Cool in Tucson (18 page)

The dubious eyes watched him.  “Was that Mom?  Why didn’t you let me talk to her?”

“Well, she’s just shopping up a storm, she’s in a hurry.  And she said a movie’s okay.  What movie would you like to see?”

She shook her head firmly.  “It’s a school night,” she said.  “I can’t go to a movie, I have to finish my homework.”

What was with this kid?  She acted like a grown-up woman with a bug up her ass.  His sisters would have been just yelling the names of movies at him by now.

Hector tried the grin his Mama could never resist.  This strange brat just stared back at him with her stern little jaw clamped shut.  “Look, your Mom said it was okay, what are you worrying about?   What’s your name, by the way?”

“Denny.  I need to go home now.”

Well, shit, maybe that would work.  Drop her there and…
“Where do you live?”

“It’s back there near the store.  But I can’t go there by myself.”

“Well, no, of course not.”  He got into the right lane, ready to turn.  “I’m gonna take you.”

“No, I mean I can’t go in the house without Mom.  We have to go get Mom first.”

“What, you’re afraid to be alone in your own house?  A big girl like you?” 

“
No
.”  Angry, she shook her head so hard her braids whipped her face.

“What is it then?”

She glared at him.  “There’s somebody else there right now.”

“Oh?”  Hector saw how her eyes had gone flat and cold, and had a hunch.  “Who, your Daddy?  Your brother?”  She was shaking her head.  “Your Mom’s boyfriend?”  She didn’t say yes but she quit shaking her head and sat staring down at her knees. 
Shit.  A thousand cars I could have grabbed, I have to pick the Evil Mama’s damn car.

“Maybe I could go to my aunt Sarah’s house,”
she said, still looking at her knees,
 
 kind of talking to herself.  “I don’t know if she’s home, though.  I’d have to call.”

Hector opened his mouth to say, “Go ahead, call,” but then who knew if Aunt Sarah would recognize Evil Mama’s car and raise a stink?  So he put on the big-buddy grin that always worked with his sisters, leaned over her and said, “Aw, come on, you deserve a treat, don’t you?  Let’s go to the movies.  You ever seen Master and Commander
?
” 

“No.”  He watched her trying to resist.  “It’s an old movie, isn’t it?”

“Havin’ a rerun at the Roxy.  I already saw it once, but it’s so good I’d like to go again.”

“Well—” Finally, the face that turned toward him wore a kid’s expression, excited.  “Okay.” 

“Aw
right!
  Oh, you are gonna
love this movie
.  Hang on, here we go.”

He drove west to Campbell and past the crowded lot in front of Bookman’s, around the corner to the front of the theater and up the ramp to the theater parking on the second level, thinking,
Who’s gonna look for a stolen car at a movie theater?
  And off the street like this, he really couldn’t ask for a better place to wait for shithead Estes. 

He grabbed his Trader Joe’s bag, said “Let’s go, Denny!” and walked down the ramp to the theater window smiling down at her, doing his best to make this look like
Tio
Hector and his little niece with the braids.  Denny made it look even better when she looked over the railing, said, “Look!” and pointed down to the little park on Edison Street where a dozen or so teenage boys in weird pajamas were threatening each other with sticks. 

“Aw, don’t worry, that’s just a dumb slant-eyes game,” Hector said. “Ain’t nobody getting hit much.”  The little girl looked at him funny and said something about Ti Kwan Doh, and Hector thought angrily,
always somebody wants to correct me
.  Wanted to smash her face right there but told himself,
Keep your shine on, kind ol’ Uncle Hector.

He thought he had enough money in his pocket but it didn’t quite cover the tickets, he had to reach into the grocery sack again.  It was okay though, everybody around him was looking at the times on the board and buying tickets, so nobody watched him.  

They grabbed a pair of seats near the back, on the aisle, because the picture was starting.  The camera panned across the opening scene, the tall ship in the fog, men and boys on deck with all the sails flapping and the ropes hanging everywhere, the young seaman saying, “I thought I saw something.”  Then the macho captain cut through the crowd like a shark, grabbed up the spyglass and said, “Where?” Denny was hooked right away, he saw, staring up at the screen with big eyes. 

He sat beside her, waiting, and then, oh Christ, his damn cell phone started to ring inside the bag.  He thought he’d remembered to turn it off.  People all around him were looking, and somebody said, “Sshhh!” and he whispered, “Sorry!” and fished around in the bag till he found it.  But then he couldn’t seem to get the motherfucker turned off.   He punched where he knew END should be, but it kept ringing.  Somebody said, “Will you
please—”
and in a panic to get the noise stopped he darted back up to the entrance door and out into the hall where he could see the buttons. 

Under the light, he finally found the END button and got the ringing stopped.  Then he stood staring at the thing in his hand. 
This ain’t my phone
.  For a second he got that disoriented feeling he’d had when Denny first sat up in the backseat of the car, his brain saying,
This can’t be happening
. 

Then he realized, his own phone was right where he always kept it, in the holster that clipped on his belt.  He checked it; it was turned off all right.  This was Ace’s phone
he was holding. 
Man, you gotta get your mind organized, you can’t be lettin’ little things rattle you like this.
 

