Lucky Stars (20 page)

t
wenty-five

M
aura and I took separate cars and met at Victor’s at 7:30 on the evening of our enterprise. Since he and Mom were off doing their respective business, we were alone in the house with the staff. It was Carlos, in fact, who had answered the door and politely ushered us inside.

“He’s sort of cute. A Latin lover type,” Maura said as we trekked through the living room and the dining room and the sunroom to get to the screening room. “Too young for me, but cute just the same.”

“He’s not too young for you, but he
is
taken,” I said. “Besides, I
don't trust him any more than I trust the rest of the Stepford servants on the payroll here. They all seem too good to be true.”

No sooner did I
finish the sentence when Quentin, Victor’s projectionist, entered the room and asked us if
we were ready for him
to begin the movie. We
said sure, go ahead. We had no i
ntention of watching it and were
planning to skip out the minute he dimmed the lights.

“Maybe we should stay and see it,” Maura whispered after Quentin announced he was showing the latest Jackie Chan martial arts adventure. “We could learn some self-defense moves. You never know when they might come in handy.”

“They won’t come in handy tonight,” I said. “This mission should be pretty straightforward.”

We waited for the opening credits to appear on screen, then tiptoed out, figuring that once Quentin was safely ensconced in the projection room we’d have a good two hours of snooping before we’d have to be back.

“Let’s hit the library first,” I said as we crept from room to room, cursing every time we’d land on a creeky floorboard and possibly alert the troops to our whereabouts. “I think it doubles as Vic’s office.”

Maura nodded and followed me into the large, panelled room where only recently I’d sat with my mother and tried unsuccessfully to persuade her to break up with her boyfriend.

We slid the pocket doors closed behind us and flipped on the lights.

“Where do we start?” said Maura, staring at the multitude of built-in drawers and cabinets.

“You take that side. I’ll take this side.”

“Fine, but what are we looking for? We’re not accountants, so even if we find financial documents, we won’t be able to decode them. We certainly won’t be able to tie them to the death of Victor’s wife.”

“Probably not,” I said, “but we’re here and we might as well hunt for something. What about getting background on Victor’s life? Let’s check for photos of him and the missus, or mortgage papers for real estate he’s owned, or correspondence having to do with the businesses he’s run—anything that’ll tell us more about him.”

“Whatever you say.”

We began the laborious task of rifling through Victor’s drawers. After forty-five minutes, all we had to show for our trouble was a sore shoulder (me) and a paper cut (Maura).

“This is really boring,” she said.

“Then go back and watch the movie,” I said, slightly pissed off. “I’ll do this myself if you’re not into it.”

“I’m never going to be as into it as you are,” said Maura, who seemed pissed off that I was pissed off. “She’s your mother, not mine, so you have much more at stake than I do.”

“Yes, but you’re my best friend,” I said, “and best friends help each other out, even when the job is
bor
ing.
”

“Maybe, but you should have had a more specific plan,” she said. “Then we wouldn’t be wasting our time looking for nothing.”

“I didn’t hear you complaining when we went to Marina Del Rey without a ‘specific plan,’ ” I said. “But that was probably because there was something in it for you—the geezer deputy sheriff.”

“Don’t even think about getting on my case about the men I go out with,” she said, pointing at me. “You’re just like your mother, the way you criticize my life.”

“I am
not
just like my mother!” I said hotly. “And I don’t criticize your life. I simply make observations. You’re much too sensitive.”

I
was
just like my mother, who used to try to neutralize me with the very same argument.

“I’m sorry, Maura,” I said. “I guess I’m uptight because—”

I stopped midsentence. I heard two sets of footsteps clickety-clacking across the hardwood floor outside the library.

“Quick! Into the closet!” I flipped off the lights, then the two of us scrambled into the walk-in closet beyond Victor’s desk and shut ourselves in.

We stood there huddled together, holding our collective breath, as someone pulled open the pocket doors and entered the library.

“That’s strange,” I heard
Carlos say in Spanish as he turned the lights back on. “These doors are never closed unless Victor is having a private meeting.”

“Maybe he closed them before he left,” Rosa suggested. “Maybe he didn't want you sneaking in here while he was away.”

