Right. For Mrs. Branford, no often meant yes. “But how did you know I was here—”
“Miguel,” they said in unison.
Of course. He’d raised the alarm, calling on two people he knew would drop everything in a heartbeat to be my backup. My face must have revealed my uncertainty at exactly what they could do to help me, though.
Mrs. Branford sighed patiently, as if she was being tolerant of my thickheadedness. “Olaya speaks Spanish, and I had Sylvia Cabrera, née Garcia, in my class—”
My mouth gaped open. “You did—?” I stopped and closed my mouth. Of course she did.
“A million years ago,” Olaya said.
Mrs. Branford smiled with satisfaction. She loved the fact that she knew practically everyone in Santa Sofia from her decades of teaching. “She was a smart girl with a bright future.”
I hoped Mrs. Branford’s assessment was correct and that Sylvia Garcia had gone on to do great things.
The three of us walked up the to the small but tidy home.
The front door was open, covered only by a screen door. The sun was setting behind us as I knocked on the screen door’s frame and called, “Hallo?”
A man appeared. He was short and stocky with what was once dark hair, now graying, and five o’clock white stubble on his face. “Yes?”
“Hi. My name is Ivy.” I gestured to my companions. “This is Penelope Branford and Olaya Solis—”
His mouth opened and he stared at Olaya. “Olaya? De la panadería Yeast of Eden, verdad?”
I understood enough to know he’d asked if she was from the bread shop.
“Sí,” she said with a smile, and then she spoke to him in Spanish. She ended by saying Sylvia Cabrera’s name, so I knew she’d asked him if he knew her, or maybe if she was home.
“No está aquí,” he said. My rudimentary Spanish kicked in and my hope faded. She wasn’t here.
“Dónde está ella?” Olaya asked.
Yes, where was she? At the market? At work? Would she be back soon?
“En Colombia,” the man said. I didn’t have to know any Spanish to understand that Sylvia was, apparently, out of the country.
“Colombia?” I asked, trying hard to keep the shrillness from my voice. “Why is she in Colombia?”
The man looked at me with a grimace. He spoke in halting English. “She was deported.”
Oh no.
Mrs. Branford had been silent, but now she muttered something harsh under her breath and stomped her cane against the wooden floor of the porch. “She cannot have been deported.”
But the man nodded. “It is true.”
“But Sylvia grew up here. I remember her. I remember her saying she’d been in Santa Sofia her whole life. How could she be sent away?”
No one had an answer for her.
“What happened?” I asked.
He understood what I’d asked, because he responded in Spanish to Olaya. She translated a moment later. “He says it was a surprise raid. ICE came and rounded people up. Sylvia had gotten caught in the middle.”
“She should not have been there,” he said in heavily accented English. “It should have been me.” His chin quivered with emotion. He said something else in Spanish, which Olaya translated. “She came here as a baby, but I come here later. I did not go to school here. It should have been me.”
“When did it happen?” I asked him.
Olaya repeated the question in Spanish and he answered in English. “February 23.”
I looked at Mrs. Branford. She looked at Olaya. Olaya looked at me. They hadn’t heard about the raid, but I had. Thanks to @MarisasMama.
Suddenly my hopes of getting inside information about the Renchriks’ business were dashed. With Sylvia Cabrera gone, it was a dead end. More than anything, though, I felt for Sylvia. She’d been ripped from her home and sent to a country she didn’t know. It was unfathomable.
Olaya gave a heavy sigh. “Y tú?” she asked. “Quién eres tú?”
Good question. Who was this man?
He pointed to his chest. “Yo? Me llamo Roberto Garcia.”
I touched Olaya’s hand. “Ask him if he’s related to Sylvia—”
“I am her brother,” he said slowly. “Quién eres tú?”
At this Olaya looked at me. “He wants to know who we are.”
“Sylvia’s name came up in connection with a woman named Nessa Renchrik,” I said.
Olaya translated and he nodded.
“Did she work for her?”
He didn’t wait for the translation before nodding.
“For Seaside Property Management?” I clarified.
“Sí.”
