Poison and Pinot

by Samantha Silver

  My phone buzzed, and I knew it must have been Karen texting me; almost no one else in Rosemary Creek knew my number. Well, apart from Barbara, but seeing as she was thirty feet away I figured she would just come out if she needed something. I made sure the couple were preoccupied with looking around before pulling my phone out to check it.

  I was thinking maybe we could spy on JL tonight. We could follow him and see what he does. Might be worth a check.

  Maybe Karen was right. Maybe it would be a good idea to follow him and see what he did. After all, he was our prime suspect, and right now, we needed a lead.

  "I know, Gary. I'm just worried, that's all. The lady at the hotel wouldn't lie about a murder," the lady whispered to her husband as they walked past the garden gnomes Barbara had out in the front.

  "Peg, we're in Napa Valley. I hardly think we have a reason to worry about anything that extreme. The most we'll see are probably some vandals graffitiing a sign or something," her husband tried to reassure her, inspecting the collection of snow globes.

  I could just make out the woman's frown from the way I was standing. She didn't look too happy.

  "I know but what if the murderer is still out there? Waiting for their next victim? Maybe we should cut the vacation short, after all."

  As dramatic as she was being, my stomach clenched at the thought. I wasn't so sure that someone was out to hunt down people in Rosemary Creek, but it wouldn't matter if Lisa's murder went unsolved much longer. It was only just hitting me that something like that could affect tourism. And that meant Creekside Trinkets.

  Waiting until the couple moved around to another part of the store, I texted Karen back.

  I'm in. We need to find out what he's been up to.

  Chapter 16

  I groaned as soon as Karen pulled up in her little hatchback.

  "Do we have to?" I whined. "I'm sure Barbara wouldn’t mind if we just borrowed the Lexus this one time."

  Karen rolled up her window, glaring at me through it, pointing to the passenger seat. I stalked around the car and got in, folding my arms across my chest after buckling up.

  "It's just roomier, that's all. No need to get all offended."

  "Or you're just a car snob. Miss I-used-to-work-at-a-car-dealership. No more insulting my baby," she said, patting the dash. "Do we know where we’re going first?"

  I pulled out the little post-it note on which I had jotted the address of James Lim's office, thanks to Ken. "It's in that small office plaza, off Reed Lane. Suite 5."

  Karen looked over at the Post-it note in my hand. "I don't suppose that came from your boyfriend? Did he give you the name of the office?" she asked with a grin.

  "Okay, if you're really going to do this, then we should probably put down some ground rules here —"

  Karen waved me off, laughing as she drove off. "I'm just messing with you, you know that. I think I know where we can park so we’re not spotted. Hopefully, anyway."

  The parking lot of the office plaza was pretty bare, but luckily for us the adjacent lot was separated by a thick line of hedges with a wide enough opening for us to see through if we got out of the car.

  "You realize that we look like a couple of creeps, sitting here like this right?" I asked Karen, leaning up against the hood of the car. "I’m like, eighty percent sure someone’s going to call the cops on us. Heck, I would call the cops on us."

  "Technically, we are being creepy. Spying isn't exactly known as the most noble deed."

  She had a point.

  By the time we saw anyone going in or out of the building, it was already getting dark outside, and of course I had totally forgotten to bring my favorite jacket with me for this stakeout.

  "I could really use some of your mom's hot tea right about now," I mumbled, breathing into my hands and rubbing them together to warm them up as the wind whipped around me. "Maybe we could go inside and pretend to be potted plants or something. At least it would be warmer in there."

  But Karen was too busy watching the door to answer me. I looked over just in time to see our suspect sauntering out the front door, patting his jacket down for his car keys, before jumping into his car.

  "Is that a Rolls-Royce?" I wondered aloud, hurrying after Karen who had basically launched herself back into the car, barely having time to click my seatbelt in before she tore off after him.

  "It's probably better if you slow down," I said through clenched teeth, hanging onto the door handle for dear life. I wasn’t exactly a fan of speeding, not after what had happened to my parents.

