The Replacement Child (25 page)

Gil watched the girls jabber at Susan, telling her things that they hadn’t told him. Joy laughed as she told Susan about band recital, in which the tuba player, on a dare, had gotten his hand stuck in his instrument.

Gil checked his watch. He needed to get back to the office.

In all the years they’d been married, Susan had never asked him about his work. He sometimes wondered if the girls even knew what he did for a living. But that was all right. The least he could do was to save them from the horrors he saw every day. His job as husband and dad was to keep them safe not only physically but from the knowledge of what human beings were capable of doing to one another. But somehow the Melissa Baca case was different. Gil realized that he wanted Susan to ask him about it; he couldn’t discuss it with any of the other officers, since Manny Cordova was involved.

“The Melissa Baca case is really interesting,” he said to Susan. He was careful not to saying
killing
in front of the girls.

“Oh, really?” Susan said as she mixed up some chocolate milk for Joy.

“Yeah, I’m working with the state police on it, so it makes it even more complicated.”

“I didn’t know that.” Susan handed the glass to Joy and started one for Therese.

Gil felt awkward. He was forcing the conversation. He sighed and gave up.

Ten minutes later, he was back at work.

G
il tried to call Lacey Gould when he got back to the police station, but she was at a slumber party for the night. He was hanging up the phone when he felt someone standing next to him. It was a police secretary who Gil thought had a crush on Manny Cordova. She shifted her stance when Gil asked if he could help her, then she walked into one of the empty offices, expecting Gil to follow.

They stood there, both waiting for something, until Gil repeated, “Can I help you?”

“I heard you were questioning Manny and I thought I should tell you that he didn’t do anything.” It came out in a rush.

“You mean Officer Cordova?” Gil asked. She turned pink. Gil hadn’t said it to embarrass her, just to clarify her feelings.

“I’m sorry, yes, Officer Cordova. He didn’t do anything.”

Gil thought that her name was Cindy. He didn’t know her last name. “What makes you think he wasn’t involved?”

“He just couldn’t have been.” Her voice was desperate. “He’s not like that. You know him.”

“You know I can’t really talk about this …” Gil said.

“Well, you should be talking to the brother of that dead girl.”

“What makes you say that?”

She was smug. This was her ace in the hole. “Because I saw him talking to his sister the day she died.”

“You saw Ron Baca talking with Melissa? Where was this and when?”

“It was at McDonald’s. The one on Cerrillos Road. I was over there getting some fries when I saw them at a table. It must have been something like four thirty
P.M.
”

“What were they doing?”

“They were talking and looking at pictures. You know, like Polaroids.”

That’s where Melissa had been for the missing hour—she’d been showing her brother the photos of Sandra Paine.

But Ron Baca’s fingerprints weren’t on the photos. Gil had run the fingerprints against all databases, including law enforcement. But Gil didn’t think the secretary was lying. It would be easy enough to check with the McDonald’s employees. Ron Baca would be hard to forget in his police uniform.

“Does that help Manny—I mean, Officer Cordova?” she asked.

T
hat’s interesting.”

Lucy looked up to see who had spoken. It was the newspaper’s secretary, staying late to finish up some paperwork. She was typing in the agendas for the local government agencies, which were listed in the newspaper every Sunday.

“Stacy,” Lucy said, “you’ve got to stop talking to yourself.”

“Come over here and look at this,” Stacy said. She handed Lucy a piece of paper. It was the agenda for the Citizens’ Police Advisory Review Committee, whose name was too long and governmental. The committee met only a few times a year to hear the public’s complaints about Santa Fe’s police service. The idea was that people who were mistreated by the police would be less intimidated if they could air their concerns to a bunch of regular Joes instead of having to file formal grievances
at the police station. The committee was fairly new and having a hard time getting started. The complaints usually amounted to nothing more than, “When the officer pulled me over, he was rude.”

“What am I looking for, Stacy?” Lucy asked as she read over the agenda.

“Down there. On number five.”

The fifth item on the agenda listed only a name—Melissa Baca—and then her occupation—teacher at the Burroway Academy. There was no other information. Very strange. So Melissa Baca had been planning to go in front of the police advisory committee. To complain about a cop?

