Marriage, Merlot & Murder (Wine & Dine Mysteries Book 4)

by Gemma Halliday

  "What was it?" Ava asked.

  "Money." Andrew's face clouded, and I could feel tightly restrained anger just below the surface.

  "Didn't Freddie have money of his own?" David asked.

  "So he said," Andrew spat out. "But he took advantage of Jules's generosity at every turn. In fact, the only thing I ever saw him give her was that engagement ring."

  "It was a very nice ring," I pointed out, playing devil's advocate.

  But Andrew wasn't having it. "Well as far as I'm concerned, that guy got what was coming to him. Juliet deserves better."

  While I agreed with the last part of that statement, something about the first part felt distinctly personal.

  I was about to ask more, when Andrew drained the last of his wine and set the glass down on the bar. "Think I could load up those decorations now?"

  "Uh, sure, let me see if Conchita can gather them up for you," I offered.

  "I can help," Ava said, leading Andrew away by the arm. While I didn't doubt her helpfulness, I had a feeling it was partly to keep him chatting.

  "Now that is a loyal friend," David said as the pair disappeared down the hallway.

  "Andrew?" I asked.

  David nodded. "Did you know he even moved to LA after college just to be near Juliet?"

  I hadn't. "They must be very close."

  "If I had to guess, I'd say he'd do just about anything to protect Juliet." He gave me that meaningful look again.

  "Wait—are you saying Andrew killed Freddie just because he thought he wasn't good enough for Juliet?"

  David shrugged. "It's a thought."

  "It feels like a pretty farfetched one."

  "Who knows what drives people to kill?" David said.

  I was about to refute that statement, but I remembered that someone in David's family had been driven to kill and was currently doing 50 to life for it. So I figured it might be a bit of a sore spot.

  "You just here for the free wine again?" I asked, changing the subject as I gestured to his glass.

  He shook his head. "Au contraire, my fine beverage purveyor. I'm actually here because I thought you might be interested in a chat I had today with a certain local artist."

  I raised an eyebrow his way. "Let me guess—Justin Hall?"

  David put his finger to his nose then pointed it at me to indicate I'd been right.

  "Okay, I'll bite. What did you two talk about?"

  David shrugged, swirling the last of his wine in his glass. "Life. Art. Paintings."

  I rolled my eyes. "How long are you going to drag this out?"

  David gave me a devilish grin that spoke to how much he loved teasing me. "Honestly, that's what we talked about. But there was one piece of art in particular that interested me."

  "Go on…?"

  "When we visited the studio yesterday, I noticed one of his paintings wasn't exactly like the others."

  "The landscape?" I guessed, remembering the cheerfully colored canvas I'd seen propped against the wall.

  David nodded. "You noticed it too, then."

  "I did. In fact it was the only one of his paintings that I really liked. But Justin told me it wasn't for sale."

  "He told me much the same thing today," David said.

  "I mean, not that I could afford it anyway," I amended. "But it was pretty. Almost had a familiar feel to it, you know?"

  "Funny you should say that, because I do know." He got that gleam in his eyes again, and he pulled out his phone. "I thought it felt familiar too, but I couldn't place it until today." He swiped a couple of times then turned the screen to face me.

  On it was a photo of the same painting I'd seen in Justin's studio. The same sunny sky and cheerful field of flowers. Only the painting was now surrounded by an ornate gold frame and was hung on a wall.

  "That's the same painting!" I said, feeling a frown of confusion wrinkle my forehead. "But it wasn't framed yesterday, and that doesn't look like Justin's studio."

  "It isn't Justin's studio. I found this photo on an auction house website. This painting is Sunlit Pasture by Pablo Miscetti."

  "Who is that?"

  "He was a part of the Impressionist movement. His work is generally thought to be on par with his contemporaries, such as Claude Monet, Henri Matisse, and Edgar Degas. Sunlit Pasture is one of his later works." David paused. "Painted over a hundred years ago."

  I shook my head. "Okay, so Justin was making a replica of this guy Miscetti's painting?"

  "Appears that way," David agreed.

