Shatter Page 11

  “My name is Cordero,” he answers. “I’m Salem’s partner at the school.”

  Dad smiles blandly. I find the tension in my neck dissipating. Dad doesn’t recognize Cordero’s name, even though I said it at the police station.

  “Nice to meet you,” Dad tells Cordero.

  Elena takes Dad’s arm. “If you’ll excuse us, I have my eye on a cotton candy vendor.”

  Dad glances at me, letting me know he approves of Cordero, at least for now. They leave.

  Cordero focuses on me, breathing in. His gaze is not casual. It’s not menacing, but it’s not casual.

  AddyDay clears her throat. “Okay, well, I’m going to go … I’ll—I’ll call you, Salem.”

  He spares her a moment of attention. “Your neck is okay?”

  “Um, yeah, it’s getting better.” She gives him a smile, which he returns, and for a crazy moment I’m stung with jealousy.

  As soon as AddyDay leaves, Cordero drops his polite façade and steps close.

  “I want to have the mock trial meeting at Elena’s house—you understand?” His tone is so low and full of emotion I can hardly catch his words through his accent.

  Confused, I step away, hitting chain link with my lower back.

  He adjusts his hat, adopting a more controlled expression. “You said it yourself. Elena has access to better trial information. We should meet at her house.” He nods toward the direction Dad and Elena took. They’re nowhere to be seen.

  Yes, Cordero must have checked the Facebook page. Yes, he knows meeting at Elena’s house was a possibility. But he doesn’t care about the mock trial practice.

  “I know you hung out with Carrie,” I say suddenly, the words taking all of my breath.

  Cordero narrows his eyes. “Change the location of the practice.”

  Now that he’s close, I notice the black tip of his V tattoo peeking out from under overlapping butterfly bandages. The bandage doesn’t completely cover the cut that’s under it—a deep cut as thin as a knife-blade. Like he guesses my thoughts, he touches the bandage and steps back from me. He glances almost by instinct at a group of guys a stone’s throw away from us.

  There are three of them. The two younger ones are the Primeros I spoke to at school. The third one is older. He has a broad neck and the wide-set eyes of a fetal alcohol baby all grown up.

  The older guy notices Cordero and comes over to us, laughing cruelly. His gold tooth flashes in the sunlight, reminding me AddyDay’s description of Tito. I think I’m looking at the banger who fought Slate and then two days later showed up at Mission Plaza on the night Juan died. The younger boys follow him.

  Tito turns to me just as I realize I’ve let myself become surrounded by gang members.

  “Lookee at mamacita here,” he says to me, his smile a promise of violence. “Yeah, I know who you are. You’re that girl. You think you can come into my house, huh? Just any time?”

  I feel all three of Cordero’s friends looking at me. All of them have heard me asking for Cordero, heard me making myself a target.

  “I need to go.” I push past Cordero to head toward the carnival crowd.

  Tito lunges and catches me by the arm. Using both hands, he twists my wrist like he’s wringing all the blood out of my skin. The pain is excruciating.

  “Ow!” I stop struggling.

  “Oh man, look it! She’s so scared!” Tito laughs with excitement.

  Cordero tries to get Tito to let me go, rattling off a string of Spanish. The younger guys glare at me, nervous because I’m here.

  Tito gets into Cordero’s face. “You think we gonna leave some girl alone ’cause o’ you? I’m the leader, yeah?”

  Cordero’s jaw clenches, but he lowers his eyes, as if forcing himself to submit.

  “Didn’t I teach you your lesson this morning? Obey me, ese,” Tito shouts, nodding at the bandages on Cordero’s face. “You wanna go to school for nothing, that’s your problem.” He shakes my arm. “Bringing this girl in my business, that’s mine.”

  Once he’s composed, Cordero looks up directly at Tito. “Make me stop.” His voice is low but distinct. He stands still, challenging Tito only with his eyes. The challenge is fierce, though. The younger boys spread out behind Tito, one to the left and one to the right. They fist their hands, looking more nervous than ever. I can’t tell whose side they’ll take.

