Remembrance (The Mediator #7) (29 page)

Sister Mary Margaret was Sister Ernestine’s opposite in every way. Young where Sister Ernestine was old, lean where Sister Ernestine was plump, Sister Mary Margaret fed us a well-rehearsed but sweetly enthusiastic speech about the benefits of educating our adorable daughter Penelope—Jesse frowned every time her name was mentioned—at Sacred Trinity.

The percentage of Sacred Trinity girls who went on to college, we were told—was the highest in the tri-county area—100 percent!—and the percentage who went on to Ivy League colleges—well, Sister Mary Margaret didn’t want to brag, but it was high.

If they weren’t murdered, of course, before they finished first grade, I thought, but didn’t say out loud.

Jesse looked annoyed during much of Sister Mary Margaret’s spiel, for which I didn’t blame him. He was playing the role of the brilliantly wealthy plastic surgeon—the medical specialty that pulls in the most money these days—incredibly well, but I could tell that having to hear the words
thanks to Father Francisco
so often was wearing on his last nerve. It was wearing on mine, too.

“Thanks to Father Francisco,” Sacred Trinity was no longer on the brink of financial disaster due to mismanagement by the previous headmaster. Father Francisco had swooped in a decade ago and saved the day with his fiscal know-how.

“Thanks to Father Francisco,” the Sacred Trinity girls’ choir had gone from being nearly disbanded to being number one in the state. They had even recorded an album. Did we want a copy of their CD for Penelope? Of course we did. Penelope would love it.

“Thanks to Father Francisco,” the Sacred Trinity school library’s floors had been stripped of the exotic wood the father’s predecessor had laid there. Father Francisco had replaced the floor with a more sensible wood, donating the difference in cost to a literacy charity. Wasn’t he the most wonderful man?

“Did Father Francisco do the labor himself?” Jesse asked Sister Mary Margaret.

She looked momentarily confused. “Er . . . no. He hired a contractor.”

Jesse was unimpressed. “Then he probably didn’t save that much money.”

I had to stifle a laugh. Sister Mary Margaret didn’t know what she was up against. Every time he was on call, Jesse saw children suffering from maladies caused by improper diet. Their parents simply couldn’t afford to feed them properly.

Yet here, in the same community, was a school that had paid $150 per square foot for flooring, and charged for tuition for its kindergarten what Jesse had paid per semester for medical school . . . though of course it did offer, even though in Carmel the temperature rarely fell below fifty degrees, heated stalls for the horses their students wished to board there. We found this out as we were given a tour of the grounds.

By then Sister Mary Margaret had neatly passed us off to a “student tour guide,” a slender, dark-eyed junior, Sidney.

I was well acquainted with the psychology behind student tour guides, since we had them at the Mission Academy, as well. It was more effective for school administrations to have socially garrulous, nonthreateningly attractive students give tours to parents of prospective students than for them to be given by people like Sister Mary Margaret. In the students, parents saw what their own children could grow to be if they attended such a fine institution.

And student tour guides were better at fielding the pricklier questions, like Jesse’s tense: “When can we meet this famous Father Francisco we’ve heard so much about?”

“Oh, sorry,” Sidney said, batting her long, dark eyelashes (she wore extensions and a good deal of dark eyeliner, but I’m sure it fooled a lot of the parents). “He’s in San Luis Obispo today at a conference.”

I knew the conference Father Francisco was allegedly attending—the same one Father Dominic had gone to—had ended Wednesday night. He’d either extended his trip so it could include a few nights of gambling in Vegas, or he didn’t want to waste his valuable time chitchatting with a couple of prospective parents.

I’d put my money on the former. Most private schools no longer considered themselves educational institutions, but small profit-making corporations, and couldn’t afford to blow off potential investors.

Sidney had charmingly explained to us that giving tours was one of her favorite things to do because “it gets me out of calculus” and “will look good on my college applications.” Her dream was to go to Yale and become the “greatest actress since Meryl Streep.”

Sidney had nothing to worry about. She was well on her way.

“How long have you attended Sacred Trinity?” I asked Sidney as we made our way toward the heated stables. I’d asked to see them as “Penelope” had a pony.

“Since kindergarten,” Sidney said. “I love it here so much. My parents live in San Francisco. I see them on weekends. But I’d much rather be here than in the city. Too crowded.”

