A Place in the Wind

by Suzanne Chazin

  “How about the twenty-four-hour deli in that little shopping center near La Casa? A lot of immigrants hang there.”

  Greco shot Vega a smoldering look over the tops of his black glasses.

  “Okay, okay. I get the point. You’re doing all of this already. So why are you here?”

  “To deliver a little word of warning. One to Adele, and one to you,” said Greco. “The Archers say Catherine volunteered Wednesday and Friday evenings at La Casa. But Kay, the head volunteer, says Catherine usually came in on Wednesdays. She doesn’t remember her being there most Fridays.”

  “La Casa must have sign-in sheets.”

  “Yes. But Kay can’t find the ones for the last six months.”

  “Ay, puñeta,” Vega cursed. Cops were meticulous record-keepers. They had to be. You could blow a whole case with one erroneous date or sloppy report. La Casa was full of social workers, who tended to view paperwork as government intrusion, a necessary evil at best. “So in other words,” said Vega, “you have no idea who’s telling the truth. What do you know about this girl?”

  “Her family owns the Magnolia Inn,” said Greco. “They’re old-money Lake Holly.”

  “So I’ve heard. But what about the girl?”

  “Honors student. Varsity tennis player—”

  “Sanchez and Jankowski told me the same things,” Vega interrupted. “But I mean, what was she like? Did she do drugs? Did she have a boyfriend? Did she take off periodically where no one could find her?”

  “No, no, and no,” said Greco. “She worked as a hostess at the Inn. She tutored at La Casa. She got good grades and played a mean backhand. Sounds to me like you want to blame the victim, when we both know Adele should have been checking her clients better.”

  “And it sounds to me like you want to blame Adele for not doing something even we can’t do,” said Vega. “I mean, you and I as cops can’t ask these guys for their real names without probable cause. How can Adele be held to a higher standard?”

  “Say all you want, Vega. But Mike Carp’s gonna see it differently. Trust me. Our new county exec’s already got his people crawling up our butts demanding hourly updates on what we’re doing to find this girl. He’s calling for press conferences like he’s already running for governor. So if Adele doesn’t want to sound as clueless as a nun in a whorehouse, she’d better get her records in order pronto.”

  “I’ll let her know. What’s the other thing you wanted to warn me about, Don Corleone?”

  Vega was teasing, but Greco’s face lost all its playfulness.

  “There is one video we did get from last night, not from La Casa. From the Magnolia Inn.”

  “Of Catherine?”

  “No.” Something pained flashed in Greco’s eyes. “Of your ex-wife.”

  Chapter 4

  “Wendy?” Vega didn’t understand why Greco was alarmed. “Her second husband’s an investment banker on Wall Street. Mr. Moneybags probably takes her to the Magnolia Inn twice a week to celebrate his latest swindle.”

  “Down, boy,” said Greco. “You might feel sorry for the poor schlub when you hear me out. The video shows your ex-wife leaving the Inn with John Archer. Catherine’s father. At midnight. The place shuts down for dinner at ten p.m. All the staff are gone by eleven.”

  “You’re not seriously suggesting Wendy had anything to do with this girl’s disappearance?”

  “That’s just it, you dope,” said Greco. “This probably has nothing to do with Catherine’s disappearance. But it’s the stuff of gossip mills. A prominent local girl is missing. And while she goes missing, her married father is having an affair with a married middle-school psychologist. You get my drift?”

  Vega did—belatedly. Then again, when Wendy was fooling around on him, Vega was just as much of a dope. She wasn’t his wife anymore. Hadn’t been for six years. But she was still Joy’s mother. His daughter didn’t deserve that kind of humiliation.

  “That’s why I’m here,” said Greco. “To give you a friendly warning.”

  “Did you ask Wendy about it?”

  “Steve Jankowski did. She refused to discuss it. So did Archer. But given the hour and their reticence, it’s safe to say they weren’t playing pinochle.”

  “Okay. Thanks for the heads-up.”

