Murder in Nice

by Kiernan-Lewis, Susan

  When Ordeur contacted him two months ago it had seemed like an answer from God. Ben had literally been moments away from picking up the phone to call the old man when all his problems were swept aside.

  True, at first they made it sound like they needed his services as a corporate attorney, and he’d been flattered—and stupid—enough to believe it. When the meeting came down three weeks ago where they told him they were aware he’d laundered money for a client through his trust account for a fifteen percent fee he was frankly surprised he hadn’t seen it coming.

  The way they presented his current “opportunity with the company” was: take a tour of Provence with your wife to visit your sister, and while you’re there convince her husband to sign the contract with Ordeur or expect a visit from a DEA confidential informant upon your return.

  Ben looked forlornly at the dark hulk of the house. If you dance with the Devil, he thought, expect to get your ass singed.

  He and Haley were scheduled to fly back to Atlanta on Monday. That gave him two days to finish the job here before his deadline of next week.

  Just the thought of what would happen if he failed prompted a shiver that sped up his spine and ended in a painful twinge in his neck.

  Laurent didn’t trust him and he wasn’t ever going to. Ben saw how the man watched him and it didn’t bode well for any heart-to-hearts. Besides, Ben’s people skills were never his strong suit. No, it was pretty clear he needed to go straight to Plan B.

  He slipped back into the house and stood quietly in the living room. One of the dogs growled. “Shut up,” he whispered. “It’s just me.”

  What’s with these people and their obsession with pets? He sidled past the two large dogs. Maggie’s poodle must be upstairs in Maggie and Laurent’s bedroom. He walked to the hallway and stood quietly again, waiting for the dogs to settle, waiting for complete silence to return to the house once more.

  Laurent’s den was off the kitchen. The door was closed but Ben had watched the big Frenchman come and go and knew it was never locked. He walked silently to the room and pushed the door open. Quickly, he turned on the flashlight on his cell phone and closed the door behind him. He could feel his heart racing as he approached the broad oaken desk.

  Dernier didn’t have a computer that Ben could see, or a landline. That meant the contract the conglomerate sent him was likely filed the old fashioned way. He scanned Laurent’s desk. There were receipts for handmade barrels and casks and for a shipment of bottles. Since Dernier didn’t crush his own grapes, Ben didn’t expect to see evidence of any kind of equipment purchase. All of that would come to a screeching halt when the co-op closed for good.

  It was obvious Dernier didn’t have a choice. Not if he wanted to continue to make wine. Why was he being so stubborn about it?

  He flipped through a magazine where Dernier had earmarked an article on something called cork taint. Whatever the hell that was.

  He stood back and surveyed the man’s desk. He obviously didn’t spend much time in here. Just three days as a guest in his house told Ben that. Laurent walked his vineyard and he pressed the flesh in town—when he wasn’t in the kitchen cooking.

  Where the hell could it be?

  A thought came to him and he circled the desk looking for a trash basket. He crouched next to it and shined his light into it.

  The crumpled contract from Ordeur rested on top.

  “I see it is time for our little talk.”

  Laurent’s voice was so close to where Ben was kneeling that he jumped and fell backward at the sound. He scrambled to his feet and shone the flashlight in Laurent’s direction, but before Ben could think of the lie to explain what he was doing he realized he still held the contract in his hand.

  *****

  An hour after she’d showered, packed and dressed, Maggie was dragging her wheeled bag down a narrow tree-lined pathway with orchards on one side and a vineyard on the other. The train station was just under two miles from the hotel. She hated the sound her luggage made on the uneven pavers of the path, as if to announce to the world that a lone female was attempting to cross the city in the dark.

  Praying that most felons or hoodlums wouldn’t be up this early, Maggie lifted the bag off the ground and used the shoulder strap to deaden the noise.

  Even without coffee, her mind was buzzing with the events of the last several hours. She was still reeling with the horror of waking up and realizing that someone was in her room with her.

