A Different Dawn (Nina Guerrera)

by Isabella Maldonado

  “As I mentioned before,” Johnson said, smoothing his tie, “I am not at liberty to release that information. We have been more than generous in providing the details we have so far.”

  She leaned forward. “This is a murder investigation, Counselor.”

  Johnson’s brows shot up. “Murder?”

  She took the opportunity for a little payback. “We are not at liberty to disclose the details of a criminal investigation.” She smiled. “I’m sure you appreciate the legal ramifications.”

  They had reached an impasse.

  “I don’t believe there is any more to say until the proper legal documents are submitted.” Johnson handed her a business card, effectively bringing the meeting to a close. “You can reach my office with whatever warrants or subpoenas you obtain, and I will comply immediately.”

  As they walked out into the parking lot, Nina became increasingly infuriated with the legal and bureaucratic logjam that had ground their forward momentum to a halt.

  “Johnson and Davies were in possession of information critical to our case,” she said. “But they wouldn’t hand it over.”

  “They have rules,” Perez said.

  “They have their asses to cover.” She kept going toward the parking lot. “We’ll have to waste hours writing up an affidavit,” she said. “And there’s no guarantee a judge will sign it.”

  Perez came to an abrupt stop. “Or you could ask me nicely and I could give you what you need in about fifteen minutes.” His cheeks dimpled. “No affidavit required.”

  “What are you talking about, Perez?”

  His grin widened. “Davies told us the woman’s baby was delivered by police officers. Since the ambulance took her to Phoenix General, odds are the Phoenix police were the ones who responded to her neighbor’s 9-1-1 call.”

  Nina barely restrained herself from jumping up and down with excitement. “Do you guys keep daily logs for twenty-eight years?”

  “Remember when I filled you in on the Records Management System?” At her nod, he continued, “Everything is digitized, going back to the beginning of our department. Every call, every report.”

  “I could hug you.”

  Perez chuckled. “All I ask is that we stop by a Starbucks and get a decent cup of coffee on the way back to the PFO. I’ll work a lot faster with a bit of caffeine.”

  Her smile matched his. “I’ll buy you anything you want.”

  Chapter 23

  Nina inhaled the sweet scent wafting up from the tall cup sitting on the table in front of Breck. “What did you say that was?”

  Nina and Perez had taken coffee orders for the rest of the team before arriving at the Phoenix field office command center.

  Breck pulled back the drink, possessive. “A caramel macchiato.”

  Nina eyed the mountain of whipped cream on top. “Looks more like dessert than coffee.”

  “This is breakfast and lunch combined,” Breck said. “It’s got that perfect jolt of caffeine with a shot of sugar that powers me through the day until dinner.”

  Nina sipped her own café Americano as her thoughts meandered to Victor’s and Maria’s relatives. How would they react when they learned of the bizarre twist the investigation had taken?

  Perez had already opened his laptop on the conference table. Now he navigated to the internal PPD server and signed in. “I’ll set up search parameters based on the date of the incident.”

  Breck, who had propped her computer next to his, pulled up copies of the PPD files Perez had forwarded to her earlier. “We know from Maria’s family and Detective O’Malley’s report that she gave birth on February twenty-third,” she said. “Based on your interview with the folks at the hospital, the bio mom of the baby who was killed in the Llorona case delivered her child on the same day.”

  Perez tapped the keyboard. “We use a system that generates a case number starting with the date of the report.” A long list of numbers appeared on the screen. “I’ll look at February twenty-third.”

  “That’s hundreds of police reports to dig through,” Breck said. “Can you narrow it down based on the hours of the day, checking around the time Maria’s baby was born?”

  “There’s an easier way,” Perez said. “I’ll enter a code to select for certain types of calls for service.” He paused, considering. “Since we don’t have a specific classification for delivering a baby, I’ll go with the original complaint, which could be a welfare check because the neighbor said she was worried about the screaming.”