“When does the committee meet next?” Lucy asked.

“On Monday.”

“Oh, Tommy …” Lucy called to him, in an exaggeratedly sweet voice.

“I hate it when you use that tone. This can’t be good news,” he said as he walked over.

She handed him the agenda, pointing to Melissa’s name.

“Damn,” was all he said. Lucy knew what the problem was: it was almost ten
P.M.
For the second time in a week, they’d have to scramble to get anything for tomorrow’s newspaper.

While Tommy was making phone calls, she finished editing an article about road construction on the interstate. It was the last story she had to read for the night. Unless Tommy found out what Melissa Baca’s name was doing on that agenda.

There was already a Melissa Baca story for tomorrow’s newspaper. Tommy had written it, and Lucy had looked it over and sent it to the copy desk for its final edit more than two hours ago. The story was slated for the local section, not the front page. It was a short story, only ten inches. Lucy had wanted the story on the front page. The first paragraph read: “Melissa Baca, a seventh-grade teacher whose body was discovered
below the Taos Gorge Bridge Tuesday, did not have drugs in her system, according to a report by the Office of the Medical Investigator. However, the state police said they still consider drugs a factor in her death despite the toxicology results.” Lucy had thought that maybe, if the story was on the front page, the readers would question whether Melissa Baca really had done drugs. But John Lopez had voted Lucy down; there were too many other breaking-news stories that deserved the five front-page slots. And Lopez knew the real reason why Lucy wanted it on the front page: she wanted to absolve herself. It was her chance at redemption, her way to make up for yet another error in judgment. If only she had asked Tommy about his confidential sources. If only she hadn’t talked about Scanner Lady in a room full of cops. If only.

Lucy went over to the copy desk to tell the assistant copy-desk chief that the road-construction story was ready to be edited. The editor said, “About time,” before calling it up on her screen. Lucy was watching her edit the story when Tommy came over.

“We’ve got a problem, boss,” he said. “The chairman of the police advisory committee says he’s never heard of Melissa Baca. He said the secretary who makes the agenda might know something about it. I called her three times, but she didn’t answer and there was no answering machine.”

“What do the state police say?” Lucy asked.

“I paged Lieutenant Pollack twice, but he hasn’t called back. I even called his house and left a message.” Pollack was their snitch, so he would call back. Eventually.

“Anybody else at the state police we can try?”

“I called some officers I know who are part of the investigation, but they gave me that ‘the only person who can comment is Pollack’ crap. I guess since we ran our story with the anonymous sources in it, the state police are cracking down on any officer who talks to the press besides Pollack.”

“Which is pretty damn funny, considering the circumstances,” Lucy said. Pollack was the leak, after all. Tommy looked nervous that she had alluded to it in the open newsroom.

“Any other ideas?” she asked him.

“Not a one.”

Lucy thought about calling Gil, but hesitated. She didn’t want to take advantage of their friendship. Is that what it was? A friendship? She didn’t know. But she was pretty sure that he would think less of her for calling him. Not that he would tell her anything anyway. He wasn’t that kind of cop.

“Okay, Tommy, let’s give it a little more time. Maybe somebody will call you back. And keep trying that secretary. While you’re waiting for calls, write up what you have and add it to the Melissa Baca story.”

The assistant copy-desk chief, who had been listening to their conversation, asked, “You’re calling the Baca story back?”

“Yeah. We’ll just add to it.”

“Do you want to move it to the front page?” the editor asked.

Lucy thought for a second. She was being handed exactly what she had argued for with Lopez. But, truth be told, the story still didn’t warrant the front page. If they could say why Melissa had been about to go to the police advisory committee, maybe Lucy could justify moving it. She looked at the clock. It was almost ten thirty
P.M.
It was becoming extremely unlikely that they were going to get any calls back.

They could sit on the information, wait until they had time to check it out, and then run the story in the next day’s newspaper. But the
Santa Fe Times
got the agendas just like the
Capital Tribune
did. Somebody might have been typing those agendas in and, just as Stacy had, noticed Melissa Baca’s name. It was too chancy.

