Desert Angel (7 page)

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D
INNER THAT NIGHT WAS A COUPLE OF DRY TORTILLAS
and a couple of tablespoons of refried beans for each person. Nobody complained, but Rita’s youngest boy kept staring at Angel’s plate as if wishing he could add it to his own. No comparison to the feast at Ramón’s. Angel decided that tonight on her walk she’d also look for cans and bottles she could trade in for a candy bar she could give to the kids. After she finished drying the dishes she left while Rita put the kids to bed.

The streets were quiet except for radio music coming from the garages where men worked or drank beer with their friends. A faded brown house looked gray in the sliver of moonlight, and Angel walked the overgrown path to the front door, which stood open a couple of inches. Inside, two dining room chairs faced each other, table missing. Plastic garbage and food wrappers covered the floor. Looked like homeless occasionally used this place. Probably nothing left of value.

Out the side door a carport was walled by torn bamboo shades and tarps. Inside were empty oil containers, greasy rags, and a rusted push mower. In back, under what was probably once the workbench, she found a screwdriver. Weapon. You never know. Just having it in her jeans pocket made her feel safer. Scattered here and there were some unbroken glass bottles and aluminum cans. She gathered them in a discarded plastic shopping bag and continued her search down the block. If she could fill that bag and one more she might be able to cash them in for a Hershey.

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W
HITE MOTHS SKITTERED AROUND
the StopShop’s neon sign.
Parked near the front door where light was brightest, a pale blue clunker served as a bench for five or six teens in shorts and tanks, no one Angel had seen before. The two girls leaned against their guys, drinking beer and giggling. What would that be like?

Angel was careful to stay out of their sight line. She brushed at the flies cruising around the Dumpster and braced herself against the sour smell. The lid creaked when she opened it but not loud enough to attract attention. Near the top of the pile beneath some paper soda cups and crushed milk cartons she found two old sandwiches still in their wrappers. Opened one. It didn’t stink and the mayo and mustard were in foil packets. Could be okay. She stuck the food inside her shirt to try later. Deeper, she spotted a treasure. A small nylon gym bag with wrinkled shorts and stiff socks that must have fallen out of some car and gotten tossed. She shook the underwear into the receptacle and inspected her find. Not bad. Now she could carry a little water and a change of clothes when she took off.

She could see a case of empty brown beer bottles on the bottom but she couldn’t reach it and she didn’t want to climb in and totally stink up her clothes. While she searched she was dimly aware of the occasional buzz of cars passing on the highway a hundred feet west beyond the parking lot. The all-night safety light on a tall pole at the edge of the blacktop hummed, and the Dumpster creaked with her weight as she shifted position, but over those sounds she picked up the low rumble of an exhaust pipe. She knew that sound. Ducking behind the receptacle, she watched a heavy camo pickup roll into the lot and park next to the clunker. She leaned over and coughed a thin gruel of refried beans onto the blacktop.

14

Angel burst in the front door breathless from running. First thing she noticed was the silence: no soft radio, no snores from the kids’ rooms, no noise from the kitchen, where Rita would be preparing food or putting together things for school tomorrow.
Did he come here first?

Angel made herself open the door to the room Jessie shared with her sister. The beds were empty. Tried the boy’s room. The same. Angel raced to Rita’s bedroom and found her throwing clothes in a daypack. Frantic. Angel cleared her throat and Rita jumped.

“Ramón called,” Rita said, glancing at her and then turning back to her packing. “Matteo’s missing.”

“Matteo?” Angel thought about the Gomez boy in the UCLA T-shirt who had been so obviously irritated at her intrusion a couple of days ago. Wanted to give her up to Scotty.

“He didn’t come back last night. Hasn’t phoned and no one’s seen him. Tío spoke to Ramón, said the boy may have gone over to their home to get some things for school. Your guy may have caught him there.”

A wave of guilt washed Angel against the door frame. She should have warned them better. Poison. Everyone who came near her was going to get hurt. She gathered herself and approached Rita.

“Stop.” She put her hand on Rita’s arm to still the packing. “You can’t go. You got your kids.”