He laughed. “Like I’m the one who sneaks around this place? It’s a miracle he hasn’t caught you sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong.”

I grabbed Maura’s hand and squeezed it. Obviously, there was trouble in Victor’s paradise.

“I don’t have to sneak around,” said Rosa. “I’ve got everything I need to protect myself against Victor.”

I squeezed Maura’s hand again, tighter this time. I was dying to blurt out, “Protect yourself against him because he comes on to you? Because he forces you to commit murder for him? Because he makes you cook brisket for my mother?
What, Rosa?

“If I were you, I’d keep that little piece of evidence to myself,” said Carlos. “We’re going to use it one of these days. It’s just a matter of time before Victor’s
crimes bring him down, and we’re not going down with him. He can rot in jail all by himself.”

Little piece of
evidence
? Victor’s
crimes
? Rot in jail? This was fantastic! I finally had my proof that he was as dangerous as I suspected. I’d heard it right from the mouths of his employees, so it had to be true. No ambiguities this time. No double talk. No possibility of a misunderstanding. I couldn’t wait to tell my mother and put an end to her relationship with Vic.

“Oh, I’ll hang on to the evidence all right,” said Rosa. “But if he ever threatens to ship us back to Mexico, he’s going to be very, very sorry. We may be in this country illegally, thanks to him, but he’s done more illegal stuff than either of us ever dreamed of.”

Maura leaned over and whispered, “Could you please translate already? I don’t understand a single word they’re saying!”

“Shhh,” I whispered back. “I’ll tell you later.”

She shrugged and waited silently for Rosa and Carlos to leave us alone.

But they didn’t leave us alone. “Did I ever tell you that you’re sexy when you talk about blackmail, Rosa?” Carlos teased, his tone turning playful.

“No. But you’re welcome to tell me now,” she said with a flirtatious giggle.

“Okay, baby, you turn me on when you even mention the word ‘blackmail.’ ”

“And you’re hotter than you were the day I married you.”

“Then how about showing me,” he said. “We’ll close these doors, turn off the lights, stretch out on the couch, and have ourselves a good time.”

I turned to Maura and mouthed the words, “They’re about to have sex.” She looked as taken aback as I was.

Sure, Rosa and Carlos were free to
do it
whenever and wherever they wanted, but did they have to want it right then? In the same room with us?

While we stood together in that closet, horrified, embarrassed, wishing we were anywhere else, Victor’s two paragons of hired help jumped each other.

“Yeah, that’s good,” she moaned several minutes in.

“So good,” he moaned back at her.

“Now touch me here. And faster. Faster!”

“As fast as you can handle it, baby,” he panted.

“Yeah, that’s it. Oh, Carlos. Don’t stop! Don’t stop! Don’t stop! Okay, stop!”

Every time we thought they had stopped, they started up again, with Rosa issuing commands and Carlos responding like the red-hot lover he apparently was. It was nearly an hour before they pulled their hands off each other, opened the doors, and staggered out of the room.

“Sheesh. I feel like some creepy voyeur,” I said.

“A shower wouldn’t be a bad idea,” Maura agreed. “Do you think it’s safe to come out or do you think they’ll be back for more?”

“All I know is that Rosa is incredibly orgasmic,” I said.

“All I know is that I’m incredibly claustrophic,” she said. “I’m getting out of this closet whether they come back or not.”

“Wait.” I held her arm. “Here’s what they said about Victor. He’s keeping them in this country illegally, he’s committed more serious crimes, too, and they have evidence of these crimes that could give them leverage against him. Whatever he did, they must be in on it.”

“Wow! Maybe they helped him dispose of his wife and now they’re all in bed together, so to speak."

“Maybe. Oh, Maura, we finally nailed Victor. Once I
tell Mom what we overheard, she’ll never spend another night in this house.”

“Call her on your cell when we leave. Right now, we’d better hurry back to the screening room so Quentin doesn’t miss us. The movie should be just about over and he’ll be turning on the lights.”

