Pressed to Death

by Kirsten Weiss

She floated to the counter, GD sniffing at her heels. “It has come to my attention that certain people are spreading rumors that I had something to do with Romeo’s death.”

  I blinked. “I would never spread rumors!”

  “Not you, dear. That gargoyle from Ladies Aid.” Her upper lip curled. “Eliza Bigelow.”

  Leo’s dark brows drew together. “Why would anyone think you had something to do with my father’s death?”

  She shook her head, her crescent moon earrings swinging. “It’s utter nonsense. They have it in their heads that I might have used him to sabotage the grape stomp. As if I would lower myself to sabotage!”

  “You did sort of, er, threaten it,” I said.

  She laughed. “Oh, that! I was just blowing off steam, dear. Now, I’m rather embarrassed about my outburst. Your mother, of all people, did not deserve to be the focus of my ire. Even if I don’t agree with her tactics, she’s only trying to do what’s best.”

  “Tactics?”

  “At any rate,” Mrs. Gale said, “I just wanted to assure you both that it’s untrue.” Her chin dipped. “And Eliza will not get away with this.”

  “You see, those are the sorts of things that some people might misconstrue as a threat,” I said.

  “Merely a promise, my dear. Merely a promise.” She turned to Leo. “So, Sunday evening then?”

  He nodded.

  “Ta!” Waggling her fingers at us, she fluttered out the front door. The bell jingled behind her.

  “How long was she waiting for me?” I asked.

  “Long enough for the paint to dry on those pumpkins.” He nodded to the window. “I think she’s lonely since her kids moved away.”

  “Yeah. I stopped by your winery today.”

  Leo’s eyebrows squished together. “My winery?”

  “I assume Trivia Vineyards is yours now?”

  He scratched his cheek. “I guess.”

  “They said there’d been some sabotage there Friday night. Someone had turned the taps on the wine barrels in the cellar and poured nearly half a million dollars’ worth of wine on the floor.”

  His breath hissed inward, his eyes widening. “What? I worked those harvests! Dammit!” He paced. “The cellar wine is aging from the last few harvests, back when I was still involved. Just manual labor.” He stopped and gazed down at a mini pumpkin on the sill. “I didn’t work this year’s harvest. It didn’t feel right going there anymore.”

  “But you went by the winery on Friday.”

  “Romeo called. He said he wanted to talk. I figured I’d listen to what he had to say. Turned out to be just a bunch of BS about tradition and family and hard work. Like he would know anything about being a family.”

  “Was he worried or upset?”

  Leo’s laugh was hard, flat. “Only about me. I wasn’t holding up the family name. He wanted me back in the vineyard.”

  “It sounds like he was trying.”

  “Maybe.” Leo knit his lip. “I think Jocelyn was putting pressure on him to bring me back into the fold.” He shook his head. “I dunno. It was weird. I hadn’t talked to him in months, and then he called out of the blue. I guess that’s why I went over there. His call surprised me.”

  “Did you see anyone or anything that might have led to the sabotage?”

  His fists clenched. “If I had, I would have stopped it. Have you ever worked a harvest? It’s work. Real work. Not like here—no offense.”

  “None taken.” I knew what he meant. I’d worked harvests when I was a teen. It was hot, backbreaking work. But there was satisfaction in helping produce something tangible, even when you were too young to drink it. “How did it go here?”

  “It’s Wednesday.”

  And not exactly a boom day for tourism. “That bad, huh?”

  “Oh,” he said, “Mason stopped by.”

  I straightened. “Did he say anything?”

  “Said he’d see you tomorrow.”

  I slumped.

  Well, I’d done that to myself by avoiding him earlier. But heck, I’d tackled a vineyard investigation. I could face Mason.

  Tomorrow.

  seventeen

  “Here’s your roast beef.” Leo tossed a paper-wrapped sandwich over the cash register.

