“Ten?” For the first time Danny could hear what the one he thought of as the victim had said. The voice was hoarse and Danny didn’t recognize it. It could have been anyone. He wondered briefly if this could be linked to the time Ray got beat up, but he couldn’t come up with a single reason for Ray to owe someone ten thousand dollars. He lost his train of thought when the dude in control answered. There was something about that voice...
“Yes, ten. I told you there was interest. Two weeks. Ten grand. And, to make sure you don’t forget...” The voice trailed off and the empty house resounded with the clash of breaking glass and the rhythmic punch of something heavy breaking through drywall.
Brad tried pulling away from Danny’s grip.
“Are you crazy?” Danny hissed, strengthening his hold. “We don’t know who’s down there or what kind of weapons they have. We need to wait for them to leave.”
As much as Danny was tempted to charge down the stairs with the hope his presence would scare off whoever was busting shit up—including some poor idiot—fear held him back. Fear and self-preservation. He wasn’t ashamed to admit it, at least to himself. He’d once seen a man who stepped between a clerk and some guy intent on robbing a gas station. He’d been five and his papá had pushed Danny behind his bigger body, but he’d been able to hear the whole thing. The robber had turned on the would-be rescuer and shot him, point blank, in the chest.
For all they knew, the guys downstairs had guns or knives and, horrible as it was, at least it didn’t sound like they wanted their victim dead. Dead men couldn’t pay debts, right? Of course, he couldn’t explain all of this to Brad, not then. After an excruciatingly long thirty seconds, Brad finally nodded and relaxed next to him.
When the sounds of destruction had died and the front door slammed, Danny waited a full five minutes before carefully getting to his feet and creeping into the hall to look over the railing into the living room below. The place was a mess, with broken glass and gaping holes in the freshly painted walls.
Papá was going to be pissed.
Brad came over and peered down at the wreck. “Do you think whoever got hurt is still there?”
Danny shrugged. “I’ll check it out, I guess. You stay here.” Brad glared at him but didn’t argue. He made his way down the stairs and scanned the first floor. “I don’t see anyone, so he must have left too,” he told Brad when he returned.
Danny looked back into the room. Brad had folded the blanket and stuffed the garbage from their dinner into the drugstore bag. “What should we do now?” Brad asked.
“I guess we’d better call mi papá. Or maybe the police?”
“How do we explain our presence here? We were basically trespassing.”
“Anonymous call?” Danny suggested. “We could say we saw someone going in and out of the house and, since it was late and under construction, we worried about vandals.”
“Do you think it’s related to the graffiti the other day?”
“I think it’s got to be, don’t you? I mean, it would be too much of a coincidence otherwise, right?”
Brad nodded. “That’s what I think. I also think the warning was meant for someone on the crew.”
“It makes sense, but who?”
“There’s something else.” Brad started popping his knuckles. “How did they get in here tonight? You locked the door after we got in, right?”
“Yeah,” Danny said, thinking back. “I put the key away and locked the door.” His mouth twisted in a wry smile. “I didn’t want to be interrupted.”
“That’s what I thought. How’d they get in?”
“Maybe they broke in somehow?”
They gathered their things and made their way downstairs. At the front door, Brad took out his phone and used the glow from the screen to illuminate the door. It didn’t look like anyone had broken in using force around the lock or knob. Danny could admit he didn’t know the first thing about breaking and entering, but if force or some tool had been used, surely there would be signs of damage.
“They used the key,” Brad said, shining the light on the lockbox. The very open lockbox.
“I locked it back up!” Danny said quickly.
“I know, I saw you. You know what that means, right?”
“No, what?”
“Whoever broke in knew the code.”
“That’s not possible.” Even as he said the words, Danny’s mind whirled with the implications. It had been somebody on the crew. Someone betrayed Papá.
“Who all knows the lockbox codes?”
“I don’t know.”
“You knew it,” Brad pointed out. “Who else could have?”
“I don’t know. I knew the code because I had to deliver stuff here a few weeks ago and something about the pattern of the numbers stayed with me. Chuy and Jackie would probably know it. They’re in charge here when Papá has to be at one of the other sites or in meetings or whatever. Ray might know it. It could be anybody. It wouldn’t occur to my dad to keep it a secret from the crew. Almost everyone on the crew has been with the company for years and is totally trustworthy.”
“It sounds like someone owes someone a lot of money. People often do things they wouldn’t normally do when there’s money or harm in the balance. Do you think whoever did this is the one who stole the equipment? The one guy said whoever he was threatening had made a few small payments. Maybe he made payments after hocking your dad’s tools?”
Danny could hear the unspoken reference to Ray in Brad’s statement. He refused to believe, or even consider, that his brother could be involved in something that would hurt the company. Besides, they were in the middle of Minnesota. What trouble could Ray possibly get into that would equal ten thousand dollars?
“We should leave the lockbox and door the way we found it. Papá will need to know someone he trusts is involved.”
Danny stalked to the Jeep, Brad at his side. The cops had better figure out who was involved. Not only had they betrayed Papá and possibly set up Brad to take the blame, they’d also put a pretty crappy end to what had been a fantastic date.
