by Linda Gerber
“What?” I asked, confused.
“This could be their break,” Mom said.
Detective Paulo continued as if we hadn’t spoken. “You can understand why we must tread very carefully as we investigate this possibility.” And then, turning to me, he asked, “The video is still on your website, niña?”
“It’s a blog,” I said.
His smile thinned. “We ask you to remove the video evidence from your…. blog. Please speak of this to no one until we have gathered enough evidence to—”
“But you have the video,” Mom said. “What evidence do you need?”
“An image is not enough to convict, Señora, but it gives us direction. Now that we know who to watch, we are confident we will be able to find what we need.” And with that, he stood, tucking the file folder under his arm. He nodded good-bye to us and to Señor Ruiz-Moreno and was just about to push through the door when he stopped and added, “I would appreciate it, niña, if you would not leave the city until this investigation is complete.”
Mom and Dad exchanged one of their glances, and then Dad asked, “How long do you anticipate that will take?”
“Days. Weeks. Months. ¿Quién sabe? It is impossible to say.”
“But we have a show to—” Mom began.
“Señora” he said icily, “your daughter is a witness to a crime. A crime potentially perpetrated by a man with worldwide criminal reach. Surely her safety is of greater concern than a television show.”
Mom drew back against her chair. “Safety?” she looked to Dad as if he could translate that into something less ominous.
Before Dad could intervene, Detective Paulo continued. “The men on this video will want to destroy the evidence. They will want to discredit its author. It is important we protect the integrity of both.”
For the first time I can ever remember, Mom looked lost. “She’s just a child….”
“I’m not a child!” I blurted. “I’m almost thirteen.” Seriously. When was she going to stop treating me like a baby?
“Don’t worry, Julia,” Cavin said in a low voice. “I’ll speak to legal. We’ll sort this out.”
I probably should have had the sense to be scared by our talk with the detective, but I wanted to skip right out the precinct door. He told me to stay in Valencia. Ha! Mom and Dad couldn’t send me anywhere! I was itching to text Mateo and tell him the good news. We should all go out for ice cream to celebrate. Or maybe to the horchateria. I was too happy to care.
The adults were not quite as enthusiastic.
“Well, this is a pretty kettle of fish,” Cavin said.
“Agreed.” Dad wiped the lenses of his dark glasses and put them on. “But obviously they can’t ask us to stay in Spain indefinitely. We’re American citizens. They can’t tell us what to—”
“That’s not what I’m talking about,” Cavin said. “We’re on a tight schedule for a reason. The show’s budget can’t take an indefinite—”
Mom stopped dead in her tracks. “The show? We’re talking about my daughter’s safety, and you’re worried about the show?”
“We’re neck and neck with A Foreign Affair,” Cavin said. “We may not be able to weather legal action.”
Legal action? That was kind of a buzz kill. “The police are going to sue us?” I asked.
“Not the police,” Cavin said. “Ye heard the detective. They can’t say for certain that the man in the film is this El Jefe, yet they are about to launch a full-scale investigation. He is very powerful and influential. If it turns out the man is innocent, and it was a video on yer blog what disrupted his life—”
Dad cut him off. “I’m starving. Who wants to grab something to eat?”
By the time we got back to the apartment, Logan and Mateo were gone. Victoria said they had gotten restless, so Bayani took them out to play soccer. Disappointment stole more of the bubbles from my good mood, but I figured our celebration would just have to wait for a while.
I went straight to my room and pulled out my laptop. Dad paused at the doorway, but I was glad he didn’t feel like he had to say anything. We both knew I was going to delete the video; there was no point talking about it.
Mom, unfortunately, couldn’t help herself. “Make sure it’s completely removed,” she called from the front room. “Refresh the page when you’re done and check it again.”
I held my breath to keep from yelling back at her and counted to ten.
“Better make it twenty,” Dad said, and left me to my computer.
I was surprised when I pulled up the blog post to see that it had already logged over a thousand hits. For me, that’s a lot in just a couple of days. I glanced over my shoulder to make sure Dad was really gone and then quickly deleted the stat counts along with the video. It probably wouldn’t help to let anyone know how many people saw the video before I took it down. Of course, since the network was hosting the blog on their site, they probably had stat counters of their own, but maybe they wouldn’t be paying attention.
Once I removed the video, my blog page looked empty and sad. I pulled stills from my camera instead and rewrote the post, listing everything I could remember from my morning walk.
Except the part about El Jefe and the guys with the van.
Breakfast in the morning was what
my mom would call a tense affair. None of us spoke unless it was to ask for the orange juice or the jam. Dad had bits of tissue stuck all over his face from shaving. He’d also missed a button on his shirt, but I didn’t want to be the one to tell him, which was weird because usually I live for those things. Mom was all pressed and polished and ready for the day’s shoots, but the purple smudges under her eyes showed that she hadn’t slept well.
“I deleted the video,” I reminded them. “It’s no big deal.” So why did it feel like I had a brick in my stomach? It’s not like I was the one who did anything wrong. Except the whole sneaking-out thing, I mean.
