Vintage Pride (15 page)

The message he’d received was that harvesting should begin in the middle of the following week—just as Jean-Luc had predicted. It meant he had fewer than eight days to recruit not only the pickers he’d need to strip the vines as quickly as possible but also the army of casual laborers necessary to support the wine-making process—the workers who’d load the grapes into bins for transportation, the drivers, the press operators and the extra kitchen staff to help Thomas prepare food for everyone. It was a logistical nightmare, but until Beno
î
t’s death, it had been one Jean-Luc had shared with him.

He cast a look up at the distant turret that was his brother-in-law’s domain to see a light burning in the topmost window.
I can’t do all this alone. Why can’t you see that?

Thérèse had mentioned bumping into Jean-Luc in the kitchen the other night. They’d obviously had some kind of heart to heart but she seemed reluctant to talk about what had been said. Probably just another failed attempt to make her brother realize that his life hadn’t ended when Benoît’s had.

The day’s stresses, coupled with the irresistible draw of the full moon, had left Marcus tense and needing to shift. He could usually soothe his tension in his wife’s arms but tonight that had not been possible. When Thérèse’s pregnancy had been confirmed, the doctor had assured them they could continue to make love throughout the whole nine months if they wished. As her belly had grown bigger they’d had to find positions that placed no strain on the bump, but she’d been as enthusiastic for sex as he’d ever known her. If anything, he’d barely been able to keep up with her needs. For the last couple of nights, though, Thérèse had been complaining of various aches and pains and just wasn’t in the mood. She’d pleasured him with her skillful hands, directing his cum onto her bare breasts, which had increased by a good couple of cup sizes in the last few weeks. The sight had thrilled him but his orgasm had still left him unsatisfied.

He’d waited till Thérèse was sound asleep then had gone down to the château’s gardens. He’d been on the point of undressing before he’d remembered the cameras. Dex had placed them in what he’d claimed were the ideal locations to catch whatever supposedly roamed the grounds after dark. The last thing Marcus needed was to have his transformation recorded on digital video.

At least the vineyards were beyond the scope of the team’s monitoring equipment. Impatience making him half-crazy, he dashed along the path between the freshly mown lawns, through the gate in the low hedge that marked the edge of the formal garden and between the rows of vines.

A brief flash of moonlight reflected on a bunch of fat, succulent grapes. Marcus reached out to stroke the fruit. All the hard work, all the strain—it would be worth it. These would produce a vintage harvest, he was sure.

Maybe he should take Jean-Luc’s suggestion seriously about finding a permanent assistant. He’d been talking to Marina on the phone today, arranging to take another couple of cases of Château LeBlanc over to her on his next delivery run. She’d mentioned her head barman was leaving and she’d decided to promote her newest member of staff, Kaspar, to the role. Marcus had met Kaspar—an exiled lion shifter from the Amsterdam pride—on one of his recent trips to Bath and been impressed with the lad’s attitude. And Marina was the best judge of character he knew. Shifter or not, she wouldn’t have given Kaspar the job if she didn’t believe he was the right person for it.

He was pleased to see his twin sister doing so well for herself. She’d found her niche, running the bar Marcus co-owned with her, l
ø
ve. Though she hadn’t yet met her mate, he still believed the right one waited for her somewhere. He hoped she would find him soon. He wanted Marina to be happy, just as he was with Thérèse.

The compulsion to shift grew more intense the longer he stood between the vines. It became harder to focus on thoughts of his sister or the coming harvest. The animal part of his nature fought for ascendancy and he could no longer suppress it.

He’d dressed in items that could be pulled off in seconds—a T-shirt worn loose over knee-length shorts and soft leather Jesus sandals. Much as he enjoyed walking shoeless, it would have been easy to cut the sole of his foot on a thorn or sharp pebble. If Thérèse saw an injury like that she’d know at once how he’d acquired it. He didn’t want to get into an argument with her if she found out he’d shifted while paranormal investigators were patrolling the vicinity.

Naked, Marcus cast a last look back at the château to satisfy himself he couldn’t be seen. Then he closed his eyes and let the transformation begin.

