Dead on the Vine: (Violet Vineyard Murder Mysteries #1 (A Cozy Mystery)) (39 page)

Dimitri carefully took a handkerchief from his pocket and pressed it to his nose. Alexandra touched his shoulder, a comforting gesture, but I swear the look in her eyes was not compassion but a sly amusement.

“Kool-Aid!” Marjory yelled again and almost dragged me and Victor off our feet as she attempted a final charge.

And then the cavalry arrived.

“Stop it MJ,” Hunter Drake said as he squeezed through the dancers and came across the lawn.

“Sheriff,” Dimitri said through the bloody handkerchief. “Arrest this woman! She has assaulted me without provocation!”

“Dimitri—” Alexandra tried to intercede, but Marjory shouted over her.

“You call that assault?” She lunged at Dimitri again and Victor hit the ground in a skinny pile while I was slung around in a half circle, “I’ll show you assault! Let me at him!”

Hunter put himself between them, and held a palm up at Marjory. “Enough,” he said sharply, and he wasn’t the friendly, laid-back Hunter anymore. He raked his eyes over the still laughing assemblage gathered around the tent and the laughter died. A murmur went through them and people suddenly found other things to look at.

Hunter turned his glare back on Marjory. “You’re ruining the party, Marjory.”

That snapped Marjory to attention. She looked over her shoulder at the crowd and then at me, and her expression instantly transformed from angry to crestfallen.

“I’m sorry, Claire,” she said, slurring the words a bit. “Your party…”

“It's okay,” I told her, giving her a reassuring smile. To be honest, I found it hard to be upset with Marjory. Dimitri’s article had been both unfair and malicious to her and many others. Only the fawning few got a good review. “Why don't you go check on Samson?” I asked her, giving her a gentle push in that direction.

By then Victor was on his feet. He brushed off the seat of his jeans. “Come on, Marjory,” he said and led her across the lawn toward the cellar where Samson was still hiding.

“You are letting her leave?” Dimitri demanded of Hunter. “Arrest her! Now!”

Hunt shook his head. “Not going to happen. I’ll take your statements down at the office tomorrow when both of you have calmed down.”

“Statements? You saw what happened! It was an unprovoked attack!”

Hunt cocked his head at that. “Unprovoked?” he said mildly. “Seems like you’ve been provoking people just a little bit, Mr. Pappos.”

Dimitri drew himself up to his full height at that. “How dare you! You know nothing of wine! And neither do most of them,” he said, his voice taking on a honking quality behind the bloody handkerchief. “In Paris most of these people’s wines wouldn’t be fit to clean a chamber pot! I will have your badge!”

“Quit acting like a buffoon, Dimitri,” Alexandra cut him off. “
You’re
the one ruining the party.” She shot me an apologetic glance. “Could we trouble you for some ice and a towel, Claire?”

“Of course,” I said.

I turned to my guests and put on my hostess smile. “Show’s over,” I said as brightly as I could. “And dinner will be served shortly. Until then I want to see some dancing!”

That got a few laughs and broke some of the tension, but not all of it. My eyes caught on Angela Zorn and Jorge, who were standing together at the front of the crowd. They were both looking at Dimitri, their expressions neither amused nor contrite, but rather nakedly hostile. I saw similar hostile looks on many other faces. It seemed Dimitri didn’t have
any
friends in the valley.

I turned to Alexandra.  “Come with me,” I said and waved them toward the house. As we crossed the lawn, me trailing them, I looked back over my shoulder at Hunt.

He gave me a wink. “You sure know how to throw a party,” he said. “Floor show and all.”

I rolled my eyes at him and kept moving.

Chapter 5

When we entered the
kitchen, it was a flurry of activity and a racket of banging pots and pans. Waiters and waitresses were buzzing in and out the back door with serving and chafing dishes while two young chefs in white tunics and colorful slacks were barking orders and shifting food to and from a series of hot plates and in and out of my twin ovens. The floor was littered with foodstuff and the counters and cabinets were cluttered and sticky with spills and splatters. I groaned at the mess, even though the head chef, an attractive young man named Paul Nitti, had assured me the kitchen would be spotless when they left.

I pointed down the hallway and spoke to Alexandra, “Take him into the living room. I’ll be right there.”

Alexandra nodded and continued on as I slipped through the catering crowd to the kitchen drawer to the left of the sink. I grabbed a tea towel and opened the freezer for ice, but there was none in the bin. I had to head back out onto the patio to dip a handful out of the galvanized tin wash tub I had filled with soft drinks. The ice supply was low there too, the sodas and bottled water swimming in water. Where was Jessica? She had gone to town for ice more than an hour ago. It was a forty minute drive round trip. I tried to suppress a flash of annoyance without success, something any mother is more than used to.

By the time I had woven my way back through the kitchen to the living room, Dimitri was sitting on the sofa with Alexandra at his side. I handed Dimitri the ice-towel and returned to the doorway, anxious to get back to the party.

He leaned back on the sofa and pressed the cloth to his nose with a groan. “It is broken,” he said.

“She didn’t hit you that hard, Dimitri,” Alexandra said.

