A Tainted Finish: A Sydney McGrath Mystery (15 page)

She was wiping the tears from her face with the quilt when Rosa crept in with a mug of tea. She smiled at Sydney, but then noticed the distraught look on her face.

“Ah,
mi hija
,” she cooed. She bent down and kissed her forehead. She reached for Syd's head instinctively. “Still you have a fever?”

“I'm not sure. I just had a delirious nightmare.”

“Bad dream?” Rosa asked. “Fevers show us the future.” She got up and padded out of the room.

“Great, thanks, Rosa!” She yelled sarcastically out the door. Leave it to Rosa to imbue a nightmare with ridiculous superstitions. Of course, it was only a dream. Yet she felt her shoulders instinctively. No holes, no blood. But the memory of the dream filled her with concern. She blushed as she recalled her vivid make-out session with Olivier. Rosa came back into the room with a thermometer. She thrust it hard under her tongue and Syd yelped like a wounded puppy. Olivier stuck his head in the doorway a moment later.

“Alright in here?” he asked.

Syd pulled the covers up to her chin and nodded, fervently with the thermometer in her mouth. She felt like an iconic Norman Rockwell painting or a cartoon of female foolishness. Rosa clucked her tongue.

“She’s still feverish,” Rosa said. She yanked the thermometer out of Syd's mouth. “101. Not bad.” She turned and scuttled out of the room.

“But not good for running around outside half-naked in the freezing night,” Olivier said under his breath with piercing black eyes.

Syd shrugged and avoided his eyes. He was wearing the same pinstriped pajama bottoms from the night before and a bathrobe she recognized as belonging to Clarence. His scent wafted over to her in a sensuous invisible net. She shivered beneath the quilt. He sat down respectfully at the end of the bed.

“I think we need to tell Detective Yesler today,” he said.

“Yeah, I think I'll see him later this morning. Charlie’s coming back.” She fiddled with the quilt.

“Okay.”

“So maybe you could stay in the trailer for a bit longer?” she asked, looking vacantly out the window.

“If that's what you want,” he spoke softly through tightened lips. He rose from the bed, sighed and lightly shook his head before he left the room. His gesture wasn't lost on Syd.

Charlie showed up around noon to find Syd bundled up on the couch in the living room with her laptop balanced on her knees. She was perusing the hordes of condolences posted on social media.

“Man, you’re playing up this damsel-in-distress thing,” Charlie sneered. She opened an IPA and took a long draw. She had sprawled herself out on a worn leather club chair, long limbs dangling over the arms.

“Yup. Not easy either. You try giving yourself the flu.”

“No need. I can do the same thing with alcohol. Hair of the dog.” She took another thirsty swig.

“Sooo, how was it?” Syd asked. She slammed her laptop closed and sat up, anxious for Charlie's account of the magazine launch party.

Charlie told her tale of the event with her usual flourish, sparing no ridiculous moment or person. The evening had proven to be excellent fodder for Charlie's voracious appetite for human folly. Her account had the women dressed in stupid clothes and even more ridiculous shoes, decked to the nines in the latest of Seattle's mock New York style. Their desire to stand out was only outdone by a stronger desire to conform. Thus, Charlie said, they all looked the same; “like emaciated stick insects in the same clothes and hairdo,” she said. Only a few women stood out as true individuals, and they were the type who drew Charlie like a moth to light: the inked-and-pierced, Fluevog-wearing, steam-punkish outliers. Charlie spared these types the sharp edge of her tongue, although she couldn’t refrain from gently mocking the cliché these outliers represented. Of course, their friend Michelle was spared her vitriol since she was tasteful, elegant, and gracious as a host.

“There’s nothing new under the sun,” Charlie sighed despondently, the high from her salacious soliloquy waning. She drained the rest of her beer. “I just wish you were there.”

“Sorry. I've got a murder to deal with,” Syd answered glibly, regretting her words immediately. “I would have loved to have been there.” At the moment the idea of spending the evening at a soiree like the launch would have been like heaven. It would be such a reprieve from her life here, a romantic return to an innocence she longed for.

“It is so ironic, Charlie. You know we felt so superior? We were so cynical up there in Seattle. We were city girls who knew
everything
. We could watch it all with a sense of superiority and witty running commentary. And we could make fun of our country bumpkin life here. But really, our time up there was the innocent time. Here, in the vineyards and trees, it’s the sleepy winery that’s the real world tragedy.”

“Dad told me about Jack,” Charlie said softly. Syd expected a glib comment from Charlie, if only to lighten the mood, but Charlie seemed to agree with her.

“I'm going to go see him today,” Syd replied.

“Maybe you should wait until you feel better.”

