Compromised (17 page)

“Apple from the tree,” Ma cracked.

“Touché. So I’m starting to feel pretty confident that Yana’s case and the Ramirez homicide are unrelated. Is it possible the shooter was the same person who committed the three rape-murders? Sure, but I don’t see it. The rapist has such a specific MO . . . I don’t see him taking a shot at me because I was getting too close to him, because truthfully . . . I wasn’t. The case was pretty fresh when the shooting took place.”

“Your gut reactions are usually pretty accurate. Are you going to give up on the Ramirez homicide to concentrate on the sniper?”

“Somewhat. Gus is on the Ramirez task force anyway. He’ll share anything he thinks I need to know.”

“So what now?”

“I asked Harry to check in on a suspect, the brother of someone particularly grisly that Yana and I put away for life. I called him twice already, but he hasn’t answered. I’ll give him until the end of the day and if I haven’t heard back by then, I’ll ask Gus to help me out with it.”

She patted me on the knee. “Good. The two of you have always made a great team, and . . .”

“And what?”

“And I’ll kill you if you go off the reservation again.” She pointed an intimidating finger at my nose. “We good?”

I showed my palms. “I surrender. I know when I’ve met my match.”

The soccer match had just ended.
Rodrigo Sanchez flipped through a few channels before settling for the
Tonight Show
, dropping the remote on the couch, and walking into the kitchen for a cold beer. After grabbing a frosty bottle of Dos Equis, he closed the refrigerator door and was about to turn around when he felt electricity crackle along his spine. His body racked in spasm and his knees hit the floor.
“Ah! Mierda!”
He’d been completely startled. At a loss for what was happening, he didn’t even think to defend himself until he felt someone holding his wrists and the zip tie ratcheting tightly around them. He’d never been Tasered before but understood that it was the only logical explanation for the powerful current frying his nervous system. A black hood was pulled over his head and secured with rope. The jolting electricity finally came to an end. Just before passing out, he felt himself being hoisted off the floor—two strong hands around each of his arms.

He awoke in the dark. A light breeze on his face told him that he was outdoors. In the next instant he realized that the buzzing in his ears was the sound of cicadas chirping loudly in the trees. He opened his eyes wide and tried to push the grogginess from his head. He was bound in a chair in a rather peculiar way, fastened to it by the ankles, waist, and elbows.

Stacked in front of him were two wooden produce crates. He called out into the night, “Hola? Hello?” The ground crunched behind him. “What the hell is going on?” he asked angrily. “Who are you? When I get my hands on you, I’ll—” The sight of a Taser in front of his eyes silenced him abruptly. “What do you want from me, man?”

He heard a click and then the hiss of radio noise.

His captor spoke into the radio: “Now.” Car headlights illuminated in the distance, clearly revealing a full-size mannequin some one hundred yards away.

“What the . . . What kind of crazy shit is this?”

Without revealing himself, the captor positioned a .30 rifle with a large telescopic sight in Rodrigo’s hands. He’d been bound in such a way that he was able to aim the rifle at the mannequin by leaning forward in the chair, although no other movement was possible.

“Shoot,” he was told.

“Fuck you. You shoot. I want to know—” The Taser reappeared before his eyes and this time the current was on and spiking between the two contact electrodes. “Yeah. Hell. Sure. Why not?” He leaned forward with the rifle propped up on the top of the crate to stabilize it and enable a good shot.

Standing behind him, his captor raised binoculars to his eyes and repeated, “Shoot.”

Rodrigo pressed his eye socket against the scope, looped his finger around the trigger, and aimed.

His captor studied him briefly before looking back through the binoculars. The first shot rang out. His captor studied the target. “Again,” he said. “Try again.” A second shot was fired. “Again.” The third shot missed the target as badly as the first two. The rifle was suddenly snatched from his hands. His abductor checked the target through the scope and made slight adjustments to account for wind and elevation. “You wear glasses?”

“Glasses? No. I don’t wear no stinking glasses.”

The rifle was placed back in his hands. “Try again.”

Zing.

“One more time.”

Zing.

“Come on, cowboy. You can do it. Hit the target. Win a teddy bear for your girlfriend.”

