Sunshine Cottage Page 18

  "I was looking for my brother," Mena said. She straightened up, and the words began to spill out of her as she let go of the secret that had been hounding her since that day. "I asked where my brother was, and someone gave me that address. So I went there."

  "He owed me money," Vic said. "He was flush with cash from a deal he'd made. He was partying with booze and a hooker and so I figured I'd stop by and pick up the cash he owed before he spent it all."

  "Booze and a hooker," Teresa repeated, seeing her own place in the nightmare.

  "I got there," Mena said. "And I knocked on the door and he answered." The horror came into her eyes as she remembered what happened.

  "Oh, sweetheart," Teresa said. "He thought you were me. He thought you were the call girl he'd ordered."

  "He pulled me in the room and then he said he liked my uniform and it was sexy. And he—he—tore at my clothes and—"

  "You don't have to say it, hermana," Vic said, wrapping his free arm around her and glaring at Teresa. "She doesn't need to say it."

  "No," Teresa said. "You don't have to say it. I understand. He thought you were me and he grabbed you and he was hurting you."

  "And he was drunk. I couldn't stop him. And I was scared. And then I saw his gun."

  "And you defended yourself. It wasn't Vic who shot him. It was you."

  "I didn't mean to. I just had to stop him. He was hurting me."

  "Of course you had to. He attacked you."

  "Treated her like a common whore," Vic said.

  "Yup," Teresa said. "Just like a common whore."

  She looked at Vicario. "So you were cleaning up by the time I got there." She remembered him wiping off fingerprints. Taking the man's gun. Looking for traces of identifying evidence. She thought he'd been protecting himself, but he was protecting Mena in the only way he knew how.

  "So she'd be safe," she said. "But how did you know about me? You never looked up. I watched you and you never looked my way."

  "I saw you," Mena said.

  "You saw me? You were still there?"

  "I was in the room. You didn't see me. I was on the other half of the room. Behind the door. I saw you through the crack in the door where the hinges were, but you didn't look that way. You didn't see me."

  That glowing door frame. In all of her nightmares that glowing light seeped around the door frame. But she'd only looked through the opening. Never even glanced at the other side of the door, where a frightened girl had been hiding, watching her brother clean up the aftermath of the attack on her that had changed her life.

  "But you didn't say anything when you saw me."

  "He would have killed you."

  "And you didn't want any more killing."

  "It would have been over if you'd just kept your mouth shut. But then you had to talk to the cops," Vicario said. "You just had to open your mouth."

  "But I still don't get this. How did you find me in Pajaro Bay? Was it a coincidence that Mena came here on vacation?"

  For the first time, Vic's look toward her softened. Into pity.

  And the final piece fell into place. He felt pity. Pity toward a girl who didn't even have family members to protect her, to keep her safe when she made mistakes and needed help.

  "Amy?" she whispered.

  "Ten thousand dollars is a lot of money," he said flatly.

  "If you don't mind selling out your own flesh and blood," Teresa said. In that last phone call to her, Amy had been asking all those pointed questions. And then the loudspeaker had announced the bus to Pajaro Bay. "She put two and two together—"

  "—And gave us a tip. We had to check it out."

  Teresa looked at Mena. "You came to Pajaro Bay because you were the only one who knew me by sight. And he came along"—she nodded to the man on the floor with the broken wrist—"to finish me off once you identified me."

  Mena nodded. "When they said there was a witness, and Vic would go to prison forever and ever, I had to tell him I saw someone at the hotel that day. But I wasn't sure it was you from the picture your sister gave Vic, and they said I had to look at you in person if they found you…." She trailed off.

  "Then why didn't you just point to me the first day you met me, and say, 'that's her. Shoot her in the head so I can go home'?" She smiled at Mena. "Because you aren't a cold-blooded killer at all, are you? That's what all the hiding and running and crying has been about. You wanted to save your brother, and yourself. But you just couldn't bring yourself to do such an evil thing."

