by Nadia Gordon
She raised her right foot up to the next strut and slowly shifted her weight onto it, hoping the slender metal band would hold. Her fingers wrapped around the warm bulb and she twisted it, listening to the stairs creak under the weight of footsteps. She twisted the bulb around one last time and it released. She could hear steps coming toward the door at the bottom. She pushed the bulb into her pocket and climbed back down the wine rack, which rocked perilously. Just as she pressed herself against the furthest wall, the cellar door opened.
Very faint, soft light filtered into the cellar from the light in the kitchen at the top of the stairs. A shadowy figure stood in the doorway groping for the light switch. Sunny heard the clicks as the switch was flipped up, down, up. She hardly breathed. Her last hope had been dashed. She had held on to a sliver of hope that it was Steve Harvey snooping around, checking up on her, but he would have called out as he came down. She heard a metallic click, a sound she’d only heard in movies, and knew the safety on a handgun had been released.
“I know you’re in here, Sunny,” said Ben. “Why don’t you come on out.”
At the furthest corner of the room where Sunny had wedged herself, a barely gray dimness made it difficult to see. It was too dark and shadowy to read, but not dark enough to prevent Ben Baker from spotting her as soon as he walked around the last wine rack. Sunny fingered the lightbulb in her pocket nervously.
“Sunny, I know you’re here. I don’t want to hurt you. I just need that gun and everything will be fine and we can all get back to normal around here.”
She could hear him moving down the corridor along the end of the racks. He was making his way toward her, moving slowly. “Not all of us,” said Sunny in a quivering voice. Her heart was beating so hard that her words sounded far away in her own ears. “Jack Beroni won’t be getting back to normal anytime soon, and neither will Wade if he’s convicted of a murder you committed.”
Ben appeared around the end of the last wine rack and Sunny met his eyes in the gloom. The pistol in his right hand was leveled squarely at her.
“I’m sorry about that,” said Ben. “Old Wade’s not a bad guy. But you have to admit he’s part of the problem. He doesn’t fight for what he believes in. He makes big threats, then he rolls over like a puppy for them. He figured somebody else would take care of defending the land. There’s no excuse for that kind of laziness. You have to protect what can’t protect itself.”
“Killing me is only going to make matters worse,” said Sunny. “That snip of your shirt is in the mail already. When Steve Harvey receives it, he’s going to know exactly who killed me and why.”
“I don’t want to have to kill you, Sunny, you know that. And all Steve Harvey is going to have is a scrap of fabric from my jacket. It doesn’t prove anything.”
“It does when he matches those fibers with the ones that you and I both know are caught in the crack on the stock of Wade’s gun.”
Ben glanced around and spotted the large package on top of the rack in the wine cage. He smiled with satisfaction. “I’ll need the key.”
Sunny stared at him, trying desperately to think of some diversion or response.
“The key, please,” said Ben. He stepped toward her with one hand outstretched for the key and the other holding the pistol.
“Even if you manage to get rid of the gun, there’s still the tire tracks off the side of the road over at Beroni. And your gardening gloves,” said Sunny.
“Doesn’t prove anything. It’s not a crime to drive off road, and it’s not a crime to shoot a gun. I’m not going to jail, Sunny, get used to that. I’ll kill you first if I have to. There’s no reason for me to go to jail. All I did was get rid of a destructive force upsetting the balance of nature. Jack wasn’t happy cutting down his own forests and turning his own half of the valley into a monoculture, a distortion that’s unnaturally vulnerable to every pest in creation. He had to attack what’s mine. My land. My wife. Jack Beroni is the one who should be in jail for all the things he tried to do. Enough talk. The key, please.”
The blood pounded in Sunny’s temples. She couldn’t think straight, but she hoped he wouldn’t shoot if she kept talking. “I’m not giving you the key, Ben. You’ll have to kill me, anyway. I know everything. I know how you parked on the hidden road and walked to Skord Mountain, stole Wade’s gun out of the winery, hiked overland to the lake at Beroni Vineyards, and shot Jack Beroni. You’ll have to kill me, but even that won’t do any good because I’m not the only one who’s figured it out. How long do you think it’s going to take Wade and Charlie and Alex to put it together? And what about Rivka and Claire and Monty? Not to mention Gabe. They’ll all figure it out when I’m found dead.”
