the middle of a lake to represent worldly cares and cremate the bloody thing. So for a couple of weeks, you shrug off the burdens and worries you haul around the rest of the time and you’re free to do things like pee openly against trees and drink like a fish. They also put on concerts, plays … the entertainment is supposed to be incredible.”
“How very bohemian sounding,” I said. “Especially the tree peeing.”
He waved a hand and said through a mouthful of berries, “Not that kind of bohemian—long hair, unwashed tie-dyed shirts, and angst-filled poetry. Don’t forget they were founded in the 1870s. It meant London, beau monde, a club that was a place for eminent men who used their wealth to do good.”
I picked up the teapot and refilled our cups. “It sounds like a combination Boy Scout jamboree and fraternity party, if you ask me. No girls allowed.”
Mick winked at me. “That’s half the fun. Luc will have a grand old time.”
“In the meantime, I’ll be at Rose Hill Vineyard talking to the winemaker about your Cab,” I said. “And discussing the blend.”
“I spoke to her yesterday. She’s expecting you.” He pulled a paper out of his shirt pocket. “Here’s her contact information. Said to ring her when you want to show up. She’s fairly tethered to the place so she’ll be there.”
He handed me the paper. I stared at the name and phone number in his bold scrawl.
“Brooke Hennessey?” I rubbed my thumb over his writing. “That name sounds familiar.”
“You know her? Not too many female winemakers out there. I should have figured you did.”
“No, not that. Hennessey … I wonder if she’s related to Tavis Hennessey?”
“Who’s that?” he said.
“He owned a vineyard in Napa awhile back. Quinn worked there,” I said and stopped.
Atoka was a small enough town that everyone knew the gossip about everyone else, but Mick and I had never discussed Quinn’s past in California and the shadowy circumstances under which he left his former employer. Even I didn’t know exactly what had happened. Quinn avoided any questions or even an attempt to bring up the subject.
“Oh, so that’s the guy?” Mick said. “I heard about it. It’s common knowledge; you must know that. The