  Mena nodded. "You saved Austin. You were nice. You weren't bad." She took a deep breath. "I was the bad one."

  "No!" Teresa said. "No. Not that. You shot that man to protect yourself. You acted in self-defense. No jury would ever convict you for defending yourself."

  Vic scoffed. "A jury's not gonna believe her. Her brother's a gang leader. They'll think she's like me."

  "But they'll believe me, Vic."

  "You?"

  "I can corroborate her story. Every word of my statement is true. Now that we know what really happened, it all makes sense. Mena was mistaken for me. I'll swear to it. They'll know that Mena acted in self-defense."

  "But they'll still put Vic away," Mena said. "They'll lock him up."

  "For improper disposal of a body," Pamela said. "We might be able to convince the DA to plead that down to a misdemeanor."

  Vic looked dubious. "You don't believe that."

  "No," Pamela conceded. "I don't. He'll probably throw the book at you."

  "So I guess you have to kill us all," Teresa said with a shrug.

  "Teri!" Logan said.

  "Yes," Teresa said. "You really only have two choices here, Vic. One: you kill us all and try to shoot your way out, and Mena will be lucky if she makes it out alive. And then she can live with the trauma, and you can hope that your fellow gang members can sneak her out of the country to hide somewhere for the rest of her life, living in terror that one day she'll be caught. Never getting an education. Never living a normal life. Never being free of this."

  "What's option two?" he asked.

  "I tell the police everything and back up Mena's story. She did nothing wrong. She was attacked and acted in self-defense. She goes free and has no criminal record. She goes back to school and can have the life you worked to give her. And you…." She shrugged. "You decide if you love her enough to take responsibility for the things you've done."

  The big, tough, evil gang member stared at Teresa for a long time. He stood there, next to his baby sister, and the tears rolled down his face like rain.

  Then he smiled. He slowly laid the gun down on the chair, and raised his hands. "You're pretty smart, for a whore."

  "Don't ever call a lady that," Logan said softly.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Teresa was sitting in the waiting room at the clinic when Paul Graham came rushing in.

  He grabbed her and hugged her hard, then held her at arm's length and looked her over. "You hurt? At all?"

  She shook her head.

  He brushed her hair away from her face. "You sure?"

  "Not a scratch," she said. "I'm just waiting to hear how bad Mr. Payson is. So Captain Ryan told you everything?"

  "Nope," Pamela said. "I did."

  She had come in after Detective Graham, but Teresa hadn't even noticed.

  Detective Graham put his arm around Teresa's shoulders.

  "Teresa," he said, "I'd like you to meet Pamela Graham."

  The old woman grinned at her. "It's nice to finally meet you, Teresa Soto. I've heard so much about you from my son."

  "Wait. What? I don't understand."

  Detective Graham led her back to the waiting room chairs and sat her down. He sat opposite her, and Pamela sat beside her, holding her hand.

  "I told you I came from a family of cops," he said.

  "Yeah," she said. "But—" She turned to Pamela. "You're a cop?!" And then the second part hit her. "You're Detective Graham's mother?!"

  "No to the first, a
nd yes to the second," Pamela said with that same serene expression she always had.

  At Teresa's dumbfounded look she laughed, and Detective Graham joined in.

  "My mom's a retired police officer," he explained. "She runs a dojo in Sacramento, and teaches Krav Maga to most of my fellow cops."

  "Taught Captain Ryan everything he knows," she said. "Back when he worked for the Sacramento P.D."

  "What's Krav Maga?"

  "A martial art."

  "Like breaking a gunman's wrist with a broomstick?" she asked.

  "You broke a gunman's wrist?" Detective Graham said to his mother in admiration. "Go, Mom."

  "I've still got my mojo," she said calmly. "And one of Vicario's lieutenants was getting out of hand with that gun of his."

  "So, wait a minute," Teresa said, still trying to catch up. "Your mother just happened to be visiting her godson in Pajaro Bay when all this happened?"

  "That's not why I came," she said. "But I did knit Caleb a nice sweater while I was here."