“Cowboy, my ass,” Rodrigo grumbled. He tried again, and again. “Shit,” he swore, knowing that he had missed the target every time. He continued to fire until he heard the telltale
click
. The twenty rounds in the magazine were gone. He frowned with disappointment. Just then the Taser hit him between the shoulder blades, the current strong and continuous until he once again passed out.

“
Sore wa karede wa arimasen,”
the captor said into the radio. “It’s not him.”

“You look really uncomfortable,” Sofia said. “Do you need a pill?”

Jack Burns sat in front of the TV, watching a morning talk show and sipping from a mug of coffee. His gaze was fixed on the TV when he answered. “I took one last night and it didn’t do a damn thing.”

Sofia picked up the prescription bottle and read the label. “It has codeine in it, papi. It should give you some relief.”

He redirected his gaze and extended his hand to examine the bandaged portion of his arm. “Yeah. Okay. I’m so tired . . . at the very least it might help me to fall asleep.”

She opened the vial and shook a pill into his hand. “Is one enough?”

“Yeah. I think so. Anyway I’ve got a job to do this afternoon so I can’t nap too long. You know what they say about medication and working with tools.”

She waited for him to swallow the pill and then sat down on his lap. “I hate seeing you in such a bad way, papi.” She stroked his cheek. “Is there anything I can do to cheer you up?” she asked in a seductive voice.

He turned his eyes back toward the TV. “I’m trying to watch the program, Sofia.”

“I can think of something that’s a lot more fun.” She waited for a reaction and grew visibly upset when he didn’t respond. “You know I’m hurting too, baby, and it’s been so long since . . .” She kissed him softly on the neck. “I need you, baby. I need you right now. Come back to bed, Jack. Come on.”

“I’m in a lot of pain, Sofia.”

She kissed him again and again, her lips warm and moist as she worked her way along his neck toward his mouth. “I’ll make you forget about everything, papi. You know I can.” She ran her fingers through his hair, then reached for the remote to shut it off.

He moved it beyond her reach. “I said that I’m trying to watch the program.”

She sprung off his lap, her eyes blazing with fury. “Fine. Watch the stupid show. What’s wrong with you, anyway?”

“How can you ask me that?” he snapped.

“Serafina was
my
little girl, Jack. Mine! I know how much you loved her because you adopted her, but I’m the one who gave birth to her. You don’t think it’s killing me that she’s gone? Do you have any idea what it’s like for a mother to see her baby’s life taken away? I feel like my soul has been torn out, and when I come to my husband for a little badly needed affection . . .
Ah
,” she swore in disgust. “I don’t know, Jack, you’re not even close to being the man I married. I need someone to hold me. I need someone to love me. You’re all I have in this world, Jack. What’s happened to you?”

“I need more time, Sofia. We’re way behind on the bills and after last night . . .” He shrugged. “I’m just not in the mood. I’m under a lot of pressure right now. Don’t you get it?”

“You’re never in the mood anymore, and that story you told me—I mean,
come on
, I didn’t believe it for a second. No one tried to rip off your toolbox. What really happened?”

He responded indignantly, “I told you what happened.”

“The kids in this neighborhood aren’t interested in your tools, Jack. You think they wanted to build a tree house or some shit and were looking for a hammer and nails? The kids who roam the streets around here are only interested in drugs and money.”

“I don’t know
what
they wanted. Maybe they thought there was money in the toolbox.”

“Sure, because that’s what every handyman carries in his toolbox: wrenches, screwdrivers, and a wad of twenty-dollar bills. Give me a little credit. Do you think I’m stupid or something?”

He stood and clicked off the TV. “Damn it. I don’t even want to watch this anymore.” Glaring at her, he said, “I told you what happened. You don’t want to believe me, then don’t believe me. A man can only be pushed so far, you know.”

A tear rolled down her cheek. “What’s happening to us, Jack? I feel like we’re falling apart. This tragedy should be pulling us closer together, but instead I feel like it’s just driving us farther apart, and I don’t understand why. I feel like you don’t love me anymore,” she said, her anger growing hotter. “I feel like you blame me for what happened because I let Serafina walk to her friend’s house by herself. I think you’re looking at me with the same kind of anger you have against the kids who let you walk home by yourself the night you were attacked. It’s not fair, Jack. It’s not fair.” She burst into tears. “Don’t you think I blame myself for what happened to my little girl?”

