Pinot Red or Dead?

by J. C. Eaton

Theo cut in again. “Norrie may have a point. When I saw the body, I noticed black powdery marks around the wound. I mentioned it to you both that day. If she’s right about proximity, then whoever shot Arnold didn’t do it from twenty-five feet.”

  “See? It was up close and maybe personal, which brings me back to Lavettia. The woman stands to inherit a lucrative business.”

  Theo continued with his groans. “True enough, but keep in mind, Arnold was fast developing a long list of angry winery owners. Any one of them could’ve pulled the trigger. Let’s all sleep on this tonight. We can talk more when we get together on Tuesday. I’m sure those women won’t hesitate to add their two cents.”

  We left it at that, and I went back to my now-cold mac and cheese. I wasn’t sure what was worse, eating it cold or re-nuking it until it resembled plastic. I opted for plastic and poured myself a glass of juice to wash it down.

  That night, I tossed and turned. My mind conjured up all sorts of scenarios involving Arnold’s death and our wine sabotage. I’d exhaust one idea and flip to another. When I finally managed to fall asleep, I dreamed that a dead body was found floating in one of our stainless steel tanks. When the face surfaced, it was Lavettia’s. I tried to turn away from her cloudy, blueish eyes, but I couldn’t. I woke up hearing Glenda’s voice in my head, shouting, “You didn’t cleanse your aura!”

  * * * *

  Mondays were notoriously slow in November compared to other weekdays. I told Cammy not to expect me in the winery until the weekend, but that she should call me if they were slammed I desperately needed the time to get my screenplay to the script analyst and make my deadline.

  Surprisingly, it was a quiet day—no frantic phone calls from the winery, and no news about Arnold’s death. I didn’t expect to hear anything on the morning news, but I was certain the news anchors would release the name of the victim during the noon segment. I was wrong. At a few minutes after four, the phone rang.

  It was Miller Holtz, of all people. “Good afternoon, Miss Ellington, heck of a thing. Heck of a thing. I’m reaching out to all the wineries in my territory. Heck of a thing. Poor Clayton’s been inundated all morning with phone calls: ‘Is the business still operational?’ ‘What’s the status of our wine?’ ‘Who’s taking over?’ Poor guy was about to have a breakdown. No one should be put in that position. Even if Clayton LeVine is, or should I say was, Arnold’s secretary. Heck of a thing.”

  “So, you know,” I said, “about your boss. Did one of the county deputies stop by the office? Is that what happened? How did everyone else know it was Arnold’s body in the ditch? A positive identification hasn’t been made public yet. Look, I wanted to call you myself, but I was advised not to. Sheriff department protocol and all that.”

  “Don’t worry about it. The sheriff’s department sent a deputy to the office. I was on the road checking in with some of the wineries at the lower end of the lake when Clayton called me. They’ve got enough evidence, official or not, to be certain it was Arnold.”

  Stuff in the wallet works for me. “That still doesn’t explain how everyone else knew. The other wineries, I mean.”

  “Really? Well, for starters, Arnold’s ditsy girlfriend posted a large ‘Rest in Peace’ banner on the guy’s Facebook page and went on a Twitter storm. If that wasn’t enough, she called everyone in his phonebook and hers! One thing led to another, and boom!”

  “Yeesh. Not a great way to break the news.”

  “I’ll say. Now we’re up to our ying-yang in damage control. Every winery is going nuts wondering whether we’ll continue picking up and distributing their wines.”

  “You will, won’t you?”

  “Of course, we will. Arnold may be out of the picture, but Lake-to-Lake Wine Distributors isn’t. He left a very solid business plan and even named his successor. I should know, because it happens to be me. I stand to inherit the business.”

  “You, uh, you….you…” For the life of me, all I could sputter out was the word “you.”

  “Are you okay, Miss Ellington?”

  “Um, fine. Yeah. I was surprised, that’s all.”

