Murder on the Vine Read online

  ALSO BY THE AUTHOR

  Murder in Chianti

  The Bitter Taste of Murder

  Copyright © 2022 by Camilla Trinchieri

  This is a work of fiction. The characters, dialogue, and incidents depicted are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Published by

  Soho Press, Inc.

  227 W 17th Street

  New York, NY 10011

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Trinchieri, Camilla, author.

  Title: Murder on the vine / Camilla Trinchieri.

  Description: New York, NY : Soho Crime/Soho Press, Inc., [2022] |

  Series: The Tuscan Mysteries ; 3

  Identifiers: LCCN 2022001082

  ISBN 978-1-64129-366-2

  eISBN 978-1-64129-367-9

  Classification: LCC PS3553.R435 M875 2020 | DDC 813/.54--dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022001082

  Interior design by Janine Agro, Soho Press, Inc.

  Printed in the United States of America

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  A NOTE

  Many people live in my Tuscan series. Some, like Nico, Perillo and Daniele are the backbone of the mysteries. Some, like Tilde, Nelli and Stella are vital to those three, but they also exist on their own. They are part of the world I have stepped into. They live in Gravigna, Greve or other villages. They belong. So do the people who step in and out of the stories. Some appear unbidden, wanting their moment. I let them in so that I can be part of this world that is slowly coming alive in my head. I want that world to come alive for you too. I know, so many foreign names to keep track of. You can get lost. I want you to stay with me and so, for this third Tuscan mystery I have added a list of characters at the back of the book to help. I hope you enjoy the trip.

  Thank you,

  Camilla Trinchieri

  ONE

  Gravigna, a small town in the Chianti hills of Tuscany A Sunday in mid-October, 10:35 A.M.

  Nico Doyle sat on the balcony of his small, rented farmhouse dressed in his running shorts, a faded Yankees T-shirt, his feet bare, eating the last of his toast. The overbearing summer heat had finally retreated, leaving warm days and cool nights. The three swallows that slept between the wooden beams on the balcony ceiling had already flown off on their long migration to South Africa, leaving their empty nests waiting to be refilled in the spring.

  He had a free day ahead of him. Tilde didn’t expect him at Sotto Il Fico until dinnertime. Looking out at a view that still surprised him, made whatever sadness he had from the past disappear. The colors of an Italian autumn were mostly muted—varying shades of yellows, browns, grays, faded greens. Italian maple trees did not offer eye-stopping splashes of New England red. The only strong color came from the deep dark green of the cypress trees in the distance.

  Nearby the leaves of his landlord’s olive trees glinted silver in the bright sun. Beyond the grove were neat rows of Ferriello vines, their leaves yellowed, their grapes already picked by hand. The harvesting of the olives would begin at the end of the month. Last year Nico had joined his landlord and the day workers for the harvest. Perched on an ancient wooden ladder, he’d shaken branches, hand-picked clingers, showering the green fruit onto the black nets below. He looked forward to helping out this year too. Payback was two bottles of the best olive oil he’d ever tasted.

  A series of shots rang out from the woods behind the farmhouse. The hunting season was open and the quiet of weekends was now pockmarked with rifle shots. The sound made Nico look over at the small table where Perillo, maresciallo dei carabinieri of the Greve-in-Chianti station, was downing his third espresso. They had met just over a year ago thanks to the sound of a single shot followed by a dog’s yelping that had sent Nico running into the woods. He’d adopted the dog. OneWag was now asleep at his feet. The maresciallo had become a friend.

  “I never asked you,” Nico said. “Do you hunt?”

  Perillo shook his head. “I don’t see the fun in it.” He’d popped in on Nico without calling first. Nico had been surprised to find him at his doorstep early on a Sunday morning but had welcomed him in with a smile and immediately offered him breakfast. Nico’s dog had greeted him with a swish of his tail and a good sniff at his shoes.

