Crushed (The Fredrickson Winery Novels)

by Barbara Ellen Brink

  He walked nonchalantly toward the Ferrari, his gaze taking in the strategically placed security camera that covered this corner and pointed at the stairwell door beyond. He was tempted to lift the handle of the car as he passed, setting off the alarm, but he refrained. Bending down, hands on his thighs, he took a good look through the driver’s side window. Agosto had left a cap on the passenger seat, the words Golden Gate Racetrack embroidered on the crown—a memento of his time here—other than that, the car was pristine, uncluttered.

  Adam straightened and walked slowly around the vehicle to the stairwell. He took the stairs down to level two, then hopped on the escalator and rode it down to the lobby. The desk was attended by two men and an older woman, busy waiting on guests. The concierge sat at his own desk off to the side, speaking with a young couple while they tried to sooth a crying baby in a stroller. Adam stepped off the escalator and moved through the lobby toward the elevators. He’d already managed to find out what floor Agosto Salvatore was staying on. He pushed the up button and waited.

  The chime sounded, heralding the elevator’s arrival. The young couple caught up with him just as the doors opened. The man didn’t appear any older than Adam, his dark hair cut short and spiked with some hair gel that smelled like citrus. He pushed the stroller, while his wife, her face scrunched in desperation, held a stuffed bunny over the baby’s head in hopes of distracting it from continuing the ear-splitting screams emitting from tiny cherub lips. Adam wanted to cover his ears as he held the door for the family. He was sure the decibels emitting from the baby was more dangerous than the sound of a jackhammer.

  “Sorry,” murmured the woman as she passed him, shaking the bunny so close to the baby’s face it was in danger of getting a mouthful of fur. She moved in beside her husband on the other side of the stroller and let her arm drop limply to her side. The baby continued to wail.

  Adam tried to remain inconspicuous, pressing as close to the other side of the elevator as possible. He watched the numbers light up as they ascended and hoped the family would exit soon.

  The doors finally opened on twelve and the man rolled the screaming child out the door. “We might as well go home tomorrow, Babe, cause pushing this thing around all day is not my idea of a vacation.”

  “Well, if your mother had been willing to watch him for one stinking week…” her voice dwindled away as the doors slid shut again.

  Adam released a sigh of relief and leaned against the wall as the elevator slid up to floor fourteen and came to a stop. The doors slid open and he was face to face with a large black woman. Behind her, coming down the hall, was Agosto Salvatore. He quickly moved back into the corner of the elevator and pulled his cap low over his eyes. The woman looked at him strangely but stepped in and pushed the button for the lobby. He crossed his arms and stared down at the floor.

  Agosto stepped in and turned to push the lobby button. Seeing it already lit up, he dropped his hand to his side and faced forward. The doors closed and the elevator descended. Staring at his wavy reflection in the brushed metal of the door, Agosto nervously combed fingers through his hair and straightened his suit coat. The elevator made stops at nine, seven, and four, and Agosto was pushed back as people entered, close enough that Adam could smell alcohol on his breath. When the doors finally opened to the lobby another group of passengers waited.

  Adam, backed to the furthest corner in his attempt to be invisible, nearly missed his chance to get off the elevator. He pushed through oncoming traffic and stepped out just in time to see Agosto pause to chat with the concierge. The man smiled and gestured toward the front doors.

  Salvatore moved toward the entrance, obviously expecting his Ferrari to be brought around any minute. He stopped and picked up a newspaper from a table, read the headlines, his mouth grim. He folded it and stuck it under his arm.

  Adam took the escalator at a run, hoping Salvatore would be too engrossed in waiting for his car to look up. He nearly collided with an old man in Bermuda shorts and a straw hat when he opened the stairwell door. “Sorry,” he said, moving quickly around him and darting up the stairs to garage level four.

