The Chardonnay Charade wcm-2

by Ellen Crosby

  “Don’t disturb him,” I whispered. “Let him sleep. Please tell him I stopped by when he wakes up, though.”

  “These are beautiful, Lucie.” She set the book down so she could take the flowers with both hands. “Thank you so much.”

  She looked tired, though she seemed less tense than the night Hector had been brought to the emergency room. I watched as she took an empty vase next to the small sink in his room and filled it with water. She set it on a window ledge and began arranging the flowers.

  “You’re welcome,” I said, as her hands worked their magic. “Before I forget, I wanted to tell you how lovely the courtyard looks. Thank you for planting all those flowers and for the roses from your garden. I don’t know when you found the time.”

  “I was glad to do it. Kept my mind off worrying. Besides, I’ve done it every year since your mother asked me. I can’t quit now.” She finished with the vase, turning it so the arrangement pleased her, and regarded me. “What roses?”

  “The vase of red roses you left in the villa,” I said. “It was very thoughtful.”

  She looked surprised. “They weren’t from my garden. Though I wish they had been. They came in the shipment from Seely’s.”

  “Really? That’s funny,” I said. “Although maybe Noah sent them to say thanks for our business. He’s done that before, though usually it’s a plant. By the way, he sends his best and says he’ll try to come by later.”

  “He’s a good man. Hector will like that.” She picked up her book again. “Thank you for coming. And for what you did for Bonita. We are grateful.”

  I blushed. “What about you? Is there anything you need?”

  Sera’s eyes grew misty and she held Hemingway against her chest like a shield. “Everything I need,” she said softly but deliberately, “is here in this room.”

  I kissed her cheek, my own eyes brimming with tears. “I know that. But call me. In case there’s something else.”

  I stopped in a bathroom on the way out and splashed cold water on my face, wiping my eyes. Then I drove the few blocks to Kit’s office, parking outside the small gray clapboard building with “Washington Tribune, Loudoun Bureau” stenciled in elegant gold script on the plate-glass front door. Kit’s office manager looked up from her crossword puzzle when I walked in.

  “She’s expecting you,” she said. “Go on back.”

  I found her staring out the window. “Knock-knock.”

  “Hiya,” she said. “Let’s get out of here. I’m starved.”

  We walked half a block to Tuscarora Mill, a nineteenth-century grain mill that had been converted to a restaurant. The bar was full and the restaurant buzzed pleasantly with the noise of the Leesburg lunch crowd. If the Romeos weren’t at the Inn, they ate at Tuskie’s. Kit’s table was in the main dining room, which still had the original broad timbers, belts, pulleys, and scales from the days when it had been a working mill.

  The hostess seated us and our waitress took drink orders. Kit wanted a glass of Pinot Noir. I asked for unsweetened iced tea.

  “What, no wine?” Kit said.

  “I’ve been sampling Chardonnays for the last few days. I need a break.”

  “On the subject of drinking”—Kit folded her hands and leaned toward me, lowering her voice—“there’s something you ought to know. It’s about Mia.”

  This wasn’t going to be good. “What about Mia?”

  “Sorry, Luce, it’s going to be in the Trib police blotter tomorrow. She got charged with public drunkenness. Not a criminal offense, just a misdemeanor. She has to pay a fine. This time. I asked Bobby about it. He said she was with a bunch of kids who’ve taken to drinking—of all places—in that old field where they used to have temperance picnics during Prohibition.”

  “I’ll kill her,” I said. “I told her to knock it off. She had a monster hangover the other morning when I found her in the kitchen. And it wasn’t the first time, either.”

  The waitress returned with our drinks and we ordered, a chef’s salad for me and the meatloaf for Kit.

  “I know we weren’t saints,” Kit said after she left, “snitching bottles from your wine cellar and drinking them down at Goose Creek Bridge, but jeez. Bobby said they were drunk off their asses. He said Abby Lang gave the patrol officer who caught them a lot of lip and the do-you-know-who-my-father-is routine. Bobby said his officer told Abby her old man could be the next face they were putting on Mount Rushmore, but if it happened again he wouldn’t cut them any slack. They’d be spending the night in the drunk tank.”

