Race to World's End (Rowan and Ella Book 3) (39 page)

Haley’s
hand froze over the dish. “Fish? This is fish?”

“Well,”
Maggie said, “it’s fish pulverized with olive oil and potatoes and artichokes
and about a ton of garlic. We normally only have it in winter and, believe me,
you can weed half a hectare after lunching on this.”

Haley
nibbled on her toast and eyed the casserole unhappily.

“What’s
the matter, dear?” Grace said.

“She
doesn’t eat fish,” Ben said, scooping up a large serving onto his plate. “I
don’t suppose you have any chicken tenders for her?”

“Ben,
stop it,” Haley said under her breath, her gaze dropping to her lap.

Maggie
knew Laurent’s policy on picky eaters and she knew he would be pretty seriously
disgusted by Haley’s inability to behave as he felt a guest ought to. Even so,
she also knew he had strong views on how a host should behave, which is why she
wasn’t surprised to see him remove Haley’s plate and retreat to the kitchen.

“There
is leftover pizza from lunch,” he said over his shoulder.
 

“You
are an embarrassment to me,” Ben said between his teeth.

“Oh,
settle down, Ben,” Maggie said, smiling encouragingly to Haley. “It’s no big
deal.”

Grace
helped herself to the
brandade
and
passed the breadbasket to Haley. “Fresh from the
boulangerie
two villages over,” she said brightly.

“Thanks,”
Haley said softly, taking the basket.

Ben
ate his
brandade,
ignoring Haley’s
discomfort.

This was going to be a long
visit.

“So,
Maggie,” Grace said, “how was Annie? Is she going to be okay, do you think?”

Maggie
waited until Laurent placed a plate with two pieces of
pissaladière
in front of Haley. She noted that Haley didn’t look much
happier with the pizza than she had the fish.

“Well, she’s pretty devastated, obviously. I don’t know what
kind of support system she has back home, but she does have a parish and I
think she mentioned she’s active in it.”

“That’s good,” Grace said.

“She asked me to look into the evidence the police have on
Olivier Tatois—”

The fork Laurent dropped was not an accident and Maggie knew it.

“Why in the world do you
think Olivier is innocent?” Ben asked her, spooning himself up more
brandade
. “You don’t even know him.”

“I don’t necessarily think he
is
innocent,” Maggie responded. “I’m
just trying to confirm that the police have the right guy.”

“Why don’t you think they
do?” Ben asked.

“I don’t have an opinion one
way or the other. As you said, I don’t know him. But Lanie’s mom asked me to
make sure.”

“So, as usual, this is Maggie
thinking she knows more than the professionals.”

“Wow. That’s a little more
direct than we’re used to from you, Ben,” Maggie said. “Refreshing.”

“I’ve heard the stories of
your so-called sleuthing escapades. I
am
in contact with Mom and Dad, as it happens.”

“Good to know. Just not at
Christmas or Thanksgiving.”

“I have my own family,
Maggie,” Ben said pointedly.

“Which most people don’t use
as an excuse not to see their parents,” Maggie retorted. “Besides, no offense,
but a
couple
is not a family.”

Haley sucked in a gasp of
breath, her face a mask of hurt.

“
Chérie
, may I see you in the kitchen, please?”

“In a second, Laurent. Think
about it, Ben. If you and Haley were to break up right now, it would be no big
deal in the larger scheme of things. But that’s not the case if there was a kid
in the mix.”

“Maggie,
now
,” Laurent said.

“How dare you, Maggie!” Haley
was on her feet, her chair knocked to the floor behind her.

Maggie felt Laurent wrap his
hand around her arm and tug her out of her chair.

“We have recently learned the
benefits of time-outs,” Laurent said over his shoulder as he guided Maggie
toward the kitchen, his hand firmly on her back. “And we will return
momentarily when we are using our inside voices.”

Maggie stomped into the
kitchen and then whirled on Laurent. “I need that jerk to realize he’s the
worst son in the universe.”

“As he is not
your
son, perhaps you are not the best
judge of that,
chérie
. Besides, your
brother wasn’t listening to you but you were upsetting your brother’s wife very
much.”

“I’m sorry about that,”
Maggie said, clenching and unclenching her fists. “He is a pompous, uncaring
jackass.”

“
Bien sûr
,” Laurent said pulling her into his arms and stroking her
hair with his large hand down her back. “Breathe, yes? Big breath.”