  "Why? He's the one driving like a lunatic," she replied, her hands gripping the steering wheel tightly. "I wonder where he's off to."

  We soon found out. A few minutes later we were parked several cars over from his at Mercutio’s Italia, one of the best restaurants in town. I exchanged a look with Karen.

  "Unless this is some sort of business meeting I feel like he's probably meeting a date in there," she said as we both got out of the car. "Come on, let's go see for ourselves."

  My stomach growled as soon as I smelled the delicious scent of spices and pasta in the air. "Oh, I was hoping you would say that."

  We followed behind James, slowing down just enough to let a few people go in front of us. That's what people usually did during stakeouts, right?

  Mercutio’s was pretty packed with the dinner crowd as we got in the back of the line to put our names on the list.

  "Geez," I muttered to Karen under my breath. "Are they having some kind of all-you-can-eat buffet or something tonight? It looks like half the town is here."

  Once we made it to the podium, the hostess looked us over and asked us for the name to put the reservation under.

  "Rose and Blanche," I blurted, suddenly panicking. What if someone knew we were here? Should we be worried?

  "Ok. Well, there's a ten-minute wait for a party of two, ladies," the hostess replied with an apologetic smile. “I’ll call you when it’s your turn.”

  Karen pulled me away from the hostess as soon as I’d thanked her. "Seriously, Taylor? Rose and Blanche? I didn't realize we were undercover," she hissed at me as we took a seat on a nearby bench.

  "Oh, hush. Sorry, I was covering our tracks."

  “You forget that this is Rosemary Creek, and literally everyone knows me. I went to high school with that girl. She played Viola in our production of Twelfth Night, and I played Malvolio alongside her.”

  I giggled. “I can totally picture you as Malvolio.”

  “Our drama class didn’t have a lot of guys, ok?”

  “Yeah, well, it’s done now,” I muttered.

  “Fine. I’m going to see if I can see James.” Standing up subtly and peering over the dividing wall that separated us from the rest of the restaurant, Karen paused for a moment, then sat back down. "I found him. And he's not alone. Stealthy, girl! Stealthy!" she said as I stood up to get a look for myself.

  James Lim certainly was not alone. He was seated across a small table from Portia, and her short blue dress didn't exactly scream business meeting.

  "Ugh. They must be on a date."

  "I'm pretty sure I just threw up in my mouth a little," Karen replied, her face contorted in disgust. "After all the time I’ve spent working alongside of her, for her even, and now this... Lisa's not even cold in her grave."

  I was usually a fan of giving people the benefit of the doubt, but it was hard to make this situation look good. "Let's just try and find out the facts before we go assuming things, okay?"

  She shrugged and sat there fuming in silence until our “names” were called.

  We were seated toward the back of the restaurant, but it gave us a good view of the two of them.

  "Can I get you two ladies started with some drinks?" the waitress asked, giving us a polite smile as she handed us a couple of menus.

  "I'll just take an ice water, please. No lemon," Karen replied, distracted as she kept looking past the waitress. Inconspicuous, she was not.

  "And I'l
l have a fresh-squeezed lemonade, please. Thank you!"

  I kicked at Karen under the table. "You're going to make their ears burn, staring them down like that!"

  But as much as I talked the talk, I certainly couldn't walk the walk. Every time I looked up from the menu, I couldn't help but look over at the pair of them, who luckily hadn’t seemed to notice our presence. Portia seemed pretty cozy, leaning forward and laughing at whatever creepy things James was probably whispering to her.

  Once our food had arrived, I found it a little easier to focus more on the bacon carbonara than whatever the two of them were up to.

  I became so absorbed in what was on my plate, in fact, that it took me a moment to recognize the opportunity that had just presented itself when Portia stood up from the table, seemingly headed to the bathroom.

  I stood up quickly, knocking into the edge of the table and sending some of Karen's nearly full glass of ice water sloshing over the side of the cup. "I'll be right back."

