3 Savor (11 page)

“I know you consider this
Avvocato
, to be family. Like a brother.”
Edoardo set down his forkful of linguini and shook his head. “Family is blood.
You have a brother. Antonio. I’m telling you this because I think you are
trusting the wrong people. Your mother tells me that last year when Antonio
wanted to buy out of the business and dissolve the partnership that you asked this
Mr. Parker to help you and he turned you down. What kind of brother turns his
back on family when they need help? Eh?” He lifted his wine glass and drained
it in one gulp.

“He didn’t turn me down exactly,”
Carl argued halfheartedly. He’d been a little miffed when Handel pushed him off
onto a firm that specialized in partnership law. Sure, he was a criminal
attorney, but he could have taken care of it if he’d wanted to. “He was friends
with both of us, so filing the paperwork would have pushed the envelope of good
ethics. He didn’t want to be accused of favoritism,” he said, repeating the
gist of what Handel had explained to them.

Edoardo poured his glass full again
and tipped the bottle toward Carl.

He covered the rim of his glass and
shook his head.

“Favoritism,” his uncle scoffed.
“Sounds like a weak excuse to me.”

“He’s a good man, Uncle,” he said,
feeling as though he should take up Handel’s side of things. “It takes a lot of
time to get a law practice up and running as he has. He’s a hard worker. I
think you would like him.”

“Is that so?” Edoardo raised his
brows, clearly amused.

“Yes, that’s so. In fact, he was in
a terrible car accident recently and just got out of the hospital. Did that
stop him? No. According to Margaret, he’s already busy working on the murder
trial again.” He threw up his hands. “It’s a huge media spectacle. On the news
every night. And someone is so upset about Handel defending this Kawasaki guy
that they actually shot at Billie through their front window the other night.”

“Really,” his uncle said, his brow
now knit with concern. “I certainly hope they find the culprits.”

“Me too.” Carl nodded, getting back
on track. “We do see less of one another since he got married, which is only
natural. But Handel would do anything for me, as I would for him.”

“And what of his sister? This
Margaret. She is, after all, the reason Agosto was murdered. He came here to
meet his son and she obstructed him at every turn. Those two come from bad
genes. I read the news stories about their father. A
pervertire
on the run from the law. They still have not located
him. Can you really say with assurance that my grandson is safe in that family?

“Uncle…” he said, uncomfortable
with the direction the conversation was flowing.

Edoardo waved off his unspoken
words. “That kind of sickness is often repeated in the next generation. I’ve
seen it before. I won’t allow my grandson to suffer needlessly when I could
keep him from it.”

“What are you saying?” Carl asked,
his mouth going dry. His uncle had the power and means to pull off a court-approved
custody reversal or a child abduction if he so wished. Edoardo’s plan –
if he indeed had one – to take Davy out of the country, would not be
thwarted as easily as Agosto’s had been.

“I’m saying that there may be a
time when you need to choose.”

Edoardo sat back in his chair and
folded his arms over his chest, his gaze piercing Carl’s heart like a laser. He
knew his uncle grieved the loss of his only son, and was desperate to be a part
of his grandson’s life now, but could he really be asking him to choose between
his friends and his family?

Loyalty to family meant everything
to men like his uncle. His ancestors had fought and died generation after
generation for nothing more than a crumbling castle and a family crest. Edoardo
would fight for much more. Flesh and blood. An heir to continue the family line
and take up the reins of his empire when the time came that he could no longer
control things.

Carl often thought that if he’d
just given Agosto the benefit of the doubt, showed him that he was on his side,
that he understood and supported his longing to know his son, everything would
have turned out differently. Maybe all he needed was family to come alongside
and turn him away from the bad choices he made. Margaret may have listened if
he’d stepped forward and pleaded Agosto’s case. Instead, she and Handel refused
to consider Agosto’s side at all, and he’d stayed out of it, not wanting to
anger his friends.

He hadn’t said it in so many words
last night, but Carl was afraid that his uncle expected him to prove his
loyalty by helping him wrest Davy from his own mother. In all good conscience,
how could he do such a thing?

