Dead on the Vine: (Violet Vineyard Murder Mysteries #1 (A Cozy Mystery)) Read Free Page A

behind Samson’s old Jeep. Two more followed.
    “This won’t be good for business,” Samson muttered as I stepped toward the foremost police car and the emerging figure of our Sheriff, Ben Stoltze.

CHAPTER 3
     
     
    I grew up with Ben Stoltze, back when St Helena was a tiny farming community, the local winemakers made cabernet that sold for two dollars a jug and most grapes were grown for the table. Times have changed, and so have I, but I swear Ben still looks like the roughneck right tackle I remember from the high school football team. Ben is an attractive man, tall and a bit stout, with wide shoulders and bowed legs. His face is deeply tanned and lined from too much sun. He looks more like a cowboy from a cigarette ad than a policeman. His stiff-as-straw blond hair is always tousled and his suit is always rumpled, but he possesses an aura of quiet competence.
    After high school, while I was entering into a marriage soon to go sour, Ben went to Southern California on a football scholarship. He lasted two semesters before he returned to Napa and joined the police force. I don’t know why he left college, and I never asked. We weren’t that close. The last time I spoke to him was at our thirty-year class reunion two years ago. Not long after that his wife Sarah, a charming woman who had raised three attractive, well-mannered sons, passed away from colon cancer. I had attended the funeral along with three hundred others. Ben had looked bad that day, drained and confused, and I was sad to see that he still wore the shadow of that expression.
    Ben walked over, his rundown cowboy boots crunching gravel, his eyes straying to Kevin Harlan’s body. Behind him came two detectives dressed in suits and ties, one tall and carrying a camera, the other fat with a tomato-red face. The heavy one had a hand thrust into his waistband in a futile attempt to adjust his too-tight pants. Behind them were a pair of deputies in khaki uniforms.
    Ben stopped beside me as the other officers continued purposefully down the row.
    “Claire,” Ben said, glancing at me for a split second with sun-faded blue eyes, then back at Kevin. Ben nodded at Samson.
    “Hello, Ben,” I replied, crossing my arms to hide my shaking hands.
    “You find him like that?” Ben nodded at Kevin.
    “Victor did,” I replied.
    “Better get Victor out here, I’ll need to talk to him. When’d he find the body?”
    “A few minutes before he called you,” I answered, watching the tall detective snap photos of Kevin’s corpse. The detective looked young for the job. He had blue-black hair cut in a bristly buzz-cut and his suit looked expensive. The fat detective was several years older, balding with a curly black fringe of hair. His clothes looked cheap, and slept in. Neither man inspired my confidence.
    “Hola, cómo está?” Ben called to the three Mexican men as he walked their way.
    They watched Ben’s approach with hesitant smiles. Many of the migrants who work the fields have a natural aversion for the police. These men, I assumed, were legal immigrants. If they weren’t they probably would have bolted before the police arrived. I personally don’t care, legal or not. Not because I want cheap labor (I pay a fair wage) but because I find fault with the policy of drawing an imaginary line in the sand and expecting millions to live in poverty on one side while we prosper on the other. Most of the migrant workers are at least half Native American and have more right to be here than I do.
    “This is bad,” Samson said as Ben spoke to the three men. “A body dead on the vines? That will hurt sales plenty, let me tell you.” He shook his head.
    “I’m more concerned about Kevin,” I snapped. “Not a profitable concern, I know, but—” I didn’t finish because I couldn’t. If I had, I would have started crying and I’m not much for public tears. Before Samson could say anything further I headed for the house, leaving him staring after me in