Shatter Read online

  She shakes her head and jogs away.

  I watch her leave. Envy is strong and soft—like a 1950s beauty queen. But this strike is changing her. Carrie’s strike. It has become a carnival reflection of what Carrie wanted—each side blaming the other, the violence growing more heated, the justification to attack greater.

  I contemplate running after her, but footsteps crunch behind me.

  “Salem, is that you?” Slate’s voice asks.

  I spin around. He jogs toward me.

  “I was worried,” he says.

  Slate.

  Slate is who I’ve trusted, not Cordero.

  My thoughts mock me in an emotional avalanche. For the first time it occurs to me that Cordero was calling Slate a liar. He said Slate’s fight had nothing to do with protecting Carrie, and everything to do with Tito, the gang member who’s worked for the killer at least once.

  Slate, who I’ve trusted. Slate, who has lied to me since the beginning.

  “Salem—” he says.

  “You weren’t protecting Carrie that night on your date.” I back away from him as the marchers split to walk around us. “You came to Mission Plaza on purpose to fight Tito.”

  Slate’s gaze darts to me, eyes blue as smoke in the distance.

  Guilty as the one who started the fire.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Ibackpedal through a row of trees. Chanting union supporters pay me no attention. I need to be away from Slate.

  He pursues me. “Salem.”

  “You were angry. You attacked a group of Primeros,” I say, stumbling on rotting peaches as I go, backpack jostling. Suspicion and fear and the driving need to know what happened to Carrie play against each other.

  “It’s not my secret,” he insists, blue eyes haunted.

  “If you’re why she died, I’ll …”

  “Anna, she tried to join the gang, yeah?” His expression is twisted by the horror of the memory. “She … had trouble making friends when we moved here.”

  “Anna?” Pausing, I picture Slate’s sister and her pretty, heart-shaped face.

  “For her gang initiation, Tito wanted her to rob a gas station holding a gun,” he says. “She didn’t want to be in the gang anymore. She said no. He said yes … he attacked her. He hurt her badly. She got away—she came home and only wanted Mom. Carrie knew where Tito’s gang hangs out. She drove me to Tito. I hopped out of the car. I just—I beat him up. I wanted to kill him. Other guys from the gang showed up. Carrie parked the car and came to us—Cordero was there. He kept her from getting hurt and broke up the fight—that’s when I found out they knew each other, that she’d been hiring him.”

  Around us, the atmosphere is a party. Marchers ignore Slate and me. Meanwhile my mind edges around the terror of the scene Slate is painting.

  Tito, with his wide-set eyes and lust for violence. Every image of him near meek, exquisite little Anna Panakhov is only half-formed before I push it away, sick, wanting anger over fear. Carrie died. I need a face, a name.

  “I thought Tito might have come after Carrie to get even with me.” Slate’s head is bowed. “I even thought the house explosion was set up—like you did. But the police said probably not. After Carrie died, I told them everything.”

  “After?”

  Despite my shouting, I think how I’ve blamed him unfairly. He had nothing to do with Carrie’s death.

  “There are lists,” Slate says. His hair falls into his blue eyes, so unusually light for his ethnic background. “We could be deported if they think we’re terrorists. We’re careful. No police record, no history of violence.”

  I don’t ask who “they” are. The police. The government. That’s why Slate’s family is private. They’re devout people who don’t talk about their beliefs for fear of reprisal.

  “When Tito went after Anna, we should have reported it right away,” he continues. “But I fought Tito instead. Then I was frightened. He looked bad. Mom didn’t want any fight on my file. And Anna—she was terrified. She begged me not to go to the police. She said the gang would call her a snitch and never leave her alone. I promised her I would say nothing. I promised her. ”

  I can’t think of how I’d react in Slate’s place. I can’t imagine the terror.

  “Carrie stayed calm the first night she found out about Anna, but later—the night she called me from Mission Plaza—she was freaked out. One minute she’d demand to go to the police, and Anna would cry, and the next minute Carrie would be confused, like she didn’t understand what Anna even had to do with going to the police.”

  “That’s because she wasn’t talking about Anna by then,” I say softly.

