Noah Braddock - 03 - Liquid Smoke

by Jeff Shelby

  Thanks to Russell Simington.

  My father.

  “The way Asanti put the case together, Tenayo and Vasquez still owed part of the mule fee after they’d made it across,” Liz said. “They were late in paying up. Simington was sent to punish them. Those details came from Simington himself. Tenayo had no family here, and Vasquez’s wife said she knew nothing of the details of his coming across. They came across separately.”

  The black water rippled with silver outside the window. Anger was beginning to boil in my gut. It was one thing for a father to choose to stay outside of a family. It was another thing entirely to take away a man’s chance to choose.

  “I told Asanti we’d be out in the morning,” Liz said.

  I shifted my gaze from the water to her. “Thanks.”

  The check came, I paid, and we walked outside into the cool air.

  Liz looked up at the sky. “It’s supposed to get ugly the next few days. Lots of rain.”

  I grunted in response, unable to shake what she’d told me from my head.

  We walked back up the street in silence, her hand warm in mine. We were halfway up the walk to her house when I stopped. “You don’t have to go tomorrow,” I said.

  She stared at me, her eyes searching. “Do you not want me to go?”

  “No, it’s not that. But I don’t want you to feel like you have to.”

  Liz gripped my hand a little tighter and pulled me toward the front door. She fished her keys out of her pocket and unlocked the door, then turned to me.

  “When you said earlier that you loved me, I said that maybe something would come up and maybe you’d change your mind. You disagreed.”

  “And I meant that, Liz.”

  “I know.” She placed her hands lightly on my chest. “There is nothing that I’m going to hear about Russell Simington that is going to change my mind as to how I feel about you.”

  It was the second time Liz had said something like that to me, and yet I couldn’t disentangle myself from what Simington was and who I was. It wasn’t that I didn’t believe her. But there was this continued nagging in the back of my mind that something ugly would emerge and everyone would look at me differently.

  Her hands moved from my chest to around my neck. “Now. Earlier, I didn’t get to see you change.”

  I pushed Simington out of my mind, refusing to let him ruin the rest of my evening, and focused on the woman I now freely admitted was the most important person in my life. “Your loss,” I said.

  “Care to come in and show me what I missed out on?” It was an offer I couldn’t—and didn’t—refuse.

  THIRTY-ONE

  To find El Centro, you head east on I-8 and push through the El Cajon valley, the mountains of Alpine and Julian, and descend into the desert-covered region that reaches toward Arizona. It has become the furthest suburb of San Diego—if a community one hundred miles away can be considered a suburb—home to not only bedroom commuters but Mexican immigrant families that like the nearly visible proximity to their homeland. Ten minutes to the east and you are in Arizona. But ten minutes south and you enter the poverty-stricken zone of Mexicali.

  I’d left a message for Miranda, letting her know where the towels were, that she was welcome to anything in the fridge and that I was sleeping elsewhere. But I hadn’t slept. I tossed and turned all night and Liz had recognized my impatience at waiting for the day to begin. She volunteered to drive, and we took the circular off-ramp into El Centro at nine on the button.

  We pulled up in front of a small, square building about a mile down Central Avenue. Letters spelling out “El Centro Police Department” were lined above two dirty glass doors at the entrance.

  “Looks deserted,” I said.

  “Not a huge department,” Liz said, shutting off the engine. “Asanti is the only detective. Four full-time officers, two part-time, and a dispatcher. Not much help for all the crap out here.”

  I nodded. The ease with which one could come and go to Mexico had created a sort of safe haven for crime. Steal a car and drive across the border. Buy your drugs and drive across the border. Kill someone and disappear across the border. But the tax base, even with the influx of new money brought from the folks making the drive to jobs in San Diego, wasn’t enough to provide the protection and enforcement the area needed. Residents couldn’t afford to move closer, though, as the cost of living grew exponentially each mile closer to the coast.

  We entered through the glass doors. The crescent-shaped reception desk was empty. We walked past it and found a man sitting at a beaten-up desk in a large room that housed several other desks, all empty.