Carl released a pent-up breath and
rose from the table. Davy was a good kid, smart and athletic for his age. He
was definitely a Salvatore. But he was also as much a part of the winery and
vineyard as one of those seventy-year-old vines his mom made her best wine
from. He opened the cupboard and took out the bottle of DiSaronno he kept
there, plunked in ice and poured himself a shot. The sweet, almond flavored
liqueur blazed a trail of warmth to his belly. He didn’t normally drink hard
liquor but the situation was making him decidedly uncomfortable.

He heard a car pull up outside, a
radio blaring country music. Dirk was here. Time to pull himself together. He
placed the bottle in the cupboard and sat down at the table to finish going
over his inventory. Thoughts of family ties and friendships on the brink would
have to wait until after restaurant hours.

The moon was no more than a sliver,
but it glowed bright against a midnight blue sky. The air was cool and dry with
the sweet, seductive scent of ripening wine berries. Handel laced his fingers
with Billie’s and pulled her close where they stood in the middle of the south
vineyard listening to the neighbor’s Great Dane bark in the distance.

“I’ll never tire of this,” he said,
slipping his hands up her arms and over her shoulders, “or forget that this is where
I fell in love with you.”

Billie pressed her cheek against
the soft cotton of his shirt and relaxed into his embrace. She murmured a
wordless agreement and breathed him in, still unable to believe that he was
alive and whole after seeing his wrecked Porsche that afternoon.

The familiar car so crushed and
twisted, shattered glass sprinkled liberally over leather seats, had made her
heart pound with dread just thinking of what he must have gone through. Handel
insisted on emptying the glove box and prying open the trunk to look for
personal items. After that he took pictures with his cell phone before he
signed off on the insurance papers. The Porsche was the first big item he’d
purchased when he started making money as an attorney and it obviously held
sentimental value. She was just glad it was made from solid German engineering.
If he’d been driving her little Mazda, as the insurance agent pointed out,
Handel probably would have been crushed to death.

She pulled back and peered up into
his shadowed face. “Do you think you were spared for a reason… other than the
fact that God was probably tired of my constant pleading?”

He brushed his fingers lightly over
her hair, his voice low and thoughtful. “My mom used to say, ‘God allows
everything for a reason. Being God, he doesn’t necessarily have to let us in on
it.’ In spite of what she put up with – my father’s drinking, abuse, and
then her cancer – she wasn’t bitter. Just matter-of-fact. Like she knew
the end of the story would change everything.”

“I believe there’s a master plan
too,” she agreed. “One we can’t see or comprehend from our viewpoint, but I
have to believe God is working behind the scenes turning the pain and suffering
of this world into something beautiful.”

“I hope so. But let’s not waste a minute
of the second chance he’s given us now.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” she said,
stretching up on tiptoe to kiss him. His lips soon moved from her mouth to her
neck, his whiskers rough and scratchy on sensitive skin, quickening the
anticipation. She pulled him closer still.

He suddenly lifted his head, kissed
her lightly on the lips and turned her firmly toward home. “Come on. That’s
quite enough moonlight for one night. I want you in bed, wife.”

“Your wish is my command,” she
said, eager to please and be pleased.

Together they hurried down the
rutted trail, stepping over rocks and uneven ground, their gaze fixed on the
porch light glowing like a beacon in the night. The neighbor’s dog had decided
to rest his bark and save it for another day. The only sound was the scuffing
of their shoes and the distant drone of a small plane flying overhead.

Light flashed from across the
field, headlights bouncing crazily in Margaret’s yard. They both stopped and
looked. The high whine of an engine reached them as someone accelerated and
then slammed their brakes. Were the same vandals at work in Margaret’s yard
now?

“What the –” Handel took off
at a run, sprinting down the field.

“Handel!” Billie yelled after him,
but he didn’t slow. He kept right on going to the end of the row, then turned
and ran toward the Parker field. His ribs were barely healed and he was going
directly into danger. She whipped around and ran in the opposite direction,
toward the garage and her car.

If those vandals were as blatant as
last time, they would be tearing around for a few more minutes. The fact that
they might have a gun and that Handel was unarmed, gave her an extra burst of
speed. Panting and winded, she opened the garage, yanked open the door of her
car and jumped in. Thank God her key was still above the visor and she hadn’t
listened to Handel when he warned her that one of these days someone was going
to walk right in and drive away with her car.

