Ellen Crosby - The Merlot Murders

“If you say so.” There was a nearly simultaneous scraping noise of many chairs being pushed back. “I’d better get going. Some of these old folks might need help navigating that path over to the Ruins. Don’t want anybody losing their footing and suing. You coming?”

“I’ll help clean up here first.”

I began stacking plates when someone said behind me, “You look like you could use this.” Joe Dawson held two glasses of Chardonnay. He smiled and handed one of them to me.

“I probably shouldn’t until we finish cleaning up.”

“Aw, go ahead.” He clinked his glass against mine. An ex-baseball player in his days at the University of Virginia, he’d been good enough to be scouted by professionals until a broken hand during a beach week surfing accident ended his career. He was tall and rangy, dark-haired with flecks of gray, and good-looking in the kind of wholesome, ruddy-cheeked way that went over big with the group of jailbait girls he taught. From what Dominique said, they revered him like a minor god. He smiled and flashed boyish dimples. “It’s good to have you home, sweetheart.”

“It’s good to be home.”

He drank some wine, gesturing to the empty tables with their hurricane lanterns still gently flickering and the fairy lights in the trees above. “Place is beautiful, you know? I just can’t imagine it without your family running things. I heard you’re giving the listing to Austin and Erica. They’ll do right by you.”

“We’re not giving the listing to anyone. The vineyard’s not for sale.”

His eyebrows went up. “Not according to your brother.”

“He doesn’t have the final word.”

“So who’s going to run the place? Not you, surely.”

“Why not?”

He said, in a schoolteacher’s patient voice, “Look, darlin’, you of all people know what punishing physical work it is. Only people who don’t have a clue what’s involved think we live in a Dionysian paradise where we toddle around with a glass of champagne all day and life’s a big party. And frankly, I’m not sure how to put this, but for someone who is…who doesn’t…” He stopped talking and looked embarrassed.

“Use a cane?” I waved mine. “You mean, like Franklin Roosevelt shouldn’t have been president because he was in a wheelchair?”

“Oh, come on, Lucie. You know I didn’t mean that.”

“You know, one thing I’ve learned about being handicapped is that people tend to marginalize you right off the bat. We’re treated as a subclass of humanity because we’re broken, somehow, or deformed. Do you know what it feels like not to be given the same chance as everyone else? For people to assume automatically that you’re inferior?” It slipped out with more passion than I intended.

Even in the darkness, I saw him flush. He set down his glass and mine and pulled me to him, brushing my hair off my face and tucking a strand behind my ear. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I really am. You know I’ll help out around here like I always do. As long as I’m still in town.”

I pulled away. “Are you going somewhere?”

“Didn’t you know? I took a sabbatical from the academy. I’m off to Charlottesville in a couple of weeks. Finally gonna finish my dissertation. It only took me ten years.”

“I hadn’t heard. The sound of hundreds of teenage hearts breaking must have been deafening when you made that decision.”

He grinned, but it was rueful. “Yeah, well, maybe. Unfortunately the one heart it didn’t break belongs to your cousin. I think she’s pretty exasperated with me. Maybe some time apart, you know? The other night she asked me in her own special way if I was ever going to put my head to the grindstone and get my doctorate. I figured it was about time.”

“Good for you,” I said. “And don’t worry about Dominique. She’ll come around. She’s just overworked right now.”

“I know. Fitz’s death was a huge blow, too.” He picked up his glass and finished his wine. “Plus she’s nervous as all get out ever since she decided to apply for her U.S. citizenship. She’s been reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in her sleep the past couple of nights.” He sounded gloomy. “I hope she doesn’t say ‘I pledge ingredients to the flag’ when she’s in front of the judge.”

A dark-haired waitress with her hair in a long braid came up to us. She held out a laundry bag and waved it at Joe. “We’re clearing the dishes. Dominique wants you two to take care of the tablecloths.”

“Whatever the boss wants.” Joe took the bag.

“Come on,” I said. “This won’t take long. You can tell me about your dissertation.”

“Nah, it’ll put you to sleep.”

“Is that a nice way of saying I wouldn’t understand?”

He flushed. “Sorry. I guess it was. You really want to know?”

I nodded.

“The title is ‘The Potential Economic and Social Implications of Thomas Jefferson’s Efforts on Behalf of a Nascent Wine Industry in Virginia’ but I might change it to what my students call it.” He handed me the laundry bag. “‘Grape Expectations.’”

I laughed and he added, “Hold this open. I’ll clear off the tablecloths.”

We moved systematically down the row of tables. “Can I ask you a favor?” he said a moment later as he balled up a tablecloth and pitched it at the open sack.

“Of course.” His aim was slightly off or maybe I moved. I shifted quickly and caught the tablecloth before it hit the ground.

“Nice save. Look, when I was doing research on my dissertation, Leland used to give me carte blanche to use his library. He really does have the best private collection of books around on that particular aspect of Jefferson’s life. Do you think I could still come…?”

“Sure, Joe,” I said. “Help yourself to whatever you need. Although the place is a mess. I don’t know how you can find anything. There are newspapers in there that quote what Noah said about the flood.”

He grinned. “You want to get rid of them?” I nodded and he added, “Tell you what. I’ll stop by and fill up the back of my truck in the next day or two. I pass the recycling center all the time.”

“That would be great.”

“No problemo.” He chucked me under the chin. “Give me that sack. It weighs a ton.”

We walked together toward a large white van with Goose Creek Catering stenciled on the sides in gold and green. Joe tossed the laundry bag inside.

“I guess I’d better find Eli,” I said, “and get him to stop whatever it is he’s got going on with Erica and Austin before they show up at the house tomorrow.”

“Jeez, glad I’m going to miss that conversation. Might as well try to stop gravity while you’re at it, changing Eli’s mind. He’s pretty determined to sell.”

“Thank you so very much for that vote of confidence.”

He looked down into my eyes. “I forgot. You may have the face of an angel,” he mussed my hair, “but you’ve got the disposition of a mule. Family trait. Good luck, sweetheart.”

I heard applause and cheering from the Ruins before I’d gone very far on the dirt path that led from the road to the amphitheater. Though it was lit by Hector’s brightly burning citronella torches, it was hard to see the uneven ground in the shifting shadows. Getting caught in a crowd is one of the few things that still panics me. I moved to the edge of the path and missed seeing the large tree root.

As I tripped, I knocked into one of the torches. It went down with me and hit the ground as I did, sending sparks shooting like a miniature Catherine wheel.

“Holy Christ, you’re on fire!” I sensed rather than saw Greg in the flickering firelight, materializing out of nowhere. He stripped off his shirt as he knelt next to me, beating the glowing orange cinders that winked like tiny fireflies on my dress and my flesh. “Give me that torch,” he ordered. Dazed I watched him right it and fix it firmly into the ground again. “There’s blood all over your dress.”