3 Savor Page 20

  She lowered her voice. “Edoardo Salvatore is not who he pretends to be.”

  “Really.” He yawned loudly and scratched his head. “Who exactly is he then? A hit man for the mob?”

  “Adam, sit up right now and listen,” she directed. “I saw a text come in on his phone. Someone with the initials JT.”

  “Justin Timberlake?”

  “Well if it is, he’s involved in some very nefarious plans.”

  Only his mother would use the word nefarious. “Mom, could you get to the point? I really need to sleep.”

  He heard the crinkle of paper. “I wrote it down as soon as I locked myself in my room,” she said. “Edoardo instructed JT to stir up the Parker woman. The next day JT answered that the fire was contained early. No vine damage. I never heard about a fire. Do you know what he’s talking about?” She didn’t pause long enough for him to respond, but continued, “Edoardo then told him to get personal. JT’s last text a little while ago said Parker’s truck just had a tune up.”

  Adam was still trying to decipher the first thing his mother said. “Why are you locked in a room?” he asked squinting into the dark. “Has that man tried… I’ll kill him,” he mumbled.

  “Concentrate, Adam! This is important. The woman you love could be in serious danger. Don’t you get it? JT has fiddled with her pickup. Maybe he put a hole in her brake line. They always cut the brake line,” she said.

  He heard knocking and a muffled voice in the background. “Is that him?”

  “Yes. I have to go. Warn Margaret,” she whispered and ended the call.

  There was no way he was getting back to sleep now. He didn’t think Margaret would be using her pickup in the middle of the night, so he didn’t have to run straight over, but the thought that Salvatore was behind all these acts of vandalism made him too angry to lay around. He needed to vent physically.

  After pulling on sweats and a t-shirt, he left his apartment and went for a run. The cooler night air felt good against his face and managed to clear the rest of the cobwebs from his mind. He turned down one street after another, running through a strange quiet world of sleeping neighborhoods where the only sound was the soft smack of his running shoes against pavement. His shirt was soaked through by the time he turned back. He cut across a baseball field to shorten his route.

  He stopped to catch his breath and looked up. Red and white lights marked the wings and fuselage of a jet making its way toward San Francisco. He felt a sense of impotent anger at the thought that his mother was in the company of that creep over two thousand miles away and he couldn’t do anything about it.

  •••••

  Sabrina answered the door wearing the only one-piece bathing suit the girl had brought for her to try, in slimming black, and a sheer cover up in a dark shade of coral. Poking through the pile of string bikinis earlier in bright sapphire, hot pink, emerald green and red, she realized that the girl had expected a younger, perkier woman to be staying with Edoardo in the executive suite. Not one with body parts that hung low like overripe fruit.

  Elasticity was something young women took for granted, wearing things without any kind of support until they realized too late that it was gone and it wasn’t coming back. But she felt quite confident in this suit. The price tag alone made her feel a bit perkier. She’d looked in the mirror and known the old adage to be true. You really do get what you pay for. Instead of a woman well into her middle years, she saw a vibrant, put-together, sexy older woman who didn’t need to be ashamed of where she was at in life. She was a knockout.

  Edoardo smiled appreciatively. “I can’t believe my luck. To accompany the most beautiful woman in Oahu,” he said, taking her hand. He kissed the tips of her fingers and pulled her arm through his. He was wearing royal blue shorts with white stripes down the sides and a hotel robe unbelted over the top, revealing a muscular chest with a light sprinkling of curling gray hair. He obviously had no problem with confidence.

  Her return smile was probably overly bright, but she couldn’t let him suspect her true feelings for him or that she knew about his underhanded plans against Margaret. The man was a cad. The absolute despicable nature of what he was doing to poor Margaret! And how did he know that Davy wouldn’t be in that pickup the next time she drove? Was he willing for his grandson to get hurt as well just to get his own way?