Mom opened her mouth as though she was going to say something, but then Dad’s phone rang and she watched silently as he fished it out of his pocket.
“Oh, John. Hello.” John is the executive producer in New York who had been pushing for me to be included in more of the show. I held my breath, wondering if he’d heard about the video on my blog. I got my answer when Dad pushed away from the table and walked into the other room to talk.
Mom watched him go and then turned back to me. “Well,” she said, smoothing her napkin on the table, “I wonder if it will be as hot today.”
Was she kidding? She wanted to talk about the weather?
“We’re lucky this place has air-conditioning. A lot of the older apartment buildings don’t.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Do you remember that year we were in Thailand in June? It was miserable. Of course, you may have been too young—”
“I remember,” I said.
“That was…. what? Three years ago?”
“Four.”
“Oh, yes.” She let the pitiful conversation die there. I guess I could have kept it going, but I was as nervous about the call as she was. I just didn’t feel like I had to keep talking to cover it up.
Finally, Dad returned to the table. He sat down without saying a word.
“Well?” Mom asked.
“They’re monitoring the fallout very carefully.”
“Fallout?” I didn’t like the sound of that.
“Apparently, some international news agencies have picked up the video and are—”
“But I deleted it,” I said.
He nodded. “Well, apparently,” he said again, drawing out the word, “other readers noticed the men in the video before Mateo did. Several of them copied the footage before it was removed and posted it around the Web.”
That strange twisting returned. “But isn’t that illegal?” I asked. “That was my video.”
“Well, technically, yes,” Dad said, his voice sounding even more tired than before. “Legal is looking into it, but there’s likely
nothing they can do. Once word got out who was possibly involved, there were too many—”
“But how could they know?” I asked. “We could barely even see the men ourselves.”
“They could have used the same video-enhancement programs as Bayani did,” Mom said.
Dad agreed. “Speculation is a popular online sport. Any evidence, real or imagined, is enough to fuel the fire. In any event, the network brass said that ordering the videos to be removed would be pointless. The cat’s already out of the bag, so to speak.”
I almost didn’t dare ask, but I had to, after the way Cavin had acted like any delay could be the end of the world. “How will this affect the show?”
“Well, now, this is the interesting part.” Dad leaned back in his chair. “They think the attention may actually boost our ratings.”
“No publicity is bad publicity,” Mom murmured.
“Is that what they mean by fallout?” I asked.
Dad considered that for a moment. “Well, yes. Partly. They’ll be conducting a few polls, watching the hits on websites and news crawls.”
“And as for this episode?” Mom asked.
“They’d like us to continue taping as usual.”
She nodded slowly. “Well, then,” she said. I couldn’t tell by her tone if she was relieved or annoyed. “I suppose we should get ready. We have a full schedule today.” She pulled her cell phone from her front pocket. “I’ll call Daniel and let him know he can come up for hair and makeup.”
Awesome. I couldn’t wait for us all to get together so I could talk to Mateo and Logan and tell them about the phone call. “Where are we going today?”
“We,” Mom said pointedly, “will be filming at the City of Arts and Sciences. You are restricted.”
“What? Are you kidding me? It’s already been two days! Shouldn’t I get some kind of consideration for my part in catching the bad guys?”
She shook her head. “I’m sorry, Cassidy. Regardless of the circumstances, your restriction stands.”
“Not to mention,” Dad put in, “that we don’t know what kind of reaction to expect from this video business. It seems not to be prudent to expose you to the crowds that tend to gather around our tapings.”
“But—”
“No arguments,” he said. “Victoria will be by at ten for your lessons.”
Mom was in the makeup chair when Bayani stopped by to go over the day’s itinerary. I sat in the kitchen with him while he waited.
“I don’t get to go with you today,” I told him.
“I heard. Bummer.”
“Will…. will everyone else be going?”
He laughed. “Yes, the boys will be there. And I’m sure they’ll both miss you horribly.”
I tried to smack the side of his head, but he dodged the hit. “Too slow!” he crowed.
I folded my arms and glared at him.
“Which one are you crushing on?” he asked, teasing.
I swatted at him again, and this time I got him. Hard. He just laughed.
“I’ll tell them you said hi,” he said sweetly.
I started to swing at him once more, but Mom chose that moment to come into the kitchen. “That’s enough, Cassidy.”
Bayani grinned triumphantly. I excused myself and retreated to my room.
I didn’t think that things could get any worse, but I was wrong. Since we wouldn’t be visiting the sites with my mom and dad and the crew, Victoria put together an historical walking tour for us in Old Town. Which was seriously unfair. At the very least, Logan should have had to come on the walk with us. Didn’t his dad say he had to do the lessons, too? But then, someone had to keep Mateo company. Logan was probably more than happy to be that someone.
Victoria decided to start the tour at, of all places, the Valencia Cathedral. At least we stopped in front of the cathedral instead of in the back, where all the trouble had started, but still. I didn’t want to be there at all, and I told her that.