* * *
When they arrived at the Ortegas’ house, Brad didn’t want to undo his seat belt. He wanted to rewind the last hour and replay their time in the house before the stranger had come and trashed the place.
“I don’t want to go in yet.” Danny leaned back and closed his eyes. “Someone’s going to call Papá and I don’t think I can be there when they do.” He turned his head to look at Brad. “Does it make me a coward that I don’t want to face him, to see his eyes when he realizes someone he trusts is fucking with his business?”
“It makes you human.”
“And I don’t know what help I could be, anyway. It’s not like he’ll look to me for support. I’m just a kid. At least that’s how he thinks of me.”
“I wish I knew what to tell you,” Brad said. He hated seeing the disappointment and self-doubt in Danny’s expression. Danny who was so positive, whose personality was larger-than-life. He took Danny’s hand, trying to give what comfort he could.
There might be something he could do to help, at least for the night. The real question was, could he handle it? He tugged at his thumb, cracking the big knuckle. He’d promised to try. Here was his chance. He met Danny’s dark gaze. “You can come up and stay with me tonight if you want.”
Danny’s eyes widened. “Yeah? You wouldn’t mind?”
“Not at all.” Brad squeezed Danny’s hand. “Really, it’s fine.”
“But before... Are you sure you want to be that open about this?”
The more Danny worried, the more determined Brad was. He could do this. “There’s not much I wouldn’t do for you, and giving you a place to crash—especially if it’s next to me—isn’t a hardship.”
The smile on Danny’
s face made the decision worth every second of discomfort he might face later.
“That’d be great.” Danny pulled the keys from the ignition and opened the door. Brad let go of his hand and got out on his side of the Jeep.
“You’d better at least let your parents know you won’t be home tonight so they don’t worry.”
“It won’t bother you for me to tell them I’m with you, will it?” Danny asked. “I don’t like to lie to my parents and, well, I’m hiding enough from them right now.”
“You said before they wouldn’t mind. You’re sure they won’t care that you’re with me, right?”
“Are you kidding me? Mi papá picked out our condoms. I’m pretty sure he knows we’re more than friends. He also knows we’ve been seeing each other and, last I checked, we’re both over the age of consent.”
Just past the driveway, where the path split between the kitchen door and the garage stairs, they halted. “I’ll peek in and let Mamá know where I’ll be. Wait for me?”
“Always.” The minute the word escaped his mouth, Brad wanted to call it back. Declarations of love were one thing, but lines straight out of a cheesy date movie were something altogether different.
Danny grinned at him, as though understanding his reaction. “I’ll hold you to it.” He winked and turned in to the house.
Ray’s monster-sized truck roared up to the house, the bass from his stereo pounding. Ray jumped out of the truck and slammed the door behind him. He strode to the kitchen door with measured steps, his posture unusually rigid. Ray didn’t seem to notice Brad at all when he passed him on his way to the house.
Had he been the one at the Bay Street house or was it something else? Brad sincerely hoped Ray wasn’t involved. He didn’t want to imagine the reactions from Mr. and Mrs. Ortega or Danny if Ray was responsible. They deserved more than that.
A few seconds later, Danny appeared, grinning. “Mamá said to tell you hello and we are both expected for brunch tomorrow morning.”
Heat crept up Brad’s neck. “I somehow hope she thinks you’ll be sleeping on the couch.”
Danny laughed, almost a giggle. “I think she prefers to think something like that. She knows better, but it’s probably better for everyone if she pretends.” Danny grabbed Brad’s hand and led him to the stairs up to Brad’s apartment. “C’mon. It’s still early for bed, but I have a feeling we can come up with something to keep us occupied for a little while.” He waved the plastic bag with his free hand.
Brad hadn’t even noticed Danny had the sack. “Oh my God! Tell me you didn’t let your mom see that!”
“Maybe I did and maybe I didn’t!” Danny taunted, and ran up the stairs, towing Brad behind him.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The cops showed up at the jobsite on Monday. They planned to interview everyone who had access to the lockbox code.
Danny didn’t like lying at the best of times, and lying to the police seemed like a really bad idea. But admitting to having used the key to get it on with his boyfriend in private would likely put him at the top of the suspect list, right? But Papá would have to be told and then he’d be disappointed in Danny. There was too much to worry about.
“You’re over-thinking it,” Brad told him when the police started making the rounds with their interviews.
“I know, but I don’t know what to do.”
“Maybe you should tell the truth. How bad could it be?”
They were back in the house, adding the finishing touches to the rooms that hadn’t been destroyed. Every time Danny saw the gaping holes—the result of a sledgehammer being used with great force—it felt like fire ants were eating at his stomach lining.
“I don’t know.” Danny flopped down on a roll of carpet waiting to be laid. “I hate this. This isn’t like the time I stole a pack of gum from the grocery store. I thought when mi mamá made me go back and admit to the manager what I had done, it was the worst I could feel. This is so much worse than that!”
