Chapter 34
Thirty-four
Alaric
Ishould be in a session with my regular Tuesday-morning patients, but instead, I’m walking into a police interview.
Maybe that’s just as well, as Liz hasn’t been far from my mind since last night.
I handled our call badly, and ending it the way I did was worse.
I sent a short email apology—no explanations, no defenses—because she didn’t deserve to be cut off like that.
But I don’t know if she’ll respond. I don’t particularly expect her to, yet even as I try to focus on my grandmother and what’s in front of me, Liz stays present in my mind, a quiet reminder of something I left unfinished.
I step into the conference room at the police station, where the detectives have reluctantly agreed to let me sit in. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or not, but my grandmother is eighty-three years old, and this way I’ll have a firsthand account of what’s happening, not just her spin later.
The detectives haven’t even settled in their seats before Evelyn takes control. She walks straight to the head of the table and sits down like she called the meeting. Her coat stays on. So does her scarf. She has no intention of getting comfortable.
David Graham, her lawyer, drops into the chair beside her and stacks his files in a neat row. He thinks the calm, organized routine hides the tension in his jaw. It doesn’t. I see every twitch.
I take the seat to Evie’s left, close enough to track every shift in her breathing. In the hallway, she told me to stay quiet. “Let me handle this,” she said.
The older detective begins trying to run through his script.
Evelyn interrupts with a flick of her hand. “I know how interrogations work. Skip to the part where you accuse me of something.”
He bristles. “Mrs. Dempsey, this is a formal interview—”
“Exactly why we shouldn’t waste time pretending otherwise.”
Graham adjusts his glasses, a polite signal for her to dial it back. She ignores him.
The older detective opens his notebook like it’s a shield and tries to begin with something simple. “Let’s walk through your timeline on Saturday, August twenty-fourth. Between eight and—”
Evelyn doesn’t let him finish. “I was home. Working. You already have the emails I sent at 8:14, 8:27, and 8:39.” She gestures toward his notes. “If your office missed them, that’s your issue, not mine.”
His jaw tightens. “We still need verbal confirmation.”
“You have it,” she says.
The younger detective tries a different angle. “What about the calls regarding the irrigation permit? Did you receive—”
“I discarded them,” she replies before he finishes. She adjusts the cuffs of her coat like the question bores her. “None came from Graham or the county office, which means they didn’t warrant my time. Again, something you’d know if you’d reviewed the documentation already sent.”
The detective glances at Graham, probably hoping for backup, but Graham simply folds his hands and keeps his expression neutral. He knows better than to interrupt Evelyn when she’s in this mood.
The older detective leans in, trying to regain footing. “Mrs. Dempsey, we need you to answer the questions directly, not talk circles around them.”
“I’m answering directly,” she says. “You’re the ones struggling to keep up.”
A flush creeps up his neck. The younger detective fidgets with his pen, taps it once against the paper, then thinks better of it.
They move on to the financials, but neither detective has fully recovered from her pace. “There were flagged transfers—”
“Routine,” she interrupts, still in that smooth, unhurried tone. “Seasonal payroll adjustments, vendor invoices, supply orders tied to harvest prep. It’s all in the financial package your office received almost two weeks ago.”
The older detective hesitates. That pause gives her everything she wants. Her spine lengthens, her shoulders settle, and she folds her hands.
“If you plan to imply misconduct,” she tells him, “at least come prepared with something substantive. You’re floating in generalities, and I don’t entertain fishing expeditions.”
The younger detective shifts again, this time with a flicker of embarrassment. His eyes drop to his notes, but I can tell he isn’t reading them. He’s recalibrating, trying to decide how to redirect a conversation that slipped away from him ten minutes ago.
The quiet between them deepens until it becomes its own presence in the room. Evie doesn’t rush to fill it. She lets it stand, controlled and unbroken, with the same patience she uses on boardrooms and auditors.
No one speaks.
Evelyn’s gaze cuts between the detectives like someone evaluating candidates for a job they’re not qualified for.
She has always been measured and in control, but I can tell there’s a tension beneath it today.
Her breath is slightly too shallow. Her fingers are too still.
Her posture is a touch tighter than usual.
