Lethal Vintage (14 page)

“All that money and his big dream is to do what you do every day,” said Sunny, looking at Wade. “His big passion is making wine.”

“Ironic, isn’t it?” said Wade. “These days, if you want to live like a peasant and make wine and have chickens and a pig and dig up your own vegetables, you have to be part of the wealthy elite. Farming is the new status symbol. I remember when store-bought food was how you snubbed your neighbors. Only the schlumpy households had to get their hands dirty. Now it’s the reverse.”

“Like in Europe,” said Monty. “The gentleman farmer.”

“I guess we’re all grown up,” said Wade. “Land is going to keep getting more expensive. Pretty soon the weeds won’t be able to afford a place to live.”

Monty held the bottle over Sunny’s glass. “¿Mas vino?”

“I shouldn’t.”

Monty poured.

“That guy Franco you think is so great, I think he threatened me when I saw him,” said Sunny. She told him what Franco said about the Sicilian Mafia and the little fish restaurant in Scylla.

“Are you sure he wasn’t just being colorful?” said Monty. “And I don’t think he’s so great, but if he was really in charge of what he claimed to be in charge of, he’s a hell of a winemaker.”

“Of course he was threatening you,” said Rivka.

“Why would he threaten me?” said Sunny.

“Sounds like he’s trying to protect his meal ticket. He’s probably worried you’re going to help send Oliver Seth to jail. What does he look like?” asked Rivka.

“Bertinotti? Decent looking, for a guy older than Wade. Short white hair, lounge-singer tan, reasonably fit. Well-groomed, by American standards.”

Wade ran his hand over two days of stubble. “Some of us have better things to do than sit around by the pool. I’d say you’re reading too much into it. Sounds to me like he’s laying the groundwork for a business proposition.”

“You don’t want to mess with Sicilians,” said Jason. “I knew some of those guys back east. They’re as tough as Jamaicans.”

“Maybe he’s the one who killed Anna,” said Rivka. “He’s covering his tracks. He wanted to see you to test the waters, see what you might know.”

“Maybe he did it, or maybe it was Oliver, or the gardener, or one of the ex-boyfriends hanging around. It could have been anyone,” said Sunny. “I still don’t see any reason why Franco or anyone else would want Anna dead. When we know why she was killed, we’ll know who did it.”

“My money’s on the lawyer,” said Monty.

“Keith Lachlan? Why?” said Sunny.

“He’s the only person who left the party, he’s close enough to Oliver to be involved in whatever personal business may have been going down, and you yourself said he was huge. Overpowering a little drunk girl would be all in a day’s work.”

“Keith is the guy from Barbados, right? Run away,” said Jason. “Dem Bajans always cookin’ up some trouble. They’re ruthless like the Brits but cunning like Jamaicans.” Sunny noticed he used his accent only to emphasize certain phrases. Otherwise he sounded like any other California kid.

“He a black guy?” asked Jason.

“More or less.”

“How’s he look?”

“Handsome in an un-cola sort of way.”

“Meaning?”

“You know, the 7-Up guy in the white suit and the wicker chair? Never mind, you’re too young. Tall, shaved head, nice skin, nice smile. Drinks too much, or something of that order. Didn’t look too healthy. His eyes were dull and kind of jaundiced.”

“Yellow eyes notwithstanding, I don’t think this is your guy.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Racial profiling. A rich, good-looking Bajan wouldn’t kill his best friend’s girl and run away. For one thing, islanders are superstitious. A Jamaican bad mon will take him cutlass to a mon troat, but he’s not going to sneak up on his best friend’s girl like a coward.
That’s inviting some kind of retribution. You don’t want to get a curse put on you by the local shaman. In Barbados and Haiti and all over the West Indies it’s the same. And honor is a big deal, especially among the rude boys. He wouldn’t betray the friendship. But maybe they weren’t friends anymore. Maybe they had become enemies all of a sudden. So we leave that to the side. He still wouldn’t kill her. Which leads to problem number two. We run hot down in the Caribbean. If this guy goes into this girl’s bedroom in the middle of the night, he’s going for one reason and one reason only, beg pardon to the ladies.”

