Darkness & Shadows (33 page)

“We’ve got nothing else.”

The doors were unlocked. There was no sign of anyone inside. Cautiously, they moved along the white-tiled floors. Tristan nodded at the
OFICINA
sign, with an arrow pointing to a door.

Inside, a man sat behind a desk, staring at his computer screen. He looked up as they entered. In near-perfect English and with a smile, he said, “Can I help you?”

“We’re trying to locate a woman who worked here,” Patrick said. “We think she was on the cleaning staff.”

“And the reason,
señor
?”

“I’m a reporter from the US, on assignment here.”

Tristan gave him a subtle sideways glance. Patrick’s return glance told her to zip it.

The man smiled politely. “A story about a cleaning woman?”

“Well, no, not exactly. I’m reporting on the body found up on the hillside,” he said, pointing in that direction but keeping his eyes focused on the man. “I’m told a woman on your cleaning staff might have seen something.”

“Do you know her name?”

“That’s the problem. We actually don’t.”

“Then I’m not sure I can help you.”

“Do you have many women on staff here?” Tristan asked.

“We have none.”

They both shook their heads.

“We use a service.” He smiled some more. “They come every week.”

“I see,” Patrick said, nodding, thinking. “May I have the name of the service?”

The man reached for his reading glasses, put them on, and thumbed through an old Rolodex jammed with cards. He pulled one out, held it up, eyeing it.
“Limpio y Brilliant.”

Patrick took out his notebook. “Address and phone number?”

“At least it’s something,” Tristan offered as they left the church. “Just hope it’s not a wild goose chase.”

“We have to rule it out, anyway,” Patrick said.

Going to downtown TJ meant heavy traffic. By the time they made their way to the address, the clock had wound well into the afternoon hours, and both Patrick and Tristan were hungry; they put it aside, motivated more by their need for information than their need for nourishment. Time was a luxury they couldn’t afford.

They walked into a small office with a half-dozen workers at desks, most talking on the phone. One was an attractive woman, thick raven hair past her shoulders, heavy makeup. Nice business suit. A plaque on her desk said her name was Guadeloupe
Martinez,
Presidente y Director General
. She flashed Patrick a generous smile. Patrick gave her one back.

Tristan elbowed him and said, “Go get her, hot stuff.”

He shot Tristan a look. It wasn’t nice.

Martinez stood and came toward Patrick, her smile spreading wider with each step. “Can I help you?” she said, her accent thick, eyes bright.

Tristan turned her head to roll her eyes, then turned back and gave the woman a polite, just-a-sidekick-don’t-mind-me smile as Patrick explained what they were looking for.

Guadeloupe frowned. Patrick frowned, too, although he wasn’t sure why. Tristan did the eye roll again.

“Is there a problem?” Patrick asked.

Guadeloupe tossed her hair over her shoulders sending a perfumed gale sailing right at Tristan and Patrick. Tristan coughed her annoyance. Patrick’s elbow jabbed her with the same sentiment.

Guadeloupe said, “Most of our crew are day workers. They come and go so fast. I don’t know how to find them.”

“Don’t you keep records?” Patrick asked. “I mean, how do you pay them?”

She frowned again. “We pay most of them cash after we know the work is done.”

“Is there anyone here who might be able to help us?” Patrick said, glancing around the room. “Please, I would be most grateful for your help. It’s very important.” He threw in his best smile for good measure.

It must have worked: she flashed the whites, and her eyes fluttered. She said, “
Un momento
. Let me see.” She turned and yelled to a guy in the back, “
¡Jorge!
”

Jorge was on the phone but put his hand over the receiver as Guadeloupe strode to his desk. She leaned over. Now Jorge was smiling.

Patrick watched with interest.

“Don’t let your eyes fall out of your head,” Tristan said.

Patrick gave her the elbow again.

Guadeloupe returned with a slip of paper. “All he knows is that her first name is Maria, and he thinks she lives here. I had him write down what she looks like.” She smiled and blinked.

Patrick looked at the paper: a location. A brief description. And underneath, a phone number with Guadeloupe’s name.

“Please let me know if there’s any other way I can help.” She smiled and blinked, and smiled and blinked. The last one might have been a wink.

“Going to give her a call?” Tristan said cheerfully once they were in the car.

“Shut up.”

“I’m not sayin’. I’m just sayin’.” Her grin was loaded with sarcasm. “Work it if you got it, baby.”

“Shut up,” he said again.

Once they were on the freeway, he said, “What do you think about getting something to eat? It’s been at least twelve…” He stopped when he noticed Tristan peering intently into the side-view mirror. “Oh, no. Don’t tell me.”

“I’m not sure,” she said, still looking.

“Which car?”

“Three back, the blue one. I’ve been watching it since we got on the freeway. Been keeping its distance but staying on us.”

Patrick glanced into his mirror. He spotted the car and felt his nerves clatter.

“Get in the lane next to his and slow way down. See if he tries to stay back.”