“Damn it, Sofia, we just need more time. Look at all we’ve been through.”

She looked into his eyes and saw that he was emotionally unavailable. His words were empty, nothing more than a means to quell their argument. Something was wrong with her husband, something far beyond the scars of the assault he had carried with him since his youth. “Whatever you say, Jack.” She wiped her tears, picked up her bag, and slung it over her shoulder. “I’m going out.”

Burns stood by the open door after Sofia had stormed out, deciding whether or not to go after her.
He was in slippers and a robe, but after a moment’s thought, he raced down the hallway to find that she had already vanished. He took the elevator down to the lobby, but Sofia had already gone out the front door and had disappeared. He shielded his eyes with his hand to look eastward into the glare of the rising sun, then turned in the other direction but still didn’t see her. “Shit!”
How could she have disappeared so quickly?

He tightened the cinch on his robe and sat down on the stone front steps. They were cold, and the chill quickly permeated his robe.

“Jack-O!”

He jumped when the name hit his ears. He hadn’t been called Jack-O in decades, and the childhood nickname felt more like an insult now. His left eye began to twitch even before Reggie came into view. Burns eyed his old friend apprehensively as he crossed the street and made his way over to him. Reggie had only been back in the neighborhood a short time, and Burns was still unsure of how much he wanted to have to do with him.

Burns had been socially awkward for decades, and the argument with Sofia had left him feeling nervous and uneasy. “Reggie,” he began in a cautious tone, “what are you doing here?”

“W-what kind of a greeting is that?”

Jack looked down at the ground. “Sorry.”

“It’s not like w-we haven’t known each other s-since we were kids.”

“You’ve only been back in the neighborhood a little while. I guess I’m still not used to you being around again.”

“W-what’s to get used to? We grew up together.”

Burns eyed him suspiciously. “Did we?”

“W-what the hell is that supposed to mean, Jack?”

“I mean, yeah, we hung out, but I was always the kid from the other side of the tracks, right? The kid who had to walk around with a baseball bat for protection.”

“Gee, Reggie, is that the way you remember it?”

“I’ll tell you what I remember. I remember no one wanting to walk me home the night those two predators beat my ass and threw me in their van. I remember Frank coming to visit me by himself after I got out of the hospital. You and Bobby Cohen dropped me like a bad habit.” He met Reggie’s gaze head-on. “That’s how I remember it. You see things differently?”

“Shit, Jack, I’m just t-trying to be a friend and throw you a little w-work.” He reached into his back pocket and handed him an envelope. “This is for the job you did the other day.”

Burns reached out to accept the envelope, revealing his heavily bandaged forearm.

Reggie’s eyes widened. “Jack, what the hell happened to your arm?”

“Occupational hazard. It’ll be all right.”

“Jesus, they bandaged you up like a friggin’ mummy. You get stitches?”

“Some.”

Reggie averted his eyes and remained silent while an uncomfortable moment passed. “Look, did-did I do some stupid things when I was a kid? Do I feel bad that I wasn’t around when you needed friends? Yeah, of course, but-but you were acting really weird, Jack, and . . . What can I say? I was a k-kid. I didn’t know how to deal with it. People were saying all kinds of crazy s-shit about you, that you were raped, and the attack left you m-mentally retarded, and . . .”

“Hell of a time to abandon a friend.”

“Hey, I had problems of my own. I was this dumb stuttering kid everyone used to p-pick on . . . including you. You were the one that caused all the trouble that night. That’s the reason no one wanted to walk you home. You d-don’t want to accept the truth, J-Jack. You’re the one responsible for what happened that night. You want to blame me? Fine, but I was in no position to stand up for anyone. If it wasn’t for F-Frank Chalice, I would’ve gotten my ass w-whooped seven days a week. It wasn’t exactly a great time for me either.”

Jack lowered his head. “You hardly stutter anymore and I’m still a broken misfit everyone looks at and asks, ‘What the hell happened to him?’”

“I’m trying to be a f-friend and you just want to be b-bitter. I’m gonna go now, and I guess I won’t be calling you the next time I need a repair done.”