“Don’t treat me like Jem,”
Maggie said crossly.

“Of course not. Jem would be
spanked by now,” Laurent said, shaking a finger in her face and grinning. “I am
treating you like a naughty grown-up girl.”

Maggie laughed and eased into
his arms. “That guy makes me so mad.”

“On this I believe we are all
clear,” Laurent said, kissing her and rubbing her back. “Can you behave when
you return to table? Even knowing there must be an apology first to your
brother’s wife?”

“Yes, yes, I know,” Maggie
said, sighing. “I got carried away. I shouldn’t have said all that.”

“Especially not to one trying
so hard to have the
bèbè
.”

“Really? You think so?”

Laurent shrugged and Maggie
didn’t probe further. The things he picked up on with people and their subtle
reactions would rival Sherlock Holmes. She’d long ago learned to take his
observations as fact and move on. Saved a whole lot of time.

“Now I really feel bad.”

“Tcht,” Laurent said, making
that dismissive sound he did with his tongue. Maggie had heard him use it many
times with the dogs. It didn’t thrill her that he was using it on her now.
“Just apologize and go forward,” he said.

“Easier said,” Maggie said, straightening
her shoulders and taking a deep breath.

When they returned to the
table, it became clear that Maggie’s apology would have to wait.

“Where did Haley go?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Something
about needing to cry herself to sleep,” Ben said sarcastically. “I’m sure
she’ll have recovered by tomorrow.”

“I’ll go up and see her,”
Maggie said, but Laurent already had a hand on her arm. She glanced at him and
he shook his head.

“Yeah,” Ben said. “Please let
her get over tonight before you launch into her again.”

“Piss off, Ben,” Maggie said.

“Always with the delicate
repartee.” Ben stood and tossed his napkin down onto the table. “I was thinking
of a smoke on the terrace. Care to join me, Laurent?”

“You go,” Laurent said. “I’ll
come,
bientôt
.”

Ben shrugged and gave Maggie
a half-smile before exiting the room.

Grace let out a long
exaggerated breath. “Well, that was tense,” she said. “But fascinating.
Whatever possessed you, Maggie to light into Haley?”

“I wasn’t!” Maggie said. “I
mean, I didn’t intend to. I thought I was going after Ben.”

“Well, she got good and
caught in the crossfire, that’s for sure. You do know she’s trying desperately
to get pregnant, right?”

Maggie glanced at Laurent but
he was already clearing the table. “I didn’t,” she said. “But I do now. Did she
tell you?”

“Mmm-mm,” Grace said,
standing with a dish in her hand. “She’s all but given up. So your little
you’re not a family unless you have a kid
tirade was pretty ill-timed.”

“I feel terrible.”

“You let him push your
buttons.”

“I can’t seem to help it.”

“That’s siblings for you.”

Maggie stared through the
French doors, where she saw her brother standing on the terrace smoking. “What
I want to know,” she said thoughtfully, “is what is he doing trying to chum up
to Laurent?”

“Now isn’t
that
the million-dollar question?”

Maggie joined Grace in the
kitchen, where Laurent was running hot water over a sink full of dishes.

“Go,” Maggie said to him.
“You cooked it. Let us clean it up.”

“I don’t mind.”
 

“I know you don’t, but only
you can find out what my jerk brother is up to.”

“He
is
up to something,” Laurent said grimly as he dried his hands.

Maggie pulled the towel from
him. “Go smoke with him and see what he wants. Do your sneaky,
I’m looking at you but you don’t know I am,
thing.”

He ran a hand down her back
and kissed her mouth before exiting the kitchen without a word. Even in this
absent-minded gesture, Maggie could sense his mind was elsewhere.

“He already knew your brother
was up to something.”

“No one will ever surprise
Laurent,” Maggie said, grinning. “Trust me, I’ve tried. Wash or dry? Oops. Hold
that thought.” She pulled her vibrating phone out of her pocket and looked at
the screen. “It’s Annie,” she said.

“Go on,” Grace said as she
turned the hot water back on in the sink.

“I won’t be long.” Maggie
walked toward the living room, grabbing her wine glass from the table as she
went.

“Hey, Annie,” she said as she
sat down on the couch. “You get home safe and sound?”

“Yes, thank you, Maggie,”
Annie said, her voice cracked and heavy with exhaustion. “I wanted to thank you
again for everything you did for me. I don’t know how I would have navigated
through the necessary channels without you.”