  I caught it one-handed. “Thanks. I’m starving.” Above me, the air conditioner rattled and hummed, fighting a losing battle with the noon-time heat. But if the museum wasn’t exactly cool, it didn’t seem to deter my Thursday visitors. Half a dozen people roamed the three rooms. A couple in T-shirts and shorts perused the exhibits in cases on the far wall, opposite my perch.

  “Why’s the motorcycle shop closed today?” Leo asked, pulling a wad of napkins from the pocket of his Paranormal Museum hoodie.

  Throat tightening, I paused in the act of unwrapping my sandwich. Mason’s shop had been closed when I arrived that morning. What was going on?

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Mason must have taken another day off.”

  “I was hoping he’d look at my bike.”

  “You have a motorcycle?”

  Leo colored. “I got it used.”

  “You mean, you bought it recently?”

  GD leapt to the counter and nosed at the sandwich.

  His chin jutted forward. “I’m an adult. It’s my money.”

  Had Leo already started spending in expectation of his inheritance? That wasn’t a good sign.

  “So what’s the plan?” he asked.

  GD butted against my hand.

  “The plan is I eat this sandwich.” I glared at the cat. Mine. “Then I take the grape press to the haunted house and make sure everything’s ready for tonight’s opening.” Jorge had helped me load the press back into the truck. “You stay here and hold down the fort.”

  Leo’s brow rumpled. “Are you sure you don’t want me to go? I know the electronics.”

  This was true, but in my role as girl detective, it was my duty to sniff around the haunted house. People would be there who had known Jocelyn and Romeo. Also, I suddenly needed to get as far away from the motorcycle shop as possible. “There may be some administrative stuff with Ladies Aid to deal with there. If I get hung up on the electronics, I’ll call, and you can walk me through the tech.”

  Leo nodded. “You know where to find me.”

  Gathering my sandwich, I rose from behind the counter and motioned to my wooden seat. “The captain’s chair is all yours.” I grabbed my messenger bag from the shelf beneath the register and headed through the bookcase to the Fox and Fennel. The tables were filled by babbling diners, but Adele was nowhere in sight. Since I’d been banned from the kitchen (don’t ask), I went to her office and rapped on the door. It swung open beneath my fist. Adele, neat in her white blouse and apron, looked up from behind a sturdy metal desk.

  “Mind if I eat here?” I asked. “Short of huddling inside the spirit cabinet, there’s no privacy to be found in the museum.”

  “Go ahead.” She pulled a pencil from her chignon and made a notation on a spreadsheet. “But you’ll be dining alone, I’m afraid.” She motioned around the cramped room at the neat bookshelves, the printer, the stacked boxes. “I just came in here to check on an order.”

  “How’s your day going?”

  “Busy.” She brandished a stack of receipts. “Marcelle called in sick, business is booming due to the haunted house opening tonight, and I have to prep for the Death Bistro.”

  “Mmm. It’s been busier than usual at the museum too.”

  She set down the papers and peered at me. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah. Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “How are things with you and Mason?”

  “You noticed his shop was closed too?”

  “Is it? Why?”

  “I don’t know.”

  �
��Oh. Is something wrong?”

  “Not something. Just about everything.” I unloaded—the ex-girlfriend, the evasions, his declaration of love.

  Adele listened, frowning. “Mason strikes me as an honorable man,” she said. “I don’t think he’d tell you he loved you if he didn’t mean it. Is that why you’ve been avoiding him?”

  “I haven’t been avoiding him. Mostly he’s been avoiding me, or he’s just been unavailable.”

  “Mostly?” Her left brow rose. “It doesn’t sound like you’ve been trying too hard to get to the bottom of this. What are you afraid of ?”

  “I’m afraid something’s gone wrong.”

  “And so you’re fixing it by avoiding the problem?”

  It sounded stupid when she put it that way. “I planned to talk to him today, but his shop is closed.”

  “Have you tried calling him?”

  “Of course. I mean, I left a message. If I call again, I’ll seem desperate.”

  “Oh, we’re playing that game, are we? You’re better than that, Maddie.” She stood and edged from behind the desk. “Call him. I’ll give you some privacy.” Leaving the room, she closed the door softly behind me.