We were safely in our seats in time to see Jackie Chan kickbox the villain and “the end” pop up on the screen. We thanked Quentin for showing us the movie, told him to be sure to say hello to Victor when he returned from his trip, and scrambled for the door. Once outside, I hugged Maura and told her I couldn’t have gotten the goods on Vic without her help.

“It was my pleasure,” she replied, “although after listening to Rosa and Carlos go at it, I’d say they were the ones who had the pleasure.”

“Didn’t they though.”

“The important thing is that you have concrete information to give your mother now.”

“Yup, I just hope she appreciates it.”

t
wenty-six

I
reached Mom on her cell phone just as she was climbing into her limo after her dinner with the Fin’s advertising people.

“Hi, it’s Stacey,” I said. “I know it’s late, but I’ve got to see you right away.”

“Are you sick?” she said. “There’s a stomach virus going around. Everybody’
s complaining of nausea, vomit
ing, diarrhea—”

“I’m fine.” I cut her
off before she went into more
detail. She wasn’t a hypochondriac exactly. She just enjoyed discussing medical maladies the way others enjoy discussing, say, gard
ening. “Would you meet me some
where? So we could talk for a few minutes?”

“I’m heading over to Victor’s,” she said, then giggled. “I like sleeping there even when he’s away. I can smell
his smell in the master bedroom. I find it erotic.” Please.

“I’d rather not meet at his house, if that’s okay,” I said. “What about the Regent Beverly Wilshire? It’s a convenient spot for both of us. We could sit in the bar and have a nice after-dinner drink together.”

“I don’t drink after-dinner drinks, you know that. They keep me up, not to mention give me heartburn.”

“Then we’ll have some nice herbal tea. See you soon. ’Bye.”

I hung up before she could object further.

Fifteen minutes later, we were ensconced in the back co
rn
er of the hotel’s bar, sitting on a plump sofa and sipping from pretty little glasses of port. I had ordered it before she arrived, figuring that chamomile was certainly not going to take the edge off what I had to tell her but that port might.

“So,” she said. “What’s this about? I’m always delighted to see you, dear, but you’ve got a problem, I gather. Is it Jack? Are you two on the outs? Tell your mother.”

“It’s not about Jack,” I said tenderly, eager to break the news but wanting to cushion the blow. “It’s about— Okay, let me start over. I know how fond you are of Victor and I can see why. He’s bright and animated and treats you well.”

“What is it, Stacey? Spit it out already.”

“All right. There’s something I’ve just found out about him and you need to hear it.”

She glared at me. “This isn’t going to be one of your fresh-mouth accusations regarding his poor wife, is it?”

“Not specifically.” I cleared my throat. “While I was at his house tonight, I overheard Rosa and Carlos talk
in
g.
”

She sighed impatiently. “I thought I explained why they’re not too fond of me. They don’t like me taking over the household. They’re used to ruling the roost, to cavorting all over the place with no supervision.”

I flashed back on the cavorting they’d been doing in
the library only a couple of hours before, and took another sip of port, hoping to drown out Rosa’s “Faster! Faster!” “This time, what I
overheard them talking about
was Victor, not you, Mom. Maura was there, too. We happened to be within ear
shot just as they were having
a very incriminating conversation.”

“Incriminating? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“For starters, they’re illegal immigrants. Victor is
keeping them in this country under false pretenses,
which means that he’s also cheating the IRS by paying them off the books. I know everybody does it, Mom, so it’s not that big a deal in the grand scheme of things, but you’ve always been such a stickler about playing by the rules.”

I waited for her to register shock or anger or disgust,
but she didn’t emit a single shriek. Instead, she shrugged and said, “He told me they were here illegally.”

“What?”

“Sure. He tells me everything, because he’s a sharer. Can you say the same about Jack?”

“Of course, but this isn’t about Jack. It’s about Victor
and how he’s harboring Rosa and Carlos.”

“For your information
, he has a dam good reason for
‘harboring’ them, as you put it. Apparently, Rosa and Carlos each have elderly parents in Mexico who are not well and who are desperately in need of money. Victor is such a generous, sweet man that he’s been willing to stick his own neck out not only to let those two stay in
America but to pay them in cash so they’ll have more to send to their loved ones.”

