Uptown Thief

by Aya De León

  “Good thing we came home,” the woman said. She padded across the carpet and picked up her shoes. “I had to pee and that restaurant bathroom was disgusting.” Her voice trailed away as she moved toward the back of the apartment.

  The screwdriver dug into Marisol’s right hip. She angled her body to take off the pressure. As she did, she heard a tiny rustle of paper. Folded up in her bra was the same newspaper article from the bulletin board in the van. She carried it as a talisman.

  Ivy League Fraternity CEOs Cleared in Sex Trafficking Case

  Houston, TX (January 17th)—A federal judge dropped all sex trafficking charges against the organization Ivy Alpha, the national men’s organization whose members are all Ivy League alumni and Fortune 500 CEOs. A complaint alleged that the organization brought in young Mexican women as prostitutes at Ivy Alpha’s annual conference in Houston last year, under the guise of a “dance performance.” The fraternity was charged with several misdemeanors and felonies, including child prostitution, as some of the girls involved were underage. “The hypocrisy is particularly outrageous,” said the attorney who filed the complaint. “All the CEOs have factories in the region that offer low-wage jobs to women as part of anti-trafficking efforts to provide ‘jobs with dignity’ to women who have been ‘rescued and rehabilitated.’” One CEO’s bookkeeper turned whistleblower when she suspected trafficking: “I requested the lodging invoice for the women since the transportation invoice clearly showed that they came early Saturday evening, but didn’t leave until Sunday morning. My boss said, ‘Don’t worry about it,’ but I dug around a little, and it became clear that those girls spent the night in the CEOs’ rooms.” Criminal charges were dropped despite several firsthand accounts by the women allegedly involved. According to the judge, the evidence was insufficient to proceed with a trial against the organization. Defense attorneys insisted that the firsthand accounts were “suspect” because “these women from Mexico would say anything in order to come to the US.”

  Pictured above, the eleven New York–based CEOs who are board members of Ivy Alpha.

  “Where did you leave the theater tickets?” the man asked.

  “In the breakfast nook,” the woman called back. “I used them as a bookmark.”

  “What time is it?” he asked, over the sound of running water. “You hate to miss the beginning of a show.”

  Marisol saw the woman’s feet as she stepped into a pair of brown boots.

  “You look stunning,” the husband said. “Maybe we can have our own little show right here at home?”

  Two pairs of feet moved closer to each other.

  The woman giggled. “Easy there, big fella. I promised my brother I’d come backstage afterward—mmmmm . . .”

  “Well . . .” The husband’s voice was low, seductive. “We can’t really be seated until after intermission, sweetheart. We have at least half an hour.”

  “Half an hour is not enough time to get into anything naughty,” she said.

  “Usually it’s not,” he said. “But I took a little trip to the fountain of youth.”

  “I thought the Viagra made your vision bluish,” she said.

  “My doctor got me something else,” he said. “I can see you perfectly. Can you see what I’ve got for you?”

  “Wow,” she said.

  The man’s pants dropped around his ankles.

  The couple laughed, murmured, and moaned. The woman’s bra fell next to her stockinged feet, and then both of their bodies sank into Marisol’s view. Their foreplay continued on the carpet.

  The husband knelt on the rug, in front of his wife’s parted thighs. He slid off the lacy beige panties below her skirt.

  As he lowered himself between the wife’s legs, she moaned.

  “Am I rocking your world, baby?” he asked.

  “Oh yes,” she called back. “Yes!” The young wife had the practiced, breathless affectation that any pro could recognize.

  Marisol distracted herself by trying to guess the take from the safe. How many bricks of cash had there been? Seventy-five hundred would cover this month’s mortgage payment on the clinic. But $14,750 would make payroll.

