King Peso: An Emilia Cruz Novel (Detective Emilia Cruz Book 4)

by Carmen Amato

  “No,” Emilia said. “Not yet. The investigation is ongoing.”

  Felipe nodded and tucked his hair behind his ears with a practiced gesture. “Is Franco still in jail? Antonio called right after they took him. I’ve been up there twice to bring him food. Are you going to get him out?”

  “I’m trying.” Emilia liked Felipe immediately, including his rapid-fire manner of shooting out questions.

  Felipe leaned forward in the folding chair, knees on elbows. “How can I help? What do you need?”

  Emilia got out her notebook and flipped to the timeline page. “Can I ask you a few questions about Sunday night?”

  “Of course.”

  Emilia went through the questions and got familiar answers. Felipe and his wife got to Antonio’s at about 7:30 pm. Silvio was already there. They left about the same time he did.

  Felipe referred to Silvio as Franco, in a way that implied a real friendship. Emilia wondered what Silvio would have in common with a hip young owner of a sporting goods store.

  “Have you known Franco long?” she asked.

  Felipe raised his eyebrows as he thought. “Eleven, twelve years,” he said. “Something like that.”

  “That’s a long time,” Emilia said, slightly surprised. “How did you meet?”

  “He and my brother Manuel worked together,” Felipe said.

  Garcia, of course. The name was so common, Emilia hadn’t made the connection. “Manuel Garcia Diaz?” she verified. “Silvio’s late partner?”

  “Manuel was my older brother,” Felipe said. “I was 19 when he died.”

  “I’m so sorry for your loss,” Emilia said sincerely.

  “Thank you,” Felipe said. “Manuel and Franco were partners for seven years. They did everything together. It was like I had two older brothers.”

  Emilia nodded, glad to learn about this side of Silvio.

  “He’s been there for us all these years.” Felipe looked around. “Helped me buy this place. Taught David how to box.”

  “David?”

  “My younger brother. David was just a kid when Manuel died and it set him adrift. Wanted to be an actor. Got involved with heroin. Franco helped him get himself together. Now David even has an acting jobs of sorts. But I don’t think any of us ever really recovered from losing Manuel, you know what I mean?”

  Emilia gave a half smile. “Everyone I know lives with the dead tugging at their souls.”

  “Franco and Isabel are like family,” Felipe said, his voice breaking. “Losing Manuel drew us even closer. We might have lost Manuel, but we weren’t going to lose Franco and Isabel, too.”

  Emilia closed her notebook, trying to fit the pieces together. Even respected colleagues like Prade weren’t above repeating the old rumors, long since officially dismissed, about the death of Manuel Garcia Diaz. But from this conversation, it was clear that the Garcia family harbored no such concerns.

  “I’m sorry,” Emilia said. “I know this is hard. I just have a few more questions.”

  Felipe tucked his hair behind his ears again. The practiced gesture seemed to help him center himself. “Go ahead,” he said.

  Emilia opened her notebook again. “Do you have a key to Franco’s house?”

  “No.”

  “Do you know anyone who had a key to his house?”

  “No.”

  Emilia nodded as she wrote. All of Silvio’s friends had the same answers. “Franco’s bookie business,” she went on. “Did he ever talk to you about people who placed bets with him? Anyone angry?”

  Felipe smiled. “My mother doesn’t approve of gambling so he never talked about it with us.”

  “Did Franco ever talk about another woman?” Emilia asked.

  “Besides you?”

  “Me?” Emilia put down her pen.

  “He said you were smart. Not as smart as Manuel but you were honest like Manuel and he knew where he stood with you.”

  “No,” Emilia said. “I meant if Franco ever . . . said or did anything that gave you an idea he was seeing someone else.”

  Felipe straightened up in the chair. “No, never.”

  “What about Isabel?”

  “You mean carrying on behind Franco’s back?”

  Emilia gave a tiny nod.

  “No,” Felipe said firmly. “Neither of them. Never.”

  “Thanks.” Emilia stowed her notebook in her bag and stood up, feeling tired and wrung out. She’d sweated through her tee shirt so many times it was crisp with salt. “I really appreciate your time.”

