Treacherous Intent (7 page)

“Oh.” That explained the smell.

Mrs. Andrada served them the small fried spring rolls alongside a sweet, hot, strong ginger tea that woke him up as effectively as coffee. The spring rolls were still warm, crispy on the outside and filled with sweet bananas.

Elisabeth leaned forward, her hands around the cracked mug holding her ginger tea. “Mrs. Andrada, as I mentioned on the phone, we’re trying to help Joslyn.”

“Isn’t Joslyn at Wings shelter? I told her about it.”

“I’m afraid she left Wings a few weeks ago.”

Mrs. Andrada sighed and leaned back in her comfortable recliner, decorated with a green-and-yellow crocheted blanket thrown over the back. “I’m so worried about that girl. I used to babysit her when she was little, you know? I knew her boyfriend was bad news.”

“Did you know Joslyn’s boyfriend, too?”

The woman shook her head. “I never met him. That’s how I knew he was wrong for her. She and her father had such a close relationship, and her boyfriend never came by to meet him.”

Through the open window came the sound of raised men’s voices speaking in Filipino. Both Elisabeth and Mrs. Andrada’s brows wrinkled at whatever they were saying.

“Is something wrong?” Liam asked.

“Not really,” Elisabeth said. “I guess I’m just jumpy with so many Bagsics nearby.”

“One of them sounds like Mrs. Navarro’s boy.” Mrs. Andrada sighed. “She didn’t want him involved with any of the gangs, but living in this neighborhood, it’s hard for the kids not be influenced.”

Liam rose and went to look out the window. There were some young gang members, and they were congregating around a souped-up Accord parked along the street. They weren’t quite arguing, but it wasn’t a gentle discussion, either. He remained by the window, watching them, as Elisabeth continued talking to Mrs. Andrada.

“Did Joslyn ever talk to you about Tomas?” Elisabeth asked.

“She was always so shy, she didn’t date many men. Stupid.” Mrs. Andrada said something in Filipino. “Joslyn is so beautiful. So when she first started dating Tomas, I was pleased for her because she seemed so happy. She moved in with him and stopped visiting her father as often. But then later in the relationship, she started visiting her papa more, and she seemed very subdued whenever I saw her. I kept praying for her, and then one day she confessed that Tomas beat her. He kept her from her friends at work and school. He’d only let her come visit her papa.”

Liam couldn’t stop the fire that flared in his gut as he heard about what Tomas had done to Joslyn. Even his isolating her from her friends was a form of abuse. He couldn’t stand men like that, who wanted to feel superior by taking advantage of someone weaker. Even the young gang members outside seemed to be picking on the smallest and youngest, a slender boy who couldn’t be more than fifteen years old.

“A few days after that, Joslyn pounded on my door. She was covered in blood and distraught. Her papa was dead and she was so afraid.” Mrs. Andrada shuddered. “She said that Tomas and his friends had killed her papa because he wouldn’t tell them where she was.” Mrs. Andrada sniffed, reaching for tissues in a box next to her. She dabbed her eyes. “He was such a good man.”

Liam looked away from the window for a moment. “He wasn’t involved with the Bagsics, was he?”

“No,” Mrs. Andrada said emphatically. “He didn’t even know Joslyn’s boyfriend was a Bagsic captain, although she told me.”

“Do you remember the time Joslyn came to your apartment after her father was killed?” Liam asked.

Mrs. Andrada pursed her lips as she thought back. “I had just started watching
Survivor
when she came in.”

Liam nodded. It would be easy to look at a TV schedule and figure out about what time Joslyn had come to Mrs. Andrada.

“How awful for Joslyn.” Elisabeth’s voice was soft. “To be betrayed by her boyfriend and then to lose her father, all at once.”

“She felt more frightened than betrayed by Tomas,” Mrs. Andrada said. “They stole her father’s money and all his valuables, making it look like a robbery gone wrong. Joslyn was scared because Tomas was after her. So I told her about Wings shelter in Sonoma, because I knew they’d keep her safe.” The woman’s lower lip trembled. “I wish I could have done more for her. Why did she leave that shelter?”

Elisabeth shook her head. “I don’t know. She was very frightened of Tomas. I think she was afraid he’d find her, and then it would endanger everyone else at the shelter.”

