Corked by Cabernet (10 page)

That got some oohs and ahs and a groan. Nikki knew that the unhappy member could be none other than Mrs. Pearlman.

“Nikki and Hayden have arranged for a picnic, and our discussions will take place out there. There is no better place to feel your soul soar than out in nature. We have a free time scheduled for the afternoon, and then a wine tasting in the evening with a talk on how wines are created. Correct?”

“Yes. I’ll be teaching the class tonight as our vintner is currently on vacation with her family in France.”

She couldn’t believe how this was all playing out. It was weird and kind of disconcerting. It almost had that “But the show must go on” feel to it. Yet she really did believe Alan was sincere. And in a way, the man was right. No one could do anything for Iwao now. It was terrible, but what could be done other than to achieve some kind of justice? And as always, Nikki had a passion for justice. Maybe she’d inherited it from Aunt Cara, maybe it had been because of some of the cruelties she suffered as a child, but whatever the reason, she did believe Iwao Yamimoto’s murderer needed to be found and brought to justice.

SURE, it was late, and Nikki had pretty much had enough of the night, but dammit, she had to go and check on Mrs. Yamimoto. It was the right thing to do. It troubled her that not one of the S.E.E. members had mentioned her. True, Mrs. Pearlman had asked where she was, but Alan had shushed her and said that the woman Iwao had been with was not a S.E.E. member and should be left alone by the group.

“Oh, so she can go home, and we can’t?” Mrs. Pearlman stood.

“That is up to the police, and Rose, I am not making you stay here. You are welcome to leave any time.”

Nikki witnessed Ruben tug on his wife’s sleeve, pulling Rose close, and delivering an earful. No one heard the exact words, but whatever he said was enough to silence the Oompa Loompa imitator, who quickly closed her mouth and sat down.

Leaving the meeting area, Nikki checked the time. Past midnight. Maybe she shouldn’t bother. What if the woman was asleep? Doubtful. A nice gesture of a pot of tea could be soothing. Oh, who was she kidding? Yes, she felt rotten for anyone who was in Mrs. Yamimoto’s situation—losing a spouse, especially in such a horrific way, had to be devastating, but even worse was knowing the killer got away with the crime. Nikki did not want to see that happen and she was sure neither did Iwao’s wife. She headed to the kitchen in the café and fixed a pot of Sleepytime tea.

Ten minutes later she stood in front of room twenty-three. The rooms were set up in sections at the hotel. Here were a few rooms on their own—cabin-like, and like this one, there were some that from the outside had the look of a town house, with one room being below the other. She had a fondness for this room. It had been her suite for several months after the fire. It was private, large, and comfortable. Nikki’s free hand shook as she rapped on the door. No one answered, and after a minute, she knocked again. Two thoughts ran through her mind—either the Mrs. had skipped wine country
or
she was asleep. She might have taken a sleep aid.

The room faced rows of Chardonnay grapes set on rolling hills, but tonight what Nikki noticed was the silence. Really noticed it. Sure, this location was always silent. It was the wine country. But it was the witching hour and dark, really dark. She should have grabbed Ollie before doing this. Just as she’d freaked herself out and was turning to hike back down the stairs, the door cracked and Nikki practically jumped out of her skin while trying to hang on to the hot carafe. This was why she’d never make a real detective—she knew how to wind herself up to the point that fear took over.

Her nerves settling, Nikki faced Mrs. Yamimoto, whose ivory face was tear and mascara stained. “Mrs. Yamimoto. I am so sorry to bother you. I brought you some tea.” She held out the carafe.

The woman shook her head. “No. No.”

“I understand. You don’t want the tea. I’ll leave you alone.” This had been a stupid and insensitive idea.

The woman took hold of Nikki’s sleeve and then bowed. Nikki did her best to bow back and then say good night. “I can leave the tea with you, Mrs. Yamimoto.”

“No, no.”

“Okay. I’m sorry to have bothered you.”

Again the woman grabbed her sleeve. Did she want her to stay or go? “Do you speak English?”

“No English. No Mrs. Yamimoto.”

“Huh?”

She motioned Nikki into the room. She followed, set the tea down on the console where the hotel daily replaced both wineglasses and coffee mugs. She held up the carafe and Mrs. Yamimoto nodded. Nikki poured the tea and handed her the first cup, then motioned for them to sit down in two cushy, velvet-covered chairs in front of the fireplace.

“I can turn that on for you if you’d like,” Nikki said, a little louder and slower than normal, thinking maybe somehow the translation would get across. She realized by the look on the woman’s face that she wasn’t registering it. Nikki took it upon herself to light the gas fireplace and do it so that Mrs. Yamimoto could see for herself how to do it, for future reference. It was chilly in the room and even the warm earth tones on the walls seemed cooler than usual.

The recently widowed woman bowed at Nikki again. They both sat down. Now what?

Nikki made a gesture and touched the woman’s hand. “Mrs. Yamimoto, I am so sorry.”

She frowned. “No. No Mrs. Yamimoto.” She pointed to herself. “Mizuki.”

Nikki pointed back at her. “Mizuki?”

She smiled. “Mizuki.”

That was nice of her to want Nikki to call her by her first name. “Mizuki, I am so sorry for your loss.” How in the world was she going to talk to this woman, especially get any information out of her? “Have the police talked to you at all?”

Mizuki cocked her head.

Nikki made her fingers into imaginary guns. “Bang, bang. Police.”

“Oh, bang, bang. No.”

