Silenced By Syrah (25 page)

Renee sighed. Nikki turned and grabbed for the oil. When she came back around, Renee had flipped over. Thank God the sheet was covering her. Nikki didn’t think she could take any more exposure of Renee Rothschild. She’d already had way too much. “Oh, Nikki. I didn’t know you were a therapist as well. I thought you were the winery manager.”

Crap. “I am, but yes, I also can give a good massage and things have been crazy here since the murder and the fire and everything, and well, Marco and Simon needed help today and they asked me if I could come and help, and wow, that is so great about Derek and Ollie and everything.” Why oh why, in those moments where she needed to be her most pulled together self, did she always blow it and fall apart? It was like Cupid also had an idiot bow and he followed her around and when he thought he’d have some fun, he’d shoot her with it and she’d turn into exactly what she was at that moment—an idiot. “But not your neck. No, that is bad. Sorry about the neck.” Okay, major idiot!

Renee laughed. “You know what, it feels so much better now. You
do
give a great massage. And let me tell you, woman to woman, that kiss was worth any pain in the neck I might have briefly had. You know, you might want to consider switching job positions and come over here to the spa full time. You would rake in the tips.”

Nikki couldn’t respond.

“Shouldn’t you do the front now?”

“What?”

“Massage. Don’t you do the stomach and front of the arms. That kind of thing? My regular masseuse in the city does that.”

“Oh. Ah. No. See, this was the energy massage, and you know energy, it travels quickly and therefore this is only a thirty minute massage and it’s designed to align the chakras.” Whatever those were. She knew Simon and Marco referred to them all the time. “So, you see, the chakras release your energy field and it has to all be done in the back, and now if I work on your stomach it will basically neutralize what I just did.”

“Hmmm. Interesting. Can I quote you in the book on that? I’ll be sending a writer out. Unless.” Renee’s eyes bugged out. “Wait a second, you would be the perfect person to write this book.”

“Oh no, no, no. I’m not a writer,” Nikki replied.

“Sure you could do this. It doesn’t matter that you’re not a writer. Not for this type of book. Plus you would be the perfect person for this. You know the winery, you’re Derek’s right hand. You even do spa treatments. You would be fabulous. I can edit you, so you wouldn’t have to worry so much about the writing. Heck, I’ve even seen some of your writing and you’re good.”

“What do you mean?”

“Weren’t you the one who compiled all the notes for Derek for the book with Georges?”

“Yes. But I gave them to Georges.”

“Who do you think Georges gave them to?” Nikki didn’t reply. “Me. That’s who. Georges didn’t write all the text in the cookbook. He did the recipes, sure, but like Derek and then you, he gave me the notes and I pulled it together.”

“Oh.”

“Oh, nothing. Your notes were by far the easiest to work with. Really, you could write this book. Come on.”

Was Renee for real? Or was she yanking her chain? “Um, you know I am so busy and I think I may be going to Spain.” Oh boy. Did she really say that? Yep. The words
going to Spain
had escaped between her lips, and oddly enough, for the first time since Andrés had presented the idea, her stomach didn’t turn over in a wave of nausea. The idea almost settled right there and felt, hmmm—okay.

“Great. That would be a perfect time to write the book. You would have the distance a writer sometimes needs to get it done without the distractions here at the winery.”

Nikki shook her head. “No. I would probably need to be here. You know, for research.”

“No. Not at all.” Renee sat up, her sheet nearly dropping off of her. Oh God, Nikki thought she might have nudophobia at that moment. “It’s perfect, and I bet I can get you a decent advance. I do know certain people in high places at the publishing house.”

Yeah. Daddy. Nikki glanced at the clock. “I am so sorry, but I have to get going. I need to make sure an order is going out. Um, it’s a very important wine dinner and it would be disastrous if the wines don’t get there. You know, big client and everything. A real disaster.”

“See, you are so perfect to do this. You’ve got your finger on the pulse of this place. I’m going to talk to Derek about it. And, I’ll get you the details for tomorrow night when we do Georges’ dinner. Super. This is so awesome, Nikki.”

“Right, awesome.” Nikki closed the door behind her. Solving murders and arsonous fires, that was one thing. But how was she going to get out of this one?