“Did anything happen between the Renchriks and Sylvia?” I asked.
Olaya translated. Mr. Garcia shrugged. “No se,” he said. “I do not know.”
“Gracias por tu ayuda,” Olaya said after another few minutes. There didn’t seem to be anything more Mr. Garcia could offer.
“Yes, thank you,” I echoed.
As the three of us turned to leave, his voice stopped us. “Necesitas hablar con el esposo de Sylvia?”
We all turned back around. “What did he say?” I asked Olaya.
“He wants to know if we want to talk to Sylvia’s husband.”
My jaw dropped open. Sylvia had a husband! “Yes, please,” I said at the same time Olaya replied, “Sí. Por favor.”
I drew in a breath. Maybe all hope wasn’t lost.
Mr. Garcia called back into the house. “Guillermo, ven aquí.”
A few seconds later, a man came up next to Mr. Garcia. Even through the screen door, I could see how handsome he was. He wore dark khakis, a white button-down shirt, open at the collar, and was a few inches taller than his brother-in-law. The older man said something to Olaya, who translated for us. “This is Guillermo Cabrera,” she said. “Sylvia’s husband.”
Guillermo shot Mr. Garcia a look, but I couldn’t decipher its meaning. He said something to Roberto in Spanish. Mr. Garcia pushed the door open and he and Guillermo stepped out onto the porch. “Hello,” he said.
“It’s so nice to meet you,” I said, one hundred percent sincere.
Guillermo’s piercing brown eyes were the first things I noticed. He looked at us with an intensity that made my skin prickle. “Can I help you?” he asked. His English was perfect. Unlike Mr. Garcia, if I had to guess, I’d say he was born and raised here.
“We were looking for Sylvia,” I said. I left it open-ended, hoping he’d pick up some thread of a narrative, but all he did was nod. “Is she doing okay?” I asked, because deportation had to be so hard on so many different levels.
“Depends what you mean by ‘okay.’ ” Now he sounded angry. With good reason, I thought. His wife had been ripped from her home. From him. We waited in silence for him to continue. “She’s been in the U.S. since she was a baby. Now she’s in a country she doesn’t even know. Before the raid, she had never even been to Colombia. Now she’s stuck there. She’s alone.”
His jawline tightened and his chin quivered, but he controlled the emotions bubbling inside him.
Saying I was sorry didn’t even begin to cut it. I said it anyway. “I’m so sorry.”
Mrs. Branford leaned heavily on her cane.
Mr. Garcia took the cue. He blustered as he held the screen door open. “Lo siento. Con permiso. Come in. Come in.”
As we followed him in, Mrs. Branford threw a glance my way. Pure calculation. I stifled a smile.
The door opened straight into the living area. A nubby cream-colored couch made with heavy fabric and with wooden legs and trim on the arms and a black faux leather recliner angled to face a small television. A stack of mail sat on one end of an oval wood coffee table, a plate with half a sandwich and chips, as well as an open can of beer on the opposite end. We’d interrupted Mr. Garcia’s dinner.
Guillermo led Mrs. Branford to the recliner. She perched on the edge, holding tight to her cane braced in front of her. She looked up at him. �
�I taught your wife, you know. English at Santa Sofia High School.”
Guillermo’s thick black eyebrows rose. “Wait. You’re Mrs. Brandon. No, Bradshaw.” He shook his head. “No, that’s not right.”
“Penelope Branford,” she said.
He snapped his fingers. “Right! That’s right. You taught her about Gabriel García Márquez, no?”
Mrs. Branford nodded sagely. She took her literature very seriously. “Oh yes. I remember it well. Sylvia—your wife—wanted to connect more with her Colombian heritage because she’d never been there. One Hundred Years of Solitude. Sylvia adored him.”
Guillermo pointed to a small upright bookshelf. Along with a few family photographs, a cross, and a few other knickknacks, the shelves held an array of books. Even from where I stood, I could see a collection grouped together of Márquez’s work.
