I loaded the delivery van with tubs of chicken salad, hummus, brownies, and all the other supplies needed to assemble the snack and dessert boxes and made the short drive to Uva. Carlos was tending to a new crop of grapes when I pulled into the driveway. The sight of him in his fitted jeans and casual chambray work shirt brought a different kind of fluttering to my stomach. His skin was naturally tanned from so much time spent under the southern Oregon sun, and his dark hair was covered with an Uva baseball cap. Every time I saw him, whether he was wearing weathered jeans or a suit and tie, I fell a little more in love with him.
He snipped the vine and then looked up and spotted me. I parked on the side of the driveway and got out of the van.
“You are here early. The tasting room doesn’t open for another hour,” he said, tucking his pruning shears into his back pocket and greeting me with a long kiss. “We missed you this morning.”
“Sorry, I couldn’t sleep.”
“I figured. This is nothing new, mi querida.” Carlos pulled away and studied my face. “How are you now?”
“Fine. Better. I don’t know. Maybe that’s just a story I’m trying to tell myself to be functional.” I looked around the house and grassy outdoor tasting area for any sign of the Professor’s investigation. There wasn’t any crime scene tape or a police officer posted in front of the tasting room. I wondered if that meant they were done with their inquiries here.
“Sí, it is understandable.” Carlos massaged my thumb with his fingers. “Is there anything I can do?”
“I have supplies for tonight. You could help me unload. The real reason I’m here is to meet Lance. Have you seen him?”
“Lance?” Carlos wrinkled his nose in confusion.
“Yeah, isn’t he here?”
“No.” Carlos looked from the vineyard to the house. “Unless he’s inside. Maybe I didn’t see him. I was down in the bottom half of the acreage earlier. Why would he be here now? I thought they were meeting at noon.”
“I don’t know. He and the Professor were supposed to connect at Torte. We were going to talk after, but he left and asked Rosa to tell me to meet him here.”
“He must be inside, or in the barn. I was down in the vineyard pruning.” He pointed to the van. “Are you ready to unload first?”
“I don’t want to keep you from pruning.”
He rolled up his sleeve and glanced at his watch. “This is a good time for a break. The tasting room volunteers will be here soon.”
In the summer we used a combination of volunteers and part-time employees to staff the tasting room. Volunteers poured wine for a few hours in exchange for a few bottles for themselves. Our volunteers tended to be teachers, stay-at-home parents, and retirees who were looking to have a little social interaction without the responsibilities of a full-time job. It was a win for everyone. We were able to offer extended tasting hours, and our volunteer crew received a mini course in viticulture and complimentary wine to bring home to share with friends and family.
As head chef on the Amour of the Seas, Carlos was known for his wine dinners. He had never formally trained as a sommelier, but his palate was pristine, and he had a deep appreciation for small farms and serving seasonal food that was grown naturally and prepared by hand. These skills had translated seamlessly into wine making. He took classes, connected with other vintners, and spent nearly every waking hour amongst the vines, singing to the grapes like they were his babies. Lance often joked that I had to keep an eye on him; otherwise, he was going to fall in love with another woman—his beloved grapevines.
“Do you want a ride?” I asked Carlos.
“No, I’ll walk and meet you there.”
I smiled as I watched him work his way past Adirondack chairs and picnic tables on the path that led up to the house. When Carlos told me that he was ready to give up his vagabond lifestyle on the Amour of the Seas and move to Ashland to be with me, I never would have believed that he would end up so happy. I had worried that Ashland would feel small and stifling after over a decade of sailing from one adventurous port of call to another. I was worried that I would hold him back, that he was giving up what he loved for a chance at rekindling our love.
It just goes to show that sometimes the problems we create in our imagination turn out to be works of fiction. Carlos was clearly at home with the vines. He spent hours tinkering with his grapes. I could see how the connection to the land had changed him. His wanderlust had been transformed by the grounding force of the lush Rogue Valley. Our daily rhythm was different than it had been on the ship, and yet in some ways very similar.
He talked about the grapes like they were members of our extended family, singing to them softly as he snipped away dead sections of the vine, and dialing in the exact amount of water they needed to survive, yet not without effort. “It’s the struggle that breeds the best vintages,” he had once said.
His words had lingered. It was a perfect metaphor for life, especially our life. It was because of our struggles that we had reached this contented point. I found myself grateful for the challenge of our years apart. If you had asked me when I first left the ship, I never would have imagined that my endless tears and months spent questioning our relationship and my future would have led to where we were now. Those experiences had allowed us to grow together.
I let out a soft sigh as I steered the van into a parking space in front of the house and noticed Lance’s EV parked near the gate. Lance had a collection of vehicles ranging from this latest electric obsession to a retro Range Rover. He quietly operated his own personal car lending library for temporary actors who needed transportation during their stay in Ashland. Lance would “check out” vehicles to them at no charge and tuck gift certificates to local restaurants into the glove box.