  He bolted through the door and ran to his car with the key fob out. Sliding between the vehicles, he squeezed back behind the wheel and started the ignition. The Ferrari was already gone from its space, but the valet had left orange cones to keep it saved from non-tipping customers. He threw the car into reverse and managed to inch out from between the pillars without scraping anything off. He turned toward the exit, his tires squealing like a litter of pigs. He couldn’t lose Salvatore now. He prayed all the lights turned red so he could catch up. Better yet, that the smug rich boy would get picked up for drinking and driving. That would put him out of commission for a while.

  Pulling up to the parking attendant’s booth, he saw a flash of blue move under streetlights and turn, disappearing from his view. He signed the card and handed it back, stepped on the gas as the bar was raised.

  By the time he hit the street, the Ferrari was pulling away from the front of the hotel, the valet waving him off. He slowed, waiting for Salvatore to pull into traffic, then followed, keeping two or three cars between them for a buffer.

  Once the city lights faded behind them, Salvatore sped up, his car weaving in and out of traffic as if he were driving in the Indy 500. Adam struggled to keep close enough not to lose him without getting himself killed in a head-on collision.

  He opened the vents and let the cool night air in, heavy with the sweet scent of sun-ripened grapes. He glanced at the clock in the dash. Half past nine. If Salvatore was driving back to San Francisco tonight, he hadn’t brought his luggage. But maybe that was a ploy to throw anyone watching off his tail. The police may have asked the hotel to let them know when he checked out.

  Wherever he was going, he was in a hurry to get there. Adam kept his eye on the taillights. Traffic thinned as they drove further out and he pulled back, not wanting to spook him. He’d watched enough cop shows to know the bad guy was always paranoid. Apparently for good reason.

  He suddenly realized they were nearing the winery. He saw the sign for Fredrickson’s lit up by the Ferrari’s headlights as it sped past, and he followed slower, glancing toward the house. Hunkered down in the shadow of the giant oaks, it seemed much smaller than it actually was. Billie still left a light on in the hallway at night, but all looked dark from his vantage point. He hoped she was getting some sleep, but she was probably sitting up wondering why he hadn’t come home and worrying about Davy. He should have called.

  The Ferrari’s brake lights came on and the car pulled quickly over to the side of the road just past the Parker driveway. Adam continued on, hoping Salvatore hadn’t spotted him. He looked in his rearview mirror and saw the Ferrari make a u-turn and speed back the way they came. He cut his lights and pulled to the side of the road, waiting to see what Salvatore was up to.

  A truck barreled past, shaking the little Toyota, and him to the core. This was a dangerous piece of road and here he was sitting alongside it in the dark. A few seconds later the Ferrari’s brake lights glowed red once again and the car turned off the road. Salvatore either pulled into the winery or the little dirt-packed access road that wound down between Fredrickson’s vineyards and the neighbor’s fields on the other side.

  Adam flicked his lights back on, waited for two cars to pass, and then whipped the Toyota back around onto the highway. He slowed when he neared the Fredrickson sign, but no car was in sight. He cut his lights and turned into the winery driveway. He thought he caught a glimpse of movement in the field to his right, but if Salvatore had actually driven his precious sports car down that rutted road, he was also playing with lights out. The road was only meant for workers on tractors or other machinery; a rough piece of dirt track that would destroy the shocks on something so low to the ground. Salvatore would probably have to abandon the car before he went far.

  Adam parked the Toyota near the winery and stepped out, closing the door softly. He stoo
d and listened, hoping to catch the sound of the performance engine whimpering in agony, but the night was quiet around him. He took to the shadows, staying close to the buildings and trees, making his way back toward the access road. He thought he heard someone cough and paused to listen. The neighbor’s dog barked across the field, probably chasing a rabbit. He moved on, pulling back vines and crawling under a row of grapes, then another. The access road was hard-packed and rutted. He followed it toward the highway keeping to the shadow of the vines. The moon, obscured by a swath of cloud cover for the moment, gave him much needed invisibility, but he knew it wouldn’t last for long. Clear skies were obviously the curse of California. At least for someone wanting to move about in the dark undetected.