Chapter Seventeen

I’ll do one last circuit of the grounds and then I’ll let Dex know this is a colossal waste of time. We’re never going to find anything here.

Ethan ran a hand over the back of his neck, soothing the ache that always formed there when he was tired. His crankiness was his own fault. He hadn’t been getting much sleep this past couple of days, thanks to his inability to keep away from Jean-Luc.

At least this was the last night of the investigation. The crew had decided the lunar eclipse would make a perfect dramatic setting for anything that might or might not occur—one last chance for the spirits to show themselves. And up to now, in his opinion it simply hadn’t happened.

Maybe Kim was having better luck in the cellar. He’d go up to his bedroom, take a couple of painkillers then join her in her hunt for ghosts.

Something made a rustling sound close by and Ethan’s hand tightened reflexively around the walkie-talkie in the pocket of his combat pants. He almost let out a gasp of relief when he realized it was only a fox, which slinked out from beneath the hedge and regarded him for an instant before scurrying off.

Ethan glanced up at the moon as his heart rate slowed. He’d never seen it look quite such a startling shade of red and he watched as more of its surface disappeared into the earth’s shadow. The flashlight he carried provided enough light to see by but he still felt he ought to make his way back to the château before the night darkened further.

As he turned, a noise came from the direction of the vineyard. Whatever had made it had to be considerably larger than a fox, and he wondered whether one of the sheep who grazed on the neighboring hillsides had found its way among the rows of plants.

He walked closer, considering who he should alert to the problem, then stopped, unable to believe what he’d seen—or at least what he thought he’d seen. The low, sandy-colored body, the shaggy mane… If he didn’t know better, he’d swear a full-grown male lion was wandering through the vines.

He rubbed his eyes, telling himself not to be so ridiculous. This was northern France, not the African savannah, and unless the beast had escaped from some traveling circus, there was no way it could be strolling in these fields as though it owned them. Unless the legends were true and some big beast did roam the château’s borders, protecting the LeBlanc family from harm.

Damn it, of all the times not to have a camera to hand!

When he looked again, the animal had gone. There was only a familiar white-blond shock of hair in the spot he thought it had been. Was that Marcus? Ethan blinked hard. And if so, was he…naked? God, his vision must really be playing tricks on him tonight.

Even so, he called out, “Hey, Marcus, are you there, buddy?” He didn’t get a reply. He shook his head, telling himself he’d dreamed the whole thing. But it hadn’t been his imagination. Marcus, looking like he’d just stepped off a Californian beach in his outfit of T-shirt, board shots and buckled sandals, stepped out into the wide path that ran between the vines and strolled along, humming to himself as though he didn’t have a care in the world.

On spotting Ethan, Marcus came to an abrupt halt. His tanned face went pale and his mouth dropped open in shock. If Ethan had caught him with a bloodied knife in his hand, a dead body on the ground at his feet, he couldn’t have looked guiltier.

“Er…Ethan, how long have you been here?”

“Oh, just a matter of moments. You know, it’s the damnedest thing. I was out checking the cameras in the garden, I heard a noise and I could have sworn I saw a lion walking through the vineyard. But that’s crazy, right?”

“Right.” Marcus was still clearly struggling to gather his composure.

“And you didn’t see anything, did you?”

“Not a thing. I—I was out here because I couldn’t sleep so I came to take a look at the vines. I just needed to reassure myself I wouldn’t find any signs of rot or damage, anything that would threaten the harvest. You know what it’s like.”

He didn’t, but Ethan nodded along anyway. Something had rattled Marcus and Ethan was damned if he knew what it could be.

“Well, I’m on my way back to the house now,” he said. “There’s a Thermos of coffee in the kitchen if you want a cup.”

“No thanks.” Marcus brushed a stray lock of hair out of his eyes. “I should really be getting back to bed, just in case Thérèse wakes up and wonders where I’ve gone. But I’ll walk with you.”

“So how were they?” Ethan asked.

“How were what?”

“The grapes. You said you were checking them.”

“Oh—of course. They’re in excellent condition. All I’ve got to worry about now is who’s going to pick them for me. Once the grapes are ripe, we only have a window of three weeks at the most before they’re past their best.”

“So what do you do? Recruit from the villages around here?”