  I clamped my lips together and shook my head, visualizing the scene she’d described. “Ever since my mother died, Mia’s been out of control. It’s almost like she has a death wish sometimes, you know?”

  “Or she’s wearing the superhero suit so she’s invincible. Lot of that going around with those kids. Did you know they drag-race late at night on Route Fifteen? All the way from Leesburg to Gilbert’s Corner. Sometimes when I’m coming home from work really late, I’ll see a lot of parked cars in one of the lay-bys. Someone’s gonna get killed.”

  “God, Kit, what am I going to do?”

  She shrugged. “Talk to her.”

  “She won’t listen.”

  “What about Eli? She listens to him and Miss Apple Blossom, doesn’t she?” My sister-in-law had once been the queen of the Winchester apple festival. She’d also been the woman who stole Eli away from Kit. It still rankled.

  Our food arrived. Kit doused her meatloaf with salt, then ketchup. She bit into a piece. “I love their meatloaf.”

  “Why didn’t you taste it before you put salt on it?”

  “Because it needed salt.” She picked up the saltshaker again. “So, get Eli to shoulder some responsibility for a change and talk to her. Unless he’s too busy arranging his tie collection by color. Or maybe he does it by designer.”

  “Miaow.”

  Kit smiled, unrepentant. “I’m allowed. He’s turned into such a wimp ever since he married the Queen Bee.”

  “No comment. I’ll talk to him, although he’s at the beach right now. Hilton Head.” I pushed a tomato around on my plate.

  “What did he do? Rob a bank? How can he afford Hilton Head on the salary he makes?”

  “I guess with his share of the money from selling my mom’s diamond necklace. Plus I bought out his interest in the vineyard.”

  “When he gets back, tell him you need him to pull his weight and help out with your sister.” Kit poured gravy on her mashed potatoes. “Especially since she’s not hanging around the best crowd. Abby Lang is trouble.”

  “I know. I wonder if her father knows what she’s up to.”

  “He’s got his mind on other things, if you ask me. Like the vice presidential nomination. Pass the rolls, please?”

  I passed them. “He left the fund-raiser with Georgia. That was the last time I saw her alive.”

  “Hugo Lang is the Mr. Clean of the U.S. Senate. Hell, of the entire Congress,” Kit said. “I can’t think of a single reason he’d have for killing Georgia, if that’s what you’re getting at.”

  “Do you think they might have been romantically involved? Not that I do, but it would explain things. Like why he endorsed her.”

  “No, I don’t.” She was definite. “Come on, Luce. He still wears his wedding ring. There’s something kind of heartbreaking about a man who does that when his wife’s been dead that long. He could have gotten married again loads of times.”

  “I know.” I watched her slab butter on a roll. “Okay, next subject. What did you want to say about Randy? Bobby tell you something?”

  “Just that they’re looking for him,” she said. “I was hoping you might have some news.”

  “Only that Jennifer Seely’s been leaving messages on his mobile phone voice mail. She said his mailbox is full,” I said. “Randy can’t go five minutes, never mind five days, without talking on that phone.”

  “Meaning what?” Kit asked.

  I set my fork on my plat
e. “Either he’s dead or on the run.”

  She considered the options. “My money’s on him being on the lam. Otherwise someone would have found him…his body…by now.”

  “Not necessarily. We have five hundred acres. A lot of it’s woods and underbrush. Say he was leaving the barn and someone confronted him. It wouldn’t be hard to ditch a body someplace where it might not get found for a long time.”

  She shuddered. “So if Randy’s dead, are you thinking his killer is the same person who killed Georgia? Someone had a busy night.”

  “I don’t know. But what if that person was really after Randy—and Georgia was in the wrong place at the wrong time?”

  “I need a scorecard. Who wants Randy dead?”

