Suspicion of Malice (7 page)

The police were looking at a young dancer with
the Miami City Ballet, Robert Gonzalez. Unless there
were two of them, Anthony had met him.
Hi. Mr.
Quintana? I'm Bobby Gonzalez. How're you doing? So
...
is Angie ready?
Gonzalez had sat on the edge
of the sofa clearing his throat and looking around
while Angela finished dressing. A springy, muscled
five-eight or -nine, curly black hair, and a scar across
his knuckles.
This is a very nice place you have, sir.
Polite, but they were all polite with a girl's father.

What had this father learned? That Gonzalez was twenty-one, born in New York City, lived in East Harlem, moved to Miami at thirteen with his mother and four siblings. He'd never attended college. He
rented an apartment with two other dancers on
Lenox Avenue in Miami Beach, and he drove a faded black Nissan with the tints peeling off the windows. Anthony had not embarrassed Angela by refusing to
let her go out that night, but he told her, when she
returned, that it was the last time. As far as he knew,
she hadn't seen Bobby Gonzalez again.

The police had good reason to suspect him. He
had worked for a few weeks at the Cresswell boat
yard over the summer. The night of the party, witnesses remembered a confrontation. Cresswell pok
ing Gonzalez in the shoulder, Gonzalez asking him if he wanted his ass kicked.

Jack Pascoe had paid Gonzalez to help with the cleanup, but Gonzalez disappeared around midnight, sticking Pascoe with the bulk of the work. Police wanted to interview him, but he was avoiding them.

Gonzalez had an arrest record: carrying a con
cealed weapon, possession of marijuana, resisting arrest with violence. As a defense attorney, Anthony knew that such charges could be bullshit. These had
pleaded out to misdemeanors, but it made him nervous. "Concealed weapon" usually meant "knife."

When his portable phone rang, he nearly tipped over his drink getting to it. "Angela?"

But it was his sister, Alicia. She spoke in Spanish, the more intimate language of family. She hoped she
wasn't calling too late. Was he in bed?

"No, no. Espero por Angela. iQue pasa?"
He told her
he was waiting for Angela. Had something hap
pened?

"Not really. I wanted to talk to you, that's all. I
was just saying good night to Grandfather. He wanted
to know where you were. He asked me, 'Where's
Anthony? I am dying, and he doesn't come to see
me' There were tears in his eyes! Thank God Nena
was asleep in her room."

"He isn't dying, Alicia, he's playing his little
games again."

"I told him you were still in Spain, that you would be home soon. He made me say it twice before he let go of my hand. Anthony, you have to come see him."

At eighty-four years of age, with a wheelchair and a pacemaker, Ernesto Pedrosa still knew how to manipulate. There were a houseful of relatives, a full-time nurse, and he had begged Alicia to leave her
husband and children in Texas to come home for a
few weeks to help take care of him. Alicia had never
refused his demands.

Anthony sighed. "You know we argued. I don't want to talk about it."

She laughed. "An argument? Oh, I heard about it
from Aunt Fermina. You were shouting at him in his
study with the door closed, then you told Nena you
would never set foot in the house again. Why?"

"Alicia, I am closer to you than to anyone in the
family, but there are things that I can't discuss, not
with anyone."

"Nena told me that all this happened after you broke up with Gail. Maybe you went crazy. Is that it? You won't talk about that either. Why did you
call off your engagement? Or did she? Who was it?"

"It doesn't matter. It's over/'

"She adored you. I could see it in her face when
she looked at you. And in yours too. What happened,
Anthony? Please. What is going on with you?"

"Alicia, I have to go. Angie will be home soon, and I have work to finish."

"Oh, Anthony. My poor brother. Your pride is
going to kill you someday. I love you, but you're
breaking my heart."

When he hung up the phone, Alicia's words
echoed in his ears.
"Me estds rompiendo el corazon."

Propping his forehead on his fists, Anthony closed
his eyes. After a moment, he got up and paced to
the glass doors that looked out at the inlet behind
his house. Past the patio and the screen he could see
the quiet black water, bright windows on the other side, and the silhouettes of boats tied to docks.

The old man was at it again, using Alicia this time. For thirty years—since the day Anthony had been dragged out of Cuba against his will—Ernesto Pe
drosa had tried to control him. As a boy, Anthony
had felt the sting of his grandfather's belt, but he had never cried, enraging the old man even further. At
twenty, he'd been thrown out of the house for read
ing socialist literature. In adulthood he had made his
own way, asking for nothing—unlike his cousins,
who had grown rich taking whatever shit the old
man had handed them. It was Anthony who threw
it back at him. They fought. They disagreed about
everything. Cuba and the American betrayal, the
food at dinner, the fall of the Soviet Union, the Miami Dolphins, the
Miami Herald,
the embargo, Anthony's
divorce, the venality of local politicians, whether the
grass needed more water.

After each fight, they would refuse to speak to
each other. Anthony would appear only for holidays
and family occasions. Then his grandfather would
start sending emissaries. A cousin, to invite him to dinner. Nena, to ask if he'd accompany them to midnight mass. After years of this maneuvering, the ar
guments had worn thin, and peace was declared.
Ernesto had not become soft, but he had become old.

