A Blossom of Bright Light (14 page)

“It shouldn't be. If you love her, you should want what's best for her—whatever that is.”

Dolan got off the phone and walked back to their table. There was a deliberateness in his step that Vega couldn't read. He wasn't breaking out the handcuffs, but he wasn't breaking out the champagne, either.

“Well?” asked Vega. “Does the hoodie have a pink lining?”

“It does,” said Dolan. “In all likelihood, it's the same one Joy is describing.”

“Good.” Vega felt like he could breathe again. “Talk to my ex, get a statement, and then you can focus the investigation in a different direction.” Vega began to rise from the table. “I gotta get to work.”

Dolan put a hand out to stay him. He turned to Joy. “You should probably get back to class. Your dad or I will be in touch if we need anything.”

“Okay. Thanks.” She kissed her father on the cheek, a surprise. “See you later, Dad.” She didn't look worried in the least.
Should she be?
Vega felt like his insides were going through the spin cycle. He waited until Joy had left the cafeteria to speak.

“Spit it out, Teddy. What did Gupta tell you?”

“Some good news and some bad.” Dolan sighed like even the good news wasn't all that good. “The teenager—and Gupta says she's definitely a teenager—wasn't murdered. She died of an internal hemorrhage. From a rupture to her uterus in childbirth. She died elsewhere and was moved to that location.”

From somewhere just outside the cafeteria, Vega could hear voices and the sound of someone putting change in a vending machine. He understood before Dolan could even get the words out what the bad news was. He understood too that he was going to be part of this case after all. Whether he wanted to or not.

“The bad news,” said Dolan, “is that Gupta tested her DNA as part of your dragnet. It came back positive. I think you just found the mother of Baby Mercy.”

Chapter 17

D
r. Gupta had Baby Mercy's DNA. She had her mother's DNA. By process of elimination, the police now had a complete DNA profile of the baby's father as well. Unfortunately, the profile didn't match anyone in the police database. So until they could find and question the baby's father, Joy would remain on everyone's radar.

Captain Waring's first instinct was to remove Vega from the Baby Mercy end of the investigation since it was now related to the dead teenager on campus. But Vega pointed out that for another detective to step into the case at this juncture would entail a lot of overtime—perhaps even a handoff to the state police. Waring was loath to assign more overtime and even more loath to hand over jurisdiction. So for the time being at least, Dolan and Vega were working opposite ends of the investigation, with support from Louis Greco and the Lake Holly police in between. For Vega, it felt like waking up a Red Sox and being traded to the Yankees. But at least now he could get his hands on the teenager's autopsy report.

Not that it told him much. Dr. Gupta put the girl's age at between fifteen and seventeen, given that only some of her bones had completely ossified and her wisdom teeth had only started to erupt. She had no tattoos or obvious scars. Her teeth in general were in poor condition, which Gupta noted would be expected if she grew up in a place that lacked water fluoridation—a situation common in Latin America. She was small in general—just under five feet tall. At death, she weighed only 115 pounds, and that was after having given birth to a full-term baby.

Dolan made up a flyer in English and Spanish listing the dead teenager's height, weight, and approximate age and where her body was found. The flyer also contained front and side photographs of her face—eyes closed—and a description of her clothing. What Dolan didn't disclose was any mention of her pregnancy or that her baby was the one found in Lake Holly. They would leave that to a suspect to reveal. Right now, the key to the whole case was putting a name to this girl. And Vega knew the first place he needed to visit.

The block surrounding La Casa was a lot busier on a Wednesday afternoon than it had been on Sunday morning. The auto body shop was open, hydraulic saws squealing from the dim recesses of the garage. There was a sandwich truck in front of the propane company where several workers in dark blue uniforms were lined up, placing their orders.

Vega parked his unmarked Impala in the lot and walked in. He was instantly greeted with what sounded like a jackhammer coming from the back of the building. The entire place vibrated from it. Ramona, Adele's assistant, poked her head out of the front office.

“What are you doing?” shouted Vega, cupping his ears. “Teaching a course on demolition?” In the front room, a gray-haired volunteer was scribbling an English lesson on a dry-erase board in front of a semicircle of day laborers. Vega wondered how the men could concentrate.

“A couple of clients are installing some bookshelves for Adele in the back room,” shouted Ramona. “They have to drill through cement block to do it. She's back there if you want to talk to her.”

“Thanks—I think.”