  She owed Billie an apology for not believing her when she said the man was no good. But now was not the time to show her hand. She would smile and flirt and eat so much food at the luau that he would have to get a luggage trolley to carry her back upstairs. That ought to cool his ardor.

  “Ready to turn heads?” he asked, opening the door into the hallway.

  “Let’em spin,” she quipped, a little worried that having dinner with the devil might be more dangerous than she anticipated.

  On the ride down in the elevator, he faced her, one hand braced on the wall, his gaze seductively focused on her mouth. He was just moving in for a kiss when the bell rang and the doors opened. She slipped under his arm and out, hearing a soft chuckle behind her. He was not going to be easily distracted from his pursuit. She needed to find a reason to get them back on that helicopter and on their way home.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Margaret clipped three separate clusters of grapes from different rows in the vineyard and started toward the house. She intended to test the level of acidity and see how close to harvest they really were. The vines were heavy with fruit this year, the wine berries exorbitantly large. It would be a terrific crop. They only needed to have everything run like clockwork for magic to happen.

  She heard the hum of the Corvette before she saw it turn into the drive. Adam pulled up to the garage and parked beside her pickup. He got out and looked around. When he saw her coming up the hill he waved and leaned against the car with arms folded. His long, lean legs were encased in faded jeans and he wore the green shirt she’d given him for his birthday. Her favorite color. She smiled, and quickened her pace.

  He straightened up and kissed her when she stopped to open the garage door with the number pad. She wasn’t taking any chances with the rash of vandalism. Her wine cellar was the thing she prized most, other than Davy, and she couldn’t bear it if someone got in and trashed it. She licked her lips. “You taste like peppermint,” she said, carrying the grapes inside the garage.

  Adam anticipated her destination and lifted the wooden door in the floor, propping it up with a crossbar. He descended the first few steps into the cellar and turned on the light for her. She set the grapes on a low table and turned around for a proper kiss. When she pulled away she noticed the dark rings under his eyes. “What are you doing here so early, anyway? You look like you didn’t get much sleep.”

  His brows drew together. “I got less than that. Mom called about an hour after I went to bed. Did I tell you she’s in Oahu with Salvatore?”

  “What?” Margaret’s mouth dropped open and she shook her head.

  He nodded, frustration clear in his eyes and the tenseness of his shoulders. “It was a spur of the moment thing. But I guess now that she’s there she’s at least seeing him for who he really is.”

  “What did he do?” she asked, worried that Sabrina would be used by Edoardo just like she had been used by his son. “He didn’t...?”

  He shook his head. “Not that I know of. If he touches her, I’ll kill him.”

  She pointed him to a chair. “Sit. You look about ready to fall down.”

  “I went running after she called. For two hours,” he said, slumping into the metal chair.

  “Did it help?” She knew he ran when he was angry or frustrated. He said it was better than taking it out on the people he loved. She loved him for that too.

  He shrugged. “A little.”

  She set up her testing equipment while he told her about the call and the strange text messages his mother had intercepted. She wiped her hands on a towel and turned around. “Someone messed with my truck?”

 
“I think you should have it looked over. By a mechanic. Who knows what this JT guy did.”

  “That’s crazy. Why would Salvatore do something that could potentially hurt Davy as well?”

  “He’s just a rich thug. He acts like he’s above the law, that he can change things to be what he wants them to be with a wad of money and a snap of his fingers. We need to get proof that he’s behind these acts of violence and maybe he’ll get on his private jet and fly home… alone.”

  “I can’t afford to have a professional mechanic look over my entire truck. Who knows how much they’d charge. I haven’t even had the power steering belt replaced yet and that’s been squealing for a while now.”

  “I’ll pay for it,” he offered, reaching out to pull her onto his lap.

  She went willingly, curled up against his chest and kissed his neck where the V of his shirt was open and inviting. “You can barely make the payments on that car out there after paying your rent each month,” she teased. “Don’t worry. I know a guy.”

