Land of Careful Shadows

by Suzanne Chazin

  Overhead, Vega could hear a rumble of heels on the polished floors, the over-animated chatter of overindulged women. He didn’t feel like walking the gauntlet past them with a dusty box from the basement. They’d probably assume he was here to fix the boiler.

  He dug through the box a little more until he came to a plastic bag. Inside he found a stuffed pink rabbit holding an Easter egg along with a silver-colored bracelet with three charms clipped to it: a lollipop, ballet slippers, and a teddy bear. Both were clearly presents for a child. Vega was beginning to believe Maria’s daughter was in Guatemala. He pictured a little girl in some rural backwater village waiting for word from her mother that would never come while her presents grew musty and old sitting in this rich white woman’s basement.

  There were no sales receipts, no way to know exactly when the items were purchased or how old the recipient was. Hell, with girls, you never knew. Vega remembered Joy loving her stuffed animals to death when she was three or four. But she was almost eighteen now and she still had two or three she kept on her bed. Last year, when Vega took her to a local carnival, she’d begged him to win her a stuffed bear by knocking down a stack of weighted bottles. Twenty bucks later, he’d managed to secure that five-dollar bear.

  He was about to close up the contents for the police station when something at the bottom of the box caught his eye. It was sticking out of one of the pockets of a yellow hoodie. An envelope. He teased it out of the pocket. It was addressed to Maria Elena c/o Cindy Klein, 43 Apple Ridge Dr., Lake Holy, NY, USA.

  Vega noticed that the town was misspelled “Lake Holy,” not “Lake Holly.” The return address was from a woman in Aguas Calientes, Guatemala: Irma Alvarez-Santos. The print was uneven and each letter looked as if it had been painstakingly scrawled. The top of the envelope had been ripped open. The letter inside was just a few short lines that looked as if they’d been scribbled in a third-grader’s handwriting. Vega was not used to translating written Spanish, but if he went slowly, he could make out the meaning:

  My dear Maria,

  My heart is glad you are safe and have found a good place to work. I pray to God every night that He keeps you well and that your heart isn’t heavy with longing anymore. Here is your crucifix. May God keep you safe in His love.

  Your Mami

  Vega went through the translation in his head three times. He was sure he had the words right. Irma Alvarez-Santos had signed the letter “Mami.” She was Maria Elena’s mother. That meant, in all likelihood, some part of Maria Elena’s name, even if she was married, was Santos. They had a possible last name now. They had a cell phone number. And they had an address of the next of kin. A simple cross-check of ICE’s database might be able to fill in the blanks on her identity. At least they’d be able to contact her mother and let her know what had happened to her daughter. It was sad news and, unfortunately, Vega was the one who was going to have to deliver it. But at least the family would have some closure.

  But a question now haunted him: What longing was Maria’s mother referring to? Unless Vega had screwed up the translation, it sounded as if Maria hadn’t come to Lake Holly, as Morales had said, just because she thought it was “safe.” She’d come to ease some longing.

  For what?

  Vega was sweating by the time he lugged the box up the basement stairs, out the garage, and toward his truck on the street. There were cars parked along Cindy Klein’s driveway and a gaggle of women walking up to her front door armed with flowers and small, delicate bags of gifts that seemed like a waste of time for a woman who clearly had everything. Vega avoided making eye contact with the women and they did the same. He was invisible to them. A workman. But he could not escape the three women walking straight toward him on the driveway. Skinny jeans. Large, dark sunglasses. Long, keratin-treated hair blow-dried to perfection and the sort of understated but expensive jewelry that would rival the GDP of a developing nation.

  The woman in the middle was Wendy.

  Vega put the carton down on the driveway and wiped his hands down his dark blue trousers. Normally he tried to avoid such encounters. But not today.

  She was like the others of course. Well read. Well bred. Underfed. But there had always been something a little different about Wendy. The way her eyes crinkled with genuine warmth when she smiled. The way she pushed her lip out, little-girl-like, when something troubled her. She could freeze you out faster than a nor’easter in January. But when you were in Wendy’s good graces, there was something almost celestial about the experience. You felt lit from within, warm and glowing. You felt like a better person somehow, like she set the benchmark and all you had to do was rise to the occasion.

