by Brenda Novak
“For what?” she asked.
“To get you out of my system,” he said, then walked away.
Anne’s house was like a mausoleum. Expansive. Sterile. Filled with art and sculpture. The only thing that moved, except the ceiling fans in the glass extension overlooking the backyard, was Dolly, the poodle.
Tail quivering with excitement, Dolly sat on her perfectly groomed behind and begged for a morsel of Sophia’s food.
“You’ve already had yours, baby.” After sliding the plate she’d prepared for Sophia away from the edge of the table, Anne scooped the dog into her lap. “Let Sophie enjoy her dinner. It’s rare enough that I get to see her.”
Sophia didn’t miss the chastisement in her mother’s words. She knew Anne wished she’d come out more often. Her mother always had some new trinket or painting or antique to show off. And the tennis courts were done now, as Anne had pointed out twice in the time it took to warm up a few leftovers. Her mother insisted there was so much to do at Casa Nueva.
That she’d actually named her estate was a bit too arrogant for Sophia’s tastes, but it certainly wasn’t the most pretentious thing her mother had ever done.
“Isn’t it beautiful?” Anne asked before Sophia could once again point out how busy she was with her job.
Sophia gazed over the garden where her mother spent the majority of each morning. The tranquility of it should’ve drawn her out here more often. Except that every time she came, she saw herself as a teenager hiding in the pool house or skulking around the backyard to delay her entry into the house if her stepfather happened to be home.
“It’s lovely,” she said. “As always.”
“I have a new kind of dahlia.” She smiled proudly while petting Dolly. “An import from Denmark. I’ll have to show it to you after you finish eating.”
“I’d like to see it.”
Adjusting her Dolce & Gabbana sunglasses, Anne sat back, looking cool and comfortable in white linen pants, a peach blouse and leather sandals that were peach and turquoise. A scarf around her neck tied all three colors together. She also wore a white headband to keep her shoulder-length blond hair from her face. Sophia suspected she’d had a facelift last year, but even if she asked, Anne would never admit it. She wanted everyone to believe she was vanquishing the years without help. Either way, with her fingernails and toenails polished the same shade of peach as her blouse, she was a class act, still very attractive at fifty-five.
“How’s work?” she asked.
“Fine.” Sophia didn’t want to get caught up in a discussion of the UDA murders. That could waste an hour or more, and she knew her stepfather would be coming home in forty-five minutes, assuming he kept to the same routine as usual. She didn’t want him to interrupt them, didn’t want her mother censoring what she said to make it more pleasing to Gary’s ears.
“Gary called a little while ago to tell me about Stuart Dunlap,” Anne murmured, lowering her voice. “I’m so sorry. I know he was a friend of yours.”
Not as close a friend as her mother would’ve liked. “I feel terrible for the family.”
“So do I. Those two boys are everything to Edna. I have no idea how she’ll get through this.”
“It won’t be easy.”
“Do you know who did it?”
“Not yet. But I’m working on it.”
“What about those other murders?”
“I’m working on those, too.”
“Are you getting any sleep?” The dog jumped down as Anne leaned forward to smooth the hair out of Sophia’s face, like she used to do when Sophia was a girl. Sophia didn’t bother stopping her. She knew her mother would take it as a subtle form of rejection if she did.
“Enough. There’s been a lot going on lately.”
“No kidding. But please tell me you’re taking time for yourself.”
Obviously, Anne had no clue what a murder investigation involved. “When I can.”
“How’s your love life?” She gave Sophia a conspirator’s grin. “I hear there’s a new man in town. And that he’s gorgeous!”
Sophia rolled her eyes. “Don’t get your hopes up, Mom.”
“I hear you two have been spending a lot of time together.”
The singsong quality of her voice made Sophia scowl. “He doesn’t like me. Not since I shot him with my Taser.”
“You…what?”
“I shocked him. You know, like with a stun gun?”
Her mother rocked back. “No!”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He broke the law and resisted arrest.”
Resting her chin in her hand, Anne sighed. “I’m afraid you’ll never get married.”
“He broke the law!”
“So? I’ve told you and told you—men don’t like women who carry guns and have tattoos and ride motorcycles. That’s intimidating. They prefer soft, frail females who make them feel powerful.”
Like her. Anne fit that stereotype perfectly. “Yeah, well, I’m not pretending to be feeble in order to build some guy’s ego, especially this guy’s. It’s big enough already.”
“Is it?”
Sophia wanted to say yes, but because her mother’s eyes had lit up as if she was eager to hear—and spread—the inside scoop, she couldn’t do it. Rod could be cocky, but she’d figured out that his cockiness was a defense mechanism to cover his vulnerability. If he felt he’d meet with rejection or hostility, he added a swagger to polish up that outer shell, so folks would assume he didn’t really care. But he did care. And when he opened up, he was kind and gentle and funny and sexy and…so many things she liked. “I can’t really say,” she hedged. “I don’t know him that well. I didn’t even when he used to live here.”
Playing dumb seemed the safest route, the easiest way to hide her feelings, but Anne wasn’t about to let the subject go. “He had a rough childhood, Sophia.”