  He looked up, his brown eyes rimmed with tired, red veins. “Help you?”

  “We’re looking for Detective Asanti,” Liz said.

  “I’m him,” he said, rising out of the chair. “You must be Santangelo.”

  He was maybe six feet tall and thin like a stick of gum. A red tie was sloppily knotted at the neck of a short-sleeve white work shirt. Grey slacks revealed permanent wrinkles in the thighs, and his black leather shoes were dusty and well worn.

  He extended his hand to Liz. “Aurelio Asanti.”

  “I’m Liz,” she said, and they shook. Liz looked at me. “This is Noah Braddock.”

  We shook hands.

  He looked at Liz. “I called Lucia Vasquez. She was not anxious to see us, but she agreed.” “Thank you,” Liz said.

  He shifted his eyes to me. “I cannot promise that she will have anything to tell you. And I would appreciate it if you would not press her on questions she does not wish to answer.”

  “I don’t want to upset her,” I said.

  He gave a curt nod, then held out a hand in the direction we’d come in. “Let’s go, then.”

  Asanti drove a late model Crown Victoria that looked as if it had just been pulled out of the detail garage. The white paint gleamed in the sunlight, and the windows were so clean they were barely visible. Liz rode in front, and I stretched out in the expansive backseat.

  We drove south, through the downtown area of buildings in disrepair, boarded-up store fronts, and sidewalks overgrown with weeds.

  “Makes you want to consider moving, right?” Asanti asked, a disappointed smile on his face in the rearview mirror.

  “Not so much,” I said. “How did you end up here?”

  “I didn’t end up here,” he said, no animosity in his voice. “It’s where I grew up. My parents came across two weeks before I was born. I went to school over in Tucson, but other than those four years, I’ve never lived anywhere else.”

  “Why did you come back?” Liz asked.

  “Even though it’s growing, I know most of the families here,” he said. “Most started out as mine did. Entering illegally and finding a way to stay. Some people would say different, but I was fortunate to be born here, and I am grateful for that. Working in the community where I was raised and with my friends, this is where I’m comfortable.”

  We crossed back under the interstate, and Asanti turned left, pointing us toward a group of ranch houses in the distance.

  Asanti glanced in the mirror. “Mr. Simington lived here for a while.”

  I met his eyes, but didn’t say anything.

  “Many folks involved in the smuggling arrangements live here,” he said. “It’s convenient. Close to the international border, with highways that will take you west, east, and north as soon as you cross.”

  “Did you know him before you arrested him?” I asked.

  Asanti nodded. “I did. Like I said, I know most everyone here. New guy moves in, you hear about it and you do some checking. When I saw his history, I introduced myself.”

  He stopped the car in front of a low-slung stucco one-story with a chain-link fence around the property. A rusted-out wagon and a tricycle missing a rear wheel were left for dead in the weeds that made up the yard.

  Asanti shifted in the front seat and looked at me. “Funny thing was, we got along okay. He knew I was making a po
int in introducing myself. Didn’t lie about who he was. Saw him around town, having coffee, eating lunch, those kinds of things. Always said hello.” His eyes shifted to the house. “When the thing happened, he was the first person I went to. There was a car in his driveway that matched the description of one that had been seen near the killings. He never bothered to deny it. Like we both knew it was coming and he didn’t feel like outrunning it. If I hadn’t known he was in El Centro, I’m not sure he would’ve even hit the radar.” Asanti shrugged and gestured at the house. “Come on.”

  I opened the door and slid out of the backseat, images of Simington flashing in my head like a slide show. With Carolina. In El Centro. In prison. They seemed like pictures randomly thrown together in a shoebox. Regardless of what I learned or what happened to him, I doubted I’d ever understand him.

  Liz, Asanti, and I walked up the cracked sidewalk to the front of the house. The mesh on the screen door was torn in two places. Asanti rapped on the metal frame, the noise echoing down the quiet street.