  “So … what was she afraid of?”

  “She was there when Juan was murdered.”

  “You’re sure?”

  I nod.

  Slate hunches over, a hand to his forehead, eyes pressed shut.

  “I miss her so much,” he manages to say.

  “I—” If I say one word about my longing for Carrie, how I’ll never be right without her, I’ll cry and never stop.

  He pulls me into a hug. We stay that way for a long time.

  Finally, he lifts his chin from my head. I’m mesmerized by the way he searches my face, like he’s looking for something specific, something always just out of reach.

  I know it’s not me he sees in my features.

  “I’m not Carrie,” I say.

  My whispered words bring him back from wherever he went, a place far away, a place where Carrie is. A moment with her is what he wants, not this one, not me. My mental image of Slate shifts to dark skin and river water—the intensity of Cordero’s gaze. I’m more confused than ever.

  “I have to go get ready for the mock trial.” I run away, ignoring the gentle plea of his calls.

  I plan to go to AddyDay’s, which is past my own home. I should dart back into the orchard to avoid Dad, but instead I find myself approaching my real home—my old house. The roof over the patio is gone along with huge chunks of the kitchen. What remains is a half a house—one that’s eerily familiar. The venetian blinds Carrie and I used to play in are visible in the sliding glass door to Dad’s bedroom. The lilac bush sends me its scent.

  In the driveway, a white van has accordion tubing running past new police tape and into the garage.

  The forensic expert is here.

  He’s here and it feels like his conclusion might come too late. How could I have thought I’d be able to find Carrie’s killer or stop the explosion threatened for today? Following the growers to a secret meeting—what kind of plan is that? The mayor has an alibi now. Dad’s the only grower left on the list. I don’t know where Cordero is or if I should try to save him somehow.

  I’m not secure in my decisions like Cordero is.

  Again, I feel the pressure of his fingers against my skin. I feel the tremble as I waited for him to come closer, his eyes black, his expression vulnerable. Like he’s not always in control. Like he wasn’t conscious of what he was doing at all.

  Get out there more, talk, kiss a guy, Carrie told me. And when Cordero tried to kiss me, I stopped him.

  I’ll never be confident or find her killer. I’ll never be strong, the way she said I would be. That dream died when she did.

  The pain inside me burns like fire. I run away from the scorched house. I land in a sea of people headed for Grandma’s farmhouse next door. A news crew is on the front grass, filming a woman with a handheld microphone. I can hear her loud, clear voice.

  “… the man who owns the orchard behind me,” the woman says. “Police say he had money on hand to bribe the murdered union official Juan Herrera.”

  Police? Bribery?

  My mind flashes to the wad of cash in Dad’s hand when he took Carrie and me with him to the bank the morning before she died.

  I cover my mouth. “No.”

  Just as I move to go toward the orchard to leave, a guy with a ponytail points his bullhorn at my face. “Look, it’s the daughter!”


  The volume blasts my ears. I reel away. He follows me. “Better say goodbye. His alibi is busted, kid. Dear old Daddy’s a murderer.”

  Something heavy and squishy slams into the side of my neck. I recoil. Rotten peach-juice soaks into the collar of my running shirt. The peach rebounds onto the grass.

  “Look at her!”

  “Spoiled rich kid.”

  Protesters surround me, shouting while I flee. I’m enraged. We’re not rich. But I’m ashamed too. We’re rich compared to peach pickers. Dad was bribing a union official.

  I look back at Grandma’s house. Dad is in the driveway, flanked by two officers. His bowed head slaps me harder than any peach could. Without thinking, I veer toward him.

  “Dad! Dad!”

  When I get close, Officer Haynes cuts off my path to Dad. Two cop cars are parked behind our Prius.

  “Calm down,” the officer says. “It’s just a search warrant.”

  I dodge him. “Dad?”

  Dad reaches for me, standing by the door of the nearest police vehicle. He’s not held by the officers or cuffed. The second cop is nearby.

  “Salem, are you okay?” Dad grabs my shoulders. “Where were you?”