  Should she report Randall? Was it too late to do that? And then the bigger question: should she tell Laurent? He had enough on his plate right now just getting the grapes in from the field without driving to Marseille to kill a national television personality.

  Thinking of Laurent made her think of sweet little Jemmy and she felt a sudden hard twinge in her stomach when she brought the baby’s face to mind.

  Am I a bad mother? I miss him desperately. I would love nothing more than to hold him right now.

  Maggie pushed open the ancient wooden door of the tiny Cassis train station and stood in the lighted foyer for a moment. A sudden sickening feeling sidled into her stomach. To her left was the ticket seller’s booth, yet unmanned this morning. To her right was a small café kiosk being set up. She headed for the café and arranged her bags around a chair.

  “Un café crème, s’il vous plait,” she said to the owner, who nodded and disappeared.

  The horrible fact was she was in no hurry to go home. Laurent wasn’t wrong about that. But it wasn’t because she was running away from Jem!

  The owner brought her coffee and a croissant on a pretty china plate. Maggie was surprised—and delighted. She looked up at him before he left. He just shrugged.

  Who knows why the French do what they do? Maggie thought, picking up the warm croissant and realizing she was very hungry. Maybe they’re so in tune with food they can just see when someone needs to eat without being told.

  She was alone in the little train station but could see the encroaching light of the new day peeking into the large palladium window over the front door.

  Did Laurent think she was trying to escape her motherly duties? Did Grace? She glanced at her cell phone. Five o’clock was too early to call Grace back. She’d do it on the train.

  Maggie closed her eyes and took a long sip of the hot, milky coffee and when she did she got a vivid image forming behind her eyes—a memory of when she and Ben were children. He was the eldest and only boy of the three children and he had always taken his role as brotherly protector seriously.

  In her mind, Maggie saw Ben sitting between her and her sister, Elise, at the top of the stairs on Christmas morning waiting for their parents to get up. He held both their hands and helped pass the interminable minutes until they could go downstairs by telling them stories of Santa and his elves.

  Maggie had forgotten that moment, when she had felt so connected to him by their mutual excitement of the magic of the day and by his palpable love for his sisters.

  When had that changed? When had Ben changed?

  Two bowls of café crème later, Maggie bought her ticket for the three-hour trip to Nice and boarded the train. There was nobody in her train compartment so she spread out her bags, sent a quick text to Laurent, and closed her eyes.

  She awoke to an insistent rapping on her compartment window and realized she had slept the entire trip. Flustered, she gathered up her belongings and hurried out into the brilliantly bright light of Nice at midmorning. She’d meant to call Grace and sort out what she was going to ask the concierge. She’d intended to process how Randall could suggest it was Dee-Dee who killed Lanie.

  Weird, unbalanced Dee-Dee. Was she capable of murder? The image of Dee-Dee throwing her cell phone at the poor duck came immediately to mind.

  Maggie walked briskly down the busy sidewalk of tourists and shoppers, wondering if she would have enough time to do everything she needed to do before racing back to the train station as she’d promised Laurent.

 
Why is he making everything so hard? Why can’t I just do what I need to do?

  It occurred to her that Laurent never raced around like a maniac to make sure she wasn’t left alone at the house or to ensure some casually made promise was kept. She slowed her steps. Why am I stressing? I’m going to do what I need to do. If he loves me, he’ll respect that.

  The Soho Hotel loomed at the end of the block, the stark blue horizon of the Mediterranean serving as a dramatic backdrop behind its marble white façade. She marched into the hotel. The concierge stood at the front desk, empty of waiting guests, watching her come.

  Maggie parked her wheeled bag in front of her.

  “Bonjour,” she said. “I called earlier about needing to talk to one of your maids.”

  The man stared at her and didn’t speak.

  Maggie took in a covert breath to steady her patience. She knew she shouldn’t have just blurted that out. The French like more finesse and preamble. Laurent always said she shot herself in the foot when she charged in without taking the time to set the stage.