  In five seconds flat, I was right behind Portia, flip-flopping back and forth on whether or not I should just come right out and approach her, when she noticed me coming into the bathroom in the large mirror.

  "Oh, Taylor! I didn't realize you were here tonight." The blush that crawled up her face made it obvious that she hadn’t wanted to me to know about the fact that she was going out with James Lim.

  I decided at that moment that there was no need to beat around the bush. I was going to pull a Karen and just be blunt about the whole thing. "Yes, Karen and I are both here. We thought we'd get out of the house and enjoy dinner somewhere in town. It's been a long day. I saw that you're here having dinner with James Lim."

  The blood drained from her face. "Well, um, yes. We were discussing uh, some business matters. About Lisa's contributions to the rescue."

  I nodded, pretending to check my face in the mirror. "You two seem to know each other pretty well. I had no idea you thought so highly of him. Karen thought you hated him."

  She blinked. "I wouldn't go as far as to say I hate him, per se."

  I turned to her, narrowing my eyes. All of the times I'd ever spoken to Portia, she had never been so purposefully evasive.

  "So, you like him. Is that a new development, or have you always 'not hated him, per se'" I repeated.

  I expected her to be defensive, but instead Portia just seemed antsy.

  "I wasn't seeing him before Lisa died, if that's what you're hinting at. I would have never done something like that."

  Without another word, she whipped around and disappeared behind a closed bathroom stall, leaving me standing alone and staring at my reflection.

  And when Portia came back out to wash her hands, she refused to make eye contact with me, instead choosing to pretend I wasn't even there, her shoes squeaking across the tile floor until she paused as she was just about to pull the door open.

  “I know you and Karen fancy yourselves as little detectives. But I’d be careful. Whoever was responsible for Lisa’s death is not going to be happy that someone’s snooping around.” Her chest rose and fell rapidly, her breathing heavy, before she threw open the door and disappeared as the door swung open and shut behind her.

  Had Portia just threatened us?

  I waited a few minutes, trying to reign my emotions back in before I headed back out to our table. Karen was not going to like what I had to say, especially since that conversation led me to wonder if maybe it wasn't James who had killed his wife after all. If Portia was lying about the affair happening only after Lisa's death, what if Lisa knew about it, too?

  I took a seat at the table with a heavy sigh. "Well, I talked to her, all right."

  The look on Karen's face darkened as I explained what Portia had said in the bathroom.

  "The more I find out, the more I can't help but wonder what on earth was going through Portia’s mind. As much as Lisa did for us, I don't understand why Portia would do something to hurt her like that."

  "She claims that it only happened after Lisa died, though."

  Karen rolled her eyes in reply. "Right. Of course it did." She looked down at the table for a moment, drumming her fingers along the edge of it before looking back up at me, her eyes wide. "We need to go check out her office. Like, now. I get this feeling like maybe there's more to the story that Portia isn’t telling us, and we might find something there."

  She folded her napkin back up and placed it on the table beside her glass. "That way we can find out if Lisa knew anything about the affair. I'm not saying she would, but if she did, maybe she planned on doing something drastic."

  I frowned. "Like what?" As far as I knew, Lisa was an angel among women. At least that was how everyone had painted her so far.

  "Maybe she decided she wanted to get revenge on Portia somehow? I don't know. If she did something like that, she would probably strike where it would hurt Portia the most: Gilly Mills," Karen finished softly. "I'd hate to think she would do something like that, but hell hath no fury like a woman scorned."

  I took another bite. "Right, but that just doesn't seem like something she’d do. I agree we should check Portia's office, especially since that's pretty easy for you to do since you worked there and all. But we might be wrong about all this," I said, not wanting to overreact. Karen’s face was full of anger; she wanted to be mad at Portia, and even if her anger was misplaced, I couldn't blame her. Sleeping with the enemy didn't exactly paint her to look like a saint.