“Come now,” she said. “This cathedral has a fascinating history. It began as a Visigoth chapel built by the Romans nearly two thousand years ago. The Moors replaced the chapel with a mosque when they were in power, and then the Christians turned the mosque into a cathedral. You might be interested to know that some people say this is the very chapel where the Holy Grail is kept.”
“You’re talking about the Holy Grail?”
“Yes. Of course I’m speaking of the Holy Grail…. although some experts dispute it.”
“Do you think that’s what those guys were after?” I asked.
“Perhaps,” Victoria said. “Although the cathedral houses a museum where a number of valuable artifacts are kept. It’s possible those would have been much easier targets.”
We continued our walking tour, but I wasn’t paying much attention. I kept thinking about the Holy Grail and feeling rather important. My video had led to the capture of at least two artifact smugglers. For all we knew, they could have been a part of a huge smuggling operation, and if they hadn’t been stopped, they actually could have gone after the grail. They might even—
“Cassidy, are you even listening?”
“Yes,” I lied.
“Then what was the last thing I said?”
“You asked if I was listening.”
“Very funny. Now pay attention.”
I would have. Except by then we had come to the Torres de Serranos, which is this old sentry gate at the far end of the historic quarter. It was cool looking and all, but she kept droning on and on about how it had been built in the fourteenth century and how the road from the exit led west to Barcelona. Blah, blah, blah. I don’t know if it’s possible to sleep standing up, but I was getting pretty close to finding out. I tried to listen and to answer her questions as attentively as I could, but seriously? I didn’t really care that the two gothic guard towers flanking the gate were polygonal.
“Cassidy.” She turned to scold me, but then she slipped her arm through mine instead and said in a low voice, “Walk!”
I tried to pull my arm away. “I’m sorry. Jeez! I’ll pay more attention to—”
“Keep walking,” she said, tightening her grip on my arm. “And don’t turn around.”
“What’s wrong?” I asked, looking back over my shoulder.
“No,” she hissed. “I said don’t turn around!”
But it was too late. I had already seen the photographer lurking in the alleyway. More to the point, he saw me see him. Which meant he didn’t have to hide anymore. He stepped right out into the open and started snapping away.
“Let’s go.” Victoria quickened her step so that I practically had to run to keep up with her.
“What’s he doing?”
“What does it look like he’s doing?”
“Taking pictures?” I said. “Awesome!”
“What on earth are you talking about?”
“This is so cool! I have a papa-stalker!” I’d never been chased by a paparazzo before. Not by myself, anyway. Maybe with Mom or Dad. I glanced behind us again. “Wait till I tell Mateo and…. uh-oh.”
“What is it?”
“Um, there’s more than one.”
She tucked me closer to her. “I should have known. I thought we would be fine by ourselves, without the production to draw attention.” She glanced behind us again and then sped up, dragging me along. “Vultures. Just don’t look at them, okay? Let’s not let them get a clear shot.”
We weren’t far from the apartment, but she backtracked a couple of times, darting down side alleys and even cutting through a building or two to try to throw them off. I probably shouldn’t have thought it was such an adventure. Not if I had known what a swarm of paparazzi could do. But in the moment, I was having a blast. For the first time in my life, I felt like a real live celebrity. I pretended our chase was a cat-and-mouse game, like in the old movies I used to watch with Grampa. I even imagined myself with a beehive hairdo and a big pair of Audrey Hepburn dark glasses.
When we
burst into the lobby of our own building, out of breath and sweaty, another photographer popped out from behind one of the potted palms, practically blinding us with his camera’s flash.
Victoria jumped in front of me. “Stairs,” she said. “Now!”
I cut off to the side and stumbled up the steps while Victoria charged the photographer. She yelled at him in alternating Spanish and English. “What’s the matter with you? ¡Váyase! Go away! I’ll call the policía!”
The man ran off, and Victoria lectured the doorman for not keeping the guy out of the building. Her voice echoed up the stairway, angrier than I’d ever heard it before. I let myself into the apartment and waited for her.
“Is this about the video?” I asked when she came in the door. “Because if it is, that’s just lame. Nobody around here even knows who I am.”
She didn’t answer me until she crossed the room and pulled out her bag.
“Cassidy,” she said, “there’s something you should see.”
Victoria settled on the couch and
patted the cushion beside her. I sat obediently and waited.
“I probably should have showed this to you earlier, but I didn’t know what to make of it,” she said. “I picked it up at a convenience store this morning.” She pulled a folded newspaper from her bag and spread it out on the table before us. “There,” she said, pointing.
I just about fell off the couch.
I knew enough to recognize the format of a European tabloid. It’s not like it’s a serious newspaper or anything, more like the National Enquirer back home. But that picture was me! On the front page!
“What is this? What does the article say?”
“It talks about how your video is the evidence the police are relying on to charge Alejandro García-Ramírez with artifact smuggling.”
I ran my fingers over the image. It showed me in midstride, coming out the door at the horchateria. I was wearing my scarf skirt and laughing, my phone in my hand. I remembered the moment in a flash. Mateo had just done a perfect imitation of Daniel. He would have been to my left. “I don’t understand,” I said. “This was taken before I even posted the video.”