  The Ferrari, as he suspected, had been deserted close to the highway. The wheelbase would never survive this terrain. Salvatore was gone, a faint scent of cigarette smoke lingering in his wake. Adam turned and moved back the way he’d come. Why would the man be out here at the winery in the dark? Was he planning on walking all the way around to Margaret’s place, or was he up to something else?

  Nearing the winery, he thought he heard a voice on the wind, a murmur that rose and faded away, followed by a short, harsh laugh. He paused, wondering whom Salvatore was meeting. The moon slid out from behind clouds and lit up the yard like a theatre spotlight for just a moment. Adam slunk back against the wall of the shed and inched forward to peer around the edge. He didn’t see anyone. Wherever they were standing was out of his line of sight, and he was afraid to venture further and be seen. Another voice—murmured words indecipherable at this distance, but the feeling behind them was clear.

  Anger.

  The moon disappeared again, and he moved back around the building in the other direction, hoping to come up behind them and hear what they were saying. Somewhere in the distance a radio was suddenly turned up, the happy stuttering trumpets of a Mariachi band. The neighbors were probably working through the night to bring in their harvest.

  He rounded the building fairly quickly, moving toward the work yard. The black hulking shapes of a tractor and trailer lay before him, his familiar forklift—an eerie specter—crouched beside the sorter. Somewhere close a car backfired and he automatically ducked. His pulse accelerated as he stood there listening hard to decipher meaning out of the silent aftermath. Realization flooded his mind. Not a car backfiring, but a gunshot. The sound had been close, echoing off the walls of the winery.

  Leaning back, he pulled his cell phone from his pocket. Who should he call? The police? Handel? He flipped it open and the face lit up. Flipped it closed again. What if this person with a gun saw the light? He crouched low, listening. The porch light came on at the house, lighting a path halfway across the gravel. He heard the squeak of the screen door as Billie looked out, her dark hair shining in the overhead bulb. She glanced around, then closed the door and shut off the light.

  Adam released the breath he’d been holding and slowly stood up, stretching the kink in his back. Everything was quiet again. No voices. No nothing. Maybe it wasn’t a gun he’d heard. Maybe it really was a vehicle backfiring in the neighbor’s fields—or something else. The bang could have come from a machine.

  Staying to the shadows, he moved forward. Someone grunted, struggling with something heavy behind the machinery, a scooting sound and a thud accompanied by heavy breathing. He waited what seemed like an interminable amount of time. Just when he’d decided to confront the person, he heard the Ferrari start. The soft purr of the performance engine was unmistakable even at this distance. He turned and raced back around the building and down the dirt track, hoping he didn’t trip in a rut and twist his ankle. The car’s headlights sliced on, blinding him. Thrust into reverse, it moved backwards at a dangerously damaging speed, bumped back onto the shoulder of the highway and spun around in the gravel, gears grinding. Adam watched as the car spun out in the gravel and shot forward like a bullet, rubber squealing as it found purchase on solid blacktop, and headed back toward town. Red taillights winked and slowly disappeared into the night.

  He coughed and covered his nose against the assailing blanket of dust. Salvatore had tricked him. He must have known he was being followed. Was one of Billie’s employees also in on the kidnapping? He turned and ran back toward the winery. By now, the other person would have had sufficient time to disappear.

  He didn’t hesitate this time, hoping to catch the culprit before they got away. No doubt the pounding of his shoes against hard-packed earth was as loud as a battle cry. He ran toward the machines, silent in slumber, hoping to surprise his opponent, but nothing moved. The only sound was the distant Mariachi band playing another happy harvest song on the radio. He picked up a metal fork leaning against the sorter and raised it over his head like he was going spear fishing.

  “What are you doing out here?” A voice demanded. A flashlight flicked on, blinding him. He whirled around brandishing the fork. Billie jumped back and gasped. “What the…!”

  “Billie!” He dropped the fork and stood there in the beam of the flashlight, blinded and dumb.