While he had grown up with enormous wealth and family fortune, he had made it his mission to anonymously donate large portions of his trust to causes near and dear to his heart, as well as invest in small businesses throughout the Rogue Valley. Very few people knew about Lance’s philanthropic tendencies, which was exactly the way he wanted it.
“Thank goodness you’re here.” Lance rushed to greet me before I had a chance to get out of the van. He was still in his running gear. “We have a problem. A serious problem.”
“What?” My heart thudded in my chest as I stuffed the keys in my pocket and closed the van door.
“It’s Sophie.” He pointed to the tasting room.
“I don’t understand.” Pointing to the empty room did nothing to clarify his meaning.
Lance waved his hands in circles like he was trying to will me to catch up with whatever he was trying to say.
Carlos strolled up to us, rubbing a stalk of rosemary between his fingers.
“Oh, good. You’re here, too, perfect,” Lance said in a rushed tone, clapping Carlos on the back. “We need all the help we can get right now.”
“What’s going on?” I repeated, looking around in every direction. Nothing seemed out of place, but Lance’s bulging eyes and fidgeting had the tiny blond hairs on my forearms standing at attention.
Had there been another murder?
Was Sophie okay?
Did I need to call the Professor?
“I got a frantic, nearly incoherent phone call from Sophie while I was meeting with Doug,” Lance explained, gesturing wildly with his hands. “She was inconsolable, muttering about being responsible for Jimmy’s death.”
“Wait, she admitted to killing him?” I looked at Carlos in disbelief. Had I heard Lance wrong?
“She wasn’t making sense. She was rambling on about how she couldn’t live with herself. She would never be able to forgive herself, and she couldn’t go on.”
“That sounds like a confession,” I said, noting internally that it also sounded like Sophie was in a bad place in terms of her mental health. “Why are you here, though?”
Lance pointed to the house. “To find Sophie. She’s—holding vigil. I can’t get her to budge.”
“What did Doug say about this?” Carlos asked. He sounded as confused as I felt.
“We agreed that it would be best for me to approach Sophie alone. I’m sure he has his reasons, but he doesn’t seem to think that she’s a ‘flight risk’—his words, not mine. He’s on his way and has been in contact with a licensed therapist, but in the meantime, she’s glued herself to the cellar door.”
“Glued herself?” I tried to piece together everything Lance was saying. Could this be an open-and-shut case? But if Sophie had confessed to Jimmy’s murder, wouldn’t the police want to arrest her immediately? Something didn’t make sense. Actually, pretty much nothing made sense.
“Not literally, darling, but like I said, she’s not budging. Maybe you’ll have better luck. Woman to woman, so to speak.”
“She’s downstairs?”
Lance pointed the way.
“I’ll unload the van,” Carlos wisely suggested. “When Doug and the police arrive, I’ll let them know you’re in the cellar.”
I followed Lance downstairs. Sure enough, Sophie was slumped against the cellar door. Her clothes and hair were disheveled, making me wonder if she’d slept here last night. She had her knees tucked entirely into her oversized crew sweatshirt.
She wiped her nose on her sleeve and squinted at me as we approached.
“Sophie, you remember my friend Jules?” Lance asked, practically purring like a cat with his soothing tone.
She bobbed her head, brushing away tears from her splotched cheeks, not meeting my eyes.
“I thought it might be easier for you to talk with her. Jules has had her fair share of heartbreak.” Lance was laying it on thicker than our buttercream.
“Can I get you anything?” I knelt next to her, ignoring a wave of dizziness that came with bending over. “A glass of water? Tea? A sandwich?”
“No. Thank you, though.” She sniffed, sucking air in tiny bursts through her nose. “I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to eat or drink again. He’s dead. He’s really dead.”
“You’re in shock. It’s normal to feel like that,” I said, in what I hoped was a calm and even tone.
“I can’t believe it’s true.” She rocked against the wall, causing the shelves to rumble slightly. “I keep thinking it’s a bad dream and I’m going to wake up any minute, you know?”
“It sounds like you two were close,” I prodded.
Lance hung back near the stairs, close enough to hear our conversation but far enough away to not feel like he was looming over us.
“I loved him.” Sophie buried her head in hands and broke down.
“It’s okay to cry.” I put my hand on her shoulder. “It’s your body’s way of releasing and healing.”
“But it’s my fault. If it weren’t for me, he’d still be here,” she gasped between sobs. “I did it. I’m responsible. The police can arrest me now and put me out of my misery. I don’t deserve to be alive while he’s dead. I can’t believe what I’ve done. I can’t go on another minute like this. It’s me. I’m the reason that Jimmy Paxton, the man I loved, the man I was going to marry, is dead.”
I couldn’t believe it, Lance was right.
Sophie wasn’t even attempting to conceal her guilt. She had killed Jimmy and was understandably overcome with regret. Dozens of questions competed for space in my brain, but one rose above the rest: If she had loved him and intended on marrying him, why would she have killed him?