Darkness & Shadows (34 page)

The woman didn’t respond, kept walking. A kid on a beat-up mess of a bike whizzed past her.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said.

They were headed for the car when Patrick stopped. He turned around and scanned the neighborhood.

“What?” she said.

“It worked with one—it might work a lot better with more.”

“Huh?”

“Just watch.” He walked down the street where a bunch of kids were hanging out on bikes. Tristan followed. From his wallet, he pulled a bunch of twenties.

“Any of you speak English?” he said to them, holding up the wad of bills.

Half of them nodded anxiously; the others didn’t need to. He was speaking the International Language of Cash.

“I’ve got twenty bucks for each of you who brings me a woman named Maria and twenty bucks for her, too. Find your friends. I’ll give them money as well. Are you up for it?”

Ten heads were now nodding and smiling.

“You’ve got fifteen minutes,” Patrick said, “then the deal’s off. And I want proof, letters with a name and address, IDs, anything.
Comprende?
”

The kids scrambled in all directions and disappeared down the street. Tristan watched with wide eyes. “That was fucking brilliant.”

He nodded. “Now let’s see if it works.”

They didn’t have to wait long. The kids came back with nearly twenty Marias.

“Okay,” Patrick shouted out to the crowd. “Everyone line up in front of me.”

Patrick and Tristan questioned each Maria, but one by one, as he handed them their money, Patrick’s hope began fading again. Maybe his brilliant plan wasn’t so brilliant after all. Or maybe they were simply chasing another ghost.

Now there was only one person left in line: a man, envelope in hand, looking timid but hopeful.

“Nice try,” Patrick said to him, his voice cold and flat. “You’re going to need more than that to make it work. A sex change for one.”

“No!” the kid with him said. “Maria’s his wife! She couldn’t come! She’s at work!”

Patrick assessed the man, then turned to Tristan. Tristan was already looking at him. He glanced at his watch, looked up at the kid, the wheels spinning in his head.

Patrick looked at the man and said,
“¿Estuvo trabajando su esposa en Nuestra Señora de la Misericordia algunas semanas atras cuando el cuerpo fue encontrado?”

The man nodded.

“
¿Ella lo vio?
”

He nodded again.

“Holy tamale…” Tristan said. “I think you just found our Maria.”

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Maria Saldonado—
the
Maria—was working just a few miles up the road at a school. Tristan and Patrick couldn’t get there fast enough.

They found her in the auditorium.

“Maria?” Patrick called to her from the top of the aisle. She was leaning over and cleaning the seats, and she turned her head slightly to look at him.

“
¿Usted habla ingles?
”

“
Un poquito
,” she said and nodded.

“I’m a journalist. May I talk to you?” Patrick rushed down the aisle. “It’s very important. It’s about the body found at the church.”

She straightened up and turned to face him, and Patrick’s jaw dropped.

Maria was pregnant, and not just a little; probably somewhere in her final month. She looked to be ailing, dark circles cradling her eyes, her face a mask of exhaustion and pain.

“Aw, jeez,” Tristan muttered.

This woman should not have been working, but clearly, this woman had to. Suddenly she swayed, put her hands to her belly, and squeezed her eyes closed. She collapsed into the seat behind
her before Patrick and Tristan could reach her. Patrick placed a hand on her arm, and Maria threw her head back, grimacing with pain, breathing heavily. Perspiration covered her face and soaked her blouse.

Tristan ran up the aisle, and returned with a cupful of water. She handed it to the woman, who drank greedily.

“Do you want some more?” Tristan asked.

Maria put a hand up and shook her head, still trying to catch her breath.

Patrick moved his gaze to her ankles; they were swollen like balloons. No shoes, probably because getting them on would have been nearly impossible. He and Tristan glanced at each other, and without words, each knew what the other was thinking.

Tristan knelt and looked into the woman’s eyes. “When are you due?”

“Soon,” she said, her accent thick. “Very soon.”

“You shouldn’t be working like this. You could lose the baby.”

Maria nodded her shame and said, “I know… I know… but I have to. My husband cannot work. He is sick. We need food.”

“Not anymore, you don’t,” Patrick said, lips pressed with determination, reaching for his wallet. He pulled out three hundred-dollar bills and handed them to her. “This should hold you until the baby’s born. We’re taking you home. You need to rest.”

Maria’s eyes warmed with her smile. “
¡Gracias! ¡Muchas gracias!
Thank you so much!” She pressed the bills to her chest, raised her gaze to the ceiling. “
¡Gracias Dios mio!
”

Now Tristan was smiling, too.

They headed to the house. Patrick drove while the two women sat in the back, Maria resting a weary head on Tristan’s shoulder, Tristan holding Maria’s hand. Patrick looked in his rearview mirror and smiled. It was one of the rare moments where Tristan had
let her guard down. He was moved by the look of genuine concern on her face.