“I can call a doctor—” I began to offer when we were interrupted again.

“Is it true?” Samson asked, a note of glee in his voice, as he suddenly came up behind me. “I heard his giant beak has been snapped in two!”

Standing just inside the living room door as I was, I was blocking his view of Dimitri and Alexandra so maybe his crassness can be explained by saying he didn’t know Dimitri was there. Then again, I doubt Samson would have cared. Tact isn’t his strong suit.

“I will laugh in his face the next time we meet!” he said “I will—” Whatever else Samson wanted to say stopped halfway out of his mouth as he caught sight of Alexandra.

“Hello, Samson,” Alexandra said, giving him a smile that would have made most red-blooded males swoon.

The effect on Samson was quite the opposite. He looked stunned for a moment, his face draining of color, turning a bloodless gray. But that didn’t last long before color flooded his wrinkled old cheeks and his eyes flashed with anger.
“You,”
he spat, the single word pregnant with contempt.

“It's been a long time,” Alexandra replied, still smiling, though it looked forced and strained. “You look well.”

Samson's lips worked wetly and he seemed about to bark something more, but instead of speaking he ducked his head and spat on the floor three times then forked the sign of the evil eye at her with two grizzled fingers. He glared at her one more time, spun on his heel and marched back down the hallway.

Dimitri took the bloody cloth from his nose. “And to hell with you, too, Xenos!” he yelled at Samson's back. “We will get what is ours!”

Samson stutter-stepped and I thought for sure he'd come charging back into the room - he was a man who loved a juicy confrontation - but instead he squared his shoulders and continued on. I heard the cellar door slam closed behind him.

“What was that about?” I asked, looking from Alexandra to the puddle of spittle on the floor at my feet. Gross. I was considering stomping down to the cellar, grabbing Samson by the ear and hauling him back up here like a puppy that had piddled on the floor, but Alexandra took a Wet-Wipe from her purse, stooped, and cleaned it up.

“Samson and I—” she began, but Dimitri cut her off.

“The doctor, de Montagne!”

“All right!” I yelled back. But I wasn't going to let this lie. I'd find out what was going on, from her or from Samson.

I didn’t have to call a doctor - there were two of them at the party. I headed out back and tracked down Phillip Spoetzel, a plastic surgeon turned winemaker who had made his money artificially enhancing the chests of a few thousand women. He was now busily losing all that money trying to grow zinfandel on a piece of flat land that would have been better suited to growing apples.

Phillip was reluctant to leave the party. He was dressed up in his party-down clothes - a cabana shirt covered in palm trees over plaid shorts - and just a little tipsy, but I dragged him inside anyway. It wasn't like he was being asked to perform brain surgery, after all. I left him in the living room with the married couple and returned to the party.

I arrived back outside just as my daughter Jessica and Blake Becker came around the corner of my wine cellar.

Jessica had a half-melted bag of ice in each hand, dripping water, and Blake was loaded down with four more bags. Jessica looked tousled and flushed. She gave me a guilty look and then dropped her head and hurried my way. Blake barely met my eyes. He too looked flushed and a little sweaty. And that made me more than a little suspicious. The two of them had been spending a lot of time together since I had made the decision to auction fifty cases of cabernet through Star Crossed, but until that moment I had no suspicions it was anything more than business.

I know, I know, meddling mother alert. Jessica is twenty-seven years old - theoretically old enough to make her own decisions - but her love life has been a source of drama and conflict for us since she hit puberty. And Blake, while still vigorous and good-looking, was only ten years younger than I was! But that was an issue I would have to take up later.

“The washtub is low on ice,” I said to Jess. “Put a couple of bags in it and the rest in the freezer.

“Did Marjory really—” Jessica began, but I cut her off.

“We can discuss that later,” I said, giving her the mom-eye, letting her know that Marjory wasn't the only thing we'd be discussing. I shot Blake the same look and his flush grew even deeper. They went past me to the washtub and I rejoined the party.

Everyone
wanted to talk
about Marjory, who had yet to return from my wine cellar, and the punch she had given Dimitri. No one seemed all that concerned about Dimitri's good health. In fact, most of them would have been happy to put the boots to him while he was down. Only Hunter was taking the issue seriously.

He pulled me aside and spoke in low tones. “Dimitri's got a case, Claire,” he said. “If he files charges, I'll have to arrest Marjory.”

“Hopefully it won’t come to that,” I said. “Maybe Alexandra will talk him out of it.”

“Or maybe he'll decide that he doesn’t need the embarrassment of having the story spread across the entire Valley.” Hunt said hopefully.

“It probably
has
spread across the entire Valley by now,” I told him. “Dimitri is a very unpopular man.”

“I got that impression,” Hunter said as he took a crumpled pack of Winstons from his breast pocket and shook one out. He saw me eyeing the pack and hesitated, then put the cigarettes away.

“Sorry,” he said but I shrugged it off.

“You can smoke if you want to,” I said.

Hunt shook his head. “I should quit myself.”

I nodded and left it at that. I wasn't going to be the stereotyped reformed sinner with a soap-box and a disapproving eye.