Syd remained silent and chewed on her lip for a few minutes in silence.

“Marcus gives his love,” Charlie spoke with trepidation, changing the subject.

Syd looked over at her and sighed. “Yeah, I haven't called him since he left. He's left some messages,” she smiled sheepishly.

“Uh, some?” Charlie teased.

“Okay. Lots. And about twenty emails. Facebook and texts. All of them asking when I'm coming back.”

“And when is that, exactly?”

“Not for a while. I have to see out Crush. I promised.”

“Dad wants me to talk you into leaving.”

“Yeah, he got really pissed off at me the other day. I went to question Jack after he kind of told me to leave it alone. He thinks I'm interfering, but he's wrong. Besides, I gave him information about the insurance fraud. He thinks its Olivier. But after last night he should think differently.”

“You mean the breakin? Dad’s there now, and I don't think it helps Olivier in any way whatsoever.” Charlie said incredulously.

“There was no breakin. Just a prowler. He was
looking in
but he never
got in
.”

“What are you talking about, Syd? He got in and made a huge mess! The entire office is trashed.” Charlie frowned at her.

“Where? What office?”

“Jack's office. I was just there. I met up with Dad before I came here. The place is a mess. Whoever did that was obviously looking for something.”

“When did
that
happen?” Syd asked, jumping up off the couch.

“Not sure. I heard a White Salmon cop say it was early this morning. A cruiser went by the building at 5 am and everything was normal. But the window was broken, and it would be hard to miss. So it must have been after 5 am.” Charlie narrowed her eyes at Syd as she paced the floor. “What were you talking about, Sydney?”

“Here. We had a prowler here last night. A Peeping Tom, sometime around four.” Syd paced in front of the couch, picking at her lip.

“Fuck, Sydney. Does Dad know?” Charlie was growing angry with Syd as she spoke. She wore a formidable scowl that held an uncanny resemblance to Jim’s.

“No, we decided not to call him,” Syd spoke hesitantly. It seemed like such a rational decision last night, but she could see how Charlie might disagree. “He was gone and he wasn't coming back. Alejandro chased him off with a bat.”

“Right, because a murderer twice over is going to be put off by a farmer with a bat.” Charlie hissed back at her in a flat voice.

“Anyway, Olivier was here the entire time. And he was in his trailer when the prowler came, so that certainly was
not
him. And he was here in the house when Jack's office got broken in to, if it happened this morning.” Syd spoke rapidly, ignoring Charlie's angry glare. She took a deep breath and processed what Charlie said.

“Twice over?” she asked.

“Dad’s convinced that Jack's car was tampered with. Something to do with the ABS. There was a recall on the car for brake failure related to the ABS, but Jack had it fixed a few months back. And after this morning there’s no question.”

Syd sat back down on the couch, picking at her lip. Jack had a meeting with Paul about insurance fraud the afternoon before his accident. She had seen him that morning. It felt like a lifetime ago, but it was really only two days earlier. She couldn’t believe she had missed the connection herself. She had been preoccupied with her own grief over Clarence's illness, and then her own feverish virus had been a big distraction. Still, she felt like an idiot. She took a deep, raspy breath and fought off the feeling of losing the air in the room.

“I have to talk to your dad. Did he talk to Paul? Did Jack talk to Paul? Jesus, Charlie. I think I could have prevented Jack's accident. I told your Dad, but I didn't realize what it meant.” She got up again and paced the room. Charlie sat still and watched Syd cover the same stretch of floor for a few minutes.

Explain it to me, Syd,” Charlie said in a forced calm voice.

Syd talked through the details of her conversation with Jack; about the will and the key man insurance policies. She explained Jack's suspicions that the medical examination required by the policy would easily have revealed the cancer in Clarence's body in the full body scan. The exam was only six months before Clarence's plane crash and the hospital stay that revealed a blood test replete with Stage IV pancreatic cancer diagnoses. The exam had been a forgery, or at the very least it had to have been tampered with.

“But the cancer could have not shown up in the first exam, right? I mean, it didn't really show up on the autopsy report. But Dad says that's just because they determined cause of death from laryngeal spasm, or something like that.” Charlie's voice trailed off at Syd's expression.

“Maybe. Seems unlikely. But that doesn't explain Hans’s behavior after the deal went sour. He continued to pay a hefty premium on a policy, even when he had no vested interest in Clarence as a business partner. It doesn't explain why he lined up a buyer so quickly for the winery. Or why he lined up a winemaker. Or how he planned to cut Clarence out of ownership for the corporate buyout. The point is that if Jack blew open the policy as fraudulent, Hans Feldman had a good deal to lose. Again.”