  “Yeah, but I don’t like the idea of you asking one of those guys for a favor.”

  He sounded a little jealous and she tweaked his nose. “It’s not a favor, silly. He’s a friend and a very nice kid. He offered to replace the belt for me the other day. I’m sure he won’t mind looking over the rest of my hunk of junk.”

  “I’m sure he won’t, but I think I should be there as well. Where do we find your young mechanic genius?” he asked, rubbing a lock of her hair between his fingers.

  “Carl’s restaurant. Dirk is head dishwasher there,” she said and grinned.

  •••••

  Billie was already in her office at the winery by half past six. Despite Handel being just a reach away, she tossed and turned all night, managing to feel more tired when she got up than when she went to bed. She hadn’t seen Ernesto yet, and wasn’t necessarily looking forward to it. She owed him an apology for jumping to conclusions. Whether or not Javier had anything to do with the fire, she knew Ernesto would never knowingly let him stay here if he thought the boy would bring damage to the vineyards. He’d lived through that hell once already.

  She turned on her computer and opened email. Deleting spam seemed to be a fulltime occupation anymore. She clicked through the list, opening business correspondence and taking notes to call certain people later in the morning. An email from her brother had a link to YouTube. That was weird. He sent it a little after one in the morning. Did he record himself playing the club last night?

  The link opened to a video screen shot of the shed on fire. She clicked to play and watched Adam run with the hose, spraying at the already engulfed wall with what amounted to a drizzle. Then Ernesto came from the other direction, pulling the winery hose behind him and spraying the surrounding vines with a sense of desperation. His eyes were wide and anxious beneath the brim of his cap.

  Davy zoomed in on the shed as flames shot through the roof and ate away at the east wall. A man moved out from the shadow of the building on the south side, glanced sharply toward the road when he heard the siren, then darted off into the vineyard out of camera range. Javier.

  She pulled the time lapse bar back, sat forward in her chair and replayed the last bit.

  Even with the blurry pixilated quality of the video at that distance, she recognized his shirt. He’d been wearing the same shirt when she met him in the vineyard earlier in the day. His face was not clear, but she had no doubt they’d found the culprit hell-bent on causing the winery trouble. But why? What was his motivation? If he really quit the gang and wanted a new life as he told his uncle, why would he screw it up? And if he was there on behalf of the gang, to distract Handel from looking for other suspects in Kawasaki’s murder trial, then she felt really bad for Ernesto. He didn’t deserve that kind of disloyalty after trying to help the kid.

  She let the video play to the end. Davy turned the camera on the approaching fire truck and watched as the men jumped down and set to work pouring a deluge of water over the flames in a matter of minutes. And there she was grabbing Ernesto by the elbow and yelling into his face. She flushed with embarrassment when she watched Adam pull her away from the poor man so he could go about the business of saving her vines.

  The video ended with a shot of them both walking back toward the house, Adam’s arm around her and her head on his shoulder. She owed her brother big time for his quick thinking and for stepping in when she’d lost it.

  Sally knocked on the open door. “Hey, boss.”

  “Good morning.”

  “I’m making some coffee right now. It should be ready in a few,” she said, leaning against the doorjamb with arms crossed. “That was quite the excitement yesterday, huh? Did the firemen ever tell you how they think it started?”

  Billie sent the video to Handel’s email. She shut Safari down and pushed back from the desk, grabbing two notes she’d written for Sally when she came in. “No. They just assumed with power tools in there that maybe it was an electrical fire, but I’m sure they’ll have an official report soon.” She handed Sally the notes. “Could you call these two distributors and see what’s taking so long on our orders?”

  Sally nodded, but didn’t budge. She apparently still had something to say. “Good thing Javier wasn’t in there when it started, huh?”

  “You knew he was sleeping in the shed?”

  “I saw him go in and out and put two and two together.”

