“What are you looking at?” she asked. While she had pretty features, her acne was prominent.
I tried not to chuckle at her attitude. “Want to get a smoothie after class?”
“A smoothie?” She looked at me as if I’d just suggested taking cyanide.
Zahera peeked over my shoulder as I was about to answer. “I know the best place, and it’s just around the corner from here,” she said, flipping her wrist. Cristina stared at Zahera’s perfectly manicured nails and hands, which I knew to be as soft as rose petals. I used cheap hand lotion and had never been able to afford a manicure—ever. My nails were more like Cristina’s.
Zahera kept talking as if our instructor, Lulu, wasn’t in the room. “It’s one of those hole-in-the-wall places; even has live music. Can you believe it? Live music in a smoothie shop. It’s one of the reasons I love San Antonio.”
Cristina nodded slowly, her eyes shifting between Zahera, me, and Lulu. “Okay, but I can’t—”
“My treat,” I blurted.
“Listen, Ivy, you might think you’re earning your stripes for some Good Samaritan award, or you might think it gives you a straight ticket to the great gates,” she said, pointing upward, “but I don’t play that way. I’m not a trophy charity. That’s not me. I’m a grown-ass woman who can take care of herself.”
“Shhh,” a woman sneered at us. “Don’t you want to listen?”
I nodded, then pretended to turn a key in front of my mouth just for good measure.
But Zahera couldn’t stop herself. “Grown-ass woman?” Wearing perfectly molded yoga pants, she planted a hand firmly on her hip. “I’m all for young people growing some cojones and taking responsibility for their own lives, but there’s a line that you don’t cross with people who are older than you. They’re not just wiser for everything they’ve experienced and succeeded at, but because of all their scars and everything they’ve failed at. Ivy here is a perfect example.”
“Thanks, I think.”
Two other women turned around and hissed, “Shhh.”
Zahera lowered her voice to a soft whisper. “So how about a little respect?”
Cristina took in a deep breath and appeared to be gearing up for another round.
“Hey there,” Daniel called out.
The three of us turned our heads to the front.
“Yeah, you, the one who spoke out earlier.”
Cristina’s eyes grew wide.
“Why don’t you come up front and help us demonstrate our first couple of moves?” he suggested, waving her up.
Cristina had so far come across as confident, if not cocky. Right now, she appeared anything but. I had a feeling, though, that interacting with people in a normal setting was just what she needed.
“Go ahead. It’s okay,” I said, and a few people offered claps of encouragement.
She looked at me, and then her eyes wandered to others in the room, checking them out. Maybe she wondered what everyone thought of her, this little misfit. I halfway expected her to bolt for the door.
“Cristina, no one is going to hurt you,” I whispered.
Zahera jumped in. “We’re just all a bunch of women trying to figure out life one day at a time.”
Cristina uprooted her feet from the floor and slowly started moving to the front. The claps grew louder, and I could see her shoulders tense up. I motioned for those around us to chill out, hoping Cristina would think it was no big deal.
“Okay, Cristina, thank you for being our dummy’s new partner,” Lulu said, handing Daniel a plastic bag full of pads. He began to slide them on to various body parts, including one around the crotch, which drew a few laughs from the crowd.
Lulu regained our attention as Cristina stood next to Daniel. “You will not see us teach any chants or any rituals. This isn’t a typical martial arts program. If you’re expecting any katas, or rituals, then this class isn’t for you.” She extended her hand toward the door. No one left the room.
She walked across the front of the group, but her eyes stayed on us the whole time. “As some of you might have read, Krav Maga is the same basic hand-to-hand combat system used by the Israeli defense forces.”
“It’s not just a Jewish thing, is it?” Zahera whispered in my ear while arching an eyebrow.
I rolled my eyes and made sure she could see me.
“What? I’m a proud Muslim woman, and I just wanted to make sure I’m not disrespecting my culture,” she said, snorting out a laugh, and I quickly followed with one of my own.
