This Wicked World by RICHARD LANGE Read Free Book Online

so he gets out of the car and leans in to grab his jacket off the backseat, where he stowed it when they left Denny’s.
    He follows Robo through a gate in the fence and up the concrete walk to the porch. There’s a white plastic chair sitting there, and a dusty hummingbird feeder that looks like it hasn’t been filled in years hangs from the eaves. The front door is open, but the house is dark beyond the heavy black security screen. Boone hears people speaking Spanish on a TV somewhere inside.
    Robo bangs on the screen and calls out, “
Hola?
”
    A young girl coalesces out of the murk with a baby perched on her hip. The girl’s black hair is cut short, and she’s wearing jeans and a white tank top with the word DIVA spelled out in rhinestones. The baby is naked except for a diaper.
    “
Si?
” the girl says.
    “Maribel
está aqui?
” Robo asks.
    “
Soy
Maribel.”
    Robo tells her that he’s a friend of Oscar’s grandfather and would like to talk to her for a minute. She asks if he’s police.
No, no, I’m too honest for that,
he says in Spanish. Maribel looks past him at Boone, and Robo adds,
Now him, he’s not so honest, but he’s working for me today.
    Maribel flashes a little smile, then says something over her shoulder to someone else in the room. Another girl appears with a key that Maribel uses to unlock the screen.
    “Bet you a million she doesn’t know he’s dead,” Boone whispers.
    He and Robo step into the living room. It smells like baby powder and Pine-Sol. The sofa is covered with a colorful blanket, and there’s an unmade bed in the dining room. A framed painting of Jesus hangs on one wall and a poster of Mickey and Minnie Mouse on another. A Mexican soap opera is playing on the TV.
    An older woman in a bathrobe comes walking up the hallway from the back of the house. Her hair is wet, and she’s wiping her hands on a towel. She stops short, startled, when she sees the men, and draws her robe tighter around herself.
    What’s happening?
she asks.
    They’ve come about Oscar,
Maribel replies.
    The woman’s shoulders sag like she knows it’s going to be bad news. She rattles off a stream of curses under her breath —
pinche
this and
pinche
that — then offers the men coffee. They say no,
gracias,
really, but she hustles off to the kitchen anyway.
    Turns out the woman is Maribel’s aunt, and the other girl is Maribel’s cousin. The uncle also lives there, and the cousin’s husband, but they’re at work.
    Maribel motions for Robo and Boone to sit on the couch. She drops into a torn recliner and uses a remote to mute the TV.
    This is Oscar’s son, Alex,
she tells Robo. The baby grabs the thin gold chain and crucifix around her neck, and she has to pry them out of his little fingers.
Have you seen Oscar?
    Young lady,
Robo says,
I don’t know a gentle way to put this, but Oscar is dead
.
    Maribel slumps in the recliner and raises one hand to her mouth. Her dark eyes fill with tears, but she doesn’t break down. Her cousin, however, gasps and runs for the kitchen, shouting, “
Mamá! Mamá!
” This frightens little Alex, who begins to cry.
    I’m sorry,
Robo says. Boone looks down at the floor, out the window. It’s as awful a moment as he’s had in a while, everything laid bare like this.
    The aunt and cousin return, both hysterical, and Robo has to calm them down before he can tell the story. How Oscar was found on the bus; how he died from infected dog bites; and how Oscar’s grandfather hired him to find out what happened.
    Maribel’s face is blank, but her stoicism is betrayed by occasional sharp intakes of breath, stillborn sobs. Her aunt sits on the arm of the recliner and strokes the girl’s hair as Robo explains to her that he needs her help to uncover the truth.
    The baby wants down. Maribel props him against the coffee table. He bounces a few times to test his legs, then loses his balance and sits abruptly on the floor.
    Just start at the beginning,
Robo says.
Tell me