  The door opened, and a small woman in jeans and a yellow polo shirt appeared. She was drying her hands with a dish towel. Her shiny black hair was pulled back away from her face, showing immaculate dark skin and brown eyes. A small gold cross hung around her neck.

  She and Asanti exchanged quick greetings in Spanish. She opened the door without smiling, her eyes moving past Liz to me. I felt her gaze stay on me as I stepped past her into the home.

  The living room was small. A sofa against one wall, an old console television opposite it. Toys were piled in the corners. The carpeting was thin, but looked like it had just been vacuumed. A small kitchen table surrounded by four chairs was nestled in a corner next to the kitchen. A hallway split the kitchen and living room. The smell of burnt bacon floated in the air.

  “Lucia Vasquez,” Asanti said. “This is Ms. Santangelo and Mr. Braddock.”

  She nodded politely at each of us, still without a smile. “Good morning.” Her voice was soft, with very little accent.

  She gestured for us to sit on the sofa, and she pulled a chair away from the kitchen table and sat across from Liz and me. Asanti remained standing.

  “Lucia, anything you tell them will stay between us,” he said. “Nothing that you say can harm you. And if you do not wish to answer the questions, you do not have to.” He turned to us. “Correct?”

  Liz nodded. I said, “Yes.”

  He nodded as if that was acceptable and then stepped away and took a seat at the kitchen table. Liz looked at me.

  “Mrs. Vasquez,” I said, trying to organize my thoughts, “I am trying to learn whatever I can about the man that arranged to bring you and your family here.”

  She held my gaze. “We paid a man to come across.”

  “Did that man help you get here to El Centro?”

  “Yes. We met him at our home in Mexico. He said if we can pay him, he will bring us to America.”

  “How did you meet him?”

  “My husband,” she said, her eyelids fluttering. “Hernando and Miguel met him in a restaurant in our town. They made the plans.” “You came here first?”

  “Yes. Hernando wanted me to come with the boys first. To make sure we were safe. My sister lives here. We stayed with her for about six months. Then Hernando came with Miguel.”

  I thought of how frightening it must have been for her to travel with her sons and without her husband to a country she couldn’t be sure wanted her. Lucia Vasquez was a brave woman.

  “Detective Asanti told us that there was a problem with money. Was your husband unable to pay?” I asked.

  A flicker of anger ran through her eyes, and she rubbed her hands together. “The man. He changed the money.”

  “Changed the money?”

  She nodded, hard. “He told Hernando that it will cost five hundred dollars to come to America. Hernando paid him.” Tears formed in the corners of her eyes. “But after he brings Hernando over, when he brings him to my sister’s, he tells him that he must pay three hundred dollars. More. He did the same to Miguel.” The anger flickered again. She wiped the tears from her eyes with her finger. “We did not have that. We spent everything we had to get all of us here.”

  I didn’t want to ask questions that were going to bring back painful memories. But she had answers that I needed.

  “When Hernando told him that you didn’t have the money, what happened?” I asked.

  She clasped her hands together and looked back up. She straightened herself in the chair. “Hernando told him he would get the money. The man gave him two days.”

  “But Hernando was unable to get the three hundred dollars?”

  “He and Miguel, they each got two hundred dollars,” she said, her words heavier with anger than sadness. “Our family and friends, they gave us what they could. Hernando thought this would be enough, and he tells the man that they will get the rest soon.”

  “But that wasn’t enough?”

  She shook her head slowly. “No. Hernando and Miguel, they got angry. They are afraid he will keep asking for money. For forever, you understand.”

  I did. Interest and extortion born out of fear.

  “So Hernando and Miguel, they tell him no more. They tell him that they will go to the police and even go home to Mexico if they have to. But they will not pay him any more.”

  I glanced at Asanti. I wondered what he would’ve done if they had showed up at his station.

  “That’s when the other man showed up here.” She paused, fixing her eyes on me. “The man that you look like.”

  I felt the blood rush to my face, like a kid who’d fallen down on the playground in front of all his friends.

