Rosé and Rocks (Wine Valley Mystery Book 4) by Sandra Woffington

Author:Sandra Woffington [Woffington, Sandra]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Red Summit Publishers
Published: 2019-06-26T16:00:00+00:00

“Let’s get lunch at the Crisp and Crunch,” said Max, stepping out onto the sidewalk. “I’d rather hit a newer spot today than our old one. And it’s closer, on the next block.”

Joy added, “Aaron, Pete, if you aren’t partial to healthy fare—although Max likes the loaded baked potato—we can meet you in an hour.”

Aaron dipped his chin in approval. “No chance! Let’s stick together.”

After a ten-minute wait to get a table, during which everyone swiped their phone screens, the hostess sat them at a booth on the outside patio, next to the boardwalk along Stagecoach Street. A man and his beagle sat across from them. The menu included items for dogs.

The place had an industrial feel with concrete floors, polished and stained a rust color, gray metal tables, stainless steel poles, and wooden accents to warm up the otherwise cold decor.

Max ordered the loaded baked potato; Joy, a spicy Thai salad; Aaron, a pepper-crusted sirloin with garlic mashed potatoes, and Pete, grilled seasonal vegetables with garlic bread. Max added a Coke, Joy a water, Aaron a glass of Pinot Noir, and Pete a beer.

“Local boy, Max?” asked Aaron.

“Local yokel, as my dad would say,” replied Max.

“Joy?”

“Nope. San Diego.”

“How about you, Aaron?” asked Joy

“A modest upbringing in Los Angeles. My father was a painter—as in buildings. Mother, an art teacher. I clearly take after my mother.”

“Have you always wanted to direct?” asked Max, knowing that the more questions he asked, the fewer he would need to answer.

“Ever since I snapped my first picture. It was of my dog, Bongo, a terrier. Appropriately named. To this day, I think it’s a miracle to capture a single moment, a fragment of time, and encapsulate it in an image. A single frame that stops time. And that image tells an entire story. It speaks of heartache, embarrassment, triumph, joy, angst, and we, the viewer, can share that emotion just by being a witness to the image. Multiply that, and you create a film.”

The drinks arrived, and Aaron offered a toast. “To the story.” After they clinked glasses and sipped their drinks, Max added, “I never saw it like that before.”

Joy jumped in. “Although I would say we work backwards from that. We have to discover the story through bits and pieces of the picture. We put them together like the proverbial jigsaw puzzle. If we have enough pieces, we can tell the story, even with some pieces missing.”

Pete sipped his beer. “There’s always a story.” He raised his glass to the passing pedestrians headed in opposite directions. “Everyone walking this street has a story, and sometimes, they cross paths. They intersect. They affect change in the other.”

Aaron’s eyes flashed open. “Exactly! And those intersections create new storylines.”

Max sipped his iced tea. “Until they die, like Jed, and their story ends.”

Joy added, “But new stories begin. The town changes, the people change, ancestors walk the same streets and others move to new settings. I haven’t been living here for long, but I like to

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