  Felipe stood, too. “Can I get you some water? Coffee?”

  Emilia slung the strap of her bag over her shoulder. “No, I have to get going.”

  “Wait.” Felipe darted over to a pile of cardboard boxes stacked by the far desk and came back with a package of socks and a handful of protein bars. “Look, it’s not much, but we have these great socks. They’re for runners. Nice cushion to keep your feet from getting sore. And you look like you could do with something to eat, too.”

  “Thank you,” Emilia said, touched. “You just made my whole day.”

  He led her through the store, where customers chattered in the aisles and the registers kept up an electronic chant. “I’m glad we finally met,” he said. “Stay in touch. Anything we can do for Franco, you let us know. Or if you need more socks. Or a surfboard. Or whatever. Give a call. Come by.”

  Emilia grinned. “I will. Take care.”

  She walked back to the Suburban and dialed Macias yet again. The connection went directly to voice mail. Again. “Why haven’t you called me back?” she demanded of the faint hum at the other end. “I’ve talked to five witnesses who can all place Silvio at―.”

  An electronic tone cut off Emilia in mid-rant. A metallic voice informed her that the inbox was full.

  Emilia swore and broke the connection. Sandor’s phone also went to voice mail.

  She shoved her phone back in her bag and checked her watch. It was nearly 5:00 pm.

  As she shifted the Suburban into gear she was glad she’d met Felipe Garcia. She’d always imagined Silvio as a loner, respected yet feared at work. It was nice to know that Silvio had other people in his life.

  But only one stupid enough to break into a crime scene and find his maldita bookie ledgers.

  Chapter 8

  On Thursday afternoon Emilia drove into El Roble. Silvio’s neighborhood looked the same; battered buildings, anxious people. Nothing survived long in the blighted barrio, she decided.

  Good women only lasted 42 years.

  She learned her lesson and parked further away from Silvio’s house this time. With her shoulder bag slung across her body, she strolled towards Silvio’s house. There was a pair of latex gloves in her jeans pocket from the emergency stash in the Suburban.

  The street was bereft of cars or people save for half a dozen boys by the curb in front of the small grocery store. A street sign was cemented into the sidewalk and apparently served as rallying point. Some of the boys listlessly tossed stones into the gutter. As Emilia neared, they scuttled closer to the store, like crabs seeking shelter.

  “Hey,” Emilia said by way of greeting. She wondered if any of them were the halcones who’d watched Silvio return to his house after the Copa America match.

  “Puta,” one of them replied. “Give me money.” His voice was breathy and strained. He was nine or ten years old, dressed in flip flops, dirty jeans, and a tee shirt that had once been orange but was now striped with dirt. A clear plastic soda bottle dangled just below his chin, suspended by a bit of string like a necklace.

  His friends laughed, but their laughter was aimless and their eyes were unfocused. Two of them held plastic soda bottles close to their faces while the others wore the same bottle necklace as their leader.

  The cop called them “glue boys.” The kids put glue in the bottom of empty plastic bottles and sniffed the fumes that wafted up all day long. The high from the glue cut hunger pangs and diluted the misery and lonel
iness of being homeless in a combat zone. Street gangs sometimes paid a glue boy a couple of pesos to play lookout, but after a year or two on glue, the kids’ brains were fried and they weren’t reliable.

  “You all going to school this morning?” Emilia asked.

  The boys scattered, laughing inanely.

  Emilia slowed as she crossed the street and approached the faded blue wall marking Silvio’s house. The block was nearly deserted. No tech vans, no identifiable cop cars. No people hanging around.

  The exception was a glue boy. The straggler was very young, six or seven at the most, wearing the standard uniform of glue bottle necklace, tee shirt, ragged jeans, and flip flops. Someone had been taking care of him, however, as his hair was neatly barbered, his shirt was relatively clean, and he looked as if he’d had a few regular meals of late.

  When Emilia reached the edge of the wall he ran off with an awkward, shuffling gait.