  “Harry Dye’s goddaughter,” I said. “Gaby Manzur. She’s one possibility. I heard about her yesterday. Randy got her pregnant at beach week in Cancún awhile back. She ran into him at Seely’s when she was visiting Harry and Amy. Jen said she went nuts. Told him he’d pay for what he did to her. Jen said Randy didn’t recognize her and that really sent her over the edge.”

  “Jeez. You think she was mad enough to kill Randy?”

  “Mad enough, yes. Capable, I don’t know. But she was alone at the Dyes’ place the night Georgia was killed. And then Randy disappeared.”

  Kit looked puzzled. “So who killed Georgia? You think she did that, too?”

  “Maybe Gaby knew Georgia was with Randy in the barn, then waited until she left. Or it could be that Randy killed Georgia like we’ve been thinking all along. The note said he wanted to make up for something, but maybe she wasn’t buying it.”

  “I don’t know. Sounds pretty sketchy to me.”

  “Fair enough. But I still wonder if we’ve got this the wrong way around. Instead of looking for who killed Georgia, maybe we need to figure out who was after Randy. And that goes down a completely different road with a completely different pool of suspects.”

  Kit finished her meatloaf and sopped her roll in gravy. “You know, kiddo, you’re overlooking the one obvious person who would have wanted them both dead. I heard Ross still can’t produce the parents of the babies he supposedly delivered that night.”

  “Ross didn’t supposedly deliver twins,” I said. “If he says he did, then he did.”

  “Why are you so defensive? He’s got a motive and no alibi. Why does that make him any different than Randy’s Cancún girlfriend?”

  “He’s a doctor. He saves lives. He saved me.”

  Kit shook her head slowly. “Aw, Luce.”

  Our waitress showed up and offered us dessert menus.

  “No, thanks. Just coffee for me.” I glanced at Kit. “You having dessert?”

  “I shouldn’t.” She scanned the menu. “Oh, God. Strawberry shortcake with fresh strawberries in season. I’ll take one of those, please, with extra whipped cream. And we’ll have two forks.”

  I rolled my eyes. “No way.”

  “You eat like a bird. You’re pushing yourself awfully hard,” she said. “When’s the last time you had a physical?”

  “What are you, my keeper? I’m fine.”

  “It seems like that foot of yours is bothering you more and more. You ought to have it looked at.”

  “I talked to Ross about it,” I said. “I’m telling you, I’m fine.”

  After lunch, she walked me to my car.

  “Are you coming to any of our Memorial Day events this weekend?” I asked.

  “I’m on duty Sunday, but Bobby and I are coming to the concert Saturday night.” She fished in her purse and pulled out lipstick and a mirror.

  “Everything back on track with you two?”

  “It’s a date to a concert. We’re trying to figure things out. So stop looking at me like that.”

  “Why don’t you both come to the barbecue on Monday, too? I’ll put your names on the list.”

  “Thanks, but I’m working all day Monday.” She opened the mirror and applied a bright red mouth.

  “You really did pull the short straw on a holiday weekend, didn’t you? At least come to the fireworks Monday night.”

  “I’ll ask Bobby. We’ll try. Though it seems to me,” she said as I got into the Mini, “for the past week you’ve had nothing but fireworks at your place.”

  “Don’t I know it,” I told her.

  Unlike Middleburg, which was a main-street town, Leesburg, the county seat, was more spread out. It had once served as the temporary capital of the United States when the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were moved there for safekeeping during the War of 1812. During the Civil War, the town changed sides between the Union and the Confederacy so many times—depending on whose army was there—that folks lost count.

  The Patowmack Free Clinic was only a few blocks from Tuskie’s, still within the boundaries of what was known as “historic Leesburg.” A pretty one-story wooden structure, it looked more like someone’s home than a business. Half a dozen rocking chairs where patients could sit and wait were lined up on the veranda, overlooking flower-filled border gardens maintained by the local garden club. A plastic box with patient forms in English and Spanish hung next to the door below a plaque with the schedule and a notice that there were no drugs on the premises.