  She didn’t look at him that way anymore and though he accepted it, he could never say it stopped hurting.

  Wendy told the other two women she’d meet them inside and walked up to Vega, the heels of her leather boots clicking on the driveway. She lifted her sunglasses and looked him up and down. She sighed as if his plan had always been to screw up her day.

  “What are you doing here, Jimmy?”

  “My job.”

  “Moving boxes?”

  “It’s part of a police investigation.”

  “You’re investigating Cindy Klein?” She waited for more but he didn’t offer it. He wouldn’t have even if they’d still been married. It was one of the first things he’d learned as a cop, not to talk about cases in progress. So he changed the subject.

  “I thought you worked on Tuesdays,” he said.

  “Not since the school budget cuts.” Up close, she looked tired, the skin beneath her hazel eyes bruised from lack of sleep. Makeup only hid so much. “I know you’ve been calling me,” she said finally.

  “Then how about you answer for a change?”

  “Because it’s not a conversation I want to have over the phone.”

  “Hey.” He spread his hands. “I’m not on the phone.”

  Wendy made a face. “Not here. I’m late enough as it is.”

  “All right. How about in an hour or two?”

  “Benjy has a doctor’s appointment at one forty-five.”

  “How about after?”

  “Sammy has karate at three-thirty.”

  “Qué coño, Wendy?” Vega kicked the Belgian-block curb of the driveway. He couldn’t contain himself. “Joy has blown off her internship with Dr. Feldman. She’s failing school. I caught her crying in front of Kenny’s house the other night. You mean to tell me little Benjy’s fucking karate lesson is more important?”

  Wendy flared her eyes at him. “It’s Sammy—”

  “—Whatever—” He couldn’t tell the twins apart and didn’t want to.

  “—And you don’t have to curse, Jimmy. In English or Spanish. I’m not one of your foul-mouthed colleagues.”

  Vega shoved his hands in his pockets. He wasn’t just embarrassing her. He was embarrassing himself, playing to all the class distinctions he’d always railed against. “I’m just worried is all.”

  “We are addressing the situation already.”

  “We? Who’s we?”

  “Joy. Myself—Alan.”

  “Alan doesn’t get any say in this. She’s my kid.”

  “Then maybe you should get to know her better. If you did, you’d know this has nothing to do with Kenny who, by the way, she’s still seeing.”

  “Then order her to break it off. He’s a bad influence on her if they’re both failing school.”

  “Her therapist says—”

  “—Ah Christ, Wendy!” Vega kicked the curb again.

  “You sent her to a therapist?” Therapy: his ex-wife’s answer to everything, except, oddly enough, their marriage. That she just ended without consulting any touchy-feely authorities on the subject.

  “I didn’t ask you to foot the bill,” she countered.

  “You didn’t ask me anything.”

  “Joy was having nightmares. I thought it might help her. Adolescents are very egocentric at this age. The developing fr
ontal lobes of the brain aren’t mature enough to—”

  Vega cut her off. He wasn’t in the mood to hear his daughter dissected like a science project. “—She doesn’t need to talk to a therapist. She needs to talk to us. Amherst is going to take away her scholarship if she keeps this up. Hell, things get bad enough she may not even graduate high school. If this is over some boy—”

  “—I’m pretty sure it’s not.”

  “Then what is it? I’ll do anything, Wendy. Just tell me how to make her better and I’ll do it.”

  “I don’t know.” A sudden gust of wind coursed down the driveway and Wendy turned away from it. Her long, chestnut hair flew across her face and she raked it back. She folded her arms across her chest to fight off the cold but she was so narrow and her arms so long, that there just didn’t seem to be enough of her to grab on to. She looked lost and frightened and for a moment Vega had the urge to take her in his arms, brush aside that hair, and comfort her even if he had no words of comfort.

  “I have to go, Jimmy,” she said, not unkindly. “They’re waiting for me inside.”

