Blood for Wine Page 17

  “That was a lie,” I said.

  She nodded. “I didn’t know that then. Anyway, he asked me to get involved with the man.” She shook her head with a bewildered look. “I just laughed at him, but then he offered me twenty thousand dollars up front and another twenty if I pulled it off. That got my attention. He said it would help him save his marriage and teach the man a lesson.” She brought her eyes back up, and they were filled with remorse. “I was desperate, he knew it, and he gave me just enough reasons to rationalize it. Of course, as I got involved with Sean, I began to doubt what Amis had told me, but it was too late. It’s been self-loathing ever since.”

  I asked a series of questions that helped me fill in the rest of the details, how she was vague about where she lived and where she worked, how she used the cash to pay off debts and extend Josh’s home care when she was meeting Sean. It was a juggling act, but she told herself she was doing it for her son.

  “How did the videotaping work?”

  “Richard always rented the rooms and gave me the key. He told me to tell Sean that I’d taken care of it so his name wouldn’t be involved. That means Richard had access to the rooms.” She looked at me, her eyes filled with an earnestness that was hard to discount. “Tell Sean. Please. I didn’t know about the videos.”

  I said I would and then asked another question. “You sold Amis a lot of anti-anxiety drugs, right?”

  “Yeah, he was one of my best customers, four stars on our corporate rating system. He got all kinds of freebies. People think the AMA cracked down on this sort of thing, but there’s still plenty going on under the table.”

  “So you bent the rules to keep him happy?”

  Her brows went up in surprise. “Uh, what do you—”

  “I’m just curious. He’s got a reputation as a pill pusher.”

  She sighed. “My boss told me to keep the Xanax and Klonopin flowing to him. He liked the sample packs. Gave them out like candy to get people started. I don’t think it was a money thing with him. I think he just liked having people dependent on him.”

  When I had most of the disgusting picture, I said, “Look, Maura, this is how it’s going to work—we’re going to confront Amis. I’m going to tell him that if he doesn’t return the photos and video clips, we’re going to the police where you will fully cooperate. He might threaten you or try to buy you off. It’s your job to convince him that you’re not going to waver. If you don’t convince him, and we don’t get everything back, Sean will take the whole thing to the police and both you and Amis are going down. And I can’t guarantee who will see those shots of you and Sean in bed.”

  She swallowed and closed her eyes for a few moments. I thought she might be getting sick. Then she straightened up and looked at me, her jaw set, her eyes blazing. “That can’t happen. I’ll do whatever it takes.”

  “Good. I’ll be in touch. And if you tell anyone about this, the deal’s off. Understood?”

  She nodded and got up to leave, then hesitated for a moment and turned back to me. “How did you find me?”

  “Trade secret.”

  She shook her head and managed a wisp of a smile. “Believe it or not, I’m glad you did.”

  I ordered a Mirror Pond and called Sean McKnight. “Richard Amis? Are you kidding me?” he said when I broke the news. “He came in to talk to me, maybe three or four times at the church. I didn’t know him, and he wasn’t a member of our church.”

  “How did he approach you?”

  “He said he was having a crisis of faith, but now that I think about it he kept turning the conversation back on me, asking me about my sense of integrity, my commitment to my church, saying how much he admired me. At one point he told me about his marital problems, and I responded by admitting to him that my marriage was weak, something I never admitted to anyone before.” McKnight sighed. “I remember thinking afterwards that the whole thing was a little strange, and I had this vague feeling of being manipulated. But I’d never counseled a psychiatrist before.”

  “He was sizing you up, seeing if your character would dictate giving up your money and your property to protect your family and the church. He sized up Maura just as cynically.”

  “Will she cooperate?”

  “I think so.” I told him about her sick child and how desperate she was for money.

  “I knew there had to be a reason she did this. She’s a good person, Cal. Amis took advantage of her.”

  “Yeah, well, we’ll see how this plays out. I’ll be in touch. Meanwhile, not a word about it to anyone. We’ve got a good shot here.”