“That’s just talk,” said Monty, blushing and sounding flustered. “Maybe he’s the one islander who doesn’t mind being a coward. Maybe he’s the only Caribbean guy out there who’s not much with the ladies.”

“I know one thing for sure,” said Jason. “If he really is straight out of the islands, he could be as ruthless as they come. To survive down there well enough to make it out to California, you’ve got to be a killer. I just worry that when they go looking for this particular killer, they’re going to find the nearest black man, like always.”

Rivka stared mush-eyed at Jason. Monty Lenstrom took his spectacles off and cleaned them on a square of fabric he took from his wallet. Sunny sat deep in the couch, fighting sleep.

“Another example,” said Wade, continuing a ramble about his new theory. “That Beach Boys song that goes, ‘She’ll have fun-fun-fun till her daddy takes her T-Bird away-ayyy’.” He sang in a scratchy falsetto. “Dad gets wind his daughter has been racing around in her new car instead of studying, so he takes it away. Little does he know, he has just delivered his precious little girl into the arms of the pursuing male. Ironically, by trying to shield her from one danger, he makes her vulnerable to an even worse threat.”

“That’s not irony, that’s a parable of modern paternalistic society,” said Rivka, sitting up. “It’s the signal that it’s time for the girl-chattel to be shifted from the property of the father to the property of the suitor. The father, who initially gives his daughter the spoils of his wealth, must disenfranchise her in order to prevent her from disrupting the male power structure by gaining independence.”

Wade looked stunned. “Okay, maybe that one’s too complicated. Let’s look at another example. You only hurt the ones you love. Irony. Another one. The surest way to lose something is to find a special place for it so you won’t lose it. Irony. I’m serious! What if the universe achieves stasis—balance—not through compassion, as I was once foolish enough to believe, but through irony? The irony theory solves the greatest riddle of existence: If God is all powerful, why does he allow pain and suffering? Because, ironically, God is not all powerful. Irony is how a benevolent but not-all-powerful god makes sure the smarty pants don’t overrun the place. Irony is the ultimate check on power. It underpins everything.”

“I think I know what you mean,” said Monty. “Like, I’ve always wondered why crackers and chips go soft when you leave them out, but bread gets hard. Why shouldn’t bread get soft?”

“Ah, that’s a different principle at work,” said Wade, his eyebrows rising to the challenge. “Whatever your strengths are, you degrade toward their opposite. Crispy gets soft, soft gets crispy.”

“But obsessed nutcases just get nuttier and nuttier,” said Rivka. She looked at Wade and Monty. “Hello! Crackers get stale because they absorb moisture from the air. Bread dries out because it releases moisture into the air. It’s about relative water content, not metaphysics.”

“Ironically, the girl who looks like the high-school dropout is actually the brains of the group,” said Wade.

“You might be right about crackers,” said Sunny, “but bread is more complicated. It doesn’t dry out. If it did, warming it in the oven wouldn’t make it soft again, it would make it harder. It’s soft because heat makes the starch soften up. As it cools down, the starch recrystalizes and it gets harder.”

Monty looked over his glasses at her. “How do you know these things?”

“Cooking is chemistry,” said Sunny.

“Ironically, putting dry, hard bread in a dry, hot place makes it more moist,” said Wade, staring at his friends with a ridiculous look of triumph. “Another one. When do you find your true love? When you’re not looking. Ironically, the desire for love is the most effective repellent against it.”

“That is regrettably and painfully true,” said Monty.

“So irony explains everything,” said Sunny.

“Not everything,” said Wade. “Only things that are, say, out of balance. Irony is the great corrector.”

“Would you say murder is evidence of something out of balance?”

