Murder in Aix (The Maggie Newberry Mystery Series Book 5) Read online

  Down the hall and through the bars, Julia could hear the sounds of someone being beaten. The soft thuds of fists against flesh and the muted grunts of the victim filled the hallway as the entire cell wing fell silent to listen. Julia dug her nails into the palms of her hands and found herself wondering how Sybil had kept herself sane those last brutal weeks of her life. Or if she simply hadn’t bothered.

  * * * *

  Jacques’s accountant must be doing well, Maggie thought. His offices were ensconced comfortably at the top of an old—but not too old—mixed-use office building on the edge of the oldest section of Aix. Grateful for the smoothly functioning elevator, Maggie took a moment to enjoy the view from the sixth floor. From her vantage point in Yves Briande’s waiting room, she could see the Cours—majestically shaded by two perfect rows of stately plane trees—as it dissected the town. She watched the tourists and the shoppers meander up and down the famous boulevard, looking like colorful ants on a mission.

  She was the only one in the waiting room, and for that she was grateful. It was still a struggle to speak French—even conversational French, where the other party might be prone to lapse into colloquialism or the difficult to understand dialect of the region. While she had learned through tapes and Laurent—who spoke Parisian French—it was the unmanicured patois of St-Buvard’s shopkeepers who had largely taught her the bulk of what she knew of the language.

  “Madame Dernier?”

  Maggie shook herself out of her thoughts and stood to greet Yves Briande, Jacques’s accountant and the man who had every reason to want him dead. If ever she was grasping at straws, she thought as she stuck her hand out to shake his, this was it.

  “Yes, thank you, Monsieur Briande for seeing me. I’m afraid I probably need to make clear that I am not here for advice on my finances and I know it must have felt like that when I set up the appointment.

  Briande, a squat, florid man with stark white hair that he kept combed in a slick swath across his crown and forehead, frowned but motioned for her to take a seat in the waiting room. Maggie was relieved he wasn’t throwing her out.

  “What is it I may help you with, Madame?” he asked politely. He sat and steepled his hands together, resting them on his knee.

  “I heard that you were the accountant for Jacques Tatois and I was hoping I might discuss your dealings with him.”

  Maggie had decided on the walk over that revealing she was a friend of the accused who was looking to find out more about his accountant’s motive for killing Jacques was probably not her best opening gambit.

  “I see.”

  Maggie had to admit that Briande didn’t look like the kind of hothead who would nurse a grievance for months and then set up an innocent woman to take the fall while he took his revenge. Besides, as Laurent had pointed out with some impatience earlier in the week, typically acts of revenge demand the emotional satisfaction of watching your enemy die. Poisoning Jacques was as passive an act of murder as there was. He died alone, even the exact time of his demise undetermined. If you hated someone, what kind of satisfaction was there in that?

  “I’m not sure if you know that this is still an open investigation, Monsieur Briande?”

  “I was under the impression that the police had settled on a suspect.”

  “Yes, that’s true, but until she is convicted, the case remains open.”

  “I have to say I was amazed to hear that Madame Patrick had killed him,” Briande said, smoothing his comb-over with large, fat fingers.

  Maggie forced herself not to respond to his words. If he found out she was friends with Julia, he would certainly refuse to talk with her.

  “I guess everyone was. The police are investigating whether or not there was a financial benefit to the murder,” she lied.

  Briande frowned. “Financial? That would surprise me. Jacques was broke.”

  “Well, maybe the killer…Madame Patrick…wasn’t aware of that. It could be the reason she…you know…”

  Briande laughed. “I am sure Madame Patrick—who had a personal relationship with Jacques—had many other reasons why she might want him dead. As would anyone who knew him very well. But ignorance of his financial situation wasn’t likely.”

  “Oh, yes? And why is that?” Maggie smiled encouragingly at him. She was trying so hard to get him to reference Jacques’s public accusation against him. She had to admit, he was smooth. If he was the killer, he didn’t seem a bit concerned that anyone was probing about this very damning incident—a powerful motive if there ever was one.

  “Like so many people last fall, Monsieur Tatois—how is it you Americans so delightfully put it?—lost his shirt on the Mistral Promis. I, myself, bet and lost, but unlike Monsieur Tatois, I know restraint and did not wager more than I could afford to lose.”

  Annoyed that the conversation was going down a road other than the one she had planned, Maggie reminded herself how much gold she had often uncovered when interviews took on a life of their own and rerouted her expectations.

  “The Mistral Promis?” she prompted.

  “Ahhh! How can it be that you have not heard of it?” Briande shook his head and clapped his knees with both hands in as close an approximation of delight as Maggie had ever seen in a grown man. “Well, as I am sure you must know, a Frenchman will bet on anything. And in winegrowing country, the bookmakers here enjoy a long and profitable history of climate betting.”

  “People bet on when the weather will turn or when is the best time to harvest?”

  “Yes, certainly there are always bets like that, but the Mistral Promis was very special. Created by bookmakers in Marseille, it made its way to Aix last year for the first time and was received with much enthusiasm.”