“If your Army father could hear you now, he would…” I began to say. Zahera’s dad was a proud American Muslim and a hardcore military man, having spent more than thirty years serving at bases overseas and now at JBSA, Joint Base San Antonio. I never saw him without his combat boots.
“He’d have the hundredth heart attack of his life, then give me a lecture on why I hadn’t been able to find the right kind of man to marry.”
“Barefoot and pregnant. That’s what he wants for his daughter? Hasn’t he figured out how smart you are?”
“Smart-ass, yes. Smart, not so much.”
“I can see that.”
I looked back up to the front of class, where Lulu positioned Cristina and then showed her a particular move. Lulu whipped her shoulders around and then jabbed a fist forward, talking to Cristina at a level I couldn’t hear. Cristina nodded.
“Do you think Cristina is really getting this, or is she just nodding to not rock the boat?” Zahera said with a hand cupped to the side of her mouth.
“Who knows?”
“Okay people.” Lulu clapped twice. “We’ve got our first scenario set up, thanks to Cristina being such a quick learner.”
Daniel, who had stepped out of the room for a moment, walked back in with a mask over his face, one that was heavily padded but also had the design of a man with dark sunglasses and a cigarette hanging off his painted lips. The women thought it was a hoot. He turned and held up both arms, acting like he was Rocky.
Lulu walked over and put a hand on Daniel’s extra-padded shoulder. “Okay, Cristina is walking home after a night out on the town, dancing with her girlfriends.”
“I don’t dance,” Cristina said, turning her head to the side to ensure the instructor heard her response.
A few giggles from the crowed.
“O…kay,” Lulu said. “How about you’re walking home after a night at the mall?”
Cristina shook her head. “I’m not a fan of shopping for clothes and shit.”
Lulu shifted her eyes off Cristina, and even in the crowd of women, they found mine. I gave her a slight shrug.
“Alrighty then…how about we say you’re out late at night after meeting up with a friend at the library?”
“There’s a used bookstore over off Lamar,” Cristina offered.
“Perfect, the used bookstore,” Lulu said, sounding relieved to have found common ground on something that didn’t really matter.
Daniel began to growl, and some of the ladies laughed again. He turned and raised his hands again. He appeared to really enjoy his dummy role.
“Hey,” Zahera said, bumping my shoulder. “That guy is hot, cute, and funny. Might be someone you want to…you know, look into.”
“You’re crazy, Z. He’s not my type anyway.” I crossed my arms and focused on Cristina, although an image of the young lawyer at Torchy’s Tacos popped in my head. His alluring eyes had made an indelible impression.
“He’s walking okay, and he’s employed. The fact that he’s built like a Greek God…that’s just a side benefit.” Zahera hooted the moment the words came out of her mouth.
“Maybe you should give him a ride then.”
“Maybe I will, but only if you don’t want him.”
I shook my head. “He’s not a toy horse that you put in twenty-five cents and ride for five minutes.”
She winked at me. “Wanna bet?”
We giggled liked two teenagers while I tried not to dwell too long on tha
t visual. Then we focused our attention back to the real teenager in the room as she got some last-second instructions from Lulu.
“Okay…” Lulu said, stepping away as if she were a director stepping behind camera. “Action.”
Cristina walked leisurely across the padded floor, her eyes looking straight ahead. Daniel crept up from behind. He jumped up and put her head into a hold of some kind. Cristina quickly slid her fingers under his arm and tried to pry his arm away, but it didn’t budge. He wasn’t playing around. He then rocked her back and forth until she started to lose her balance.
“Come on, Cristina. Fight like your life is on the line,” Lulu barked like a Texas high school football coach.
The ladies in the room began shouting for Cristina. It was like we were at a boxing match.
“Come on, Cristina. Try that move I showed you.”
“I’m…trying,” she said through a clenched jaw, and she wasn’t the one forcing it shut. Daniel had a firm grip, and he wasn’t letting up.