  “Arnold didn’t have any family, and he worked his butt off for the business. When I last spoke with him, which wasn’t all that long ago, he told me he’d be leaving the company to me in his will. Not his house or personal effects. Who knows about those? The girlfriend will most likely get her claws into them. Frankly, it’s not my concern. The business is. As soon as we get things straightened out, a new sales rep will be hired to replace me. I’ll need to take the helm, so to speak.”

  First Lavettia, then Miller. They were like vultures circling around fresh meat. “What happens in the meantime?”

  “Business as usual. Payroll’s been set up. Bills are on autopay. Listen, I’ve got at least three more calls to make. I’ll be in touch.”

  “Uh, before you hang up, any news on that wine hijacking?”

  “Zip. But like I told the Martinez family, the demand for Pinot Noir is going to increase. We’ll sell it for more and come out ahead. As for the wineries, they have their own accountants and know how to handle business losses.”

  Terrific. We just traded Ebenezer Scrooge for the Grinch. “I don’t mean to keep you, but when will you know for sure? About inheriting the business?”

  “Sometime this week, I’d wager. Guess it’s time I put Marvin Souza’s number on speed dial, huh?”

  Not if Lavettia has a thing to say about it. “Okay, then. Thanks for getting in touch.”

  Holy Cow! Who else did Arnold Mowen deed his business to? And why wasn’t Miller Holtz the least bit concerned about who killed his boss? As if I didn’t know.

  Chapter 9

  “We’ve got hot chocolate, coffee, and tea,” Madeline Martinez said. “Help yourselves. I made a few batches of snickerdoodles, too. Got a hankering for them last night.”

  As planned, the WOW crew was gathered in her living room on Tuesday. Two o’clock, to be precise—Rosalee Marbleton from Terrace Wineries, Stephanie Ipswich from Gable Hill Wineries, Catherine Trobert from Lake View Winery, and of course, Theo and me.

  Unlike the other ladies who complained about the rifle noise in the morning, the pop-pop sounds didn’t wake me. Maybe I’d gotten used to them with so many hunters sighting in their rifles over the weekend.

  “Guess it’s official now, huh?” Stephanie said. “Why on earth did the five o’clock news have to be so graphic yesterday? My kids were in the room. First graders don’t need to know about carotid arteries being severed by a bullet. And I didn’t need to hear them asking over and over again, ‘What’s a corroded eatery?’”

  “Did you tell them it was a bad bakery?” Theo laughed.

  Catherine snapped the cookie she was holding in half, bit into the smaller chunk, and swallowed it. “Is that what they said on the news? I hadn’t heard.”

  I jumped in before Stephanie could respond. “Did they mention whether the gun was fired from a long or short distance?”

  She shook her head. “No, but they showed a sketch of the human head, zeroing in on the carotid artery.”

  “Too much information, if you ask me,” Catherine said. “A simple name, and perhaps a nice photo of Arnold Mowen when he was alive, would’ve been more than enough.”

  Stephanie nodded. “I agree. At least the speculation is done. The county made a positive identification from the guy’s dental records. Apparently, he had implants and lots of them.”

  Theo and I looked at each other, and then I spoke. “We knew it was him the minute we found the wallet and the driver’s license. Hunting accident, my you-know-what.”

  Rosalee stood and poured herself some tea. “They might have to conduct this investigation like the deli counter at Wegmans: Get in line and take a number. Let’s be honest, the man all but had a target on his back. That’s what happens when you get too greedy. And talk about gre
edy, that Miller Holtz isn’t too far behind. Imagine what it’ll be like with him as the CEO. I wouldn’t be surprised if he finds a way to pay us even less for our wines.”

  “Unless he’s behind bars for murder,” Theo said. “Talk about motive. That guy was chomping at the bit to tell all of the wineries he was going to inherit the business.”

  I shifted in my seat, debating whether to open my mouth, but I figured ‘what the heck’. “He wasn’t the only one. Lavettia Lawrence, the platinum blond with the dangling gold jewelry, told me she was about to inherit the business.”

  Madeline slapped herself on the cheek, making an audible noise. “You don’t say. Really?”