  After McKnight left I sat back in the booth and mulled the situation over while I finished my beer. It looked like Maura was in, and the revelation that Amis was distributing drugs like candy might give me added leverage. I shook my head thinking about McKnight’s reaction. His feelings for Maura surfaced again, the woman who had literally destroyed life as he knew it. And now, after talking to her, it seemed she had feelings for Sean as well. It was crazy, but at the same time somehow touching.

  Shakespeare said love was merely madness. The man had a point.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  The next morning I had Nando on the phone. “That’s right, his name’s Dr. Richard D. Amis. He’s a psychiatrist practicing out of McMinnville. Search all your databases, do a full background check, the works. I want to know exactly who I’m dealing with.”

  I called Jim next and told him I wanted to check in with him and Candice. She’d left me a voice mail following her latest date with Daniels, and I wanted a firsthand account. We settled on lunch at Le Petit Truc, and Jim said to come early if I wanted to catch some of the barreling operation. When I set out that day, the bright autumn sky made me squint, and a bank of clouds along the Coast Range looked like a whitewashed, if somewhat fluffy, Great Wall of China. Seemingly overnight, the vineyards were flecked with reds, yellows, and gold, and soon there would be nothing but row upon row of stark, leafless vines on the hillsides, like orderly boneyards.

  I parked and went into the warehouse, figuring I would find Jim there. Archie plopped down at the entry without even bothering to sniff the air inside. Fermenting grapes were definitely not his thing. I saw Jim and Juan at the end of a long canyon of wine barrel racks. Jim was placing a stainless steel nozzle into the bung hole of a barrel. The attached hose led up to a fermenter tank hoisted on the tines of a forklift operated by Juan Cruz. Jim wore the lab coat that was more purple than white, and wine spatters dotted his forehead. When he saw me he broke into a broad smile. “History in the making,” he said. It was a smile like the Jim Kavanaugh of old, and I was glad to see it back.

  As I got closer, his smile faded. “Whoa, you’re more beat up than you admitted.”

  I shrugged, managing to smile. “Bloodied but unbowed.” I’d told him about the meeting with Isabel Rufino but hadn’t dwelled on the beating I’d taken. It was embarrassing, after all.

  He shook his head. “You’re going to rue the day you took me on as a client.”

  I shrugged again. “So how’s the barreling going?”

  “Great,” he said as he twisted a valve on the nozzle, and looking over at Juan, added, “She’s on. That should empty this fermenter.” He looked back at me and wrapped on the barrel with wine-stained knuckles. The staves were smooth and gracefully curved, the bare wood reminding me of the oak rounds I split the other day. “In France, it takes a seven-year apprenticeship before you can even begin to make these beauties. The technique hasn’t changed in three thousand years.” He wrapped the barrel again. “This wood’s over a hundred years old, and the staves are air-dried for at least four years before they’re used.”

  A sucking sound signaled that the fermenter had drained. Jim shut off the valve and disconnected the hose as Juan trundled off in the forklift to dispose of the empty fermenter and hoist up another full one. “Wine storage in oak be
gan with the Romans,” he went on, and then launched into the chemistry of aging pinot noir in oak that was cut short when Candice hollered from the other end of the aisle that he had a phone call. He hadn’t finished, but I heard enough to convince me that aging wine in one thousand dollar oak barrels wasn’t just a marketing gimmick.

  Juan shut off the forklift and declined a lunch invitation so he could run some errands. I followed Jim into the wine tasting room, where Candice sat scowling at her computer screen. “I picked up some sandwiches,” she said without looking up. “They’re on the bar.”

  When Jim closed the door to the adjoining office to take the call, I unwrapped a sandwich and took a seat across from her. She looked up and gasped. I suffered through another explanation of my bruises, then said, “Got your message. At least the food was good at the Joel Palmer House, huh?”

