A Blossom of Bright Light (22 page)

D
etective Louis Greco was nothing if not a creature of habit. He always got his fringe of hair trimmed on Wednesdays when his favorite barber was working. He always bought his lunch—salami on a roll with roasted peppers—at the same little Italian deli every day around half past twelve. They had it packed and ready to go when he walked in. If he got called out on a case, they just refrigerated it and waited till he came in later.

And at four o'clock on Friday afternoons, he always went to the 7-Eleven next to the Car Wash King in town and bought ten Lotto tickets. Always ten. Always on Fridays at four. He was nothing if not superstitious.

When Greco came out of the store, Vega was leaning against Greco's car. It was a white Buick LaCrosse with a county police emblem on the rear window.

Greco stopped about ten paces in front of Vega and regarded him like he'd rolled in something nasty.

“Unless you're here to talk about that crappy Yankees pitch in the fourth inning last night, I've got nothing to say to you, Vega.”

“You see the autopsy report on Zambo yet?”

“No. That's Wickford's case. Hammond will give me the highlights on Monday, I'm sure.”

“I've seen it.”

“I don't even want to
know
how that happened.” Greco fished his keys out of his pocket and pushed the remote to unlock his car. Vega immediately helped himself to the front passenger seat.

Greco looked over at Vega and sighed. “See, the way this works is, I get in my car and head home, and you figure out a way not to get yourself fired—unless you're planning to skip the pension, buy some lottery tickets, and handle your financial planning the Puerto Rican way.”

“You're the one buying the lottery tickets.”

“'Cause I've had the unfortunate luck of knowing a Puerto Rican who's gonna get me fired.”

“Zambo was poisoned, Grec.”

Vega watched the shock resonate and then recalibrate itself to cop cynicism immediately. “This your theory?”

“Gupta thought I was still on the case, so she walked me through everything.”

Greco put his fingers in his ears. “I didn't hear any of that. And I'll swear to it on a witness stand.”

“Okay. Here's something else you didn't get from me: Adele just texted me and told me Romeo Rivera's not Neto's dad.”

“Huh?”

“Adele says she just spoke to Inés. Inés won't say who Neto's father is, but apparently it's not Romeo. It's some guy who raped Inés when she was a teenager and, for all we know, raped that dead teenager too.”

“Did Claudia or Inés report it?”

“I can't reach Adele to ask, but I get the impression they didn't. In any case, she says Romeo's not your boy.”

“And my guys are always keen to hear suspects tell us why they aren't,” said Greco dryly.

“Suit yourself. Do the DNA test. Just thought you should know. Those are the film highlights. So—you want to stay for the whole show?”

“There's more?”

“I got some things you should look into.”

Greco looked over to the other end of the blacktop where the car wash was located. Men in striped uniform shirts and rubber boots were hosing down vehicles before they went through the automated conveyor. Greco turned on his engine and began to back out of his parking space.

“Where are we going?” asked Vega. “My car's parked here.”

Greco made a sharp right into the entrance for the Car Wash King. “I'm gonna talk to you, I want a dark tunnel where no one can see or hear us. You got three whole minutes to talk and I'll listen.”

“I can't tell you everything in three minutes.”

“People make babies in under three minutes, Vega. You can lay out your bullshit theories.”

A rainbow-shaped sign welcomed them to 0T
HE
C
AR
W
ASH
K
ING
.
The cheapest basic car wash was eight dollars. Greco pulled between the orange cones and held his hand out to Vega. “I listen. You pay.”

Vega dug a ten-dollar bill from his wallet. “That's what Joy's lawyer says.”

“Yeah, but I come cheap. Eight bucks wouldn't buy you pissing time with a lawyer.”

The attendant beckoned Greco's car forward until his wheels locked into the metal tracking. Greco shifted into neutral. He took his foot off the brake and his hands off the steering wheel. Then he popped open the glove compartment and offered Vega a Twizzler. Vega waved him away.