“Are you telling me you’ve never lied to your parents?”
“Not about something like this. Mostly I avoided telling them about stuff that wasn’t any of their business. I mean, they didn’t need to know about the time I got drunk when I was sixteen, right? I didn’t drive, no one got hurt, so what did it matter? You know, stuff like that.”
Maybe it made him a mama’s boy, but keeping this from his family had him on edge.
“Daniel Ortega?”
One of the policemen stood at the entrance to the room with Papá next to him. “We need to ask you some questions,” the police officer said.
Danny swallowed and stood up. He hadn’t done anything wrong, but the idea of being interviewed by the police made him think of grimy interrogation rooms and hulking guys playing bad-cop and badder-cop. Every cautionary tale he’d heard about the way Hispanic men were treated by white police spun through his head in an endless stream of worst-case scenarios.
The officer was young and skinny enough that his utility belt seemed disproportionately large around his waist. His bony wrists were visible under his uniform shirt. Danny took a deep breath. He didn’t have any real reason to panic, and this guy didn’t look like the type to throw a metro phonebook at his head. Good to know.
Papá led them to the smallest of the bedrooms on the main floor. So this was going to be the interrogation room, was it? No two-way glass, no metal tables. This was getting better all the time.
“You’re aware of the damage done over the weekend?” The cop—Officer Timothy Brandon, according to the patch on his uniform—pulled out a little notebook and a pen.
“Yeah, ah, we saw it. I mean, I saw it, this morning.”
“It looks like the vandals gained entrance using the key in the lockbox at the front door.”
It wasn’t a question, but it was obvious the cop was waiting for an answer. “That’s what we’ve been told.”
“It doesn’t look as though anyone broke into the lockbox.”
Again, not a question, but when the pause after the statement grew uncomfortable, Danny said, “Okay.”
“How do you suppose they accessed the lockbox?”
“Whoever it was must have known the code.”
“Do you know the code?”
“Yeah. I’ve had to deliver equipment and things after-hours, so I was given the code.”
“Who else knows the code?”
“I couldn’t say for sure. I mean, my father, obviously, and Chuy and Jackie, the crew chiefs. My brother Ray. My brother-in-law Frankie. There are probably more who know the code or have known it for one reason or another. The people who work for my father are trustworthy.”
“Your father mentioned there have been some items stolen lately. Do you know anything about that?”
“Only what I’ve heard. I know what pieces were taken, but nothing more.”
“I’ve heard your father suspects one of the new employees of being responsible for the thefts.”
“Brad didn’t steal anything!”
“You sound certain.”
“If you knew Brad, you’d understand. He doesn’t have it in him to steal.”
Officer Brandon nodded and made a note in his little notebook. “Why were you nervous when we came in here?”
“I’m a young Hispanic male and I watch TV.”
Officer Brandon didn’t seem surprised by the comment. “Are you sure it wasn’t guilt?”
“Guilt? Why would I be guilty?”
“We see a lot of vandalism like this, and when there are threatening messages involved, it’s usually associated with gang and drug activity.”
“You can’t seriously think I’m involved in selling drugs or in gangs. Are there even any gangs in Northfield?”
Officer Brandon nodded again and made ano
ther note in his little notebook. Did he have any other reaction? “Sometimes we get some activity from the cities, sometimes someone taps into the college crowd. You said you knew the code. Did you share it with anyone?”
“No!”
“Who’s we?”
Danny shook his head. “We?”
“You said ‘we’ve been told’ and ‘we saw.’ Who is ‘we’?”
“Oh.” Danny jammed his hands into his jeans pockets. “A friend was with me.”
“A friend? And who is this friend?” By the tone of his voice, Danny couldn’t tell if Officer Brandon thought he was making something up or if he expected friend to mean fellow gang member or drug contact.
“My boyfriend.”
That seemed to surprise him. He looked up from his little notebook. “Your boyfriend?” Danny gnawed his lip. The cop waited. The silence grew and grew until it was a separate entity in the unfinished room.
Danny broke. “Okay, here’s the thing. You can’t tell my dad, okay?”
Officer Brandon’s posture didn’t change, but his gaze became predatory.
“Oh no, it wasn’t me. But I was here and I heard it all. You see, my boyfriend and I wanted some privacy...” The whole story poured out, including some details that probably weren’t necessary. Surely Officer Brandon didn’t need to know about running into his father at the drugstore or that the chicken was lukewarm by the time they ate it. Danny managed to keep from sharing the more explicit details of the evening, thank God. “You see, we overheard everything that happened, but we didn’t see anything.”
“How many people do you think were here?”
Danny thought back. “I only heard two speak, but based on the footsteps, I figure there were maybe more.”
“Did you recognize any of the voices?”
“No, not really.”
“Is it no or not really?” Officer Brandon may have looked like a typical ninety-pound fifteen-year-old playing dress-up, but he had the serious cop tone down pat.
“Something about the one guy’s voice sort of rang a bell, if you know what I mean, but I couldn’t place it. And I couldn’t hear what the other guy said.”
Nobody’s Hero Page 21