“Maybe. And then they can sit around for the rest of their lives talking about it, because they can’t prove anything without the gun. Now give me the key.”
Ben’s outstretched hand was only a few feet from Sunny. The resolve seemed to harden on his features.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw a shadow move. Her mind cleared. “I, I don’t know which key it is,” said Sunny. “I might not even have the right key ring with me—that’s why I hadn’t taken the gun out yet.”
“No more talk! Give them all to me!”
Slowly she moved her hand toward her pocket, hardly daring to breathe or look as Rivka drew up behind Ben. Rivka was holding a bottle of wine by the neck. Sunny showed no expression as she drew the lightbulb out of her pocket and dropped it on the cement floor. The sound of the shattering glass distracted Ben, who looked down at the floor and back at Sunny just as Rivka smashed the bottle down on the back of his head. The gun went off with an ear-numbing explosion as he crumpled to the floor. Sunny buckled in response to the deafening noise and a searing hot pain in her leg. A gush of wine flooded from the rack behind her, surging out in a widening puddle around her feet and filling the close space with the heady smell of well-aged Cabernet Sauvignon.
They stared down at Ben’s face, slack and unconscious. A panicked look on her face, Rivka let go of the bottle in her hand and it smashed on the floor, the sound of the crash mixed with the continuing ringing of the gunshot.
Sunny flinched and let out a gasp of pain. She leaned against the wall of wine, struggling to stand. Not a foot away from her, she saw where the bullet had shattered several bottles of wine. It was only then that she felt the warm, wet sensation on the back of her thigh. She braced herself and turned to look. There was a tear in her skirt. Sunny reached behind her and lifted it, careful to hold it away from her skin. About six inches above the back of her knee a chunk of green bottle glass that looked about the size and shape of a large arrowhead stuck out of the back of her leg. She let her skirt drop and looked back at Rivka, afraid she would be sick. The room whirled.
Just then they heard someone jogging down the stairs, and a second later Steve Harvey appeared around the corner of the wine racks, carrying a huge flashlight in one hand and a pistol in the other. “Freeze!” he yelled, and trained his gun first on Rivka and then Sunny. Then his eyes went to Ben Baker, who was curled on the floor, with blood-red wine soaking his shirt.
16
Wade Skord saved the best for last. His crew of volunteers had arrived hours before dawn, bundled up and shivering against the night cold. They’d strapped headlamps on over their stocking hats and shouldered the old wooden crates, heading out into the vineyard with Wade leading the way with a lantern. They sliced clusters of berries free by the misty glow of their headlamps until the sun came up. By noon, most of the vineyard had been harvested and boxes of perfectly ripe berries were being upturned into the crusher-destemmer. Stems tumbled out one side and the thick, scarlet must gushed out the other into the fermentation tanks, sending up the smell of fresh Zinfandel grape juice, an aroma of dusty jam and boysenberry and a hint of clove.
By the time Sunny and Rivka arrived in the early afternoon, the only area of vineyard that still had fruit hanging from its vines was half an acre of woody oldsters, pri
mitivo planted in the late 1880s, around the time Ernest Campaglia was producing his first vintage at the Cortona Winery next door. Wade had lived at Skord Mountain for five years before he discovered these vines, tucked away in the hillside behind the house. They’d gone wild and unruly, twisting up into the encroaching oaks and Doug firs. He had spent three years coaxing them back into yielding the kind of fruit he could use to make a wine worthy of the terroir. “My own little piece of Beroni Vineyards,” he used to say. “History in a bottle.”
The harvest crew, or at least those with the stamina to make it through the entire day, lay scattered on the dry grass in front of the winery like broken toys, all of them stained, dirty, sunburned, and exhausted. A woman Sunny recognized as a line cook at an upscale grill in Napa was in her socks walking on Monty Lenstrom’s back while he grunted and twitched his legs. Gabe and Alex Campaglia were stretched out against either side of a pine tree with their arms folded under their heads, looking like a couple of muscular bookends. Wade walked over when he noticed Rivka and Sunny making their way down to the winery.
