Dirty Little Lies (21 page)

Marisela decided not to push. Too much, too soon, and the chick could clam up for good.

“Oh, I remember doing that,” Marisela shared, “on the only pecan tree in our neighborhood. We’re from Florida, so when we hit the backyard, we had our pick of produce,” she explained, chattering about the sour oranges her mother used to make her garlicky
mojo
until Tracy relaxed. She listened raptly, asked questions, always watching Frankie warily, but after a little less than half an hour, she was grinning broadly at the two overfilled baskets of berries and yakking as if they were old friends.

“Why don’t you wash these up in the barn before you get back on the road?” Tracy asked.

“That would be great,” Marisela said warmly. “Is there somewhere I can wash up, too? This is hard work, farming.”

Tracy hesitated for a moment, then, tentatively, nodded toward the house. She walked ahead of them hurriedly.

“Just let me clean up a bit,” she said, her voice shaky. “I live alone. I’m not used to company.”

Marisela and Frankie stopped on the porch and allowed Tracy to slip inside. Marisela leaned in close to Frankie, looking like any adoring girlfriend when all she really wanted to do was talk to him without being overheard.

“Think she’s really cleaning up?”

“Either that,” he said, eyeing the house over her shoulder, “or hiding something she doesn’t want us to see.”

Thirteen

AT THE DOOR
, Frankie hesitated. “You should go in with her alone. She’s warming up, but I think I still make her nervous.”

Marisela skimmed her fingertip down the slim line of facial hair on Frankie’s face, loving the sharp feel beneath her skin, though she wouldn’t admit her weakness, even under torture. “Can you blame her? With that beard and moustache, you look like
el diablo
.”

“Last night, you thought it was sexy enough.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve got a thing for fallen angels. Not all women need a danger fix the way I do.”

For an instant, Marisela felt herself rising on the balls of her feet, her mouth inches from his, her gaze riveted on the lips that had brought her such decadent pleasure the night before. Frankie could be macho and rude and intimidating, but she couldn’t manage to kick him out of bed for his faults, not when he was so damned skillful underneath the covers. And on top of the covers, for that matter.

“I’ll call in to Titan,” Frankie said, watching over Marisela’s head as Tracy scurried through her house, cabinet and drawer doors slamming shut as she moved. “See if you can get her to open up.”

Tracy appeared at the screen door, slightly breathless and red-faced. “Come on in!” she said with an animated friendliness that completely contrasted with the shy woman who’d first greeted them. “I’ve got some iced tea, if you’re interested.”

“That would be wonderful,” Marisela replied, swinging around Frankie. “Honey, why don’t you make that call and meet us inside?”

He handed over the berries and headed toward the Corvette.

With a basket hooked on each arm, Marisela smiled as Tracy pushed open the door. Once inside, the clutter silenced her. The couches, two of them, overflowed with a dozen pillows in various colors, textures, and types. Shelves upon shelves, those on the walls or inside curios, were crammed with collections of all shapes and sizes—candles and candlesticks, snow globes and music boxes, statuettes of everything from birds to bunnies to bears. And where there wasn’t bric-a-brac, there were books. The woman could open a library. Stacks of tomes from worn leather hardbacks to the latest paperback bestsellers were stacked two and three deep. The ceiling glistened with what Marisela guessed were tacks and fishing wire, supporting a wild array of wind chimes, dreamcatchers, cut pieces of crystal, or discs of artsy stained glass. Surprisingly, the floor was clear except for rugs, yet every other space swam with something to grab the attention.

And perhaps distract from the sadness in the soul.

“I have a lot of collections,” Tracy explained flippantly, watching as Marisela’s gaze swept through the living room, dining room, and front hall.

Marisela pressed her lips tightly as she formulated an answer that wouldn’t be rude. “That’s one way to put it.” She smiled and winked.

“I guess you could say I’ve got issues,” Tracy replied with a nervous twitter of a laugh.

“Who doesn’t?” Marisela shrugged, which sent a few berries skittering to the floor. She put down the baskets and retrieved the escapees. “You should see my shoe room.”

Tracy’s eyes widened to the size of the dozen or so saucers she had lined up on the mantel. “A whole room?”