  “Wait,” Liz said. “There were two men?”

  Lucia nodded. “Yes. The man that killed Hernando and Miguel, I had never seen him before that night.”

  “Who was the other man?” I asked. “The man you paid.”

  “He had a funny name,” she said, blinking as she tried to recall.

  From down the hallway, young voices spilled out, hollering at each other. Two boys bounded into the living room and landed in pile at their mother’s feet.

  “Manuel! Rigo!” she said harshly. “We have guests.”

  The boys untangled themselves and stood. They looked to be six or seven years old, dressed in shorts and Chargers T-shirts. Both had the dark hair and dark skin of their mother. They looked at each other and giggled.

  Lucia rattled off something in Spanish, and the giggling stopped. They looked at us.

  “Sorry,” the slightly taller one said.

  “Sorry,” the other one said.

  Liz smiled. “It’s okay, guys.”

  “We’ll be done soon,” Lucia told them. “Go back to your rooms.” They tore off toward the back of the house. I wondered if they knew what had happened to their father.

  Lucia watched them go, then folded her hands in her lap. “They’re very handsome,” Liz said.

  Lucia forced a tiny smile. “Thank you. They are good boys.”

  Lucia turned to me. “The one that look like you. He was named Simmings. Something like that.”

  “Simington,” I said, the name tasting sour as it came out of my mouth.

  “Yes,” she said. “And the man that we paid was named King, maybe? I remember he always wore a very crazy shirt.” “Crazy how?” I asked. “Women dancing. Lots of colors.”

  A crazy shirt. I remembered the guy from the casino who Carter and I had exchanged words with.

  And King sounded too close to the name Simington had given me to be a coincidence.

  “Keene?” I said. “Landon Keene?”

  She looked at me, then nodded slowly. “Yes. That is it.”

  THIRTY-TWO

  “Do you know Keene?” I asked Asanti as we drove away from Lucia Vasquez’s home.

  “I know the name,” Asanti said. “I’ve heard it mentioned in several different cases involving illegal transportation. Not in a good way. But I’ve never
seen or spoken to him.”

  “What’s your sense?” Liz asked.

  “People are scared of him.” Asanti turned back under the interstate and pointed us toward the station. “Most of these guys just use straight intimidation. It’s the most effective tool to use against a person from another country. Immigrants fear the US authorities because they are worried about being sent back to Mexico, so they would rather deal with people like Keene or Simington.”

  I shifted in the seat. Every time I heard Simington’s name it was like an unexpected pin prick that I couldn’t dodge. In my eye.

  “I think I met Keene,” I said.

  Liz turned around, and Asanti glanced in the rearview mirror. I told them about the confrontation Carter and I had had with him on the casino floor.

  Asanti pulled the car back into the police lot. We all got out. “Not surprising,” Asanti said.

  “What’s not?” I asked.

  “Keene’s presence in a casino.”

  “Why? Does he have a gambling problem?” I asked, thinking of Simington’s debts.

  “That I don’t know,” Asanti said, leaning against the trunk of the car. “But casinos are prime hunting grounds for people in his business.”

  “How do you mean?” Liz asked.

  “Let’s say Keene runs a ring of coyotes,” Asanti explained. “He needs guys to run his cargo over the border. It’s not the safest job in the world and not a position you send a resume for.” A dour expression settled on his face. “Keene needs leverage to get people to work for him. He needs people who desperately need money.” “People with gambling problems,” I said.

  Asanti pushed off the trunk of the car. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and rubbed it over the spot he’d been leaning against, wiping away whatever minute smudge his weight might have created.

  “Exactly,” he said, putting the cloth back in his pocket. “They look for regulars, men who are sweating heavily as they lose. Guys who are there so often it’s clear they aren’t employed. They’re not hard to spot. Their losses are piling up, and a guy like Keene offers them a way out. Quick cash for a little amount of work. Do the job, get the paycheck, and get right back to gambling. It’s a dangerous, foolish way out, but a way nonetheless.”