  Silence hung over the worn cement like a storm cloud. A crisscross of crime scene tape barred the pedestrian gate with its flimsy warning of PROHIBIDO EL PASO. Emilia worked one end loose, unlocked the gate, and slipped inside.

  The courtyard was empty. Both Silvio’s police sedan and the truck he owned were gone. Plastic tables and chairs were stacked against the side wall, ready for Isabel’s next meal for El Roble’s lost children.

  The house was the same faded blue as the front wall, but enlivened by a yellow door and a terra cotta pot of geraniums. Emilia used the same key to let herself into the house.

  All the lights were off and the entranceway was dim. The air in the house was sour and stung her eyes. Emilia followed a suspicious stink and an angry hum to the foot of the staircase.

  Halfway up, a writhing dark mass covered three steps.

  Flies. Thousands of flies.

  “Madre de Dios,” she blurted.

  No one had bothered to clean up the blood after removing Isabel’s body. The flies were gorging on it. The smell was overwhelming.

  Gagging, Emilia hauled the hem of her tee shirt over her mouth and nose. She stumbled backwards. Once in the living room, where weak sunlight shone through the curtains, she coughed and caught her breath again.

  The living room was messy, just as Silvio had said. The sofa and chairs were pushed at odd angles. Two pictures were propped against the wall and she could see the faded squares where they had once hung. The television and DVD player were still there, however, as was a stack of DVDs. A few popular action movies seemed right up Silvio’s alley while Isabel probably enjoyed the cooking show boxed set. Two children’s movies, one with cartoon cars on the front and another showing a bulbous purple animal, were hidden at the bottom of the stack.

  She passed through the tidy kitchen on the way to Silvio’s office located at the back of the house. Just to satisfy herself, Emilia checked the back door and the windows before moving on. No sign of a break-in, just like the crime scene report said.

  Silvio’s office enjoyed the clutter of a man who spent a lot of time engrossed in the sports pages. Emilia thought back to the last time she’d been there. She and Silvio had downed beers at the table and set up a sting, unaware that they would net the crooked cop who led Internal Affairs. Dark humor and raw tension had sat with them at that planning session, as did the confidence that Emilia could rely on Silvio in the midst of crisis. Now she had to play that role for him.

  She snapped on the latex gloves and began rifling through the newspapers, magazines, and Copa America brackets strewn over the table and chair seats. It didn’t take long to realize that the ledgers weren’t on the table or on the bookshelves, which were full of scrapbooks, boxes of old trophies, and rolled-up posters. A basket held battered boxing gloves.

  Emilia looked around, sure she had missed something. But the room was small. There was no closet or storage cabinet. She searched the room a second time.

  Thirty minutes later she’d found out everything she ever wanted to know about Silvio’s former boxing career, all the sports news from the last two months, and his best guess for the final Copa America matchup. She didn’t know anything about two green linen-covered accounting ledgers, the kind everybody in Mexico used.

  ☼

  With her shirt once again pulled over her nose and mouth, Emilia stepped over the angry swarm of feasting flies and went upstairs. She hadn’t planned to search the house but maybe the ledgers had ended up somewhere else. Isabel could have moved them after Silvio left to go to Antonio’s. The crime scene techs could have picked them up and misplaced them.

  There were two bedrooms and two bathrooms on the second floor. The master bedroom was tidy but plain, the bed dressed with white sheets and a dark green blanket. The bedclothes were flung back on one side as if someone had just gotten up.

  On the dresser, two silver frames showcased photos of Isabel and Silvio. In the most recent one, Silvio wore his trademark white tee and squinted at the camera while Isabel smiled and shaded her eyes with one hand. He had his arm around her and she wore a floral apron over a brown dress. In the background, children sat at plastic tables like the ones Emilia had seen stacked in the courtyard.

  The other photo showed a young couple, excited about the future and grinning into the camera. Isabel was trim, with long wavy hair. Silvio looked every inch a heavyweight champ.

  Emilia tried to reconcile the happy youth with the scowling, often surly man she rode with every day. Bad things had happened between the two pictures and they had changed him. Emilia felt as if she was intruding into a part of his life that Silvio would not want shared, looking at things she did not have permission to see.

