“I’m not in a gang,” Gonzalez said, his voice as taught as a tripwire. “No one in my family’s in a gang. I’m a businessman. I have a clothing business. You know where my money comes from since I gave you my tax return with my petition.”
“What’s this about these friends at this warehouse?” Judge Flores asked.
“Business associates. Sometimes I conduct business at the warehouse where I keep the inventory for my store. That’s not a crime.”
“And this ‘spot-the-cop’ thing?”
“Just a little game I invented. Like I tell my girlfriend’s kids all the time, you got to get used to looking for police. Cops always assume the worst about you if you’re black or brown. We need to train our kids early to look out for them. Helps them stay out of trouble.”
Judge Flores scowled at the specter of police profiling being raised in his courtroom.
“I’m not saying we know anything for certain yet,” Caroline interjected. “I’m just saying we need to be careful with this placement. After all, Mateo’s doing fine with his foster family—”
“He should be with his real family,” Gonzalez shot back. “Not some random couple in Santa Clarita.”
“Not to disparage Mr. Gonzalez’s relationship to my client,” Caroline said, “but it is a remote relationship, at best. He is Mateo’s aunt’s ex-boyfriend. We’re not talking about immediate family here.”
“Family means whatever family feels like, and Mateo’s my family,” Gonzalez said.
Though the words weren’t directed at Caroline, they landed squarely. She had a semi-dysfunctional mother, an emotionally distant father, and an alcoholic uncle—that was her family. Her life had long ago ceased to include any family gatherings. There were no birthday parties. No weddings. It had taken her grandmother’s death to bring them together.
“Look, I felt real bad when Mateo’s aunt died,” Gonzalez continued. “She was a really great girlfriend. My new girlfriend isn’t nothing like as special as she was.” He grinned toward the bench in what Caroline surmised was supposed to be a winning manner, but which only underscored the insult to his current girlfriend.
“My house is the best place for Mateo while his papa’s in prison,” Gonzalez continued. “Mateo’s my sobrino. That’s true no matter what this paranoid white lady says about me.”
Gonzalez turned to glower again at Caroline.
This time, Caroline met his gaze. Some nagging instinct told her that he wasn’t just giving Mateo lessons in avoiding the police.
“Let me remind you both to direct your attention to the bench,” Judge Flores said, his exasperation verging on true annoyance.
Caroline arranged her features into an affable mask and turned back toward the bench. She’d made her point. Now it was time to sound more reasonable than Gonzalez, despite the desperate clawing of her instincts.
“Maybe I’m being paranoid, as Mr. Gonzalez suggests. If so, I will apologize. But we need to be sure before we move forward.”
“But Mateo’s current placement was always intended to be temporary, Ms. Auden,” the judge said. “We need a more permanent solution.”
“Mateo’s father will be out of jail in six months,” Caroline pressed. “The Castillos, Mateo’s current guardians, have not objected to caring for him for another six months—”
“Perhaps not, but they didn’t sign up for it, either,” the judge pointed out. “We need to be realistic. The minor’s father has had issues with alcohol. Yes, Mr. Hidalgo is in recovery during the period of his incarceration, but even if he achieves some measure of sobriety, the stress of his release may compel him to drink again. He may require time to get himself together. We need a longer-term placement in the interim.”
Caroline resisted the urge to nod. Everything Judge Flores had said made sense, but it didn’t matter.
“I understand the court’s concerns,” Caroline said. “But if Mateo is being used as part of an illegal enterprise, it could send him down a terrible path. If he gets picked up by law enforcement, he could end up in juvenile hall. If he doesn’t get picked up, he could end up being initiated into a way of life that this court and his father certainly want him to avoid. Either way, it’s a disaster—a disaster this court has the power to avert.”
“I appreciate your passion, Ms. Auden, but a case is only as good as the evidence supporting it, and at this point, all you have is speculation based on the word of a child.”
“I know,” Caroline conceded. “That’s why I request time to investigate my client’s statements.”