  “Oh, you wanna—” Tito relaxes his grip on my wrist.

  Cordero grabs my opposite arm and yanks me behind him. He’s so quick. Tito stumbles before losing hold of me completely. Using Tito’s momentum, Cordero shoves him to the ground and spins to hold my elbow.

  We run.

  He propels me past ice cream cones fisted by girls in black braids. We don’t stop until I see Dad and Elena in the distance with their back to me, facing the Octopus ride. Behind us, Tito stops near the bathrooms, eyeing a security officer strolling nearby. The older boy points at Cordero like Cordero’s going to get it later and sulks off with both younger boys.

  Cordero spins me to face him. “I’m going to Elena’s house.”

  I can’t think or breathe. His face is inches from mine, dark, intense, and shaking. Only it’s me that’s shaking, by his grip on my arm. I glance one more time to verify Tito isn’t following us. Cordero might be hurt for helping me escape. My heart rate is maxed.

  “Óyeme. Listen to me.” Cordero’s low, urgent words blow into my cheeks. “Tell everyone we’re having the mock trial at Elena Thornton’s house.”

  “Elena Thornton’s house,” I repeat. “You mean Rick Thornton’s house—before they separated.”

  As soon as I say it, my thoughts become steady with the sense of it. Elena’s soon-to-be ex-husband worked with troubled youth, giving them a refuge from gang members. It’s not the class Cordero wants—it’s the house. The house that someone tried to break into three times.

  “There’s nothing—” He stops. His calm denial comes a beat late. For once I’m sure my guess is right. “Why do you—”

  I become furious—him helping me doesn’t matter. Finding out what happened to Carrie matters. “So you’re going to break into Rick’s house? Why? Because someone like Tito told you to? Why won’t you talk to me about Carrie?”

  Cordero’s eyes flash. “Tito is a bad leader—”

  “Oh, you think?”

  “In the gang, there are the leaders and there are the …” He’s losing his cool, watching me lose mine. He’ll explode if he can’t find the word he wants fast enough. “… the followers.”

  “Who cares?”

  “Me. I care. I …” He switches to Spanish. I only catch a few of his words. Palo, stick. No son complicados, they’re not complicated. I can’t translate fast enough.

  “Was it a gang leader or a gang follower who killed Carrie?” I scream, losing all control.

  “Quiet!” he says in a harsh voice.

  Bystanders stare at us.

  Composing himself, he backs away from me and gives the people around us a small smile.

  I don’t care about them. I step toward him, ready to shout again.

  He shakes his head slowly, but his eyes remain as intense as before. “Calm down.”

  He waits, watching me shake and breathe heavily. He’s right. I’m causing a scene. No one will talk to me, not even Jeremy, because I lose control. I swallow and rub the back of my neck. People watching us lose interest.

  Cordero approaches me with a smile and friendly attitude. He even puts his arm around me, like we’re an item.

  He whispers in my ear with the same intensity in his eyes as before. “Let’s walk.”

  I want to shrug his arm off my shoulders, but only because I want him to feel rejected. My body takes instantly to the warmth of his presence and the feel of his breath on my hair. Even the faint smell of cigarette smoke coming from his clothes makes me think about the house he lives in and the company he keeps, whether he wants that company or not. I think I respect him. I might even sympathize with him.
/>
  Still, he may be covering for someone who hurt Carrie.

  I keep my back stiff.

  “Our guys don’t cut gas lines.” Baseball cap pulled low, he leans close to me and puts his finger to his temple. “They—boom.” He pulls his finger-trigger.

  I shake my head, refusing to listen. “I know someone killed her.”

  “Of course someone killed her.”

  “Someone who—” My gaze shoots to the line of his brows. “What?”

  He nods, serious and motivated. He cares very much about this topic. “Of course someone killed her.”

  We meander through the carnival—his arm around me, my face turned to drink in his lowered gaze, like we’re some loving couple. He knows she was killed. Finally, someone believes me and it’s the wrong someone—it’s not a cop who can investigate and punish, it’s a gang member who’s skilled at acting and owns a gun. But he believes me. He knows she was murdered.