  Vega saw Greco out. Then he went upstairs to check on Adele. He found her standing by her bedroom window, staring out at her driveway through a parted slat in the blinds. Clouds, thick and gray as dryer lint, had begun to gather on the horizon. They mirrored something dark and unsettled in her face. She looked like a feather could knock her over.

  “Any word?” There was so much hope in her voice.

  “Not yet.” Vega came up behind her and put his arms around her. She was wearing a sweater and jeans, but she was still shivering. He brushed her silky black hair to one side and kissed her cheek. It was wet. And salty. He could tell she’d been crying.

  “I heard what Greco said about the missing paperwork,” said Adele. “He blames me, doesn’t he? They all do. The police. Catherine’s family. The community.”

  Vega turned Adele to face him. Her whole body felt like it was being held together by rubber bands. Worry carved small crosshatches into the space between her brows. It compressed the bow of her lips. Weighted down her shoulders. Dimmed the fire in her ale-colored eyes. Each pain came to him as if it were his own. He chucked a hand beneath her chin and brought her gaze up to his.

  “Listen to me, nena, you didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “Ten years I’ve been running La Casa. And in all that time, we’ve had maybe a handful of petty thefts. A couple of fistfights. None of it directed at my volunteers. If one of my clients hurt this girl, I don’t think I can live with myself.”

  “Don’t say that.” Vega’s words came out sharp and panicked. He’d never heard her talk this way. He pulled her closer. “Things happen. Things you can’t control. If anyone understands that, it’s me. I fired my weapon for all the right reasons. I followed all the rules and laws. And it still went bad. But I’m here. I’m getting through it. And you will too.”

  “You’re stronger than I am, Jimmy. You held up.”

  “You held me up. I wouldn’t be here in one piece right now without you. You don’t think we can get through this together?” He brushed a thumb across her cheek. “I’ll cancel tonight.”

  “Tonight?” She stepped back, confused. Then she remembered. “You’re playing the Oyster Club. With the band.”

  “I’ll get Danny or Richie to find someone to fill in.”

  “On lead vocals and guitar? It’ll never happen. They’ll have to cancel. You’ll let the whole band down.”

  “I don’t care. You need me.”

  “There’s nothing you’re going to be able to do for me tonight. I’ve got a ton of phone calls to make and memos to write and meetings to schedule.”

  Was she being selfless? Or just practical? Vega wasn’t sure. Adele was hard to read sometimes. Either way, he knew how he felt about it. “I don’t want to leave you.”

  “I’ll be fine, though I think Sophia’s going to have to stay at her father’s.” Adele’s stomach growled.

  “You hear that?” Vega frowned. “You need food and rest, nena. I saw your refrigerator. There’s very little in it.”

  “I can grocery shop tomorrow,” Adele assured him. “What I really need is my car back.”

  “I’ll walk back and fetch it now.” A thought occurred to him. “Hank’s Deli is around the corner from La Casa. How about I bring you back a sandwich? You like their ham and cheese. I could get you some bagels, too. They’re good to munch on.”

  “All right.” There was no enthusiasm in her voice. After the shooting, Vega couldn’t imagine eating. Food tasted like damp socks. He had a sense Adele was going through the same thing. He didn’t want to leave her like this. Not to fetch her car. Not to play with his band.

  “Nena, I don’t think I should—”

  She pushed him back. “Would
you go already?”

  * * *

  Three television news vans were parked at the police barricade by the time Vega walked back to La Casa. The story was growing. Two reporters saw Vega unlocking Adele’s car and made a beeline for him. He fended them off by flashing his badge and claiming police business.

  He got in and drove a short distance to the one-story brick-front shopping center that housed Hank’s Deli, along with a pizzeria, a hardware store, a laundromat, and a liquor store. The deli still bore Hank Cipriani’s name, even though Hank had retired to Florida six years ago and sold the business to his Guatemalan manager. Now Oscar and his family worked the business twenty-four–seven, even though they kept the name. “My American customers like to think that the señor is still around,” Oscar once told Vega. The man was nothing if not smart.