I blinked at her, amazed that she continued to condone Victor’s shady behavior and dumbfounded that she’d bought his absurd story about the tragically needy parents.

“I’m not saying I like the idea of them being here illegally,” she went on. “But I respect Victor’s motives for allowing them to. He’s helping them, Stacey. He’s helping them because he’s a wonderful, wonderful man. If only you’d accept that.”

Jeez. This was going to be harder than I thought. “Mom, there’s more. Take another sip of port.”

“I’ve had enough port. I can feel the acid building up in my stomach already. I’ll never get a good night’s sleep now.”

“Fine. Don’t take another sip. Just listen, because here’s the really bad
news. Rosa and Carlos said une
quivocally that Victor is a criminal. They said he’s done a ton of illegal stuff and should rot in jail. They said they’ve got evidence against him. Those were their precise words. I’m so sorry, Mom, but I heard their conversation. Yes, it was in Spanish, but I understood it perfectly.”

She narrowed her eyes at me. “Look, young lady, you may be my daughter, but you’re not very smart when it comes to dealing with domestics. Rosa and Carlos are a couple of ungrateful idiots if they talk like that behind their employer’s back. Calling him a criminal just because he’s letting them live under his roof!”

“Mom, Mom. That’s not why they called him a criminal. They were referring to other crimes he’s committed.”

“What crimes?”

“They didn’t say.”

“There. You see? Nonsense. Complete nonsense. I love Victor and he loves me, and ev
erything else is immaterial.”

So she was giving him a pass yet again. He had her totally bamboozled.

“Let me ask you a question,” I said. “If Victor did commit a crime—something much more serious than the immigration thing—would you love him then? Or is this guy the Teflon Man in your mind?”

“I don’t like your tone or your insinuation,” she said, her voice rising. “Victor would never commit a serious crime, not knowingly. The only one who’s guilty of anything is you.”

“Me?”

“You. You’ve never been able to
li
e to your mother and tonight is nothing new. You and Maura didn’t
happen
to overhear Rosa and Carlos talking. You went over to Victor’s tonight with the sole purpose of snooping, of eavesdropping, of doing anything you could to poison me against him. You
were
snooping around at his house, weren’t you, Stacey?
Weren’t
you?”

I started to deny it, but why bother? She was right: she could always tell when I was lying, ever since I was a kid.

“Yes,” I admitted. “Maura and I did go over there hoping to find some proof that the man you think you love isn’t who he seems. It was for your own good. I was trying to protect you.”

“I don’t need protecting,” she said huffily, her nostrils flaring.

“Yes, you do. I’ve told you before and I’ll tell you again, Mom: Victor is up to his eyeballs in slippery stuff. You’ve got to trust me on this.”

“Trust you? About men? I don’t hear any wedding bells in your future, Stacey. I don’t suppose Jack has asked you to marry him, has he?”

“Not yet,” I said defensively.

“That’s what I thought. You go through one bad apple after another and you want me to listen to you about Victor?”

“That’s not fair,” I said, my own nostrils flaring. “I may not have a marriage proposal on the table, but Jack is no bad apple. He’s loving and sensitive and totally honest, unlike
your
bad apple. Wait, let me correct that: your
rotten
apple.”

“Victor is not a rotten apple!” she said, her face reddening with rage.

“He is so! He cheats the government and sleeps with women a fraction of his age, and he just may have murdered his wife!”

“That’s enough!” she barked, waving her arms in the air. “I refuse to listen to such disrespectful talk for a single minute more!”

With those fighting words, she rose from her chair, threw a couple of twenty-dollar bills on the table, and announced that she was leaving.

“So you can’t stand to hear the truth, is that it?” I said, as angry at her as she was at me.

“Here’s the truth,” she said, poking her finger at me. “I consider myself lucky that someone as worldly and intelligent and attractive as Victor Chellus has chosen me. He’s not an angel, God knows, but then no man is.” She turned to go, but returned for one last parting shot. “Oh, and don’t call me to apologize. Starting tonight, I’m officially not speaking to you!”

Gee, that went well, I thought, and polished off her port and mine.