  “They can’t arrest you. They can’t!” I want to take it back—the grower’s tape I handed over. He’s just my dad. Why can’t the police see he’s just my dad? I’ve lost Carrie already.

  “They found the missing tape recording. I left the grower’s meeting early on May 24,” Dad tells me, as if in shock from the news.

  My heart sinks to a new level. He really hadn’t remembered.

  Someone pushes us. My elbows slam into the cop car side window. Dad stumbles, protectively covering me from a bald man screaming that Dad will pay for his crimes. The man is pulled off of us by Officer Haynes. The second officer controls the crowd, pinning Dad and me against the car’s white exterior for a moment. I regain my footing. Dad and I have near privacy amidst the blue of two uniformed policemen and the distraction of a raging man.

  I stare up at Dad, my throat dry. “They say you bribed Juan. It was that cash you took out of the bank with Carrie and me, wasn’t it?”

  Dad fingers my hair, made sticky by peach juice. He must see the yellow strands of fruit dripping down my neck. His face sags.

  “I meant it as a donation the first time,” Dad says so only I hear him. No anger, no menace. “Years ago. He said it was for a charity for pickers, but I got the hint eventually that he was pocketing the money and possibly tampering with votes to keep the union from going on strike, to keep the money flowing. Juan never showed up for his money this year, but the amount I withdrew matched some records he was keeping. I think Carrie was suspicious. She wanted to know who I was meeting. I’m glad she’s not here for this.” Choked up, he turns away from me.

  My body goes cold under a layer of sweat. Dad was bribing Juan to discourage the union from going on strike, and Carrie found out about it. Dad had nothing to do with any murder.

  Officer Haynes takes me by the upper arm. The second officer leads Dad into the police car. He covers his face. The car door slams shut and triumphant cheering bursts from the crowd.

  “Do you have any friends nearby?” Haynes shouts to me.

  Through tears I look up at his boyish face. Officer Haynes isn’t a dirty cop after all. He was simply waiting for the right time to reveal Dad’s blown alibi and the idea of bribery. The right way to amplify the impact. The arrival of the Laborer’s March in Verona with all its passion. Dad doesn’t get a trial by jury—his conviction is here, with the media and the spectators and the perception of his guilt.

  I spin away from Officer Haynes in fury.

  “Salem, wait,” the officer yells.

  I escape through the orchard past hundreds of people. I run alongside a bus with open doors, inching forward. I check my phone.

  Unknown: I’m okay. I will see you at the mock trial.

  My strides get wider, and faster. More determined.

  Cordero is alive.

  Juan was corrupt.

  I finally realize that means growers aren’t the only ones with motive. What if Benicio de la Cruz found out Juan Herrera was a traitor? Benicio would never go to the media or police with that. Dirt like that would ruin the strike. He’d take care of the problem himself, and if a grower got blamed, all the better. Just today I watched Envy doing exactly the same thing.

  The growers’ secret meetings. The union’s secret plans. Which one is covering up Juan’s murder? Which one will result in a bomb today? Which one would have targeted the Taco Shop at Mission Plaza during Senator Lethco’s speech? The growers to intimidate the union? Or the union to place the blame on the growers and cry poor me?

  The growers will be at the mock trial.

  Envy and Kimi will be at the mock trial too, armed with their insider knowledge of the union’s final secret meeting.

  I veer toward the bus. I have to be at the mock trial. I have to follow the growers and the union officials. I’ll need help, but I can’t go to the police. Officer Haynes may be in the clear, but there’s no telling if he’d handcuff me to a peach tree to keep me “safe” and away from the rally.

  The bus doors are closing. I hop on just in time. Clueless to my identity, the passengers on board applaud my late arrival while the vehicle picks up speed in earnest. I take a flag handed to me by a squat Hispanic man.

  It reads, “Sacramento or Bust.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  The window next to me is glared with sunlight as the bus enters the freeway onramp. My clothes have dried, leaving me grimy and smelly. There are sticky peach guts on my neck.