Patrick slowed, and so did the blue car. People were now honking at them, annoyed at the holdup in traffic. Patrick said, “I think we have our answer,” and sped up again.

“Yep.”

“What do I do now?”

“Same routine as last time.”

“But the traffic’s a lot thicker here. Don’t know if I can swing it.”

“It’s moving faster up ahead.” She pointed out the window. “Take the first exit you can.”

About half a mile ahead, he got into position, did his thing. Lost the car. When they reached the top of the off-ramp, he looked at Tristan.

“This game just got a lot more dangerous,” she said.

C
hapter
F
ifty
-N
ine

C
HAPTER
F
IFTY
-N
INE

They decided to nix lunch. Suddenly, staying alive seemed much more important.

“If someone is following now,” Tristan said, “chances are good they’ve been following us all along.”

“And if that’s true,” he added, “it means they also know where we’re staying.”

Tristan didn’t respond, but Patrick could tell she was already thinking things through.

“So what now?” he nudged.

“We don’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of getting protection from the
Federales
, and we can’t go home. No safer for us there.”

“I’m not leaving until we get what we came for, anyway.”

“Our tail can only be one of two people, the way I see it,” she said. “One of Pike’s goons, or Clark. Or maybe I’m wrong, and this is someone we don’t know about yet.”

“I like that possibility even less. Whoever it is, how’d they know we’re here?”

“I’m positive nobody trailed us into Mexico. I was watching the whole time.”

“If we’re talking about Clark, it doesn’t matter. The man has a way of striking out of nowhere when you least expect it. He’s like a snake.”

“He
is
a snake. A crazy-assed one. I’m willing to bet it was him in the car.”

Patrick sighed. He was, too. “So which road to hell should we take now?”

“I’m thinking.” She did, and then, “Let’s keep with the program, see if this Maria woman checks out. The faster we do this, the faster we can get out of sight… and find a new place to hide.”

The road to hell had just been a joke, but by the time they found it neither was laughing. This neighborhood was worse than the last: a shantytown, an epicenter of poverty that spread as far as the eyes could see—rows and rows of tiny broken boxes, each filled with tiny broken lives. Many of the dwellings leaned in every direction but up, as if the gentlest of winds could blow them over. The only paint on the walls was graffiti, and some didn’t have walls at all, just plastic tarps, torn sheets, and plywood to separate the interiors from the outside world. Electricity seemed to be a luxury. The only running water was a trail of raw sewage; the only mountain view, stacks of trash piled high in the yards, on the sidewalks, even in the roads. Much of it was burning, the smells of smoke and raw sewage mixing together, their toxic vapor dance filling the air.

Patrick’s nostrils began to burn, and his eyes were itchy and filled with tears. He watched the village children, and sadness tugged at his heart—they were running everywhere, many of them unclothed, most of them covered in filth, mangy dogs bounding in circles around them. Despite their dismal surroundings, they were still playing, still smiling and laughing. He wondered if they were even aware that a better world lay just a few
miles north. A world where clothing and shelter were a normal way of life, taken for granted.

He couldn’t bear to look any longer. He turned his head away.

They got out of the car, and Patrick heard a groan. When he found the source, he couldn’t believe it: a woman sat on the ground, leaning against a beat-up, overflowing trash can. Strung out, eyes closed, head nodding up and down. A pipe hanging loosely in one hand.

Her boy—maybe five years old, if that—sat by her side, looking lost and alone. Might as well have been. Then, to Patrick’s horror, the boy snuck the pipe from his mother’s loose hand and took a hit, inhaling deep. He caught Patrick’s gaze, smoke streaming from his nostrils, his innocent child-like smile clashing oddly with the moment; for him, this was normal. For him, this was life.

Patrick looked at Tristan. She was watching, too, her disgust palpable. She shook her head and said, “This place is hell.”

“Let’s get it over with,” he said.

They started canvassing the neighborhood, searching for Maria, but the more they did, the more they realized they were getting nowhere fast.

“The name Maria’s about as common here as chile relleno,” Tristan said.

“I know.” Patrick put his hands on his hips, scanning the mess surrounding them. “And by the looks we’re getting from everyone, it’s pretty clear we don’t belong here. We need to get through this as fast as possible.”

“Problem is, your girlfriend’s description wasn’t much help. Long dark hair, dark eyes, and in her thirties? That’s half the women here.”

“She’s not my girlfriend.”

“This is a bust,” Tristan said. “We’re just spinning our wheels.”

“In a puddle of sludge,” Patrick added. He was hungry, tired, and they had absolutely nothing to show for their efforts. They’d just hit a wall. Hard.

Tristan said, “We don’t even know for sure if this Maria actually exists. The kid could have been giving us the shaft.”

She wasn’t stretching the truth at all, and he knew it, which drove his frustration even higher. “She’s all we have. There
is
nothing else. We can’t give up, not yet.”

Tristan threw her hands up. “I’m open to suggestions…” She spotted a female walking past who matched the description, and out of pure desperation, shouted, “Hey! Maria!”