  "You still don't get it," Detective Graham said. "I asked her to get on that bus with you."

  "Actually, Paul, I volunteered," she corrected him. "He told me about how the DA was abandoning you, and how worried he was about your safety. And I just thought it would be a good time to visit Ryan and his family and see this little village Paul was always talking about."

  "So you… when you made friends with me on the bus… and when you starting teaching tai chi at the community center… and just happened to be there tonight…."

  "I was just keeping an eye on you." Pamela smiled.

  "And at the auction…," she said, trailing off.

  "I thought you and that charming young man should have a nice romantic dinner out."

  "What charming young man?" Detective Graham asked, perking up at the news. "Are you sure he's the right kind of man for Teresa? How do you know he's good enough for her? What's his background? Does he come from a nice family?"

  Pamela laughed. "He's a boy scout, Paul."

  But Teresa shook her head. "That part didn't work out. But the rest of it—the part about keeping me safe…." She hugged Pamela. "Thank you. I'll never forget it. You saved me."

  "You saved yourself. When they found you, you figured out what had happened, and how to set things right. Not just for yourself, but for little Ximena, and even for Vicario. You figured out how to get justice for everyone. You're very brave, Teresa Soto."

  "When they found me," she said softly. "About that…." She turned to Detective Graham. "Did she tell you that part, too?"

  His expression turned grim. "That's the other reason I'm here, Teresa. I was already halfway to Pajaro Bay when I got the message from Captain Ryan that something was going down."

  "Already on the way?" She felt her whole body go numb. Somehow she knew what was coming.

  "It's not something I could tell you over the phone."

  "My mother," she said.

  "The last welfare check, they found your mother. She's dead, Teresa. I'm sorry."

  She nodded. "You can't fix someone who doesn't want help," she whispered. He had warned her, over and over. Her mother had been drowning for years, despite all her efforts to hold back the tide. People didn't survive that level of self-destruction. Not when they made absolutely no effort to change their ways.

  "And Amy? My sister?"

  "In the wind." He said it with contempt. "No sign of her. When your mother OD'd, she probably panicked and ran."

  "She didn't even wait around to get the reward for ratting me out," Teresa said quietly. "Sold me out for thirty pieces of silver and she never even collected it."

  Detective Graham flashed a badge at the nurse at the front desk, and they were all quickly led to the room where the old handyman was being treated.

  He was sitting up in bed, sipping a glass of orange juice and watching impassively as Dr. Nico put neat stitches in his leg.

  Logan sat in a chair, holding Mr. Payson's hand.

  "This leg is impressive," Dr. Nico said.

  Teresa didn't see anything impressive about it. The old man's leg was a mangled mess of scars, and it lay twisted on the bed at an odd angle.

  "What did you do to mess up your leg so badly?" the doctor asked.

  "An old football injury, right?" Teresa said.

  "Nope," he said. "Jumped off Bixby Bridge twenty-five years ago. Had a pretty hard landing."

  Her eyes grew wide. "What?!"

  "Teri," Logan said to her. "This is my grandfather, Langston King."

  "The dead guy? The one who trashed the house and disowned your mother and got her ki—" She froze. "Sorry," she said to the old man. "I mean—"

  "The one who got his own daughter killed because he was a judgmental, self-absorbed old fool and a—" He used a few choice words and then cleared his throat. "Pardon my language, Miss. It wasn't an appropriate way to speak in your presence."

  "I'm not a hothouse flower," she said dryly, and Logan flashed her a look.

  What?" she said. "Everyone in the room knows it."

  "Except me," Dr. Nico said. "But hey; I'm just the doctor." He finished the last stitch and covered it with a clean bandage. "No tap dancing," he said.

  "Got it," his patient agreed. "For a week or so, anyway. Then I'll be giving Fred Astaire a run for his money."

  "Fair enough," the doctor said. "Your medical bills will buy me a beach house."

  He left.

  "So you're really Langston King?" she said.