  As we travel, I try to collect my thoughts enough to prep for the mock trial. Digging through my backpack, I make sure I’ve got everything I packed this morning. I take out the class roster that I’ll need to give to the guards at the courthouse. The last page is a copy of a Verona High identification card belonging to Cordero Eduardo Vasquez-Ramirez.

  Pausing, I stare at Cordero’s sullen expression. Of course that’s how he looks—the same as the day I met him. When did I stop seeing him that way? When did my mental image shift, focusing only on his eternal alertness, his intelligence, and the hot-button trigger of his emotional reactions—a kaleidoscope of astonishing variety? The photo at my fingertips is as far from his real character as sand from fresh water.

  He knows I’m going to watch him every minute today, obsessed with the riddle of his motive. Will he stick with the gang, no matter what? Find justice in a bullet?

  It all comes down to one question.

  Who is Cordero really?

  The dark expression in his picture is so foreboding, I wonder if even he knows the answer.

  My phone vibrates.

  AddyDay: C left w Marissa. Says his phone’s almost dead. We’re almost there.

  Me: Your stepdad is cleared. Rick says Bill was still at the peach meeting May 24.

  AddyDay: I knew it! I knew it!

  I text Dad too.

  Me: I’m safe and on my way to Sacramento. I love you.

  Dad: Love you too. You’ll do great. Don’t worry about me.

  Don’t worry. Impossible words.

  I go to the bathroom in the back, behind the seats. I’m lucky I got on one of the nicer buses. I wash my hair in the sink with twenty squirts of foaming soap. The vehicle is bouncy and I hit my elbow on the wall. I use paper towels to coax dried river mud off my legs and peach goo from my neck. I put on the outfit I packed this morning, a sleeveless, yellow blouse and black pencil skirt that hits me above the belly button. AddyDay picked it out.

  My luckiest pre-packed items of the day are a brush, hair spray, and all the bobby pins I could want. I backcomb my hair. I sweep it into an updo reminiscent of the 1960s and pin a chic, black pillbox hat over the crown of my head. Makeup takes a while. I catch my reflection in the mirror and don’t recognize the troubled, elegant young lady staring back.

  By the time I get out, we�
�re in downtown Sacramento. I disembark on three-inch, double-strapped high heels, stepping into a sea of American flags and purple union balloons. Row after row of printed banners stretch the width of a seven-lane street, held by a hundred hands each. Everyone else is clapping in rhythm to chants. A block ahead, the courthouse stands white and majestic. The protesters are headed away from it, toward the capitol building a mile away. Three news helicopters circle blue skies. My damp hair pulls at the base of my neck from all the bobby pins.

  Overwhelmed by the smell of exhaust fumes and not at all refreshed from my prep time in the bus bathroom, I cut past rally members, heels clicking. My phone rings, and I answer on the go.

  “… Salem?” AddyDay’s voice is faint against the background sounds of air horns and cowbells.

  “What?” I yell, pressed by my surroundings. The killer might strike again in just two hours.

  “Where are you guys? You only have a few minutes,” she exclaims.

  “Wait, Cordero’s not there?”

  I arrive at the base of a grand outdoor staircase leading to the courthouse entrance, and stop, breathless.

  Cordero Vasquez stands on the top step, wearing a crisp, buttoned shirt. His open collar is flared in the smooth style of an era fifty years past, partially concealing his gold necklace. Rolled sleeves complete his West Side Story–styled suit. AddyDay actually knew what she was doing. His ironed clothes make his dark features shockingly attractive and match the people waiting to enter the courthouse better than my more obviously period outfit. There’s nothing common, though, about his measured gaze and the strength of his stillness—a controlled laziness, like a tiger that doesn’t need to crouch before it’s ready to spring. His tattoo is as fierce as ever.

  He’s looking at me like he was waiting for my arrival.

  My pulse trips—whether in memory of Cordero’s breath against my lips, or in anticipation of finding Carrie’s killer, I don’t know.

  “AddyDay, hold on a minute,” I say.

  Running, Cordero and I meet halfway up the steps, surrounded by interested onlookers. The courthouse is situated in the middle of a wide lawn area dotted with grand willow trees, the area under their canopies shaded with the promise of seclusion.