Plum Gone: A Sonoma Wine Country Cozy Mystery (Sonoma Wine Country Cozy Mysteries Book 2)

by A. J. Carton

  “But now you don’t think the lawsuit was a good idea,” Emma sighed.

  The woman nodded. “My husband was a hard man. Sometimes he treated me badly. I will be honest with you, sometimes I do not miss him. But this lawsuit? What has it got us? Nothing. And if we had stayed put, my husband would be alive. And we would still have a decent roof over our heads.”

  Emma’s face must have betrayed the pain she felt hearing those words.

  The woman shrugged. “I’m not blaming you or Steve. If Mr. Randall is breaking the law, like Steve said, he should pay. But it’s still not a fight worth fighting. Not for people like us. Not for me.” She looked at her daughter. “Not for them.”

  “OK,” Emma nodded. “But if Curt Randall murdered your husband and Steve can get you money, that’s OK. Right?”

  Emma took the woman’s shrug as a skeptical yes.

  “Then here is what I need to know….”

  She began with Steve’s list of questions.

  “First, was there anyone else, besides Curt Randall, that might have wanted your husband dead?”

  Yolanda Gomez’s answer to this question was more complicated than Emma expected. Much like Armando Diaz, she described her husband as a man haunted by trouble.

  “It followed him like his shadow,” his wife explained. “From the moment I met him. He fought with everyone. His family. His friends. He didn’t have any except Louis Cardenas. He fought with his employers. With people he met in bars.”

  The young widow stopped speaking abruptly. Then as though to answer the question Emma did not ask she said. “Why did I marry such a man? I was pregnant. I didn’t have a choice.”

  “You didn’t have a choice,” Emma repeated softly.

  “About getting pregnant,” the woman laughed bitterly. “And then, about getting married.”

  Emma felt a sharp intake of breath. This was not the story she had expected.

  “In answer to your question,” the woman continued. “A lot of people wanted to see my husband dead.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Sometimes, even me.”

  In response to the look of horror that Emma felt cross her face, the widow added quickly, “I didn’t kill my husband. I was here the night he died. Here with my mother. She will tell you the same.”

  Emma quickly ran through the list of other suspects. Yolanda Gomez confirmed each one’s alibi. Armando Carillo hated Gomez but he was in the fields picking onions on the night her husband died. Her brother had seen him. As for Jose Diaz, Yolanda just laughed.

  “Jose was afraid of his own shadow.” She repeated the bartender’s phrase. “He wouldn’t hurt a flea. Couldn’t. He was afraid of Santiago since they were kids. That is why Santiago thought he could bully him into joining the lawsuit.”

  “But he didn’t,” Emma replied.

  “Apparently not.” Yolanda squinted her eyes at Emma. “I know what you’re thinking. Sure, Jose carried a grudge. But Jose is not a killer.”

  “What about Louis Cardenas?” Emma asked. “You just said Cardenas was your late husband’s friend. Perhaps the only friend he had. Why did Cardenas drop out of the suit?”

  Yolanda Gomez explained, “That is why Santiago went north, Senora. To answer that question. Louis and Santiago were friends since childhood. Then, suddenly, Louis drops out of the lawsuit. But that’s not all. He convinces other workers to do the same. Santiago couldn’t figure out why. All he knew was that Louis was traveling north. So he followed him to find out what was going on.”

  “Did he find out?” Emma replied, finally believing she was on to something.

  Yolanda Gomez dropped her eyes. “I don’t know,” was all she said.

  “What do you mean? What don’t you know?” Emma asked.

  “The last time I talked to him, all Santiago said was that Louis – that ‘rat’ he called him – had found a better way to…he used a not nice word…to screw Randall.”

  “And what was the ‘better way’?” Emma asked.

  Yolanda nodded. “That’s what I don’t know. Santiago never called me again. The next morning Jose called. He told me Santiago was dead.”

  Emma thought about everything Yolanda had said. Then she asked the third question. “On the night he died, Santiago told his cousin that he was going to Randall’s house to tell him something Randall didn’t want to hear. Something that would make Randall respect him. Do you know what that was?”

  Yolanda Gomez shook her head. “No.”

