Peak Season for Murder

by Gail Lukasik

  “Yeah, okay, whatever.” I was sounding childish and didn’t care. I took a last bite of my fish and left the rest.

  The waitress saved me from spouting off a clever comeback. After we told her we didn’t want dessert, she promptly cleared the plates and left.

  “If anyone can nail down Brownie’s real identity, you can,” Jake offered.

  Was he throwing me a bone, an olive branch, a white flag? Regardless of his intention, I softened.

  “Why would someone hide his identity and steal someone else’s?” I wanted his take on Brownie’s deception.

  “Lots of reasons, and most of them criminal.”

  That memory of Brownie strumming his guitar and singing “Take It Easy” came back as if in contradiction.

  “Or maybe he just needed to reinvent himself, start his life over.” Hadn’t I done just that by casting off my old life in Chicago, leaving Tom and a failing teaching career and escaping to Door County? But I hadn’t changed my identity. Brownie had been hiding from someone or something.

  The waitress returned with the check and discreetly placed it on the table beside Jake.

  “You heading home?” Jake asked.

  Okay, what was he asking? “Yup,” I answered. “You?”

  Now it was his turn to fiddle with a spoon. “When did things get so weird between us?”

  “It was always weird, Jake.” That was such a un-Jake-like question I wasn’t sure where this was going. Did he want to have sex, did he want to start over, have a real relationship? Or all of the above?

  Jake paid the check as if this were a real date and walked me to my truck. The night was still warm with large clouds relieving the blackness. I unlocked the door and turned toward him to say goodnight. He pulled me close and kissed me as if it were a first kiss. All under the watchful gaze of the knights, their fiery torches guarding us both from whatever the night held.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: SATURDAY, JULY 15

  In true Martin fashion, he insisted that we meet at Egg Harbor’s new beachfront at seven a.m. When I called him last night, he mumbled something about his upcoming piece on beach flora, seven o’clock sharp, and then hung up.

  Even though it was Saturday and the Egg Café was crammed with tourists, I’d treated myself to a designer coffee before heading up Route G to the beach. It was a few minutes after seven, and except for a heavyset man wading into the water with a snorkel, the beach was empty.

  As I sipped the chocolaty coffee, I stared out at the horizon. There were still times when this place overtook me, erasing everything else like a sudden loss of memory. The sheen of the bay flat and glistening, the shimmer of dew on the slender beach grasses, the black-eyed Susans swayed by morning light, the blur of purple flowers, and the heat yet to rise.

  “Waiting long?” Martin asked as he came up beside me.

  I wasn’t rising to the bait. “So what did Brownie tell you about Edward Lawrence?”

  “Nothing?”

  In a huff, I turned to walk back to my truck.

  “Hold up,” he called after me. “Why so touchy?”

  “Look, I’m not in the mood to trade insults with you this morning. Either tell me what you know, or I’m outta here.”

  “Sarah got back yesterday.” He smiled at me.

  I rolled my eyes. So that accounted for his chipper mood. His ex-wife, Sarah Peck, had returned early from Chicago. Martin, who’d never gotten over the divorce, was hoping to rekindle their relationship.

  “Yeah, so. I cleared my stuff out.”

  “Why are you like that?”

  “I’m not going there.”

  “Leigh, Sarah wanted me to thank you for looking after her mobile home. That’s first off. And”—he wiped his hand on his jeans and held it out to me—“I know I’ve been a real son of bitch to you from day one, but let’s start over.”

  I stared at his hand and then at his chronically florid face. In the morning light, his red hair looked like it was about to catch fire. “You’re serious?”

  “Never been more so.” He actually sounded sincere.

  “Sarah put you up to this, didn’t she?”

  “Are you going to shake my hand or not?”

  I shook his hand reluctantly, wondering what Sarah had said to him to account for this complete turnaround.

  “They did a good job with the grasses. That is, if the tourists don’t trample all over them,” he commented as his eyes traveled over the plants.

  I didn’t trust Martin’s sudden turnaround toward me. “Look, here’s the thing. Jake said you found something out about Brownie when you interviewed him. What was it?”