  "Yup. I don't blame you for being disgusted."

  "I'm not disgusted," she said. "Just confused. I thought you died in a suicide twenty-five years ago."

  "Everybody did. I planned to kill myself. But my body refused to cooperate. I broke my leg and got the wind knocked out of me, but I didn't die. I crawled up to the road. A car stopped and I got in and went with the guy to Los Angeles. I got lost in the streets there, drinking and going quietly mad for years."

  "What changed?"

  "I got tired of it," he said. "I started getting jobs and working a bit. And got myself a little furnished room and worked and lived and forgot all about Langston King and Pajaro Bay for a long time."

  "What changed?"

  "I saw an article in a magazine about Roi Soleil. How the big historic house was being turned into a community center. It had a quote from one Logan King Rios about the plans to build something positive out of the old relic. I thought I'd come see what they were building."

  "And see your grandson?"

  He shrugged. "Yeah. See how things turned out after I threw everything away." He looked at Logan. "Seems they turned out okay without me around."

  "But you didn't have to stay away," Logan said, still holding onto his hand. "Did you still hate us that much?"

  "Hate you?" He smiled. "Why would I hate you?"

  "You hated my mother."

  He shook his head. "I never hated her. I thought I knew best. Thought I was so smart." He chuckled. "After all these years, I can't even remember why I thought I was so clever. Can't even remember why I thought it was so important to think I was better than everybody else."

  He put his hand on Logan's. "In the end, all that matters is the people. Not the status. Not the money. Just the people."

  Logan had a hard time looking at Teresa.

  He leaned on the windowsill in the little clinic room and watched her.

  She was now sitting on the edge of the hospital bed, laughing with his grandfather about all they'd gone through.

  Her bright, intelligent expression showed that she took in everything, noticed it all, with a maturity far beyond her years—far beyond the maturity of a person who'd lived the kind of sheltered life he'd known. And despite all the hurt she'd experienced, she reacted with compassion to an old man who had messed up his entire life and had come back to try to make amends.

  "Teri?" he asked during a lull in the conversation.

  She stood up and joined him over in his spot by the window.


  "Not Teri," she said. "Teresa. Teresa Soto." She put out her hand to him, formally, and he shook it.

  "It's nice to meet you, Teresa Soto," he said, equally formally.

  She stood next to him and looked out the window. "So this is it, I guess," she said.

  "What do you mean?" He fought the urge to run his hand through her rumpled hair, smooth it down and caress it.

  "It's all over. The hiding out here and all."

  "Ah. Then you don't want to stay in Pajaro Bay."

  She shook her head. "It's not the place for me now. It was fine when I was Teri Forest. I could be here and have that job and—" She stopped when her voice broke. "But not now that the truth is out."

  "Don't you want to stay?" he asked.

  She shook her head. "How can I? You heard everything Vic said, everything Mena said."

  "Heard that Mena killed the man who attacked her? Sure."

  "Heard why he attacked her. Heard that he thought she was me. Thought she was a prostitute he'd hired."

  "Yeah," he said. "I already knew about you."

  She faced him. Her dark eyes were wide, framed by the oversized red eyeglass frames that made her look like a studious little librarian. "You knew?"

  "Since you told Austin. In the clinic." He stopped. "I heard you talking and eavesdropped on the conversation. It was wrong of me."

  "That's what you got out of it? That it was wrong of you to eavesdrop?"

  He thought of the wreckage he'd made of his office when he'd learned the truth. Of the anger and disgust that had overwhelmed him. Of the conversation he'd had with Jack—with his grandfather, a sad old man who'd thrown away his relationship with his daughter. Who never heard her out, never listened, but thought himself qualified to judge another human being's life. And had been haunted by that mistake for twenty-five years.

  He looked Teresa straight in the eye. "I have no idea what you went through. Want to tell me about it?"

  She sighed, a deep sigh that seemed to empty her out, like her lungs had been filled to the brim with pain and fear, shame and regret, and she had been holding it in for so long it had almost consumed her.