  "Do you think she threatened to stop funding Gilly Mills if she found out?" I asked.

  Karen shrugged, pushing away her plate of food, clearly no longer hungry. I never understood how she could do that. No matter what happened, I was always up for finishing a meal.

  "I think at the very least this calls for a little digging around,” Karen answered.

  I lifted another forkful of delicious cream-covered fettucine to my mouth, wishing that our dinner wasn’t being interrupted by our new stake-out plans. After all, Barbara had been right: this place really was excellent. "That sounds like a great idea. I'm all for it, really. Just as soon as I finish my food."

  Karen glared at me over her plate, but fixed a smug smile on her face anyway, waving at our waitress to flag her down.

  "We'll take the check now. Oh, and two to-go boxes, please."

  I looked down at my half-eaten plate of food, groaning.

  It was going to be a long night.

  Chapter 17

  "But do we really need to steal her phone?" Karen whined.

  I yanked at Karen's arm for her to follow me after we threw down our money to cover the check and tip. With my to-go box tucked under my arm, I hurried out to Karen's hatchback, wishing I'd chosen the uglier dress at Glitzy's, after all. At least then I wouldn't be freezing my butt off. Goosebumps prickled along my skin.

  "We have to get it before she leaves," I hissed. "Come on."

  Now, usually it was Karen wanting to do all the sneaking around and whatnot, but something about interacting with Portia just then had lit a fire underneath my rear. I ignored Karen's grumbling and ducked down behind the cars in the parking lot to get a good glimpse at Portia.

  "All right. A little magic should do the trick. Go ahead," I gestured to Karen.

  She blinked. "Really? Now I have to be the thief? Typical." She shook her head, but ducked down to my level behind a car, and, whispering a spell that I hadn't heard yet, she closed her eyes.

  Portia slid into her car and peeled out of the parking lot as if her life depended on it.

  "I really hope that did something, because she's gone now," I pointed out, stating the obvious. "What did you do, exactly?"

  Karen held out her hand with a grin. An older iPhone I didn't recognize was sitting in the palm of it.

  "Just a little bit of magic. We're not keeping this, by the way. We’re going to go to Gilly Mills, we’re going to look through her office, and then were going to leave it there so she finds it tomorrow when she goes back to work. Got it?"

&
nbsp; "Of course," I replied. "Scout’s honor."

  "Were you even a Girl Scout, ever in your life?" she mused as we got into the hatchback.

  Shrugging, I smoothed the length of my short dress down and crossed my legs, hoping that the heat would hurry up and thaw them out. "Not exactly, but I've eaten enough of the cookies to be an honorary member."

  Karen rolled her eyes at me in reply.

  "Okay. We're going to have to be very, very careful. We don't want any of the animals to hear us snooping around in the back, or the whole neighborhood is going to know what’s going on. I know we don’t exactly have a lot of neighbors here, but trust me, the animals’ voices carry. And going invisible isn't going to do us any good." Karen eased up the dirt driveway as slowly as she could, wincing as she hit a couple of potholes.

  "Why not?" I asked.

  "The animals would smell us before they’d see us."

  Of course they would.

  "So we’re going to have to do something a little bit different this time," Karen continued as she quietly put the car in park, parking it behind a hedge that she assured me no one ever went behind, so that if anyone else happened to show up tonight they wouldn’t see our car.

  Once we were standing outside of the back entrance of Gilly Mills, Karen took my hands in hers. In the dark, I could make out her eyes fluttering shut as she concentrated. I could even feel the tingling along my skin, in my teeth as we combined our output.

  "Protego concustodio admoenio paries personoroa," she chanted three times in a row, each time getting louder. Then she let go.

  At first, I wasn't sure anything had happened. There was no change around us, and I felt exactly the same, but when Karen pulled out the keys to the building, I noticed she wasn't being careful about making too much noise anymore.

  She got us inside, shutting the door behind us without making sure to keep quiet about it, and immediately made her way to the alarm system, where she punched in the code.