  His lips retracted, and he was biting down on whatever insult he was about to hurl at me. He actually sighed. “It was after the interview was over. I asked if he knew this guy Edward Lawrence from Green Bay. Ed Lawrence used to run the Sierra Club. He hemmed and hawed and finally said that Lawrence was a common name. I didn’t think anything about it until Ken threatened me.”

  “Threatened you how?” Not another incident of Ken raging.

  “Well, I was walking the path and suddenly he jumps out at me holding that damn baseball bat. He kept hitting it against the palm of his hand, saying stuff like, Brownie doesn’t like talking about his family. And what’s that got to do with our cleaning up the land? That I should keep my nose outta people’s business. He was really pissed. Then he blurts out that he caught some guy sneaking around their place a few nights ago and he was sick of all the attention.”

  “Did he know who the guy was?”

  “It was too dark. He got away before Ken could catch him. Though he did say he had a beard.”

  This was a complete waste of my time. Some guy sneaking around in the woods whom Ken couldn’t identify. Martin suspected Brownie wasn’t who he said he was, which I already knew.

  “Thanks anyway,” I said, keeping the sarcasm out of my voice.

  “Gotta help each other out. How’s Lydia doing? I stopped by her shop yesterday, and Carrie told me Lydia hadn’t moved back in yet.” Lydia had a thing for Martin, which wasn’t reciprocal.

  My face went hot with guilt. I hadn’t called her yet. Was she still at Joe’s place? “Good as can be expected, I guess.”

  “Well, have a good one.”

  “You too.” I walked up the short path to the parking lot, got into my truck and drove south to the Gazette office in Sturgeon Bay. Have a good one? How’s Lydia? Gotta help each other out? What did Sarah do to Martin yesterday, lobotomize him? More like she did some barley breaking.

  As I drove, I called the police station and asked for Chet.

  “You can’t see Albright, if that’s why you’re calling.”

  I was hoping to talk to him today. “Why can’t I see him?”

  “’Cause he’s on suicide watch. No visitors, no how.”

  “Did he make an attempt?”

  “Can’t say.”

  I thought about telling Chet about Ken’s suspicions that someone gave Brownie cherry wine. But that proved nothing. “Can you at least tell him I called?”

  “This ain’t no answering service.” He blew out an annoyed breath. “Yeah, I’ll tell him.”

  “And one more thing, what was Brownie’s alcohol level?”

  “Still running tests. So stop fishing around there.”

  Getting answers from Chet was like cooking pasta. Throw it against the wall and see if it sticks. I decided to fling some pasta. “So the ME found something in the initial tox results and is sending the samples on to the state lab for further tests?”

  “The ME’s just being thorough, so don’t make nothing out of it.”

  “Ken told me he suspects someone gave Brownie cherry wine. There were no bottles at the scene because he smashed them and threw them in the bay.” I decided to fling some more pasta at the wall. “He claims that if Brownie started drinking again, he’d never drink cherry wine and that someone else gave him the wine.”

  This time Chet grunted. “Know th
at already. And what’s cherry wine got to do with cause of death? Brownie died from a blow to the head with a baseball bat. So there’s nothing else there.”

  “Have a good one,” I said with more enthusiasm than I felt. Why was I nattering on about cherry wine?

  “I intend to.”

  Just as I hung up, my cell rang. I glanced at the screen. Samuel Wetzel. I made an abrupt right turn off the highway and into a gas station, eliciting loud and prolonged honking from the driver behind me.

  “You’re up early,” I answered. With the two-hour time difference, it was just after five a.m. in Seattle.

  “Coffee waits for no man,” he responded. “Listen, I can’t be sure if your guy is Rossi. It’s been a long time, and it’s hard for me to imagine what Rossi would look like now. But I think your guy is about the same height as him. And Rossi did have a mustache. I know it’s not much.”

  I was disappointed but not surprised. “Well, if you think of anything else—”

  “Hold up. I’m not done,” he said. “You know what I said about liking mysteries.”