  Emma continued. “Santiago also told his cousin that night that he was in danger. Do you know why?”

  Again, Mrs. Gomez shook her head. “No.”

  Emma paused a few more seconds. Then she asked one more question. “Is there anything else you think Steve and I should know, Mrs. Gomez? Anything that might possibly shed light on who killed your husband?”

  After Emma asked her question, Yolanda Gomez was silent for a long time. Emma could tell she was struggling with something. Something she knew, but didn’t want to tell.

  “Mrs. Gomez,” Emma finally said. “It’s important to a lot of people that we find out who killed your late husband. Please. If you have any more information, tell me. It could make the difference between an innocent man going to jail – or a guilty man going free.”

  Still, Yolanda Gomez remained silent. Her black eyes flickered around the room like desperate flies.

  When she finally spoke, her voice barely registered above whisper.

  “The last night I spoke to Santiago,” she said, “he told me someone was paying Louis off. I don’t know who. But you cannot tell Louis I know. He’ll kill me if you do.”

  “Louis Cardenas would kill you?” Emma gasped. “Then Louis Cardenas would kill your husband, too.”

  “That’s right,” Yolanda Gomez nodded. “But he didn’t. The night Santiago died, he was in the fields working, side by side with my brother. You can ask Antonio when he wakes up. Louis did not kill my husband. Someone else did.”

  An hour later Emma had asked Yolanda every question she could think of regarding the Gomez family: schools, health issues, special needs. Anything that might help Steve get a bigger judgment against Curt Randall.

  Then Emma’s phone rang. It was Steve.

  “Hi,” he said. “How’s it going?”

  “OK,” she answered guardedly.

  “I’m delayed,” he added.

  “What?” she said.

  “Delayed. We got a lotta stuff to do. You’re gonna have to kill another couple of hours.”

  “Couple of hours!” Emma gasped.

  “It was your call to give me the car,” Steve reminded her. “You didn’t want to drive.”

  Emma took a deep breath. “OK,” she replied. “Call me when you’re done.”

  Steve hung up.

  Chapter 17: Friday Noon – A Girl Named Maria

  Emma clicked off her phone and looked around the small room where she and Yolanda Gomez sat talking.

  “Steve’s running late,” she apologized. “I know you must have things to do. I’ve taken up enough of your time. Is there anywhere I can walk to get some lunch?”

  Yolanda laughed. Then she shook her head. “If you wait a few minutes, maybe my mother can drop you somewhere. When she takes my brother to work. There’s a cantina, but it’s too far to walk. Especially in this heat.”

  Which, Emma knew, was true. Over the course of their conversation, the room where they sat had heated up like the inside of a furnace.

  Yolanda had excused herself to make her brother some lunch when Emma thought of something. She knew it wasn’t relevant to the Gomez murder, but it interested her just the same.

  Yolanda had heated up some rice and beans and made some quesadillas. She offered a plate to Emma, who munching on the rice and beans, asked Yolanda about her mother.

  “My mother?” Yolanda replied. “She cleans houses every morning in Coachella. She takes the car.” Yolanda glanced at her watch. “She’ll be back very soon to drive Antonio to work. We
couldn’t manage any other way.”

  “How old is she?” Emma asked, surprised that the woman still cleaned houses.

  “Sixty-five. She was old when she had me,” Yolanda explained.

  “Your mother’s my age,” Emma said, grateful she wasn’t cleaning houses. “Is she from around here?” she asked.

  “Down the road, in Thermal,” Yolanda replied. “And guess who she worked for as a kid.”

  “Curt Randall?” Emma asked. She had already done the calculation in her head. At sixty-five, Yolanda’s mother would have been close to Cory’s age. Curt Randall’s son who died in Viet Nam. “Did your mother know Cory Randall?” she asked.

  The young woman put down the pan she was washing. “Sure,” she said. “My mother knew Cory. I think she knew Cory well. She always said Cory was different.”

  “What do you mean?” Emma asked.

  “Different from his father.” Yolanda shrugged. “Of course, I never knew him, but according to Ma, everyone loved Cory.”

  This information took Emma by surprise. “Loved him?” she repeated.

