The Good, the Bad and the Guacamole

by Rebecca Adler

  “Where is Sheriff Wallace?” Senora Mari demanded.

  The young woman’s eyebrows flew up into her hair at the older woman’s tone.

  “What she means,” I said, placing a hand on Senora Mari’s arm, “is that we’re having a bit of an emergency.”

  “Oh, heavens.” The young woman placed a hand at her throat as if her lungs were failing.

  “We want Patti Perez released immediately.” My abuela shook my hand from her arm. “You have no right to keep her here.”

  I agreed, but it sounded preposterous coming from the older woman. They were the sheriff’s office. They had the right to do most things, given the circumstances.

  Shaking her head sympathetically, the young woman made her way back to the secretary’s desk. “I’m sorry, but I can’t help you. You’re going to have to go down to the jail.”

  “But we don’t know if she’s been arrested or merely brought in for questioning.”

  Senora Mari approached her desk. “I am Senora Marisol Martinez.” She drew her shoulders back and raised her chin.

  “Nice to meet you. I’m Clarissa.” Beaming with goodwill, the substitute receptionist stuck out her hand.

  Senora Mari studied her hand for a moment. The girl’s wrist and hand were hidden by bangles, leather bracelets, and henna tattoos. Drawing herself up to her full height, she took the girl’s hand by the fingers and shook it for a split second. She lifted the corners of her mouth a scant half inch, her usual way of pretending to smile at strangers, in spite of the fact she had preached to me the importance of making a good first impression only minutes earlier. My grandmother was not going to pretend to be friendly if you were not her friend. Not going to happen.

  “Josie Callahan.” I, on the other hand, greased the bureaucratic wheel by giving Clarissa a big smile and a hearty shake.

  The delicate young woman withdrew her hand and rubbed her fingers.

  I glanced toward Wallace’s office. “Is the sheriff back from vacation? I know he’d be willing to help us. We go way back.”

  A look of doubt crossed her face. “No.”

  “Is he coming in later?”

  Indecision followed immediately by decision flew across her expressive features. “I don’t rightly know what I’m supposed to tell you folks, but I’ll check with him if possible. You can call me back in an hour or so.”

  I glanced at Senora Mari. She had trapped Clarissa in a narrow-eyed glare. “Humph. We’ll be back.” She lifted her chin and spun on the heel of her sandals in an attempt to make a grand exit.

  “Nice to meet you,” I said, preparing to follow the older woman before she got us both kicked out.

  Clarissa’s mouth hung open as she watched Senora Mari march down the hall and out the door. “Uh, you too.”

  As my cheeks had started to ache, I dropped the let’s-all-be-friends smile. “We’ll be calling back in an hour to see if you called Sheriff Wallace. You can count on it.”

  I followed the signs that pointed toward the county jail and eventually caught up with Senora Mari. She had stopped at a vending machine and was studying the snacks.

  “Hot Fries taste like pork rinds. Sí?”

  “But they’re not the same.”

  “I like pork rinds. I’ll take them.”

  I learned long ago that Senora Mari didn’t buy her own snacks if someone else was available to buy them for her. Not that I minded. It wasn’t clear to me how the whole Martinez family managed to support themselves from the earnings of their two modestly successful businesses. Yet they kept a roof over their heads and food on the table, gas in their trucks, and AC blowing from the vents in the summer, which could cost as much as a diamond ring, depending on your jeweler.

  We found an even uglier part of the building that housed the jail with helpful, faded signs with arrows that pointed to booking, processing, visitation, and clerk’s office.

  Where was Lightfoot? Ugh. Had we even called him?

  I glanced down and realized I had a message from him on my phone. What’s up?

  Was he kidding me? I responded as politely as I could manage. Where’s Patti?

  His response gave me some relief.

  “Let’s wait over here.” I gestured to a few metal chairs with cushioned seats that were propped to one side against a grayish wall. “Lightfoot says she’s in an interrogation room.”

  “Are they railroading her out of town?”