  Government cutbacks had hit the clinic hard a few years before, and Marisol had opened a discreet escort service to cover the $5,000 gap every month. Then, one of their private foundation supporters came under fire for funding birth control, and didn’t renew their operational grant. Previously, it had been one of their most reliable income sources. Marisol kicked the escort service into overdrive, hustling to hang on until later this spring, when a different foundation would disburse a grant award for 1.3 million dollars. Her scheme was working until their biggest corporate sponsor went bankrupt. But that same week the chance to heist the first corrupt CEO practically fell into her lap. Her mother would have called it a sign from God.

  A hand swung into Marisol’s view, almost touching the screw that lay just beyond the perimeter of the carpet. Marisol jerked and nearly banged her head against the roof of the vent. Holding her breath, she watched the woman dig the back of her fingers into the carpet. With each thrust, her little finger moved closer to the screw.

  “Oh God!” the woman moaned.

  When her hand touched the screw, she didn’t seem to notice. Then they changed positions, with the wife on top.

  Marisol felt jagged from the tension between the adrenaline rush and the need to stay still. Her leg twitched, and she breathed to calm her system. She willed herself toward soothing thoughts, recalling the last place she felt she could really relax. She imagined la playa, El Escambron Beach, in Puerto Rico, and being with her grandmother when she was eleven. She recalled humid nights sleeping under a mosquito net with Cristina, laughing and admonishing her younger sister not to scratch her bites, even as Marisol secretly scratched her own—not scratched, but pressed the tip of her nail on the bite, making an X across the surface of each one. Scratching broke the skin, made it bleed, invited infection. The nail press brought delicious relief, but left no trace.

  The sharp clacking of the woman’s boot heels on the hardwood floor brought Marisol back. Back to the screwdriver digging into her hip, her cramping fingers as she held the grate, the pain in her jaw from biting down on the flashlight, and her stiffening muscles.

  “I just need to freshen my lipstick,” the wife said, slightly breathless. “You have the tickets?”

  “Got them,” the husband said.

  Marisol waited in the dark, at the edge of her endurance. The vent air was starting to taste stale, and her fingers and neck cramped. As she turned her head slightly she saw the little model building, and recognized the logo on it from the CEO’s tech factory in Mexico. Suddenly she didn’t feel discomfort, just a furious, cold resolve. Before the scandal broke, this CEO was hailed for providing “decent” jobs for formerly trafficked girls. Yet building a tech assembly factory beside a notorious red-light district simply meant rescue operations could send a never-ending supply of cheap labor. Marisol could have stood the hypocrisy of hiring sex workers for his conference. But she had read the court transcripts. According to the women involved, some corrupt members of the anti-trafficking organization had handpicked the girls they considered most attractive and then groomed them as dancers. They dangled promises of green cards to the United States. Then they just shipped them into the conference to provide sexual services to the CEOs.

  The bag of cash pressed against her ankle. As always, she would send some of the funds to a group in Mexico that worked directly with the women.

  She kept her eye on the edge of the logo until she heard the alarm code. She waited until all three locks were bolted into place before she unpacked herself from the vent, spilling her body out onto the floor and spitting out the flashlight.

  She heard the ding of the elevator. Pulling pliers from her bag, she snipped off the ends of the screws and used epoxy to glue the four screw heads onto the front of the grate.

  As she waited for it to dry, she swept her arm along the
living room shelf, knocking everything onto the floor. The ceramic and glass framing a picture of the man and two teenage kids shattered on the hardwood floor, but the plastic cover on the little model building only cracked slightly. It wasn’t nearly as satisfying as dropping the award seventy stories during her first theft.

  * * *

  It was just past midnight when Marisol’s taxi crossed into Alphabet City. She drove by a couple screaming outside one of the bars: “You were flirting with her! You were totally fucking flirting!” They drove through traffic backed up from an accident on the Williamsburg Bridge.

  With all the gentrification, the Lower East Side felt muted these days. When Marisol was a kid, Loisaida had a different soundscape: Mamas calling, “Oye, Yunior, get your ass inside!” Salsa blasting from apartment windows, and summertime outdoor conga jam sessions with the splash of hydrants.

