“What can you tell us?” Carter repeated.
“I came over this morning to see if Helia wanted to head to town for breakfast,” he said, with a subtle squeeze of her hand. “She was on her way out to check the birds.”
“Birds?” Jess interrupted.
Helia pointed with her free hand to the still-circling vultures. “We don’t get a lot of vultures around the vineyards. Well, not around these vineyards. I saw them out my kitchen window and thought it was weird. I wanted to investigate. As Collin said, he was standing on the stoop getting ready to knock when I opened the door.”
“We decided to check it out before breakfast. I wasn’t really expecting much. Maybe a dead rabbit or other small animal,” he said. “But well, that’s not what we found.”
The two detectives raised their gazes again to the circling birds. “It’s there?” Jess asked.
“He is, yes,” Monk answered.
“What’s the best way out there?” Carter asked.
Helia pointed to the dirt alleyway between two vineyard blocks they’d walked down. “Down there, then turn right at maybe the thirtieth row or so. I wasn’t counting so don’t remember. But you can follow the birds.”
Carter nodded to the four officers, who gathered their kits and headed out. Monk wished the detectives would go with them but hadn’t expected them to. They’d wait until the scene was secure before adding extra footprints.
“How do you know it’s a man?” Jess asked.
“I didn’t see a face, the body was turned away on its side, but they were in a suit,” Monk said. “It fit like a man’s. Short blond hair, one hand flung over their hip, the hand looked male, too. Large. But I guess, to your point, I don’t know for certain.”
“Did you touch anything?” Carter asked.
Monk shook his head. “I stopped twenty feet away. Helia was behind me.”
“I didn’t even see it, him, whatever. Collin blocked my view.”
“You didn’t check to see if he was still alive?” Jess asked.
Monk gave Helia’s hand another squeeze. “There was no point.”
Carter and Jess stilled, like predators preparing to hunt. Information, for now, but they’d turn to him—or Helia—eventually.
“Meaning?”
He hated having to answer with Helia at his side, but her fingers curled around his, as if telling him it was okay.
“His side is split open. Like someone took an axe or machete here.” He pointed to his waist, right above the top of his jeans. “The cut ran all the way to his spine. His hips twisted away from his torso.”
Both Carter and Jess blinked. He’d seen much worse in the military, but he doubted the Napa Valley detectives regularly encountered that kind of brutal violence. Vanessa paled andmade a small sound of distress. Harry wrapped his arm around her as Carter and Jess shifted to form a circle.
“When was the last time you were out that way?” Jess asked.
Helia’s parents looked at each other, then to her, before Harry answered. “We lease the vineyards to a winery so have no reason to be out there, as they do all the maintenance. I honestly can’t remember the last time I was that far out.” Vanessa nodded in agreement.
“A photographer from the wedding last weekend wanted a wide shot of the venue and we walked about fifty yards down the alley, but not as far as where we were today,” Helia said.
Turning to him, Carter asked, “Where’s your car? Did you walk here?”
Monk dipped his chin. “I did, but as you know, Bacco is that way,” he said, pointing the opposite direction from where they’d found the body.
“Have any of you heard anything unusual in the past day or two?” Carter asked.
Again, Harry and Vanessa shared a look before shaking their heads. Helia did the same with a confused shrug.
“It’s far enough away that if someone came in through one of the other alleyways, no one here would hear it,” Monk said.