  Nina had performed many welfare checks in her years on the force. When someone was concerned about another person’s safety, they called police and requested an officer to respond. In Nina’s experience, this often led to discovering a month’s worth of newspapers in the driveway, flies all over the inside of the windows, and a decomposing body inside.

  “I’ve got something,” Perez said. “Welfare check on February twenty-third. The address is for an apartment in South Phoenix. Two officers from the South Mountain precinct were dispatched. I’m pulling up the report now.” His gaze traveled down the screen. “Hot damn. They delivered a baby.”

  “Bingo,” Wade said from across the table. “Please tell me they recorded the mother’s name.”

  Perez glanced up. “Carmen Cardona.”

  Breck began typing. “What’s her date of birth?”

  While Breck entered the data into the FBI system, Nina’s mind wandered. Had Carmen Cardona deliberately taken the wrong baby? Not likely. Both were healthy girls, according to hospital records.

  “Is there a father listed on the police report?” Nina asked Perez.

  Perez shook his head. “The officers asked for the father’s contact info so they could let him know about the birth of his daughter, but Ms. Cardona refused to identify him.”

  Not a good sign. Nina turned to Wade. “Why does a woman not want the father of her child identified?”

  Wade considered before responding. “Because she doesn’t know who he is, she’s afraid of him, or she’s involved in an affair.”

  “Or,” Breck said, “because she has substance abuse problems.” When everyone stared at her, she continued, “I found her. After her address in Phoenix, the next place she turns up is in jail in Montgomery County, Maryland, about a year later.”

  “Maryland?” Nina couldn’t hide her surprise.

  “Convicted for prostitution and drug possession,” Breck read from the screen. “She got out after six months.”

  “What the hell happened in her life?” Kent said to no one in particular. “And what happened to her baby?”

  Nina’s heart lurched. “You mean Maria and Victor Vega’s baby?”

  Kent paled. “Shit, that’s right.”

  Breck was still scrolling through databases on her computer. “Uh-oh.”

  Nina braced herself for more bad news. “What now?”

  Breck spoke in a hushed tone. “Her current residence is listed as St. Elizabeth’s.”

  “What’s St. Elizabeth’s?” Perez said when the room grew quiet. “And why are you all looking at each other like that?”

  Nina realized Perez probably wouldn’t know about a facility on the other side of the country. “St. E’s is a psychiatric hospital in Washington, DC.”

  “I did an internship there for my doctorate in psychology,” Wade said. “They treat patients with serious mental illness who need full-time inpatient care. They also take patients who are committed by the courts.”

  “If she’s a long-term resident, she could be too mentally unfit to answer questions,” Kent said, “or too medicated to remember what happened almost thirty years ago, or possibly unaware of who she is.”

  “Damn,” Perez said, expressing the general view of the situation.

  “We’ve got to try.” Nina wasn’t ready to give up. “Can we get in to talk to her in person?”

  “I can,” Wade said. “Might be able to arrange for one of you to come with.”

  Nina was determined to
be the one accompanying him.

  “I’ve pulled her criminal history,” Breck said. “She’s been locked up a bunch of times. Mostly property crimes like burglary and shoplifting, but also prostitution. Likely to support her drug habit.” Breck shook her head. “Seems like Cardona was self-medicating with illegal narcotics. Her longest stretch was five years for possession of heroin. The last time she was incarcerated was seven years ago. It looks like she went to St. E’s a few months after she served her time.”

  “Involuntary committal?” Wade asked.

  Breck’s eyes never left the screen. “Doesn’t say.”

  Nina’s thoughts kept coming back to what she viewed as the most important point. “Any information about Cardona’s baby?”

  “There is no data relating to her having a child.” Breck frowned. “Nothing I can find, anyway.”

  Nina turned to Wade, who would know more about inpatient treatment than the rest of the team. “If she was in jail and later institutionalized, wouldn’t Child Protective Services take her daughter away?”