  I wouldn’t have used those terms, but the older woman’s meaning was clear. “No, they aren’t.” My pulse kicked into a higher gear. Who was questioning her? Lightfoot or Wallace, or someone unknown to her—someone who wouldn’t understand that her personality and moral character didn’t match her dyed hair and multiple tattoos? Did she have a lawyer?

  Surely my Goth friend had watched enough television to know that you should always ask for a lawyer if they started asking you questions about a murder. What if she did ask for a lawyer? Whom would they send? The only public defender I could think of wasn’t fit to wash cars at the Spruce and Shine.

  After five minutes of waiting, with my pulse rate beating a mile a minute, I approached the clerk. “Sorry to bother you.” I smiled my most sweet Southern-girl smile.

  The Latina behind the counter didn’t look up from her typing. On her well-worn metal desk lay a six-inch stack of reports. “Uh-huh.” Her eyes never left her computer screen.

  “We think a friend of ours is here being questioned.”

  “Uh-huh.” She flipped over the top page on the stack, realigned the top sheet of paper, clicked a few keys on her keyboard, and kept right on typing.

  “We don’t know if she has a lawyer.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Friendliness wasn’t working. Melodrama might. “I don’t know what to do. I’ve never had to do this before. She’s being accused of murder. They’re picking on her because she doesn’t have any family to take her side. And that ain’t right.”

  I only use the word ain’t in certain circumstances, like when I think it makes me sound more pitiful.

  She stopped typing, adjusted her glasses, and took a sip from her hot-pink water bottle. “What’s her name?” she asked in a voice as tired as a ditchdigger’s.

  “Patti Perez.”

  A spark of interest kindled in her eyes. She glanced at two other county employees—an older woman nearing retirement and a young man who appeared to be wearing his first tie—who were heatedly discussing the price of gasoline, the curious fact that Texas did not have lower gas prices than Louisiana, and why in tarnation not?

  “They took her through, but she hasn’t been booked.” Her fingers raced across the keys, her eyes narrowed in concentration. “She hasn’t been charged with anything at this point.” She shook her head and looked me full in the face for the first time. “There’s nothing I can do.”

  “Please.”

  She glanced furtively around again. “Except to tell you that if it were me, I’d find her a lawyer and quick.”

  “Why?” I whispered.

  “Wallace came through this morning. Met her and the deputy at the door. He’s all over this investigation. Taking it serious.”

  “Okay. Thanks.” My mind slowed to a crawl. Who else did I know that would take Patti’s case and set her free? And why had the sheriff’s fill-in receptionist refused to tell me he’d returned from vacation?

  Her long nails stopped clicking on the keyboard. She opened her drawer, pulled out a salmon-colored business card, and slid it to the edge of her desk with one pink nail. “She’s the best.”

  With a quick glance over my shoulder to make sure no one was looking our way, I stretched out over the counter and snagged the card. Salmon with black lettering, it read, Gretchen Cruz, Attorney at Law.

  “She’s my cousin, but she’s smart.”

  I reread the fancy b
it of cardstock, hoping to discover some hint as to whether or not this woman’s cousin was legit. Not that beggars could be choosers.

  I wanted to ask, If she’s so smart, why’s she here in Big Bend County instead of Dallas or at least El Paso?

  The clerk must have read my doubts in my face. “She’s here because my Aunt Diana is very ill and my cousin wants to be near her mother.”

  The phone rang in a shrill blast. “Hello?” The clerk listened for a second. “No,” she answered, clacking her nails on the desk. “Why?” She listened again and rolled her eyes at whatever the caller was saying. “Not today. Ask me again tomorrow.” Without a good-bye to soften the blow, she hung up.

  After a few moments spent studying my person, with special attention given to the Austin T-shirt, she leaned toward me conspiratorially. “Don’t judge my cousin because she’s a Latina. She attended Rice University on a full scholarship.”

  Which was more than I could say for myself. “I’ll give her a call.”

  The woman nodded her approval and went back to typing, her fingers once again flying across the keys, clicking and clacking like castanets. Her eyes met mine for a split second and she nodded infinitesimally.

