The Christmas Present. Tracy Wolff
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get for growing so big.”
Rafael grabbed a towel to wipe his face, decided to accept defeat gracefully. Maybe if he brought his mama flowers and kept her busy, she wouldn’t remember to nag him about being the only one of her children who was terminally single.
Yeah, right. His mother wouldn’t let a little thing like death stop her from hassling him—why should a bouquet of flowers do the trick? Still, Rafa thought as he drained a water bottle in one long gulp, it was worth a try.
“All right. I’ll call her.”
“You’re a good man.” Gabriel clapped him on the shoulder. “So, winners buy lunch, right? Because I’m starving.”
This time it was Jose who flipped him the bird, having extracted his head from under Miguel’s arm.
“Well, come on then, I’ve got to be back at work in half an hour and I’m hungry, too.” Miguel picked up his bag from the side of the court and headed into the center.
A few minutes later they were all seated at Manuel’s, Rafa’s favorite hole-in-the-wall taco shop, shoveling carne asada burritos into their mouths. Rafa had already blown through his first when he noticed Nacho standing at the corner with an unfamiliar white boy.
“Hey, Jose. Did you get a chance to talk to Nacho about what he pulled the other night?”
Jose followed his gaze. “Absolutely. My partner and I went by and read him the riot act. Hopefully, it’ll be enough.”
Rafa cut his eyes to his best friend. “You don’t think so?”
“No, man. That kid’s a walking time bomb.”
“That’s what I think, too.”
“Who’s he with?” Miguel nodded at the prepped-out white kid. In his chinos and fancy sweater, he stuck out like Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer. “Is he one of your kids, Rafa?”
“No, but he seems familiar.” He continued to watch him, wondering what the kid was doing in this neighborhood—and with Nacho. “That doesn’t look good, though.” He turned to Jose.
“I know. But I can’t see Nacho buying any of his customers lunch.”
“He’s dealing?” This from Gabriel.
“That’s what I hear.”
Rafael cursed. “You know that’s not a good thing. The kid’s already an amoral ass. I can’t wait to see what a few months as a dealer turns him into.”
“I think it’s too late to worry about that.” Jose took another big bite.
“I know. But still…” Rafa ran a hand over his eyes. You can’t save them all, he reminded himself. Especially the ones who aren’t interested in salvation. It grated that a teenager was going bad in front of his eyes. He still remembered Nacho as a little kid. He’d been skinny and mean even then, but there’d been something endearing about him, anyway. Now he was just plain mean.
Regardless, Rafa couldn’t help wondering if the rest was still there, too, just buried beneath the crap. On his way out of the restaurant, he stopped by the table. “Hey, Nacho. Who’s your friend?”
“Screw you, Rafael.”
“Thanks, but you’re not my type.” He held out his hand to the other kid, who shook it, but then looked as if he wanted to swim in a vat of hand sanitizer.
Rafa didn’t get what these two were doing together, but he’d bet the twenty in his wallet that it had something to do with the drugs Jose had been talking about. “We’re having a barbecue at the center this weekend. You guys should drop by.”
“Yeah, ’cause that’s going to happen,” Nacho sneered.
“Too busy picking on defenseless women to make time for a hamburger, huh?”
“Too busy avoiding pendejos like you.”
“Well, that’s your prerogative.” He looked at the preppy kid. “Nice to meet you…?’
“Thomas.”
“Thomas,” he repeated. “Maybe I’ll see you around.”
“Maybe.”
As Rafael hustled to catch up with the rest of the guys, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d seen the new kid before. Anymore than he could ignore how uncomfortable that knowledge made him.
“THANKS SO MUCH FOR seeing me today.” Vivian extended her hand to each homicide detective in turn. “It’s nice to meet you both.”
“Same here.” Detective Anthony Barnes nodded to her, a lock of his too-long, sand-colored hair falling over his baby face as he did so. He looked younger than Diego, and the idea that this guy had arrested her client for murder threw her for a major loop.
“You want some coffee?” demanded Daniel Turner, the other detective, even as he raised a hand to signal the waitress.
“That’d be great,” she said, though she’d already had an entire pot of the stuff that morning. But she didn’t want to seem prickly, especially since these two had been nice enough to meet with her when other detectives would have turned up their noses.
She smiled at Turner, and was glad to see that he, at least, looked like her idea of a homicide detective. A little overweight, a little rumpled, with lines in his face that showed every one of his forty-odd years, he seemed like he’d been doing this job for a long time.
“Thanks again for meeting me,” she said, in an effort to keep everything cordial. “I know how busy you are.”
“That’s okay.” Turner shrugged. “We wanted to get a look at the woman who was defending that piece of scum, anyway.”
Maybe he’d been on the job too long, Vivian thought, as sheer strength of will kept a pleasant expression on her face. “So, you’re really convinced Diego did it?”
“We’re not in the habit of arresting people for murder if we think they’re innocent.” The detective’s voice was deliberately bland.
“Of course. I wasn’t trying to imply that you did. It’s just that after reviewing the case, so much of the evidence seems circumstantial to me.”
“Enough circumstance adds up—if you know what I’m saying.”
“I do. But still, why Diego? I know you always look at the boyfriend or husband first, but sometimes he isn’t the killer.”
“Most of the time he is.” Turner reached for one of the little packets of half-and-half and ripped it open. “In this case, Sanchez is definitely it. He’s practically got a scarlet A branded into his chest.”
“Why? Witnesses say they saw him drop the victim off at her house at least a couple hours before she was murdered.”
“Yeah, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t circle back,” Barnes interjected. She glanced at him and was surprised at how uncomfortable he looked, as if he’d rather be anywhere but in this crappy little coffee shop.
Deciding to push him, she replied, “It doesn’t mean he did, either. It seems to me he really loved that girl.”
“Yeah, well, appearances are deceiving. If you learn nothing else in this foray of yours into criminal court, learn that,” Turner said, before Barnes could speak.
“Oh, I think that’s a lesson I’ve already learned.” Vivian smiled sweetly at him as she let her eyes run over him from head to toe.
He flushed. “Good. Because no one else had motive, means and opportunity.” He tore open two packets of sugar and dumped them into his coffee, then took a huge swig without bothering to stir it.
“Means?” she asked as she went over the file in her head for what felt