by Gina Cresse
The clock said nine and it was dark outside. Of all the vineyards on the list, Dash Zucker’s was one I could get a closer look at immediately. I put on my shoes and checked the batteries in my flashlight. Outside, I rummaged through the gardening shed for a pair of shears and shoved them in my back pocket. To avoid being spotted snooping on his property, I stayed off the road and cut through the vines on my land. I hoped I wouldn’t run into the skunk family.
When I reached the fence, I shined the light through the rails to the other side, looking for clusters hanging in the vines. I’d seen grape trucks come and go from his property for the past week and wondered if there were any berries left. Surely they could not have picked every single bunch.
Finally, I decided it would be safe to climb the fence to find some grapes. Since I’d had to fill two hand-dug wells on my own property, I couldn’t rule out the possibility that Zucker’s place had the same hazards. I didn’t know if he went to the trouble of filling them in, so I had to be careful. Keeping the light aimed toward the ground, I scanned the dark horizon in the direction of Dash’s house. I couldn’t see any lights, so either his house wasn’t visible from where I stood, or he had all his lights off.
Holding the flashlight under my arm, I combed through the leaves, feeling for clusters. As I moved toward the road, I wondered if my light was visible to anyone driving by. My fingers finally landed on a cluster of plump grapes that the pickers had missed. I removed the shears from my pocket and clipped the bunch from the vine. Making my way back through my vineyard, I stopped to pick a cluster of my own grapes for comparison.
Placing them side by side on my kitchen counter, I could not tell them apart by looking at them. I plucked a berry from Zucker’s bunch and popped it in my mouth. It was sweet and juicy, like any good grape should be. Doing the same with one of my grapes, I was prepared for an ah-ha moment when I could point an accusing finger at my neighbor’s vineyard and shriek, “Imposter!” But I couldn’t. They both tasted—like grapes. I dropped the Zucker grapes into a Ziploc baggie and put them in my refrigerator.
Luckily the Rubbermaid container had been spared when the skunks let loose on Andy. In the morning, after I fed the horses, I twisted an eye screw into a support post in the barn and cut a length of wire to secure the container’s handle to the wall. The raccoon family would have to bring wire cutters next time if they wanted to take off with my cat food. I filled the cats’ dishes and headed back toward the house just as Andy’s pickup pulled up to my gate. I ran in the house, grabbed my purse and the shotgun and started back out when it dawned on me that he could be of help with my grape question. I retrieved the Dash Zucker grapes I’d taken last night then headed outside.
“Morning,” I said.
“Morning. Just put it in the rack there,” he said, pointing at the gun rack in the rear window.
I handed him the baggie of grapes first.
“What’s this?”
“Can you tell what variety they are?” I said as I placed the gun in the rack and climbed into the passenger seat.
Andy inspected the grapes in the baggie. “Is this a test?”
“No. I just want to know if they’re Zinfandel or Carignane grapes.”
“Where’d you get them?”
“I’d rather not say.”
He gave me a weary glance, as if he was too tired to pursue the answer. “Well, without seeing the vines they came off of, it’s hard to tell. You can send the seeds to a lab to find out, but that would take some time.”
“So, if I got you some leaves from the vines, then you could tell me?”
“It would be better if I could see the vineyard, but maybe, yeah, I could probably give you an answer. I’d need stems and leaves.”
“Okay, good. I’ll get you some stems and leaves tomorrow.”
Putting the truck in gear, he glanced over at me then pulled out onto the road. “You want to tell me what this is about?”
“It’s a project I’m working on for the State.”
As we drove over the bridge, we saw the divers from the Sheriff’s Department descending on the pond and all questions about grape leaves were forgotten.
“Wonder if they’ll find anything?” Andy said.
“The way my luck’s been going, they’ll probably find Jimmy Hoffa with one of my kitchen knives in his back.”
The shooting range was a twenty-minute drive, near the Mokelumne River. Andy handed me a pair of earplugs and goggles then he explained the shotgun’s safety mechanism and showed me how to rack a round of ammunition into the chamber. At first I was intimidated and not forceful enough, causing the shells to get jammed halfway through the process. He showed me how to eject them and demonstrated the proper method.
“Do it like you mean it,” he said, wrenching the action bar back then pushing it forward again. “Don’t baby it. It’s not a damn flute.”
He unloaded the chamber and handed me the gun for another try. This time, I set my jaw and took command of the weapon. With the round ready to be fired, Andy nodded toward the cardboard target in the distance. I raised the barrel and looked down the sights, holding it out away from my body.
Squinting at my pose, he waved his arms. “Not like that. You’ll bust your shoulder.”
He put his left hand over mine on the barrel and wrapped his right arm around me, pulling the stock into place tight against my shoulder. “This thing kicks like a mule,” he whispered in my ear.
Breathing in his Stetson cologne, I heard myself say, “Mmm….” It was involuntary, like a reflex. In a gallant save, I quickly followed it with, “…Mules sure can kick.”
“Yes they can. Now, don’t close your eyes,” Andy said quietly, then let go of me and stepped back. “When you’re ready, just squeeze the trigger.”