When I looked back, Mrs. Branford’s eyes had turned glassy. “Thank you for sharing that, Guillermo. For a teacher, there is nothing more powerful than knowing you have had a significant impact on a person’s life. To bring literature to someone . . .” She sighed. “My heart is happy about that for Sylvia, at least.”
“We won’t take more of your time, Guillermo. I was just hoping to talk to your wife about the Renchriks,” I said.
He blinked, a slight pause before he responded. “What about them?”
“She worked for them?”
He nodded but grimaced. “We both did. I still do.”
My spine cracked. “You do?”
“I manage the maintenance crew for Seaside Properties.”
“The yard maintenance?” I asked.
“That. Food services. Transportation. All of it.”
“And your wife?” Olaya asked.
“We met there. She was in Housekeeping. Then she became Nessa’s personal assistant.”
Mr. Garcia muttered something under his breath in Spanish.
“He says they ran her ragged,” Olaya translated for us.
Guillermo nodded. “It’s true. Just like in the movies. They had her running errands. Taking the dry cleaning. Picking up fruit from the farms for their special guests. Picking up and delivering fancy coffee. It was a tough job. A thankless job. But it was a job.”
“How long have you been married?” I asked.
Guillermo’s gaze dropped to the ground. “My brother-in-law likes to say me and Sylvia were married, but we weren’t in the eyes of the law. We married each other on the beach. She is my wife.”
“But not with a license,” I said, filling in the blanks. They had had their own ceremony, but it wasn’t recognized.
“Right. We met ten years ago and fell in love, but she—” The tension returned to his face. “I don’t know what we could have done differently. She was . . . a victim of her circumstances.”
What an incredibly sad story. They’d found love with each other late, but they’d found it. And then it had been taken from them.
“You’re a citizen, then,” Mrs. Branford said.
Guillermo dipped his head in acknowledgment. “Born and raised in Los Angeles.”
“If you were engaged to Sylvia,” I started, but Guillermo seemed to know where I was going with my question and he shook his head. “She was undocumented—”
“As a baby,” Mrs. Branford said.
“You know her story,” Guillermo said, “but it doesn’t matter. She came unlawfully. That’s what the lawyer said. We are trying for a provisional waiver. And we are praying.”
“Mr. Renchrik didn’t care that she was undocumented?”
Guillermo shrugged. “Most of his people are undocumented. Cheap labor.”
An idea came to mind. Nessa Renchrik had a dream of running for state senate. She’d met with a potential donor. Could the fact that her family paid workers under the table have come to the surface? Surely that would ruin her chance of running. Could Nessa and the donor have argued about it? Could the donor have killed Nessa and could the whole thing stem from the undocumented workers the Renchriks employed?
It was possible. I needed to find out who Nessa had met with the day she died.
A little girl appeared behind Guillermo. He reached behind him and cupped his hand around her shoulder. She looked to be about eight, or so. Giant brown eyes. Soft brown hair. Sylvia’s child. Another child without a mother.
We left with that sobering fact hanging in the air. Guillermo probably felt guilty for not being able to protect the woman he loved. And Mr. Garcia clearly felt guilt. He’d said he’d come here later than his sister. Her whole life was here, whereas he’d had a life in Colombia. Not that that made the idea of being ripped from your home any easier. Ripped from your child.
I thought about the article @MarisasMama had sent me the link to and the ICE raid. Maybe it wasn’t Nessa who was involved. I pivoted my attention to the decidedly un-grieving widower. Cliff Renchrik. Could he have been behind the ICE raid?
I dismissed the idea as soon as it fully formed in my head. That made no sense. He employed undocumented people, so why would he do anything to send them away? All that did was deplete his workforce.
My head pounded with contradicting information. I came back around to Sylvia and Guillermo, and their little girl. I felt for this little family and the hole that was there without Sylvia.
Chapter 12
“The ICE raid was in the news,” I said to Miguel. We stood side by side in my kitchen. He used tongs to place grilled chicken on two plates, followed by a spoonful of rice, while I tossed the salad I’d made. I thought about the link @MarisasMama had sent me. “I mean it’s definitely there, but it was pretty buried.”