  “Yeah. I know.”

  “Alan and I are taking the kids to dinner tomorrow night at that hibachi steak house in town. You know the one.”

  Yep, Vega knew it. It had been a five and dime when he was a boy. He checked out the restaurant menu once when he and Joy were looking for a place to eat. Their cheapest entrée was twenty-five bucks. He took Joy for pizza instead. She sulked through the entire meal, which really irked him considering how often she made Kenny’s impoverished state sound almost heroic. It was one thing to deal with your boyfriend’s economic limitations he supposed, and quite another when they were your dad’s.

  “How about I call you when dinner’s over?” Wendy suggested. “Alan can take the boys back home and you, Joy, and I can sit down somewhere for coffee.”

  “All right.” He picked up his carton and turned to leave. Then he thought of something. “Hey, Wendy? The nightmares—when did they start?”

  “I don’t remember. Maybe a month ago?”

  “Before or after the accident?”

  “After, I think. I’m not sure. She was shaken up that night and all. But I think that was more because your car got totaled. I mean, physically, she was fine.”

  “Yeah. Of course. Call me tomorrow.”

  Chapter 17

  Vega found Greco in the basement of the Lake Holly police station, down the hall from the holding cells. He was sprawled before a projection screen in a darkened room. Across the screen, two teenagers, a boy and a girl, were staggering down a dirt path in the woods at night. The girl’s shirt was unbuttoned and the white of her breasts shone like two half-moons against the darkness. The lower right-hand corner of the screen was stamped with the time, date, and for some odd reason, the moon phase. It was taken last October fifteenth.

  “Little early in the day for porn tapes, don’t you think?” Vega dropped the carton of Maria’s belongings on a table.

  Greco gave a throaty chuckle and stuck a Twizzler in his mouth. “Not this porn, believe me.”

  “Is that the reservoir?”

  “Yep. A hunter brought it in this morning. Seems he rigged up an infrared camera at the lake last October to track deer movement. He forgot all about it until yesterday. He thought we might find the footage useful.”

  “Find anything yet?”

  “Yeah.” Greco gestured to the screen. “That lake sees more action after dark than your average congressman’s bedroom. It’s a regular lovers’ lane for the Lake Holly High crowd. Tell ya one thing—our boys are gonna have to do a better sweep of the area. Usually, we only do it in summer. But it looks like every time the temperature hits at least fifty-five, that place goes from Bambi to bimbo in under five minutes. Our buddy down the hall, Morales, is on here with Maria by the way.”

  “Do you have any footage of them last month?”

  “I’ve only gotten up to mid-October so far. Why?”

  Vega told Greco about his interview with Cindy Klein.

  “If we’ve got him on camera for a Sunday in March, we may have the whole case right there,” said Greco. “Take a seat.”

  Vega pulled up an uncomfortable metal folding chair—the kind they used for suspects when they were interrogating them. Greco nodded to the carton on the table.

  “What else did you get?”

  “Maria’s cell-phone number. Maybe her last name. And what looks like her mother’s address in Guatemala. I’ve already run a check on the number. It’s a prepaid wireless account from Verizon.”

  “You request a subpoena for her phone records yet?”

  “Just put the paperwork in now. I asked them to speed it up given our deadline with Morales. We’ve already got his cell number so we can do a cross-check there, see when they last communicated.” Vega gave a quick overview of the rest of the contents of the carton.

  “Still falls short of probable cause to charge Morales,” said Greco darkly. It was almost three p.m. They both knew they were running out of time.

  “I know,” said Vega. “I’m going to go back to Cindy Klein and at least get her to ID Morales. But before I do, let’s see if the video gives us anything.”

  They sped up the rest of the October footage. Greco was right about the teenagers. Most of them came loaded down with six-packs and fifths and probably a lot more besides. Vega called for Greco to hit the pause button on several occasions. Matt Rowland was on two segments of the tape, both times toting six-packs. Once, with two other boys that Vega suspected were Brendan Delaney and Eddie Giordano. Another time with a girl.