“Definitely.”

“Then by that logic, we should be able to apply your theory to Anna’s death and figure out what happened.”

Wade’s eyes sparkled. “Yes, we should.” He thought for a moment. “The trouble is, you have to know who the joke is on. I’ll give you an example. I have a friend from way back who always wanted to be a great artist. Was one, really. Worked so hard before one big show, he gave himself spinal meningitis and nearly died. Nothing much happened in his career. He did a bunch of great work, a few critics recognized it, a few pieces went to good collections, but nothing really took off. Finally, after years of struggling to get by, he gives up. Decides it’s not worth it, he’s not going to paint anymore. To hell with it. He moves back to Montana, where his family
has some property, reverts to his old carpentry hobby, and starts building furniture in the barn to make ends meet. Whereupon he is immediately hailed as a modern master of furniture design and his chairs end up in the MoMA and the Smithsonian. The list of people waiting to pay forty grand for a chair is as long as my arm. Now, that, my friends, is irony. Not the work of a cruel god, but the best gesture of a compassionate creator in over his head. ‘You can’t always get what you want, but you can get what you need.’ ‘Careful what you wish for.’ ‘Every cloud has a silver lining.’ Irony is at the heart of all our wisdom sayings.”

“Since when have the Rolling Stones been indoctrinated into the canon of cultural wisdom?” said Rivka.

“Nineteen sixty-eight,” said Wade.

Jason yawned and Rivka stood up. “Ironically, since I’m very tired and have to get up early, I’m going home,” she said.

“That’s not ironic,” said Wade.

“You’re right,” said Rivka, and gave him a sock in the arm.

She and Jason said their good-byes and headed out the sliding door. Monty followed close behind.

“So you’re saying there are two kinds of irony,” said Sunny when they’d gone. “Punitive and benevolent.”

“That’s my current thinking,” said Wade. “You get what you deserve, for better or worse. If something bad happens that can’t be helped, it at least comes with a silver lining. On the other hand, every blessing is a little mixed.”

“I can’t think of any way Anna deserved to die. This is all very cute rhetorically, but reality has plenty of unmitigated tragedy in it.”

“Ironically, a benevolent universe can only retain its goodness by allowing genuine evil to exist,” said Wade. “Ironically, just when the girl no one could catch was finally ready to settle down, it was too late.”

Too late, thought Sunny. She put down the glass of port she’d been sipping and decided to put her shoes on and go home to bed. Ironically, it was at precisely that moment that she fell into a deep, sound sleep on Wade Skord’s couch and didn’t wake up until long after the sun warmed her cheeks the next morning.

The shriek of the coffee grinder woke her.

“Sorry, I thought you were awake,” said Wade.

“With my eyes closed?” said Sunny.

“Okay, I lied. I couldn’t wait any longer for coffee.”

She sat up, feeling exactly like someone who has slept in her clothes on a friend’s couch without washing her face or brushing her teeth. “Ugh. What happened?”

“You drank half of New Zealand and passed out. I wasn’t going to let you drive and I figured you’d punch me if I took you to bed, so that seemed like the best place to leave you.”

The percolator started perking and the smell of an extremely potent brew wafted her way. Synapses sputtered.

“Tell that thing to hurry up. I might snap in half like a dry twig if I don’t get some coffee in the next thirty seconds or so. What time is it?”

“You should always drink a few glasses of water after you down a bottle of wine. A good mountaineer always pees clear.”

“I’ll remember that next time I pass out. The time?”

Wade consulted the clock on the wall directly in front of them. “Six fifty-seven.”

Sunny hauled herself up and took a seat at the kitchen table. Farber the cat rubbed against her ankles. Wade made toast with butter and honey and joined her. There was a bowl of blueberries and a plate of strawberries.

“Just like a B and B.” Sunny picked up a strawberry and smelled it. “From the garden?”