  She laughed. “Yeah, no breakthroughs, but the sturgeon with lobster mushrooms was scrumptious. But don’t be discouraged. I’m still laying the groundwork.” She glanced at the office door as if to confirm it was shut and said in a lowered tone, “I hope Jim doesn’t take this the wrong way, you know, like I’ve lost my virtue or something. Men can be so judgmental.”

  “Has he said anything?” She shook her head. “You don’t have to do this, you know. You can stop right now. We haven’t learned anythi—”

  Her eyes flashed daggers. “No, Cal. I didn’t tell you everything on the phone. I’m convinced something weird’s going on. He had more questions about the business, really bored in on that and what I knew about the case against Jim. I didn’t tell him anything, of course. We went back to his place, and I got a look at his study when I went to the bathroom. He keeps his computer in there and lots of papers and files. I’m going to check it out one of these nights after he lapses into a drunken stupor.”

  I stopped chewing. “Jesus, Candice. I don’t think that’s—”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll be careful.” She smiled slyly. “Post-coital slumber’s deep, especially after a bottle of Scotch.”

  I suppressed a laugh this time. “So, what’s weird about him?”

  She leaned forward and fixed me with her gaze. “He seems obsessed with Lori’s death. Back at his place, he threw back a couple more Scotches, and when I was leaving he grabbed me by the shoulders, his eyes all fierce and crazy looking. ‘How can you work for that man?’ he said. ‘He’s a murderer, Candice. He killed Lori because he was afraid he’d lose his winery when she divorced him. He’s a monster.’”

  “How did you respond to that?”

  “Well, I didn’t buy it, of course, but I didn’t show it. I just looked at him, you know, kind of in disbelief, as if that was the first time I’d heard anything like that. I want him to think he’s winning me over.” She shrugged. “This is probably just an act to get me to open up about Truc and the case.”

  I shook my head. “I still don’t like it.”

  She drew her mouth into a resolute line and set her jaw. “Cal, I’m not afraid of him. I’m taking him to the airport tomorrow night and picking him up on Sunday. The romance is blooming. Trust me.”

  I nodded reluctantly. There was no use arguing with this woman.

  At that point, Jim came back into the room. He sat down next to me and massaged his forehead with the fingers of both hands. “That was our liability insurance agent,” he said, looking up at Candice. “He’s a nervous wreck, asked me a bunch of questions. The jerk acts like he’s never had a client indicted for murder before.”

  “He can’t cancel our liquor control bond, can he?” Candice asked, an alarmed look spreading across her face. “That would shut us down.”

  Jim looked at me. I shrugged. “I don’t think so, but he might refuse to renew it, force you to go elsewhere.”

  Jim waved a hand in disgust. “He was vague, told me he’d get back to me.” He pulled his pant leg up, rolled his sock down, and began scratching the skin above his ankle bracelet. “This bloody thing’s driving me crazy. Itches all the time. Which reminds me, I had to cancel my east coast marketing trip and a couple of key winemaker dinners since I can’t leave the goddamn state now.”

  “And our distributors are pissed about that,” Candice chimed in.

  Jim took a sandwich and began eating. The room fell silent for a long time. I felt obliged to say something lawyerly and encouraging, but I just didn’t have much to offer. And my battered appearance seemed to be a metaphor for how the case was going. I finally broke the silence by mentioning that Nando Mendoza was still looking for Isabel and that I’d managed to hire one of the best blood spatter experts in the country. They weren’t confidence builders, but it’s all I had. What I didn’t say, and what I’m sure occurred to both of them, was that costs were rising, adding to the money hemorrhage.

  After we finished the sandwiches, I told Arch it was time to go. Candice stood up next to Jim, propped a forearm on his shoulder, and cocked her head toward him in a show of support. Jim looked at her, then me, and cracked the faintest of smiles. “Bloodied but unbowed. I like that. Pretty much sums up the situation.”

  Candice’s face grew serious. “We believe in you, Cal,” she said. Jim nodded to underscore the expression of confidence.

  Great. Just what I needed.

