A Fierce and Subtle Poison - Samantha Mabry Page 0,44
I knew she was gauging my reaction, studying the ways my facial muscles twitched, taking mental notes. It was obvious she’d not just found me out to relay information. She wanted something from me; she thought I was guilty of something; she’d always thought I was guilty of something. In her eyes, she was a hammer, and I was that one stubborn nail that would never slam into place.
“I never said anything about their bodies. I only saw Marisol’s. You said on the news that her condition was consistent with that of a drowning victim.”
“I did say that, didn’t I?”
“So what happened?” I demanded.
“I’m still working on figuring that out, but in the meantime, if there’s anything you can remember—anything that pops into your head—that Marisol might have said or done that could help me out, be sure to let me know.”
My response was flat, short: “I’ve already told you everything I know.”
She cocked her head, sharp like a marionette. “Well, you may think that, but there’s this thing called repression. We see it a lot with witnesses. It’s like you forget certain . . . details about an event, especially if those details are desagradable.”
“I know what repression is.”
“Is that right?”
Yeah, that was right. And I hadn’t forgotten any of the details about that night, particularly the desagradable ones. I couldn’t forget them if I tried.
She reached into her coat again, this time to produce a business card. Several seconds passed before I took it and shoved it in my back pocket.
“Just think about it,” she added. “You’d be surprised how even the smallest detail can crack a case.”
Just as she said crack the crowd erupted into applause: The bomba had ended. The dancers in front of the fountain stood frozen in triumph.
“Is that it?” I shouted over the applause. “People are waiting for me.”
“Your friends? I spoke with a couple of them. Ruben Reyes said you have a temper. That you broke down his door.”
What the hell, Ruben?
At this point I had choices: I could act meek, apologetic, shake my head regretfully and say that she and I got off on the wrong foot, that I wasn’t the insufferable snob she thought I was, that when it came to me and my dad, the apple fell far, far from the tree. Or, I could tell her to back the hell off, that I just went through a trauma and wasn’t going to play the part of the villain in whatever bullshit narrative she was constructing. Or, I could choke down my pride, force a smile, say thanks, tell her I would call if and when any deep, dark memories resurfaced and then wait for Mari and Sara’s cases to close so I could get on with my life.
“Is everything all right, Lucas?”
“Fine,” I said, looking La Lopez in the eyes and matching her patronizing grin with one of my own. “I’ll be sure to let you know if I remember anything.”
I should’ve just stayed home. Even at one in the morning and with the light rain, the plaza was packed; bodies were crammed up against each other and into every conceivable space. Normally, I would’ve loved that, the wild crush of humanity, but that night it felt like I was drowning.
After Detective Lopez left me, I milled around the edges of the crowd for a while. Just before the band kicked into a new song, I turned at the sound of a shrill whistle. It was Rico. He was waving his right arm over his head to try and get my attention from across the plaza.
I sized up the number of bodies between myself and Rico and sighed. As I pushed through, the crowd seemed to give off a collective rumble. Fingers hooked my clothes. Arms and legs in mid-twirl flew out in front of me, whacking against my shoulders and my shins. The mingled, cloying scents of cheap cologne, sweat, and spilled beer flooded my nose.
A woman laughed, high and loud, to my right, causing my head to snap in that direction. There, through the tangle of arms and legs and long skirts, I thought I saw a dark figure in a narrow alley between two buildings. I stopped and squinted.
It was Dr. Ford. He was crouched down in front of the little girl I’d seen earlier, the one with the red ribbon. But now, instead of being displayed proudly in the air, the ribbon was hanging limply down by her side. Dr. Ford, dressed just as