by Greta Boris
She swallowed the terror rising in her throat and forced herself to calm. Improv. Use your improv skills, Gwen. But the only role she could think of that fit the circumstances was "victim."
"Why should I help you? What's in it for me?" She narrowed her eyes and feigned suspicious interest. At least she could pretend she was tougher than she was.
Mo's fingers twitched. He grabbed the leg of his pants and they stilled. "For starters, I won't blow the whistle on you and your boyfriend. The police will think you killed poor Lance, you know. Not to mention how hubby would feel about it if he knew what you were up to. I will swear you were in The Leaky Barrel with me all evening. Wine tasting."
The switch was only feet away now, but he stood too close for her to reach it unnoticed.
"And, of course, there's your life. Help me, or I'll kill you."
Gwen jumped at the word "kill." Her back slammed into the wall. Something hard and small jutted into her hip. "What do I need to do?" Her words came in panted breaths.
"Just your job. Show me a property."
Her fingers walked up the wall toward her low back. "That's it?"
"Maybe one or two other little things." He waved a dismissive hand.
Gwen felt along the plastic ridge of the switch with imperceptible movements. She relaxed her facial muscles into an expression of resignation. "I guess I don't have much choice, do I?"
"I believe I have you over the proverbial barrel." He chuckled at his own joke.
She flipped the switch. Blackness fell. She slipped toward the bed. His arms knocked against the wall where she'd stood a half-second before.
“Oh, very clever," he said into the darkness. "How will I find you with the lights out?"
She found the lamp in the dark, yanked it from the wall and climbed onto the bed. She heard the light switch click uselessly.
Everything was still for a moment, then the noise of his breath, the sour smell of him, the shuffle of his feet moved closer. Brandishing the lamp in her right hand, she used her left to guide her. She crept across the width of the California King mattress.
"Have you ever played searchlight?" he said.
Gwen didn't answer.
She heard the smack of flesh on wood. Mo cursed. A minute passed. He said, "I used to watch children playing on the beach at night. They used flashlights to tag and capture each other. I should have brought one." He sniffed the air like a hunting dog.
Gwen felt the mattress sag under the pressure of his hand. She slid off the far end of the bed and dropped to her knees.
Lightning lit the room, then thunder rumbled. She huddled into a small ball and hugged the edge of the bed.
"Where are you, little Gwen?" Frustration laced his voice.
Gwen, eyes now adjusted to the moonlight, could see the bedroom doorway only yards away. It might as well be a mile. If she could see shapes in the shadows, so could he. She felt the bed heave and heard his steps—more confident this time—coming toward her.
"Come out, come out wherever you are," he said in a sing-song.
Gwen gripped the lamp and drew her feet underneath herself.
"I'm tired of this game." He sounded peevish.
She readied herself to spring and swing at him. He rounded the bed. A wet sheen on his forehead glistened in the gloom.
They made eye contact.
At the same moment, the trill of the doorbell sounded.
Both their heads snapped toward the hallway.
"Gwen Bishop. Gwen. Are you still in there?" Mrs. VanVlear's muffled voice called out followed by hollow, sharp, rapping. The doorbell rang again.
Before Gwen could yell for help, she saw a quick movement in her peripheral vision. Pain reverberated through her skull, then nothing.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
The evening started unbelievably well. I saw Gwen's car coming up Sailor's Haven when I was talking to that noisy old biddy. I was able to pull around the corner without her noticing me. I parked, jumped the wall into the backyard, made my way around the side of the house and hid behind a hydrangea bush. It was raining, but even that worked in my favor. The downpour created a camouflage.
I watched Gwen pull up to the curb and carry several parcels into the house. A moment later she reemerged, leaving the front door open wide behind her. She scurried right past me so intent on getting out of the wet night she never looked my way. I watched until she was bent into the trunk of her car to retrieve more bags and sneaked across the yard and through the front door.
I glanced around. The second floor seemed like the best place to hide until I could establish a plan. I ran up the stairs before Gwen made it through the front door with her bundles and positioned myself in the walk-in closet of the master bedroom. I waited.