  Laurent always set the stage.

  She switched to French and dropped the ingratiating smile, but kept her voice steady and pleasant. “It is very quiet for a Friday, no?” she said.

  The man’s eyebrows edged upward. “Oui,” he said. “We are expecting an influx of Germans at any moment.”

  She knew he wouldn’t be amused at any joke referencing the German occupation of Paris in 1940, but it took all her self-control to refrain from attempting one.

  “Well, everyone loves the Côte d’Azur,” she said, reigning hard at her impulse to just get to the point.

  “Bien sûr. Does Madame know which maid she needs to speak with?”

  Bingo!

  “She will have been the maid who cleaned my room during my last stay,” Maggie said. “Room 205.”

  He nodded and picked up the phone, spoke briefly, and then turned back to Maggie. The sheerest of smiles hinted around his mouth.

  “Bientôt,” he said, directing her with a glance that indicated Maggie should wait in the lobby.

  She thanked him profusely and patted herself on the back for behaving contrary to her natural inclinations. Maybe I am learning a few things.

  She didn’t have to wait long. A few minutes after she sat down, a young, dark-haired woman slipped silently into the lobby, her eyes probing Maggie’s questioningly.

  Maggie stood. “I’m here on behalf of the American lady whose daughter was killed in the hotel two weeks ago,” she said in French.

  The woman nodded but looked around the lobby as if uncomfortable to stand there.

  “Shall we go somewhere else?”

  “Outside?” the woman said, pointing to a hallway leading away from the front door and the frenetic Promenade des Anglais outside it.

  Maggie picked up her bags and followed the maid down a long, dark hallway, which opened up to an alleyway. In the alley was a large dumpster and a wooden picnic table shoved up against a tall, stone wall. Wild bougainvillea poured off the wall in casual, vibrant drapes of bright purple.

  “My name is Ooli,” the woman said as she sat at the picnic table and drew out a pack of cigarettes from her uniform pocket. “Cigarette?”

  Rule number two, Maggie reminded herself as she nodded and accepted the cigarette. Don’t do anything to make your only source of information pull back.

  Ooli lit Maggie’s cigarette and then her own. “I told Madame that I had information about the death.”

  Maggie nodded. “Madame Morrison doesn’t speak French. She didn’t understand.”

  “I thought perhaps that was so. I don’t want to talk to police, you understand?”

  Maggie nodded again.

  “First,” Ooli said, holding up a finger but looking around her as if expecting someone to be listening to them, “I saw who visited the dead woman’s room that night.”

  Maggie’s excitement surged. Had she seen the murderer?

  “Second, I saw who visited her room other nights.”

  Maggie frowned. “Other nights?”

  Ooli nodded and sucked in a long inhalation of smoke, her dark eyes watching Maggie carefully. A moment passed between them and Maggie reached into her bag and took out a pad of paper and a pen. She drew five boxes on the paper and wrote the room numbers for Dee-Dee, Randall, Desiree and Olivier inside each. She marked a heavy line around the box that was Lanie’s room. She showed it to Ooli.

  “You know these rooms?” Maggie asked.

  Ooli smiled nodded.

  “Please, show me,” Maggie said.

  Ooli picked up the pen and drew a line from the box marked 208 straight to Lanie’s room box. She looked at Maggie and smiled.

  Room 208 was Desiree’s room. Maggie found herself getting excited. She reached for the pen but Ooli withheld it. When Maggie looked at her in confusion, the maid drew a sixth box, wrote the number 210 inside it, and drew a line from it to Lanie’s box. She put the pen down and pushed the paper back to Maggie.

  Maggie looked at the paper and felt her fingers grow cold.

  Room 210 was Ben’s room.

  Twelve

  “You can’t just throw us out! What will you tell my sister?”

  “Your sister seems less able to endure you than even I,” Laurent said dryly as he stood across the desk from Ben. “I’ll call you a cab.”

  “Haley will be mortified to be thrown out like this.”