Chapter 24

After Renee’s massage, Nikki put her foot down with Marco and refused to play spa lady any longer. She’d had more than enough. She checked her cell phone messages and there was one that made her change all of her plans to help Marco out.

It came from the Chowchilla prison, and the warden told her that she had permission to come down and speak with Bernadette Debussey. When she’d made the request, she’d used the pretext that she was a writer and wanted to do an article on prison life for women. Obviously, it had worked.

But, the case was a done deal, right? Granted Moran was still on the run, but Bloomenfeld would surely cop to everything eventually. However, being curious, she did want to meet Georges’ ex, find out if she was as crazy as Janie said. Detective Robinson had spoken with Bernadette and she’d told him about the huge insurance policy that Baron had on Georges.

She made the decision to visit Bernadette, if for nothing other than the three-hour drive each way, which would give her plenty of time to consider her life and whether she should change it so drastically by taking a chance with Andrés and moving halfway around the world.

She headed back to her room and changed into her jeans. She opened the closet and grabbed her tennies. There was the bag that Robinson had given her. Her stuff. Marco had it sent up like she’d asked. Well, no time for that right now, not if she wanted to make it to the prison in time for visiting hours.

The drive was nothing short of boring. She decided to call Andrés. Surprisingly, he answered. “Hey,” she said. “You stopped ignoring me?”

“Hi you.”

“Didn’t you get my message the other night? I wanted to see if you could meet me at the wine bar.”

“I did,” he replied. “But I thought you needed time to think without me pressuring you.”

She could almost see the smile on his face, because he wasn’t saying it in a mean and condescending way. He got to her like that. “Hmmm. Is that what you thought?”

“Didn’t you tell me that’s what you needed?”

“Yes. I guess I did.”

“Uh-huh. And, you missed me, didn’t you?” Andrés joked.

She couldn’t help but smile herself. “You got me.”

“I did, didn’t I? If you don’t go to Spain with me, think how much you will really miss me then. Do you want to put yourself through that?”

“You’re good. Why are you so good? Huh?”

“I can be bad if you want me to. That might be fun. It might be even more fun than being good. What do you say, come to Spain and be bad with me?”

She sighed and bit her lower lip.

“You’re chewing on your bottom lip, right now, aren’t you?”

“Mhhm.”

“It’s okay. You take some more time. No pressure. I’ll let you miss me some more. But you do know you only have a day left to decide. No pressure.
Adiós mi amor
.”

“Adiós.”
She clicked off the phone. Men like Andrés only come along once in a lifetime. So why was it so hard to go and be bad with him? Take a chance. Say yes. It’s easy—a three-letter word,
yes
. She still didn’t have an answer to that as she arrived at the prison in a little over three hours after making a coffee stop and filling up. She walked through the front doors of the cold and foreboding building. The place felt sterile, like most institutional buildings. It smelled of cleaning fluids, but not in a good lemon-fresh way, but rather a wipe-off-the-germs way.

A guard thoroughly checked her purse after she walked through an x-ray scanner and told her to sign in and wait in line with the other visitors, that they would be taken to the visiting area in fifteen minutes. The fifteen minutes almost felt longer than the three-hour drive, and Nikki started questioning why she was even there. Finally another guard appeared and checked everyone off the list as they proceeded single file. There were men and women of all ages, probably mothers, fathers, sisters, lovers, husbands . . . and there were also a handful of children. She shivered at the thought of what it must be like to have a mother behind bars. A brief thought of her own mother entered her mind, and then of Janie and the loss of her mom. All were different situations, but the children in line going to see their moms did have something in common with both Nikki and Janie. There was a loss.

In the visiting room there were small tables and chairs set up and everyone in the group knew right where to go. Nikki leaned in and asked the guard who Bernadette Debussey was. The guard pointed her out.

Bernadette was a petite woman with curly, long, dark hair that she must have straightened prior to her incarceration, because it was super curly now, the kind of style most women who had it hated. She looked up at Nikki with big brown, almond-shaped eyes. Nikki sat down and introduced herself. There was a hardness in those eyes, and she couldn’t help wondering if it had always been there, if the thirty-year-old woman was the sociopath everyone claimed her to be, or if that hardness had developed during her so far six-month stay in jail.