  He nodded. “Unless the father came forward or she had other relatives the child could stay with.”

  The door opened and Buxton entered the room. “I just got a text from the Phoenix crime lab. The rest of the results from the DNA tests are in.” Without further comment, he activated the intercom at the center of the table and took a seat. “Go ahead, Dr. Ledford. You’re on speaker with the team.”

  “We completed the search through CODIS, and we have more findings,” the lab director said. “The extraneous sample from the Llorona case we believe is from the perpetrator does not have a match in any criminal database.”

  “That would be asking too much,” Nina muttered to Wade, then spoke into the intercom. “What about the baby from that case?” She wanted confirmation that their theory about the switch at the hospital was correct.

  “We got close familial matches for the child,” Ledford said. “There was a paternal match with José Salaya, a multiple felon who died in prison in Florence, Arizona, four years ago. Drug overdose.”

  Nina saw Breck typing furiously, doubtless scouring databases for information about Salaya.

  “We also got a mitochondrial match for the mother,” Ledford continued. “She was in the system due to a felony arrest for burglary.”

  They all held their breath. This should corroborate their investigative findings.

  “Her name is Carmen Cardona,” the lab director said after a brief pause. “I appended her information to the file in Detective Perez’s queue in the RMS system. That’s all I have for now.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Ledford,” Buxton said. “Your input has been extremely helpful. Please keep us posted on any further developments.”

  Nina let out a long breath. Now there was no doubt the babies had been mixed up in the hospital nursery. Victor and Maria had taken home Carmen Cardona’s child, who had died at the hands of the unsub. But what had Carmen done with Maria’s baby?

  “I’m searching every database I can access,” Breck said. “I still can’t find hide nor hair of Carmen Cardona’s daughter. There’s nothing, no school records, no international travel, nothing in CPS. She’s a ghost.”

  Ghost. Nina didn’t like where that word took her. “Look for a death certificate that matches the birthdate listing Carmen as the mother.”

  “On it,” Breck said.

  Perez was downloading the information the lab director had sent to his laptop. “What did she do with that baby?” he muttered as he clicked through the files.

  Breck looked up. “No death certificate matching any of those search parameters.”

  Kent grimaced. “We know Carmen has a history of substance abuse. This is horrible, but . . . could she have sold her baby for drugs?”

  As everyone else seemed to reel from the very thought, Wade’s face hardened. “I know one thing for damn sure. We need to talk to Carmen Cardona, and I want to do it in person.”

  Nina voiced a thought that had been nagging at her. “The babies got switched at the hospital. No one knew. If it weren’t for this investigation, no one would have ever known.” She directed her gaze at Buxton. “We’re going to have to notify the families.”

  Wade reacted before Buxton could respond. “We’re going to tell both families that Maria was not a murderer, that we can’t find any trace of her baby, and that there’s a serial killer loose?”

  Buxton scrubbed a hand over his face. “We can’t tell them anything until we get some answers. And there’s only one person who can provide them.” He looked around the room. “We’re flying back to DC first thing tomorrow.”

  Chapter 24

  Nina jammed another blouse into the suitcase lying open on the hotel bed, unconcerned about its wrinkled state. “I’ll be glad to bring some fresh clothes when we come back.”

  “Amen to that,” Breck said, tossing garments into her own luggage.

  “I’m packing some running clothes for the trip back,” Nina said. “The weather is gorgeous here.”

  Nina jogged to relieve stress. She relished the time to herself, engaging her body in a demanding activity while freeing her mind to think. For her, it was moving meditation.

  A knock at the door separating the adjoining suites interrupted the conversation. Nina pulled it open to find Wade peering down at her.

  “We need to be at Sky Harbor airport tomorrow morning at seven,” he said. “We’ll be in the air five hours, so we’re scheduled to land at Reagan National at three o’clock eastern time.”

  Stepping aside, Nina motioned him into the room. “Will we be able to see Carmen Cardona tomorrow?”