Vega found Adele in the back room near the snack bar, directing three men on the installation of a six-foot-high bookshelf that would delineate an area in which children could do their homework after school. She was standing with her back to Vega, wearing a soft, cream-colored blouse over dark tan pants, her bob of silky black hair glistening under the strips of industrial lights. He tapped her on the shoulder. She turned and her face softened at the sight of him. He felt a momentary skip in his heart to know he could still do that to her. She said something. He shook his head. He couldn't hear her over the noise from the drilling.

“Can I talk to you for a moment?” He shouted. He motioned outside. At least they'd be able to hear each other there.

Adele mimed that she needed a jacket from her office. Vega waited, and they both walked into the parking lot. The sun was warm and felt good on their backs, but a stiff breeze fanned the trees on the hillside. Adele wrapped her jacket tightly around her shoulders. Vega nodded to the noise coming from inside.

“Make sure your guys installing those bookshelves don't put too much pressure on the drill bit when they sink those holes.”

“But I want the screws to hold in concrete.”

“Too much pressure will just pulverize the concrete and plug up the holes,” Vega explained. “You'll end up breaking apart the very thing you wanted to hold together.”

Adele tucked a strand of hair behind one ear and studied him for a long moment.

“What?” he asked. “I know construction, Adele. That's how it works with concrete.”

“That's how it works with people too.”

“Huh?”

She turned away. “Forget it.” The sandwich truck across the street was leaving. “You didn't come all the way over here today to tell me how to mount a bookcase.”

“No.” He could see she was cold. “Wanna sit in my car?”

“I was just about to grab lunch.”

“From the truck?” Vega made a face.

“No. I was going to drive over to Claudia's. Her food is much better. Want to join me?”

Vega kept his gaze on the hillside. Yellow crime-scene tape still fluttered like ribbon in a girl's hair. Baby Mercy's death and all its implications rested like a giant minefield between them. He wasn't sure they'd ever be able to breach the divide.

Adele must have read his mind. “We're not going to solve our problems over lunch, Jimmy. I know that. But you came to talk to me about something and I'm hungry.”

He nodded. “You're right. Hop in. I'll drive.”

 

On the outside, Vega's unmarked Chevy Impala looked like a standard, forgettable medium-blue American sedan. Inside, it was equipped with scanners, a radio, and a laptop computer. He lowered the volume on his police radio and closed up his laptop. Nothing much was happening in the county at the moment. A few minor traffic accidents. A request for uniformed assistance on a couple of highways. He pulled a flyer from his envelope and handed it to Adele while he drove the six blocks through town to Claudia's.

“That dog? The one that belonged to the state trooper? This is the body it found in the woods yesterday.”

“Oh my God,” said Adele. “Was she a student?”

“Not that we can ascertain so far. She's Hispanic, between the ages of fifteen and seventeen. She's not on any missing persons' registries. Her prints don't show up in any federal databases, so she's never been arrested for a crime or illegal entry into the United States. Do you recognize her?”

Adele pulled her glasses from her purse and settled them on her face. She hated wearing them, Vega knew. But they didn't look bad. The black rims gave her a scholarly appearance, filled his head with fantasies of getting down and dirty between the stacks with the school librarian. A very voluptuous school librarian. He felt his cheeks go hot. Here they were, about to break up, and his thoughts still flowed in one direction. That was his curse.

Adele seemed oblivious. That was hers.

She frowned at the flyer. “The picture looks like a few teenagers I've seen come through La Casa. But it's hard to say. People look different when they're . . .” Adele's voice trailed off. She folded her glasses and put them away. “I'm confused how a dog that was supposed to track Joy ended up tracking this girl instead.”

“The dog
did
track Joy. As it turns out, the hoodie the girl was wearing once belonged to Joy—”

“According to Joy, she cleaned out her closet over the summer and Wendy gave her stuff to Goodwill. It's just a coincidence that the hoodie happened to be on this girl.”

“Creepy coincidence,” said Adele. “And serious, besides. Have you checked with Wendy?”

“I can't. It'd look like I was tampering with a witness. I have to let Teddy Dolan check it out. He's been assigned to the case.”

“Are you worried?”

“That Joy is involved?” Vega blew out a long breath of air. “Right now, all I can do is hope we figure out who this girl is. Maybe then the rest will fall into place. When we get back to La Casa, can you take some flyers, show them around?”

“Sure.”

Claudia's didn't have a parking lot. Vega parked across the street from the stucco two-story building with the red awning. He was glad to be here with Adele, even if he knew he was fooling himself. For an hour at least, he wanted to pretend.