I counted to three in my head, then fired.
BOOM!
It was a noise I wasn’t prepared for and it left me stunned. Even with the earplugs, I heard railroad crossing bells ringing in my head. The smell of burnt gunpowder invaded my nostrils. Up until that moment, I’d had no idea how much power I held in my hands. It scared the hell out of me. I was afraid I’d never have the courage to fire it in a life-threatening situation—and at the same time, terrified that I would.
Chapter Ten
Andy was uncharacteristically quiet on the drive back home. He kept glancing over at me as if he wanted to ask a question, but something stopped him.
“What?” I finally asked.
He squinted, clenched his jaw a couple times, then smiled. “Nothing.”
“Did I do something wrong with the gun?”
He shook his head.
“Spinach in my teeth?” I noticed a black smudge on his right cheek. “Gunpowder on my face? What?”
“Okay. I just wondered why you didn’t have your boyfriend show you how to use the shotgun.”
“What boyfriend?”
“The cop.”
“Detective Obermeyer?”
“Yeah. He opposed to you protecting yourself or something?”
Watching Andy’s profile as he drove, I thought back to the morning he had knocked on my door and saw Obermeyer eating breakfast, and me in my robe. At the time, I didn’t care that he got the wrong idea because he was so irritating, but now… “He’s not my boyfriend.”
He studied my face like he was looking for any hint I might be lying. “No?”
“No. You misunderstood.”
Another five minutes of silence, then Andy looked over and smiled. “Hungry?”
The place we stopped to eat wasn’t very busy since it was still early. We were seated in a booth next to a window with a view of the river. The greenish-blue water was low and not moving very fast, and a line of willow trees grew along the opposite bank, leaning over the river as if the long draping branches were trying to touch the surface. A pair of Mallard ducks paddled close to the shore and every so often one of them would dunk its head under the water and leave its rear end bobbing like a buoy a
s it latched on to some unlucky fish. Flitting just above the surface, a shiny blue dragonfly hunted for its lunch.
While we waited for our sandwiches, my conscience finally nagged me enough that I pointed toward Andy’s right cheek. “You have a smudge there.”
Wiping the side of his face with a napkin, he said, “Did I get it?”
After a brief inspection, I nodded. “Yeah. Must’ve been gunpowder.”
“Thanks for telling me. I hate walking around like a Bozo.”
We exchanged a warm glance and it seemed like we were finally on the road to being nice to each other. We talked about the grape harvest progress and were just moving on to the subject of horses when the waitress brought our food.
“I better go wash my hands,” I said, then got up and glanced around for the restroom.
“Down the hall, on your right,” the waitress said, pointing over my shoulder.
As I walked away, I heard Andy tell the waitress he’d left something in his truck and would be right back. The restroom was at the end of a long hallway. I pushed through the heavy door and passed a woman with a small child as they came out.
The little girl pointed at me and said, “Look, Mommy.”
“Shhh.” her mother said, and smiled at me as they left.
When I stepped in front of the mirror, I realized what she was pointing at—the end of my nose was black with a gunpowder smudge. I looked like a Cocker Spaniel. “Two can play this game,” I said under my breath as I scrubbed my nose clean. The fact that the two of us had played the game and he was just better at it annoyed me more than the embarrassment.
When I returned to the table, my hands and face freshly washed, Andy smiled.
As I slid into the booth, I smiled back. “The next time you get sprayed by a mad skunk, don’t come knocking on my door.”
Without saying a word, he placed a gift on the table in front of me. “Peace offering.”
I recognized it from the day he’d seen Detective Obermeyer at my breakfast table. It must’ve been riding around in his truck ever since.
“What is it? Bozo suit? Spring loaded exploding snakes?”
He shook his head.
“‘I’m With Stupid’ T-shirt?”
“Just open it.”
Cautiously, I tore a corner of the paper off. It was a book, as I’d previously suspected. Tearing the rest of the wrapping off, I recognized the cover. It was a book about organic grape growing that I’d been trying to find for months. Every time I tried to order it, I was told it was out of stock or out of print, but it was supposed to be the ultimate reference for organic farming.
I turned it over and glanced at the back cover. “Thanks.” I set it down on the seat next to me like a doggie bag. The feud was back on as far as I was concerned and there was no way I’d show any weakness by letting him know how much the gift meant to me.
“You’re welcome,” Andy said. “That one’s hard to find.”
“Is it really?”
“The author’s a friend of mine.”
“Huh,” I said, trying very hard to not look too impressed as I picked up my sandwich and started to eat.
By the time we got back to my place, the divers had apparently finished searching the pond, but they’d left their tell-tale yellow crime-scene tape strung up all around the pond, leaving me to wonder what they’d found.
Pete’s pickup was parked along the road in front of a grape truck and he waved to us as he talked to the driver, handing him a field tag to take along with the grapes to the winery. Andy drove up to my house and let me out near the carport. I hoisted the shotgun out of the rifle rack and rested it on my shoulder.
“Don’t forget your book,” Andy said, handing it to me, along with my purse.
