Page 12

It’s well past nightfall when I return to the house. The family has finished their dinner already, and the children are both in their rooms. If I were in a better frame of mind, I would visit with each of them and talk about their day, but I’m too overwhelmed by what happened at the park to be up to conversation. What I want more than anything is a long shower and a restful night.

Alas, it’s not to be. The children are in their rooms, but Victoria Cartwright is alone in the great room. A half-open bottle of wine sits on the coffee table in front of her, and by the looks of it, she’s responsible for the half that’s missing.

She sees me and smiles, lifting her wineglass which is nearly empty, a good thing since she doesn’t hold it steadily. “Mary! What a pleasant surprise! Come, join me.”

“Oh, I appreciate, Victoria, but I’m very—”

“Come on. I insist. I have no one to talk to but my family, and I can’t really talk to them.” She leans forward and lifts the bottle. “There’s wine in it for you. Don’t worry, it’s not from the estate.”

I remember at the last second that I shouldn’t understand why she says that. I frown and ask, “Pardon?”

She flips her hand. “Never mind. Come sit with me. Please.”

I sigh inwardly and join her on the couch. She heads to the kitchen for another glass, swaying a little on her feet but not stumbling. When she returns, she has a second bottle of wine. I can’t imagine she’ll last long enough to open it, but I don’t say anything. I’m too exhausted to be her moral center.

“O kay !” she says cheerily, pouring the wine. Her pour is outstanding, her hands perfectly steady in spite of the alcohol. I suppose nearly five decades of experience makes up for a bit of intoxication.

She hands me a glass and says, “So karma’s a bitch, isn’t it?”

“So I hear.”

I sip my wine. It’s quite lovely, but I’m not sure I should compliment it since she points out that it’s not one of their wines.

“You make a mistake and you think you can get away with it, and you do. For a while. Hell, for a really, really, really long time. Then karma shows up, and”—she makes a popping noise and drops down into her chair—“Everything falls apart.”

I think of my “encounter” with my sister earlier today and nod. “The past has a way of catching up with us whether we want it to or not.”

She chuckles bitterly. “You can say that again.”

She falls silent for a while. I sip more of my wine, then notice that she’s not drinking. She’s only staring moodily into the fireplace. It’s dark right now, and when the silence becomes too awkward, I stand and offer to build a fire.

“Suit yourself. It’s propane, so you just need to add the logs, press the ignition and turn the light. Kind of like a barbecue.”

I place two of the available logs into the fire and soon, a roaring flame is warming the room. Remarkably, it actually manages to soothe me a little.

It seems to soothe Victoria as well, at least enough for her to talk some more. “It wasn’t even that much of a mistake, either. Just a little bit of stupidity in my twenties. It lasted… like seven months, I think?” She laughs. “I can’t even remember.”

I know exactly what she’s talking about, but I can’t let on that I’m aware of her affair with Robert Cartwright, so I ask, “What lasted seven months?”

“Stupidity,” she replies vaguely. “I married Parker young, and I got scared that I had chained myself to the wrong man. I convinced myself that I didn’t love him, that I just wanted his money, that the sex was bad. It wasn’t bad. It was good. Not mindblowing, but I mean, it was good enough.”

I sip more of the wine. It’s starting to take effect, which is probably a good thing considering the direction of this conversation. I’m starting to regret letting her talk me into listening to this.

She sighs. “Anyway, I did something stupid, felt bad about it, and never did it again. And I really didn’t. I mean, for the next twenty-one years, I never did anything . I was a saint to that man.”

She finally drinks her wine, swallowing the entire glass in one gulp. Her pour is a little less steady when she refills her glass.

I try for something comforting to say. “So many people who marry young make similar mistakes. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. You realized you were wrong and changed your behavior. You don’t need to feel guilty.”

She reacts differently from what I expect. She points at me. "Exactly. I shouldn’t have to feel guilty. For God’s sake, it was just a fling when we were younger. Why the hell is everyone—is everything… Why the hell is everything falling apart around me?”

Her words are slurring badly now. I think this last glass will leave her prostrate. “Perhaps you should lie down for a moment, Victoria.”

She giggles at that, laughing until she’s red-faced and tears are streaming down her eyes. “Oh, Mary. You’re so sweet. I’m drunk on purpose. I intend to be absolutely shitfaced right now.”

I think you’ve accomplished that , I don’t say.

“Did you know that the wine was poisoned?”

It's a testament to her inebriated state and my frayed nerves that, for a split second, I'm terrified that she means the wine I'm drinking. A powerful shiver runs through my body before I remember the wine from the tasting last week.

“Oh. Which wine?” I ask, remembering that I don’t know about the Listeria .

“The Pinot from the tasting last week. Not all of it, I guess. Just three of the barrels. The rest of them were fine. That’s why we’re not puking our guts up.”

I have my wineglass to my lips when she says that, but the image her words conjure up cause my stomach to turn, so I take it away. “I’m grateful for that,” I reply drily.