  Adele was right. I was being at worst a coward and at best a fool. Digging my cell phone from my messenger bag, I called Mason.

  It went to voicemail, and my breath hitched. I shouldn’t have run when I saw him yesterday.

  He rumbled through his greeting.

  I plastered a smile on my face because I’d read that people can sense over the phone when you’re not smiling. “Hi, Mason, it’s Maddie. It’s been a while since we’ve spoken, and I know you wanted to talk to me about something. It seemed like you had a lot on your plate, so I thought I’d give you some space, but now I’m feeling like I was wrong. Anyway, please call me when you can. I miss you.”

  I hung up, making a face. Good thing I was an independent woman in the twenty-first century who was not going to make mountains of molehills. Ha. I ripped the paper off my sandwich and tore into it, wishing I’d asked Leo to buy barbecue chips too. Sue me. I’m an emotional eater.

  Picking a slice of jalapeno from the damp paper, I popped it in my mouth, enjoying the vinegary burn. I could limp to the corner market and buy those chips I was craving. They would take my mind off Mason for maybe thirty seconds. Or I could step up and get some actual investigating done.

  I scrounged for Detective Slate’s business card in my leather wallet. He picked up on the second ring.

  “Slate here.”

  “Hi, this is Maddie Kosloski. I was wondering if you’d found anything on that old murder-suicide?”

  “I found the file in the archives—actually, the archivist found it for me—but I haven’t had a chance to go through it. Things have been busy around here.”

  “An understatement, I’m sure. Is there any chance I could come by and take a look at it?”

  “Sure. I’ve checked it out in your name. If I have to go anywhere, I’ll leave it with the desk sergeant.”

  “I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

  Crumpling up the remains of my sandwich, I dropped it in the metal wastebasket beside Adele’s desk and left through the alley door.

  I unlocked my pickup and glanced up at Mason’s apartment windows.

  His blinds were shut, and that meant he probably wasn’t home. Mason was all about natural lighting. Where was he?

  I climbed into my truck and drove to the police station.

  In the mint-green reception area, I announced myself to the desk sergeant.

  He made a call, and Detective Slate strode into the room. He was jacketless, his shirt sleeves rolled up, a manila folder in his hand. Smiling, he jerked his head toward the hallway. “This way.”

  He led me to a glass-walled conference room and dropped the folder on the long wooden table. “Are you planning another mock retrial?” Back in the spring, I’d cosponsored a mock retrial for the McBride case.

  “Do we need one?” I tweaked the pull cord on the dusty mini-blinds, energy fizzing through my veins. This was exactly what I needed—more research, less moping.

  “Not if this file is anything to go by. There’s not much here.”

  He opened the folder and spread a series of black-and-white photos on the table. “Crime-scene photography came into its own in the 1920s. This was the only murder that year, so the local photographer went all out. Unfortunately, it still doesn’t give us much to work with.”

  I leaned over the photos. “Alcina’s burnt cottage.” Even in grainy black-and-white, the photographer had captured the horror. Charred bodies sprawled on the floor, the ruins blackened rubble.

  Slate’s dark brows rose. “You knew?”

  “The bit about the remains being discovered in her burnt cottage was in that old newspaper article I showed you. But what I don’t understand is, who burned the cottage? If this was a murder-suicide, and both bodies were found inside, who set the fire?”

  “Luigi could have set the fire after killing Alcina, and then shot himself before the flames consumed him. It’s not that uncommon. The murderer is ashamed of what he’s done, so he tries to blot out the evidence before he kills himself.”

  I grimaced. And that was the difference between a professional investigator and amateur Maddie. Slate actually knew what he was talking about.

  “At any rate,” he added, “the police report seems cut and dried.” He drew out a yellowed piece of paper and handed it to me.

  Our fingertips brushed, and again electricity shivered through my core.