  “So what exactly is the Mistral Promis?”

  “It was an attempt to guess the exact date the Mistral would come to Provence in last year’s harvest.”

  “And when was it?”

  Briande shrugged. “I don’t remember. It was, however, much later than anyone had any memory of it ever happening before.”

  “So everyone in town bet and everyone lost.”

  “C’est ça.” That’s right.

  “And Jacques bet all his money and lost it all.”

  “I am sure I break no client privilege by confirming that to you.”

  “Were you his accountant at the time of his death?”

  A look passed over his face. “No, but I was his accountant at the time he lost all his money and surely that is more pertinent?”

  “And you’re saying it was this wide-spread betting phenomenon that was responsible for Jacques losing all his money.”

  “It was on the news. On the television. There was virtually no one who escaped—many people were ruined that day. I am, in fact, reliably informed that your own husband bet significantly on the Mistral Promis. His losses must have been considerable. Tu sais?”

  Maggie’s hand flew to her mouth to stifle her gasp before she could stop it.

  Laurent? Gambling?

  “I see this is news to you, Madame,” Briande said, a coy smile on his lips. “We men must not tell our wives every little thing, n’est pas?”

  “You know my husband?” Maggie was astonished to hear her voice sounded normal. Her heart was racing and she had a nearly uncontrollable urge to call Laurent straightaway to find out if this was true.

  If it was, it meant he had lied to her. Lied by way of omission. The time-honored road to dishonesty practiced by…a niggling image of herself attempting to re-define the connotation of a stranger in order to circumvent her promise to Laurent came uncomfortably to mind.

  “We are not acquaintances in that way,” Briande was saying. “I have met him upon occasion, but there is no one in St-Buvard—or indeed in Aix-en-Provence—who does not know the vigneron criminel and his Americaine wife.”

  If Maggie hadn’t already been sitting, she would certainly need to now. Did Laurent know this? Did he know they were infamous in the region? Did he know his
criminal past was widely spoken of?

  In any event, the interview was over. Maggie struggled to her feet. She felt a trickle of perspiration inch its way down her back and, autumn or not, she felt overly warm and breathless. She shook hands with Briande, noting his amusement at her discomfiture. She had come with the intention of putting him on a list of possible suspects that might edge Julia out of pole position.

  She left with a very big bone to pick with her husband.

  Chapter Twelve

  Annette watched the pickers stroll down the long winding rows of the vineyard. It was well past lunchtime but they were obviously breaking for a meal in one of the clearings at the north perimeter of the old stonewall that enclosed the vineyard. It had not surprised her to discover that the American woman owned a large mas in Provence. It was practically a cliché—the English and the Americans swooping in to buy great tracts of land in order to impress their friends; living in quaint stone houses that had stood, some of them, for hundreds of years. Bragging rights. To have that kind of money! She watched the large man move among the workers. At first she thought he was the foreman, normally an owner didn’t need to get so dirty, but she could see by the way they deferred to him—all of them—that it must be his vineyard.

  She knew who he was—who they both were. Wealthy outsiders. Here to pretend to be a kind of people that they were not. Playing a game for their own amusement. The size of the estate was considerable. To play such a game of this magnitude, they must be rich indeed. And the rich always commanded the tune and the dance. Her thoughts flitted briefly to Michelle. Would money really solve her problems? Could money possibly make her less angry at the world?

  She lit a cigarette and tossed her lighter on the car seat next to her. However rich or powerful these people were, they would not be allowed to interfere with what had been put into motion. She heard the crunch of gravel from a long distance away and turned her focus away from the fields and to the end of the estate’s driveway where she would be able to clearly see the American as she approached. In her rear view mirror, she could see the big man in the field was standing with his hands on his hips, looking in her direction. She smiled. As well he might. He saw a strange car in his driveway. He would be wondering.

  As the American’s car came into view, Annette threw her cigarette out of the window and stepped out of the car. She would need to be quick. The master of the house was indeed curious, and with a very pregnant wife likely overly protective too. She kept the keys firmly in her hand as she waited for the car to come to a stop next to hers. The American was out of the car almost before it was completely stopped. She was younger than Annette had thought, and prettier.

  It didn’t matter.

  “Madame Dernier?” she said, her voice imperious and cold.

  The American came around the car to face her without their vehicles between them. Annette couldn’t help but notice that she glanced to the fields where her husband must still be watching.

  “And you are?”

  The American’s French sounded like crows fighting over a chicken bone. It was physically painful to hear her speak. Annette held up her hand. “I know enough English to spare both of us any more discomfort with your attempts to speak French. I will be brief. I am Annette Tatois, the wife of the man your English friend murdered.”

  The American made a most unpleasant—almost comical—face and said, “You mean ex-wife, I think.”

  The effrontery! Michelle was at least right about one thing. This cochon would ruin everything if given the chance. Annette forced herself to ignore the comment.

  “I must insist that you stay away from my daughter and my aunt, Lily Tatois. If you refuse, I will have no recourse but to have you arrested.”

