by Dan Wells
The woman’s voice took on a hint of weary amusement. “Looks like news travels fast. Are you at that school thing too?”
“The whole neighborhood is.”
“Then you and your father can travel together,” said the woman. “I should have just told him to ask you along, but I’ve got a teenage daughter of my own and she wouldn’t be caught dead with me in a public setting. Good to know at least some families stay close.”
“Enjoy it while it lasts,” said Marisa. “My dad’s going to disown me by the time we get to the station. But we’ll be right there.”
“See you soon,” said the detective, and closed the call.
“I urge you,” said Carlo Magno, “with every scrap of paternal authority that I possess, to stay home tonight.”
“She said she wants to talk to me,” said Marisa. “What am I supposed to do, tell a cop to stick it?” After a moment she blinked and added: “And I already ordered us a cab.”
Carlo Magno sighed and looked down at his medical nuli, as if expecting it to commiserate. “You see what I have to put up with?”
“Your blood pressure is abnormally high,” said Triste Chango. “You should consider a dinner low in sodium, and avoid stressful situations.”
Carlo Magno smacked it with his cane. “Fine,” he said, and started walking toward the door. “Let’s get this over with.”
The South Central police station was an older building, renovated in the 2020s, so instead of the bright colors and 3D holodisplays Marisa was used to from the movies, it was all polished steel and full-length window walls. Practically ancient design. The officer at the front desk took their names and signed them in, and left Marisa to sit in the waiting area before taking Carlo Magno into one of the back rooms. They were apparently interviewing Don Francisco at the same time in a different room; she didn’t hear any belligerent shouting, so they might have been totally oblivious to each other.
It was nearly ten in the evening, but the station was still humming with activity; officers and detectives and nulis moved purposefully through the halls, all too busy to even notice Marisa, let alone answer any questions. She bit her tongue and forced herself to wait, remembering Sahara’s advice—she’d know the details soon enough—but then the desk officer returned with another person and told him to wait with her.
It was Omar Maldonado.
“Hey,” said Marisa.
“Hey.”
She never knew how to talk to Omar anymore. They’d been friends as kids, but only when their fathers weren’t looking, because the two men hated each other so much they’d forbidden their children to associate with each other. And then they’d grown older, and Omar had gotten more involved with his father’s business, and Marisa had started to see in him an undercurrent of . . . something. Deception was maybe the best word for it. The subtle sense that everything he said was an act, like a smooth, trustworthy interface over a website riddled with malware. He was wickedly good-looking—that she could appreciate no matter what he said or did—but he was impossible to believe in. He’d betrayed Marisa and her friends, sometimes horribly, but he’d helped them as well, sometimes even saving their lives at the risk of his own. And what bothered Marisa most of all was that she could never be sure, good or bad, what he really wanted. How much of his assistance was a calculated effort to win their favor?
It’s an abusive relationship, she told herself. Once a Maldonado, always a Maldonado.
She looked at him now, sitting in the bright lights of the featureless gray police station, and saw something in his face that she’d never seen before. She’d seen him friendly, angry, two-faced, charming—so, so charming—but until tonight she’d never seen him afraid.
She wanted to ask if he was okay, but was that the right thing to say? How could he possibly answer? He’d thought his mother was dead, and then he’d found out she was alive and then maybe dead again, or at least maimed. She hadn’t shown up in any hospitals. Had she died—for real this time? How many pieces was she in? It made Marisa sick just to think about it, and she forced herself to talk even if only to quiet the voices in her head.
“They want to talk to you, too, huh?”
Omar looked up, facing her directly for the first time that evening. His eyes had lost their usual spark, but they weren’t red; whatever was bothering him, he hadn’t been crying. She wasn’t sure if he could.
“No,” he said, and as he shifted in his chair, a mask seemed to come over his face, hiding all the fear and the damage and replacing it with slick, affable calm. “I’m just here if my father needs anything. I assume you’re here for the same?”