  “What’d she say?” Senora Mari asked, loud enough for everyone on the street to hear.

  I handed her the card.

  “Looks good. What are you waiting for?”

  “We don’t know anything about her.”

  She tried to grab the card from my hand. “Give me your phone. I’ll call her.”

  “And how are we going to pay her?”

  “Patti has money, right?”

  “Some, I guess.” I had no clear idea whether or not Patti’s parents had left her anything other than their home and Broken Boot Feed and Supply and its outstanding bills.

  “Call this lawyer before they arrest your best friend.” She pulled the Hot Fries from her bag. “¿Eres una gallina?”

  My eyes rolled. There was nothing quite like having my almost-eighty-year-old abuela accuse me of being a chicken. She was right, of course. What would it hurt to call this woman, Gretchen Cruz, and ask some basic questions?

  I called. A woman with a deep, assertive voice answered on the first ring. “Gretchen Cruz, Esquire.”

  Despite that slightly pretentious opening, she listened as I introduced myself, but refused to answer any of my questions except for commenting with sympathetic humming sounds. “I will be there in ten minutes.”

  Before she could hang up, I jumped in with my most important question. “Uh, I don’t know how this works. Don’t you need a retainer or—?”

  “I’ll meet you there and we can discuss it in person.”

  “But—”

  “Look,” she said in a firm tone. “You want me to fight to keep your friend out of jail, right?”

  “Yeah.” I had to find a knight in shining armor and fast. “Yes, I do,” I said, bellying up to the bar.

  “Then we will fight, and we will win,” she growled. After a brief pause, she continued in a friendlier tone. “You’ll see.”

  The line went dead and I immediately regretted my decision. What had I done? How would I find the money to pay her the retainer she required?

  In eleven minutes, a petite woman with a cap of dark hair crossed the waiting area with the same intensity I’d seen in members of the Texas State Guard around the capitol building in Austin. Her mahogany bangs swept across her brow while the sides were super short. She wore a purple linen suit with black heels. In her left hand she carried a well-made if often-used leather portfolio. “Gretchen Cruz.” She gave a nod, but no smile. “Pleased to meet you.” Her voice was a pleasing alto with just a hint of twang.

  I stood and shook her outstretched hand. “Thanks for coming.”

  Unlike the young receptionist we had met only minutes earlier, Cruz had tough hands and short nails with clear polish. Her wrists were bare except for a slender gold watch and a simple band that graced her ring finger.

  Senora Mari stood as well and broke into a long tirade in Spanish about the inadequacy of the public defenders and the prejudice in the Texas legal system. The other woman listened, nodded, and finally lifted a hand. “I see,” was all she said.

  “I’m building a business here and few folks know me.” She turned and waved at her cousin, who bore no resemblance to her whatsoever, and the other woman waved back. “I’ll charge you a hundred dollars to walk in there and say I’m her lawyer. After I meet with her, I will report back to you, and then we’ll discuss my fees.”

  Senora Mari pinched my arm. “Go ahead.”

  “Wait,” I urged. I wasn’t one to make important decisions under pressure. The holdup was not whether I should spend the money, but, rather, when did I need to hand it over . . . exactly.

  I rubbed my arm and glared at Senora Mari. “Okay, already.” As usual, Abuela was correct. Patti, Goth Princess, tough on the outside, not a murderess on either side, needed immediate rescue.

  “She’s innocent. Won’t it make her look bad to bring in a lawyer during questioning?”

  “From what you’ve told me, it sounds as if there’s a good deal of circumstantial evidence piled against her. And you think she needs an advocate now. Right?”

  I nodded.

  She reached out squeezed my upper arm. “Trust me.”

  Watching her walk away, Senora Mari nodded proudly. “A Latina lawyer will save her. You watch.”

  “From your lips to God’s ears.”

  Senora Mari raised her eyebrows at my phraseology, and then she crossed herself and touched her fingers to her lips.