He had offered Anthony everything—businesses worth hundreds of millions of dollars, a sixteen-room mansion, bank accounts not even his wife had been
told about. Ernesto Pedrosa would have given him
all this, but he would have kept his grip on the
strings. Anthony might have cut them—Ernesto must have expected him to try—but one moment, one hid
eous revelation, and the game was over.

A simple act, but impossible to tell Alicia about.
Not her, or Nena, or any of them.

Ernesto Pedrosa had arranged for a murder. A
man had been shot and dumped into the river on his orders. No money had been paid. It had been done
out of loyalty, respect. Love for an exiled patriot who
for forty years had fought for
la causa,
the cause
above everything. He had sacrificed his only son,
Tomas, dead at the Bay of Pigs, for the cause. He
had financed terrorist acts for the cause, had warped American foreign policy, had divided a community. When Pedrosa asked a favor, it was done. A certain man had threatened his grandson—his life, his flesh, his heir—and so he had to die. Ernesto had not first
asked permission from the beneficiary of this service,
no, because he'd thought Anthony didn't have the
cojones
to see that it had to be done.

Confronted, the old man had admitted everything.
Anthony had cursed him to hell and back, had
ripped the bullet-riddled Cuban flag off the wall and thrown it at him. From his wheelchair, Ernesto had
laughed.
Call the police. Have them take me away. You
have the backbone of a woman. I should have left you
in Cuba.

Anthony had walked out and had kept going. In
saving him, Ernesto had killed everything else between them. Anthony could not go on as before. To
condone a murder, to forget that the dead man had
a family—Anthony might as well have pulled the
trigger himself.

His sister had been wrong. This had nothing to do with Gail Connor. She had only been the catalyst,
telling him what Ernesto had done, and daring him to do something about it. What? To wreck a family by turning an old man over to the police? She had
not understood that. She had said he would cover for Ernesto to protect his own position. That he
wanted power more than truth. That he and his
grandfather had become exactly alike.

There it was: her quick accusations, her lack of
trust, her willingness to believe the worst. Of course he'd been angry, but not for long. They were equally
unsuited. He felt the relief of a man who'd been
kicked off the elevator just before the cables snapped.

He went back to the kitchen, picked up the bottle on the counter, and held it to the light. Empty. When had he bought it? Monday. He couldn't remember drinking all of it, but someone had. He threw it into the trash.

The front door opened, and he turned toward the sound. "Angela,
estas tu?"

"I'm home.
Estoy a casa, papi."
She had an Ameri
can accent. He was trying to improve her Spanish,
but she spoke it reluctantly. "Hi, Dad."

"iDonde has estado? Es tarde, ninita."

She turned and looked at him. "I wish you
wouldn't call me that. I'm not a child."

"You're late." He spread his hands wide. "I may say that, no? Where have you been?"

"We went for something to eat afterward."

"Who are 'we'? You and . . ."

"Some of the girls in my class."

"Haven't I asked you to call if you expect to be
late? I tried to reach you. Did you have your
phone off?"

"I didn't notice. It was off in the theater, then I
forgot."

"We have orientation at the university at eight
o'clock in the morning. Did you forget that too?"

"Papi,
don't yell at me, please. I'm sorry." She came over and leaned against his arm. The part in
her hair ran straight and clean, and the delicate curve of her forehead and cheeks made his chest hurt. "I'm
really sorry to be late. I won't do it again."

He could never remain angry with her. He kissed
the top of her head. "All right. I was worried. Come
sit down. I want to talk to you."

She seemed not to hear him. Then she raised her eyes. "What if I don't go to school this semester? To tell you the truth, I don't think I'm ready for college."

"Not ready? What would you do instead?"

"Audition for the ballet. They always need extra
people for
The Nutcracker,
and auditions are in a cou
ple of weeks. The thing is, I need to work hard to prepare, and there are all the rehearsals and perfor
mances. If I make it, and they like me, they might
hire me to be in the company. And if not, I could go to school in January. Doesn't that sound reasonable?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Sweetheart, listen to me. Don't you think maybe
you're just a little bit infatuated with all the lights and the glamour?"

"That's a very patronizing thing to say."

"Angela."

"It is! I've been dancing since I was seven years
old!"

"You never said anything about dancing as a ca
reer. Now suddenly this is what you want?"

"I'm a good dancer, better than anyone in my
class. Edward Villella himself saw me this week. He picked me out to show the others what to do. He said,
'Look how well she moves, look at her line.' He
chose
me."

"And on the basis of a compliment, you would
throw away your college, your place in the dormitor
ies, the tuition that I have already paid—"

"We could get a refund!"

"Olvidalo.
Absolutely not. It isn't the money. I
don't care about that. Of course you're a good
dancer. You're a very talented girl, but you said
yourself, a dancer has a short life. Then what? You'd
have no education, no way to earn a living. Do you
expect me to support you? I won't. You'd be spoiled
like so many kids whose parents have money."

"But Dad, just to audition—"

"No. I can't allow it. Don't look at me like that, Angela. You're only seventeen years old. You must grow up a little. Get an education first. Or dance in your spare time—as long as it doesn't interfere with your studies. Have I ever been proven wrong in my
advice to you? Have I?"