  "Why?" I asked, almost more to myself than him. Justin hardly seemed the type to want to copy Impressionist masters. His paintings were abstract and dark. And he seemed rather proud of them. Why would he suddenly switch his style to something so different?

  "That, I can't tell you." David turned his phone back around, scrolling. "There is a market for replicas, which may be what he is looking to tap into. However, I can tell you that the original Sunlit Pasture is set to be in an auction in San Francisco at the end of the month."

  "What do you think something like that will sell for?" I asked, my mental gears turning.

  He frowned at the phone. "Conservative estimate? Three, maybe four, hundred."

  "Four hundred dollars?"

  David gave me a crooked smile. "You're so cute. Four hundred thousand dollars."

  "Whoa. That's a lot of money."

  David kept his poker face on. I knew the circles the Allen-Price family ran in had a much different idea of "a lot" than I did. But to a starving artist like Justin…it could make a huge difference. Heck, to a starving winery like mine, it could make a world of difference.

  "So what did Justin say about the painting when you visited him?" I asked.

  David sighed and sipped his drink. "Unfortunately, not much. He tried to steer the subject away, quite untactfully, I might add."

  I glanced at David's phone. "Very coincidental that he would paint it right when the original is set to be sold."

  David shrugged. "Like I said, there is a market for replicas. Maybe Justin thought it was a timely endeavor, as interest is generated in that piece from the auction."

  "Or possibly, Justin wasn't just replicating the painting. He was forging it."

  David raised an eyebrow my way, a grin snaking across his features. "That's a pretty big accusation, Ms. Oak. What exactly do you think Justin plans to do with this forgery?"

  "Sell it for four hundred thousand dollars." I pointed to his phone to illustrate my point.

  "That would be a great theory," David agreed.

  "Thank you."

  "If the original wasn't already at the auction house." He pointed to the phone to illustrate his point.

  Unfortunately, his point was a better one. "Oh. Right." I frowned.

  "What did you say to her?" Ava said, coming back into the room and presumably seeing the disappointment on my face.

  "Just that I don't see why Justin Hall would forge a painting," David answered.

  Both of Ava's blonde eyebrows went up toward her hairline. "Someone needs to catch me up and fast," she said, grabbing an empty glass from behind the bar and helping herself to the open bottle of Pinot.

  "David went to see Justin Hall today," I told her, grabbing a glass myself. Hey, everyone else was drinking my wine—if you can't stop 'em, join 'em.

  I opened a new bottle as David filled Ava in on what he'd learned, finishing with showing her the auction house website.

  "I'm with Emmy," Ava finally said. "This feels too coincidental to be innocent."

  "But what is Justin hoping to do with the forgery?" I asked, voicing David's previous thoughts. "The real one is already at the auction house."

  Ava frowned and sipped thoughtfully. "Well, what if maybe Justin was planning to swap out the fake for the original?"

  "Would that be possible?" I asked, turning to David.

  He sucked in a breath, inclining his head toward the framed painting displayed on his phone. "Maybe. But I'm not sure how Justin w
ould get that close to the original. Security is pretty tight at these places."

  "Maybe he planned to break in after hours?" Ava offered. "Maybe he had a partner on the inside? Or maybe he planned to attend the auction and make the switch somehow there?"

  I thought back to the rough-around-the-edges vibe Justin had given off at his studio. He'd struck me as deceptive, short-tempered, and violent. Not necessarily the type to rub elbows with the kind of people who dropped four hundred big ones on an Impressionist painting.

  However, I could think of one person who absolutely did seem the type to mingle in those circles and we knew was not above a little dishonesty when it benefited him.

  "What about Freddie," I said, formulating my theory out loud.

  Both Ava and David turned my way. "What about him?" Ava asked.

  "Well, what if Freddie was the partner on the inside, so to speak? Maybe Justin painted the forgery, and Freddie was going to swap it out at the auction."

  "I don't know," David hedged. "Didn't those two hate each other? Like, to the point of physical blows?"

  "They did fight Friday night," Ava said, narrowing her eyes in thought. "That's true. But maybe it wasn't about Juliet."