  Over the next hour, a couple of guys came in wearing stereotypical gold chains, wife beaters, slack-hipped jeans, and tats up and down their arms. Scary dudes. They spoke so softly to the booking clerk that no matter how hard I tried to hear what they were saying, I couldn’t make it out. Senora Mari had finished her Hot Fries and had spent the last fifteen minutes trying to wipe the residue off her fingers with hand sanitizer.

  We waited for an update from Gretchen Cruz until I thought I’d have to run outside and scream. Uncle Eddie and Aunt Linda both called, separately, for an update, and both offered to join us at the jail. “No, thanks.” I told them. “There’s no need for all of us to waste our time.”

  I glanced at Senora Mari and raised an eyebrow in question. “Do you want Aunt Linda to come by to pick you up?”

  She looked away, considering her options. “No.” She straightened to her full four feet, eleven inches. “Tell her to make sure Carlos is checking the expiration date on the meat.”

  I wrinkled my nose in disgust.

  “What?” she asked, chin raised defensively. “Is it my fault he refuses to earn his GED or go to the market?”

  I opened my mouth to answer and then shut it again. He was never given the opportunity to shop alone because she insisted he always shop with her assistance. Everyone knew that all tamales, enchiladas, and anything else served from our kitchen at Milagro had to pass her strict standards. The fact that Carlos could put up with her eagle eye and constant criticism spoke to his patience and his need for employment.

  On the other line, Aunt Linda asked again.

  Senora Mari shook her head vehemently and pulled one of our to-go menus from her purse. She folded it together with the nimble fingers of one hand, lifted a few stray tendrils from the back of her neck, and began to fan herself as if she were about to keel over from heatstroke.

  “You sure?” I asked. I was having enough trouble remaining calm without worrying about her passing out.

  “Sí.”

  I said good-bye and settled in for a long wait on an uncomfortable chair. After fifteen minutes, Senora Mari was fast asleep with her head on her chest and her hands folded across her stomach. With each exhalation, she made a light whistling sound through her nose. If
she was faking it, she had my undying respect.

  The longer I sat, the angrier I became. Who in their right mind would accuse Patti of killing anyone? My follow-up article would be printed in the upcoming edition of the Bugle, but by then it would be old news. News? What had I written? Basically a fluff piece on Jeff Clark. Sure, I’d interviewed a few peripheral people on his tour, so I had an idea of who he’d potentially hacked off. Cardplayers, old girlfriends, and their husbands or boyfriends.

  Broken Boot was a small town. Would the sheriff bring in the Texas Rangers? Not if I knew Sheriff Mack Wallace. He’d do his darnedest to solve the crime, make the arrest, and gain the glory without involving the rangers, FBI, or any other law-enforcement bureau besides his own deputies.

  Add to that the fact that Mayor Cogburn was up for reelection and you had a lot of pressure for the sheriff to solve the crime and make an arrest before he lost control of the whole kit and caboodle.

  Where was Lightfoot? He would tell me what they had on Patti. And, if I played my cards right, he might let me help with the investigation. Yeah, right. Flying pigs were not on the horizon. Still, he had to be sympathetic to Patti’s plight. Maybe enough for a brief share-and-share-alike session between the two of us.

  Three hours had passed, and we were both exhausted from the strain of worry. I took Senora Mari by the arm and gently helped her to her feet.

  “These shoes are going in the trash,” she said, emptying the Hot Fries bag and a few old tissues into a metal receptacle.

  “Shh. Your sandals aren’t made to wear for long periods of time.”

  “And yours are ugly.”

  I ignored my abuela’s exhausted attempt to return my unintended insult. As we reached the exit, we both turned to wave at the female clerk of divine intervention. She wiggled the long nails of one hand in our direction just as her very efficient cousin and a familiar deputy crossed the waiting room from the opposite doorway.

  As they approached, the deputy removed his Stetson. “Senora,” Lightfoot said with a respectful nod to Senora Mari.

  She pursed her lips and gave him a narrow-eyed stare. “So. Did you arrest her?”