Mrs. Andrada nodded slowly. “She was like that, thinking about others. She said she stopped seeing her friends because she didn’t want Tomas to know about them.”

“Did she think they’d get involved in the gang, too?”

“No. I think she was afraid Tomas might use them against her somehow, if he knew how much they meant to her.”

Like her father.

“Did you know any of her friends?” Elisabeth asked.

“I only know one girl, Mariella Gable. A very nice Chinese girl. She brought me moon cakes for Chinese New Year.” Mrs. Andrada’s face creased as she smiled. “She and Joslyn were both studying for their master’s degrees at the college.”

Liam straightened as he continued watching the men on the street. The argument seemed to be getting heated.

“You won’t mention anything that I’ve told you to the Bagsics, will you?” Mrs. Andrada wrung her hands together, the tendons standing out under her frail skin. “This neighborhood is part of their territory.”

“We won’t say anything about you.” Elisabeth reached forward and laid her hand over the woman’s fingers.

“My son would tell me not to get involved with Felix’s murder, but he was my friend for so many years. And anyway, I can’t do nothing while Joslyn is in danger.”

“We’re doing everything we can to put Tomas in jail,” Elisabeth said fiercely. “Can you tell us anything more about him?”

The woman shook her head. “He never came here except the day he killed Felix.”

“Do you know where he lives?” Liam asked. They knew so little about Tomas and the night of the murder, and while his neighbors might be afraid, they might speak to Elisabeth and Liam because they weren’t cops. Yet that was only a possibility if they could find the building.

“No, though it wasn’t far. Joslyn would mention it only took a few minutes to drive here from his apartment building.”

But in this section of L.A., there were dozens of apartment buildings all within twenty minutes from this street. How could they know which direction? Would they have to visit all of them?

“Did Joslyn ever give you any gifts?” Elisabeth asked.

Liam looked at her. What an odd question.

“Gifts? Like Christmas?” Mrs. Andrada asked.

“Little things, like candy, or a trinket.”

“Oh, yes.” Mrs. Andrada got up and went to a small card table in the corner of the living room, returning with a flat pastry box. “I like the mochi from Oishii Bakery, so she would bring me some whenever she called. My son brought me some yesterday. Did you want one?”

Liam tentatively tried one of the small rice cake balls. The glutinous rice on the outside was soft and sticky, while the inside was filled with sweet red bean paste.

“Mmm.” Elisabeth licked the sticky remnants from her fingers. “Did Joslyn give you anything else?”

Mrs. Andrada thought a moment. “She did once give me roast pork from Elena’s Filipino Restaurant. And for Christmas she brought me this.” Mrs. Andrada rose and returned with a green pashmina shawl, which still had the tag on it. “It’s so fine, I don’t have anywhere to wear it.”

Elisabeth glanced at the tag. “Theo’s Boutique.”

The men’s voices from outside carried clearly into the living room. Liam didn’t have to understand Filipino to know they were now in a heated argument—and they were only a few feet away from Elisabeth’s car.

“I don’t like the sound of that,” Mrs. Andrada said. “You should go before it gets worse. They’re such hotheads....”

Elisabeth rose to her feet. “Thank you for speaking to us.”

“Just do what you can to keep Joslyn safe.” Mrs. Andrada squeezed Elisabeth’s hands briefly.

As Liam and Elisabeth stepped out onto the sidewalk, he pulled her in the opposite direction from their car and the arguing gang members. “Let’s circle around and come up to the car from the other direction.”

“You don’t need to convince me.” She hurried alongside him, away from the rapid-fire Filipino that was steadily rising in volume.

By the time they turned the corner, they saw that the argument had petered out, but the men had migrated closer to where they were parked.

An old pickup truck headed down the street, its engine chugging and sputtering. And suddenly there was a loud, sharp
bang!

In an instant, the street dissolved into arid desert, grit in Liam’s mouth, sun and sweat in his eyes. Voices shouting, gunfire in loud bursts all around him. His heartbeat rapid and hard against his chest, squeezing his lungs so he couldn’t breathe. There were men all around him, jerking and falling, bleeding into the dirt and sand. He was going to die if he didn’t fire his weapon, but he couldn’t lift his arm. There was too much pain sizzling up his shoulder like acid. He realized he was on the ground, and the blood in the sand was his own. Men around him were shouting, saying—

“Liam!”