  "Maybe it was about the painting!" I said, picking up her train of thought. "Let's say Freddie knew this Miscetti painting was coming up for sale at the auction. He's heard Juliet mention this artist ex-boyfriend. He gets an idea to create a forgery and commissions Justin to paint it. Only something goes wrong."

  "Maybe Justin wanted a bigger cut," Ava suggested.

  "Or Freddie did," David added, nodding as he digested this new theory.

  "They fight at the rehearsal dinner, Justin takes a swing at Freddie, but Baker steps in and breaks it up before he can do much more. So, Justin shows up at the wedding the next day and confronts Freddie."

  "They argue again," Ava said, picking up my thread. "And Justin kills him in a fit of rage!" She slammed her fist down on the bar top.

  "That," David said, stabbing his wineglass her way, "is a very dramatic theory."

  "Thank you." Ava did a little curtsy.

  David grinned. I wasn't entirely sure he'd just given her a compliment.

  "The only problem is proving it," I said.

  "Maybe we could check Freddie's phone records again for any calls to Justin's studio?" Ava suggested.

  David's grin widened. "'Again'?"

  "We might have finagled access to them," Ava said.

  "I'm impressed," David said, and this time I think he actually meant it. "You girls are much more devious than you let on."

  "Thank you. But we're women," Ava corrected. "Not 'girls.'"

  "Oh, trust me," David said above the rim of his glass. "I'm well aware of your womanly attributes."

  Ava giggled and playfully reached across the bar to slap his hand.

  I narrowed my eyes. Was she flirting with him again?

  "Even if we saw Justin's number come up in Freddie's phone records," I said, trying to get the conversation back on track, "that doesn't prove they were in cahoots."

  David snorted his wine. "Cahoots? Who are you? Jessica Fletcher?"

  I ignored him with no small effort.

  "Well, what about the PI?" Ava asked.

  David turned to her. "PI?"

  She quickly filled him in on the private investigator that Mr. Somersby had hired to look into Freddie. "If he was following Freddie, maybe he saw him meet with Justin? Or followed him to the auction house? Or something that might link him to the forged painting?"

  I had to admit, that was not a half bad thought. "I don't suppose he's gotten back to you?" I asked her.

  She shook her head.

  "Maybe tomorrow we should try visiting him in person—"

  I barely had the words out before Charlie's Angel Ava pounced on them.

  "I'll be here at nine!"

  * * *

  After David and Ava both left the winery—not together, I was happy to see—I locked up and realized I was famished. And just a little buzzed. All I'd ingested since noon was a slice of quiche and two glasses of wine.

  I ducked into the kitchen and checked the fridge for inspiration. Luckily, it looked like Conchita had been shopping recently, and I had my choice of several ingredients. I did an eeny meeny minie mo, and since I'd already had a low carb, if rich and comforty, kind of food day, I decided to stick with the theme and make Roasted Eggplant Mozzarella with Homemade Basil Marinara Sauce.

  As I assembled the ingredients for the sauce and set them sautéing and simmering in a large pot, my mind wandered over everything we'd learned that day and the myriad of people who might have wanted Freddie dead. While Edward Somersby had originally topped my list (and not just because he still owed me money), I had to admit the more I learned about Freddie, the more people who had line-jumped him in that list.

  Bridget McAllister, for one. The fact that witnesses had seen her sneaking away with Freddie to the crime scene just before Freddie was found dead was a definite red flag. She'd been jealous enough of Juliet to drag her girlfriends to Wine Country and crash Freddie's wedding. And we only had her word that she'd left him alive on my terrace…and not grabbed a champagne bottle in a fit of if-I-can't-have-you-no-one-can passion.

  Of course, I reasoned as I moved on to slice my eggplant, Bridget hadn't been the only one to crash the wedding. Justin Hall had been there too, presumably uninvited and coincidentally just hours after punching Freddie in the face. Possibly over a forged painting? I had to admit, I was dying to know if that PI had inadvertently uncovered a link between the philandering groom and the violent artist.