“Well, no need to thank me,”
Maggie said. “My French may not be good enough to argue philosophy but it’s just
barely good enough for most everything else.”

“I also want to thank you for
agreeing to look into Lanie’s death more. Olivier has a lawyer, who told me she
would be open to sharing information with you. I gave her your contact
information and wanted to make sure you had hers, too.”

“Okay. Sure. Can I ask you,
Annie,
why
you think Olivier might
not be guilty? I mean, I know you met him and liked him and all but…”

Maggie heard Annie take in a
long ragged breath before answering.

 
“Well, to be honest,” Annie said, “at
first I didn’t believe it because I felt that I had special information that
seemed to…prohibit the possibility of him being guilty. I didn’t want to say
anything to you before. It just seemed like an invasion of Lanie’s life and I
have done such a bad job of protecting her when she was alive.”

“Special information?”
What the heck was she talking about?

“The French coroner told me
after the autopsy…” Annie broke down in tears and Maggie sat up straight in
anticipation. “He…he told me when he gave me Lanie’s…remains something utterly
heartbreaking.”

Maggie remembered that Annie
was weepier than usual when she waved her off on the airplane, but she assumed
it was because everything was coming to an end. Now her mind raced:
What could be so heartbreaking after losing
your only child?

“Lanie was pregnant.”

There
you go.

“Wow, Annie. I am so sorry.”

Annie sniffled loudly. “So,
of course, I knew it couldn’t be Olivier. Only a monster would knowingly…”
Maggie listened as Annie made an effort to get a grip of her emotions. When she
spoke again, her voice was stronger. “Olivier agreed to a DNA test.
Understandably, his lawyer believed it would be helpful in establishing that he
could not have killed Lanie. That he had no
motive
.
His lawyer told me Olivier was eager to take the test, the results of which we
got today.”

Oh,
don’t tell me…

“The baby wasn’t his.”

Seven

The
next morning, Maggie was up early, but still not before Laurent, of course. She
found him in the kitchen talking to Jem, who was in his high chair scrutinizing
a mashed-up peach.

“I need two coffees,” Maggie
said, kissing the baby and then moving to the counter where Laurent had just
made a full pot.

“You are expecting a
stressful morning,
chérie
?” Laurent
said, smiling as she drew two mugs from the cabinet.

“They’re not both for me. Did
you see Haley come through here?”

“She’s in the northeast
quadrant of the vineyard.”

“Wow, really? Why, I wonder?”
Maggie poured the coffees. “I don’t know how she takes hers.”

“The point is the effort,
chérie
.”

“Yeah, good. In that case…”
Maggie reached for the antique china ewer of cream on the counter and added it
to both mugs, along with two spoonfuls of sugar. “Can you get the door?”

Laurent walked her to the
French doors and gave her shoulder a light squeeze as she passed through. “
Bonne chance
,” he said, closing the door
behind her.

Maggie stood on the terrace
for a moment and squinted into the horizon. The northwest quadrant got the sun
first and there was a bench out there, so she figured that was probably why
Haley went that way. It was also the furthest point from the house.

Maggie steadied the two
coffees and walked gingerly over the uneven ground until she reached the first
of several long rows of well-tended aisles of grape vines. To her immediate
right on the perimeter was a stand of gnarled olive trees providing nothing
useful but a thought to their historical role. They’d probably been fruitful
during Laurent’s uncle’s time, but now they weren’t even good for shade.

There was an apple orchard on
the far side of the vineyard but it too was not harvested. Maggie had stepped
on a snake there the summer before and decided on the spot there was no real
need to ever go back.

Laurent’s vineyard was
sectioned into fourths, with the main intersection a wide dirt tractor road.
Although she rarely came into the vineyard—
Laurent’s kingdom and domain
—Maggie knew she was nearly to
the northwest quadrant when she came to the road. Her foot caught a small root
and she spilled coffee onto her hand.

“Ouch! Dammit!” She stopped
and put both coffees down on the ground to wipe off her hand.

“Maggie? Is that you?”

Maggie looked up to see
Haley, hidden until this moment, rise from the bench on the other side of the
tractor road. Laurent must have moved the bench. She didn’t remember it being
so close.

“Yes, it’s me,” Maggie said.
“How did you know? The early-morning cussing?”