“Dirt to table in under ten minutes.”

“Impressive.”

“We aim to please.”

Wade got up and came back with coffee. They sipped, watching the new day outside the glass doors. Sunny spoke first.

“If irony is the core nature of the universe, then the person who loved Anna most, who most wanted her to stay alive, must have killed her. That’s Oliver Seth.”

“Only if the joke is on him,” said Wade, waggling a weathered finger at her. “You have to figure out who is the butt of the joke, cosmically speaking. Who was behaving like the biggest jackass?”

“You mean other than me?”

“As far as I can tell, you behaved with the usual McCoskey restraint.”

“That’s what I mean. If I’d been more impulsive, I would have gone up there to their room when my intuition told me to and Anna would still be alive.”

“If, if, if. You must stop torturing yourself about it, Sun. There’s no way to know what might have happened. Think of Lawrence of Arabia. Maybe it was written. You just never know what might have happened. If I’d married my high-school sweetheart, I’d have ten kids and a dog by now. Do you want to look back and create a bunch of feelings of regret, or shall we try to figure this out?”

Sunny smiled into her cup. She felt an annoying rush of tears for no specific reason. Her head hurt. The whole lunch-for-sixty-to-eighty-visitors
juggling act was about to start all over again. Sometimes she wished she had a regular job and a boss and could just cop a husky voice and call in sick. She met his eyes. “Right. Onward.”

“Let’s try it like this,” said Wade. “Who was trying to defy their fate? Think about the Taoist idea of wu wei. You float along like a cork at sea. You don’t fight the current, you work with it. You go up the waves and down the waves. The irony kicks in when you try to fight the inevitable. How do you drown in a riptide? You swim as hard as you can toward shore until you exhaust yourself. How do you get out? You relax and swim with the current, at an angle toward the beach, until you’re out of the rip or close to shore. Wu wei. You use the forces greater than yourself to achieve your goals. Then there’s Oedipus. Everyone thinks that’s a story about how you can’t escape your fate. Yes and no. The Hellenic Greeks knew their stuff. In my opinion, it’s a mystical teaching story written to illustrate, among other points, that irony is the core nature of the universe. Try too hard to control things beyond your reach—by violence, for example—and you create the opposite effect. Oedipus’s parents thought they were getting over on the gods by hiding their son, but it all came back to bite them in the ass. If they’d just accepted the prophecy, he probably wouldn’t have fulfilled it.”

Sunny frowned. “What, you mean by talking open and honestly with their son about how he was destined to kill his father and marry his mom? You think that would have worked?”

“I’m still sorting out the nuances of the theory.”

“I can see that,” said Sunny. “Besides, if I knew who was resorting to violence to change their fate, I would know who killed Anna even without your theory.”

“Let’s take another angle,” said Wade thoughtfully. “Ironically, if you want to know a man’s weakness, you have to look at his strength.”

He watched her with eyes sparking under an overhang of snarled eyebrow. His uncombed hair was a savage mass of gray cowlicks. He gave Sunny a sage look that came across somewhere between pompous and deranged. She couldn’t help laughing and shook her head. “I don’t get it.”

“Stick with me, you’ll catch on. What is Monty’s strongest attribute?”

“Savviest nose and most incisive palette in a valley stuffed to the gills with wine experts.”

“Exactly. And what is his biggest weakness?”

“We’re talking about a man who wears glasses electively. Where should I start?”

“Think Achilles’ heel. Achilles probably had bad breath, a nasty temper, and back hair, but his only real weakness, like all the weaknesses that matter, was innately tied to his greatest strength. In Monty’s case that would be…”

“Wine. As in drinking too much of and spending too much on.”

“I rest my case. Greatest strength and greatest weakness ironically and innately linked.”

“Brilliant, but how is that relevant to my situation? And bear in mind I have to leave for work in seven minutes or less.”

“We have to work backward. What weakness, or shall we say vice, led to Anna’s murder?”