  “But you didn’t think it was worthy of a mention?” she asked, putting her hands on her hips. “If the insurance company learns that he was sleeping there and was the cause of the fire, they’ll not only refuse to pay but they may cancel our policies.”

  Sally had the sense to look chagrined. “Sorry, boss.” She backed into the hall. “I really didn’t know. It was just a guess. If I thought…” she shook her head.

  “Never mind. It’s too late now. I found out yesterday, a few hours before the fire. I told Ernesto that Javier couldn’t stay there. He was going to let him crash on his couch until he could find him another place.”

  “That’s a strange coincidence,” Sally said. “You don’t think he did it in retaliation, do you?”

  “That’s something I need to speak with Ernesto about.” She followed Sally to the front office. “Has he showed up yet?”

  “I haven’t seen him.”

  Ernesto usually came in and had coffee and one of Sally’s cookies before going out to the fields, but she didn’t know if he would feel comfortable about seeing her after the way she acted the day before. She peeked into the conference room where Sally left a tray of cookies on the table nearly every morning, but no one was around.

  “If you do, tell him I’m looking for him. I’m going over to the house for a few minutes. I’ll be back in a bit.”

  •••••

  When she left the house earlier, Handel was still sleeping, no doubt mentally worn out from his brief stint as an investigator and subsequent hours spent at the police station the day before. But when she let herself in the back door, he was sitting at the table drinking coffee and reading the news on his laptop.

  “Morning, babe,” he said, tilting his face up for a kiss.

  She grazed his forehead and picked up his cup. “I haven’t had my coffee yet,” she said and sat down to finish his.

  He got up and filled another cup, placed it in front of her and took his now empty one back to the counter. He refilled it, emptying the rest of the pot and shut off the warmer. “You were sure up bright and early,” he remarked.

  “Maybe that’s why I caught the proverbial worm. Check your email,” she said, blowing across the top of her steaming cup.

  He sat down and clicked to the video, then watched it all the way through in silence. His eyes met hers across the lid of his laptop. “Javier?”

  She nodded.

  “Did you notice the way Ernesto looked at you when Adam pulled you away?”

  “What do you mean?”

  Handel set the video to
the correct spot and turned the screen so she could watch. “The guilt on his face. He knows it was Javier.”

  She sighed. “I can see why he would deny it. He tried to help the kid and all he got in return was trouble. He loves his job as vineyard manager. It’s what he’s always wanted to do. Maybe he thinks I’ll fire him because of Javier.”

  Handel met her eyes. “Would you?”

  “Of course not! I can’t believe you’d ask me that. Ernesto is part of the Fredrickson family now. Like Sally or Loren or Sammie.” She propped her chin in her hands. “As soon as I see him I’ll apologize for acting like he was guilty before proven innocent.”

  “Lot of that going around,” he said, pointing at a local news article he was reading online. “They’ve already tried and convicted Sloane without ever hearing the facts. The more sensational the crime, the more media salivates, stirring up controversy and making personal judgments against people they know nothing about.”

  She reached out and covered his hand, squeezing his fingers lightly. “Doesn’t matter. He has the best attorney in the state. I’m confident the truth will prevail.”

  “Yeah, but whose truth? Hosea’s or Sloane’s?”

  “Maybe they’re one and the same.”

  There was a knock on the back door and it opened. “Can I come in?” Adam asked, already closing the door behind him.

  “I think you are,” Handel said. He closed his laptop and pushed it to the side. “Have a seat.”

  Adam glanced at the empty coffee pot before taking the chair at the end of the table. “Did you guys watch Davy’s video of the fire?” he asked without preamble.

  Billie got up to make another pot of coffee. “I just showed it to Handel,” she said, filling the decanter.

  “Well?”

  “It’s Javier. Ernesto gave him a job a while back,” she said, putting in the filter and coffee. “I haven’t spoken with Ernesto yet, but Handel thinks he already knows.”