  “Really.” I began to feel as if I’d left a business meeting and somehow returned to my seventh-grade lunch table. Worse yet, it was my fault for telling tales out of school. My mother would’ve been appalled. “Maybe we should forget about Arnold and actually discuss the real reason we’re here—the wine thefts and sabotage.”

  A few groans followed.

  “This isn’t coincidence, you know,” Theo said. “I think these are calculated acts, deliberately designed to boost the market price on the Pinot Noir. True, those oak barrels were easier to tamper with than stainless steel, but how do you explain the wine truck hijacking? Only the red wines? And only the Pinot Noir?”

  He turned to me. “Don got that tiny little detail from Clayton LeVine—before all hell broke loose.”

  “So, now what do we do?” Stephanie asked. “Sit back and wait for the next winery to be hit? We can’t afford round the clock surveillance and all of you know that these crooks, or whatever you call them, know how to render our alarm systems useless. Face it, they’re always one step ahead of the good guys.”

  Suddenly, that gave me an idea. Not the best idea, mind you, but an idea. “Suppose we go old school and double-cross them?”

  Theo looked ashen, but the ladies seemed intent on hearing what I had to say.

  “Listen, if it’s Pinot Noir they’re after, let’s fool them. All of us have oak barrels we’re not using for one reason or another. Fill them with water and make sure there’s a visible number chart. We all use barrel number charts that list the wine and year. So what if someone tampers with our water? It’s not like we plan on bottling it. Besides, this is only for another few weeks. Everyone should be done bottling the reds by then.”

  Theo rubbed his chin and paused. “So, if I understand you correctly, the real number chart would be under lock and key while the fake one would be in plain sight near a barrel. Like hanging on a building wall or something.”

  “You got it.”

  “That’s not a bad idea, Norrie,” Stephanie said. “I’ll run it by my husband.”

  Catherine gave a quick nod. “Same here.”

  “I don’t have to run anything by anyone,” Rosalee said. “I’ll just do it. It can’t hurt.”

  I reached for a cookie and held it for a moment. “Hold on, there’s more. The fake number chart should be written on transparency paper with a marker, and then put on a white clipboard. That way, when those scoundrels check it out, their fingerprints will be on it. Staples and OfficeMax both sell white clipboards. Francine’s obsessed with them.”

  “If it’s water in the barrel, how will we know it’s been tampered with?” Catherine asked.

  “Have your winemaker pull up a sample each day and test it in the lab for calcium carbonate. They should be able to do that. If it shows up, we notify the sheriff’s department and have them check the transparency paper for prints.”

  “Goodness, Norrie,” she said. “How do you come up with this stuff?”

  “I don’t. But Nancy Drew does. One of my employees is a real aficionado and she insisted I become familiar with The Official Nancy Drew Handbook.”

  “Really? It’s still in print?”

  “In print, on Kindle, on Nook…”

  Theo shrugged. “It can’t hurt. Well, one ‘Deck the Halls around the Lake’ down, and one to go. I can’t believe the wine association even considered running a third weekend.”

  “It’s the biggest money maker for them,” I said. “Besides, it isn’t until after Thanksgiving. It’s always the second weekend in December.”

  Madeline stood and poured herself another cup of coffee. “Tell me about it. No sooner am I finished with one holiday, the next one begins. At least I won’t have to cook a giant turkey for the winery event. Or figure out what to do with the leftovers, for that matter. So, are we all agreed on Norrie’s plan?”

  A chorus of “yes” followed, and the meeting concluded in record time. Theo and I had driven over together in my car and we all but raced out the door.

  “I’m glad you’ll be joining Don and me for Thanksgiving this year. He’s already browsing through cookbooks to find new and different side dishes.”

  “I really wish you’d let me bring something.”

  “And what? Spoil his fun? If you insist, you could pick up a pie at Wegmans. Anything except rhubarb.”

  “Done! I hate rhubarb too, and I can always taste it no matter how many strawberries they bake into it.”

  “What did you just say?”

  “That I hate rhubarb?”

  “No, something about tasting it.”

  “I said I can always pick out the rhubarb, why?”