  “How do you know?” I whisper. “The police don’t even know.”

  He matches my intensity. “How do you know?”

  “Because …” I’m not sure if I should tell him about the markings on Carrie’s car matching the marking on the victim’s shoe. “Because Juan Herrera is from the union. Because Carrie hired you to protect the union.”

  Cordero’s arm becomes lighter, almost leaving my shoulders. His anger is cold. “How did you know that?”

  “Who tagged Carrie’s car?”

  “Who told you?” Cordero demands, pulling me closer. He even slips his hand around my waist. At his touch, my chest threatens to burst from the need for air—the good kind of need. I feel like it’s wrong to react positively to him. Like maybe I’m betraying Carrie.

  “I’m not … I won’t answer you until you answer me. You never answer,” I say, flustered.

  Air escapes his nostrils, but he eases his grip on me by degrees, like he’s unsure what to do with me. His black cap is low. He stops walking.

  We stay like that, me in his arms, testing each other visually.

  “I want inside Elena’s house.” His dark eyes prove it—telling me just how much he wants it.

  “If you—if you show me what you’re taking from the house, I’ll get you inside.” What am I doing?

  With the darkening of an already dangerous expression, he backs away from me, folding his arms in refusal. My shoulders and waist feel cooler without him, but I’d move closer again if I could do it somehow without him noticing. I miss the closeness.

  I swallow. “If you show me—”

  “Today,” he demands.

  “Wait—go in Elena’s house today?”

  “You’re friends, right? Take me to the house.”

  “I can’t. We barely know each other,” I say, even as I throw together a plan to do exactly what he requested. I’ll be eating dinner at Elena’s in just a few hours. I could get Cordero inside.

  His eyes narrow.

  “Um, Cordero? Salem?” a voice asks.

  At the interruption, I step back from him. Only then does my world include the carnival. The crowds are sparse in the dead heat of late afternoon. AddyDay toys with the scab on her neck while Cordero dons his aloof expression.

  “Um …” AddyDay continues. “Well, I saw your dad coming and thought I’d give you a heads up …”

  I look. Fifty feet away, Dad and Elena stroll toward us, eating cotton candy.

  “Today.” Cordero tells me. He keeps his voice low in front of AddyDay, who hums softly—a little tune called “Minding Her Own Business.”

  I try to match the confidence in Cordero’s gaze. “How will you even know when to come?”

  “I’ll know.”

  Cordero leaves, walking in Tito’s direction, which happens to lead right past Dad and Elena. He falters on his first step, his right shoulder rolling forward. I’d forgotten about his injuries, and he’s likely to get more after helping me. He straightens. Elena calls to him in Spanish, steering Dad toward him for a hello. I could die of embarrassment. Cordero actually stops to talk. How will he know when to come to Elena’s, or how to get inside? My shoulders tense. Will he watch her house the whole time I’m there?

  “Are you okay?” AddyDay asks me. “I said Cordero was, you know, not evil, but don’t go dating him or something.”

  “Are you kidding?” I ask, wondering which part of, I think Cordero might be a murderer confused her in our earlier conversation. Still, I blush.

  “Good—then you’re not mad I interrupted? What were you talking about?”

  I hesitate, not sure I want a sidekick. “Before Carrie died, she … hired Cordero to protect union members.”

  “Oh, that’s so nice of her.”

  “No—what? It’s not nice. It’s kind of a big deal. Cordero’s in a gang and he was supposed to intimidate anyone the growers hired to intimidate strikers. Do you understand? Carrie hired a gang member. The growers have millions of dollars on the line and Carrie hired a gang member to stop their plotting. I think that’s why she died. I think one of them killed her.”

  “You … you think the fire at your house was on purpose?” Her eyes are huge.

  “Cordero thinks so too. And now he wants to get inside Elena’s house, but I don’t know why. He was talking about Carrie too. Gang members used to hang out at Elena’s a lot, back when she was married to Rick Thornton. You know Rick, right?”

  She nods slowly, still overwhelmed. “Everyone knows Rick.”