  “How come we keep getting footage of people walking in and we don’t always have corresponding footage of them walking out?” asked Vega.

  “There are other ways to get to and from the lake,” said Greco. “Hell, you probably used one yourself to get to Bud Point when you were a teenager. So if you’re thinking that traffic in without a corresponding out means anything, forget it. There’s no way to track anything about their movements except what you see on the screen.”

  Vega flipped through more images until one brought him up short. He hit the pause button. Another teenage boy. A lanky, good-looking Hispanic with a walk much older than his years. A teenage girl with long, dark hair, tight jeans, and bangs that hid her eyes. Vega could feel the heat between them radiating off the screen, the hormonal thrumming and anticipation of release. The boy held out his hand and the girl grasped it as she stepped over a log. She threw back her head and laughed. It was how Vega used to feel with Linda at that age. Light. Reborn. Like every sensation was new and fresh and no one had ever felt this way before. It all counted. It all mattered.

  “You recognize them?” Greco frowned at the screen.

  “No.” Sometimes the only way to preserve something fragile is to leave it alone.

  Vega started up the video again. They went through all the November footage. By the end of November, the temperature brought a halt to the nighttime revelries. There were only dog-walkers and hikers after that.

  The couples and drinkers didn’t start up again until that first week in March when a burst of unseasonably warm temperatures brought everyone out of hiding. There were plenty of people on the tape again. Joy and Kenny, but no shots of Matt Rowland and only one of Maria and Morales. The date stamp in the corner read Sunday March 8th, 4:23 p.m. The film footage showed the two of them walking down the footpath to the lake with a six-pack of beer. Morales was holding Maria’s hand. At one point, she tripped and he grabbed her before she fell. Then he stroked the side of her face and kissed her on her forehead, his lips lingering a second too long before he pulled them away. She offered Morales a weary smile that seemed to carry the weight of the world in it. Vega felt sympathy for them at that moment. The tenderness of Morales’s gestures, the languid pace of their movements as if they both already sensed something slipping through their fingers.

  Was this the day Maria disappeared? If so, something about thei
r time together already registered a good-bye in it. Vega looked at his watch: three-thirty p.m. He had two and a half hours to assemble enough evidence to justify charging Morales in Maria’s death. The tape was a good start. It proved that Rodrigo was lying about when he last saw Maria. If Vega could get Cindy Klein to testify that Maria disappeared on March eighth that would nail things down as well. There was just one thing troubling Vega: that hate letter. He mentioned it to Greco now.

  “How do you know it had anything to do with the crime?” asked Greco. “It could’ve been sent to Maria by someone else before she got killed. It could have been sent to Morales and he just stuck it in her purse. The letter writer doesn’t even have to be an American. Some immigrant from another country could’ve had a beef with her—or him.”

  All possible. Still, without a confession, the evidence felt incomplete. “Let me take another crack at Rodrigo,” said Vega.

  “You think he’ll break?”

  “He’s been in that cell for nearly twenty-two hours. I think if he was ever going to break, he’ll break now.”

  Chapter 18

  Rodrigo watched the minutes and hours tick by on the big clock across from his holding cell. He had been in this cell since six p.m. last night.

  Four paces one way, six paces the other.

  No windows. Fluorescent lights that blazed day and night and sucked the life out of every surface they touched. A thin, ripped, vinyl pad on top of a block of cement for a bed, a stainless-steel toilet. Not even a place to wash up. There was a television high overhead but they were having trouble with the cable so it worked only sporadically. Not that he wanted to watch it anyway. The officer had tuned it to an English language station that seemed to show nothing but rich Norte Americanos having parties with each other and fighting.

  Four paces one way, six paces the other.

  He was the only one in a bank of three holding cells. There was a constant thrum from the heating ducts. His lip hurt. His clothes were covered in dried blood and mud and stank of sweat. His nerves had gotten the better of his digestive system and he was cramping up with diarrhea. Every time he thought the worst of his life in the United States was behind him, he’d come up against some new hurdle to jump over, some new despair that threatened to overwhelm him.