Marisa rolled her eyes. “My papi would sooner cut out his own liver than ask me for help right now. He doesn’t want me here at all—didn’t say a word to me in the cab.”
“But you came anyway,” he said, and pointed at her. The gesture struck her as incredibly odd for some reason. “That’s loyalty.”
“Tell that to him. If the cops hadn’t demanded that I be here, he’d have left me chained to a lunch table back at the school.”
Omar’s left eyebrow went up. “They demanded that you be here? The cops, you mean?”
“Yeah, they . . . want to talk to me.” She frowned. “Not you? We were both in the car that day.”
“But we were too young to remember any of it,” said Omar, leaning forward. Even through his facade, she could see the gears turning in his mind. “They want to talk to my father and to Sergio, but Franca and I are out.”
“And Jacinto?”
He dismissed the notion with a shake of his head. “He’s always out. Maybe they’ll want to talk to him later, but . . . Mari, you were two years old. What could they possibly want to ask you?”
“I . . .” Marisa shook her head. “I don’t know. I thought I knew, but if they’re not interviewing you, then maybe . . .” She shrugged. “Maybe they knew Papi was sick, and that he needed someone with him?” But even as she said it, she knew that couldn’t be it—the detective had said on the phone that she wanted to ask her some questions.
“She came to me last night,” said Omar.
Marisa’s jaw dropped open. “What? Your mother? She came to see you?”
“No, I don’t mean . . .” He was staring at the wall, his eyes never moving. “She didn’t come in person, she came in a dream. Or I guess really I came to her in my dream, and she was trying to get away. Running and running, and she kept looking back over her shoulder, and she’d see me, and then she’d turn away again and keep running. Running and running and running. And I thought she was scared, but maybe she was angry. Maybe she was just anxious to get away. But she didn’t want to be with me, so she ran away, and now she’s . . .”
Marisa watched him, stunned by the pain in his voice. When was the last time she’d heard any real emotion from Omar, let alone pain? “I’m sorry,” she said at last. “That sucks.”
He laughed once—a short, derisive cough. “Yeah.”
“Brains are stupid sometimes.”
He looked like he was about to say something, but didn’t.
“Why was she running?” asked Marisa. “Usually in dreams you just . . . know things.”
“Not in this one,” said Omar.
“Sorry,” said Marisa again, and then followed up with another weak “That sucks.” What else could she say?
Before she could come up with a good answer, the desk officer brought a third person to the waiting area: a woman, maybe thirty years old, and almost impossibly attractive. Her hair was dark but lustrous, and her face was like delicate porcelain. She looked beautiful in a way that real people seldom did, more like a dream than a human being. Sahara would be all over her, and she assumed Omar would be as well. She glanced at him, and saw that he was, yes, watching her, but coolly—more like a wary evaluation than the blatant admiration she had expected. Always wearing a mask. She looked back at the woman, trying to be casual about it, and studied her more closely; it was hard to focus on anything but h
er face, to the point that her clothes seemed to almost blend into the background. When Marisa looked at them, she saw that the stranger was dressed completely in black: black trousers, a black suit coat, even black gloves. Who wore gloves in LA in the summer? She looked efficient and professional, like maybe she was a lawyer or a business executive.
For her part, the woman didn’t bother looking at Marisa or Omar at all, but simply watched the row of office doors where Carlo Magno and Don Francisco were being questioned.
A message from Omar popped up in Marisa’s vision, and she blinked on it.
Do you know who that is?
No, she sent back. You?
No idea.
Marisa glanced at the woman again, and blinked to take a photo and send it to her friends—but then stopped, staring at the still photo, and decided to go a step further. She wasn’t using the bandwidth for anything else, so why not send a live video? She blinked again, setting her djinni to start streaming, and sent a quick message to Sahara and their friend Anja:
Fijense a esta mamita.
The first response came from Sahara: What the crap does that mean?
Just blink on the video feed.
