Sharpshooter

by Nadia Gordon

  What comes next is the hard part. She drops the gun, leaving it, the spent cartridge, and the canvas case behind. There is absolutely no reason to risk having the murder weapon found in her possession. She goes back to her car, hoping no one has heard the shot, or if they have, that they assume it is Wade playing Assault Golf. With all those hills and valleys to bounce the report around, no one would be able to say where the shot came from, anyway. But Steve Harvey said that the gun was not there. He and his team had looked hard enough to be certain it wasn’t there. Still, it didn’t make sense for the murderer to remove the weapon. Maybe she simply ditched it nearby and the police missed it. Sunny had just been over that landscape, and a coyote with a metal detector could miss a gun out there. Between the brush, the down leaves, and the steep terrain, it would be easy to hide.

  Sunny thought she had a good idea of how Jack was murdered and still no idea why or by whom. What made her think she could figure it out, anyway? Whoever shot Jack is going to get away with it. And it is entirely possible that a jury will convict Wade Skord. She had to figure out who did it.

  She slid a tray of leaf cookies into the oven. The person who killed Jack was almost certainly the person who called him that night at Larissa’s party. It had to be someone he knew and wanted to see, even go out of his way to meet urgently and clandestinely. Judging by Larissa’s description of Jack, that would almost certainly indicate a woman, perhaps the mysterious blond girlfriend from high school. And yet Gabe had already outed Jack’s rendezvous technique. If it had been a simple booty call, surely they would have met at his house, using the old logging road. Whoever he expected to meet, she was a good shot and familiar with Wade, his gun, his property, and the Beroni place. She’d had some kind of contact with Jack’s lawyer. And she’d planned far enough ahead not to leave any fingerprints. She also would have needed to bring her own bullet.

  There were still one or two more slender threads that might lead somewhere. Sunny would go see Michael Rieder in the morning, ask him who had he given his business card to in the last week or so, and what had he and Jack been talking about lately. It was a long shot, but it was worth trying since she didn’t have much else to go on. And she needed to find out who Jack’s high-school sweetheart was. That shouldn’t be too hard; he went to school with plenty of people. Come to think of it, she had a few questions for Steve Harvey as well, and she needed to turn over that business card as evidence. She had a funny feeling it wouldn’t mean much to Sergeant Harvey. She could already see the indulgent look on his face, like, “That’s probably been lying around for a month.” Still, you never know. Maybe somehow it would help Wade’s case.

  She pulled the first tray of cookies out and slid another in, then went up front for another glass of wine. On the way back she heard a sound like a shoe scuffing against stone outside the window, and when she looked up she caught a glimpse of a face pulling away from the window. Her heart pounded. She put the wine down and went to her bag, found her cell phone, and checked the signal and battery. She turned the lock on the back door and slipped into the dining room to check the front door. When she came back into the kitchen, she took a ten-inch knife from the rack, placed it on the counter beside her, and stood still, listening and waiting.

  Wildside, for all its virtues, was not a secure building. Fortresslike security had never been a priority. The windows were low and accessible, with antique closures designed to discourage a breeze, not a crowbar. Even the bolt on the main door was screwed into soft wood. One good shove would pull it away. The back door actually sported a hook latch, like the one on the screen door at her grandmother’s house. The handle locked, but that was not much security.

  She pulled the second tray of golden brown cookies out of the oven and put the orange peels into their final sugary boil. She looked at her watch. Ten minutes after two. Suddenly the insanity of what she was doing struck home. Why was she baking cookies and boiling orange peels at this hour of the morning? Had she lost her mind? She thought of what Wade would say in a phony West Texas drawl when he was pretending not to be scared. “A coward dies a thousand deaths, a brave man dies but once.”

  She speed-dialed Rivka on her cell. Rivka’s phone rang four times, taking what seemed like an eternity between each ring, then the voice mail picked up. Sunny hung up. Normally she would phone Wade at a time like this. She could call Steve Harvey, but he’d give her a speech about staying out of police business. Charlie? She thought for a moment and then hit the number for Monty, who answered in a groggy voice.

  “Hello?” he said.

  “Monty,” whispered Sunny.

  “Sunny? What time is it?”

  “Late. Or early, depending. Listen, could you just stay on the line with me for a couple of minutes?”

  “What’s the matter? What’s going on?” Sunny heard Annabelle in the background, asking who was on the phone. Monty said, “It’s Sunny. Something’s wrong.”

  “Nothing’s wrong. I’m at the restaurant and I thought I saw someone creeping around outside.”

  “You what? I’m calling the police.”

  “No, don’t! They’ll make a big fuss. Just stay on the line while I get out of here.”

  “I’m coming down. I’ll be there in seven minutes.”

  “You don’t have to do that. I’m just going to close up and get out of here. I’m going to put the phone in my pocket so you can listen. If you hear a thud or a shriek and the line goes dead, would you send somebody over here?”