“Yeah, me too. Kind of wish we hadn’t gotten ten different prestigious wine critics violently ill, but hey, that’s the price you pay, right?”

“I’m very sorry to hear that, ma’am. Is everyone all right?”

"No one's going to die if that's what you mean. But unless Julian knows where all the skeletons are buried, we're going to deal with a scandal that's going to ruin this vineyard. I mean, the company will be fine. But this vineyard…” She looks out the window at the vines. “Those grapes can trace their lineage back to the very first vines that grew on this estate over one hundred sixty years ago. There’s history here. There’s meaning. We’re not just some pretentious rich family playing at winemaking because it’s fashionable and we can afford it. We’ve been doing this for generations. It’s in our blood. I can’t stand the thought that a youthful indiscretion could ruin all of that.”

“I can’t imagine it’s that serious. I don’t pretend to understand the wine business, but surely the contamination of a few barrels with a very common parasite has nothing to do with whatever might have happened in your past, and I truly can’t believe that Continental Vineyards will be devastated by this.”

She scoffs. “You sound like Julian. ‘You’re overreacting, Mom. It’s no big deal, Mom. I’ll take care of it, Mom.’”

“I didn’t mean to offend you, ma’am,” I apologize quickly. “I’m very sorry if it—”

“You’re fine,” she interrupts, flipping her hand. She finishes her glass but thankfully doesn’t pour herself another. “It’s not like you can say, ‘Oh yeah, you’re right, Victoria. You fucked up, and this is gonna suck .” She giggles. “God, I sound like one of the twins.”

Her smile fades rapidly. Emotional instability is a ubiquitous trope of drunkenness. I have seen situations like this turn violent before. I believe it’s time for me to leave. I start to stand, but Victoria speaks before I can excuse myself. “I’m just afraid that I’ve cursed the family. Not just me. Sorry, the wine’s getting to me. I mean… I feel like the family is cursed. I’m not the first person to make this kind of mistake. I’m not the first person to suffer consequences for it either. Henry Bellamy’s wife had an affair with a rebel soldier, and she killed herself.”

I blink. That was mentioned nowhere in the diaries I read.

“Then the granddaughter… I forget her name… Um… whatever. She married a man she didn’t love, and he left her. The rest of the family never talked to her again. Then Parker’s grandmother… I think she cheated on another guy with his grandfather. God, I’m drunk. Anyway, she ended up getting dementia and forgetting that she married Parker’s grandpa. Kept asking for the other guy, the first one she married.” She giggles. “Oh boy. I think you’re right, I think I’ve had enough.”

Once again, her emotions flip. She stares at me with a vaguely frightened expression. “I loved Parker. I loved him so much. He was the only one I ever loved. I just made a mistake. It was nothing. It meant nothing. But it cost me everything .”

It’s definitely time for this conversation to end. I can’t just leave her alone like this, though. “Victoria, let me help you to bed. We’re both exhausted and neither of us are entirely sober. It sounds as though you’ve had an incredibly trying day on top of all of this. Let’s get some rest. Things will seem better in the morning.”

“It’s my fault really,” she says. She allows me to help her up and lead her to the stairs, though, so that’s progress. “I just hate that Robert and Julian are fighting. Luann, you know, she fancies Robert’s boy, but they can’t do anything about it because Robert and Julian would be so angry.”

“I’m sure they’ll manage somehow,” I say drily.

I lead her carefully up the stairs. She clings to my arm tightly, as though afraid if she lets go, she’ll fall through the floor and straight to the hell she’s created for herself. She might not be wrong.

“I just want everyone to get along before it’s too late,” she continues to lament. “Before something worse happens. I just hate that everyone’s fighting, and now we’re going to lose the vineyard on the estate.”

We reach her door, but she stops before walking inside. She turns to me and says in a clearer voice than I’ve heard her use all evening. “I did this to make it up to Parker. I wanted his family’s legacy to survive. I wanted it to mean more than just a business. Julian doesn’t understand. He doesn’t know how important this was to Parker. I just wanted to do something for Parker so I didn’t go to my grave feeling like a complete traitor to his memory.”

I don’t know how to respond to that. I’m not sure there’s anything I can say. She seems to realize this because she smiles and pats my shoulder. “You don’t need to worry about all of that, though. You just take care of the kids. Let me deal with the ghost of my dead husband.”

I know a thing or two about ghosts, so I do respond to that. “Just remember, Victoria. Ghosts are ghosts. They can’t hurt you.”

She gives me a sad smile. “I think you know that’s not true.”

She leaves me there, once more stunned into silence, and heads inside her room. I force myself to return to my own room and go through the motions of getting ready for bed, but her words stay with me as I finally lay down to sleep.

She’s right, of course. Ghosts aren’t floating specters that can fling objects across rooms, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t real.

Ghosts are memories. And I know very well that memories can hurt a person more deeply than anything else.