  Perillo pushed his empty plate aside and reached for his pack of cigarettes. “You’re a good man for taking me in and feeding me. It’s not the bacon and eggs breakfast you once promised”—Perillo tapped the unfiltered cigarette on the table—“but I’ll concede toast slathered with ricotta and acacia honey is very good.”

  Nico reached down to pick up a bowl filled with new potatoes sitting next to OneWag. “I didn’t know you were coming.” For a moment, the maresciallo’s serious expression had led Nico to think something bad had happened, but Perillo had eaten breakfast and said nothing. Nico knew that whatever was on his friend’s mind would eventually come out.

  “What are you going to do with all those potatoes?” Perillo asked. Nico was always trying to come up with new recipes for the restaurant run by Tilde, his dead wife’s cousin. It was an odd hobby for an ex-homicide detective, Perillo thought, but then being an unpaid waiter at the restaurant was even odder.

  “I’m going to peel them,” Nico said, “and I know not to ask for your help.”

  “That is an unfair assessment of our friendship.” Perillo reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out his rolled-up newspaper. “For you, I will spread this yet unread paper at your feet to catch the peelings.”

  “Very generous of you, Maresciallo.”

  Perillo sat back in his chair, fingering his cigarette. He wasn’t in the best of moods, hadn’t been for weeks now. It was Ivana’s idea to talk to Nico. As an American and some years older, Nico would have a different perspective.

  From under the table, OneWag eyed the spread-out newspaper. He raised his snout and sniffed. The paper must have given off a warm smell because the small dog took a few steps and curled himself into a ball on top of it.

  “Ehi, Rocco, get off.” Perillo shook one edge of the paper to get the dog to move. He’d given OneWag a name he could pronounce. The dog, being smart, answered to both names. He now gave the maresciallo his Do I know you? stare. He didn’t budge. Paper was much warmer than tile.

  “It’s okay,” Nico said. “He’ll get covered with potato skins. That’ll teach him.”

  “O Sole Mio” rang out from the suede jacket hanging on the back of Perillo’s chair. He reached for it, checked who was calling and swept his finger over the screen. “Vince, didn’t I tell you I was taking the morning off?” Perillo put the phone on speaker.

  “You did, Maresciallo, but a Signorina Benati insisted I call you.”

  “For what reason?”

  “Her bartender has been missing for three days.”

  “Take down the details, tell her we’ll look into it, then send her home.”

  “She won’t go until she talks to you. She says you met her last September. She’s the manager of the Hotel Bella Vista.”

  “Of course, I remember her. Offer her a coffee from the bar. I’ll be there in half an hour.” He slipped the phone back into his jacket pocket.

  “Nothing serious, I hope,” Nico said.

  “The last time we went looking for someone, the missing woman had decided to solve a fight with her husband by taking off to Paris for a week. Keep your fingers crossed that it’s not more serious than that.” Perillo eyed the cigarette he was still holding for a few seconds, then slipped it back in the pack.

  Nico noticed but didn’t say anything. He’d never seen Perillo, a heavy
smoker, put a cigarette away before.

  “I’m thinking it would be good for me to stop smoking,” Perillo announced, as if reading Nico’s thoughts.

  Nico dropped the peeled potato back in the colander and picked up another one. “Excellent thinking.”

  Perillo kept staring at the cigarette pack. “It takes courage.”

  Both quitting and voicing his worries, Nico thought. “Far less courage than hunting down a murderer.”

  Perillo leaned forward, dropping his elbows on his knees. “I did a terrible job with the last one.”

  “You found the guilty party.”

  Perillo shook his head. “I’ve become a man I don’t like.”

  A strong statement from a man who came across as very sure of himself, sometimes even pompous. Nico dropped his peeler in the colander and turned to look directly at Perillo. “What man is that?”

  “A man who eats and smokes too much, who worries about getting old.” Perillo looked down at his feet. “I don’t trust my own capacity to move forward. I’m full of doubts. I don’t recognize myself.”

  “Where I’m from, we call that a midlife crisis.”

  “You had this crisis?” Perillo didn’t wait for an answer. “Did it make you feel like a lesser person?”