  Yolanda laughed. It was the first time she had smiled since Emma arrived. “Yeah. According to Ma, Cory was the opposite of his dad. Kind. Generous.” She giggled. “And handsome. But if you really want to know about Cory Randall, wait till Ma gets home. She’ll give you an earful.”

  A few minutes later, Concetta Gonzales walked into the trailer, followed by her grandson and daughter. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously when she saw Emma, creating an older replica of the look her eight-year-old granddaughter had given Emma when she arrived.

  Yolanda quickly introduced Emma to her mother. But the older woman brushed by her to knock on the bedroom door.

  “Antonio, get up,” she cried. “You’re gonna to be late. Am I the only one here who still works?”

  Clearly, Emma thought to herself, Concetta Gonzales was a force to be reckoned with.

  Yolanda handed her mother a plate of rice and beans. The older woman dug into it hungrily before finally addressing Emma.

  “You’re here about the lawsuit, right?” she asked. “You gonna get them some money?” She gestured towards her three grandchildren. “That son of …” she stopped. “Well, he oughta be good for something, right?”

  Emma nodded. “I hope so.”

  “Gotta do more than hope,” Concetta nodded matter-of-factly. “So?” she asked, “did my daughter tell you everything you need to know?”

  Before Emma could answer, Yolanda cut in, “Ms. Corsi asked me about Cory Randall, Ma. I told her you were the person…”

  At that moment, Antonio opened the bedroom door. He grabbed his lunch off the hot plate and looked at his watch. “We gotta go, Ma.” Glancing at Emma he added, “Who’s she? That lady from Steve’s office?”

  “She wants to know about Cory Randall,” Concetta answered.

  Antonio had rolled his quesadilla into a napkin. “Time to leave, Ma. We’re workin’ on Indio Lane. It’s a good hour’s drive. I’m startin’ early today.”

  Watching the mother and son prepare to leave, Emma’s heart sank. Her curiosity about Cory Randall would not be satisfied that day.

  But when Concetta Gonzales opened the front door to the trailer, she motioned Emma to follow her with an abrupt shake of her head. “You! What’s your name again?”

  “Emma. Emma Corsi,” Emma answered.

  “OK, Emma. You wanna hear about Cory Randall?” she said. “Come on in the truck. I’m gonna tell you everything you need to know.”

  That is how Emma found herself jammed between Antonio Gonzales and his mother in the front seat of an old green Ford pickup truck, bumping over rutted roads out to the Randall Enterprises’ Indio Lane farm.

  When they dropped Antonio off at the field, Emma remembered to confirm he’d seen Louis Cardenas in Coachella the night Santiago Gomez died. Concetta confirmed her daughter’s alibi as well.

  “I’m no fan of Cardenas,” Antonio shrugged. “But, yeah, he was there. There’s no way he killed Yolanda’s brute of a husband. As for my sister?” The notion of her needing an alibi made him laugh. “Why would my sister go to Sonoma to kill her husband? She could have done it a hundred times, without leaving home. I’d have handed her the poison to do it. Right, Ma?”

  Concetta Gonzales nodded. “Yolanda was home, with me, the night Santiago died.”

  It was on the long, hot ride back to Puebloduro that Concetta Gonzalez then told Emma the story of Cory Randall. It had all the romance and heartbreak of a Latino soap.

  “I met Cory the summer I turned fourteen,” Concetta began. “He was fifteen when he first came here to work in the fields. Of course, everyone knew that, one day, he would take over the business. So he was important. Mui importante. Smart. And wapo. You know, handsome. Like a movie star.” Concetta Gonzales rolled her eyes and patted her heart. “Not a Latino lover,” she added. “More like Tab Hunter. Remember him?”

  Emma remembered Tab Hunter well. The cute, blond, teenage heartthrob of the fifties.

  “So you could say he was not really our type here in Coachella,” Concetta shrugged. “But, of course, he was our type. Cory was every girl in America’s type.”

  Concetta Gonzales stopped talking. Her eyes glazed over staring through the windshield. She remained transfixed so long Emma feared she might not continue.

  “So what happened next, Concetta?” she finally asked.