With just another few weeks to do her job, she knew she could incriminate or exonerate Gonzalez. She was a tech whiz and a compulsive researcher. Or, as one client had dubbed her, less flatteringly, a “truffle pig for evidence.” In the grip of a hunch, she’d stay up all night. She’d look under every available stone for any pebble of useful information if it gave a client a chance at justice. Or, in this case, if it gave a child the life and family he deserved.
“I’m just asking for a few weeks to do some due diligence,” she pressed.
“Twelve days,” the judge said. “You have twelve days.”
“Thank you, Your Honor,” Caroline said quickly. “If I don’t find proof of gang affiliation or other wrongdoing, I will stipulate to the placement of Mateo Hidalgo with Rogelio Gonzalez.”
It was what the court would order anyway if she couldn’t provide proof, so it didn’t hurt to signal she would agree to it without a fight. Reasonableness was the currency of the courts, and she might yet need to pay for other concessions from Judge Flores.
“Good. We’ll reconvene at one on September 26,” the judge ordered, hitting his gavel.
Caroline shoved her laptop into her bag. Her mind raced, forming a to-do list. She needed information. Fast. The court had already run a criminal background check on Gonzalez that hadn’t turned up any misdemeanors, let alone felonies. That meant she needed to dig elsewhere for answers to her questions: Where did Mr. Gonzalez work? What was his girlfriend’s story? Who were those business associates at the warehouse?
Suddenly, a prickling sensation spread across Caroline’s forehead.
She lifted her gaze to find Gonzalez glowering at her from across the courtroom.
Without giving him the satisfaction of a reaction, Caroline returned to packing her bag.
She knew she was an asshole if her suspicions were wrong, but she didn’t have time for preemptive self-recrimination. She had a bad feeling about Gonzalez. And now she had enough time to see if that feeling was right.
As soon as she was outside the courthouse, Caroline wrote a text to her assistant, Amy.
Pls set up call w/Wallace Boyd, assistant DA
Google for his
I’m avail to talk w/him any time today
Caroline didn’t know whether her law school classmate Wallace Boyd was in the gangs unit of the district attorney’s office, but talking to Boyd would be a start. If she threw a large enough net, she might find information about Gonzalez’s neighborhood or business associates.
Amy wrote back ten minutes later, as Caroline was climbing into her Mustang GT.
Meet Boyd @ 3:30 @ adjunct DA’s office
Caroline dictated a quick response.
I don’t have time for f-2-f. Pls just set up a call
Amy’s response was just as fast.
Nope. He wants in-person
Caroline exhaled. Damn. Of course he did. She’d gone on exactly two dates with overeager Wallace Boyd during law school. She’d declined a third.
Okay. Pls get an address for me.
As Caroline resigned herself to wasting hours going to the DA’s office to meet with Boyd in person, she considered flaking on the soup kitchen. But she quickly quashed the thought. Her uncle needed her help. She’d just need to make up the time somewhere else in her day.
Leapfrogging from stoplight to stoplight, she sent a barrage of texts, telling Amy about the spot-the-cop game at the warehouse where Gonzalez supposedly store
d the merchandise for his apparel business. When she finished, she wrote:
Pls see what you can find out about that warehouse.
I’ll be in the office after seeing my uncle.
I expect you to have the whole case solved by then.
Caroline smiled and hit “Send.” Amy was more of a friend than a legal assistant, and it was nice to have someone to joke around with, especially after a contentious morning.
Seconds later, the phone rang.
The quip on Caroline’s lips died as she read the name of the caller: Harold DuBois.
Caroline cocked her head at the screen.
She hadn’t expected to hear from The Pastures’ administrator. She’d recognized his promises to help look for the watch as what they were—desperate measures, intended to avert a lawsuit from a would-be heir. She didn’t believe his inquiries would yield any actual answers.
“I’ve got good news for you,” Harold said when Caroline answered the call. “A convalescent hospital in Burbank just responded to my post on that chat board. The administrator there says he has an employee named Patricia Amos.”
Caroline almost cheered out loud at her good fortune.