She backed out and whipped around
in the driveway sending a spray of gravel dust flying out from under her tires.
The motion sensors caused all the lights on the house and garage to come on as
she shot up the driveway to the road. There was no traffic at this time of
night and she hit the gas, sending the speedometer up to eighty miles per hour
within seconds. The half-mile distance to Margaret’s turnoff was covered so
fast she had to slam her brakes on to make the turn, no doubt leaving a nice
skid mark behind on the asphalt as she whipped into the driveway and turned her
car sideways to block the vandals from getting away. Gravel crunched and flew,
pinging the underbody of her vehicle as she skidded to a stop. She shut off the
ignition, threw open the door, and jumped out.

She heard Handel shout, and the
sound of a vehicle roaring toward her. Headlights bounced over the bump in
Margaret’s driveway and blinded her as she stood in the middle of the road,
caught and held in the beam.

The truck ground to a halt within a
few feet of her position. She couldn’t see who was driving or even the make and
model of the vehicle. She just knew it was a truck or SUV by the sound of the
engine. Frozen in place as though her tennis shoes had taken up roots, she
stared into the blinding glare while dust settled around her and waited
helplessly for whatever was going to happen next.

“Billie!” she heard Handel yell
from somewhere back by the house and then the driver of the truck hit the gas
again, swerved around her and the car, bounced down into the shallow ditch and
came up on the other side. As quick as they had come, they roared away into the
night.

Handel pounded toward her,
breathing hard and heavy. He grabbed her and pulled her against him, regardless
of the pain to his ribs. Huffing and panting into her ear, his heart beating
raggedly against her breasts, he gasped out a warning, “Don’t
ever…do…anything…like that…again.”

“I’m sorry,” she said against his
shirt, now damp with sweat. She felt him tense as another car slowed at the
driveway and turned in, stopping behind her Mazda.

They pulled apart and stared into
the glare of headlights, lower than the truck’s and partially blocked by her
taller vehicle. The door of the mystery car opened and a shadowed form stepped
out.

“Billie? Handel? What are you doing
here?”

“Adam?” She ran toward her brother.
“Are Margaret and Davy with you?” she asked, worried that they hadn’t heard
anything from them since the commotion began.

“Margaret is, but what…”

Handel hurried to the other side of
the car and yanked the door open. “Margaret. You’re all right,” he said, relief
flooding his voice.

“Of course I’m all right,” she
said. “But now you’re scaring me. What is going on?”

“Where’s Davy?”

“He’s staying with a friend
tonight.”

Still breathing hard, he bent over
holding his side. “Thank God.”

Billie circled the vehicle, her attention
diverted. “What’s this?”

“What do you think it is? It’s my
new ride,” her brother said proudly.

Margaret climbed out of the
Corvette and pulled Handel toward the house. “You two get these cars out of my
driveway. I’m taking Handel inside. He doesn’t sound very good.”

•••••

“I’m fine,” Handel reassured them
for the third time. “The doctor said I’m healthy as a horse. A little running
is not going to kill me. I was just out of breath.”

“Healthy as a horse and stubborn as
a mule,” Margaret muttered, waiting for him to drink the glass of water she’d
handed him.

He obediently slugged it down and
grinned as he held out the empty glass. “Happy?”

“Ecstatic.”

“So what’s going on?” Adam asked,
dropping onto the couch and looking from Handel to Billie and back again. “You
raced over here after midnight and blocked off Meg’s driveway just to catch us
coming home from the club?”

Handel explained what had happened
and they both looked plenty concerned. He glanced at Billie. “We thought
someone was targeting us because of the trial, but now –” he shook his
head. “I don’t know what’s going on. Since there’s nothing the police can do
tonight, except keep us up later than we already are, I’ll call Officer Torn in
the morning and fill him in on tonight’s adventures.”

“Maybe it’s someone with a grudge
against Fredrickson’s,” said Adam, “and not any one in particular. After all,
everyone around here knows that Margaret works for you as chief winemaker, and
now you’ve both been harassed.”

“That’s true.” Billie yawned widely.
“Babe, let’s go home and get some rest.