  Concetta gave her head a sharp little shake and glanced sideways at her listener. “What happened next? Well,” she continued, “nothing, exactly.”

  Emma waited for Concetta to continue. Then her stomach sank. Was that it? she wondered. Cory Randall was the cute son of the company’s owner whom all the girls had a crush on? End of story?

  “Did you actually meet him?” she said.

  “Meet him?” Concetta scoffed. “Of course I met him. We all met him. My brother lived with him in the men’s barracks.” She glanced sideways at Emma and snorted. “Now they call it ‘employer housing.’ It has to be up to code. A lot of good that did. Growers don’t provide housing any more. Now the migrants…”

  Emma feared Concetta would get sidetracked again. “But getting back to Cory.”

  “Cory,” Concetta nodded sharply. “He was such a nice guy. Any time he got a little money, he took us dancing. Or to the movies. He had a car, too. When he turned sixteen. A red Corvette convertible. I drove in it a few times.”

  They were halfway back to the trailer park. Concetta turned to look at Emma. “You wanna stop for a beer?”

  They’d sat down in an air-conditioned cantina and ordered drinks when Concetta resumed her story.

  “Of course I had a crush on Cory.” She shrugged. “Everyone did. But there was nothing romantic. He was a gentleman. A real gentleman,” she repeated slowly nodding her head.

  “So what happened?” Emma asked, afraid, once again, that the story might end there.

  Concetta sighed. “What happened is that before we knew it, it was the sixties. And like I said, Cory was smart. So smart he got into Stanford, that fancy school up north. Of course, all of us thought, That’s it. Cory’s never hangin’ out with us Latinos anymore. But guess what? Nothing changed. Every summer, Cory came down to Coachella. Lived in the labor camp. Worked with us, side by side.”

  Concetta stopped talking again and seemed to consider something. Finally she said, “I guess I shouldn’t say nothing changed. Two things changed. The first thing was Cory.”

  “How?” Emma asked. “Did he get snobby?”

  “Snobby?” Concetta looked annoyed. “Cory was never snobby.”

  “Then what do you mean?” Emma said.

  “Cory didn’t get snobby at Stanford,” Concetta repeated emphatically. “It was the sixties, honey. Remember? You’re my age, right? What do you think happened? Cory got political. Chavez started the boycotts. Cory and his father argued over how old Mr. Randall was running the farm.”

  “I never heard them argue,” Concet
ta added, “but that’s what people said. Cory told us workers we should have better housing. Better working condition. He even encouraged us to organize. Mind you, all this while he was the grower’s son spending the summer here working under exactly the same conditions.”

  “So, all of a sudden, Cory the all-America heartthrob, became Cory the saint,” Emma cut in.

  Concetta didn’t like the comparison. She shook her head. “Cory wasn’t like that. He was our friend, not a saint.”

  “So what else changed?” Emma asked.

  “The other thing that changed was probably just as important. No,” Concetta corrected herself. “In the end, sadly, it was more important.” She took a deep breath, and again became lost in thought.

  Emma waited for a few seconds for Concetta to continue. When she didn’t, Emma finally exploded.

  “What? What was the second thing?” she asked.

  “The year Cory turned nineteen, a new family came to work here,” Concetta replied. “The Hidalgos. They had five children. The middle daughter was my age, seventeen. She and I became friends. Her name was Maria. She was very smart. She wanted to be a doctor. Imagine! A farm worker wanting to be a doctor. And she was beautiful.” Concetta laughed cynically. “You can imagine the rest…”

  She stopped talking again and stared out the windshield.

  Once again, Emma feared that the woman was not going to continue. “Please tell me what happened,” she said.

  Concetta let out a long sigh. “That summer Cory and Maria fell in love. I was with them the night they met. He looked at her and I saw the look I had always wanted to see when he looked at me.”

  “So?” Emma asked.

  “So nothing,” Concetta replied, “at first. Maria put him off. No one could believe it. She rejected the advances of the boss’s son. Of course, that only made him love her more. When school started, he even drove down from Stanford on the weekends to be near her. And finally, I guess, she relented. By then she was in college in L.A. I didn’t see much of her anymore.”