Ellen Crosby: The Merlot Murders

“Except that piece of her dress.”

He looked at me. “You have to understand, sugar. I have done a lot of good in my career. I have helped so many people. I have made it a crusade to do pro bono work for those people, most of whom would never have been able to hire a lawyer of my caliber.”

“What people?”

“She was Mexican.”

“I see.”

“I’m glad,” he said, “because let me tell you, I have repaid my debt to society. And it’s been far, far better this way than if I’d been behind bars.”

“Of course.”

“You do see, don’t you?”

“Yes.” I swallowed. “So what did Greg want from you?”

He smiled a rictus smile. “To be rich. To be like everyone else he grew up with. He hated it that Jimmy was a grease monkey. He knew that was his future, too. Hell, he’s not that smart. Just barely got through college without flunking out. He was too busy screwing girls and partying to really learn anything. But he wanted your house. More specifically, he wanted your land.”

I was stunned. “He has no money.”

“No, but I do. He knew your daddy was broke. He figured he could pick the place up for a song, then flip it and make a bundle.” He added, acidly, “I would have recouped my original investment of course. It would have cost me nothing.”

“He was going to sell to a group of developers who want to build a Civil War theme park. That’s how he was going to make a bundle.”

Now he looked surprised. “Who told you that? The Eastman girl.” He spoke with the same kind of venom as when he had talked about my “deformity.” “I’ll handle that.”

“Leave her alone. She hasn’t done anything. She doesn’t know any of this.”

His laugh was unpleasant. “Don’t worry, sugar. I don’t resort to something this extreme unless the situation warrants it.”

“That’s a relief.”

“Don’t you smart-mouth me or I’ll shoot you in the one good leg you’ve got left. If the fall from the bridge doesn’t kill you, you’ll bleed to death.”

“You mean, like Leland?”

He looked momentarily startled, then he smiled. “Poor old Lee. If only he’d gone along with me, none of this would have happened. It all would have been peaceable. He’d have his money and we’d have the land.”

“Were you with him that day?”

“I was.”

“You killed him.”

“Now, honey, don’t you go sayin’ things like that,” he drawled, like I’d just said a cuss word and he was trying to make me mind my manners. “Your daddy died in an honest-to-God hunting accident.”

“You’re lying. You shot him.”

“Lucie love, I’m warning you. Let me put you right on this. Lee asked me to go along with him to shoot a few of those pesky crows that were eating your grapes. What happened was he got tangled up in a trellis wire while he was sneaking up on some danged bird. He should have known better than to have his finger on the trigger. Damn thing went off and he shot himself. Unfortunately, he bled to death before anybody could get to him in time.”

“You left him there to die.”

He looked at me severely. “I had to protect my reputation.”

“Of course you did.”

“You’re sassing me again, sugar. I don’t like that.” He waved the gun at me. “I’d hate to have to really shoot you. You know I’m against handguns except for legitimate hunting purposes. Plus I didn’t bring the silencer.”

I almost said “what a pity” but that fell in the category of sassing him and I wasn’t sure how much patience he had left. “What happened to Fitz?”

He almost spat. “That was Greg.”

“Greg killed Fitz?” I stammered.

“Had to. Fitz came upon him when he was at the winery that night. He figured everyone would be at Lee’s wake and he wanted to go through things in case Lee had been sloppy and left anything around that might get back to him. So he made it look like a robbery, guessing you’d think it was one of your migrant workers.”

“I met Greg leaving the wake as Eli and I arrived. What did he do, rebroadcast his show that night, too? Until somebody figured out it was an old show, it looked like he always had an alibi, didn’t it?”

“He did have it all figured out,” Mason said. “He shacked up with Mia and screwed her until he got her to see reason about agreeing to sell your land. Then he had Brandi work on Eli. He had some old letters she’d written him. She wanted him to pay for the abortion and I guess he finally coughed up a little something.”

“Abortion?”

“Yes,” he said, “they had quite the fling.”

So Brandi wasn’t faking her difficult pregnancy. “That’s sick.”

“He’s not a nice guy,” Mason said. “Then you came home. Greg was getting tired of Mia anyway, so he decided to work on you. He bet he could get you to go to bed with him within a week. But you wouldn’t cooperate, would you? I think he really wanted to do this without it getting messy.”

“It got messy enough that you tried to set Sara Rust’s house on fire so you could get rid of the records from Knight’s Auto Body.”

There was a distant rumble of thunder. It could have come straight from hell. “Aren’t you the clever girl,” he said. “Guess we’re going to get that rain, aren’t we?” He motioned with his gun. “Let’s get on with it. I don’t want to get this suit wet.”

“Don’t do this. You haven’t killed anyone. Don’t.”

“Don’t be difficult, sugar.”

“I’m not jumping.”

“I’m going to have to shoot you, then.”

“Then do it.”

He raised his hand and aimed. I looked away.

“Goddamnit, Lucie! Jump!”

I looked over at him. He was furious.

“No.”

“Then I’ll have to make you.”

It’s still hard to remember precisely how it happened, but he did make a lunge for me. I swung the golf club at him, as hard as I could. The hooked end caught his hand, knocking the gun out of his grip. He yelped with pain and staggered to regain his balance. But I think those nice wing tips must have been brand new, because he slipped on the gravel like it was greased. He stumbled forward and pitched toward the low wall. God help me, but I swung at him again. He went over the ledge head first. His scream reminded me of the Wicked Witch of the West as she melted to her death.

I got to the parapet and looked down. He lay crumpled, face down in the dry creek bed. He’d landed among some river rocks. I was sure he was dead. If we got the kind of rain that the skies seemed to be promising, there’d be water flowing there again and maybe it would wash him downstream toward the Potomac.

I got back to the Mercedes, hobbling as fast as I could across the rough ground. There had been a car phone on the dashboard. I didn’t remember him locking the doors. Not only was the car unlocked, he’d left the keys in the ignition.

I took the phone out of the cradle and punched the button with the little green telephone on it. Greg’s name flashed on the display. I hit the button again and the LED display flashed that it was calling his number.

He answered instantly. “I’m leaving the house. I’m finished with the gasoline. You got rid of her, didn’t you?”

I disconnected.

I jammed the phone back in the cradle. The Mercedes started like a charm as the phone rang again. Greg, calling back.

The ringing stopped and the message icon blinked a few seconds later. How long did I have before he wondered why Mason wasn’t answering the phone? I backed out onto Mosby’s Highway and raced for home. When I finally looked at the speedometer, it read eighty. Sixty in the Volvo and you’d need a chiropractor. I slowed to fifty to take the turn onto Atoka Road.