“Well, if it isn’t Hercule Poirot and her sidekick, Crouching Chavez,” said Wade. He gave Rivka a friendly kung fu chop.
“Elementary, my dear Skord,” said Sunny, feigning a puff on a pipe.
Wade stood with his hands on his hips, looking ridiculously pleased with himself. His face and T-shirt were smudged with shades of purple and red, and his hands were stained nearly black with juice. A pungent, sour smell like a truckload of recycling seeped out from the shady opening of the winery. Tanks were being scrubbed down and young wine was being racked from barrel to barrel. A whiff of sulfur drifted from the fermentation tanks. The juice was already beginning to heat up.
“How’s the leg?” asked Charlie, barely lifting his head from the ground, his voice thick with fatigue.
“Getting better, but my career as a swimsuit model is probably over. I’m going to have a scar the size of Wade’s belt buckle.”
Wade thumbed his trademark buckle, a rodeo prize as big as a tea saucer that they’d bought together at a flea market in Petaluma.
“It’ll be great. It looks like a three-pointed star,” said Rivka.
“A scar is the natural man’s tattoo,” said Wade.
“You’re the toughest chef on the block now,” grunted Monty, his face turned to the side and shoved into the ground.
“Great, that’s just the reputation I was going for.” Sunny limped over and eased herself down onto the grass next to Charlie.
“Let’s see that hand,” he said.
Sunny held it out and he lifted up an edge of the bandage. “Ew. Have you been cooking with that thing?”
“I wear gloves.”
“It’s still gross.”
“Thanks.”
A gust of cool air heavy with moisture wafted up the draw.
“I think we got that fruit in just in time,” said Gabe. “I looks like it might want to rain tomorrow.”
“I’m glad to see you here, Gabe,” said Sunny. “I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”
“What’s that?”
“Why, exactly, were you stalking me? It was you, wasn’t it, Sunday night?”
Alex snickered and Gabe looked off at the vineyard self-consciously. “I saw you leaving my place,” Gabe said. “I was up the road cutting firewood when you came by. I figured whatever you wanted, it had something to do with Jack, and I thought you might get into trouble.”
“So instead of calling me, you waited outside my house, tailed me to Wildside in the middle of the night, and tried to give me a heart attack by pressing your face up against the window like a psychotic killer?”
“That wasn’t actually intentional. I just wanted to see what you were doing in there.”
Alex made an L with his thumb and index finger and held it up to his forehead. He mouthed loco. Rivka laughed. Monty, released from his trial of pleasure and pain, rolled himself closer to them. “I still need to know one thing, too,” he said to Sunny. “How did you manage to end up with Wade’s gun in your wine cage?”
“Simple. I got it from Rivka, who lifted it from Alex, who I’m pretty sure found it in the woods by the lake at Beroni, when Silvano went to phone the police on Friday morning after he found Jack.” She looked at Alex, who’d drawn up his knees and had his face tucked under one arm. “Alex arrived at work a few minutes after Silvano Friday morning. When he saw what had happened, he thought he’d better take the precaution of removing the murder weapon, just in case the homicidal maniac turned out to be his brother—or his father, for that matter. Better safe than sorry. Unfortunately, Silvano caught a glimpse of him hiding something away in his truck. That’s why he figured Alex or one of the other Campaglias did it. If Silvano hadn’t been so amenable to the idea of getting rid of Jack himself, he might have gone to the police.”
Monty flipped over on his back. “What I don’t get is how you knew it wasn’t our pal Gabe, here.”
Sunny smiled at Gabe. “I knew he didn’t do it.”
“What made you so sure?” asked Monty.
