Murder in Nice Read online

  MURDER IN NICE

  A Maggie Newberry Mystery

  Susan Kiernan-Lewis

  Copyright 2014

  San Marco Press/Atlanta

  Murder in NICE is the sixth installment in the popular Maggie Newberry Mystery Series.

  The French Riviera is the ultimate travel destination…unless murder is on the itinerary

  When Lanie Morrison—an old high school friend of Maggie’s—is murdered on the Côte d’Azur while auditioning for the hit TV travel show “Americans See Europe,” Maggie is forced to break away from village life and brand-new motherhood to find her killer.

  She soon learns that before she can find out who murdered Lanie, Maggie will need to uncover the terrible secret that was literally the death of her friend. When she does, Maggie learns the hard way that some things were better left alone.

  San Marco Press/Atlanta 2014

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Epilogue

  Prologue

  Lanie sipped her glass of red wine. The majestic Hotel Negresco filled the view from her small balcony at the Soho Hotel that faced the busy Promenade des Anglais.

  She noticed the familiar silhouette of the Negresco even before taking in the curve of the brilliantly blue Mediterranean as it outlined the dramatic stretch of umbrella-dotted beach. To be sure, she thought, the view must be every bit as remarkable from the Negresco—that grand dame of luxury and British superiority. But, as she’d asked Bob last spring when they’d booked the tour: would you rather stay in a landmark or gaze upon it?

  In the end she’d gotten her way, but not because the idiot cared one way or the other. She shook her head. How the man had risen to become the preeminent travel guru of the Western world she would never understand.

  The truth was, the man wouldn’t know a pourboire from a po’boy. Lanie retreated from the balcony.

  If one more person comes simpering up to me to say how nice Nice is, I shall vomit on their Louis Vuittons. She dropped her robe on the carpeted floor before walking to the bathroom, where she gave her appearance in the bathroom mirror a quick, satisfied look before turning off the water cascading into the bathtub. She poured herself another glass of wine, set the bottle on the floor next to the tub, and slipped into the soothing, fragrant hot water.

  After the tour’s recent drive through Provence, Lanie was officially sick of the smell of lavender, but if she wanted bubbles in her tub tonight she would have to endure it.

  God, the French think they invented the stuff…and everything else decent. She made a face as she leaned back into the tub and tried to get comfortable.

  As the tension left her shoulders she had to admit it hadn’t been a terrible trip so far. Bob had promised her the bulk of the presentations and he’d been true to his word—even without having to sleep with him. The thought was disgusting. Bob Randall was heavyset and continually flushed. She couldn’t imagine how they managed to color correct his face in post-production.

  She noticed, however, none of it stopped that whore Dee-Dee from coming on to him.

  The fact was, this trip to the south of France was critical to all of them—three travel guides vying for one slot as co-anchor on Randall’s crazy-successful video travelogue series, Americans Love Europe. The ten-day trip along the Côte d’Azur was the audition that would launch one of them—her, Dee-Dee or that skank Frog, Desiree—into the most coveted, career-making position in travel reporting.

  She took a sip of her wine and let out a sigh. Maybe she would sleep with Randall. With everything at stake, now was probably not the best time to get all moral and pure. If she was careful, Olivier need never know…

  She heard a sound from the bedroom.

  She held her breath and looked at the closed bathroom door, wine glass still in hand. What was it she heard? A muted creak from a floorboard giving way to a stealthy footstep? The sound of one of the pigeons venturing from the balcony into the room in search of crumbs? Did these old hotels creak and groan for no reason? She strained to listen, but the sound didn’t repeat. What was it Bob had said? There had been a recent upswing in attacks against tourists in Nice. Just enough to make her a little edgy…and ruin a perfectly nice bath. After a moment, she let out the breath she was holding. She likely hadn’t heard anything at all, she reasoned.

  When she heard the sound again, it registered in her brain as a definite creak…coming from the bedroom. She sat up straight in the tub. As she listened to the accelerated drubbing of her heart pounding in her ears, Lanie suddenly remembered she had given Bob a key. But was this the sort of thing he would do? Just enter her room without calling first?

  She stared at the closed bathroom door. There had been no reason to lock it. Frankly, she was surprised she had even bothered to shut it. Could she have imagined the sound a second time? Perhaps it was the noise from the street?

  She saw the doorknob of the bathroom door begin to slowly turn.

  “Hello?” she called, hearing the panic in her voice. “Who’s there?”

  When the door opened a dark figure filled the space, backlit against the balcony door.

  “Oh, it’s you,” Lanie said with a sigh. “Did you get lost?”

  The dark shape lunged at her. Lanie scrambled to stand up in the slick, soapy water and collided with her attacker, falling backward with a splash.

  She gasped and tried to gain purchase in the slippery interior, slick with soap. She clutched at the figure’s jacket. Her legs slipped out from under her and strong arms pushed Lanie backward. She tried again to get to her knees, but an explosion of pain slammed into her head. Bright vibrating stars obliterated her vision. They faded slowly to black, taking all sound with them. All, that is, but the soft popping of the lavender bubbles.