The expression changed when she realized he was watching. “What?” she said, pulling the wall up again.

“You’re okay, Reynolds,” he said. “You know that?”

She fought her grin, and said, “You’re not so bad yourself, Bannister.”

The wall was down again.

And Patrick couldn’t stop smiling. Because a month ago he could not have imagined they’d be saying those words to each other.

But he was so glad they had.

Maria’s husband lit up with delight when she told him about the money. Patrick didn’t return the buoyant smile; he was too busy feeling overwhelmed by his own deep sadness at the family’s dismal living conditions. The place was in shambles, sheetrock torn from its framework, floors nothing but exposed concrete, a large hole through the ceiling covered on the outside by a plastic tarp. He knew there was no running water; in fact, from what he could see, there was no hope—just a baby on the way into all this poverty, and all the money he had couldn’t repair these people’s lives. Even worse, there were thousands more families here just like them.

“This is Enrique,” Maria said, grinning with excitement.

They shook hands, and Patrick said, “Yes, we’ve met.”

Enrique motioned them to sit on a torn and tattered couch. Maria sat in a chair, her posture straight, palms pressing against her thighs for extra support. She said, “I tell you now about the church. Yes?”

“We need to know everything you can remember about that night, Maria,” Patrick said.

She leaned back in her chair, looking at the door as if watching her memories replay. “I was taking out garbage. I hear a car pull up. Someone dumping something… and then, fire. At first, I think they are burning trash. This is normal here. Later, the
Federales
come and tell me it was a dead woman.”

“What did the car look like?” Patrick asked.

“Big. American. Four doors, dark, like black… or blue?”

“Do you remember what time this was?”

She thought about it. “After midnight, maybe two?”

Patrick leaned toward her, flattening his hands together. “The guy who dumped the body, did you see what he looked like?”

“No.” She shook her head.

Patrick frowned. “Nothing at all?”

“No, I see. I see.”

“Huh?”

“Not a man. I see a woman.”

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Patrick and Tristan drove away in silence, both knowing what the other was thinking, both at a loss for words.

Patrick gave it a try. “A nun?”

Tristan shrugged. “Nobody’s perfect.”

“Comedian. Okay, Maria said the woman was thin-framed, about five foot three.”

“Jocelyn Fairchild,” Tristan said.

“The description matches. So while Wesley ran off into hiding, she cleaned up the mess and dumped the body? But why dressed as a nun?”

“If she planned on dumping it by the church…”

“When in Rome?”

“Something like that.”

“Weird, though,” he said, still thinking.

She pulled back. “And this surprises you? Clark and Fairchild have been tossing out strange like Tootsie Rolls on Halloween.”

“Point taken.” He went silent for a moment, and then, “Well, the cops have got Fairchild locked away now, at least. That’s one less psycho to worry about. Which brings us to the next question.
Where do we sleep tonight? We can’t go to the trailer if Clark knows about it.”

“I haven’t seen anyone on our tail since earlier, and I’ve been watching.”

“He could be waiting for the right time.”

“And we’ll be waiting, too.” She reached under her seat and pulled out a very large gun.

Patrick did a double take. “Where do you keep coming up with all this weaponry?”

She pulled the magazine out, checked the rounds, smacked it back in. “Just be glad I do. We’ll keep an eye out for him.”

But Patrick knew it would take more than an eye to keep them safe for long.

They made it through the night without incident: that was the good news. The bad news was that it did little to calm their nerves. The enemy’s imprecise, unpredictable movements put them even more on edge. Not knowing when or where Wesley would strike next had them constantly looking over their shoulders, waiting for the other shoe to drop—or the bullet to hit.

Since neither could remember their last meal, the hole-in-the-wall taco shop looked like a slice of heaven, sure to deliver a slice of heartburn on the side.

“We need to flip this cat and mouse game,” Tristan said. She took a bite from her burrito, chewed without seeming to taste, dropped it onto the plate. “We’ve got to find Wesley before he finds us.” She pushed her refried beans around on the plate. “He and Fairchild killed Charlene. We know that now, and I’m pretty sure the cops know it, too.”

“And your point?”

“Wesley wants us, and Pike wants Wesley. We could set a trap and lead them to each other. Get them both off our backs.”

Patrick shook his head. “We’d need to get Wesley across the border, not to mention have Pike waiting for him. We’re not in a position to do that. And we’re not done here yet.”

She slashed a line through the pile of beans with her fork, shaking her head.

Patrick persisted. “I think we should stick with our plan and stay focused on getting what we need here, then get out. I’m skittish enough without making it more complicated.”

She looked amused.

“What?” he said.

“You’re skittish all the time.”

“I’m not
skittish all the time
.”

She raised a brow.

He looked down at his burrito, poked at it.