Doctor Spoetzel came out of the house, followed closely by two waiters laden with chafing dishes. Dinner was about to be served. Spoetzel made a pit stop for a fresh glass of wine before he came our way. He nodded at Hunter.

“His nose isn’t broken,” he said to both of us, “but you'd think he'd been shot. He told me to send the bill to Marjory.” He grinned and shook his head ruefully. “I told him to forget it. I like my own nose un-bloodied.” He hoisted his glass at us and turned back to the party. Hunter and I trailed behind him and got in the food line.

I chose the halibut and a glass of cabernet. Hunter had a Diet Coke and the chicken. We found a place to sit at the rickety card table with the wonky leg. I had taped the leg down that morning with a wad of duct tape, but it still looked precarious.

For a moment I considered rousting Marjory and Samson from the cellar to join us, but decided against it. Like two unruly children, they had forgone their right to eat with the grownups.

Hunter and I were joined by Angela Zorn and Jorge McCullers.

I had gone to school with Jorge and his brother Hector. Jorge had a reputation extending all the way back to junior high as a hard drinker. And he was living up to it at that moment. He was already half-drunk and wearing a sloppy smirk I remembered from the Senior Prom when he had spiked the Kool-Aid punch with a half-gallon of Wild Turkey.

His employer, Angela, was what many in the valley considered a newcomer, having purchased Mount Halley Vineyard less than ten years before. I knew her only from the Vintners’ Association meetings where she rarely spoke or offered an opinion. But she was full of opinions that day.

“Is he dead?” she asked and Jorge laughed, though Angela didn't join in. I could tell she was drunk as well. Her eyes were watery and red, the whites as runny as undercooked eggs.

“He's fine,” I said and forked some halibut into my mouth. It was delicious. I'd have to ask for the recipe.

Angela had the halibut, too, but she wasn't eating. She drained the wine from her fruit glass in a single gulp and handed it to Jorge. He took the hint, stood, and headed for the bar, his step a little unsteady.

“That man is going to ruin me,” she said, looking me hard in the eye, her head wobbling slightly from the wine. “Did you read what he said about my Zinfandel?”

I had, but I shook my head anyway. I didn’t want to get into that conversation. I had had enough drama for one afternoon. “I wouldn’t worry about it.” I said, but she wasn't listening.

“He said that it would make a perfect pairing for a meal of peanut butter sandwiches and Cheetos!” she ground the words out, her teeth bared. They were purple around the edges from my Vintner's Reserve. “Sales are down twenty percent! Twenty!”

I kept chewing, nodding stupidly. I looked to Hunter for help, but he kept his head down and his fork working. Coward.

Jorge arrived back at the table, two glasses in his hand, both brimming with wine. But the two glasses hadn't been enough; he had one index finger hooked around the neck of a half-full bottle of cabernet he had filched from the bar.

“It gets worse,” Jorge said. “We have an auction contract with Star Crossed. They sold two hundred cases of our ’06 Merlot last month for three hundred dollars a case. That’s less than half what we get wholesale.” He flopped down, handed Angela her glass and plunked the bottle down on the rickety table. “And they’ve still got another six hundred cases listed for their upcoming auctions.”

“If they sell it for the same price as the last auction, I'll go under,” Angela told me as she raised the glass to her lips. She took a huge swallow, emptying most of the glass, binge drinking wine that sells for one hundred seventy-five dollars a bottle. “But not without a fight. I pay Becker to sell my wine while his partner bashes me in the newspapers?” She slammed the glass down and wine splashed across the table, rocking it dangerously.

Angela wasn't the first person I had had this conversation with. Dimitri’s interview was probably going to cost Star Crossed many clients. But it wouldn’t drive the auction house out of business. As the article in the
Examiner
had pointed out, Dimitri had the respect of the best restaurants and biggest collectors around the world. A word from him could move your wine from the back pages of a wine list to the first one on a sommelier’s lips. Clout like that guaranteed customers.

I was struggling for something to say to turn the conversation in another direction when Hunter looked up at Jorge.

“Not planning on driving, are you, Jorge?” he asked mildly.

But Jorge didn’t take it mildly. His face flushed and his eyes narrowed. “You here as a guest or the sheriff, Hunter?” he asked. He lifted his glass and took another purposeful swallow, staring at Hunt over the rim.

“Right now, I'm a guest,” Hunter replied. “But after the party I'll be happy to bust you and toss you into the drunk tank.” He stared at Jorge, letting that sink in, then added, “It won’t be the first time.”

“I know how that works,” Jorge said bitterly as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Last time your buddies broke two of my fingers.”

“You
broke your fingers by punching Deputy Peals in the face,” Hunter said. “And that's why you did sixty days in county.”

“Well, I guess that makes me just another drunk Mexican getting what he deserves, right, Hunt?”

“If you had a complaint you should have filed it, Jorge,” Hunter said stiffly. He had laid down his fork. His hands balled into fists on the table cloth.

Jorge snorted laughter. “Lot of good that would have done me,” he said. “We both know how much chance a Mexican stands in court.”