She looks invincible, but I know better.
Her body telegraphs the strain in ways she thinks no one notices.
The detectives certainly don’t. They exchange a look that carries frustration, irritation, and a hint of professional embarrassment. They expected defensiveness. They didn’t expect someone who treats their interview like an inconvenience in her schedule.
Evelyn is winning the room easily. She’s also pushing herself far harder than she should. Her control is flawless, but the cost of holding it is starting to show. The longer this goes, the more my worry for her increases.
She’s not going to let up. She’s not going to slow down. And the detectives are outmatched enough that they’re only going to escalate.
The older detective clears his throat, like he’s swallowing something sour. He straightens a stack of forms in front of him, buying time. “Let’s move on,” he says, “to communications between you and your operations team the week before the fire.”
Evelyn folds her hands. “Go ahead.”
He hesitates, reading whatever is on the top page with a frown. “We’ve reviewed a series of internal emails that raise concerns about the level of tension between you and your vineyard staff, specifically regarding the new irrigation system. There were disagreements about—”
“There are always disagreements,” she says, calm and clipped. “That’s what happens when you oversee people who mistake opinions for expertise.”
The younger detective chokes back a snort and tries to hide it by pretending to adjust his notes. His partner shoots him a look sharp enough to cut glass.
Evelyn doesn’t acknowledge either of them.
“We’ve also spoken with several employees who felt you were, how was it phrased?” The detective glances at his notes. “Overly involved in the day-to-day operations.”
“I own the vineyard,” she replies. “Being involved is my job.”
He tries again. “Some described your behavior as controlling.”
“I bet they wouldn’t say that about a man.” She snorts. “Some people can’t tell the difference between leadership and micromanagement because they’ve never experienced the former.”
He pushes forward. “Mrs. Dempsey, we’re not here to criticize your management style. We’re trying to understand the circumstances leading up to the fire at the Paradise Hill cottage.”
“Then ask better questions,” she says.
He visibly swallows irritation. “Fine. Here’s a better question.” He leans forward. “Why did you override two separate staff recommendations to delay the installation of the new irrigation lines?”
Graham tenses beside her. He’s preparing to intervene.
Evelyn doesn’t give him the chance. “Because the recommendations were based on outdated information and fear of change,” she says. “The vineyard needed the upgrade. We were already behind schedule.”
“Behind schedule,” the detective repeats, like he’s holding the phrase up to the light. “Because of staffing shortages. Because of vendor delays. Because—”
“Yes,” she says. “Those things happen. This is agriculture, not aerospace engineering.”
He flips a page. “One of your staff indicated that you were obsessed with getting the lines installed before the end of the month.”
“That staff member also once tried to prune a block of pinot as if it were merlot after a weekend bender,” she says. “Do you want to continue citing him as a credible source?”
The younger detective’s pen stops mid-scratch. He inhales like he’s bracing for the next blow.
The older detective’s patience thins. “Mrs. Dempsey—”
She raises a hand. Just two inches. Enough to stop him. “Detective, you keep circling the same point, hoping I’ll eventually contradict myself. I won’t. If you have actual evidence tying me to a fire, present it. Otherwise, this line of questioning is wasting everyone’s time.”
His face tightens. He doesn’t like being called out, especially not with Graham sitting there. The younger detective’s shoulders have slumped, like he’s realized they walked into the wrong kind of storm.
I suspect she’s not being entirely honest, but nonetheless, my grandmother is brilliant, commanding, and relentless. Everything she has always been.
She’s also still pushing herself too hard. Her skin is paling under her makeup.
The older detective finally leans back, breaking eye contact. It’s the closest he’ll come to admitting she has outmaneuvered him. He tries a new approach. “All right, then let’s talk about the fire’s point of origin.”
Evelyn stills. It’s small, but I know her tells. Her fingers tighten around each other for a heartbeat before she smooths them flat again.
He notices the stillness too. And he pounces.
“Your staff mentioned you were especially focused on the northeast blocks the week before the fire.”
That area is next to Paradise Hill and has a view of the cottage.
She keeps her voice even. “I’m focused on every block.”
“But you were seen there late,” he says. “Multiple times. After hours.”