“I guess I’ll need to buy more ammunition,” I said.
“And we’ll have to practice a few more times, at least until you’re more comfortable with it.”
“Comfortable? I don’t know if that’ll ever happen.”
As I took my things in the house, Andy walked down to the road to talk to Pete. Glancing out my front window, I saw Detective Obermeyer’s car pull into my driveway, so I put my things down and walked out to meet him.
“So, what’d they find in the pond?” I asked, offering him the porch swing while I hoisted myself up on the railing.
“Cell phone. Laptop. We sent them to the forensics lab to see what they can find.”
“You think they belonged to the dead girl?”
“Probably, unless your beavers are more technologically advanced than they’re letting on.”
I laughed. “How many times do I have to tell you? They’re not my beavers.”
“It would really help if you could remember something about that white pickup you saw.”
“I know. I wish I could tell you more, but—“
“Sometimes witnesses just need a little help to recall details they think they’ve forgotten.”
“Help?”
“Hypnosis. There’s a woman we work with who’s pretty good.”
“The problem isn’t that I don’t remember. It was dark. I couldn’t see anything.”
“You might be surprised.”
After mulling it over, I finally said, “I guess it couldn’t hurt. But I don’t think I can be hypnotized.”
“Everyone thinks that, but when they see the video of themselves singing like Elvis—“
“I better not!”
“Just kidding,” he said. “You’ll be completely aware of what you’re saying and doing. It’s not like in the movies.”
“I know.”
“Oh, you’ve done it before?”
“No. Someone I used to know went to one of those past-life regression hypnotists years ago. He told me all about it.”
Obermeyer rolled his eyes. “I don’t buy into all that past-life business.”
“I didn’t either, but Roger recalled being hung as a traitor during the Civil War, and if you knew him, you’d reconsider.”
Late that night I put on jeans and a black T-shirt and headed over to the neighbor’s vineyard again, this time to retrieve stems and leaves for Andy to inspect. The moon was full and I didn’t really need the flashlight to find my way, but I used it anyway in case the skunks were out and about. I crawled through the fence and headed for the closest vine. My shears were too small for the job and I struggled to get them to cut through the cane I’d chosen, but I wasn’t about to go back to the tool shed for another pair. The sooner I could get out of there, the better.
Just as the metal blade snapped through the tough wood, I saw a streak of white out of the corner of my eye. When I turned to see what it was, the flashlight I’d been holding under my armpit slipped and fell in the dirt. I didn’t need the light to see it was a dog running straight for me. Judging the distance between me and the fence against the distance between me and the dog, I was pretty sure the dog would get to me before I could make the fence. Besides that, the dog could get under the fence just as fast as I could get over it.
The dog looked pretty big—I guessed it was a Yellow Lab. I’d known a few labs in my life, and they were all friendly dogs, so my instinct was to act like we were long lost buddies.
“Hey, there. What a good dog,” I said, sounding as confident as I could. By the time he reached me his tail was wagging and I felt the tension in my body relax. I bent down to pat him and pick up my flashlight. “What’s your name, huh?”
There was a strange sound like the rustling of leaves in the distance and the beam of my flashlight washed across the source of the noise for a brief instant. I waved the light in that direction again until it landed on what I could only describe as a wildly erratic ball of hair, teeth and eyeballs racing straight at me, growling, barking and spitting all at the same time.
“Crap,” I whispered. From the size and color, I guessed it was a Jack Russell Terrier. Again, there was no way I’d make it to the fence in time. I was familiar with the breed and figured my only hope
was to convince him I was not to be crossed. I took a step in his direction, pointed a steady finger at him, stomped my foot, and in my sternest voice, yelled, “No! Bad dog! Go home!”
He just barked louder and faster and kept right on coming. I braced myself for the attack and hoped the gentle lab would be in my corner.
“Bobby! J.R.!” a voice hollered from the dark.
The Jack Russell stopped about three feet away. The hair on his back stood straight up and his lip curled so tight I could count his teeth. With every breath, he snarled his hatred for me.
A tall, dark figure appeared from behind a distant grape vine. “Who the hell are you?” he growled.
“Your neighbor. Can you call off your dog?”
After a long pause, he finally yelled, “J.R.! Get your rotten ass back here!”
With a flashlight in one hand and a rifle resting on his shoulder, Dash Zucker walked next to the little dog and nudged him with his foot. “Get back!” The Jack Russell turned on him and clamped on to his boot with determined jaws.
Dash shook his boot hard until the dog finally let go. “Damn dog.” Then he pointed in the direction he’d come from and addressed the lab. “Bobby, take J.R. home and—eat him or something.”
The big lab loped away and the animated little terrier followed.
I finally let out the breath I’d been holding.
“If he bit you, it’s your problem, being on my property and all,” Dash said. I got the impression he hoped the dog had drawn blood.
“No, I’m fine.”
My brain kicked into overdrive trying to come up with a plausible reason why I’d be in his vineyard, taking cuttings from his vines—in the middle of the night. Nothing came to me right away, so I just stood there.
“What are you doing on my property?” he finally asked.