“Yeah, well,” Nicky struggled for something to say. She took a sip of her tea and stood. “I just wanted to bring you the tea.” She pointed to Mizuki’s mug. “Good night.”

Mizuki stood and held out her hand. “No. Uh.” She brought her hands up to her face as if she were searching for the words. “Jen.”

“Jen? What?”

“Jen. Jen. Sierra.”

“Sierra?” Now that caught Nikki’s attention and Mizuki had said it loud and clear. “Sierra Sansi?”

Mizuki nodded.

“Jen? Who is Jen?”

Mizuki held out both hands and waved them at Nikki. With frenetic movements, she opened up a laptop on the desk and motioned for Nikki to come over. She did. It took a couple of minutes for the laptop to warm up. Jen? What was she trying to say?

Once the computer was on, Mizuki opened a file of photos and clicked through several. Most of them were of Iwao in different locales, a few of them were of Mizuki. And then there were a couple of Iwao with a handsome young man. He had an athletic build, high checkbones, dark hair, and had to be related to Iwao because there was quite a resemblance to the dead man.

“Is this your son? Jen?” Nikki made a motion like she were rocking a baby. She pointed to Iwao, then Mizuki, then this man she called Jen.

Mizuki eyes grew big. “No Mrs. Yamimoto!”

Then it hit. Mizuki was not married to Iwao. Now things were coming together. She did look too young to be this Jen’s mother, but he was obviously Iwao’s son, and if Nikki had it right, she wanted her to contact him. He should know that his father had been murdered. But what was this about Sierra Sansi?

“Mizuki. What about Sierra?”

Mizuki did a few more clicks on the computer screen, and there in a photo stood an unhappy, stern-looking Iwao, and this Jen hugging Sierra and planting a big kiss on her cheek.

AFTER leaving Mizuki’s suite, Nikki sprinted back to the house. What did this new information mean? Things were already getting messy and she knew she’d have to befriend Sierra for some answers. Did Mizuki think Sierra was connected to Iwao’s murder? Sierra had found him initially, but she didn’t strike Nikki as a brutal killer at all.

She stopped halfway to the house, breathing hard. The night air was crisp, and with only a sliver of a moon in the sky, stars twinkled like diamonds. She ran regularly but the day was catching up with her. Bending over with her hands on knees to catch her breath, she was caught off guard when she looked up. What the . . . Who was in her house? All the lights were on, blazing like headlights on a semi, and she’d been caught in them. Again—what the . . . She knew she’d only left the porch and family room lights on. Oh, no. What if Derek had somehow caught wind of all this and come home? No. That would be impossible. His flight was out of San Francisco at nine. Well, it’s true the murder had already gone down and they were being questioned around that time. Maybe Robinson had called him, or even Simon. He’d probably be pacing the floor and worried sick that she hadn’t shown up yet.

She picked up her pace again until she reached the front door and hesitated slightly before opening it. There was a killer on the loose. But it was highly unlikely he or she would turn on all the lights in the house. Plus, even though Ollie didn’t have a mean bone in his body, the sight of him was pretty intimidating. The UPS guy still didn’t believe that he was harmless. What the hell. She walked through the door and immediately knew that it wasn’t Derek awaiting her. She recognized the woodsy scent of Allure by Chanel.

It was Simon, of course, accompanied by Marco.

“Oh, Bellissima, where have you been?” Marco rushed to her and held out a brandy snifter.

“I see you two haven’t wasted any time getting comfortable.”

“We knew you’d have the good stuff,” Simon said.

“Give me a break. That mansion you live in has bottles worth thousands in the cellar, not to mention you could have gone into the warehouse for a nice bottle of wine.”

“Sure, Snow White. Do you really think my mommy dearest left us the key to the cellar? And besides, we weren’t about to head into the warehouse with some bogeyman in the hood.”

She rolled her eyes at him. Simon did have a point about his mother, Patrice. When the boys’ father died, she inherited the home and the boys inherited the winery. Patrice was not exactly mother of the year by any stretch of the imagination, and since Nikki had first arrived at the winery, she’d done what she could to chase her away. Eventually Nikki won that battle and Patrice was currently residing in Greece. Simon and Marco promptly took over the big house on the hill, while Derek remained in the ranch style he’d built by using the frame from an original barn that stood on the property.

Nikki eyed Ollie standing over his dog dish, ground beef in his bowl. “I see they tempted you with the good stuff, huh, Cujo? Nice going, letting the riffraff in.”

“He seemed hungry,” Simon said and sneezed. “I just took my allergy pill.”

“I don’t know how you could really be allergic to him. He hardly has any hair at all.”

Simon dismissed her comment. “It should kick in soon. I always forget he’s like a permanent fixture here.” He pointed to Ollie.

Guilt flooded her upon realizing that in her afterglow of the late afternoon events with Derek, she’d forgotten to feed Ollie. Bad mommy! She bent down next to him and he looked at her like he was definitely pissed off at this faux pas. “I’m sorry, bud. My bad. Aren’t you lucky the boys stopped by? And now that I’m home, you two can skadoodle on up to your place.”

“Skadoodle? No way. We want the scoop. What gives? Like, where have you been?”

“Taking care of a few things. And what are you talking about? Scoop about what?”

Marco frowned. “At this hour, and after this evening, you were taking care of things. What things?”

“You can do better than that,” Simon said. “We’ve been worried about you.”

“Worried about me?”

“Duh. Killer on the loose? Marco and I
do
worry, you know.”