  “Yes,” I said expectantly.

  “Last night I did some searches on the Internet and found a connection between Lawrence Browning, the MIA guy, and Anthony Rossi. As it turns out, Browning was in what we called a swing battalion. Basically, they were the guys who were flown into hot spots. It was like being flown into hell. So Browning’s platoon went into this hot spot, were ambushed, and that’s when he went missing. Guess who the medic was who treated the guys who made it out?”

  “Anthony Rossi,” I answered.

  “Anthony Rossi,” he confirmed. “Gotta pen and paper? Write down this site. Go to it and click on Tim Washington. He tells the story of that ambush. He doesn’t mention Rossi, but you’ll get an idea of what it was like, what we went through.”

  I took down the site. “If Rossi’s not mentioned as the medic, how did you find out he treated the guys who made it out?”

  “Rossi was the medic assigned to the platoon that needed help. That means he was there on the ground when they were ambushed.”

  “If you ever get bored with managing a coffee shop, you’d make a good investigator,” I said jokingly. Sam had just given me a link between Browning and Rossi and moved me closer to finding out if Rossi was Brownie Lawrence and, if so, why he’d assumed Lawrence’s identity.

  “Yeah, right. That’s all I need is another job. I’m supposed to be retired,” he laughed. “Now you do something for me. Let me know how all this turns out, will ya?” He took in a deep breath and let it out.

  “You were there, in Vietnam, right?”

  “What gave me away?”

  “You said, ‘what we went through.’”

  “Did I? Most times I don’t want to think about it. Your call brought it all back. But, hey, I’m alive. A lot of guys can’t say that.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  “Leigh, where the hell are you?” Lydia shouted into the phone. “The tour’s leaving in ten minutes. You’d better be on your way.”

  I’d just parked in front of the Gazette office with the intention of finishing the article on Nate Ryan and checking out the website Sam gave me.

  Oh no, the wine tour was today. How had I forgotten? Especially since it had been my idea.

  Two months ago I’d invited Lydia to join me on the Door County Premium Wine tour. Last fall, I’d pitched an article on the expanding Door County wineries to the Wisconsin magazine Seasons. And the winery tour was central to the piece. With more and more Door County wineries catering to wider and deeper varieties of wines, Door County wineries were no longer known just for cherry wine. In fact, there was now a whole range of Door County spirits from vodka to whiskey, as well as premium wines.

  “I’m leaving the Gazette now.” I screeched away from the curb and turned left at the first intersection.

  “The Gazette? What are you doing at the Gazette?” She was shouting so loudly I held the phone away from my ear.

  “Settle down. I can make it,” I reassured her.

  “There’s not enough time to drive from Sturgeon Bay to Fish Creek, especially with Saturday tourist traffic. This is so like you,” she said with disgust.

  I was speeding up the street, praying the police were busy elsewhere. Lydia was right; I couldn’t make it in ten minutes. “What’s the first winery on the tour, just in case I don’t make it? I’ll meet you there.”

  “I can’t believe you. I just can’t believe you,” she said, huffing and puffing into the phone. She was in full drama mode. As I impatiently waited for the first break in traffic on Highway 42, I heard Lydia call out to someone. “What’s our first winery?”

  She came back on the phone. “The Solemn Grape in Carlsville.”

  “I’ll see you there,” I said and hung up just as Lydia called me a selfish loser.

  To divert myself from screaming at the enormous mobile home towing a compact car and going thirty-five miles per hour north on Highway 42, I listened to one of the nature tapes I’d bought at Earth’s Bounty, a boutique nature shop in Sister Bay. As the soothing sound of waves hitting the shore flooded the truck, my breathing calmed, but my mind whirled with possibilities. If Brownie was Rossi, and if someone from his past had discovered his real identity, then at least there might be someone else who could have killed him. The suspicious bearded man Ken had seen sneaking around the woods near their shanty? The gentle background music swelled with the waves. I didn’t want Ken to be guilty. I didn’t want to believe that I had been so wrong about him and his capacity to rebuild his life. I didn’t want to believe he’d hurt his friend.