  “Adam? I heard something and thought someone was breaking into the winery. I called the cops. They’ll be here any minute.” She shook her head. “Now what am I going to tell them? That my stupid brother was roaming around in the dark, and nearly assaulted me with a sorter fork?”

  “Could you point that thing down a bit? You’re killing me here,” he said, holding a hand over his eyes.

  She lowered the beam to the ground. “What are you doing out here?”

  “Could I see that flashlight please?” he held out a hand and she reluctantly handed it over.

  “Well?”

  He moved around the sorter, shining the light over the ground, looking for something to prove that someone other than himself had been skulking around the winery. He bent down, squinting at the dirt. What looked like tracks from a bobsled being pulled across the ground, equally spaced marks, led past the sorter and along the belt that carried the grapes into the winery to be pressed. The marks stopped at the edge of the concrete walkway that rounded the building. There was nothing around that would make those dragging marks. One of the large grape bins, pushed against the wall, filled with the cast off fruit and stems that went through the sorter and was rejected, was the only thing within ten yards of the marks.

  He straightened and blew out a frustrated breath. “Salvatore was meeting someone here. I don’t know what they were up to, but they took off.”

  “Was it Sean Parker?” she asked, clearly repelled at the thought that the man could have been right outside her door.

  “I don’t know. Never saw him. I was actually wondering if Salvatore had an accomplice here at the winery. Someone who could help Parker get the boys away without anyone being the wiser.” A siren whined in the distance. “The cavalry’s coming to save the day.”

  She took the flashlight from his hand. “None of my employees would be involved in Davy’s kidnapping,” she stated emphatically. “Don’t even go there.”

  He held up his hands. “Sorry. Just thinking out loud.”

  “Well think silently,” she said. The police turned up the driveway, sirens silenced now, but lights still flashing. She moved to meet them, then stopped and poked Adam in the chest. “Has this got something to do with Handel?”

  “I left Handel at home with Margaret. I saw Salvatore pulling into the dirt road behind the winery with his lights off. So I followed him.” He left out the part about the hotel but he figured it wouldn’t help his case with the police.

  Red and blue lights flashed, reflecting on the front of the house like a child’s mobile. “Let me do the talking,” she said, hurrying toward the cruiser.

  *****

  Officer Stanton pulled his cruiser closer to the yard, headlights on bright and a side-mounted spotlight flooding the yard with enough light to grow marijuana. He and the other officer, were both holding flashlights big enough to do double service as billy clubs, roame
d the yard, searching behind the machinery and around the sheds.

  Adam pointed out the tracks and the officer shook his head. “Could be anything. Are you sure you didn’t see anyone?”

  “It was too dark, and I wasn’t close enough to hear what they were saying.”

  “But you heard a gunshot?”

  “It sounded like a gunshot.” He shrugged. “But I don’t know. It echoed between the buildings strangely. Could have been a vehicle backfiring in the field I guess.”

  “But you did see Mr. Salvatore’s car?” Officer Stanton asked, his brows raised.

  “Yes sir. A convertible Ferrari is hard to mistake even in the dark. I thought it was strange when he pulled into the access road. It’s dirt and very rough. Not a great surface for a sports car.”

  “Okay, we’ll check it out.” He turned toward Billie. “Ma’am, let us know in the morning if anything seems out of place or missing.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want me to go inside and turn the outside lights on?” she asked, pushing her hair behind her ear.

  “If anyone was still hiding here we would have found them.” He met Adam’s eye and jerked his head toward the Toyota. “Is there some reason Margaret Parker’s car is over there?”

  “I borrowed it,” he said, hoping they didn’t call Margaret and check out his story. They’d obviously run her plates.

  “Okay.” He tipped his hat. “Good night, folks. We’ll have a patrol car come up your road a couple times tonight. Keep an eye on the place.”

  “Thank you, officer.” Billie grabbed Adam by the arm and pulled him toward the house. “You’ve got a lot of explaining to do.”