“I know. I lived here, too, Mom. But…” She groped for the right words. But what? The Dunlaps had hurt him deeply. They would’ve destroyed a lesser heart. And yet Rod’s beat strong and true. Or was that only what she wanted to believe?
“And I hear he’s got money now.” She slipped that in before Sophia could go on. And there it was. The reason for her mother’s sudden interest in the Dunlap bastard.
“Maybe that’s true. Maybe it’s not,” she said. “It’s none of my business. Anyway, I don’t want to talk about Rod Guerrero, okay?” She was having a hard enough time putting him out of her head. He’d wanted to stay the night again. And, heaven help her, she was tempted to call him up and let him do it.
“Are you dating anyone else?” her mother asked.
“Not right now.” Finished with the food she’d eaten only to make Anne feel she was doing a good job of being a mother, Sophia pushed her plate away. “Hey, I saw that article in the paper about Gary. That was pretty nice, huh?”
Her mother seemed surprised by her choice of topic but was pleased enough not to question it. “Very nice.”
“So his store’s doing well?”
“Better than ever.”
“Who would’ve thought there’d be so much money in feed?”
“The rentals help, too.”
“Still, the guy before him couldn’t make it,” she mused.
“The guy before him wasn’t as smart as he is.”
“Right.” Sophia took a sip of the iced tea she’d brought out with her food. “He must be putting in a lot of long hours, though, huh?”
“Too many,” her mother agreed.
“But he spends his evenings with you, doesn’t he?”
Anne waved a dismissive hand. “Sometimes. But even then he’s up till all hours.”
“Doing what?” Sophia settled back in her seat to make the conversation seem more casual.
“Who knows? He’s always on his laptop. He started trading stocks a few years ago and has gotten more and more involved in it. I’m sure that’s what he’s doing a lot of the time.”
Sophia wasn’t nearly as convinced. “Do his cell phone bills come here to the house? Or do they go to the store?”
“To the store, I guess. I never see them. Why?”
“I was just wondering if you balanced the bank statements, that kind of stuff. I remember you used to do it when I was younger.”
“Only when I was married to your dad. Gary’s so much better about money. He takes care of all that. And he does it at the store. I haven’t seen a bank statement in ages.”
Sophia knew she could be wrong, but she had a hard time giving Gary any credit for that. From her perspective, he did what he did to keep her mother completely insulated and oblivious to his actions.
He was good at that. She’d seen him act in a similar manner with what he’d tried on her. “How do you get money?” she asked.
“He gives me an allowance.” Anne smiled meaningfully. “A generous allowance.”
Sophia returned the smile as if a rich husband was as important as Anne believed. “It’s amazing that he’s been able to turn the feed store around. Why do you think the guy who owned it before couldn’t make it?”
“He was an idiot.”
“The article in the paper said that Gary attributes part of his success to his ability to deal with Mexican Americans, to speak their language.”
“That’s probably true. A lot of farm laborers come in. Knowing Spanish helps him communicate. Gary taught himself,” she added proudly.
“I remember.” The tapes he’d purchased to learn it had blared through the house for hours.
Anne scooted her chair closer. “You know…I’m glad to see a little interest on your part toward Gary. You’ve always been so…resistant to accepting him.”
You mean in my bed? The words went through Sophia’s mind, but she didn’t speak them. She didn’t have much time to accomplish what she’d come for. “Yeah, well, maybe I’m growing up,” she said vaguely, and glanced at her watch. Six-thirty. The store closed at six. What time did Gary usually get home? It’d been too long since she’d lived with her mother to have any sure way of knowing. It could be soon.
“Can you excuse me for a minute?” she asked. “I need to use the restroom.”
“Of course.” Her mother picked up her plate and followed her inside but veered off toward the kitchen.
Sophia walked to the entrance of the guest bathroom, paused to be make certain her mother was busy washing up and wasn’t paying attention, then crept across the marble entry and beneath the curving staircase to her stepfather’s office.
French doors opened into a luxurious denlike room with white paneling, white carpet and floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking grass so green and so carefully trimmed it could’ve been used as a golf course. At Casa Nueva, there were no reminders of the heat outside—no desert landscape, no Southwestern art, none of the beige stucco that was so popular this close to the border. Her mother considered all of that to be “common” and “vulgar.”
The thick padding beneath the carpet made it easy to walk without sound. Sophia crossed to the desk and jiggled Gary’s mouse to dissolve his screensaver. She wanted to check his browser history, see where he’d been on the Internet. But the first thing that came up was a page requiring a password.
“So that’s how you keep Mom out of your business,” she murmured, and started to search the files and drawers instead.
In one drawer she found quite a bit of cash. Marveling that he hadn’t bothered to put it somewhere safe, she thumbed through the stack of hundred-dollar bills and counted nearly five thousand dollars. Five grand was a lot to have on hand, the type of cash smugglers often carried. But cash wasn’t incriminating in and of itself.
She tried another drawer. Office supplies.
Another drawer. Checkbooks. A few photographs—none of her, thank God.
The last drawer. Paper for the printer on the credenza behind her.