“So why would he kill Clarence then? I mean, if he knew he had pancreatic cancer, he could have just waited it out, right? Pancreatic cancer moves fast.” Her voice faded again as she sensed her friend’s discomfort. Syd sighed despondently.

“Maybe he grew impatient. It would have been an expensive premium. Clarence was 64, after all.”

“But Jack had a policy too?” Charlie asked.

“We can pretty much rule him out now, I think.” Syd frowned while her fingers worked over the skin on her lips. “But he had the medical report in his office, you know.” She explained that he had mentioned that he had found something in the report that might be incriminating. “And then...and then he gets in a near-fatal car accident and his office gets broken into.”

They were interrupted by a polite “uh-hem”, the sound of Olivier clearing his throat. He stood stiffly near the kitchen table at the end of the room, holding a beaker of red wine. “Sorry to interrupt.”

“Hey, Ollie!” Charlie said, she turned in her chair and greeted him with more warmth than Syd expected. At least she had convinced Charlie of Olivier's innocence for the moment. Syd could just kiss Charlie sometimes.

“Hello, Charles,” he replied, flashing a genuine smile. He had lovely ivory teeth in a wide mouth. Syd felt a jolt in her stomach. The room was quiet for a moment, and Syd looked down at her fidgeting hands. Olivier remained on the other side of the room, as far away as possible. Charlie glanced at each of them quizzically.

“You might want to check this,” he offered the beaker to Syd, striding over to the sitting area with natural feline grace.

Syd took it and sniffed. She swirled it and sniffed again. She tasted it and handed it to Charlie, who did the same thing. Charlie grunted.

“Is it stuck then?” Syd asked.

“Yeah, I think so. The temp has dropped to 17 degrees Celsius, and the Brix stopped moving at 8. It's been the same for two days.”

“It's got some hydrogen sulfide on it. When was the last time it was feed?”

“At 12 Brix. It was 26 degrees, so I didn't want to bump it too much. Clarence always wanted the ferments on the cool side.”

“Yeah. Whole berry?”

He nodded.

“I'd expect it to stay the same at different levels of temperature and alcohol when the berries break down. But the skins should all be broken at 8 Brix. Hmm. And it has had a vigorous punchdown? Is this Tempranillo?”

“Yes and yes.” He smiled at her, not unimpressed. It wasn’t easy discerning a varietal during fermentations.

“So maybe we should bring in a coil and heat it up? I wouldn't worry too much about the hydrogen sulfide. Tempranillo can throw a lot of it, and this vineyard is prone to reduction anyway. We have another tank of this, right? Same yeast? So we can grab some juice from the other tank too.”

“I agree,” he said, nodding at everything. He turned to leave, but just before he reached the door he turned back. “It's good to have you back, Charlie.” He smiled another heartbreaker grin at her and left through the kitchen door.

Charlie feigned a gunshot wound to the heart, keeling over. “Fuck, if that ain't one of the most gorgeous villains I’ve ever known,” she said in her best Scarlett O’Hara accent.

“Yeah,” Syd muttered, faking disinterest.

“So what's up there?” Charlie prodded, wearing a shit-eating grin.

“Nothing. What are you talking about?” Syd skirted her look as she got up and made her way to the kitchen. Charlie followed her in hot pursuit.

“Oh, now I
know
there’s something there. Don’t tell me you slept with him. Fuck, Syd, did you sleep with him?” She squared Syd’s shoulders in the middle of the kitchen, looking down into her face.

“
No
,” she said grumpily at her friend, and wrestled out of her grip. Charlie had only been back for ten minutes and she was already annoying her. She fumbled around in the cabinet for the Advil. Her head hurt.

“Okay, okay. But you like him, Syd. There’s something there. I know it. You could cut the tension with a knife.”

“There was tension because I asked him to stay in the house last night after the prowler, and then I asked him to leave this morning.” she snarled at Charlie in exasperation.

“Why’d you do
that
? Seems kind of like it would be handy to have a guy around when there’s a murderer on the loose.” She meant to be funny, but it came out too close to the truth for comfort.

“I wanted the room for
you
, actually. I was going to ask you to stay here with me. Think of it like a Bahamas vacay, but on a budget.” Syd tried to remain calm, but knew she looked scared.

“Okay, consider me moved in.” Charlie turned her friend around and gave her a long hug. “But really. There is something there, right?” She smiled slyly at Syd as she moved out of the hug.

“Okay. I had a sex dream about him last night. Really, it was only a make-out dream. But it was the hottest thing that has happened to me in years.” She blushed through a shy smile.

“Oh my, oh my. What would the honorable and smitten Mr. Marcus think about that?” She smiled maliciously.