“That would be nice to know.”

“Well, it wasn’t greed. She didn’t have money, right?”

“None of her own as far as I know. But if she had wanted money, she could have married it whenever she wanted. Or earned her own. She was very clever.”

“Isn’t that the kind of woman other women resent?”

“Some. I’d say Molly Seth, Oliver’s sister, falls into that camp. And Anna thought Oliver’s cook, Cynthia, resented her.”

“Did she have any reason to want Anna gone?”

“Molly? No, none that I can see. I’d say she was irritated to have her around, that’s about it. The cook might have been resentful of having to wait on Anna, but it’s her job, after all.” Sunny studied the contents of her coffee cup, considering the many passions Anna Wilson had inspired over the years. “It was mostly men who reacted to Anna. They adored her.”

“And those she rejected? What about a spurned lover?”

“Troy Stevens. Possibly even Molly’s new boyfried, Jared. But neither of them seems to hold any current resentment.”

“Okay, scratch resentment. What about fear?” said Wade.

“Oliver may have been afraid Anna would reveal his secrets. But afraid enough to kill her? I seriously doubt it.”

“What about fear of commitment? When I heard the story, the first thing I thought was she must be pregnant. A guy like that doesn’t want to be tied down to a wife and a baby.”

“No, that’s not it,” said Sunny. “Anna was as skittish as he is. More so. If anything, she was the one who needed to be convinced to settle down. Besides, Oliver Seth can afford as many children and ex-girlfriends as he cares to acquire. He has enough money to pay his way out of any situation.”

Wade sipped his coffee. “We are talking about an incredibly violent act with enormous consequences. The individual would need to be powerfully motivated. Who wanted something bad enough to kill an innocent girl?” He smacked his lips thoughtfully. “I don’t see it. Either we’re looking at it from the wrong angle, or there’s a missing piece.”

The missing piece was in those e-mails Anna had sent, Sunny was sure of that, but she just couldn’t see it. Maybe Wade would be able to make sense of them. For now, she needed to get to work. Tonight they could look at them together. She finished a piece of
toast and followed it up with a strawberry. What she really wanted was a plate of bacon and eggs with potatoes piled on the side, but there wasn’t time. Wade picked up Farber and gave him a scrub around the ears. The morning sun lit up the storm of fur it produced. The cat threw himself against Wade’s chest, purring loudly. Sunny looked at the clock. Half past seven. Time to roll.

Outside the truck’s open window, the roadside vineyards flourished and the cool morning air was full of summer smells. Sunny took the winding turns slowly, letting the truck coast down the hill. In a couple of months it would be harvest time and the crush would begin. The sight of lush leaves and tight green clusters of nascent grapes was a balm to her tattered nerves and throbbing head.

On Highway 29, as she accelerated into a straightaway, the truck hiccupped. She gave it more gas. It chugged and lurched. The pedal touched the floor to no effect. She switched to the reserve tank. A moment later, the engine died. Instead of admiring grapevines, she should have been watching the dashboard, which clearly showed a now complete lack of fuel. There was a turnout ahead. The truck coasted, winding down to a crawl. In the rearview mirror, a semi approached at full speed. The valley’s narrow, two-lane artery with its tractors and tourists on bicycles didn’t slow anyone down. Cars and trucks of every size barreled through the countryside as if they were on the interstate. She hit the hazards and prayed. The pickup’s tires tipped over the edge of the pavement onto the dirt turnout just as the semi loaded with two trailers of gravel blew past, inches away.

Several more cars zipped by, rocking the cab of the truck. Sunny flipped the lever back and forth between the main and reserve tanks, turning the key pointlessly. The truck chugged and failed. There was
a gas can in the back, but it would be a long, not to mention humiliating, walk in either direction to the nearest gas station. She got out her cell and dialed AAA. She was on hold when a black Jaguar driven by a blond woman in big sunglasses braked and pulled over just ahead. Molly Seth got out and walked back to the truck, picking her way through the gravel in high heels. Double merde! thought Sunny, hanging up. Molly was dressed like a matador in black capris and a black bustier over a white blouse. Sunny got out.