Haley laughed and walked
across the road to meet her. “Pretty much,” she said. Haley was wearing a pair
of loose linen slacks and a short-sleeve cotton top. Appearing fresh and
unaffected by the hot morning, she looked like she absolutely belonged in the
middle of a two-hundred-year-old Provençal vineyard.

Maggie handed her one of the
coffees and in the bright morning sun immediately saw the bruise under Haley’s
eye. Was that new? Or had it been covered with makeup before?

 
Why
is it you always think the worst when you see a woman with a black eye?

“I am so, so, so sorry about
last night, Haley,” Maggie said. “Laurent tells me all the time that I don’t
know what I’m saying half the time but last night I really put my foot in it.
Please forgive me.”

Haley held the coffee and
nodded, her smile firmly in place. “It’s okay, Maggie. I knew you when,
remember? You always spoke your mind. I overreacted.”

“No, you didn’t at all,”
Maggie said. “It was all me. I let Ben get me riled up but that’s no excuse.”

Haley looked away and Maggie
saw the bruise was more yellow than purple. So it had happened a few days ago.

Should
she say something about it?

“He’s going through some
changes at work,” Haley said. “And Ben doesn’t like change.”

“He really seems…edgy. More
than usual,” Maggie said, grateful to change the subject from her to her
brother.

“He’ll get through it,” Haley
said, her eyes going to the span of orderly vineyards all around them.

“What made you come out
here?” Maggie asked, following her gaze at their surroundings. To Maggie, it
all looked like so many desiccated sticks jammed into the ground, albeit with a
bunch of plump, fat grapes attached.

“It’s so beautiful,” Haley
said, her voice holding a tone of surprise that Maggie could even ask such a
question. “I like to take advantage of different scenery when I’m away from
Atlanta. One morning back home—months from now—when I’m looking out
my living room window at the traffic on Peachtree Road, I’ll remember this
moment when the air smelled like roses and everything was absolutely and
perfectly quiet.”

“Except for my cussing.”

Haley laughed. “I might edit
that part out of my memories.”
 

“Did Laurent mention the
lemon festival in St-Buvard today? Half the village will be there, which isn’t
saying much, but it’ll still be fun. I mean, if you like imagining you’re
someplace totally out of reality.”

Haley laughed again and
Maggie felt her heart settle. She’d been forgiven.

“I wouldn’t miss it,” Haley
said with a smile.

*****

St-Buvard was a small
village, Maggie thought with satisfaction, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hold
up its end of the food bargain when it came to
terroir
and pride of produce. Although not ranking anywhere near
the level of an Aix or Avignon food festival, the St-Buvard
citron
festival was still renowned
throughout Provence.

And after a steady string of
murders a few years earlier, being known for a lemon festival was a nice change
of pace.

Grace, wearing immaculate
white linen slacks and matching top, carried a patent leather red clutch bag
under her arm. She shaded her eyes as she stood next to Maggie. The festival
consisted of nearly fifty stalls, tables and kiosks that had been erected in
the small village square. Laurent had a table near the entrance of the square
for his label. Maggie saw he’d hired two of the young gypsy boys to hand out
samples of the wine.

Next to them, and clearly the
apex of the festival, was a long table with rows of shiny, polished lemons
stacked in pyramids. In front them were displayed lemon pies, lemon tarts and
dozens and dozens of bottles filled with citrus-infused marinades and oils.

Le
Canard
, the village pub
and café, would serve a full menu today starting with its famous
poulet au citron
and finishing with
les
tartes
au citron
. Even the small Catholic church of St-Buvard,
Sainte-Mère-Église,
had a small kiosk of
lemon cookies perched on the edge of the flagstone courtyard that was the main
stage for the festival.

Of course there were always
those vendors who came from outside St-Buvard with their lavender sachets and
olives, or even their cheap Paris sweatshirts and knockoff sunglasses, but for
once the locals didn’t seem to mind. Maggie noticed one stall in particular had
a wide banner that read:
Le meilleur à
Aix
.
The best of Aix
—selling
a lemon-infused
pastis
and doing a
brisk business.

“Don’t you already have a
veritable dump truck full of lemons from your own trees?” Grace asked as she
sampled a lemon-spritzed bite of
chèvre
on a small toast round. She nodded at the proprietor, who promptly shoveled
half a dozen wheels of the goat cheese into a small paper bag for Grace.

“Today’s not about lemons,”
Maggie said, shifting her overly full food basket to her other arm. “It’s about
France’s general obsession with food.”