  “Not lesser, just different. I did go through a period of obsessing about the changes in my body and my brain, then Rita got sick. I quickly realized how lucky I was to just be alive.”

  The idea of something happening to Ivana made Perillo shiver. She had become his axis. “I feel like a weakling.”

  “Whenever my thinning hair or a new ache gets me down,” Nico said, “I remind myself that having most of my wits still with me is pretty damn fantastic.”

  Perillo looked out on the olive grove, the fields beyond, thinking of Ivana soon coming home from Mass, starting to cook the Sunday meal, waiting for him. Thinking of Signorina Benati waiting for him at the station. Nico was right. What he had was good: a wonderful woman who still put up with him, a job he enjoyed, a good friend in Nico. He would need to remind himself when the doubts crept back in, as he was sure they would. “Thank you, Nico. You’ve lifted my spirits.” Perillo stood up. “Tell me the truth—I wasn’t really so ineffective with the last murder, was I?”

  Nico picked up his peeler and a potato. “Not at all. You led a team effort with great tenacity and intelligence.” He was exaggerating a bit. Daniele, Perillo’s right-hand man, had been the tenacious one. “The Three Musketeers, isn’t that what Ivana called us?”

  Relief spread across Perillo’s face. “One for all. All for one. Thanks again for breakfast and the boost. I have to get back to Greve.”

  “You’re welcome. I may not have any bacon in the refrigerator, but I’ve always got ears on me.”

  “I’m counting on that. I’ll see myself out. Ciao, Rocco.”

  OneWag conceded a tail swish.

  As the sun continued to rise and spread light over the olive grove, Nico turned his mind to a happier subject—a surprise for his adopted family at Sotto Il Fico—thinly sliced potatoes layered with crumbled sausages, sliced onions, Parmigiano, a sprinkling of rosemary and a sweep of olive oil.

  LAURA BENATI STOOD UP from the bench outside of the maresciallo’s office as Perillo rushed into the station. He was a short, stocky man, with a handsome face, a strong nose, lots of black hair and appealing dark eyes. The first and last time she had seen him, he had shown up at the hotel in uniform, asking questions after a man had been murdered in Gravigna. Afraid his presence would upset the guests, she had tried to get rid of him as quickly as possible, had even fed him a lie. Now she was the one who needed his help. She hoped he would be kinder than she had been.

  Laura stood up and extended her hand as Perillo came near. “Thank you so much for coming.”

  Perillo took the woman’s hand and studied her for a moment. She was somewhere in her late twenties, with a lovely pale face and rounded cheeks. Last year she had worn her wavy blond hair loose and something very pretty. Why did he remember those details and not her first name? Today she wore a severe dark blue dress, and her hair was pulled back into a tight bun. Perillo came back to the present and shook her hand finally. “Ah, yes, Signorina Benati, I remember you well.”

  “I’m sorry I’ve interrupted your Sunday, but I’ve learned that when you have a problem it’s always best to deal with the top.”

  “Absolutely,” Perillo said with a smile, enjoying the small ego boost. He opened the door to his office and indicated for her to enter first.

  Laura looked around the large room. There were only three chairs—a straight metal chair in the back next to a computer, a wooden armchair behind a large ink-stained wooden desk in the center of the room, and directly in front of the desk, the straight one she now sat in.

  Perillo had followed her in. “You want to make a missing person report,” he said as he lowered himself into the armchair. “Is that right?”

  “Yes. Cesare has been gone three days now. He didn’t—”

  Perillo raised his hand to stop her from going on while he took out a notepad from his desk drawer. “Please be patient with me, Signorina Benati. My computer scribe, Brigadiere Donato, is filling his eyes with art in Florence this Sunday. It is up to me to write down your details.” He didn’t trust gum-chewing Vince to get it all down correctly and Dino was painfully slow.

  “A tape recorder is faster,” Laura said with an authoritative tone.

  Perillo bristled. Daniele had been trying to convince him to tape interviews, but tapes could be cut, erased, the machine could break down. Besides, he couldn’t stand to listen to his voice. He poised his pen on his notebook. “The name of the missing person?”