  “Right. Will do.”

  Sunny turned off the orange peels, looked at the cookies sitting out on their trays with regret, made sure all the lights were on inside and out, and then threw open the back door. She ran hunched over like a Green Beret to the truck, just in case whoever was out there was a shooter. She managed to slide the key into the ignition, roll up the window, lock the door, start the engine, and hit reverse in one fast, smooth motion. She put it in first and hit the gas. Crunching and throwing gravel, the truck bounded out of the parking lot. A few bounces and a slight fishtail and Sunny was on the road.

  She found the cell phone in her pocket. “You still there?”

  “Way to burn rubber!” said Monty.

  “You could hear that?”

  “You bet. Listen, say ‘I’m fine’ if you’re okay and ‘I’m okay’ if you need help.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “How do I know there’s no one holding you at gunpoint, telling you to say that?”

  “Monty, there is no one holding me at gunpoint. I’m okay now.”

  “What—is that code or really?”

  “Monty, enough cloak-and-dagger! I’m safe. Thanks for talking me in.”

  “Okay. Call me when you are inside your house.”

  “I will.”

  “Don’t forget, or there will be a SWAT team breaking down your door in about ten minutes.”

  “I won’t forget. Thanks, Monty. Um, you and Annabelle won’t…”

  “Tell anyone? No, we won’t. I’m getting you sleeping pills for Christmas, McCoskey.”

  “Thanks.”

  11

  Sunny got out of bed automatically and staggered to the front door, wondering who was knocking at six-thirty in the morning. She peeked through the hole and opened the door. Charlie Rhodes stood on the stoop looking fresh as a new daisy in sport sandals and outdoorsy shorts. His silky brown hair stuck up in front and he had an exhilarated smile on his face, as though he’d just ridden down a big hill on his bike. The collar of an olive-green microfiber shirt showed under a slate-blue pullover made out of some trademarked descendant of fleece designed to wick away or ward off everything from excess personal moisture to rain, sleet, and dead of night.

  Sunny stood in the old gray sweatshirt and baggy drawstring pants she’d gone to sleep in and ran her hands over her hair, smoothing her bangs to one side and tucking the loose ends behind her ear. She ran her hand over her face and rubbed discreetly at what must be a crust of drool near the cor
ner of her mouth. Any chance she might have had at a romance with Charlie Rhodes was in serious jeopardy. She frowned at the navy-blue sky behind him and said, in what turned out to be a froggy voice, “When I said let’s have coffee at six-thirty, I’m pretty sure I meant let’s have coffee at nine-thirty.”

  “Huh, I guess I missed that part. You want me to come back later?”

  “No, no. I just want to complain about it. Get in here, the draft is freezing my toes.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Mm. Dandy. Why?”

  “You seem tired and, uh, grouchy.”

  “Tired. That makes sense. The grouchy part should wear off in a sec. Don’t be alarmed.”

  She padded into the kitchen with Charlie trailing behind her and put water on for coffee, loaded glossy black-brown beans into the grinder, gritted her teeth against the coming noise, and pushed the button. The roar of grinding assaulted her tender sleep-deprived ears. It was a painful introduction to the day, but unavoidable, and at least it would soon be counterbalanced by the smell and taste of fresh coffee. She took a pair of clunky ceramic mugs down from the cabinet and handed one to Charlie. They stood staring at the teakettle and blue flame, mugs held like sepulchers in front of them. Sunny struggled to stay in the conscious world. Charlie had woken her in the middle of a dream and she kept tumbling back into it. She was at Skord Mountain, walking in the vineyard. The vines were lush with green leaves and heavy with plump fruit, the way they were now. As she walked through them, pushing their reaching arms aside, they began to wither and crumble under her touch until all around her the vines were brown and dead. She looked around in alarm and saw that the entire vineyard was dying. Soon all the leaves and berries had shriveled and fallen off, and the vines themselves were desiccated and brittle. She started to run back to the house to tell Wade, and as she ran, the vineyard turned from brown to ghostly white. When she looked back from the porch, the hillside was an ashen white graveyard of dead vines and stakes sticking up like markers in a wide cemetery. She recited the dream to Charlie.

  “It’s the kaolin clay. I told you about that on Friday night at dinner,” said Charlie. “Down in Temecula, they sprayed the vineyards with clay to keep the sharpshooters from getting to them, but it didn’t work. They just ended up with acres of dead vineyard painted white.”

  “I remember,” said Sunny, staring dully into space. “That must be it.”

  “There’s news on the sharpshooter front, as a matter of fact.”

  She glanced up at him. “Good news?”

  “Well, I guess I’d have to say it’s bad news. They found one late Friday afternoon.”

  “You mean inside the valley?”

  “It was in one of the yellow sticky traps up on Mount Veeder. In an olive grove near the vineyard at the Maya Culpa Vineyard.”

