No Shelter by Robert Swartwood Read Free Book Online Page A

the nail. Finally she shakes her head.  
    “These men,” she says, “they are very, very bad. But ...”  
    “But?”  
    “But us women, we are all here in this country illegally. What ... what will then become of us?”  
    It’s like a giant corkscrew jammed into my stomach, being twisted and twisted, this question of hers catching me so off guard. Here is a girl younger than me but yet looks ten years older, who has been forced into a life of prostitution where half the time she is beaten to an inch of her life—here is this girl finding herself preferring this rather than being sent back home.  
    “Who says you’ll be sent back?”  
    Rosalina gives a soft, sardonic laugh. “Everyone in this country hates people like me. We are ... less than human. We are trash. They will send me back to my country without a second’s thought or care.”  
    “But wouldn’t you rather be back in your country? Don’t you have anyone there?”  
    “I have my husband and children, yes.”  
    Rosalina sees my expression and quickly shakes her head.  
    “No, no, believe me when I say I love and miss my family more than anything in the world. We came over here four years ago, us and a dozen others. But then the police came and took my husband and children and many of the others away. There were only a few of us left, women, and we had nothing—no money, no shelter, absolutely nothing.”  
    “I still don’t understand. Why then wouldn’t you want to go back?”  
    “Because this ... this is America.” She says this in such an obvious way, a soft light starting to burn in her eyes. “This is the land of wealth and freedom. You have to work to get it, and once I get it, I will send for my husband and children.”  
    I see where she’s going with this and slowly ask, “Rosalina, how much money have you earned since you’ve been at the ranch?”  
    She looks away, tallying the amount up in her head. “About six hundred dollars.”  
    “So that means you need another four thousand four hundred dollars before you are free.”  
    She nods, slowly, that soft light dimming bit by bit in her eyes.  
    I don’t tell her the obvious, something she must already know but something she has blinded herself to. She just stares back at me, her eyes filling again, and slowly shakes her head.  
    “I cannot return empty-handed.”  
    I reach back into the sports bag, pull out the last toy Scooter has provided me. It’s a night-vision scope which I stuff into the front of my pants pocket. Then I softly shut the back door and walk around to the other side, keeping my gaze level with Rosalina. When I reach her I place my hand on her shoulder and ask her to again tell me everything she can about the ranch.  
    She wipes at her eyes, slowly shakes her head. “Please tell me—why are you doing this?”  
    I think of that woman from years ago, the one I used to know, the one who called me a friend, and I say to Rosalina, “Because nobody else will.”  

 
     
     
    11

    The darkness has taken on a greenish-yellow tint. I can distinctly see the ranch house at the base of the desert, a squat brick building with bars over the windows. Adjacent to this is another building, just one room, a shack where Rosalina says the guards spend most of their time.  
    There is no electricity, no indoor plumbing to either building. A generator growls softly in the night, keeping the lights on inside the guards’ house.  
    I lie on my stomach on top of the rocky hill, the night-vision scope to my eye. I sit up and turn, focus back down to the other side of the hill where I parked the Town Car. Rosalina is inside, the keys in the ignition. I told her if I don’t return within an hour, or if she senses trouble, to take the car and never return.  
    In the heavy and cold silence a sound comes from down the hill. Rusty hinges screech as a door opens. A man steps outside. I focus the scope on him. He’s tall, Hispanic, wearing a holstered