Fine, sent Sahara. Her ID appeared in the streaming window, followed almost immediately by another message in the conversation: Hot damn, Mari, why I don’t I hang out in more police stations? She’s gorgeous.
Right?
She can’t be real.
Marisa moved her head slightly, so that the video feed could see more of the room. See? I’m in a real place. This is a real person.
Whoa, said Sahara, is that Omar?
Yeah, he’s here with his dad.
Kick him.
Come on, Sahara, his mom just died.
Did her death magically transform him into a decent human being again?
Anja joined the conversation with a string of incomprehensible German: Ich beschlagnahme Eichhörnchen!
What on earth? asked Marisa.
I’m sorry, sent Anja, I thought we were playing “Random phrases in languages our friends don’t speak.”
Ay, que feas, sent Marisa. You live in LA and you still don’t speak Spanish? Or at least have autotranslators set up on your djinnis? How do you even survive?
And you don’t have one set up for German, either, sent Anja, or you would know that I confiscate squirrels.
I don’t think Anja’s making sense in any language right now, sent Sahara.
Blerg, sent Marisa. Blink the link, huera.
Anja’s ID appeared in the streaming window. Whoa, she said. Check out the hot chick.
That’s exactly what I said, sent Marisa. Any idea who she is?
A model? asked Sahara. An actress?
Maybe she’s a lawyer, sent Anja.
She’s not Don Francisco’s lawyer, sent Marisa. Omar doesn’t know her, either.
You asked Omar before us? sent Anja.
Show her, sent Sahara.
Marisa moved her head again, looking at Omar.
Tier, sent Anja. Kick him.
Marisa rolled her eyes. I can’t kick him in the police station.
Too bad, sent Sahara. The police station is one of his more sensitive areas.
Hang on, sent Marisa, and shot her glance over at one of the office doors. The lock clicked, and the knob was turning. When the door opened, Carlo Magno stepped out, looking even more furious than when he’d gone in. Detective Hendel stepped out after him, wearing a shirt and tie, a long skirt, and a headscarf. Muslim? Marisa shook her head. Based on the name, she guessed the detective was Orthodox Jewish.
“Thank you again for your time, Mr. Carneseca.” She offered Carlo Magno her hand, and he shook it grudgingly. “Would you like to wait here while I talk to your daughter?”
“Absolutely not!” Carlo Magno roared. “I’ve already told you everything—she doesn’t know any more than that, so I’m taking her home!”
“Mr. Carneseca,” said the detective, but before their argument could go any further, the woman in black stepped in between them, smoothly cutting off Carlo Magno and clasping the detective’s hand in a firm handshake.
“Good evening, Detective Hendel, I’m Ramira Bennett. We spoke earlier on the phone?”
“Yes, Ms. Bennett, if you’ll please have a seat I can—”
“I’m afraid my employers are on a very tight schedule,” said Bennett. She didn’t let go of the detective’s hand, and was somehow smoothly maneuvering Hendel back into her office. “My questions will only take a short time, and then you can return to your interviews.”
She’s here to ask the detective questions? sent Sahara. Now I really want to know who this is.
“Yes,” said Carlo Magno, “talk to her. I’m taking my daughter and we’re leaving.”
“No,” said Detective Hendel, and in the same instant Marisa said: “Papi! Stop making a scene!”
“I’m not making a scene!”
He’s definitely making a scene, sent Anja.
“Sir,” said Ramira Bennett, and turned the full strength of her attention on Carlo Magno—though still, Marisa noticed, keeping herself firmly between the detective and the rest of the hallway. “If you and your daughter will wait here for just a moment, I’ll see what I can work out to help you.”
Carlo Magno stuttered, shocked by either her offer of help or her blinding facial symmetry, and before he could summon a proper response, the woman had maneuvered Hendel into the office and closed the door behind them.
THREE
Omar whistled. “She’s good.”