  One

  “He needs a hat, Laurent.” Maggie stood on the threshold of the French doors, her arms crossed, and watched her husband read the newspaper on the patio while jiggling the baby absentmindedly on his knee.

  “He’s fine,” Laurent said without looking up.

  “It’s too hot out here for him.” Maggie frowned and took a step onto the patio from the coolness of the house. As she often told her friends back home in Atlanta, summer in Provence alternated between blazing hot and so-hot-you-could-die.

  “Bon,” Laurent said, depositing the baby on the slate flooring under the table. “He is in the shade now.”

  “Laurent, no!” Maggie yelped as she ran to the baby and scooped him up off the ground. “There’s God knows what under there. Scorpions, rat droppings…”

  Laurent had yet to look away from his newspaper. “As you wish.”

  Maggie brushed the baby’s chubby knees in case any hint of sand or dirt had attached. She snuggled him close and kissed his neck, which prompted the nine-month-old to giggle.

  “Besides, you know he wouldn’t stay put,” she said, speaking more to little Jean-Michael, or Jem as Laurent had begun calling him. “Would you? He would be in the potager in a flash ripping up all your precious radishes and potatoes.”

  “I do not grow potatoes in the potager,” Laurent said, t
urning the page of his newspaper.

  “Well, whatever you grow in there.”

  “Besides, Monsieur Jem is more than welcome to help his papa in the potager. Even ripping up radishes would be more attention than his maman has paid it.”

  Laurent's potager—parsley and English thyme interspersed with radicchio, beets, spinach and radishes—was planted at the door leading into the house, ready to be plucked as quickly as it took the grill to get hot.

  “Gardening is not my thing,” Maggie said, kissing Jem’s head and bouncing him on her hip.

  Laurent finally looked up at her and grinned. “I love to see the two of you c’est ça.” He dropped the paper and held out his arms and Maggie moved to perch on his knee, baby still in her arms.

  She loved the smell of the two of them—her two men, she thought with a happy sigh. Laurent was citrus and tobacco—although she rarely saw him smoke—and little Jem had that indefinable baby-smell that made it impossible not to kiss his sweet head whenever he was in her arms.

  “Happy, chérie?” Laurent murmured into her neck.

  She felt a spasm of warmth race up her spine as his hands stroked her back through her thin blouse. “You know I am,” she whispered.

  It was true. She loved it here. But she hadn’t always. There had been many adjustments to living in a three-hundred-year-old house, not the least of which were the antiquated bathrooms.

  She smiled remembering how hard she’d lobbied for central air when she first arrived before accepting that closing the shutters during the hottest part of the day in summer typically cooled the house sufficiently.

  It had been a long and difficult adjustment, with all profits from the vineyard going back into the vineyard.

  “Hi, you two. I hope I’m not interrupting anything.”

  Maggie and Laurent looked up to see their friend and houseguest, Grace Van Sant, standing in the open French doors. Every time Maggie saw Grace she was amazed at her friend’s cool beauty. Grace once joked that her mother named her after Grace Kelly, but to see her now, impeccably dressed, languid in her blonde elegance and poise, it was no joke.

  Fact was, Grace’s mother had nailed it.

  Laurent stood up, slowly sliding Maggie to her feet. He was six foot four, a big man with a gentle touch and a silent tread. More than once, Maggie had marveled at how his grace and stealth belied his size.

  “If Grace is back,” Laurent said, gathering up his newspaper, “it must be time for lunch.”

  Grace walked onto the patio. “Glad I can serve as such a reliable timepiece for you, Laurent,” she said, smiling. “Is Zouzou still napping?”

  Laurent went into the house as Maggie pulled the portable baby monitor out of the pocket of her slacks and flipped it on. The sounds of the toddler’s snores competed with the static of the device.

  “Kind of defeats the purpose if you keep it turned off,” Grace remarked wryly.

  “Totally defeats the purpose of having a little peace and quiet,” Maggie said, handing the monitor to Grace, “if you have to listen to every breath and gurgle as they sleep. No offense, Grace. I assure you Zouzou’s snorts are more adorable than most.”

  Grace laughed and snapped the monitor off. “I take your point, darling.” She gently tweaked Jem’s plump cheek. “How’s this little one? Did he sleep at all?”

  Maggie sat down at the outdoor table Laurent had just left. “No, and it’s driving me crazy. Why won’t he sleep?”

  Grace sat down. “Well, I’ve heard the smart ones don’t.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Just what I’ve read.”

  Maggie looked into Jem’s bright blue eyes. When he saw he had her attention, his toothless grin widened and drool crept down the corner of his mouth.

  “Plenty of time to be an overachiever,” she said to him. “Take the opportunity of a nap when it’s offered.”

  “Good luck with that,” Grace said, leaning back into the cane chair, a tired smile on her lips.