“They’re with friends. He can’t find them.” She cast around the room, spotted a flashlight standing on her night table and tossed that in. “Ramón said the guy could know about me now,” Rita said, rushing, distracted. “None of the Gomez family ever visited, so Matteo couldn’t tell him much more than my name and the town, but that guy’ll find out where I live as soon as he asks. Everybody knows me.”

“He’s already here,” Angel said, hating to bring worse news. “At the StopShop.” Angel grimaced, remembering Scotty’s oily charm. “Won’t take him long.”

“Get the lights.” Rita raked the room with her eyes one more time before she shouldered the daypack. “You go out the back. Go through the yards to the school. I’ll pick you up in a couple of minutes.”

Angel wanted to argue but there was no time. She’d learned that. Scotty was too quick. Moving through the kitchen, Angel took a second to open the fridge. Water. She wouldn’t forget again. But Rita didn’t buy water. Angel gave up and bolted outside.

She climbed through a broken fence into the neighbor’s place and, despite dogs barking in a couple of houses, made her way to the side street. Seeing no people, nothing moving, she stayed low and used parked cars and tall weeds to cover her two-block run to the school. In less than a minute Rita’s Toyota barreled down the street and slowed enough for Angel to jump in.

“I got an idea,” Rita said, making a hard left at the next block and then another, heading back toward the street she lived on.

“Don’t!” Angel yelled, fighting a swirling panic. “He’ll see us. He’ll hurt you.”

“Hang on,” Rita said, concentrating on driving with her lights off. “I know a place to watch from.”

Angel was sorry she had gotten in the car. Rita would be better off without her. Angel reached for the door handle.

“Don’t even think it,” Rita said, slowing and turning into a driveway. She pulled into an empty garage, jumped out, and ran around to move a rickety gate closed enough to hide the vehicle. Angel was still in the front seat, locked with indecision, when Rita opened the car door and took her hand. “If we don’t see headlights, we’re crossing the street.”

Angel tried to tug away but Rita’s grip was strong. “No way,” Rita said. “Help me spot him.”

They ran to the corner and crouched behind thistles looking toward Rita’s house a block to their left on the cross street. No headlights, nothing moving. Rita put her arm around Angel, stood, and started across the intersection. “Act natural,” she said. “We’re going to that empty white place.”

Angel could hardly stand it. This was so stupid. They had to run. Run! But she walked with Rita, her body agreeing to what her mind refused. When they reached the weeds by the front porch, Angel’s knees gave way, as if going against her strongest instincts had paralyzed her.

“We can get on the walkway from the backyard,” Rita said, hauling Angel to her feet and sneaking along the side of the building.

Rita’s words made no sense. Angel needed to gather her strength to break free.

Behind the house were more weeds and the tumbled remains of a brick barbecue. But along the far edge of the yard sat a tall rusted metal staircase that wound in a spiral toward the top of the house. “I think this is the tallest platform in town,” Rita said, as she led Angel to the very steep steps that disappeared in the dark above the roofline. “Don’t stand when we get up there. Crawl to the front edge,” Rita said. “We can see everything from there.”

Angel’s resistance faded. Things were so messed up it was hard to keep trying. Matteo. Soon maybe Rita, too. Angel wasn’t worth it. Wasn’t worth the trouble she was causing. It felt like something inside was crumbling, washing away. When Rita told her to climb, she did without argument. A fall was as good a way to die as any.

The railing was gritty, hard to hold. Even in the darkness Angel could see her hands were getting filthy. When she looked down, Rita was inching up right below, close enough to catch her if she slipped.
Why is she risking all this for me? Because I’ve trapped her.

Angel stopped climbing, looked down over her shoulder. “You don’t have to do this. Get out of here. Save your family.”

Rita didn’t look up. “Climb now, talk later,” she said, poking Angel in the butt. “Move, girl.”

Slowly, taking more care, Angel made it to a metal grate that formed an edge around the roof.

“Get on up,” Rita said. “Watch out for the furniture so you don’t knock anything over, and slide yourself across to the edge by the street. It’s like a deck.”