I could feel my palms get clammy as I leaned up on my toes, my eyes riveted on what looked like a real struggle for Cristina. She tried to swing her leg around, aiming for his crotch, but she didn’t connect. It seemed like he was forcing her to make a much more advanced move if she wanted to free herself. Or maybe he was just trying to prove a point—it took a lot of practice and education to have the confidence to get out of any attack.
“Come on, Cristina,” Zahera yelled over everyone. “Don’t let this slimeball take control of you. Fight back!”
I saw Cristina’s eyes shift suddenly in my direction. Then she pulled up and, in one quick motion, swooped her body downward, sliding her head out from Daniel’s grasp at the same moment her fist connected with his padded larynx. He stumbled back a step, grabbing at his throat. In the blink of an eye, she released a roundhouse kick behind the knee, and he dropped like a rock to the ground. Her momentum spun her in a full circle.
“A knife!” someone yelled.
I saw a metal flash as Cristina slammed her elbow into Daniel’s crotch, then pounced on top of him, her short-edge blade stopping an inch from his neck.
“Holy shit,” Zahera said. “She’s a fucking ninja.”
Our first Krav Maga class ended early.
18
I slurped in a mouthful of orange-flavored smoothie that frankly tasted more like chalk with two squirts of orange juice on top. Zahera had convinced me I needed to drink this one with the “enhancers’’—egg-white protein, Vitamin D, acai, and a bunch of other ingredients I couldn’t pronounce. But because a teenage kid was watching me order, I just sucked it up and said, “Sure, I’ll take one of those. Eating healthy is just what I need.” I was aware that my tone lacked the conviction I was going for.
Cristina was up at the counter getting a refill on her black coffee while Zahera stepped away to take an emergency call from one of her patients. It seemed like she was on-call at all hours of the day and night. Of course, having babies wasn’t an eight-to-five activity, for Zahera or the pregnant women.
Pregnancy. Why did I think I needed to have a child? And how the hell did I think I could raise a child on my own? I had too much on my mind to even go there right now.
I glanced at my cell phone sitting on the table, and then it buzzed. It was Stan, who had just exited the drive-thru at Torchy’s Tacos—the same place where we’d had our tense interaction with the Gideons and their trash lawyer, Herbert Ross.
“I’m in heaven,” Stan said, sounding like he was chewing on a full package of beef jerky. I could only imagine how much food went flying around in his car as he spoke. “This burrito is incredible. Add a little hot sauce on top…” He paused, and I could hear him groan as he took another bite.
That was when I approached the subject of Russell Gideon, explaining the background information I’d found in his file about his notable salary, the comment Russell’s wife had made about him being out of town constantly, and my subsequent conversation with his boss, who’d confirmed Russell had essentially been ordered to travel no more than five days a month.
“Stop right there.” I heard the hissing of him sucking down some type of beverage.
For the next five minutes I had to listen to how Rick Huerta was out to get Stan while at the same time building a case to charge Miguel in Tommy’s death. I believed every word, but I knew I couldn’t do a damn thing about either issue unless we had more data.
“So you think Russell Gideon killed his own son while he was out of town, even while his son was being held hostage by Miguel’s father?” Stan asked. “If I bring this up to Huerta, he’ll say I’ve lost my marbles and will ensure I get put on the mentally-unstable list. I won’t just lose my job, I’ll be put in an institution.”
I reminded Stan of the odd behavior by Russell and Monique at the restaurant. “I know you, Stan; you saw something there that didn’t feel right.”
“Dammit, Ivy, you can’t let things go. You’re a pain in my ass, you know that?”
A minute later, he grudgingly agreed to use his position to look into Russell’s specific travel itinerary over the last few months. I promised to buy Stan a healthy smoothie once he got me the information. He proceeded to eat more of his burrito, mumbled a few words, and ended the call.
“Who was that?” Cristina had just sat down, blowing into her steaming coffee.
“Just someone who I think can help with one of my cases.”