  Maggie knew Grace was working hard to keep her spirits up and her mood bright. The divorce from Windsor was finalized the week before, and although Grace was the one who had pushed for it, it had been a long, hard spring while she coped with what the breakup truly meant for her and her little family of four. When Maggie and Laurent offered refuge for her and Zouzou at their home in Provence, Grace had gratefully accepted.

  “How’s the business coming?” Maggie asked. Grace was attempting to create an online children’s clothing boutique using Provençal and Parisian wares.

  “Oh, it’s a long way from coming. I guess I thought I’d just spend my days shopping for adorable clothes for Zouzou and Jemmy, clue in the rest of the world through Facebook or something, take my middle-man cut, and go back to having a life.”

  “And it’s not like that?”

  “I don’t know what it’s like, dearest,” Grace said wearily. “I’ve never had to work before and I don’t think I like it.”

  “A startup is the most work of all,” Maggie said.

  “Thanks, precious. You always know just what to say.”

  “Oh, here comes Laurent with the wine.”

  “Case in point,” Grace said with a smile.

  Laurent set down a tray of filled wine glasses and a bowl of olives.

  “One of yours, Laurent?” Grace asked as she took the wine glass he handed her.

  “Non,” he said. “Better.”

  “No way,” Maggie said, sipping from her glass. “Mmm-mm, but whoever made it, it’s good.”

  “Lunch in ten minutes,” Laurent said before leaving them again.

  “He is a man of few words, your papa,” Grace said to the baby.

  “That’s for sure.” Maggie let the dry fruitiness of the rosé fill her nostrils before taking the next sip. Laurent was trying to fine-tune her palate when it came to wine. She began coughing, the light tickle of the aroma overwhelming her.

  “You okay, sweetie? Choke on an olive pit?”

  “Very funny,” Maggie said, her eyes watering as she gained control of the coughing.

  “Well, how about your business?” Grace asked. “Selling any books?”

  Maggie shrugged and reached for one of the olives from the stoneware dish filled with olive oil. This one had a tiny ceramic cicada perched on the rim of it. “I think I sold one. No, make that two. I sold two last week.”

  “That many?”

  “Well, I won’t find out for sure until quarterly royalties come in, but my agent has told me not to get my hopes up.”

  “Is that because you haven’t earned out your advance yet?”

  “What advance? No, it’s because I haven’t sold any books yet.”

  “Well, that’s disappointing.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “Are you not promoting it enough?”

  “I don’t know, Grace, I was thinking of changing my name to rhyme with Rowling, but Laurent thinks it sounds desperate.”

  Grace laughed. “What does your publicist say?”

  “Oh, dear, dear Grace,” Maggie said, shaking her head. “She says the same thing Santa and the tooth fairy say: if only I existed I could really do things.”

  “You don’t have a publicist?”

  “It may surprise you to know that Stephen King and I are not one and the same.”

  “For that you may be thankful,” Grace said.

  “Nobody has a publicist unless they’re a well-known author, or unless they hire one themselves.”

  “Well, why not hire one?”

  Maggie scooted her chair closer to the table and looked over Grace’s shoulder at the door to the house. “Can I ask you to do something for me, Grace?”

  “Why do I get the idea this something has to do with not letting Laurent know?”

  “Because I don’t want Laurent to know.”

  Grace sighed. “Keeping secrets from Laurent never ends well. When will you learn that?”

  “I need you to find out something for me.
”

  “Darling, when it comes to winkling information out of your husband, I would imagine you were in the best position to do that.”

  “You’d think so, but he can always tell when I’m up to something. He won’t suspect you.”

  “Thank you for giving me the opportunity to damage my relationship with the one man besides my father who is still speaking to me.”

  “I really need your help with this, Grace.”

  “If you’re worried about another woman, Maggie, let me stop you right there, because if you don’t know that darling hunk of a man by now and how crazy he is about you—”

  “That’s not it.”

  “I should think not.”

  “I need you to find out…” Maggie dropped her voice and glanced again toward the house. Grace leaned in closer to catch her words.

  “…if we are having money troubles.”

  Grace frowned and leaned back in her chair. “That’s it?”

  “You don’t know the French if you think that is not a very big deal. And a very private deal.”

  “Even from you?”

  Maggie looked beyond the terrace in the direction of their vineyard. A platoon of olive and fig trees lined a pebbled path from the terrace leading to the fields. From there, the truffle oaks, thyme bushes and cypresses created a virtual park, framing the forty hectares of grape fields and emphatically demarcating the property.

  The vineyard was cut into four quadrants by two narrow dirt roads. The larger of the two—often used for tractors—sliced down the center of the vineyard past an ancient shed with an abandoned well at its threshold. It was a beautiful walk, Maggie mused, especially at sunset, and she and Laurent often enjoyed taking it with the dogs before dinner, when the final rays of sunlight draped the vineyard in a soft glow.

  “Laurent never talks about money,” Maggie said, turning back to Grace. “I have no idea where our money comes from or how.”

  “Seriously?”