Shutter(74)

“Get some help, young lady,” the bus driver said. “I’m still calling dispatch.”

The doors hissed shut behind me. A few rusted cars from the ’50s and ’60s sat in the upholstery shop’s parking lot, along with a few lowriders and chopped pickup trucks. I knocked on the heavy metal door until a man opened it, a gun tucked into the front of his pants.

“Are you Cedric Romero?” I asked.

“Who in the hell are you?” He put his hand on his pistol.

“A friend of Erma Singleton. I have some information.”

Cedric didn’t let me finish. He pulled the gun from his waist and waved me in. “Inside.”

The old shop was smoky with marijuana. A few gangster-types hung around the counter and weathered tables. Music blasted from a stereo.

“Turn that shit off,” Cedric shouted, and the room immediately went silent. “What do you want?” he said to me.

“I know who killed your family.”

Around the dingy room, dangerous men shifted in their chairs.

“Who the fuck are you? I thought you were friends with Erma. She’s dead. You know that, right?”

“I swear I’m telling the truth. I work at the crime lab.”

Cedric cocked his gun. “You’re a fucking cop?”

I hadn’t thought this through, clearly. “Please, just let me prove it to you.”

“What are you going to prove to me?” Two of his goons had circled behind me.

“I can prove that it was Garcia who killed your uncle Ignacio.”

Cedric let his pistol drop to his side. “That fat fuck wouldn’t dare.”

“Let me show you.” I pointed to an old computer sitting dusty on the shop desk.

Cedric kept his gun on me as I signed into my Flickr account and pulled up my work files. He leaned over my shoulder. The photos loaded slowly, filling Cedric’s face with hollow light.

The photos came up one by one, unfolding the series of events that took place at the Benavidez mansion. The twentieth image: his uncle falling. Then the twenty-sixth image: Garcia’s face.

“I took these photographs of Garcia killing your uncle at the Benavidez mansion two nights ago. He is taking out everyone associated with this deal. He had Erma Singleton killed, too. And Judge Harrison Winters and his whole family.” Cedric’s gun hand began to shake with rage, and the muzzle was pointed right at me. But I wasn’t afraid anymore.

There was an echo as the front door of the upholstery shop slammed shut. Garcia and Vargas stood at the entrance with their guns drawn. Cedric returned the action. His crew stood from their stools, their crusty couches, all with guns drawn.

“Garcia, you’re gonna die,” Cedric said.

“She doesn’t know what she’s talking about.” Garcia aimed his gun at me. “We don’t need her anymore.” He pulled the trigger twice.





CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

f/5.6

WHILE ILAY on the floor of Pino’s Upholstery, I could hear Mr. Bitsilly singing so hard and so loud that his voice resonated in my skin. His throat was becoming raspy, his handkerchief soaked with sweat. Grandma and Mrs. Santillanes prayed alongside his songs. They were ashen-faced. I watched it unfold like a fly on the wall, desperate to yell for help, to make myself heard. I could feel their fear pounding through my veins.

“Something is wrong,” Mr. Bitsilly was saying. “Something is wrong with Rita.” His nose began to bleed. He struggled to rise to his feet.

A knock at the door. “It’s the neighbors. Rita’s friends.” Mrs. Santillanes opened the door for Philip and Shanice.

Shanice was shivering, her wet hair dripping on her shirt. “Have you seen Rita?” She noticed Mr. Bitsilly dabbing his mouth with a wet paper towel. “Is that blood?”

Deep in my mind, I watched Mr. Bitsilly step out of the apartment and through the yellow tape belting my doorway. He shuffled his feet through the pieces of my life. He sang as loud as he could and spread smoke and prayers into every inch of my space. Mrs. Santillanes followed him, gripping her rosary, praying in a whisper. Grandma prayed beside her. They stood together, the one source of warmth that now had them breathing clouds of mist into the cold air that filled my apartment. Philip and Shanice huddled together and watched the windows cloud into ice.

Edwin Bitsilly sang until he tasted blood in his mouth. He sang until we were staring at each other across the impossible void, until he could see my bleeding body lying next to frayed gray mops and a metal bucket. He pushed his voice into that room and his breath into me.





CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

f/4

I WOKE UP on the floor of Pino’s Upholstery in excruciating pain. I could feel the pulsing hole in my thigh emptying onto the concrete and another wound on my side that went right through me. In my direct line of sight were Garcia and Cedric’s feet. I tried my best to play dead under the bloody cascade of my hair.

“Cop, you need to drop your gun.” The sounds of sirens rang from the freeway. “You’re the one who let him go to jail and now he’s dead. We’ve been paying for that drop for months. You were supposed to stop it.”

That’s when they started firing. Cedric dropped to the floor with a clean bullet hole to his face. I lay as still as I could, fighting the pain, willing myself not to flinch. Suddenly, Garcia was gurgling next to me, eyes open wide, his bloodied hands pulling at the neck of his collar. He was choking on his own blood. The ringing shots stopped; the room was filled with the smell of gunpowder and iron and dampened whispers.