  Over time, many of the murals had become discolored. Red paint faded quickly, so the Puerto Rican flags were now pale pink, white, and blue. These days offered plenty of bright red neon for ATM or Under New Ownership signs. Where there used to be glinting mirrored mosaics on somebody’s storefront or crazy sculpture installations in a vacant lot, now there were galleries, and graffiti lettering to advertise beauty salons that mostly catered to straight hair.

  Even people’s fashion colors had dulled. The visual riot of Latin clothes had yielded to subdued hipster hues. Tropical turquoise, magenta, yellow-green, and violet still appeared in women’s outfits, but no longer all together.

  The cab dropped her on a quiet street between Avenues D and C. She held her purse closer. It wouldn’t do to get mugged on the way back from a burglary.

  With the exception of that small hitch tonight, her burglary modus operandi was working flawlessly. Kim had a client who was a tech consultant with these Ivy Alpha guys. He and his lovely Asian “girlfriend” got invited to their parties. Kim could take pictures with her date in strategic locations, and Marisol would research the technology in preparation to do the hit. With wealthy Manhattanites, it was easy to pick a night they’d be out.

  Half a block from her apartment, Marisol noticed a figure huddled in a doorway. The block was deserted. At first she stepped back, in case it was a setup. But as she got closer, she could see it was a young woman. Her face was hidden, but Marisol could see a bare bruised leg in a scuffed-up pair of eight-inch, silver platform boots.

  Chapter 4

  “You okay, honey?” Marisol asked the girl in the doorway.

  She didn’t stir.

  “Hello?” Marisol saw the slight rise and fall of breath. She tapped the spot she estimated to be a shoulder.

  The girl shrieked and curled into a ball. “I’m sorry! Descúlpame!”

  Marisol saw the girl’s face for a second. So young. Marisol had a flashback of her own bruised teenage face, a late-night trip to the emergency room, lying to a social worker.

  “It’s okay,” Marisol said, placing a hand on the girl’s back to calm her. “Nobody’s gonna hurt you, nena.”

  The girl released the fist that her body had become.

  A hospital ID bracelet peeked from under the sling on the girl’s arm. Marisol recalled the times she’d cut hers off before she returned to her uncle’s house. She didn’t want to get in trouble for involving the authorities.

  “Mamita, you shouldn’t stay out here,” Marisol whispered. “I’ll take you to the clinic down the street.”

  “They’re closed for the night,” the girl muttered into the sheet that fell back from a heavily bruised face. She was Latina, with honey-blond hair, midnight at the roots.

  Marisol reached out her hand. “I work there. I can get you in. Come on, mija. Do you need help up?”

  “He said he’d kill me if I ever went there,” the girl said, tears spilling across the plum and violet of her face. “He dumped me at the ER and said to come home when I could walk. There ain’t many places in the city a beat-down whore can go. He said he knew all of them and he’d be watching.”

  Marisol felt a flash of rage. She remembered her uncle’s words, decades ago: I’m your only family now. Nobody else wants you. His words stung. He had reached toward her body, but she sidestepped him easily that night since he was falling-down drunk.

  “Mira,” Marisol said to the girl. “Of course you’re scared of whoever did this, but he’s not here now. There’s a place for you a few buildings down.”

  Marisol took the girl’s good arm to help her up, but she stayed put.

  “Corazón, look around.” Marisol knelt down. “There’s nobody here but us.”

  The young woman looked out at the empty street. Every car was perfectly covered in white. “He has guys on his payroll who follow us sometimes.”

  Marisol knew the risk the girl would be taking to go to the clinic. Still, if she could just get her into the building, she could protect her.

  “Jerry was right,” the girl said. She was on her feet now, unsteady on the torn platform boots, and still wrapped in a hospital sheet. “I really—” She took two steps, wavered, collapsed against the doorway, and threw up into the snow.

  “I’m taking you in,” Marisol said. She put her arm around the girl, half-carrying her down the block to the clinic.