Hoping to discover something solid to explain the reason his phone number had been written on that wipe board, she moved to the filing cabinet. And found a handgun.
It was a Glock. She recognized that right away. But was it the same caliber as the one used in the UDA killings? She was just lifting it out of the drawer when a noise at the doorway made her turn.
Gary was standing there.
24
“What are you doing?”
Sophia raced through a series of excuses, searching for one he’d believe.
“What are you looking for?” he demanded before she could answer, and came into the room.
Although she’d been caught red-handed, Sophia couldn’t reveal the truth. If she was lucky, finding Gary’s number in that safe house might finally make it possible to unravel the mystery behind the UDA murders. And even if it didn’t, even if it was completely unrelated, she had to keep that information to herself long enough to figure out what it meant.
After dropping the gun back in the drawer, she pressed a finger to her lips to indicate that he should keep his voice down and jutted out her chin. “What do you think I’m looking for?”
To Sophia’s relief, the emotions registering on his face changed from shock and suspicion to irritation. “Don’t tell me. You’re hoping to find that picture you think I have of you.”
She silently released the breath she’d been holding. “What else?”
“That’s crazy, Sophia. I let you search my wallet at the store. Now you’re here, going through my office? What gives you the right?”
“The lies that Leonard is spreading, for one!” she said with a dark scowl.
It was his turn to act as if he was concerned that Anne would hear. “Keep your voice down.”
“He’s ruining my reputation!” she snapped.
“But I don’t have any such picture!”
“Then how does he know that anything inappropriate went on? And how is he extrapolating some unwelcome groping when I was sixteen and seventeen to mean I’m having an affair with you now?”
The hardness that entered Gary’s eyes told her he didn’t like how consistently she held him to the truth of his actions. “I have no idea. He hates you.”
She got the impression Gary did, too. She knew he’d deny it if she accused him. Her mother was still hoping they’d achieve peace as a family. But she’d been a problem for him, in one way or another, ever since he’d married her mother, and as long as she refused to let him escape responsibility for what he’d done, that wouldn’t change.
“Maybe Leonard’s doing whatever he can to make your life miserable,” he was saying. “But he’s lying about me. I don’t have any naked pictures of you. And I can’t understand why you won’t believe me. I’m not even attracted to you!”
That comment, more than any other, told her he was no different than he’d been years ago. He sounded like a high school boy, not a stepfather. “I wish you never had been.” At least, not in that way. She’d needed a stabilizing force, someone or something to shore up her crumbling world. Instead, she’d gotten a sexual predator, which had made her world fall apart even faster.
“You misunderstood what I was trying to do. You misunderstood everything,” he said.
“Oh, quit playing the martyr.”
He moved toward her as if to strike her. Instinctively, she raised her arms to protect her face, but he caught himself, and said only, “I wish you’d stop saying that.”
Sophia bit back the many angry responses that vied for expression. Arguing about the same old thing wouldn’t change the past. She had to focus on the reason she’d come here today. “How long have you owned a gun?” she asked.
His eyes cut to the filing cabinet she’d just closed. “For years, why?”
“You’ve never mentioned it.”
“I haven’t mentioned a lot of things. You and I don’t talk, remember?”
“Where’d you get it?”
He was in a full sulk now. “That’s none of your business.”
“Gary? Is that you?” Her mother’s voice carried in
from the living room. She was coming toward the office.
“I don’t want to deal with that old…issue again,” he said. “Ever. This is your last warning.”
Warning? Sophia stepped closer. “Or what?”
He didn’t answer, but the pressure of his lips against his teeth expunged all color from them and told her he had plenty to say. “You make me so—” he put some distance between them as he threw up his hands “—crazy.”
“There’s my sweetheart.” As Anne came to stand in the doorway, she realized Sophia was here rather than in the bathroom and looked curiously between them. “What’s going on?”
The mask Gary always wore with Anne fell neatly into place. Sophia felt chilled to see him slip into character so effortlessly.
“Nothing.” He smiled. “I was just giving Sophia a sneak peek at your birthday present.”
Blushing with pleasure, Anne came farther into the room. “What is it?”
He slid his arm around her. “I’ll never tell. Not until the big day.”
Anne appealed to Sophia. “You’ll tell me. Won’t you?”
“Not me. You’ve got to wait.” Her voice was a little too flat to make her “birthday” enthusiasm believable, but her mother was a pro at twisting any situation into what she wanted it to be.
“Isn’t he a wonderful husband?” she gushed.
Sophia struggled against her gag reflex. “He’s a keeper.”
Gary kissed Anne, a bit too passionately for having an audience. Apparently, he had trouble understanding what was appropriate, even now. But he succeeded in distracting Anne, which was probably his intent. “It’s too bad, what happened to Stuart, don’t you think?” he said as he pressed his forehead to hers.
“It’s terrible!” Anne agreed.
Sophia toyed with a paperweight from Gary’s desk, momentarily tempted to throw it. “You don’t know anyone who’d want him dead, do you?”
Gary frowned as he considered the question. “We’ve got two possibilities. Either the Mexicans are retaliating, or…”
“Or?”
“It’s Roderick Guerrero.”
She shook her head. “No.”