“Still looks like wire insulation to me.”

“Better wire insulation than—what's that dish you Puerto Ricans eat? The lumpy, mushy one that looks like someone cleaned out their garbage disposal on your plate?”

“You mean
mofongo?
Mashed green plantains, garlic, and pork crackling?”

“Yeah. That's the one.”

“I love
mofongo
,” said Vega. “It's like Puerto Rican stuffing. My mom used to make it all the time when I was a kid.” He wished his mom were still around to make it for him now.

“I'll stick to my Twizzlers, thank you.” Greco pulled one out of the package and bit off an end. The attendant swabbed suds across the Buick's windshield, obscuring their vision.

“So talk,” said Greco. “You've got three minutes.”

The track began to pull the car forward into a maze of brushes and long, soft strips of yellow cloth that batted against the windows. Vega had a vivid memory of the first time he went through a car wash. He must have been about five. It was in the Bronx on one of those rare occasions his father came by to visit. Orlando Vega was a bass player in a Dominican merengue band, but to earn money, he did a variety of odd jobs from handyman to house-painter to limo driver.

His father must have been working as a chauffeur at the time because he had a big Lincoln Town Car with him. He offered to take Vega for a spin. Vega had only been in a car once or twice before that, and he thrilled, as all boys would, to the speed of the vehicle, the smell of the fine-tooled leather, the purr of the engine. Add to that the sheer showiness of his good-looking father in a sharp suit behind the wheel of this big flashy car cruising along Tremont Avenue. It was the sort of day Vega had always wished for, the sort of day he should have been able to recall with warmth and fondness.

Then his dad decided to take the vehicle through a car wash. Looking back, it was probably part of the reason Orlando Vega was driving the car around in the first place. Still, the noise and darkness terrified Vega. It was probably all of three minutes, but he cried the entire time. His father yelled at him for smearing the windows with tears and snot. He called Vega a
miedoso—
a coward. By the time they were out the other side, Vega just wanted to go home.

When he thought back on that day, he wanted to remember the breeze on his skin through the open windows, the smell of new car leather, his dad's sharp suit and Brut aftershave. But what he really thought about was the dark, noisy car wash and that sense of failure when his dad called him a coward. He didn't see his father for a long time after that. By the time they moved to Lake Holly when he was eleven, he didn't see him at all.

Vega tried to shake those thoughts from his head. He knew he didn't have much time, so he told Greco about Gupta's findings that Zambo had ingested hydrofluoric acid.

“Where did it come from?”

“That's just it. None of the bottles or cans you and Hammond found match up. HF can only be stored in plastic. I think somebody gave Zambo a swig of something—maybe some cheap vodka in a plastic bottle—and then took it away.”

“Whoa. Hold on,” said Greco. “How do you get from Zambo being poisoned to Zambo being murdered? The guy was a homeless alcoholic. He'd drink paint thinner if he thought he could get off on it. You're talking about an industrial solvent that could have come from anywhere.”

“Not anywhere. HF is an ingredient in wheel rim cleaners. You're driving through the very business that uses it all the time. And who owns every car wash in the area?”

Vega gestured through the windshield of the Buick. Great vacuums were sucking up fat amoeba-shaped droplets of water from the glass. The noise sounded like a jet engine.

Vega felt foolish for letting his five-year-old self come back to haunt him.

“You know how ridiculous you sound?” asked Greco. “Zambo would have sucked down lighter fluid if he thought he could get drunk on it. I'm not surprised he's dead. I'm surprised he didn't die sooner.”

“You're not even the least bit curious why someone would poison him?”

“Because I'm not convinced it wasn't accidental! Look, Vega, I know what you're trying to do. But you make an accusation against people like the Gonzalezes—and by extension, Schulman—you better be sure you're right and have all the evidence to back it up. Not to mention the blessings of your own department. What do you have? Some vague ramblings from a drunk who easily could have been the source of his own demise? A mentally retarded teenager's sketchy ID? You have absolutely nothing. You go after the Gonzalezes with any of this, you're guaranteed to embarrass everyone: your department,
my
department, Adele. Hell, if I were her,
I'd
walk away from you after this.”