“Sounds like they kept it on the down low.” He carried the plates to the table.
I sliced half a loaf of a baguette I’d picked up from Yeast of Eden on my way home from my visit with Guillermo Cabrera, and brought it, and the salad, to the table. We sat down, but I wasn’t very hungry.
The article @MarisasMama sent me had been from Santa Lucia, a neighboring town. “Why wouldn’t our paper report it?” I mused, referring to the Santa Sofia Daily.
“Maybe it did, Ivy. Maybe we just missed it.”
Or maybe it was because the Daily was notoriously un-journalistic. They didn’t really investigate things; they just reported feel-good pieces that supported the community. There was a place for that, but not at the expense of the actual truth.
Miguel had a forkful of chicken and rice halfway to his mouth when I asked, “How about a scandal at Chavez Elementary School a few years ago? Does that ring a bell?”
He stopped, grains of rice falling back onto his plate. “Oh yeah. That was crazy.”
I tore off a piece of bread and dipped it in a dish of olive oil. God, it was good. A baguette didn’t have a lot of ingredients, but getting the bread right so that it was soft and luscious on the inside and crunchy on the outside could be tricky. Olaya did it perfectly every time. “Tell me,” I said.
“There was a new teacher. Young. Latina. Freshly minted teaching credential. Her first year, I think. It didn’t come out till the spring of that school year, but she’d been bullied for more than half the school year.”
How horrible. “Students bullied the teacher?”
He popped a chunk of bread in his mouth. “No, that’s not what happened. She wasn’t bullied by students. It was teachers.”
I almost poked a finger in my ear. Had I heard him right? “Wait. What?”
“Some of the teachers at the school bullied this new teacher. I don’t remember what they did, exactly, but I remember it was pretty bad.”
“So not the students.”
He shook his head as he tore off another hunk of bread. “Nope. Other teachers.”
I couldn’t even imagine. What if something like that had happened to my mother when she’d taught at Santa Sofia High School? Or to Mrs. Branford. I shook away the very idea. No one would mess with Penelope Branford. “So what happened?”
“It was a few years ago. I think
the teachers lost their jobs—”
I couldn’t stomach any more food, but I sipped the Sangiovese red Miguel had poured. “I would hope so.”
“What would that have to do with Sylvia Cabrera or Nessa Renchrik?”
Being a person of interest in a murder hadn’t diminished Miguel’s appetite. He shrugged as he finished up his meal. “Maybe nothing.”
But it wasn’t nothing. Katherine Candelli and Margaret Jenkins-Roe had talked about it. It had to mean something.
Miguel and I finished our dinner, then went for a walk on the beach. A little salt air to clear the mind. At least that’s what I’d hoped for, but my mind was beyond clearing. I kept coming back to the bullied elementary school teacher. Could Sylvia Cabrera and Nessa Renchrik have been involved in some way? And how had Sylvia ended up working for the Renchriks?
Something about the situation and the lack of information about the scandal felt very fishy. I wanted to know more.
* * *
Like all schools these days, the entrance to Chavez Elementary was firmly locked and armed with a buzzer. No one was getting in without being explicitly buzzed in. I pressed my finger against the button, and a moment later the door clicked and I was able to pull it open and enter the vestibule. Glass doors straight ahead led to the interior of the school, but they also were locked. From where I stood, I could see through the glass doors into the school. The walls were covered with student work, and cool bulletin boards celebrating learning.
To the left was the front office. A posted sign read: All visitors must check in at the front office.
I entered, my eyes instantly drawn to the patchwork quilt hanging on one wall. Each block represented a character trait like thoughtfulness, honesty, and honor. At first glance, this was not a place I would have associated with adult bullies masquerading as teachers.
The woman sitting at the front desk looked at me. She had beautiful black skin, long braids with a few pulled back and clasped behind her head, and large hoop earrings. She wore a wraparound cobalt-blue dress that, even from her seated position behind the counter, accentuated her curves. She was the perfect face for the school with her warm smile that extended up to her eyes. The placard on her desk said: Miss Jackson.
Death Gone A-Rye Page 11