  “The Maya Culpa. That’s up by Monty’s house. And Hansen Ranch. Don’t tell me they’re going to spray up there.”

  “Not yet. There’s an emergency meeting this morning to decide what to do about it.”

  “But it’s a possibility?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Oh my God, they can’t do that. That’s where most of Wildside’s produce comes from. And they’ll put Hansen Ranch completely out of business.”

  “It’s not decided yet. And it might not be the end of Hansen Ranch. They passed a law that says in case of emergency, organic produce can be sprayed and still be called organic.”

  “Oh, that’s comforting. So now organic is a euphemism for pesticide-flavored. Does this situation really qualify as an emergency? One bug?”

  “We’ll see. I’m going to suggest we have a good look around before we do anything. It might actually be a single rogue specimen, just some lone sharpie off on his own, way out ahead of the pack. Frankly, it’s not likely, but it’s worth taking the time to be sure. Unfortunately, the Conservation Corps intern who identified the specimen on Friday didn’t tell anybody about it until yesterday, or we might have started checking out the area over the weekend.”

  The kettle piped and Sunny poured boiling water into a French press and stirred the grounds. While it brewed, she stood on a chair and rummaged in the cabinet over the refrigerator. She took down an unopened bottle of drinkable Merlot, nothing fancy.

  “That’s just terrible news,” she said. “I was really hoping they would be able to keep it out of the valley for a few more months by being super vigilant at the inspection stations. I assume the Maya Culpa people are freaking out.”

  “I don’t think they know yet,” said Charlie. “I tried to reach them last night, but I kept getting the machine and I didn’t want to leave that kind of information in a message.” He held up his fist by his ear as if he were holding a telephone. “‘Hey, just wanted to let you know that your vineyard is probably infested with sharpies and about to die of Pierce’s disease. Even if it’s not, we’ll be by to bomb it tomorrow or the next day.’ I’ll try to reach them again this morning. They’re going to want to be at the meeting.”

  Sunny hunched over the coffeepot and pressed the filter down slowly with both hands. “I’d like to be there, too. If they spray Hansen Ranch, it will have a direct impact on Wildside. I can’t serve food that’s been treated with carbaryl even if Sacramento says it’s organic. We’ve built our reputation on genuinely organic food and wine.”

  “Right,” said Charlie. “That makes sense. You’re more than welcome to attend. In fact, everyone is welcome. It’s a public meeting. Has to be because they’re talking about putting together a countywide mandatory initiative.”

  “You mean spraying land from here to Calistoga whether we like it or not.”

  “Well, yeah. Probably more localized than that.”

  Sunny cranked the corkscrew down and squeezed the bottle of Merlot between her thighs. The cork made a throaty ponk! when she pulled it out, a sound that always cheered her up. She unscrewed the cork and laid it neatly beside the bottle, then poured them coffee and added a splash of red wine to hers. She held the bottle over his cup. “Do you like it this way?”

  “I’ll skip. I generally try not to start drinking until lunch.”

  “It’s not drinking. It’s just a splash for flavor. Robert Mondavi does it.”

  “So does the pope, but that doesn’t make me Catholic.”

  She grinned. “No need to get sassy about it. If you don’t want to be cool like me and Robert, that’s fine. Suit yourself.”

  They went out the kitchen door to the patio and settled into a couple of splintery old redwood deck chairs Sunny kept out there for just this sort of occasion. Come to think of it, it was just the sort of occasion she’d been hoping for: namely, Charlie Rhodes putting his feet up in her house, or at least on her patio. She smiled to herself. It was still cold, but the first of the morning light promised another beautiful day. Even sitting down she had that dizzy feeling insomniacs know so well. Pinpoint lights danced in the periphery of her vision. Sleep deprivation was unpleasant, but being an altered state, it had some enjoyable aspects to offer, assuming you didn’t need to get anything done that day. She pulled her legs up under her and huddled over her coffee.

  “So when and where is this meeting taking place?”

  “Eight o’clock. At the new courthouse. The room number will be posted on the bulletin board as you walk in.”

  They sipped quietly.

  Charlie said, “It should be interesting. Jack Beroni has been the strong arm of the pro-spray contingent for a while now. With him gone, it’s hard to say how the debate is going to go.”

  “The big wineries must have had more than Jack representing them.”

  “Yeah, they send a cadre of suits to most of these things. But Jack was leading them. He had the most clout because he’s a Beroni, and he was charismatic. People listened to him. They’ll still have plenty of representation without him, but it’s not going to be as credible or persuasive. This could be a real battle for the big wineries. They’re big employers, so som
e people may support them to protect their jobs. I expect the organic contingent to come out in force, and a lot of the public is going to be behind them. The down-valley residents don’t want their yards sprayed with chemicals just so the corporate wine baron on the hill can make more money. It’s going to be a tough sell.”

  “Were you there when Wade and Jack got into it recently at some meeting?”