No Witness But the Moon(69)

“It’s just a sprain. She’ll need a boot brace for a week or so and then she’ll be fine. Peter wants to drive Sophia home.” Adele frowned at the children sitting at a table by the vending machines. The girl was carefully parceling out the candy bar for the boy and herself. “Damon?” Adele called to the little boy.

He smiled at Adele. The girl’s body language grew suspicious and defensive. She hunched closer to the boy. Vega realized that the teenager hadn’t yet met Adele.

“Damon?” asked Adele. “Is that your sister?”

“Yovanna, yes,” said the boy.

Adele turned to Vega. “These are Marcela’s children,” she said in English. She sounded alarmed. “What are they doing here?”

Vega swallowed hard. “I don’t know,” he lied. He couldn’t say anything that would jeopardize an ongoing investigation.

Adele addressed the girl in Spanish. “Yovanna? I’m a friend of your mother’s. Is she okay?”

“Yes.” The girl kept her eyes on the table.

“She’s not hurt?”

“No.”

“Byron? Is Byron hurt?”

“No.”

Adele turned back to Vega. “What’s going on?” Vega beckoned her out of the room.

“Marcela and Byron aren’t hurt or in trouble. I can’t tell you anything more than that.”

“But you know what’s going on?”

“Some of it. Look, Adele—” He took her hand. Her fingers had gone clammy and cold. “This whole case is changing right now. You have to trust me.”

“What about Marcela’s situation?” Adele must have read it in Vega’s eyes. She pushed his hand away. “You didn’t tell anyone what I told you, did you?”

“Nena, I had to let the police know that someone threatened the family.”

“You told? After I asked you not to?”

“I had to. It’s going to go to Dolan and my department anyway.”

“But not like this! Not for the police to use any way they want! What’s going on?”

“I can’t say. Not yet.”

“Oh, you can’t say. Goody for you. You can’t talk about the shooting. You can’t tell me why Marcela’s children are here. You betray my confidence and won’t tell me why—”

“C’mon, Nena. Don’t be like this. Things are happening. I have a duty—”

“Don’t tell me about your duty. Your duty got Marcela’s father killed!”

Vega stood there, feeling everything, saying nothing.

“Just—” Adele held up her hands and backed away from him. “I think you were right, Jimmy. I think it’s best we took a break from each other. You’d better call a cab. I don’t think I can handle having you around right now.”





Chapter 26


Vega’s cell phone rang by his bedside on Sunday morning. He rolled over to grab it and felt the ice-pick sharpness of strained muscles and bruised skin. Every inch of his body ached, right down to the shafts of his hair. Even the sunlight peeking through the cheap room-darkening shades felt like an assault.

He squinted at the name that came up on the screen. He was hoping it was Adele. Or Joy. Or even Teddy Dolan or Louis Greco with an update. The name on the phone read: Ellen Cantor.

Greco’s shrink. No way did he want to talk to her. No way did he want to call her back, either.

“Yeah?” He hoped his hoarse clipped voice would indicate his displeasure at being called so early.

“Is this Jim Vega?”

If she’d listened to his voice mail properly, she’d have realized that he identified himself as “Jimmy.” How could she help him if she couldn’t even get his name right?

“This is Jimmy Vega.”

“This is Ellen Cantor. You called me yesterday?”

“Yeah.” Vega searched for his manners. Why was he being so hostile?

He knew why. One word: Wendy. His ex-wife. He could never look at any kind of counselor and not think of her. The therapy queen. The woman who believed talking things out could solve all your problems—and then promptly cheated on him and left with nary a session of marital counseling. They’d been divorced almost six years now. She was long remarried. Joy was grown. Those twin rug rats that Alan had impregnated her with while she and Vega were still together were in kindergarten now. It was time to stop hating her for how she’d hurt him. But for some reason, the wound never closed. His psyche felt like a minefield that poor Ellen Cantor was glibly planning a picnic on.

“Thanks for calling me back,” said Vega finally. “I, uh—don’t know if you know who I am.”

“You’re the police officer who was involved in that shooting incident.”

Involved-in-that-shooting-incident. That was kind. Better than he’d have said.

“I’ve been—sort of—ordered—by my job to get some counseling before I return to work and uh, a friend gave me your name.”

“When would you like to meet?”

“I don’t know,” said Vega. How about never? Is never good for you? “Next week? The week after?”

“I’ve been following the news. I think we should meet sooner than next week. Are you free today?”