At one point, I bumped into a shelf in the dark, and a shoe thudded to the floor. I feared I'd given myself away, but there was an auspicious clap of thunder at the same moment that must have covered the noise. No one came upstairs.
I left the closet door open a crack and could hear movement and voices below. Several times, I almost crept out just to see what was happening, but I'm glad I didn't. Good things come to those who wait.
The scent of roses was my first clue that a splendid opportunity was about to present itself. My second, the view of Lance dropping said rose petals across the bedroom floor. Romance was in the air.
Catching the gigolo with his pants down was almost too good to be true. He was easy to deal with, half-drunk, eyes closed, and naked as a jaybird. His death was as smooth as a good Cabernet.
Gwen was harder to deal with. I hadn't expected her to turn out the lights and bolt, but even that was only a momentary setback. I enjoyed the chase. It proved she was a good choice. She had grit and ingenuity.
Then that stupid, stupid old crone banged on the front door and almost ruined my plans. She made a tremendous ruckus. I was afraid she'd rouse the entire neighborhood, but nothing ever came of it. When she left, I threw Gwen over my shoulder, no small feat, and sneaked her out through the back door.
It bothered me that I had to bring her to my shop. My sanctuary. But I couldn't think of anywhere else at such short notice. I only kept her there long enough to retrieve her car. It wouldn't do to let the police find it and come to the conclusion she'd been a victim instead of a perpetrator. I left the vehicle in a rough area of Santa Ana with the windows down and the keys in the ignition, walked several blocks to an all-night bar, had a glass of abysmal wine to calm my nerves and called an Uber. I had the driver drop me in the Dana Point Harbor, and I walked to Sailor's Haven to pick up my car. .
When I finally returned to the shop, I was so agitated I paced between the shelves for over an hour, running a finger across the bottles—my form of meditation. It calmed me, helped me think. I drew on the strength of the wine.
Every bottle represents an ancient process, a magic formula. Every crop of grapes demands its own unique care. Was it a hot, dry year? Wet and cold? An early or late spring? Nature infuses the grape with a mystery only the alchemist can unravel.
He combines varietals—dark with bright, sweet with pungent—to achieve balance. He adds a pinch of this, a drop of that, then hides his creation away in the dark. The longer it sits, the more deep and complex it becomes. Every wine has its perfect time. Opened too soon, it will be weak and shallow. Too late, and it's spoiled. This was my time.
My sister wouldn't win. She wouldn't steal my light, or my birthright. But I knew I would have to storm the castle soon if I wanted what was mine, and I did. What had started as a hunger for justice had grown into ravenous need.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Gwen rocked Emily, back and forth, back and forth, in the white rocking chair with the floral print cushion. It was the same chair she'd rocked each of her babies in. The day she found out the child she was carrying was a girl, she went to Home Depot and purchased a can of bright white semi-gloss. It had taken several coats of paint to cover the once blue rocker.
"Hush,
sweetheart. Hush," Gwen murmured and kissed the top of Emily's head. Instead of the smooth, blond, strawberry-scented hair she'd expected, wiry strands poked her lips. She rocked harder. "There now, Mommy's got you."
Emily had dreamed a terrible dream. She'd seen blood in a bathtub, a lifeless body, the black silhouette of a stranger in the dark. At least, Gwen thought, it was Emily who’d had the nightmare. It was possible that she, herself, was the one who'd dreamed.
It was cold. She should cover Emily with the blanket she always kept on the chair, but it was hard to move her limbs. Even her eyelids felt like blocks of cement. Straining, she attempted to lift them but couldn't. She tried to bring her fingers to her eyes to rub them awake. Her hands stopped short. They must be tangled in Emily's hair. Exhaustion overwhelmed her, and she dozed again.
She was awakened by violent shivers. The blanket. She knew where it was but couldn't reach for it. Her arms wouldn't cooperate. She opened one eye a slit and looked at her hands to see what the problem was.
They were tied.