Angel had never seen anything like this before, a platform where a roof ought to be, but it was mostly flat except for some buckling where the plywood seams came together. Looking ahead she saw a thin-legged table surrounded by a few folding chairs. More chairs were strewn around the deck as if a storm had knocked them over. A tiny barbecue not much bigger than a cinder block sat near the table close to a couple of milk crates. She looked to be above everything but the palm trees. Okay, she got it. If she stood she would be a silhouette that could be seen by anyone.

When she reached the front edge, the town spread below her. Lights peeking out windows in the occupied houses seemed like holiday decorations. She could see all the way to the shore and the dark water beyond. A short distance to her right, past Rita’s house, three street lamps marked the main road in from the highway and the StopShop glowed with a soft neon rainbow that was almost festive. The store’s parking area was halfway screened by the building, but she didn’t see anything that looked like Scotty’s pickup.

She looked in the yards below for anyone with a flashlight or anyone smoking a cigarette but the homes and streets seemed deserted as usual.
Maybe he left.
She felt Rita move close, turned to watch her prop on her elbows, heard her groan with the effort.

“Now we watch,” Rita said, still getting her breathing quieted.

“I’m sorry,” Angel said, but maybe it was too soft for Rita to hear. Angel bit her lip until she tasted blood. She kept getting caught off guard. How dumb was she? She hadn’t done one thing right. Should have kept running. Now it was too complicated because Rita couldn’t run. Her whole family was going to pay big-time.

“Did you bring a phone?” Angel asked.

Rita reached for her handbag but stopped. “In the car,” she said. She shook her head. “Too scared to think right.”

Angel thought she could see water in the corners of Rita’s eyes.
She’s so beautiful.
She reached for Rita’s hand but froze as headlights turned off the main road onto their street.

A pickup moved slowly toward them, too slowly, and stopped in front of Rita’s house. The headlights went out, the driver’s door popped open, and a man ran at full speed through Rita’s driveway and into her backyard. The sound of wood splintering carried softly up to where they lay. The house lights came on. While they were straining to hear more, Rita’s front door burst open and the man strode out to his truck, looking north and south along the road. When he stopped moving and became very still, Angel knew. Scotty. First scan for movement, then get quiet and listen. Just like he’d described, telling her how to hunt. Travel till you run across their track, make tighter circles till you find them.

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S
COTTY STAYED IN THE STREET FOR SEVERAL MINUTES,
moving only to reach in and turn off the truck. First he faced north, looking toward the edge of town and the house where they perched. Angel could feel Rita tense and wondered whether they were back-lit and visible. He didn’t look up.

After a minute he turned to look east. Angel resumed breathing. The town spread in that direction five or six blocks to the sea. Head Start was one block past his truck and two down, but he may not have known that, may not have asked about it. On the other side of the pickup, to the west, the land was mostly open desert with very few buildings. Angel watched as he took off his cap and rubbed his hair with his arm. The night wasn’t that hot. He’d probably worked up a sweat breaking into Rita’s.

Finally, he climbed in the pickup, started it, and rolled backwards to a dirt rut near where Vincente’s semi had been parked, about a quarter-mile across bare ground from the highway and the StopShop parking lot.
He’s leaving!
But he wasn’t. He turned and continued backing two or three hundred feet onto the path, braked, and shut off the engine. He could sit in the truck and watch Rita’s home. The house platform was now peripheral, off to his left. Angel was pretty sure he couldn’t see them.

“Do you think he has night goggles?” Rita asked.

Angel’s relief evaporated.

“We better cross again. Get the phone,” Rita said. “He can’t see us in the street from his angle.” Rita pushed herself on her stomach back to the edge with the stairs. Angel watched as she swung her legs off the roof and moved carefully to place her feet back on the steps.

Angel hesitated, aware of a strong urge to just lie still; hide, sleep. Let Rita save herself. Again Rita must have read her mind. She returned, took hold of Angel’s sleeve, and towed her the first couple of feet, sliding back to the stairs.

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T
HE GARAGE WHERE THEY’D HIDDEN THE CAR
smelled sharp, rank. Cat spray, rat pee, who knew what else. Angel levered herself in through the open passenger window. No sense opening the door and triggering the light if she didn’t have to. Rita dug her purse out of the seat and found the cell phone. Walked to the edge of the garage door to keep watch on the street.