“No. The story stays in the local section,” Lucy said. She wished that Lopez were there to witness her sacrifice.

“Why don’t you call up those confidential police sources
who told you about the drugs and ask them about it?” the editor offered.

Tommy said, “Yeah, right” before walking away. Lucy just shook her head.

G
il was on his way home when he made a detour to Mrs. Baca’s. He didn’t plan on going inside. He was just driving by on the off chance that Ron might be back from the Pecos. Gil had called Mrs. Baca earlier to check on her but had gotten the answering machine. She hadn’t called back.

When he pulled up in front of the Baca house, all the lights, inside and outside, were on and the front door was wide open. Gil got out of his car, flipping the snap on his holster but not switching off the gun’s safety. He considered calling for backup, but the situation didn’t warrant it. Not yet. He went up to the house, calling for Mrs. Baca.

He found her in Melissa’s room, throwing clothes into boxes. The walls were bare; the picture of Melissa with her father was gone.

“Mrs. Baca, what’s going on?” Gil asked.

“These things need to be put away.”

Gil was starting to get mad at her relatives—it was like what people always said about the police:
Never around when you need one.

“Mrs. Baca, let’s wait until tomorrow to do that.”

She looked up at him, considering, “Why?”

“It’s late.”

She seemed to accept that. She got up and fixed Melissa’s bedcovers, turned off the light, and closed the door.

In the hallway, she turned to look at him. “What are you doing here, Detective Montoya?” It was the first normal thing she had said to him in days.

“I’m looking for Ron.” She nodded.

Gil got an idea. “Mrs. Baca, did Ron call Monday night to tell you he was coming over to fix the washing machine?”

“Oh, yes. He called about an hour or so before he showed up.”

“Did Melissa answer the phone when he called?”

Mrs. Baca thought, then said, “She talked to him for a few minutes, then handed the phone to me.”

“Do you know what they talked about?” Gil thought that maybe Melissa had told him to meet her in Oñate Park to talk more about the Sandra Paine photos.

“I was in the kitchen. I couldn’t hear them.”

She was starting to fade. He didn’t want to leave her until she was safely in bed. He started going around the house, turning off lights. They got to her room. He looked around. It wasn’t very big; in fact, it was much smaller than Melissa’s room. Gil wondered why Melissa had had the master bedroom while Mrs. Baca stayed in a child’s bedroom. One entire wall of Mrs. Baca’s bedroom was taken up in a shrine with a large crucifix over it. An altar table had candles on it with an assortment of pictures—all of the same person in various stages of life. As a baby, as a boy, and then as a man. Gil guessed that it was Daniel. And he wondered where the shrine to her husband was.

He had Mrs. Baca lie down fully clothed in her tiny twin-size bed. He turned the light in her room off and cracked her door, leaving the hallway light on. Just as he did for his girls. To keep the boogeyman away. He didn’t want to leave Mrs. Baca like this. He thought about calling Mrs. Cordova, but it was late. In the end, he wandered around the house, peeking in on Mrs. Baca until he was sure that she was asleep.

He went out and sat in his car, watching the house, not sure what else to do. He called his mother. She answered on the fourth ring.

“Mom, I’m not going to be able to make it over there tonight. I’ve got some work to finish up.”

“Whatever you think is best,
hito,”
she said. “Your work comes first.”

They hung up and he slouched down in the seat, knowing that he was going to be there for a while.

L
ucy opened her front door quietly for the sake of her neighbors, then tripped on a stray shoe and fell to the floor with a loud crash. Damn. Hell. Great entrance. And she wasn’t even drunk. For a change.

The copy editors had invited her out again and she’d gone with them to the bar. She’d quietly sipped a Sprite while they got louder and louder on their beer. She had wanted to drink. Badly. There were a thousand things she wanted to forget. Time might heal all wounds, but alcohol makes you forget you have wounds. But she was strong. Hear me roar. She had worked out at the gym today and not had any alcohol. Being this healthy was bound to be bad for you.