Grace tucked her cheese into
Maggie’s basket. “Uh oh,” she said. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing,” Maggie said
sharply. “Except there’s no way anyone can take off five pounds of baby weight living
in a country where the sole focus is eating.”

Grace nodded. “Only five
pounds?”
 

“Shut up.”

“Are you going to talk about
last night?”

Maggie stopped and frowned.
“I didn’t realize Laurent and I were that noisy.”

“Funny girl. I’m talking
about Lanie’s surprise pregnancy.”

“And the fact the baby
wasn’t
Olivier’s.” Maggie nodded. “Major
shock, that’s for sure. Poor Annie. She begged me to keep her updated on what’s
happening with the case.”

“How would
you
know what’s happening?”

“Exactly.” Maggie approached
a wizened old lady behind a counter where a large pot of steaming paella sat. “
Bonjour
, Madame Bonet,” she said,
kissing the woman on both cheeks. Grace shook the woman’s hand and she and
Maggie were both promptly handed small bowls of the fragrant rice dish, which
they took to a small bench under a large sycamore tree.

“Annie thinks because I can
sort of speak the language that the police will tell me what’s going on.”

“You know, darling, Laurent
was out on the terrace with Ben by that point, but I’m almost positive I heard
you tell Annie you would find out who killed her daughter.”

Maggie took a mouthful of
paella and closed her eyes. The saffron mingled with the sharp briny flavors of
the seafood and melted into a perfect taste sensation.

“Madame Bonet makes the best
paella,” she said, opening her eyes.

Grace was watching her
expectantly. “Well?”
 

“I don’t see how it could
hurt me digging around just a little bit to see what I can find out, for
Annie’s sake.”

“And you’re sure it doesn’t
have anything to do with the fact your brother thinks you’d be insane to get
involved?”

“Where does he get off having
an opinion one way or the other? What’s it to him?”

“I agree, darling.
Laurent
, on the other hand, will
definitely have an opinion and I think we both know what it will be. Oh,
there’s Haley,” she said, gazing over Maggie’s shoulder and into the festival
throng. “She’s brave, wandering around by herself with not two words of French
to rub together. I understand you spoke with her this morning?

“I did. She was very sweet
and I didn’t deserve it.”

“Where’s your brother? Did he
come with Laurent?”

“This isn’t his scene.”
Maggie waved to Haley and her sister-in-law broke into a wide grin and hurried
over. She, too, carried a basket full of individually wrapped parcels of bakery
goods, cheeses and lemons.

“Oh, my God, you can smell
the lemons from your
house
, Maggie,”
Haley said. “I’m in heaven.”

“Whoa, you have a serious
load of pastries there,” Maggie said. “And I have a certifiable weakness for macaroons.”

“Well, you’ll be able to eat
your fill tonight,” Haley said. “By the way, I saw Laurent on the other side of
the square. He looked to be drinking.”

“Well, he
is
a winemaker,” Maggie said, smiling at
the woman behind a table selling sunflowers. “Kind of goes with the business.”

“Yes, but he had the baby,”
Haley said. “
And
Zouzou. In the
States, anyone under twenty-one wouldn’t even be allowed to sit in a bar.”

“Well, the French are more
evolved,” Grace said.

“God, you cannot be worried
about Laurent,” Maggie said, laughing. “Those kids couldn’t
be
any safer. Why do you think Grace and
I are over here sucking up our freedom like convicts on work release?”

Maggie paid for a dozen
sunflowers. “Besides,” she said, “didn’t you hear Laurent complaining this
morning about me leaving the clothes basket at the top of the stairs? He’s
convinced
I’m
the real danger to
anyone’s idea of safety.”

“Well,” Haley said, “he has a
point. Even without carelessly placed obstacles, the steps at your house are
very slick. I’ve caught myself several times coming down them.”

“Those steps are eighty years
old,” Grace said. “Laurent’s uncle built the house in the late thirties.”

“Older than that,” Maggie
said. “His uncle did the renovations on the existing
mas
. Domaine St-Buvard dates back to the eighteen hundreds.”

“So no wonder the stairs are
slick,” Grace said to Haley. “They’ve been worn down over the generations. Can
you imagine?” Grace looked out over the bustling festival. “I love how old
France is. It’s like living in history.”

“Yes,” Haley said
impatiently, “but my point is that perhaps—especially with children in
the house—a little more care might be taken.”