  “Well, I told Cordero I’ll help him get inside Elena’s house if he tells me what he knows about Carrie.”

  “Okay. Okay, let me think. It’s all so crazy.” She taps her lips. “So you need access to Elena’s place. That seems doable, really.”

  “I’m eating dinner there,” I remind her. “I could crack a window before I leave.”

  AddyDay makes a face, not sure about the idea. I’m not either. If I let Cordero inside and he hurts Elena, that would be my fault. But Cordero’s given zero indication that he wants to harm anyone while inside the house. He could harm Elena anywhere. There’ve been other break-ins, so it seems like he’s trying to find something.

  What is it, then? An old cell phone of some gang member, with the contact list still intact? Cash?

  “Anyway, I can’t let Cordero inside without me.” I say. “He might not show me what he takes.”

  AddyDay tilts her head. “Of course, you could look for it yourself—whatever he’s looking for.”

  “I don’t know what it is. Anyway, how will I search the house without Elena and Dad noticing?”

  I glance at Cordero as he nods goodbye to Elena and Dad and jogs stiffly away. What if I could find what he’s looking for? No negotiation with him. And if I can’t find anything, well then, partner with him.

  Across the way, Dad raises his eyebrows, noticing how I’m watching Cordero’s tall frame recede into carnival crowds. I look away, more embarrassed than ever.

  “Distract them?” AddyDay says as Dad and Elena head toward us.

  “What? Oh.” I shake my head. “The three of us won’t be at Elena’s house that long. Right after dinner, she and Dad are going to a movie.”

  “A movie? Wait, that’s perfect! I have a plan.”

  “Should I be worried?”

  AddyDay gives me a knowing smile, like I was joking with her. I hadn’t been.

  Dad stuffs his wallet in his back pocket as he arrives with Elena. “You get your study schedule all aligned with Cordero?” he asks me.

  “Of course.” Elena sends a wicked look at Dad over her cotton candy. “Think how important good grades are.” Dad’s suspicion of my interest in Cordero must be so amusing to her.

  “It was nothing.” I try not to look nervous talking about Cordero, which makes me more nervous.

  I’ll never get him inside Elena’s house if Dad finds out he’s a Primero. Dad is smart enough that he’d be suspicious of every move I made after that.

  “Hey, remember how you asked me to dinner?” AddyDay
asks Elena. “Well, I was thinking—maybe I could come still?”

  “You want to?” Elena answers. “I have enough food to feed ten of Salem’s friends.”

  “Oh, good,” AddyDay says. “I’m just so excited about the UC Berkeley library access Salem told us you have. You and Salem’s dad are going to a movie later, right? Can Salem and I stay and research on your computer while you’re gone? Do you really get access to all the FBI files?” Her innocence is astonishing.

  I hold my breath even though Elena’s face is breaking into a wide grin.

  “I’m not sure about that,” Dad answers.

  “I do get access to the FBI files—everything they’ve released. As a journalist, I find the subscription fee is worth every penny.” Elena turns from AddyDay to Dad, like she’s asking his permission too. “Oh, they’ll be fine.”

  “Well?” I ask Dad.

  “Well.” Dad takes a breath. “All right.”

  Just like that, whatever is inside Elena’s house—and all it might tell me about Carrie’s death—is hours away from being discovered.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Isit next to AddyDay in the back seat on the way to Elena’s house, scowling at all of Elena’s questions and amused hints to Dad about my love life. AddyDay chats freely, but I have no attention for anything but Cordero.

  He argued with me when I said Carrie was killed by a gang member—but he wasn’t arguing that her death was accidental. He was saying the killer wasn’t a gang member. Does that mean he knows who killed her? He spoke in Spanish for a while. Maybe he said something important, thinking I wouldn’t understand.

  I pull up the Internet on my phone and search for the phrases I remember him saying about gang members. They’ll hit you with a stick. They’ll shoot you. They’re not complicated. There has to be something that I’m missing.

  Cordero’s words keep ringing through my head. The way he phrased it. He’d said, they. Not we.

  The gang. Could he be planning to leave it?

  “Are you?” AddyDay asks me.