  The feeling stayed with her as Emilia explored the room.

  The ledgers were not there.

  The second bedroom evidently was Isabel’s storage space. Boxes containing dried goods like beans, rice, oil, and pasta were stacked along one wall. All were neatly labelled.

  Again Emilia searched patiently and methodically. She even shoved boxes away from the walls in case the ledgers had fallen or been hidden.

  The ledgers were not there.

  The ledgers weren’t in the bathrooms, either.

  Emilia stood on the stair landing, unsure what to do. She drifted into the master bedroom, worked the recent picture of Silvio and Isabel out of its silver frame, and stuck it in her shoulder bag. It might come in useful and she knew she wasn’t coming back to the house any time soon.

  The smell of the blood and the thick swarm of flies made her gag again as Emilia returned to the first floor. She combed each room again, working fast. Her hands were damp with sweat inside the latex gloves.

  The ledgers were not there.

  She found herself back in the kitchen after a third pass through Silvio’s office. Emilia opened the back door, stepped out, and sucked in El Roble’s version of clean air.

  The back patio was a small tile affair, with a set of white plastic chairs surrounding a café sized white plastic table. A pretty flower garden grew against the back of the house, with fat roses nodding on glossy green stems and chili-colored hibiscus spreading above low flowering plants, the names of which Emilia could only guess. On the other side of the back door, a vegetable garden was heavy with a crop of tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant. Between the garden and her storeroom, Isabel had been well stocked to feed the army of children forever knocking at her door.

  A small shed, painted to match the house, leaned against the faded blue wall enclosing the property. The shed had likely been the chauffeur’s quarters before El Roble’s drug-fueled decline.

  The shed’s corrugated metal roof extended like a canopy over an outdoor work area with a sink and stone counter. A single red cloth was pinned to the clothesline above the sink and flapped gently in the late afternoon breeze.

  Emilia tried the door to the shed. It was unlocked and swung inward.

  A louvered window let in enough light to reveal a garden shovel and narrow rake propped in one corner by a neatly coiled hose. A long narrow table held a ba
g of dirt, an old basket, a neat stack of small terra cotta pots, and hand tools corralled in an old coffee can.

  The floor was swept clean, except for a blanket folded into a lumpy rectangle. Glad she still wore her gloves, Emilia picked up the wad of cloth. Something fell out and clattered against the concrete floor, making her jump.

  She dropped the blanket, shoved at the door to let in more light, and saw a small plastic child’s toy with sliding numbered tiles. Emilia bent to pick it up and saw something shiny under the table.

  It looked like a curled tube of toothpaste after every bit was squeezed out. But this tube was metal. Emilia unrolled it. Cracked red lettering proclaimed multi-purpose glue. The best adhesive for metal, wood, and plastics.

  “And small boys,” Emilia muttered.

  She stuffed the tube in her bag, next to the photo of Silvio and Isabel. Emilia retraced her steps through the house, let herself out the front door, crossed the courtyard, and finally slipped through the gate. She smoothed the crime scene tape back into place before stripping off the gloves and wadding them into a pocket.

  The glue boy who’d been in front of the house was back, hunched by the edge of the cement wall as if trying to make himself invisible. Despite the bottle around his neck, Emilia recognized the posture of hunger. She hoped that she had never looked like that when she was his age.

  “Hey.” Emilia strolled towards him, deliberately casual and unhurried.

  The kid watched her approach. His chin came up.

  “Is this your corner?” Emilia asked. He looked ready to take flight if she said the wrong thing.

  His eyes focused. Emilia took it as a good sign that the glue hadn’t yet rotted his brain.

  Emilia came a step closer. “You hiding from the other boys?”

  “They don’t scare me,” the kid said. His words were slurred but both audible and intelligible. He folded his arms, careful not to jostle the plastic bottle near his throat. The tee shirt heralded the Barcelona soccer team. The plastic flip flops were a size too big. His feet were dirty.

  “What’s your name?” Emilia asked.