“Really? Is she there now? Did you tell the police?”
“She’s there, but let’s wait before calling the police,” said Harold. “I know the administrator, and he e-mailed me Patricia Amos’s personnel file. I’m a little foggy on this attachment stuff, but I’ll forward it to you if you promise to let me handle the police if this is the same woman.”
Caroline’s arms tingled at the possibility of catching the thief who’d stolen her grandmother’s watch. Patricia had gotten too brave. Now she’d pay for her overconfidence.
“I promise,” Caroline said. “Send it over.”
CHAPTER 3
“It’s not her,” Caroline said.
She’d just pulled her Mustang GT into a parking space outside the soup kitchen when Harold’s e-mail pinged on her phone. Now, as she talked to Harold on speaker, she studied the brown-haired woman with horn-rimmed glasses on page one of the personnel file.
A smidge over five feet tall, this short brunette was not the tattooed, red-haired Patricia Amos who’d stood beside Caroline in her grandmother’s room. In fact, this Patricia Amos wasn’t even a CNA. She was a nurse. And she wasn’t a recent hire. Instead, she’d been working at Meadowlark Convalescent Hospital for eight years. Plus, there was no indication that the Burbank administrator had ever had any problem with his Patricia Amos—the cover e-mail said Patricia had been an exemplary employee during her long tenure at the convalescent hospital.
Harold hmm’ed on the phone. “It says I have to download Adobe Acrobat to see it. Where do I go on the Internet?”
“Look, we can chat later if you need to, but I have some things to do. Thank you for sending this to me.” Caroline clicked off, leaving Harold behind in his hapless fog of IT confusion.
In the silence of her car, Caroline closed her eyes.
Disappointment drove away the last vestiges of hope from her heart.
Patricia was probably halfway to Las Vegas. Or Mexico. Or Europe. Grandma Kate had never had the watch appraised, but if that repairman was right, it was worth more than enough to pay for a plane ticket. And a house.
Climbing from the Mustang, Caroline strode toward the soup kitchen.
She had no time to lament what was irretrievably lost.
She needed to focus on trying to save her uncle. Thumbing the AA flyer in her back pocket, she prepared to do battle with him.
When she stepped inside the fluorescent-lit assembly room, Caroline was greeted by a volunteer from one of the charities hosting the soup kitchen. With bushy white eyebrows and sky-blue eyes, he exuded a kind of vitality usually reserved for retired generals.
“Thanks for coming,” he said, handing Caroline an apron to protect her business suit.
Donning it, Caroline followed the man to a row of plastic tables piled high with foodstuff and chafing dishes. Steamed peas. Mashed potatoes. Burgers. All smelled barely edible.
“You’re in charge of peas,” said the man, stopping in front of the first chafing dish. He offered Caroline a ladle, then pointed toward the table at the beginning of the food line, where neat rows of pamphlets and brochures described the charitable services available to the homeless.
“Please encourage folks to grab a pamphlet or two on their way through the line,” he said.
Caroline nodded. Although she’d never been stationed at the first chafing dish, she’d volunteered enough times to have noticed the omnipresent table of brochures.
Settling into her spot, Caroline waited for the first patrons to arrive. She thumbed the AA flyer in her back pocket. She gave the peas a stir. Then she looked down at the pile of pamphlets.
Her breath hitched as her eyes fell on a familiar name.
OASIS CARE
The charity that was supposed to get Grandma Kate’s estate.
Caroline grabbed the pamphlet. Opening it, she found glossy images of people studying from books, fixing cars, and cooking meals. The banner across the top of the page trumpeted the aggressively cheerful slogan: HELPING YOU HELP YOURSELF.
The next page touted Oasis’s alcohol treatment program. Lauded as one of the best in the city, it welcomed the homeless and promised free beds for anyone in treatment.
Suddenly, new understanding dawned for Caroline: her grandmother had died knowing that her only son was an alcoholic who lived on the street. In her estate plan, she’d made a final offering. Her dying act to try to help him.