Her jaw flexes. Not anger. Not fear. Something controlled and private. “I was inspecting the irrigation installation,” she says. “I do that often.”
The younger detective sits up a little straighter, perhaps sensing opportunity. “Mrs. Dempsey, did you or did you not have any reason to be near the origin point of that fire the night it occurred?”
Graham inhales sharply, ready to object.
Evelyn gets there first. “No.”
The older detective tilts his head. “You’re sure?”
Her eyes narrow. “I don’t use words I’m not sure of.”
Silence settles across the table.
She’s holding the line. But I can feel her standing on the edge of something she won’t admit to.
Seems the detectives sense it too. And that makes them bold.
The older one leans in. “Mrs. Dempsey, I’m going to ask you directly. Is there anything you haven’t told us, anything at all, that might explain your presence in that area before the fire started?”
Evelyn’s smile is small and deliberate. “Detective, if I had been within twenty feet of that fire, you wouldn’t need to ask. You’d have already found it on the Paradise Hill camera feeds.”
The younger detective closes his file with a frustrated snap.
But they push harder. Ask whether she’s been under pressure. Whether she’s overwhelmed. Whether she’s handling the business alone.
She slaps her palm against the table. “Overwhelmed? I run a vineyard. I’m not climbing Everest in heels.”
“Evie—” I try, unable to help myself.
Her head turns slowly. One look shuts me up.
She stands, but it’s too fast. Her hand skids along the table for balance. She tries to wave me off, but her fingers wobble, and her knees buckle a second later.
“Evie!”
I’m out of my chair, catching her before she hits the floor. Her head falls back against my arm, her breathing shallow.
“Call for an ambulance!” I bark. “Don’t just stand there. Move.”
The detectives freeze. Graham curses under his breath and fumbles for his phone.
A few minutes later, paramedics flood the room, and the whole thing turns into organized chaos—oxygen mask, vitals check, questions thrown too fast for me to answer.
I crouch beside her, tapping her cheek. “Open your eyes. Come on. Open them.”
She doesn’t react.
They lift her onto a gurney. Leaving the two detectives behind, I follow, my heart pounding. They wheel her into the hallway, monitors beeping, paramedics shouting numbers that sound wrong.
Then something in the reflection of the wall monitor catches me.
A tiny movement.
Her eyelid flicks.
I surge forward and grab the gurney rail. “Stop.”
The paramedic blinks at me. “Sir, we need to—”
“I said stop the gurney.”
They hesitate. Evelyn’s fingers curl, barely but deliberately, like she’s checking that I’m watching.
My stomach bottoms out, and heat flashes through me. I lean down, my voice low and shaking. “If you’re faking, say something. Right now.”
Her lashes don’t lift, but her mouth tightens just enough to confirm it.
Rage detonates. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I whisper. “You terrified me. You—”
Graham reaches us, breathless. “Ric, she needed an exit strategy—”
“Oh, don’t defend her,” I snap. “She played you. She played all of us.”
Evelyn cracks one eye open, just barely. “Lower your voice.”
I stare at her, furious. “That’s what you have to say?”
“It worked,” she murmurs, like this is a board meeting and she just out-negotiated a rival.
“You could’ve told me,” I say. “You could’ve warned me. You didn’t have to—”
“I improvised,” she says.
“I thought you were dying.”
That stops her. For a single beat, guilt flickers through her expression. It fades as quickly as it showed.
“I knew you would help,” she says quietly.
“That’s not an excuse.”
The paramedics shift uncomfortably. One clears his throat. “We still need to run vitals. Even if this was…strategic.”
Evelyn waves them forward as if they’re housekeeping. “Do whatever you need to do.”
I back away before I say something I can’t take back. My hands shake, adrenaline still hammering through me.
Evelyn looks over as the paramedics adjust her mask. “Alaric,” she says calmly, like none of this happened. “Pull yourself together. We have work to do.”
“Oh, I’m together,” I say, looking at the woman who faked a collapse to manipulate an interrogation and didn’t think twice about what it would do to me. “And we’re going to have a very different conversation when you’re not on a gurney.”
Her lips twitch like she finds that amusing.