Sell it, Sidney.

“So you would have been here when that girl died,” I said casually as the barn and stables, plus riding ring, came into view, the stables large but tidy, painted white with green trim, the barn done in traditional cliché—but attractive—red barn paint. “What was her name, darling?” I squeezed Jesse’s arm. I was leaning on it because it was difficult to walk on the school’s gravel paths in my high-heeled pumps. “That poor girl who died? Lucy something?”

“Lucia,” Jesse said, right on cue. He appeared immune to Sidney’s charms.

“Oh, God.” Sidney’s red plaid uniform skirt swayed sassily ahead of us on the path. “Yes. Lucia Martinez. I’ll never forget it. What a nightmare. I was a year ahead of her. But they still made us all take, like, bereavement classes to make sure we weren’t going to go mental or whatever.”

Then she seemed to remember to whom she was speaking and flashed a quick embarrassed smile over her shoulder. “Not, you know, that it wasn’t completely terrible, what happened to her. Horseback-riding accident. But nothing like that would ever happen to your daughter. It was a completely freak accident. It could never happen again.”

“Yes,” I said, remembering what Becca had said she was tired of hearing everyone say: “ ‘Accidents happen.’ I’m sure.”

By that time we were at the stables. As fortune had it, a lesson was going on. A strong-looking older woman in jodhpurs was standing in the middle of a grassy ring, directing six or seven girls on extremely healthy-looking mounts.

“Ms. Dunleavy.” Sidney called to her from the white wooden fence. “I have some nice people here who’d like to meet you.”

Jennifer Dunleavy—I recognized the name from the newspaper article CeeCee had sent me about Lucia’s death—walked over to the side of the fence where Jesse and I leaned, inhaling the not unpleasant smells of horse and fresh-cut grass and hay. She removed a glove to shake our hands as Sidney expertly introduced us. Jennifer Dunleavy’s grip was firm but not overwhelming.

“Dr. and Mrs. Baracus’s little girl has a pony,” Sidney explained. “If they decide to enroll her here, they’d be interested in boarding it.”

“Great,” Jennifer said with a big smile that looked sincere. “We definitely have the space. I’ve got a lesson right now, as you can see, but Mike can show you around. Mike!” She called to a hired hand who was holding a paint can, doing touch-ups. He smiled and began strolling over.

“Oh,” I said quickly. “My friend’s stepdaughter took riding lessons here for a time, and she said there was the most marvelous man who had the most amazing touch. What was his name again, darling?” I squeezed Jesse’s arm again.

“Jimmy,” Jesse said woodenly. I could tell he was ready to hit someone, though not anyone present at the current moment.

“That’s right,” I cried. “Jimmy! Is Jimmy still here? I’d love to meet Jimmy, if I could, and for him to show us around.”

Jennifer’s face clouded over. For a moment I thought it was because the name disturbed her. Then I realized her clouded expression might only have been because she couldn’t place the name right away.

“Oh,
Jimmy,
” she said at last. “You must mean Jim Delgado.”

And just like that, I had a last name for Becca’s tormentor and Lucia’s murderer. I tried not to squeeze Jesse’s arm too hard in my excitement.

“Oh, that’s right,” I said. “Delgado. Jimmy Delgado.”

“But good grief,” Jennifer went on. “He hasn’t worked here in nearly a decade.”

I didn’t bother hiding my disappointment. I figured a rich lady like Mrs. Baracus wouldn’t hide her feelings. She’d definitely pout if a store didn’t have her favorite brand, or a rich private school no longer employed her favorite child killer.

“Oh,” I said. “What a shame. Mrs. Walters said so many good things about him, too.”

Jennifer’s eyebrows went up questioningly at the name.

“Mrs. Walters?”

“Yes. That’s my friend. Lance Arthur Walters’s wife, Kelly Walters, of Wal-Con Aeronautics. Surely you remember. Her stepdaughter went here for a time . . . Becca Walters?”

I saw Sidney make a slight moue of distaste at Becca’s name. Well, Becca had never been a very popular girl.

But then, none of them were aware that Becca had had good reason to make herself as inconspicuous as possible: Jimmy Delgado.