“Yes, although as you’d expect, all the producers in the area are looking for casual labor at the same time, so the locals tend to gravitate toward the bigger Champagne houses because they can afford to pay a little more. But these days there are websites devoted exclusively to advertising fruit picking jobs. It’s hard physical graft and I wouldn’t call it lucrative, exactly, but like most places round here, we offer bed and board to the people we employ.”

“I bet that goes down well with Jean-Luc.”

“When Benoît was alive, he never used to mind having a house full of people. And now he barely notices them because he just keeps himself shut away in his room.”

At the mention of Benoît’s name, Ethan sought to change the subject. “As an incomer to the family, do you really believe the stories that the LeBlancs have some kind of spiritual protection?”

Marcus gave a soft laugh. “When you put it like that, it sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? But I do think things happen in life which don’t always have a rational explanation. And you must think so, too, or you wouldn’t be here.”

While he had been sidestepping the question, they’d reached the back entrance of the château.

“Well, I’ll bid you goodnight, and let you get back to your spirit hunting,” Marcus said. “And if you don’t find anything tonight… Well, there’s always tomorrow.”

Ethan shook his head. “After you said you’d made dinner reservations for us all, we decided this would be our last night of filming. Otherwise we wouldn’t really be able to relax, knowing we’d got to come straight back here and start work.”

“Well, that makes sense. And I know you’re going to love La Reine Marie. We’ve booked the private dining room and Chef Georges will be treating us to the finest food in
É
pernay.” He sighed. “I only wish we could persuade Jean-Luc to join us… Anyway, sleep well, Ethan, and don’t let the lions bite.”

He left Marcus and went into the kitchen, still pondering the Englishman’s behavior. Though Marcus had regained his usual bonhomie by the time they were back inside the château, Ethan still had the feeling he was hiding something.

He poured himself a cup of coffee from the half-full flask on the counter and was taking a welcome sip when Kim appeared. Her face was flushed and she was panting as though she’d run a marathon.

“Hey, Ethan, you should have been in the cellar just now.” Kim spoke between gasps for air. “I was definitely communicating with that spirit we sensed down there before. I asked him if he’s trapped in this place and he said yes. God, it was amazing. But you’ll see when I play back the footage.” She grinned in triumph, her breathing back to normal. “Didn’t I tell you the full moon brings them out? So how are you getting on?”

He wondered whether to tell her about the lion he thought he’d seen then decided against it. Without any kind of recorded evidence to back it up there didn’t seem to be much point. “Apart from the odd fox, I’ve spotted nothing of note. Oh, and I bumped into Marcus in the vineyard. I don’t think the guy’s sleeping too well at the moment.”

“His wife’s pregnant and he’s just about to start the busiest few weeks of his working year. Can you blame him?” Kim helped herself to coffee. “So, d’you wanna come into the cellar with me, see if we can make contact with whoever’s haunting it again?”

“I’d love to but I’m getting a killer headache. I need to go up to my room, pop a couple of Tylenol first. I’ll be straight back down after that, though.”

“Okay. You know, Ethan, I think we really might be on to something here. It’s just a shame we’ve had to wait right to the end of the investigation for the spirits to come out to play.”

Ethan had never wanted to believe in the paranormal more than he did when he saw the look on Kim’s face. “Yeah, well, we don’t want to peak with the first show in the series, do we? We’ve still got the mad monk of Prague and the ghosts of those Roman soldiers in York to flush out of their hiding places.”

He left Kim in the kitchen and was about to go into his room, then he remembered the blister pack of pain relief pills he needed was in his wash bag in the bathroom. Pausing with his hand on the door handle, he thought of Jean-Luc in his quarters on the floor above. He really needed to speak to someone about what he thought he’d seen in the vineyard. Maybe Jean-Luc could throw some light on Marcus’ odd behavior.

Not stopping to consider whether his lover might be asleep, Ethan took the stairs two at a time, eager to see Jean-Luc’s face again. He knocked on the door, which was opened a moment later by Jean-Luc, wearing his jacquard robe. Its partly open front revealed a tantalizing glimpse of his broad chest. Ethan’s cock twitched, showing his interest.