Awareness slapped her awake. Her eyes flew open. There was no sweet face haloed by the strands wrapped around her wrists. There was no rocking chair. Gwen was lying, alone, on her side on a wood floor, hands bound with rope.
The room was dim and shadowed. The only light came from under a door. It was a small space, piled high with boxes. A storage room of some kind.
The memory of the night came to her in disconnected bits, puzzle pieces that refused to make a complete picture: Lance's curling hair and beautiful eyes. The Frobisher's great room. The dark at the top of the stairs. Mrs. VanVlear with wine-stained lips. Wine, the smoky taste of Ravish. And something else. Something she didn't want to remember.
She lurched forward, trying to sit up, but couldn't move. Looking down she saw the cords that tied her wrists looped around her waist several times, crisscrossed around her legs and ended with knots at her ankles. She was trussed up like dead deer.
Fear, cold and raw, raked fingers up and down her body. She opened her mouth to scream, then shut it. She didn't want to attract... Who? A face floated in her mind.
Mo.
The wine shop owner.
She remembered the surrealism of finding him in the Frobisher's bedroom. The chase in the dark. Mrs. VanVlear's calls and then blackness. Why?
But then, of course, she knew. Another face surfaced behind her eyes. The dead, white, plastic sheen of Sondra Olsen's face.
Adrenaline, so thick and strong it burned like whiskey, flowed through her veins. She threw herself back, then side to side as far as the ropes allowed. Her ties chaffed and bloodied her skin, but nothing broke loose.
Gwen was no longer cold. Sweat trickled between her shoulder blades. She reached for the bonds with her teeth. No good.
She cried out in frustration, her voice scratching from her throat. Her eyes skittered around the room looking for a solution. A miracle.
The thudding of her heart crashed in her ears. It almost drowned out the other sound. A sound that filled her with dread. The sound of a ship's bell.
#
Tears sprang into Gwen's eyes from the bright light. She blinked. Mo stood in the doorway, silhouetted by a wall sconce in the hall behind him.
"You're awake," he said.
Gwen didn't answer.
"Good. We can't stay."
He walked toward her in short, swift birdlike steps. This was the first time she had seen him without the ship captain's hat. His hair was very thin. It made him look older. Smaller. Less menacing, until she noticed something gleaming in his right hand.
A knife. Gwen whimpered and threw herself on the floor trying to get as far away from him as possible.
He looked at the blade—not a knife, a box cutter—and showed her his teeth like an aggressive dog. Warm liquid trickled down Gwen's thighs. He laughed.
"What? You think I'm going to use this on you?" He slashed at the air. "Relax. All I want to do is cut some of those ropes."
He leaned over her, turning his head away in disgust. "What a stench. Did you have to do that? I would have let you use the toilet."
Mo flicked his blade through the ropes around Gwen's torso and legs. Then he sawed at the knot at her ankles until it snapped, but he left her wrists tied. She sat up and moaned. Pain shot through her head and down her spine.
"We need to leave. I'm going to put you in my car, but..." He put his face close to hers and held the knife between them. "No fun and games. Not now. Understand?"
Gwen couldn't take her eyes from the blade. He grabbed her arm and lifted her to her feet. She cried out. Sitting up was painful. Standing was agony.
"Look at you. Miss Piss Pants. I can't put you in my car like that. I'll never get the smell out."
He moved to the far wall of the room and pushed aside a stack of boxes with his calf. The light from the hallway fell onto the outline of a square cut into the floorboards. Holding the razor in front of him with his right hand, he grabbed a small wrought iron ring with the other and pulled open the trapdoor.
Gwen thought about rushing him when he bent into the hole to retrieve whatever he was planning to retrieve, but the feeling in her legs was just now returning. She didn't think she could get there fast enough. As if reading her mind, he said, "If you move I'll cut off your pinkie. I don't believe they give you a discount at the nail salon for doing nine instead of ten."
Mo knelt down, his head and shoulders disappearing. When he reemerged, he was holding a large dress box. He set it on the floor and riffled around in it for a moment or two. Gwen caught a glimpse of sky blue fabric, something white with ruffles, then he pulled out a soft beige skirt. "I think this will fit," he said holding it up and eyeballing Gwen.
