Page 73 of Dagger’s Shield

“I found the invoices for this year’s barrels. In total, there were sixty, but I only see twenty-five stored down here. Where are the others?”

“In storage in the other vault.” He looked at his watch. “Your father wants you to choose the wine for the toast tomorrow. Don’t let him do it himself.”

“I won’t,” I said. We walked past him and back to the chateau.

“There’s another vault?” Dagger asked once we were outside.

“There is. My grandfather emptied it forty years ago.”

“Quick on your feet,” Dagger said.

“You too.”

He nudged me. “We make a good team.”

I shrugged. “I suppose in some ways.”

His arm went around my waist, and he spun me around. “In every way, mon feu.”

I couldn’t argue with the kiss he gave me.

When it came time for bed, I tossed and turned for two hours as everything we’d learned in the last several days played over in my head. None more than the idea that Géraud might very well be the “very important business associate.” What would I do if he was? It was something Dagger and I should discuss, plan for, but not at this hour.

Not wanting to wake him, I eased out of bed and walked to the window. A light burned in the winery office.

I gasped when Dagger came up behind me. “Same one I saw,” he said.

“It has to be Rémy. I wonder what he’s up to.”

He nodded. “Come back to bed.”

“I can’t sleep.”

“I’ll sing you a lullaby.”

I cocked my head. “You will sing me a lullaby?” I repeated.

“That’s what I said.”

Deciding to call his bluff, I got under the covers and waited.

Before he was through the second verse of “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,” I was sound asleep.

When I went down for breakfast the next morning and found Rémy alone, I decided to ask.

“Do you always work in the middle of the night?”

He didn’t look up from the bread he was buttering. “It takes a lot more to keep this place running than anyone thinks.”

“Even during the holidays?”

“Especially then. I already explained that the co-op wants the books closed before the first. On top of that, the accountants want the quarterly and year-end reports, and your father wants to know how much money we made this year.”

“How much did we?” I phrased my question that way intentionally. With each clue Dagger and I found, it became more apparent that my cousin was either behind what I was certain was money laundering or, at the very least, aware of it.

This time, he raised his head. “Another record year.”

“I’d like to see the numbers.”