“That thing die on you?” said Molly.

“I forgot to fuel up. Preoccupied, I guess.”

“Aren’t we all. Come on, I’ll give you a lift. I’m headed up to Oliver’s. We can send one of the guys back with gas.”

“I can call three A.”

“I insist,” said Molly, her eyes meeting Sunny’s behind the dark glasses.

Sunny shivered. It was cold enough in Molly’s car to chill Chardonnay and the air-conditioning was going full blast. She groped under the seat for the lever to move her seat back. A hammer and work gloves lay at her feet on the floorboards. Under the seat was a roll of something. She picked it up. Duct tape. Sunny glanced at Molly, whose fingertips rested lightly on the wheel. The road was flying by.

“I have a couple of houses to show this morning,” said Molly, “but I wanted to stop by and see how Oliver is holding up. The last few days have been terrible. The police just let him back into the house last night.”

“You’re a real-estate agent?”

Molly took a card from a center compartment and handed it to Sunny. “Second homes, mostly, if you know anyone who needs one.”

At the security gate leading to Oliver’s property, everything appeared normal enough. There were no police cars and the gate swung open when Molly announced herself. The Jaguar cruised up the hill and they parked in front of Oliver’s garage. Mike Sayudo, the gardener who’d found Anna’s body, headed around the corner of the house carrying a garden hose.

“Give me your keys. I’ll ask Mike to take one of the other guys and go get your truck.”

“Are you sure? I could go with them.”

“It’s no trouble. Go ahead inside. Cynthia is there. I’ll be right in.”

The front door was open. In the kitchen, Cynthia was wiping down the counters in a low-slung tank top, skinny jeans, and heels. She had her hair in a ponytail and her eyes made up. She gave Sunny a big smile and seemed happy to see her.

“Car trouble is the worst. But I’m almost glad. It’s so good to see people here other than the police,” she said, drying her hands. “Oliver should be back soon. He went down to the winery for a moment. We’re just trying to get back to normal around here, or as close to it as we’re likely to get. It won’t ever feel quite the same here again.” She sighed. “What can I get you? I just made a pot of coffee, but I can make an espresso, cappuccino, anything you like.”

“Regular coffee sounds great,” said Sunny.

“Are you sure? A cappuccino is no trouble.”

“Honestly, regular coffee is fine.”

“I’ll have a cappuccino,” said Molly, walking in. “Could you bring it to us outside? It’s such a beautiful morning.” She looked around the kitchen. “Where is Oliver?”

“He’ll be back in a few minutes.”

They went down to the table under the arbor where everyone had had dinner the night Anna died. A twinkling glare glinted off
the pool’s surface. The pool guy was skimming leaves and another gardener was working on the lawn, as though nothing had happened and guests would be arriving soon for the next dinner party. Molly sent them away and lit a cigarette.

“That was lucky you coming along when you did,” Sunny said. “I’d probably still be sitting by the road waiting for help.”

Molly nodded and gave a half smile. “My pleasure.”

“Have you heard any news from the police?”

Molly shook her head. “They’re not exactly going out of their way to keep us informed.”

Cynthia arrived with their coffees, strawberries and melon, and a plate of biscotti. “There’s cream and sugar. Do you need anything else?”

“Just let me know when Mike gets back with Ms. McCoskey’s vehicle.”

“I’ll do that.”

Cynthia went back up to the house. In the distance a chainsaw chugged to life and dug into its work with a steady whine. Molly stirred sugar into her cappuccino but didn’t drink it. She went back to smoking her cigarette and watching Sunny. They listened to the drone of the distant chainsaw, a light breeze pushing back strands of Molly’s blonde hair.