He tossed it at her. In reflex, Gwen raised her arms as one unit and caught it. She examined the expensive fabric. Why would he have this? In a flash of insight, she knew. His victims had been found naked. Cold scurried up her arms. She flung down the skirt like she was shaking off a cockroach.
"Pick it up," he said, his voice hard. "It's a gift. That's no way to treat a gift."
She'd made him mad. Not smart. Gwen obeyed.
"Now, put it on. Get rid of your underwear too."
She stared at him stupidly for a moment. How was she going to do that? Her hands were tied. She had no privacy.
"Don't be shy," he said. "I have a mother and two sisters. Had, anyway." He leaned against the wall and began cleaning under his fingernails with the tip of the blade.
Gwen turned her back to him and wiggled out of her pants and panties then stepped into the skirt and pulled it up over her hips. She shivered as the fabric touched her skin.
Mo lifted an empty wine crate from the floor and held it out to her. "Put your things in there. I'll get rid of them."
She did as he said. He held the box as far from himself as he could and set it by the door. "Let's go."
Never go with them. That's what the police always say. You may be killed if you fight, but there were things worse than death.
"No," she answered.
He raised his lip in a parody of a smile again. "No? What do you mean no?"
"I'm not going anywhere." Just saying the words made Gwen feel faint. "You won't kill me here, in your shop. It's too messy."
Mo looked at her evenly for several minutes. Finally, he said, "What makes you think I intend to kill you?"
Gwen's laugh was bitter. "I don't know. Maybe the ropes, the knife. Hitting me over the head. The other dead agents."
His face broke in agony for a split second then remolded itself. "Don't get sarcastic with me. I'm not who you think I am."
Gwen stared at her bare feet. She'd done it again—made him angry. "I'm sorry."
"You think I'm a lunatic who slices up poor little Realtors in their listings for fun?" He waved his knife hand in the air. "I am not a monster. No. I am not."
He stopped and wagged the box cutter at Gwen like it was a finger. "My sister owes me. She's taken it all—
the attention, the position, the name, the money. Those women died for a good cause, a just cause. Don't waste any sympathy on them." His cheek twitched.
"I don't understand." Gwen's voice was almost a whisper. She needed to know his mind if she had any hope of surviving the night.
He looked at the ceiling. "They were charming to my face, Mr. Moray this and Mr. Moray that, but they didn't fool me. They were grasping, greedy, self-satisfied sluts. I exterminated them in my father's name."
A look of pain crossed his face; he stifled a groan and fisted his hands. Gwen's pulse climbed into her throat. She held her breath for several long moments, hoping his rage would pass.
He breathed through his nose and seemed to get control of himself. "I'm a sommelier, did you know that? Level two. I was born with an amazing sense of smell. Incredible taste buds. My sister, she buys whatever is on sale at the grocery store. She's a plebeian. But she had my father under her spell."
He switched the knife to his left hand and flexed and clenched his right hand several times. "The witch." His hand shot to his head, he gripped a hank of hair and pulled. It came loose in his fingers. He studied the hair, then let it flutter to the floor.
"We need to go." He walked toward Gwen.
"No. I'll scream."
"Don't irritate me." The words were a hiss. He clapped one hand over her mouth and held the knife to her throat with the other. "I thought we were friends. I even protected you from Lance. He was a wolf in sheep's clothing. Did you know that? He came into the wine shop with three other women over the past two months. And, he left with them. Left with his arm around them, whispering in their ears."
Mo tightened his grip and Gwen felt a pinch at her neck. Then he held the blade before her face so she could see the blood on its tip. A sob gurgled in her throat.
"I'll take my hand off your mouth so you can say thank you."
Gwen nodded.
He removed his hand. "Thank you," she said.
"That's better. Now, let's be allies. You scratch my back. I'll scratch yours." He folded his arms over his chest. "You get me into my father's house, and I'll keep all your dirty little secrets."