  Usually Hank’s was busy on a Saturday afternoon. Today, however, the deli was empty, save for Oscar. Even the laundromat next door seemed more subdued than usual. People were sitting on chairs by the washers and dryers. But there wasn’t the normal spillover of conversations into the parking lot. A Latina walked out with a stroller and a wheeled cart of folded laundry, but she walked quickly, head down.

  “Hola,” Vega said to Oscar as he walked into the deli. “Where is everybody? You run out of jalapeños or something?”

  Oscar didn’t smile at the lame joke. He was normally a cheerful man, his wide face breaking into a grin that compressed his eyes into slits and showed off the gap between his two front teeth. He wiped his hands on his stained white apron.

  “You’ve heard, right? About the missing girl? It’s terrible. Just terrible.”

  Vega nodded. “I just came from Adele. I’m here to get her a sandwich. Ham and Swiss on a roll with hot peppers. Make that two.” Vega found it refreshing to be with a woman who ate the same foods he did. His ex and daughter treated anything with meat or gluten like it was radioactive.

  Oscar pulled the ham from the deli case. “How is the señora?” Oscar was never a client of La Casa’s. He’d clawed his way up before the center existed. But he felt an affinity for those who came after him—and for the woman who tried to help them.

  “She’s upset,” said Vega. “Nobody seems to know anything. Did the police speak to you?”

  “This morning,” said Oscar. “They took the videos from our store camera and one in the parking lot.”

  “Were you working last night? Did you see anything suspicious?”

  “I wasn’t here,” said Oscar. “My wife’s cousin Adolfo was working.” Oscar hefted the ham onto the slicer. He had the broad shoulders and muscular arms of the stonecutter he’d once been, until Hank took him on all those years ago. “The señora likes it thin, right?”

  “Yes. Thanks. Did Adolfo see anything?”

  “The police showed him pictures of the men at La Casa last night. Adolfo said he sold beer to one of them.”

  “At what time?”

  “Around ten-thirty, judging from the video.”

  “How much beer did the man buy?”

  “A twelve-pack.”

  Hank’s was close to La Casa. It was a Friday night and a grown man buying beer didn’t make him guilty of any crime. But it could make him a witness.

  Oscar put the ham back in the case and removed the block of cheese next. He seemed grateful to have somewhere to turn his attentions.

  “This guy Adolfo saw? Have you ever seen him before?” asked Vega.

  “He comes here pretty often.”

  “Do you know his name?”

  “No. But the police said he went by the name ‘Darwin’ at La Casa. I don’t remember the last name they gave.” Oscar didn’t need to add that the name likely wasn’t real.

  “Is he Guatemalan? Mexican? Ecuadorian?”

  “He’s no Chapin to me,” said Oscar, using the affectionate term Guatemalans give to one another. “He’s nothing but a cholero.” Guatemalan slang for “low-class person,” often someone with Indian blood. Vega had to laugh. Here was a man who’d no doubt struggled under the yoke of Anglo prejudice for years. And yet he had no qualms expressing prejudice himself. It reminded Vega of when he was a boy in the Bronx and the Puerto Ricans chafed when Jewish shopkeepers and landlords treated them like slackers and thieves, and yet a lot of the Puerto Ricans did the same to the Dominicans. Wendy told him the story of how her grandmother was ostracized from her German Jewish family after marrying a Romanian Jew. Everybody, it seemed, was at the top of their own pyramid, even if they were at the bottom of someone else’s.

  Oscar wrapped up the two sandwiches and put them by the register. Vega grabbed two Snapple ice teas from the refrigerated case and put them on the counter. He was still the only customer in the store. Vega wondered if Latinos were afraid to be out—especially near a place the police had grown so interested in. As for the Anglos who usually came—Vega didn’t want to think about what was keeping them away.

  “I’ll take a half-dozen everything bagels and a container of cream cheese too.”

  “You want them sliced?”

  “Sure. Thanks.” Vega squinted up at the store camera. “This Darwin—you never said—was he alone?”

  Oscar started to slice a bagel. His hand froze halfway through the motion. Vega noticed the lift in his broad shoulders. The deep inhale in anticipation of something sharp and painful. Oscar had his own suspicions—and they weren’t good.

  “He came in alone. But the video from the parking lot . . . there was a girl on it.”