  “Already called St. Elizabeth’s and made arrangements,” Wade said. “We should be able to go visit her right after we land. Tomorrow is Saturday, but her treating psychiatrist agreed to meet us there anyway.”

  Kent appeared in the doorway. “Buxton asked us to let you two know he’s arranged for us to knock out the training we were supposed to complete on Tuesday while we’re back in DC.” He stepped inside the room. “We’ll spend tomorrow night at home, then go to Quantico on Sunday morning and fly back here in the afternoon so we can return to the investigation first thing Monday morning.”

  Nina pulled lacy dark purple panties from the dresser drawer and tucked them into the suitcase. She reached for the matching bra and noticed Kent’s face redden as he became fascinated with the lamp sitting on the desk.

  “This thing is crooked,” he said, adjusting the shade.

  She smiled to herself. Who would have thought a former SEAL would blush at the sight of lingerie?

  “I’m trying to keep an open mind,” Breck said, oblivious to the byplay. “But there’s just no way this story has a happy ending. That baby is either dead or her momma sold her.”

  The grim thought erased all humor from Nina’s mind. She considered the sheer desperation Carmen Cardona must have felt in order to do such a thing. “If you’re right, maybe that’s what pushed her over the edge mentally.”

  Breck put down a blouse she had been packing and turned to them. “Here’s another disturbing question. What if she’s the one who mistakenly switched the babies? I mean, we’re thinking it was an accident by the hospital personnel, but suppose she somehow got confused and told the staff the wrong baby was hers?”

  “I doubt it,” Kent said. “Hospitals have controls in place.”

  Wade looked thoughtful. “They didn’t have as many protocols back then as they do now. There have been many cases of babies being switched at birth in hospitals in the past.”

  “Either way, Ginsberg and Perez will continue to follow up with the hospital while we’re gone,” Nina said. “Given the new DNA results from the lab, they’ll have no trouble getting a search warrant for their paperwork. They’ll give Buxton a report after he checks out the hospital’s information.”

  “You said that hospital administrator was sweating when you interviewed him,” Breck said to Nina. “Now we know why he was
in a lather. They’re in for a world of hurt if it turns out to be the hospital’s mistake.”

  “No matter how it happened, the hospital will take the blame,” Wade said. “It’s their responsibility.”

  Nina recalled the information Perez had gleaned from police sources before they left for the day. “We know Carmen left Phoenix by the end of February, because she paid a month-to-month lease on her apartment and the landlord had a new tenant in her unit by March tenth due to nonpayment of rent on March first.”

  “Why would someone travel all the way across the country with a newborn baby?” Kent asked.

  Nina wondered the same thing. A car trip would take at least three days. “Do we know if she flew?”

  “Ginsberg is following up on that too,” Wade said. “He’s trying to find old flight manifests.”

  “I looked up Carmen’s boyfriend’s arrest records,” Breck said. “One of José Salaya’s arrests was for beating Carmen while she was pregnant with their child. I imagine she left town to get the hell away from him.”

  “Makes sense,” Nina said. “Salaya was due for release after a six-month stint in jail at the end of March, so he would have no way of knowing what happened to Carmen and the baby . . . if he cared at all.”

  “It’s quite possible that Carmen did nothing wrong,” Wade said. “That she was merely a victim of circumstances and that she’ll be able to tell us who raised the baby and where she is now.”

  Nina realized something else. “We’re going to have to tell Carmen that her biological child was murdered only days after she was born,” she said to Wade. “If she’s already struggling with her sanity, that may well and truly break her.”

  “We’ll see what sort of mental state she’s in,” Wade said quietly. “Then I’ll decide how much to tell her.”

  Nina considered the human misery involved in this case. Carmen’s tragic life and her baby’s heartbreaking death were only one part of a tapestry of suffering woven by an evil man who seemed bent on destroying the happiness of others.