  Patience, Laura thought. Her very sensible suggestion had met deaf ears. “Cesare Rinaldi. You must remember him. You interviewed him last year. He’s the bartender at the hotel. He didn’t show up for work on Friday. He’s never missed a day since I started working at the hotel eight years ago.”

  Perillo remembered the old man with his crafty eyes, a thin, sculpted face and long white hair pulled back in a ponytail. He’d come away from talking to Cesare convinced the bartender knew more than he’d told. “He is obviously a man devoted to his work. If I remember correctly, he’s been at the hotel since he was a kid.”

  Laura shifted in her chair. “I’m sorry, that’s not true.”

  “Isn’t that what you told me?”

  “Your presence at the hotel made me nervous, and, without thinking, I repeated what Cesare always tells his guests. He likes to impress them with his devotion to the job. It gets him good tips.”

  “Lying to a maresciallo is never a good idea, especially during a murder investigation.”

  “I know. I apologize.”

  Perillo gave her a hard stare. Her lie did not say good things about her. She lowered her eyes. He put pen to paper.

  “Please give me a detailed description—age, color of eyes, hair, his height, build, etcetera.”

  “I have it right here.” Laura handed Perillo the envelope she’d been clutching. “I’ve written it all down to save time. I’ve included a photo of Cesare.” She tightened her jaw, angry at herself and filled with guilt. Not for the lie. For waiting too long to come here. What if he’d had a heart attack, or fallen, hurt his head and was now lying in a ditch, unable to move?

  Perillo extracted the folded sheet of paper from the envelope. The photograph landed facedown on the desk. He turned it over. Cesare looked back at him with a smile, his arm around an equally happy Signorina Benati. They were both holding flutes filled with prosecco or champagne. A flowered garden in the background. “You were celebrating something?”

  A wistful look slid across Laura’s face. “His eightieth birthday, last year. We gave him a party in the back garden of the hotel.”

  Perillo flipped the photograph and placed it on his desk. The missing man’s obvious happiness made him uncomfortable. Perillo knew he wouldn’t be happy turning
eighty. He unfolded the sheet of paper and had to narrow his eyes to read. Getting old was humiliating and scary. “Thank you, Signorina Benati. You’ve been very thorough.” All of Cesare’s physical details were there. Even what he had worn the last time she had seen him. No wife, girlfriend or boyfriend. A nephew, Pietro Rinaldi, was the only relative. His phone number was written next to his name. Cesare is a loner, she had written at the end.

  Laura sat on the edge of her chair, leaning as close to Perillo as his desk allowed. “Can you please send out your men to find him? I’m afraid something bad has happened to him.”

  Perillo saw the care and worry on her face. Was Signorina Benati just a compassionate soul, or did she love this old man? he wondered. Cesare may have left some clues she misunderstood. In the Paris case, the husband had not understood why his wife’s best clothes were gone. “First, tell me what you have done to find him, so we don’t lose time.”

  “Cesare is supposed to check in for work at four in the afternoon. On Friday, when five o’clock came around and he still hadn’t shown up, I called him. He didn’t answer and I left a message. I took over at the bar and called every half hour. I got annoyed, then angry. His not showing up had never happened before and I didn’t have a substitute ready. By the time I closed the bar at midnight I was tired and thought he may have taken the day off to calm down.”

  “Calm down?”

  “There was an incident at the bar on Thursday night. Cesare spilled a tray of drinks on a hotel guest. The guest then complained to me that Cesare had done it on purpose and did not apologize. I apologized on Cesare’s behalf and the hotel’s, didn’t charge him for the hefty bar bill, and that was the end of it.”

  “Did you get Cesare’s version of the event?”

  “I didn’t try. I wanted to give him time. That guest is one of those entitled men who snap their fingers at the help. I had to stop myself from snapping at him several times.”

  “The name of this guest?”

  She hesitated. She shouldn’t have spoken ill of him.