“Do you think Claudia will let me put up a couple of flyers in her store?”

“She has a bulletin board by the register,” said Adele. “I don't know. A dead girl can be sort of off-putting.”

The sleigh bells on the back of the door announced their presence in the tiny store. Claudia was bustling behind the deli counter, slicing roast pork and various types of luncheon meat while three customers in dusty jeans and baseball caps grabbed sodas from the refrigerated case and slapped them on the scuffed counter. They cracked goofy jokes in Spanish and chatted up the pretty woman ringing up their order—a relative of Claudia's, no doubt—who pretended not to notice how hard the men were trying to flirt. Vega could see why. She had full, pouty lips and big astonished eyes that reminded Vega of those Beanie Baby stuffed animals Joy always favored when she was younger. Adele called her Inés. Vega got the sense she was Claudia's daughter.

Everyone said hello to Adele the moment they saw her: the workmen, Claudia, Inés. They called her Doña Adele, as a sign of respect. Vega wondered if anyone would call her Doña Adele if she moved to D.C.

The people in the store said hello to him too, but it was a guarded and formal greeting, and their eyes quickly shifted away. The gossip mill in town had no doubt spread the fact that Adele was dating him. But even so, his presence spooked them. Nobody in Adele's world ever looked at him and saw a man. They always saw a cop. The fact that he was Hispanic seemed beside the point.

The only person who said hello to him with unabashed gusto was a young man he hadn't noticed at first. He was short and round and dressed in the dark blue pants and blue-and-white-striped uniform shirt of the employees over at the Car Wash King. There was something glazed and off about his eyes.

“Hello, Mr. Police Officer! Can you put on the siren?”

Vega realized he'd seen the young man in the store before. He was Claudia's grandson or something. Claudia must have told the teenager that Vega was a cop.

“I'm not driving a patrol car,” said Vega. “I don't have a siren.”

“I love sirens!”

“Well, uh—next time I'm near a patrol car, I'll see if they can switch one on for you.” Vega was never particularly good with people with cognitive disabilities. He always over- or underestimated their intellect, which left him feeling frustrated or embarrassed or both. He hung back and scanned the aisles until the other customers finished their orders.

Some of the items brought back memories of the bodegas and
mercados
of his youth in the South Bronx: the ubiquitous blue jars of Vicks VapoRub, the yellow-andred cans of Café Bustelo, the bruised stalks of ripe plantains dangling from ropes on the ceiling. But the South Bronx of his childhood was poorer and the people much less sophisticated. There were so many things here that Vega never could have imagined at Manny's Bodega on East Tremont Avenue. Exotic fresh fruits. Colorful peppers. Vials of herbs whose names and purpose Vega could only guess at. The world, it seemed, had gotten much smaller.

Inés finished wrapping the men's sandwiches and rang them up. Vega gestured to the car-wash kid that he was next.

“No, no. My mami gives me a sandwich.”

“In a minute, Neto,” Inés answered. “First, I take care of Doña Adele and the señor.”

Mami?
Vega did a double take. No way could Inés be Neto's mother. The kid had to be at least eighteen or nineteen. Inés still had the sweet, firm face of a girl. She turned heads. Maybe she'd turned one too early. Vega could only imagine what a difficult life it must have been for her to be saddled with a child with special needs at such a young age. He wondered if there was a father around or if he'd picked up and left the moment he saw what he was in for.

Adele asked Vega what he wanted to order.

“I'll have ham and Swiss on a roll with lettuce, tomatoes, and hot peppers,” said Vega.

Adele debated less than a minute before ordering the same on a wrap. Vega was so glad to finally be with a woman who didn't consider a lettuce leaf and a wedge of lemon to be lunch. Eating with his vegan, macrobiotic, gluten-free daughter and ex-wife felt less like a meal and more like a science experiment.

The men in baseball caps and jeans were putting their money away and gathering up their sandwiches. Vega wanted as many eyes on his flyer as possible, so he approached them at the counter. Their bodies stiffened the moment Vega made eye contact. Just being asked a question by a police officer seemed to fill them with dread.

“Relax,
muchachos
,” he said softly in Spanish. “I just want to show you a picture, see if you recognize this girl.”

They looked at the picture. They looked at each other. They shook their heads, no. Vega felt like he was a high school principal asking who broke the gym window. They were nervous, but it was the general nervousness of young men who likely had no papers and no wish to hang around an officer who might decide to ask for them.

“Let me see the picture,” said Claudia, ever the snoop.