But when he remembered the Trader Joe’s bag back there under his seat, all the money in it and the gun, he got rattled all over again and hustled back to his seat in a sweat.  It was okay, though; Denny was sitting bolt upright staring at the screen like it was the first movie she ever saw, and the bag was right where he left it. 

He sat through the first scene, then leaned toward Denny and whispered, “Be right back.”  She nodded without taking her eyes off the screen.  He walked up the aisle carrying the Trader Joe’s bag, stood under the light in the hall while he pulled his phone off his belt and dialed Estes’ number.

Estes answered on the first ring, his voice sharp, “Yeah?”

“’S Hector.  My stuff ready?”

“What’s the idea hasslin’ my wife?  We don’t have to take that shit from you.”

“You shoulda been there at seven o’clock like you said.  You want your money or don’t you?”

“You better have it all in cash, Putz.  I’m not taking any checks from you.”

“Who said anything about checks?  I’ll be right there.”  He walked as quietly as he could down the aisle past Denny, who was so absorbed in the movie she never even turned her head.  He pushed the panic bar on the metal door under the lighted exit sign, went out and climbed the cement stairs to the parking garage.

Driving away, he thought once about the little girl sitting there alone in the dark  theater.  She probably wouldn’t even notice his absence till the movie ended.  Then she’d look around at the crowd leaving, and wonder—
Ah, she’ll figure it out and call somebody.  Ain’t nobody ever died from getting left in a movie theater.

He drove east and then south to Estes’ house, watching the streets carefully, checking his rear-view mirror often.  He knew he had to be ready to abandon this car at the first hint that a cop was checking his license plate number.  That would leave him on foot in a town that sprawled for miles over hot desert.  Public transportation was scarce in Tucson and taxis hard to find, but he would figure that out if he came to it. 
Long as I hang onto my grocery bag I got money and a gun, what more do I need?  Even got my bottle of Gatorade,
he thought—a little joke to cheer himself up.  Ace’s half-finished bottle was still sloshing around down there in the Trader Joe’s bag. 

And seriously, maybe he ought to try a swig.  Ever since he got back to Tucson he’d been getting so
stressed out,
it wasn’t like him at all and he was really sick of it
.
Things kept happening that he didn’t expect, making him feel like he wasn’t in charge.  He tried saying to himself again,
you already killed a man, what could be so hard after that? 
And just like that, it worked again.  By the time he parked in front of Estes’ house he was a cool dude, ready for his next boss move. 

Let’s stick to the plan now, he told himself, giving a sharp little rap on the door.  Get these papers, roll on down there to Mexico and make that bundle.  And then come back to Tucson and show ol’ Rudy Ortiz how the big boys do it.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“Okay, Janine,” Sarah said, “they’re doing us a favor, letting us talk in here for a few minutes.”  They were in the manager’s office at the back of the Fry’s store—the last stop, Sarah had been trying to get her to understand, before Mendoza took her to the Rincon station for further questioning.  

“How about some favors for me?  I’m the one whose child is missing.”  The glow from the beer and pot was fading fast.  Janine looked ragged and ready for a fight.

“Janine, you’ve got to give me some straight answers now.  You hear me?  Once Artie takes you to the station you’ll be in the system and I can’t talk to you any more.   You’ll be dealing with detectives from the child abuse section.  I won’t have any more access than any other family member does, till they decide how to charge you.”

“
Charge
me?”  Janine stared at her sister and the two uniformed officers with her mouth open, the red coming up in her face.  “You mean you’re going to blame the victim?  What the hell’s wrong with you people?”

She’s looking for a scapegoat
.  Sarah saw it all coming, the indignation and denial, the frantic search for someone to blame. 
And here I am, handy as usual
.  But Denny was out there somewhere and the games had to stop now.  “Janine, look at me.  Look at me!  Denny is missing and you lied to the police. Unless you tell me right now where you left her you’re going to jail.” 

“I didn’t lie about Denny!  She was in the car with me!”

“You told us you hadn’t been to the store. But the box boy said he found you wandering in the parking lot crying, alone, carrying two sacks full of beer and cigarettes.”

“And hot dogs and buns, and mustard and milk.  You make it sound like—”

“Okay, hot dogs.  What else did you lie about?  Where was Denny while you bought the beer?”

“In the car!  Only somebody moved it!”

“You left her in the car?  Janine, were the keys in the car?”

“Well
yeah
.  How else was I going to leave the A/C on for her?”

“You mean the motor was running too?”

“That’s what makes it
work
, right?”  She tossed her head, rolled her eyes at the ceiling.

“And the reason you couldn’t take her in the store with you was?”

“I was in a hurry!  She said she was hungry, I wanted to get home and feed her.”

“Uh-huh.  All that beer was for you?”

“No!  I was…doing a favor.  For a friend.”

“Where’s this friend now?  Janine?  Answer me!”

“He’s at home—”

“Whose home?”

“
My
home!  Waiting for me.”  Sensing that her friend at home was not being well received, she revised him.  “Or he was.  He’s probably gone by now.”  Met by dubious silence, she tried self-pity. “Why does everything I try to do just get so damn—screwed
up?
”