  Then again, the PI brought me squarely back to Edward Somersby, who had not only lied about his alibi but had also gone so far as to pay someone to investigate Freddie. Meredith Somersby had said Edward told her that the PI hadn't found anything. But I knew Edward wasn't above lying—he'd also told me he was with her the entire morning of the ceremony, which we knew to be false. If the PI had uncovered one of Freddie's secrets—like possibly being involved in art forgery or sleeping with Bridget McAllister—it could well have been the thing to push the protective father right over the edge. And of all my suspects, it was most likely that Edward could have transferred some of the feathers from Juliet's gown to the crime scene. I knew for a fact that he and his wife had visited her in the bride's suite to see her in her dress.

  "Anyone home?"

  I jumped, almost slicing my thumb along with the eggplant on my cutting board, at the sound of a voice accompanied by a knock at the back door. I sucked in a deep breath and exhaled the adrenalin as I crossed the kitchen to find Detective Grant's face on the other side of the glass insert.

  I unlocked the door and swung it open. "You scared the bejeezus out of me," I told him.

  He raised one eyebrow at me. "Bejeezus?"

  "Trust me, it's better than the dirty words I was thinking."

  He grinned and nodded. "Okay, let's go with bejeezus then," he said, stepping into the room. "It smells great in here."

  "I'm making roasted eggplant mozzarella," I told him, closing the door behind him and returning to my slicing. "With homemade basil marinara."

  "Don't suppose you made enough for two?"

  I had to admit, the sheepish grin that accompanied that self-invitation was too cute to resist.

  "Only if you grate the cheese," I agreed, nodding toward the mozzarella on the island.

  "That, I can do," he said, quickly washing his hands at the kitchen sink before digging in.

  "So, I heard you had a long chat with Juliet Somersby today?" I said, trying to infuse my voice with a casual conversational tone as we prepped together.

  "You heard that, did you?" Grant asked, his eyes twinkling at me as he started grating cheese.

  "I was looking for Edward Somersby, and his wife told me. Official wedding planner business," I said, defending myself.

  "I see." Grant didn't say anything further, but the hazel flecks in his eyes were
dancing with a frenzy of amusement.

  "So?" I prompted.

  "So what?"

  "So, are you going to tell me what you asked her?"

  Grant pretended to think about it for a beat. "No."

  I rolled my eyes. "That is totally unfair. I'm sharing my homemade sauce with you. Which, by the way, was rated 4 stars by Bradley Wu in his food column last month. The least you can do is share about your day with me."

  Grant chuckled softly, the sound so rich and warm that for a moment I forgot what we were talking about. "Okay," he finally said. "You want to hear about my day? I had coffee on my commute to work, had a meeting with my captain, then interviewed a person of interest in a murder investigation. I had a ham sandwich for lunch, visited my brother for a couple of hours this afternoon, and spent the rest of the day on paperwork."

  "I didn't know you had a brother," I blurted out. I'd never heard Grant speak of any family before. Somehow he'd always felt like the kind of hard guy who didn't have any—a lone wolf.

  Grant nodded. "I do. Six years older."

  "And he lives in Sonoma?"

  Again he nodded, though the way his eyes stayed on his pile of cheese gratings instead of meeting mine told me he was possibly regretting not skimming over that part of his day.

  "What's his name?" I asked.

  "Jake." One word answer. Eyes still on his task.

  "Are you two close?" I pressed, feeling a rare opportunity to peek at what made Grant tick before this small crack in his impersonal wall closed up again.

  "Used to be. When we were younger."

  "Did something happen to change that?"

  Grant sucked in a deep breath, and finally raised his eyes to meet mine. "I grew up, and he stayed the same."

  My confusion at that statement must have shown on my face, as he elaborated.

  "Jake is autistic."

  "Oh," I said lamely, not really sure how to formulate an appropriate response to that. Part of me wanted to say I was sorry—the difficulty he was having talking about this made it clear that having a brother with special needs hadn't been easy. But the last thing I wanted to do was offend by making it seemed like his brother was something to be sorry about. So, I settled for a neutral, "Oh," followed by, "I see."