They said goodnight and went out to
the car. Billie backed up and turned the car around. “I hope the police catch
these creeps soon. I think I’ve had about enough of their…” her words trailed
off as the car’s headlights swept the field below Margaret’s shed. A dirt trail
led to the vineyard beyond and in the light she saw that the truck had
obviously taken the trail at some point, plowing down a section of vines like
so much kindling. She hit the brakes and stared. “Oh no.”

“What?”

She reached across the console and
grasped his arm. “They ran right over Margaret’s vines. The ones your
grandfather planted in the Forties.”

•••••

No one managed to get to bed after
they went back in to inform Margaret about the vines. She ran right out,
ordering everyone to find flashlights and follow. Handel parked the car closer
and left the headlights on so they could better inspect the damage.

Billie gazed around at the broken
vines, crushed grapes, and deep grooves in the field made by truck tires. It
was so senseless. Why would anyone destroy something so beautiful and
productive, something that had stood the test of time, survived decades of
weather and disease?

Margaret knelt over a knarled,
thick uprooted vine and shook her head, tears of misery glistening in her eyes.
Adam leaned in, rubbing circles over her back, and murmuring comforting words
that Billie couldn’t hear from where she stood.

“At least they didn’t uproot them
all,” Handel confirmed, raising his flashlight to the end of the row. “We can
take cuttings from the toppled vines and start a new vineyard. That way we’ll
always have Grandfather’s Tocai Friulano if something should happen to the
others.”

“Nothing’s going to happen to the
others, because I won’t let it.” Margaret’s voice was fiery. She raised her
eyes to her brother. “Has anyone else thought that perhaps this kind of
harassment is right up our father’s alley?”

“No.” Billie said immediately,
unwilling to even contemplate such a thought. “Sean Parker is dead. The Mexican
cartel killed him. Mario would not have let him live after what he did to his
sister. He sent me the pictures back as proof. You know that.”

“Sure,” Margaret said. She turned
and stalked back to the house, Adam following in her wake. He turned and cast
Billie a worried look, but left Handel to smooth things over.

Handel released a heavy sigh and
put an arm around her as they trudged back to the car. “She’s just upset. Don’t
mind what she says. We’re all overtired and looking for answers. There’s no way
my father could survive the cartel. And if he did… someone else would kill him.
He made a lot of enemies in his life.”

“I know.” She paused and looked up
at the night sky, shot full of stars. “In my head I know it’s not possible. In
my heart… even the thought makes me feel ill.”

They climbed in the car and drove
home. Outside lights blinked on again as they pulled into the garage. The hoot
of an owl in the trees behind the house was a reminder that predators did
manage to survive best in the shadows. The thought came unbidden to her mind
that if Sean Parker were alive he would do well to remain hidden. She’d been
taught that God would judge evil one day, but if that man were in her sights
she wouldn’t hesitate to send him to kingdom come, by whatever means she had
available. A pocket of sadness filled her heart, knowing he had changed her,
made her less trusting, more vengeful. Would that she could go back to the girl
she once was and start over. But that was impossible.

She glanced across the yard to the
winery and sheds, now dark silhouettes against a star-strewn sky, and told
herself that he was absolutely, positively dead.

After Handel made sure everything
was secure, he took her hand and they hurried around to the back of the house.
The screen door was all that separated them from the comforts of home.

“Worrying about whether or not you
lock the garage is pretty silly when we left the back door wide open,” she
reminded him.

“True.” He opened the screen just
wide enough to stick his arm in and flip the light switch up on the wall, then
laced his fingers together like he was posing for a Charlie’s Angels poster.
“I’ll go first,” he said and jerked his head toward the door. “Follow me.”

She rolled her eyes and entered the
kitchen right behind him, glancing around to see if anything was amiss. Nothing
was and she started to open the refrigerator to get a glass of juice, but he
pulled her away from the door and put a finger to his lips.

“Keep one hand on my back. No
matter what, stay behind me.”

“Right,” she said, ignoring his
silly order. “I’m thirsty. We can play cops and robbers after I get a drink.”

He turned and looked at her, a
crooked grin on his face, and lowered his loaded finger. “Sorry. You’re tired.
I was just trying to lighten things up.”