  Just like I didn’t want to believe that I had been so wrong about Tom, I reminded myself bitterly. But I had been wrong. From the moment I told him I had cancer, he’d turned away from me. In his eyes, I was now damaged. And then to slap me with divorce papers because he wanted to start his life over with another woman, to start a family. Maybe I was wrong about Ken too. Maybe not.

  In the distance I saw the forty-five miles per hour sign signaling I was nearing Carlsville. And like all perfect endings, there was the trolley waiting to turn left into the Solemn Grape parking lot.

  “I don’t want to know,” Lydia barked at me, hanging back from the small tour group. “You’re here. Let’s enjoy the tour and the luncheon.”

  There was a brittleness about Lydia. Her normally curly hair was slicked back behind her ears, her navy cropped pants were bedazzled with rivets along the hemline, and her green top was festooned with sequins and cut on the bias. Her platform wedges were so high, she was taller than me. And she looked like she’d lost ten pounds, her body all jutting angles and hard surfaces.

  I touched her arm. “Are you okay?”

  She pulled her arm away and walked toward the tour group. I followed, deriding myself for not calling her. What kind of friend was I? Clearly she was miffed, and I didn’t blame her.

  I took out my notebook and joined her and the rest of the group, mostly middle-aged couples. For the first three wineries Lydia ignored me, ingratiating herself with an older man and his thirty-something son. I decided to concentrate on why I was here: to learn about Door County wines and wineries. But my attention kept drifting to Lydia. Her laugh was forced and her posture rigid, as if any moment she expected an assault.

  By the time we reached the last winery, The Barn Winery in Fish Creek, where the luncheon was to be held, Lydia’s posture had started to droop, but her beauty queen smile was still pasted on her face. Her jaw muscles must be aching.

  The winery was a converted stone barn restored in a prairie style with tiled roof and low-slung horizontal windows along one side. I snapped a few photos of the exterior before I entered the winery, trailing behind the rest of the group. The cool stony interior of the tasting room was a balm from the unbearable heat of mid-day. As my eyes adjusted to the dim lighting I spotted Lydia standing at the far end of the tasting bar with the father/son duo. She caught my eye and waved me over.
That was a surprise. Had she finally forgiven me?

  Without hesitating, I walked past the other couples lining the bar and joined her, hoping this meant I was back in her good graces.

  I was about to say something when the tour guide introduced the vintner, George, a robust-looking man with a generous belly who looked more like a brewmeister than a vintner. Unlike the first three vintners, who, though knowledgeable, weren’t particularly good speakers, this vintner was a natural, who relished chatting about harvesting California grapes and driving them back at night to blend with Door County grapes in the tradition of one barrel at a time.

  After touring the silver fermentation tanks and viewing the oaken barrels, he led us back to the tasting room where he chose a variety of wines from the winery’s select series. Though I was past hungry and a little tipsy from tasting so much wine for the past three hours, I still could appreciate the fineness of these wines, deciding that I’d purchase a case of their Reserve Chardonnay, whose per bottle cost was what I normally paid for three bottles. After all, I was about to come into some money, thanks to my fortuitous and unexpected divorce.

  George concluded the tour by asking if anyone had questions before we ate lunch on the outdoor patio. The older man with the thirty-something son who’d been annoyingly curious throughout the tour piped up, eliciting a communal murmured sigh from the group. He was a florid man with short-cropped white hair who I guessed had been either a professor or a politician, because his questions were more like opportunities to show off his knowledge about wine.

  “What happened to your cherry wine?” he said, leaning back against the wine bar as if he were in a saloon. “I remember when you had that orchard in Sister Bay and sold nothing but cherry wine.”

  George chuckled good-naturedly and said, “Most people don’t make that connection since we changed our name when we started this winery. I’ll bet you even remember the old name.”

  The son was staring down into his wine glass and grinning. I couldn’t tell if he was amused by his father or embarrassed.

  “Sweet Cherry Winery,” the man said, puffing up his chest proudly.