“Cállate,” said Carlo Magno, pointing at him fiercely and then walking toward Marisa. The medical nuli followed close behind. “Vámonos.”
“We’re staying,” said Marisa.
“We’re not.”
“This is important.”
“Education is important,” said Carlo Magno. “Family. My mother’s recipe for adobada. This is just spectacle—this is nothing.”
Your dad is so weird, sent Sahara.
Shut up, sent Marisa, and then pulled on her father’s arm as he tried to walk away. “Papi, sit down.”
“I don’t want you to talk to her.”
Marisa held her ground. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“Nothing is going on. This is over.”
Look at Omar, sent Anja. I want to see his reaction to all of this.
“Shut up!” said Marisa, and then she realized with a jolt of terror that she’d said it out loud. “Sorry!” Her eyes went wide. “I’m so sorry, that was meant for Anja, not you.”
Carlo Magno threw his hands in the air. “You’re texting your friends now? You can’t even take this seriously.”
“Why does talking to my friends about it mean I’m not taking it seriously?”
“Because I’ve met your friends,” said Carlo Magno.
Burn, sent Anja.
Marisa blinked on the conversation, closing it and turning off notifications. “Don’t change the subject. This isn’t about my friends, this is about you—I’m talking to them because you won’t say two words in a row to me unless one of them is no!”
“That’s not true.”
“Not is a derivative of no.”
“That’s not the point!”
“There it is again!”
“No it—” He clenched his fist in frustration. “Mari. You need to—” He stopped again, glancing at Omar, and then lowered his voice and looked back at Marisa. “You need to understand. What I’m about to ask you will be hard for you, but I need you to do it.”
Marisa frowned, caught up in his suddenly serious tone, and matched his solemn whisper. “What?”
“I need you to believe me.”
Marisa sighed and rolled her eyes. “Santa vaca.”
“I’m not joking,” he said. “I need you to listen to what I’m saying and recognize for once in your life that maybe a forty-four-year-old father knows more about something than a seventeen-year-old child. That maybe sometimes when I
tell you to do something it’s because I understand the ramifications and surrounding circumstances better than the girl I have dedicated my life to raising and protecting.”
“We’re in a police station,” said Marisa. “I think I’m protected.”
“From violence, yes,” said Carlo Magno. “Sometimes that doesn’t hurt as much as the truth does.”
“The truth will set you free,” said Marisa. “They tell us every frakking week in church.”
“You’re already free,” said Carlo Magno. He glanced at Omar again, then back at Marisa, and his voice softened even more—not just quiet but earnest. Pleading. “Dredging up the past is like picking at a scab. It feels good while you do it, because you think you like the pain, but then it bleeds, and it aches, and even if you’re lucky it leaves a scar you can never get rid of. And if you’re not lucky it just never heals at all, and you bleed and ache forever. I don’t want you to have to live with that.”
Marisa was touched by the change in tone, but the words just made her furious, and the discrepancy between those two feelings left her feeling unbalanced and upset. “Papi—”
“The past is in the past,” he said.
The door to the office flew open, and Ramira Bennett stalked out of it, calm and imperious.
“This is an outrage,” said Detective Hendel.
Bennett didn’t even look at her, and focused her attention instead on some kind of tablet screen in her hand. “Feel free to take that up with your local government representative,” she said. She tapped the screen a few times and then slid it into the breast pocket inside of her suit. “It’s the law, and you will comply with it.”
“You’re a real piece of work,” said Hendel.
Bennett turned and looked at her, saying nothing.
Marisa was desperate to know what they were talking about, and had to restrain herself from blurting something out. She gripped her father’s arm tightly for support.
Hendel fumed, grinding her teeth, then looked at the desk officer and shouted in a clipped, angry voice, “Lopez! Give Ms. Bennett the evidence we recovered for case number 957.”
The desk officer blinked, scrolling through some list of case files on his djinni, and then blinked again in surprise. “The . . . The hand, ma’am?”