“Such a lovely couple,” I went on. “We met on a committee to raise money for breast cancer research. Kelly just couldn’t stop raving about this school and of course Jimmy’s horse-handling skills. What a shame. I don’t suppose you know where Jimmy Delgado went?”

I felt Jesse gently squeeze my elbow. He knew I was lying about Kelly, and also laying it on too thick.

But what Jesse doesn’t know—because he has too much integrity, which is one of the reasons I love him so much—is that there’s no such thing as laying it on too thick when it comes to people who are only interested in you for your money.

“Well,” Jennifer said, looking truly regretful. “I do know where he is, but I’m afraid it won’t do you any good, Mrs. Baracus. Jim Delgado doesn’t work with horses anymore.”

“You know where he is?” Jesse couldn’t hide his surprise.

“Sure,” she said with a laugh. “Jimmy’s still right here in town. I see him all the time. But good luck trying to get him back into horse handling. He came into some money awhile ago, and now he owns his own business. Delgado Photography Studio. He specializes in children’s portraits.”

veinticuatro

If anyone at the school noticed that the wife of wealthy plastic surgeon Dr. Baracus looked a little tight-lipped as her husband hurried her back to their BMW, they didn’t mention it. They probably thought I was nauseous from having another bun in the oven.

To them, this must have been good news: Penelope Baracus was getting a potential baby sister! This meant more tuition money for them later down the line.
Ka-ching!

But once we’d gotten safely in the parking lot and could no longer be overheard, I let loose. With word vomit, not actual vomit, since by then I’d found some chewable antacids in my bag—along with the various other items I’d shoved in there back at my apartment—and was concentrating on chomping them down, one by one. The chalky coating on my tongue kept me from tasting the bile that kept rising in the back of my throat.

“What the hell?” I didn’t say
hell
, though. If the tip jar from the office had been nearby, I’d have owed it five dollars. Well, more like fifty after my tirade. “He’s still in town. He didn’t go anywhere. He’s still
right here in town.
”

“Take it easy, Susannah,” Jesse said in his smooth, deep voice. “This is good news. It will only make it easier for the police to arrest him after Becca tells them what she knows.”

“The police?” I was shocked at his naïveté, though I suppose I shouldn’t have been. The police routinely got involved in his abuse cases at the hospital. As a medical practitioner, he was required to notify them, and they were required to respond. “Jesse, Becca could barely tell
me
what happened, and I’m hardly an authority figure. She found it easier to articulate that the guy had given her candy—
candy—
than that he’d molested her, which is completely normal for a survivor of abuse, but I honestly don’t see her being able to go to the cops about any of this soon. And even if she were to, there’s not a shred of evidence to connect Jimmy Delgado to Lucia’s murder. Becca didn’t actually
see
him kill her. And it’s not like Lucia can testify.”

“But Delgado threatened to kill Becca’s parents if she told anyone what he did to her.”

“Sure, he threatened to. He threatened to do a lot of things, but he never did any of them, except what he did to Lucia, which we can’t prove. Even the things he did to Becca are her word against his, and she’s a kid who, thanks to me, now thinks the ghost of her best friend’s been following her around for the past decade. If she opens up her mouth about that, no one’s going to believe
anything
else she says. I definitely screwed the pooch on that one.”

We’d gotten into the car, where I began pulling off my uncomfortable pumps, one by one, and hurling them to the floor. Jesse watched me with one eyebrow raised in amusement. “Screwed the pooch?”

“Yeah. It means messed up. It’s more polite than saying—well, you can figure it out.”

Now one corner of his mouth went up. “I think you’re being too hard on yourself.”

“Am I? If we’re to believe what that Dunleavy woman says, Delgado’s a respectable business owner. He’s got the money to hire a good defense attorney, one who’d rip Becca to shreds in five minutes on the stand, given her current state of mind. And what are the chances Becca’s parents are going to allow that to happen? Zip.”

Jesse’s half smile vanished. “But a photographer of
children
? You know what that means, Susannah.”

“Yeah. About that.” I pulled my phone from my bag and scrolled to the article about Lucia’s death. “Becca said he used to do lots of things for the school, not just work in the stables. Take another look at that photo of Lucia.”

Jesse took the phone from me and stared at the photo. “What am I supposed to be seeing?”

“The photo credit. The print’s really tiny, but as soon as I heard it, I knew the name sounded familiar.”