“Do I know you?” Bernadette asked, a curtness in her voice.

“Actually you don’t.”

“Oh, I get it. You’re a new attorney that dipshit Don Sanders sent over, right?”

She shook her head. “Uh, no. I don’t know any Don Sanders.”

“Be glad you don’t.” She tossed back her curls, offering a glimpse of the glamour she’d likely once exuded. No room for glamour in the slammer. Bernadette crossed her arms in front of her and leaned back in her chair. Yep, she’d gotten the inmate protocol down. Tough gal. “He’s a moron. That’s what I get for signing a prenup, huh? No cash to get myself a good lawyer, not like I had a prayer anyway. Everything was stolen from me and I was set up good. No one believes me.”

“I’d like to talk to you about why you’re here.” Nikki took out a notepad from her purse, going with her plan of being a writer. She figured it might sound insane if she told her she was there out of curiosity. Could it be more than curiosity? Something still nagged her about Georges’ murder. She didn’t know what, but something bugged her, maybe the ghost of the chef himself.

“You never told me who you were.”

“I didn’t, did I?” Nikki asked. “Forgive me. I’m terribly sorry.” If Aunt Cara knew her ploys, jeesh . . . “I’m doing a story. Actually a book. A nonfiction book. I’m not published or anything, but my aunt was a homicide detective in LA and she raised me, so I’ve always been interested in crime.”
Okay, now that was good. The total truth right there.
“And writing.”
True, too
.
Acting and writing went hand in hand. Before going to work for Malveaux she’d
thought about writing screenplays.
“And, I got to thinking that it might be interesting to get a handful of stories from women in jail who claim they were falsely accused but were still convicted and are now doing time. I found your case interesting because considering who you were married to I would have expected it to be a huge story.”

Bernadette was studying her. Was her radar up? Was she completely transparent? “And your name is?”

“Nikki Sands.” Bernadette kept staring. Nikki nodded, and decided to jump on in. “For starters, as I said, I’m unclear why your situation was kept out of the press as much as it was. You were married to Georges Debussey. And now with his murder, do you think your story will come up again?”

“I don’t know. I doubt it. I heard that they caught the guy who killed Georges, at least one of them. I’m not surprised about that slimeball Henry Bloomenfeld. I never liked that guy. Some cop came here the other day.”

“What did you tell the police? Why would they question you here about Georges’ murder?”

“My kid brother, Johnny, the pain, he’s in a gang up in the city. I guess this cop might have thought retribution on Johnny’s part. The cop wanted to know where Johnny was, and I told him that I had no clue. Then he asked me a few more questions about Georges and who might want him dead. I told him that I knew Baron O’Grady, that chef Georges was working with, his pal, had a
grande
life insurance policy on Georges. But I liked Baron. Good guy. He never rubbed me the wrong way, like Bloomenfeld did. I’m not happy Georges is dead even though he helped put me here, but since he is, I’m glad it was that creepy agent of his that did it and now he’ll pay for it.”

Nikki nodded. She got the distinct feeling that this was exactly what Bernadette Debussey needed—someone to listen to her. “Let’s backtrack a bit and talk about why you’re here in the first place, and as I asked before, how did your story remain out of the media? There were a few articles, but it never became a huge story.”

“When this thing with me went down, Georges was just starting to go big. Yeah he was making money and people knew him. We lived a great life. That man knew how to invest wisely and make money, but his popularity didn’t take off until the release of his first cookbook, about the time I was convicted. Then he started working on that deal with the winery out in Napa, but I obviously didn’t see that finished.”

Nikki shifted in her chair, feeling uneasy at the mention of the winery. “Good deal for him, huh?”

“I’ll say. Sure we were rolling in cash, but him closing that deal out in the wine country was a great thing. Then, instead of me winding up between hills of grapes, I wound up here. You asked me why the story about me being arrested wasn’t a big deal? Well, you know, a restaurateur’s wife going to jail for arson makes the local news and the papers, but it’s not CNN material. I’m sure now with the book thing and all, it likely could have, but Georges had himself a very protective staff. That Lauren Trump for starters. She had her own connections on how to keep things quiet about me and my supposed crime.”