  Not daring to look up, I laid the paper on the table and focused on the writing. We’d reached the era of the typewriter, so the report was legible even if some of its letters had faded. “Alcina’s father had to be hospitalized from shock and smoke inhalation after trying to put out the fire.” The poor man. When had he realized his daughter was inside the burning cottage? I shook my head. I couldn’t imagine that sort of loss.

  “There wasn’t much police and fire department cooperation in those days,” Slate said. “It’s kind of impressive that the two worked together in this case.”

  “The good old days, when San Benedetto was cutting edge.”

  “You should read the police reports on bootlegging. San Benedetto was a hotbed of excitement.”

  “You’re kidding. I thought San Benedetto avoided all that business by selling grapes direct to homes so people could make their own wine?”

  “Yeah. Well. Whenever you make something illegal, someone will find a way to make a profit from selling more.”

  “So much for San Benedetto as sleepy backwater. And as far as the Paganini murders, I don’t suppose you’ve—”

  “Maddie, you know I can’t discuss those cases, especially not with you.”

  My hands curled around my middle. “I get it. I’m a suspect.”

  “You’re sticking your nose in. Last time you tried that, you nearly got yourself killed. You’re lucky I haven’t charged you with impeding an investigation.”

  “Impeding? How have I impeded?” And how had he managed to keep Laurel from charging me with something?

  “That story about dropping your pepper spray in the Trivia parking lot? Do you really think I’m that gullible?”

  “No.” I picked up the folder. “But a girl can hope. Thanks for turning me on to Red’s, by the way.” I lifted my key chain from the front pocket of my messenger bag. The pepper spray jangled against my keys.

  “Let me see that.”

  I handed him the key ring, and he removed the spray canister from its leather wrap and squinted at it. “All right, this stuff’s okay. It expires in a year, though. You’ll have to buy another next October.”

  “Pepper spray has an expiration date? Really?”

  He slid the canister back into the leather. “The date’s on t
he canister.”

  “Does it really expire, or is that just one of those marketing gimmicks to make you buy more?”

  “Expired spray isn’t as effective. You might also want to take a class in using it.”

  “I think I can figure out how to press a button on my own.”

  He grinned. “Just make sure the wind’s blowing in the right direction.”

  “I should have gotten a Taser.”

  He laughed, an infectious baritone. “Do you want to take the file with you?”

  “Yes, please.”

  “You’ve got it for two weeks, then I come after you.”

  “I’ll return it before you have to put out a warrant.”

  Slate walked me down the hall, past an open cubicle area. Uniform and plainclothes officers milled in the hall, hunched over computers. A female officer hailed him, waving him over.

  We stopped in front of a largish empty cubicle with his nameplate on the wall. “Do you mind waiting here?”

  I shook my head. “Nope.”

  “And don’t even think about rifling my desk for clues.”

  “If I thought you had a clue—”

  “Don’t say it.” He hurried to his colleague. She spoke to him in a low tone and motioned toward her computer monitor.

  He bent over it, squinting.

  Rifling his desk would have been rude, even if I’d had the nerve to do it in front of a dozen cops. So I satisfied myself with a hands-free perusal. Nature calendar pinned to the cubicle wall and surrounded by a random design of pushpins. Computer (off). Stack of multi-colored index cards (blank). Box of lemon bars …

  Lemon bars?

  I rocked on my heels. Ladies Aid had boasted they “owned” a cop. And they’d used lemon bars to extract donations from one man. Was Ladies Aid using the pastries to literally keep their inside man at the police station sweet?

  But Detective Slate? I didn’t know what was worse—that he could be corrupted, or that he’d been corrupted and still wouldn’t tell me the details of the investigation.

  Lemon bars! I swayed, grasping the edge of the cubicle divider. There had been lemon bars at Jocelyn’s house the night she’d been killed. She’d set them out on the table along with a bottle of sparkling wine. But she and Ladies Aid were on the outs—Jocelyn was part of Mrs. Gale’s splinter group. How could she have gotten her hands on the coveted lemon bars? Unless someone from Ladies Aid had brought them to her, perhaps as a peace offering. The killer?