  I left without answering as a wave of self-doubt and dejection washed over me. I kept telling myself it’s not your fault Jim’s life is in free fall. You’re doing everything you can. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was letting him down, and Candice and Juan, for that matter. You’ve got to do more, a nagging voice kept insisting. But what?

  Back in law school we were warned not to become emotionally involved with our clients. That, I can tell you, is easier said than done, at least for me.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  “Dr. Amis practiced in the wine town of Healdsburg, California, before coming to Oregon,” Nando said. It was the next morning, and he was giving me a preliminary rundown on Amis as we ate breakfast at the Bijou Café in downtown Portland. “His record there was not unblemished,” he went on. “He was censored twice by the California Medical Board, once in 2002, and then again, six years later. He moved to Lafayette in 2009, to start anew, I assume.”

  “Censored for what?”

  Nando shrugged. “The records are sealed, which means the board did not see fit to pull his license. However, I did find a newspaper article stating he was being sued by a family in Santa Rosa after the suicide of their daughter. The family claimed Amis was too liberal in his distribution of anti-anxiety drugs to the young woman, but Amis’ lawyer denied any wrong-doing.”

  I nodded. “Sounds about right. Did the suit go forward?”

  Another shrug. “That was the only reference I found. Perhaps the matter was settled out of court. The background search is not complete. Something else may surface.”

  “How about Maura Conisson?” I said next. “How is the surveillance going?” I had asked Nando to have one of his investigators watch her apartment, not because I mistrusted her, but more because I felt responsible for her safety and didn’t trust Richard Amis in this regard.

  “She is safe and sound,” he reported.

  He filled me in on the search for Isabel Rufino next. “We found a young man who knows this woman and the two men she is associated with,” he began. “They are trying to break into the Portland heroin trade, we were told. Small time stuff along the Springwater Corridor.”

  “Good work,” I said enthusiastically.

  He raised a cautionary hand. “We were told they were living in a large campsite a mile or so from where you had you unfortunate encounter, but when we arrived there, we discovered it had just been dismantled by the police. The mayor is playing musical chairs with the homeless people.”

  I shook my head in frustration. “Damn. So close. Any hope of still finding her?”

  He nodded. “Yes, if they continue
to sell drugs in Portland, we will find her.”

  “How many hours do you have in this?”

  He paused for a moment. “Ten, give or take. Do you wish me to continue?”

  The meter was spinning, but I felt I had no choice. “Yeah. Keep going. I need to talk to her. And remember, Nando, no revenge-taking.”

  I left the Bijou that morning feeling better than I should have. I hadn’t learned anything new about Amis, and the search for Isabel would continue. But I believed Nando when he said he’d find her. As for Amis, at least I had something concrete to focus on—taking the bastard down. And maybe, just maybe, that would open a new path into Jim Kavanaugh’s case.

  ***

  There was only one person in the queue that morning at Caffeine Central, a young woman, maybe twenty-five, who had been given a one-month eviction notice at her apartment in the southeast neighborhood of Brooklyn. The city had put new rules in place requiring at least ninety days’ notice, but a lot of landlords hadn’t gotten the memo or hoped the tenant would move out without a fight. “I can’t find a place that fast,” she told me. The inked-in tail of what must have been a fierce dragon slithered from her left shirt sleeve, but her eyes were fringed with concern bordering on fear. “There’s nothing close in, I don’t have a car, and I just lost my job.”

  I wrote a letter while she waited that put the landlord on notice that if he followed through with his threat, she would be entitled to three month’s rent plus damages if she decided to sue. I printed it out on letterhead, signed it, and gave it to her in a stamped envelope to mail. “This should slow him down. If it doesn’t, let me know,” I told her. “Good luck finding a new place and a new job.”

  She left smiling, but we both knew this only postponed the inevitable—that she would probably wind up with a long commute from out near Gresham. Why, I wondered, must one person’s good fortune come at the expense of another’s? I had no answer, only a resolve to keep trying to make a difference in the small space around me.