The low, feminine voice throbbed in his ear. His eyes came into focus abruptly, uncomfortably. Green eyes were in front of him, close to his face.

“Liam, you’re all right.” Elisabeth’s voice soothed him, calmed his galloping heartbeat. He wasn’t in Afghanistan anymore. He was in Los Angeles.

His legs trembled, and he noticed he was leaning back heavily against a car. Elisabeth’s hands were gentle on his shoulder, the side of his face. He gulped in air, cold with the California winter and not hot and dry from the desert.

“Hey, what’s wrong with him?”

The man’s voice cut through the dissolving remnants of his waking nightmare. The Bagsics. They had been directly in front of him when he’d...

Elisabeth turned to look at him, and while her face was passive, Liam could feel her hands were tense. “He’s fine,” she said to them.

“He don’t look fine.” And then the Bagsics started walking toward them.

There were four of them. None looked over twenty-one years old, and their purple and gray clothes looked inexpensive.

One of the others said something to her in Filipino. She pretended she didn’t understand, but her eyes, so close to Liam, froze.

Liam’s muscles bunched up. What had the boy said? They were coming closer.

“Troy Navarro!” a woman’s voice called sharply from the direction of the apartment building. “Does your mother know where you are?”

Liam was surprised to see Mrs. Andrada at the front of the apartment building, hands on her hips, glaring at the young men. The youngest, the fifteen-year-old, immediately hunched his shoulders, while his friends gave him sly nudges and said what sounded like derisive remarks in Filipino. It also distracted them from Elisabeth and Liam.

“Come on,” she hissed. She shoved him into the passenger seat of her car.

Liam looked back as Elisabeth drove away. Mrs. Andrada headed back into the apartment building while the gang members drifted away, several of them still teasing the fifteen-year-old.

Elisabeth’s sigh of relief was shaky. “They were just punks looking for trouble.”

“Did they recognize you?”

“No. I didn’t think they would. They’re not high up in the gang hierarchy, and a gang captain like Tomas wouldn’t publicize his private business.”

“What did he say to you?” Liam clenched and unclenched his hands in his lap. He’d been so useless, so helpless.

She shook her head. “Nothing nice.”

She didn’t make a fuss over the way he’d fallen apart. She was so understanding and caring. He didn’t want her to be. He didn’t want to suck anyone else into the dark madness of his mind. And he couldn’t afford to be like this when Elisabeth was depending on him. “This is too dangerous,” he muttered.

“We knew it was going to be dangerous,” she said. “But there’s no safe way to investigate the murder. And really, we’re just being antsy. The gang members didn’t treat us any differently from anyone else they see on the street.”

He knew she was right, but he didn’t like it. And the worst part was, he could only expect things to get worse.

SIX

E
lisabeth didn’t want to take any chances. She drove out of Bagsic territory until she found a coffee shop with free wireless internet and no sign of men in purple and gray. As she sipped her coffee, she carefully watched their surroundings while Liam looked up Mariella Gable and the three shops Mrs. Andrada had mentioned. She had to admit that Liam was a great deal faster at finding Mariella’s information on the internet than she would have been. They would make a good—

No, she wasn’t going down that road again.

The coffee shop was busy with students from nearby Twin Springs College. No gang members appeared. It could have been a normal day, without the threat to her life.

Normal for her usually meant helping the women at the shelter, doing her job. Her job took up all her time—or rather, she spent all her time at her job, working on her own. She was...comfortable with her life. She was alone and comfortable. She didn’t need anyone else. She didn’t need anything else but herself.

She looked at Liam, his head bent over his computer. He glanced up at her and flashed her a brief smile.

That smile transformed him. His dark blue eyes crinkled, his mouth was relaxed and gentle rather than hard and serious. He looked...trustworthy.

Elisabeth looked away.

His cell phone rang, and he glanced at the caller ID. “Nathan.”

Hopefully he had some information for them about Tomas and Joslyn’s father’s murder.

Nathan talked to his friend, giving mmm-hmm’s and asking the occasional question. Finally he said, “Thanks, Nathan,” and disconnected the call. “Sorry I didn’t put it on speakerphone, but...”

He wouldn’t want their conversation to be overheard. “I understand. What did he say?”

“Tomas Bantoc is known to be a high-ranking captain in the Bagsic gang. He has some anger issues, but can usually control them, which makes him ruthless and effective.”