“Well, aside from his character, which I observed to be rather sensitive and gentle despite the gruff exterior, because he is left-handed. Thanks to Farber, I found Michael Rieder’s business card to the right of the winery door. Left-handed people put their gloves in their left-hand pocket, and when they pull their gloves out to put them on before they reach for a metal door handle, for example, the business card that they forgot they had tucked in their pocket falls out to the left.”
Monty stared at her with a dazed look. “You scare me.”
“There is still one mystery that no one has solved,” said Rivka.
Sunny looked at her inquisitively.
“The cookies. Who has been stealing the sweets from Wildside’s pantry?”
“That is a very odd question for you to ask,” said Sunny, giving her a sidelong stare.
“Why do you say that?” asked Rivka.
“Because you’re the one who’s been taking them,” said Sunny. “I can’t believe you can maintain that poker face when you know you’re guilty.”
Rivka burst out laughing and rolled backward. “Oh my God. I am so busted! How did you know?”
“Well, I might have guessed when I saw hazelnut cookies in Gabe’s lunch box that morning, but I didn’t really think about it until you mentioned the orange rinds were missing. I knew you were lying about something because you implied it might be Heather who took them when you knew Heather was in New York and had been for days. The Rivka I know would never make such a mistake.”
“I didn’t want to accuse someone who would actually have to take the rap.”
“Exactly. But the real proof was that metal change box I saw in your trunk. That says ‘bake sale’ loud and clear. Who gets the money?”
“The Calistoga 4-H Club.”
“Why not just ask?”
“Last time I asked you said no.”
“I did?”
“Remember? I wanted to sell cookies at that fund-raiser for the juvenile hall?”
“They were collecting money to send kids on a field trip to the Sears Point Raceway. I nearly went over there to picket them.”
“I was going to tell you, sooner or later,” Rivka said.
“Sure,” said Sunny, smiling. “I’m going to have to keep a closer eye on you.”
“Are the cookies why you were at Wildside last night in time to clobber Ben Baker?” Alex asked Rivka.
“I knew Sunny was up to something when I left her place after dinner. I called her as soon as I got home, and when she wasn’t there, I figured she was at the restaurant. When I saw Ben’s car parked down the street, I knew there was something funny going on.”
“And Steve Harvey? How did he end up at Wildside?” asked Alex.
“I called him before I left home,” said Sunny. “I asked him to meet me in town, where I was supposed to meet Ben. But just like Baker, he went by my house and Wildside f
irst, hoping to intercept me.”
Wade emerged from the winery with two glasses in one hand and a couple of wine bottles in the other. “I need two volunteers,” he said, coming over. “Chavez, you just keep your hands where I can see them. We don’t want any trouble.”
“I’ll try to contain myself.”
“Are you ready to bottle?” asked Sunny.
“Oui, ma petite cochone. Il est l’heure de l’assemblage. Another baby vintage is just about to be born.”
“Yum. Let me at it.”
Wade poured a splash from the first bottle into each glass and handed them to Sunny and Rivka. “Personal saviors first.”
They swirled, sniffed, studied, and sipped. Sunny said, “Earthy. Dirt clods and briar patch, but in a good way.”
Rivka said, “Loads of black pepper, black cherry, clove, a bit of tobacco. Nice.”
“Nice, Miss Chavez, is not what we are about here at Skord Mountain.” He tossed what was left in their glasses on the ground and poured from the second bottle. Sunny sipped and held the wine on her tongue, drawing air over it so the vapors went up her nose, then handed her glass to Monty.
“Well?” asked Wade.
“Big, solid blackberry foundation, plenty of black pepper for kick. Slight mushroom, and probably more to come later. Healthy dash of licorice and some chocolate to finish. Very nice.”
Monty sipped and held the glass up to the failing afternoon light. “Yep. Hazelnut, some molasses. It’s classic Skord. I’d say this one is a contender.”
“Chavez?”
“Love it.”
“That’s better,” said Wade. He took a glass and poured for himself, smacking the chewy, tannic young wine. “I’m getting 1958 Chevy Bel Air all the way. Racy, but built to last. Two-door, tuck-and-roll upholstery. Flames, but nothing overstated. No chrome, no fuzzy dice.”