  “A girl?”

  “Waiting outside for him.” Oscar lowered his voice. “A canche.” Guatemalan slang for “a blonde.”

  “Did it look like the missing girl?”

  “I can’t say for sure. Neither could Adolfo. Her back was to the camera.”

  “But she was with him? Not just there at the same time?”

  “She appeared to be waiting for him to buy the beer, yes. They walked off-camera together.”

  Vega felt something heavy settle on his chest. What were the odds that this Darwin would be with some blonde and it not be the girl who’d just tutored him a block and a half away? Then again, why would a girl like that go anywhere with him?

  But Vega knew the answer to that one before he’d even finished the question. Catherine Archer was seventeen. Underage. Whatever else this Darwin was, he was old enough to buy beer. For an underage girl. Who would probably drink too much, too fast, and pass out. The rest was almost a cliché.

  “Did the police take any other evidence besides the videos?” asked Vega.

  “No.” Oscar rang up the order. Vega took out his wallet. Next to the cash register was an ad for the New York State lottery. All the immigrants played. That was the real American dream these days. Most of them had a better shot at winning the Pick Six than they ever did at becoming legal.

  “How about lottery tickets?” asked Vega.

  “You want to buy some?”

  “No. I’m asking about this Darwin guy. Did he buy any lottery tickets?”

  “I can check the play slips in back,” said Oscar. “They haven’t gone out yet.”

  “Mind if I look too?”

  “No problem.”

  Vega followed Oscar into the stockroom—a narrow space with shelves on one side and a computer on the other. If Darwin bought a lottery ticket, he’d have had to fill out a play slip—a card with little ovals that had to be colored in like a score sheet. His DNA and fingerprints would be all over that card. The DNA could take a while to process, but the fingerprints would be quick. The Lake Holly PD could run them through the FBI’s crime database and Homeland Security’s immigration database. There was a good chance one of them would produce a hit.

  Oscar pulled up an Excel spreadsheet on his ancient computer. He ran his finger down the page. The play slips were all time-stamped. It took no time to match Darwin’s purchase with the actual slip.

  “If you wait a moment, I’ll get it for you.”

  “No. Uh-uh.” Vega steppe
d back and waved his hands in front of his face. “I can’t touch it. It’s not my case. I’m going to call it into the Lake Holly PD now.” Not the PD. Greco. Vega didn’t trust Jankowski and Sanchez. If they could miss this, what else could they have missed?

  Vega wished, not for the first time, that he was back working cases. God, how he missed it! Six weeks—six long weeks—he’d spent sitting at a desk answering phones and reviewing arrest reports and time sheets. Every Friday, he asked his boss the same question: How much longer? And every Friday, Captain Waring gave the same answer: It’s under review. Whose review? What more did Vega have to do? He’d posted the second highest score of the past six months at the police shooting range. He ran five miles every other day. He lifted weights. He was in the best shape he’d been in since the academy. And none of it mattered until the bosses decided it did.

  Vega pulled his business card out of his wallet and handed it to Oscar. “Don’t let these play slips leave your store until the police get here. You run into any problems or the police don’t come within two hours, call me. I don’t want to see this evidence lost.”

  “Okay.” Oscar shoved the card into his pants pocket beneath his white apron. He looked out at the deli counter again. “Almost nobody’s come into the store since that girl disappeared. A few Chapines. But no norteamericanos. This is bad.”

  “It’s just a slow day,” said Vega. “Probably because it’s going to snow.” Though in truth, Vega had never seen it this slow on a Saturday afternoon.

  “It’s not the snow,” said Oscar. “It’s the girl.”

  “You didn’t do anything.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” said Oscar. “The police were here. Word has gone around that a Guatemalan immigrant bought beer at my store and then did something bad to that girl. As far as the norteamericanos in town are concerned, I’m to blame.”

  “They don’t think that.”

  “No?” Oscar raised an eyebrow. “You know the gas station in town? The one owned by the two Sikh brothers?”

  “Sure.” Vega bought gas there regularly when he was in Lake Holly. They had the cheapest prices around.