  Ross and Siri had recently begun locking the front door between clinic sessions, even when they were in their offices. The reason, Ross told me, was that they’d had to deal with patients who showed up at all hours—mostly from the large immigrant community of Central Americans that now comprised a significant percentage of Loudoun’s population—hoping the doctor could make an exception and see them for just a momentito. The trickle had turned into a flood and the situation had gotten out of hand.

  I went to the staff entrance around the side of the building and knocked on the door. Though I knew many of the volunteers, Siri worked tirelessly to recruit new people. The woman who opened was not a familiar face.

  “I’m sorry, dearie,” she said, “but you’ll have to come back tomorrow.”

  “I’m not a patient,” I said. “Is Dr. Greenwood around? I’m Lucie Montgomery. A friend of his.”

  She opened the door wider. “Montgomery? You’re the one who hosted our party the other night. Come right inside. Dr. Greenwood is at the church, poor man, but Mrs. Randstad is in. I’ll let her know you’re here.”

  I could hear Siri’s musical voice coming from her office at the end of the hall. Fund-raising. Ross told me it never stopped.

  “Would you care to wait in the volunteer room?” the woman asked. “Help yourself to a soda or bottled water in the mini-fridge.”

  “Thanks, but I just had lunch,” I said. “If you don’t mind, though, I’d like to look around. Looks like you’ve redecorated since the last time I was here.”

  “That nice group of volunteers from the department store in Sterling was in yesterday. They really go to town fixing the place up, don’t they?”

  She smiled and left. The old floorboards creaked as I walked down the hallway, peering into each room. Walls and windows were cheerily decorated with flags, bunting, and summer beach paraphernalia. A life-sized skeleton in the volunteer room wore a hula skirt, sunglasses, and sandals. Someone had hung a different-colored flip-flop on each of the examination room doors.

  I went into the kitchen, which doubled as their storage room. Siri accepted donations from anyone who would contribute. Even if it was of no use to the clinic, she sold it elsewhere and used the cash to buy what they needed. Boxes of gauze, bandages, sterile gloves, and packages of over-the-counter medications were stacked on one counter. Next to the microwave was an open container that resembled a toolbox. I glanced inside.

  I knew all of the painkillers by heart. In fact, I knew many of them firsthand. Weaning myself after my surgeries had been hell, but I’d done it. When I was through, I swore I’d never be dependent on drugs like that again. I picked up a couple of the dark brown plastic bottles. All controlled substances. When had Siri and Ross started stocking
them? It didn’t jibe with the “No Drugs on the Premises” sign by the front door.

  “Lucie?” Siri called.

  “In the pink flip-flop room.”

  She stood in the doorway, her gray-streaked dark brown hair cascading around her shoulders, classically elegant in a white sweater and navy skirt. “I thought you were in the volunteers’ lounge,” she said smiling. “You were supposed to be offered a cold drink.”

  “I wanted to see the latest décor. And I did get offered a drink.”

  Her eyes fell on the toolbox. “Lord,” she said. “Those meds should be in Ross’s office or else in mine—when we have them here.”

  “I didn’t know you kept stuff like this around.”

  “It was Ross’s idea. We’re pretty discreet about it and we only do it on the days we have clinic sessions. That’s why we kept the sign out front about no drugs. Otherwise we’d be robbed all the time.”

  “Wouldn’t it be safer to use a pharmacy?”

  “I don’t know how to put this,” she said, “but not all of those drugs are ours, so to speak. We’re so desperate to help our patients that sometimes if someone passes away and has a prescription for a medication that lowers blood pressure or cholesterol or whatever, then the next of kin or the funeral home will let us know.”

  “You use dead people’s pills?”

  “They’re not going to use them, are they? Lucie, we’re desperate!” She sounded reproving. “Most of our patients have no jobs and many of them are here illegally. Ross treats anyone who walks through that front door. And if he has to he goes to them. Just like he did with Emilio and Marta. He doesn’t care if they landed here from another planet, frankly. But drugs don’t grow on trees. We already beg, borrow, and, well, we don’t steal…but we do anything we can to get the treatment and medication we need for our patients. Some of those pills cost as much as a dollar each.”