She looked at me with bewilderment. “Are you some type of FBI agent?”
“Not exactly. I work for CPS as a special investigator.”
“Out to save the world one child at a time, huh?”
“You’re only a teenager and you’ve mastered the art of sarcasm.”
“For me, it’s more of a science.”
We both smiled. I turned and saw Zahera with her phone to her ear, whipping her hands around like she was doing sign language.
Back to Cristina. “Where did you get that knife?”
She chuckled, sipped her coffee, then set it on the table. “At the knife shop.”
“You bought it at a knife shop?”
Her eyes didn’t blink for a few seconds. “Okay, I didn’t buy it. I found it.” Another sip of coffee, but this time she looked away.
“Do you have a home, a family?”
“Sure,” she said, lifting the coffee, smelling the aroma.
“Where do you live?”
“Don’t really want to get into that.”
“Why not?”
She put the coffee down so hard it sloshed onto the table. “I have a home. I have a so-called family, but I haven’t been back in a while. More like twelve months. And I don’t plan on going back. Ever.”
I nodded and decided to broach the subject slowly, hoping she’d see the attempt to keep things casual, friendly. “Are you living in one of the shelters?”
A quick shake of the head. “They cramp my style,” she said, her eyes drifting down for a moment. I forced myself to take a pull from my smoothie, just to keep from firing off another question. A few seconds later, she lifted her eyes, her tone much less antagonistic. “A couple of guys were hassling me at night, and I just didn’t want to deal with it again.”
“Again?”
She quickly closed her mouth, as if she’d said more than she intended.
“Cristina, I’m not a cop, and I’m not an investigator hired by your parents to coerce you to go back home.”
“Ha,” she blurted. “I doubt my mom has even noticed that I’m not there.”
I tilted my head. “Seriously, you really believe that?”
“Okay, okay. She might know it, but she probably hasn’t done anything other than sniff coke up her nose, or maybe shoot up some heroin, to deal with all of her stress.”
Her home sounded anything but stable, but I pulled the reins on my interrogation for now.
A ding, and we both turned toward the door, which stayed open an extra second because of a gust of wind. Two wo
men from our Krav Maga class walked in, and one started pointing in our direction.
“Looks like I’ve made more friends.” Cristina rolled her eyes.
“Do you think they might have been freaked out by your knife exhibition?”
“Eh. I didn’t mean anything by it. I guess it was just instinct.”
I got the feeling she’d used that weapon before, possibly on multiple occasions, but I didn’t want to have a debate about the dangers of using a knife. “How old are you, Cristina?”
“I’m seventeen,” she said, sitting a little taller in her seat.
I couldn’t contain my inquisitive self. “Do you go to school?”
“Pfff, school? I don’t have time for school.”
“So you live on the streets, finding shelter maybe under a bridge or an abandoned house whenever possible, am I right?”
“You’re warm.”
“You probably think you’re an independent woman and have an opportunity to really make something out of your life now that you’re not at home anymore, held back by the shackles of your parents.”
“For starters, my dad is AWOL. Didn’t want anything to do with Mom or me. I barely remember the guy.”
“Sorry about that.”
She sighed. “I’m not sure if that’s what sent Mom over the edge. Maybe she was headed in that direction anyway. Doesn’t matter at this point. She’s the biggest dope-head in San Antonio. Maybe in the entire state.”
“And you couldn’t live in that environment anymore, so you decided to take control of your own life and move out.”
For the first time, her smile showed her teeth, which wasn’t a pretty sight. “You’re making me sound heroic or something. It wasn’t like that. And I didn’t really think about it much.”
“You did it to survive.” It was a statement, not a question, since I knew the answer.
She nodded a few times, her gaze staying on me. “You’ve lived through a few things, I guess?”
“A few. And look at me now.”
The Ivy Nash Thrillers: Books 1-3: Redemption Thriller Series 7-9 (Redemption Thriller Series Box Set) Page 12