As soon as the track let them off on the other side of the car wash, Vega hopped out of the car. He dug through his pockets and handed the guy drying down the car a $5 dollar tip.

“I can do that,” said Greco.

“Yeah. Sure. You're great at giving tips.”

Vega slammed the door and began walking back to his car at the 7-Eleven. No one wanted to listen to him. Then again, if roles were reversed, would he? He sounded like the panicky father he was, grasping at anything that might clear Joy once and for all of any involvement.

Nothing could ever clear him. He'd have the guilt of what he'd done to this baby on his conscience forever.

From the corner of Vega's eye, he noticed a round figure huffing toward him. It was Neto Rivera. He was in his car-wash uniform with a rag in his hand. His little dachshund was trailing behind him. Vega figured he just wanted to ask about the police siren again. Then he saw the young man's face. Neto was crying.

“Mr. Detective! Mr. Detective! I just heard that the police—they arrested my papi!”

“I'm not involved in the case, Neto. You need to speak to—” Vega searched the lot, but Greco had just turned onto the roadway, headed for home.
Puñeta!
Greco had just said to back off. And here he was, drawn right back in. “—I think it's best if you talk to your mother and grandmother about this.”

“I called Mami and Abuelita. They didn't answer. Papi is a good man. Not bad. Why the police put him in jail?”

A dumpy little Spanish guy came out of the office in front of the wash tunnel and yelled at Neto in Spanish to get back to work. Neto tucked his rag in his back pocket and palmed his eyes. Vega felt bad for the kid. The dog seemed to sense it too. He danced around Neto's feet.

“Look, Neto, why don't we go talk to your boss and see if he can give you some time off to speak to your family? I can give you and your dog a lift to your grandmother's market, okay?”

Neto agreed, and Vega walked the teenager over. The little dachshund trailed behind them. Vega was surprised the dog had never gotten run over with so many cars going through this place. At the sight of Vega, the supervisor immediately disappeared into the office. He was on the phone when Vega entered. Clearly, he didn't want to get between Neto and a cop.

“Why the police want Papi?” asked Neto. “Why?”

“The police just want to ask him some questions.”

“Then Papi can go?”

Vega didn't know how to answer that, so he drummed his fingers on the countertop, hoping the supervisor would finish his call so Vega could get out of there.

The car-wash office was like the counter of a rental car agency: clean, sparse, and cheap. There was a cash register, a placard that said “Ask about our monthly maintenance program,” plaques testifying to membership in the chamber of commerce, and posters in support of various local sports teams.

In the middle of all of this was a framed color photograph of a stocky young Hispanic man in a car-wash attendant's uniform. The picture had that blurry, yellowish tint of older photographs before everything was digitalized. The man was wearing a baseball cap, possibly to hide the first traces of a thinning hairline. He had a broad, hopeful smile. Who could have guessed that Charlie Gonzalez would go from that to all of this? Vega supposed it was both an inspiration and a source of frustration to his employees that Gonzalez had done what they could only dream of doing. Maybe that's why people call it the American Dream. For most, it will always be just that.

Neto was mouth-breathing loudly next to Vega. The supervisor was still on the phone.

“Why the police arrest Papi? Why?” The teenager was becoming a broken record. Vega tried to be patient.

“I don't think they've arrested him yet, Neto. They just want to ask him some questions.”

“Like you asked me? About Mia?”

Vega blinked at the teenager. He had no idea how close he'd come to the truth.

“I don't know.”

“Papi doesn't know Mia.”

Maybe yes. Maybe no,
thought Vega. That's what the DNA was going to find out. Vega cleared his throat, trying to catch the supervisor's attention.