Swallowing past a wave of emotion, Caroline looked up to greet her first patron, a man with hair like a tumbleweed. Despite the midday heat, he wore a heavy denim jacket.
“Peas?” Caroline asked.
The man with tumbleweed hair nodded.
Caroline scooped a helping onto the man’s saggy paper tray.
“Pamphlet?” Caroline asked, offered the Oasis one she held in her hand.
“Naw, just the peas straight up without the side of Jesus,” said the man, moving along.
When he’d gone, Caroline studied the Oasis pamphlet again.
He was right. Jesus figured rather prominently in Oasis’s stated mission to feed the hungry and care for the weak. But the rest of the pamphlet looked nonreligious. Clinics. Food banks. Substance abuse programs. Job training. Stuff anyone and everyone at the soup kitchen needed.
She folded the pamphlet at the sound of her next patron approaching.
It was her uncle. He’d changed out of the rumpled suit. Instead, he sported the same stained jeans and work boots he always wore.
“Peas?” Caroline asked, holding up a ladleful as he approached.
Hitch grimaced in a way that let her know the peas were too gross even for someone who lived in a tent under a freeway overpass.
Releasing the ladle, Caroline watched it sink slowly down into the layer of peas.
“I told you not to come here,” Hitch said. “It isn’t safe.”
Caroline glanced around the soup kitchen. Other than the line of patrons, it was quiet.
She shrugged. “I’m fine.”
“Just stay clear of Li’l Ray,” Hitch said. “He’s at the table behind me at four o’clock.”
Following her uncle’s directions, she clocked the man with the tumbleweed hair. He sat hunched over his peas, shoveling them quickly into his mouth.
“Li’l Ray’s a fixer, and he’s packing today,” said Hitch. “You can tell from the jacket.”
Caroline repressed the urge to compliment her uncle on his powers of observation. Despite being half-drunk, he hadn’t lost his police instincts. The echo of his skills made her sad. There’d once been a time when she would’ve asked him questions about the tricks of the trade. Now, she just made a mental note to avoid the man called Li’l Ray.
“You get the watch?” Hitch asked.
Caroline exhaled. She’d hoped her uncle would’ve forgotten to ask.
But Hitch just shrugged.
“Doesn’t really matter,” he said, his voice slurring.
Caroline’s chest sparked with annoyance. She’d been worried he’d be upset by the theft. But this drunken indifference was even worse.
She withdrew the AA flyer from her back pocket and extended it toward her uncle.
Hitch glowered down at the yellow page.
“I’m doing fine,” he said, though his thirdhand clothes and stale, pickled funk belied his words. “I’ve got nothing in common with any of the people at those meetings anyway.”
“Then how about Oasis?” Caroline said, offering the pamphlet she held in her other hand. If her grandmother had made the sacrifice of funding Oasis, Hitch could at least give that gift some respect by taking advantage of the charity’s services.
Hitch’s eyes narrowed at the offending pamphlet.
“I don’t need their bullshit, either. Why can’t you just leave me alone?”
“Because you don’t have to live like this. Let me help you,” Caroline pled.
“You come down here in your suit and you think you know what’s right for everyone.” As Hitch’s voice rose, the other people in the soup kitchen looked over to see the cause of the disturbance. “Go back to your fancy office and try to fix someone else.”
“Just . . . try. Please.” Caroline thrust the Oasis pamphlet toward him.
With a sloppy right arm, Hitch tried to push it away but missed and stumbled into the table, toppling the neat piles of pamphlets and brochures of a half dozen charities.
The pamphlets fluttered like doomed butterflies before settling across the linoleum.
Hitch dropped his tray on the table beside the chafing dish.
Without a word, he turned and strode out of the soup kitchen.
Anger and worry clawed at Caroline as she watched him disappear out the door.
Hitch was drunk. He was homeless. And lord knew where he was going.
Unsure what else to do, Caroline squatted to pick up the pamphlets.
The soup kitchen coordinator drifted over to join her. His presence was a silent support.
Proof (Caroline Auden Book 2) Page 3