It was a lie, of course. Despite her admiration and recognition of a good Jimmy Choo, Marisela was the sort of woman who could make do with flip-flops from Wal-Mart, decent leather boots like those she wore today, a couple pairs of sexy high-heeled sandals for special occasions, and running shoes in three states of existence—old and grungy, broken in, and brand, spanking new. However, she knew women well enough. Shoe-bonding was genetically ingrained.

“I converted a guest room,” she replied.

Tracy’s smile warmed. “I used to love shoe shopping,” she said wistfully, and for the first time, Marisela heard a child-like quality in her voice that she’d attributed to simple shyness before. Now she realized that while Tracy might have aged physically since her sister’s murder, her mental state was trapped in teenage angst.

No wonder her brother freaked when they threatened to speak to her about Rebecca’s death. She was practically a poster-child for innocence, all laced up in gut-wrenching tragedy.

“I hear there are great boutiques in Boston,” Marisela said. “At least, there had better be or Mr. Baseball out there isn’t going to be making it to any bases tonight.”

Tracy blushed and timidly gestured toward the kitchen. “I don’t need fancy shoes out here. Just a good pair of work boots and fur-lined slippers when the nights get cold.”

Marisela followed, placing the baskets of berries beside the sink and accepting the glass of iced tea Tracy offered. She took a sip and the sweet, tangy flavor soothed the throat she hadn’t realized was parched. Man, picking fruit was no picnic.

“You stay out here on the farm all the time?” she asked.

“Mostly,” Tracy said, reaching into a carved cabinet to retrieve a battered aluminum colander. “I’m not very social…anymore.”

There it was. Her in. Marisela glanced out through the window and saw Frankie leaning on the back of the Corvette, phone in hand.

“Did something happen?”

Tracy turned away, pretending to look for something when Marisela couldn’t imagine what else she’d need to rinse off the berries other than the colander she had in her hand, the berries, and some tap water.

“I’m sorry,” Marisela said, reaching out and touching Tracy softly on the shoulder. “That was rude. I shouldn’t be nosy. It’s just that, I don’t know, you seem like a really nice person. I’d hate to think of you all cooped up.”

Tracy turned around slowly, her eyes a little glossy. “I like living like this. Beats the alternative.”

“Which is?”

Tracy turned on the water, sliding her fingers underneath the stream to test the temperature. “Well, my choices have always seemed to be either hanging out with the wrong crowd and making stupid choices or in-patient-therapy. I prefer this farm to Windchaser Farm.”

Marisela pressed her lips together tightly. Tracy wasn’t exactly mincing words. “Sounds like a tough life.”

“I’m sorry,” Tracy said, her voice more forceful. “That’s an awfully personal thing for me to share.”

Marisela waved her hand as if Tracy’s confession hadn’t struck her hard. “Hey, we all screw up sometimes!”

“Some more than others. I’ve been a serial screwup for fifteen years. But out here, in the isolated farm country, I tend to do better. Least I have for nearly a year now. One day at a time.”

“You know that’s right,” Marisela insisted, attitude lacing every word. The girl-talk angle was working. Now she just had to ramp up the stakes. “I got in with the wrong crowd when I was in school. Wasn’t pretty for me, either.”

Tracy turned the berries into the colander. “Drugs?”

Marisela winced uncomfortably. “Selling, not taking. Mostly, I was a petty thief and a major thug. Some bad shit went down. I learned my lessons the hard way.”

“What happened?”

Tracy’s stare was intense, intimate. She wasn’t asking because of Marisela, necessarily, but for herself. She was seeking the secret. The magic bullet. The trick to escaping the downward spiral.

“I was attacked,” Marisela said, twisting the truth a bit to gain Tracy’s trust. “I nearly died. I literally had the sense beat into me, as my
papi
likes to say.”

The colander dropped noisily into the sink, but Tracy didn’t seem to care.

“Beat into you? By whom?”

Marisela reached out for the colander, took it and busied herself by shaking the water around the metal sieve. “Bunch of girls jumped me?”

“A bunch?”

Marisela nodded. “After a basketball game in the gym parking lot. Nearly killed me. Trust me, they wanted to. They tried. I was in the hospital for two weeks.”

None of which was a lie. She’d just described, in scant detail, her bleed-out from
las Reinas
. The only part of the story she’d failed to mention was that she’d asked for the beating as a way to permanently exit the gang. That detail might not help her stir Tracy’s sympathy.