  “Because the most unsettling thought popped into my head. What if the people who tampered with our wine didn’t want us to notice? Maybe they didn’t realize the winemakers keep testing it before it’s ready to be bottled.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Maybe some unscrupulous individuals wanted to ruin our wines for the customers and give all of us a bad reputation. Maybe it was about that all along.”

  “Then how do you explain what happened to Madeline? Or the hijacking?”

  “I can’t. Not right now, anyway. That’s not the worst of what’s going on. He might not show it, but Don’s pretty rattled about having someone killed on our property. I seriously don’t think he’s going to get a good night’s sleep until it’s resolved.”

  “I understand. Remember? Sometimes I still think about Elsbeth Waters.”

  “Face it, the killer had to be someone who wanted Arnold out of the picture. Narrows it down to two suspects in my book—Lavettia and Miller. Both of them had a strong motive to get him out of the way.”

  “When that ballistics report is complete, and Deputy Hickman realizes it was no accident, he’ll turn his attention to those two for sure. Trouble is, how long do we have to wait?”

  It was a question neither of us could answer. I dropped Theo off at his winery and drove home to focus on my real job—screenwriting. I received an email from Renee, the movie producer, telling me the company would begin filming A Swim under the Waterfall in late spring, possibly summer. The location was somewhere near Niagara Falls, but she wasn’t too specific. It didn’t matter. After that screenplay left my hands, it belonged to her and the director. She wanted to know if I’d meet my next deadline. Apparently contemporary romance was still in.

  As soon as I settled in with my laptop at the kitchen table, my cell phone rang: Bradley Jamison. That name could get my pulse rate up—even if I was standing perfectly still. I hadn’t spoken with him since Sunday, the day Arnold’s body was discovered, and the news stations broadcasted the event. He’d called to make sure I was all right and we agreed to get together for dinner soon. I supposed this call meant that time had come.

  “Hey, Norrie! Hope I’m not interrupting anything. Believe it or not, this is the first break I’ve had all day. You won’t believe what’s going on around here.”

  “Let me guess—you met Lavettia Lawrence.”

  “You could say that. She came in demanding to see Arnold Mowen’s will. She insisted Lake-to-Lake Wine Distributors was willed to her. Among other things.”

&nb
sp; “Did you read her the will?”

  “Look, I’m really not supposed to talk about this. I called to see if you were available on Friday for dinner at Port of Call.”

  “That depends. Will you be able to talk about it then?”

  “Very funny. This much I can tell you, and it’s a doozy. Marvin and I have never had a situation like it.”

  “What?”

  “Arnold Mowen had a Memorandum of Understanding with our law firm to ensure that his will was not read until twenty-nine days after his death.”

  “Huh? That’s a first.”

  “Oh. It gets better. Believe me. The MoU stipulated that our office was to contact certain individuals to inform them of his demise, and request that they memorialize him in some way prior to the reading of the will. He even listed the options.”

  “Options?”

  “Want the long list or the short list? The long list is really long. I’ll give you the short version—a memorial bench at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, a memorial brick walkway at the Boston Aquarium, and my personal favorite, the placement of a life-size statue of him at the capitol building in Albany.”

  “Isn’t there a statue of someone there already? Someone on a horse? We visited the place when I was a kid.”

  “Yeah. Some general, but I can’t remember who. Anyway, how about I pick you up at seven-thirty and we can talk about it then. If I’m still sane.”

  “Good luck with that. I’ve already met Lavettia.”

  “Lavettia wasn’t the only one demanding to hear what was in that will. Look, I can’t stay on the line. See you Friday. I’ve missed you.”

  With that, the call ended. I was positive Miller Holtz was the other bottom feeder anxious to learn what Arnold had bequeathed him. Honestly, hearing the words, “I’ve missed you,” was all I could think about. At least for ten minutes. Eventually, the rainbow-rosy-romance portion of my brain gave way to the cognitive side and I realized something—whoever was on Arnold’s memorialization list might have had a motive for murdering him. A statue at the capitol building? Really? What kind of a person demanded such a thing? And, even more puzzling, who on earth would have the means and the wherewithal to do it?