  The woman made a very unladylike sound. “On what charges? You can’t have me arrested for speaking to people.”

  “No?” How was it the cochon was so bold? She looked ready to deliver her vache at any moment, yet she faced Annette as confidently as if she had just stepped down from a Paris catwalk. “I have friends in the police.” She noticed that Madame Dernier’s eyes had caught a movement over Annette’s shoulder. The husband must be approaching.

  Annette turned and slipped into the driver’s seat of her car and jammed the keys into the ignition. From this direction she could see confirmation of what she had suspected. Dernier was striding toward the house and would reach them within seconds. Annette started the car up with a roar, making the American jump. As she turned to back the car up the long drive, she spoke loudly out of the open driver’s side window.

  “If you do not care for yourself, Madame,” she said. “Perhaps you will care for your friend. As bad as you think it is for her right now, I promise you, I can make it much, much worse for her.”

  Just as he reached them, Annette sped backward down the drive, enjoying the sight of gravel from her tires spraying the two figures as she did.

  The night had not begun well at all.

  When Grace walked to Danielle and Jean-Luc’s farmhouse next door—nearly a mile from Domaine St-Buvard—to retrieve Zou-zou, she had been invited to spend the night. It was clear to any and all who could see that the child had become attached to Danielle and no doubt had begged to stay. Grace, probably thinking Maggie and Laurent could use some alone time, accepted the invitation.

  Now Maggie sat alone in her dining room, fuming, with nothing to distract her from the showdown she had every intention of having with Laurent as soon as he returned from the field. The pickers were staying later and later each day. Often they worked long into the evening, as it was cooler and more pleasant to work at night. Laurent had set up outdoor lighting along the outer perimeter of the vineyard.

  When he finally came into the kitchen, well past ten o’clock, his face sunburned and his shoulders sloping from his long day, she was ready for him. Before he even had a chance to throw down the cloth that he had used to wipe the grime of the day from his face, she confronted him.

  “Can you talk to me about the Mistral Promis?”

  “Comment?” He frowned. The confusion—if there was any—didn’t last long. She could see the work going on behind his eyes as he quickly assessed the situation. “What do you wish to know?” he responded drily before turning to the sink to wash his hands.

  “It’s true, then? You gambled on the weather? You wagered a lot of money guessing on when the mistral would come through last year?”

  Laurent took his time to dry his hands and reach for a clean wineglass before answering. “Oui. So?”

  “Did you lose much?”

  He poured his wine and held it up to the light to examine its color. He looked at her over the rim as he drank. “Why are you asking me this?” he asked, regarding her coolly.

  “You don’t think this is information that might be important for me to know?”

  Maddingly, he shrugged. “If it was, I would have told you.”

  “You don’t think losing whatever princely sum you lost, gambling, involved me?”

  “I think I just answered that. Maggie, I am tired. It has been a long day.”

  A needle of guilt touched her. Whenever she was late getting home he always had a hot meal ready for her. Always. She glanced at the cold oven, still spotless from his ministrations this morning. “Are you hungry?”

  He smiled at her. “Non, chérie. I ate in the field.”

  “Can I ask you how much we lost?”

  Laurent sighed heavily. “Has your lifestyle changed? Did we not still fly to Atlanta this year? Are we not still doing renovations in the house for the baby’s room?”

  Feeling like her concerns were being batted away like an annoying fly, Maggie fought down the frustration that was building in her chest. “It’s not the gambling as much as the fact that you kept it a secret. I heard today that this Mistral Promis was a huge deal and that practically everybody in Provence was ruined by it.”

  “That is obviously an exaggeration.”

  “I heard that it wip
ed out the fortunes of many men. Is that an exaggeration?”

  “From whom did you hear this?”

  Maggie hesitated. She stared at him as if she hadn’t understood his question.

  “Maggie?”

  “It doesn’t matter from whom,” she said. “The point is you kept a secret from me. You understand the concept of lying by omission?”

  “I more than anyone,” he said.

  “What is that supposed to mean?” But her indignant tone was softened by her untimely realization of her many attempts in the past to circumvent Laurent by not telling him the whole truth. The look on Laurent’s face plainly showed he was thinking the same thing. “Okay, fine,” she said instead. “But it’s still upsetting. To be told by a total stranger something so significant about my husband—and I knew nothing about it.”

  “Again, who was this total stranger?” Laurent looked a lot less playful now and Maggie realized the showdown had taken a nauseating U-turn.

  Crap. If she said no one—which was her first and strongest inclination—she would be caught in a bald-faced lie and there it was. She pulled up a kitchen chair and sank into it. Maybe the baby was stealing blood from her brain or something. She used to be a whole lot faster than this.

  “I met with Yves Briande today.”

  Laurent raised an eyebrow.

  “Jacques’s accountant,” she said.

  “The one Jean-Luc told me about,” he said. His brows knit together and she could see he was not pleased. “Doesn’t he qualify as a stranger? And did we not agree you would not approach strangers related to this case?”