“How’d you get away?” Tracy’s voice vibrated with breathless desperation. She slid out a metal kitchen chair and dropped into the floral-patterned seat.

Marisela twisted the faucet and pumped some liquid soap into her hands.

“I fought back,” she said with a shrug. “I was a tough kid.”

“I hate violence,” Tracy said, her voice faint and faraway. From her seat at the table, she was staring out the window, but not at Frank. He wasn’t standing by the car anymore. Tracy’s gaze was now lost in the turquoise-blue sky where not even one fluffy cloud dared dispel the perfect morning scene.

Marisela grabbed a dishtowel and approached Tracy slowly.

“Most people hate violence,” she concluded. “Doesn’t mean we all aren’t capable of kicking a little ass when it’s necessary.”

A sob caught in Tracy’s throat and her eyes instantly filled with large, gelatinous tears. Marisela could now see that Tracy wasn’t staring out the window at all. On a small shelf beside the fluttering curtains was a small picture frame. In the center, two girls in black-and-white, like one of those photographs taken at a booth in the mall, smiled as if they owned the entire world. Looking more like twins than sisters, Tracy and Rebecca Manning’s grins were toothy and genuine, with that special teenage goofiness that only emerged in the company of close friends. Marisela and Lia had a whole collection of pictures just like this one.

She took the picture down and noticed there wasn’t a speck of dust on the polished metal frame.

“Is this you?” she asked.

Tracy cupped the photograph lovingly in her palms as tears slid with painful slowness down her cheeks. “Me and Becca.”

“You look so much alike.”

“She was my sister.”

“Was?”

“She died,” Tracy said.

Not she was
murdered
? Not she was
killed
? Just
she died
?

“I’m so sorry,” she replied.

She put her hand softly on Tracy’s shoulder, and was surprised when the woman didn’t flinch. Instead she traced the tiny, smiling face in the photograph with her quaking touch.

“We were born only thirteen months apart. Irish twins, right?”

Two fat drops fell from her eyes, splashing on the glass.

“
Pobrecita
,” Marisela said softly. “You don’t have to talk about it. I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”

That wasn’t honest, but Marisela had to play this out. She was in too deep to turn back now. And she was making progress.

Tracy shook her head. “No, no. It’s okay,” she said with a sniffle and a deep, fortifying breath. She swiped the tears off her face brutally. “No one ever wants me to talk about it. Well, my brother never wants me to. He says it too painful. That I shouldn’t torture myself anymore.” Tracy glared up at Marisela, her light brown eyes intense with more than just fifteen-year-old grief. “He doesn’t know the half of it!”

Near-hysteria pitched Tracy’s voice higher, so that she startled herself with the sound. She clamped her hand over her mouth and shot out of her chair. With jerky hands, she shoved the picture frame back on the shelf, knocking down the tiny kitty-shaped salt and pepper shakers perched beside it. Tracy screamed.

One bounced. The other dropped onto the linoleum and rolled under the table. Tracy immediately dropped to the ground on all fours, scrambling for the runaway knickknack and crying openly now with no immediate sign of stopping.

Marisela dropped to the ground beside her. “
Mijita
, what’s wrong?”

“These were Becca’s! They can’t break. They—”

The rest of her sentence was captured by a panic-stricken sob and even as Tracy recovered the runaway kitty, her shaking hands sent it clattering to the ground once again. Marisela slid under the table with Tracy, and taking a cue from her mother, who was a hell of a lot better at this shit than Marisela was, wrapped Tracy in her arms. Instantly, Tracy pressed her face tight to Marisela’s shoulder, the moisture of her misery almost instantly sinking through.

Please let this pay off. Please let this pan out.

Not that Marisela was coldhearted, but damn. It had been fifteen years.

For a few moments, Marisela crooned to Tracy in Spanish, telling her not to worry, encouraging her to let out her emotions. She was certain the woman had no idea what she was talking about, but somehow, speaking in the native tongue of her parents had a musical effect that went a long way toward communicating, even if the words were unintelligible.

Soon after, Tracy seemed to calm. The rivers of tears drenching Marisela’s jacket trickled down to a steady but lessening stream. Without words, she helped Tracy to her feet, then slid her back into her chair at the kitchen table. She grabbed the iced tea Tracy had poured for herself, but hadn’t touched. “Here,
mija
, take a drink.”