  The girl stumbled along. Marisol unlocked the door. She turned on the lamp next to one of the couches.

  In the dim light, the lobby would have looked like a living room, if not for the large reception desk and the vending machines under the stairwell. The room was filled with comfy couches and reclining chairs. A large flat-screen TV sat against the far wall, and beside it was a shelf filled with books, magazines, and board games.

  The clinic was a former storefront that had sold tobacco, and whenever Marisol leaned against the walls, she detected the faint smell of sweet pipe smoke. In the rear of the lobby, a security door opened up to a stairwell. The upper floors had mostly been converted from apartments to clinic offices.

  “What’s your name?” Marisol asked.

  “Dulce.”

  “Dulce, I’m admitting you to the shelter for the night. You’ll have an intake appointment in the morning. Wait here.” Marisol gestured toward the couch. Dulce collapsed onto it.

  “What if they won’t let me in?” Dulce asked.

  “I’m the executive director,” Marisol said. “I say who comes in.”

  She scanned her ID card and opened the door to the stairwell. She ran up the stairs, the oversized bag filled with stolen cash bumping against her hip.

  On the second floor, Marisol saw a strip of light coming from under one of the doors. She knocked, and Dr. Eva Feldman let her in.

  Marisol walked into the office and hugged her co-director. Eva was in her early sixties, her body thick and solid.

  “Three more light bulbs blew out today,” Eva said, shutting the door behind Marisol.

  “I know,” Marisol said. “They’re defective.”

  “Defective? They’re black market,” Eva said. “You got ripped off.”

  “No, I didn’t,” Marisol insisted. “The guy made good and sent ten replacement cases. It was still a great deal.”

  “Not if you factor in staff time replacing bulbs,” Eva said. She leaned her cane against the wall and sat down at her desk. Childhood polio had rendered her left leg weak and unstable.

  The long, rectangular office had a split personality. On the administrative side, the desk overflowed with papers and books. The therapy side was open and peaceful, with two chairs, a couch, and a Zen sand garden on the table.

  “I’m not here to debate supply issues,” Marisol said. “I’ve got a late admit for the shelter.”

  “Sorry,” Eva said. “We’re full.”

  “Put her on the floor if you have to,” Marisol said with a shrug. “We have sleeping bags.”

  “The floor is full, too,” Eva said.

  “No problem.” Marisol began to pull cushions off the couch. “We can make a bed for her in the hallway.”

  �
�We can’t,” Eva said, standing up. “Another citation from the fire marshal would finish us.” She picked up her cane and walked over to Marisol.

  “A surprise inspection is a chance we have to take,” Marisol said. She balanced the pile of pillows against her hip.

  “You need to stop,” Eva said. She put a hand on Marisol’s arm. “I know you’re coming in from a job, full of adrenaline. You feel invincible, but the clinic is much too vulnerable.”

  Marisol snatched the throw blanket off the back of the couch, and slung it over her shoulder. “I did not spend an hour crawling through a fucking air vent just to turn somebody away who needs us. This girl is vulnerable. She’s half-dead with some pimp looking for her.” Marisol put her free hand on the bulge of cash in her bag.

  “We have an agreement, Marisol,” Eva said. “You fund the clinic. I run the clinic. It doesn’t make sense to save one girl for one night if the clinic gets shut down.”

  Marisol sucked her teeth. “It doesn’t make sense to you because you’ve never stood in that girl’s shoes.”

  During high school Marisol had felt the urge to vomit every time she entered her uncle’s apartment.

  “I am not putting that girl back out in the snow,” Marisol said.

  “Then I’ll put her out in the snow,” Eva said. “I won’t have the whole clinic at risk because you can’t see the big picture.” She pulled a list of shelters off the crammed bulletin board. “I’ll call to see if there’s an open bed.” Eva picked up the phone receiver.

  “Her pimp is looking to finish her off,” Marisol said, hitting the Off button on the base of the phone.

  “We’re not the only clinic in the city, Marisol. We can’t save everybody.”