  “I am not throwing her out.”

  “But that’s not how it works, is it, sport? You can’t give me the heave-ho and expect my wife not to leave with me.”

  Laurent shrugged. “So you both leave. Voila.”

  “I’m telling you that you will do irreparable damage to your relationship with your American in-laws if you do this. I don’t know how people are over here, but family means a lot to Americans. Especially Maggie. You heard her little dog and pony show at dinner last night.”

  “I don’t think she means you when she talks of family.”

  “Well, you’d be wrong. You don’t have to like me, Laurent, but I’m family.”

  “Why are you here?”

  “I got turned around in the house when I got up to—”

  “Why are you in Provence? Why are you at Domaine St-Buvard?” Laurent gestured to the Ordeur contract now lying on the desk between them.

  Ben ran a hand through his hair. Laurent saw the man weighing his options—and the degrees of the lies he would tell.

  “I…I work for Ordeur,” he said finally. “I work for the American company that’s signed up all the growers from your co-op.”

  Laurent’s face never changed, not even to reflect his surprise that Newberry had chosen to tell the truth. “Why are you here?” he repeated.

  “I’m here to ask you to reconsider signing the long-term contract with us.”

  “Reconsider.’”

  Laurent looked at the contract on the desk before them. Ben Newberry hadn’t been about to ask Laurent to reconsider signing it. He’d been about to sign it himself.

  Laurent picked up the contract and ripped it in two. He let the pieces float to the floor. “I would have challenged the signature in court,” he said with a shrug. “You must be an inferior kind of counsel back in Atlanta.”

  “Look,” Ben said, gritting his teeth and snatching up the scraps of paper, “you’ve got to sign this or sell your holdings to Ordeur. They’ll give you a great price. You’ll never have to work again.”

  Laurent held up a hand to indicate he’d heard enough.

  “If you don’t sign it,” Ben continued, his eyes beginning to dart around the room in desperation, “I’ll go to prison. Is that what you want? I may not be Maggie’s favorite person but ask her if she wants her only brother to go to jail.”

  “One hour.” Laurent turned and left the room.

  “What the hell?!” Ben blurted in frustration to Laurent’s retreating back.

  *****

  Grace held Zouzou’s h
and and squatted next to what could only be described as a stuffed monkey wearing a lampshade. While this wasn’t the first flea market she’d ever been to, it had been many, many years since the last. This particular market in Arles was only held once a month, so it held the promise of many undiscovered finds. Or so that’s what Haley had told Grace this morning when she begged that they might take the children and go.

  “Grace, did you find something?” Haley called.

  Grace stood and saw Haley several yards away with Jemmy in his stroller. Haley was looking at a large white pitcher. Even from here, Grace could see the chips in the rim of it. She could also see the delight on Haley’s face.

  “You’ll never get that in your suitcase,” Grace said as she and Zouzou walked over to join her.

  Furniture was stacked on top of itself—bistro chairs, painted end tables, full dining room sets that looked like they belonged in a Victorian mansion. Since this was Provence, there was an abundance of fabric, tablecloths and pottery, blunt and dark yellow with contrasting stripes of deep blue in platters, vases and saltcellars.

  To Grace it looked more like an enlarged yard sale than a proper monthly event. It certainly had nothing on the markets in Paris, of course, or even the monthly one in Aix that stretched the full length of the Cours Mirabeau on both sides of the street, around the dolphin fountain and back up again. But Haley had made the argument that it was nearby and because it was so deep in the country they were more likely to find real treasures.

  Well, Haley was likely to. Grace wasn’t interested in previously owned goods no matter how well maintained they might be.

  “I can ship it back,” Haley said, but she put it back down on an antique marble table. “Can you believe all this stuff?”

  “Truly, I cannot,” Grace said dryly. She stood next to a rack of vintage Arlesian clothing: blouses, colorful shawls, and wide, flouncing skirts no one in their right mind would be caught dead or dying in.