Girls Like Us(28)

“How did you know?”

“Do I look stupid to you?”

“Not at all. But the details help me understand.”

She sighs. “A car would pick her up. An Escalade.”

“The same car?”

“Usually, yeah. She said he was a friend. He’d wait for her down the block. Sometimes she’d come back late. Other times, she’d be gone all night and come back in the morning.”

“Would you recognize the driver if I showed you a photo?”

“Oh, yeah. Once I went out there and gave him a piece of my mind. Told him to get off my property. I said I’d call the police. He laughed. He said, ‘Go ahead.’ Like he was daring me. Asshole.”

“Was his car white?”

“Yeah. White. Rims. Flashy, you know? The night she went missing it was a different car. A black sedan. Like a town car.”

“Same driver?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t see his face.”

“That’s okay. This is all really helpful.”

Lee returns and hands Elena a glass of water.

“Thanks,” she says. She takes a small sip. Her hands shake; I can see the water vibrating inside the glass. She holds it tightly as though she’s afraid it might slip from her grasp.

“Did you ever call the police? About the guy in the white car?”

“No. I didn’t want Adriana to get in trouble.”

“But you didn’t want her escorting,” Lee counters.

“Of course not. Would you want your sister doing that?” She stops, takes a breath, and begins slowly. “Look, it’s easy money. Put up an ad on Craigslist, Backpage, and that’s it, the phone starts ringing. Adriana, she had her regulars. I would hear her talking to them sometimes, like they was her boyfriend. ‘Hey baby, how was your trip?’ That kind of shit. She was young, you know? She trusted people. She was always like that, even back in school.”

“She was a kind person,” I say.

“Yeah, she had a big heart. She wanted to be a nurse. She was real sensitive. Like, you could put her with anyone and she would be their best friend by the end of the night. Everyone always talked to her about their problems.”

“Did she finish school?”

Elena shakes her head. “She had some learning issues. Made school tough for her. And our household wasn’t all that stable growing up. I mean, it was fine. We had what we needed. But our dad wasn’t around and our mom, she wasn’t all there, you know what I’m saying? I pretty much raised Adriana myself. I kept telling her to get her GED. But she wanted to be out on her own, to make some money and then go back. Once that lowlife she was dating got shipped upstate, she didn’t have a lot of options. She moved in with me. We fought about her getting a job. A real job. Not this shit. We fought about a lot of things.”

She sighs then, a bone-tired shudder of a sigh, and drops her face into her hands. “I just kept hoping she’d stop,” she whispers.

“When she went on a job, did you ask her where she was going?” Lee asks. “Or to text you when she got there?”

Elena bristles at Lee’s question. Her eyes narrow. “Yeah, I did,” she says, defensive. “Sometimes she would. Sometimes she wouldn’t. Look, she was eighteen. I couldn’t control her. All I could do was give her a place to stay. We all need to work, Detective.”

“I get it. I’m sorry, I wasn’t suggesting—”

“She helped out a lot around here. She’d buy groceries, bring home pizza. And she watched Isabel, too, so we didn’t need as much day care. She was making good money. Her clients were loaded. Even if she was spending too much on herself, looking the way she did, she still brought a lot of cash home.”

“What do you mean, looking the way she did?”

“You know. Hair done, nails done. Fancy clothes. After she started up working these parties, she got real focused on her appearance. You can see.” She gestures toward a door across the hall. “That’s her room, right there.”

Her hackles are up. I can see by the way she’s sitting: ramrod straight, shoulders up around her ears. She grips the glass so hard I worry she might break it. Lee doesn’t seem to notice. He opens his mouth. Before he pisses her off further, I interject. “Lee, why don’t you go check out Adriana’s room. I want to ask Ms. Marques a few more questions.”

Lee nods, grateful to have something else to do. Once he’s gone, Elena’s body softens a touch. She slumps back into her chair. I can see the energy draining out of her. Her eyelids flicker, like they want to close and stay that way.

“Adriana left around eight that night,” she says. “The kids were eating dinner. I wanted her to eat with us, but she said she had to go. She seemed rushed, like she hadn’t had much notice or whatever. She was dressed up. High heels, tight dress.”

“Did she have a purse with her?”

“She had a bag. A tote bag. Maybe she was planning to spend the night.”

“Did you see her get in the car?”

“Yeah. I followed her outside. I called out to her as she was getting in the car, but she didn’t hear me.”

“I know the car was different, but do you think it might have been the same driver?”