Vindicated, p.3
Vindicated, page 3
Paolo tried to diffuse the situation. “How much longer do you think we can keep Grace and Candace out of the loop?”
“Until I get a chance to talk to the cops,” Lucy replied. Going to the police station in Venice hadn’t been easy. She didn’t relish another visit, this time to a completely different precinct, where they’d want to go through the basics all over again. What if she found herself confessing everything—telling the cops what had happened last night?
“Well,” Paolo said brusquely. “You’d better step up. Grace needs your help.”
His tone bummed Lucy out. “You’re not the one who has to be interviewed by cops.”
“I know, hon.” Paolo gave her an uneasy grin. “Didn’t mean to sound like a jerk. You should be totally straight with us if you’re feeling bad.”
“It’s too soon to process everything,” Lucy said.
Maya shrugged. “Not everyone takes nine years to process their reactions to violence, Lucy.”
Lucy had to stop herself from shredding the younger girl right there and then. But the silence from John-Michael and Paolo stalled her.
“You’re seriously gonna put this on me?” Even as Lucy said the words, she realized she felt the same way Maya did. None of this would have happened if she’d confronted that dark memory of the Hollywood party years ago. Instead, she’d refused to think about it, buried the memory as deep as it would go.
“No one’s putting this on you, Luce,” Paolo said mildly. “You’re the only one of us who didn’t want to go up to Malibu Canyon to get rid of a corpse. You’re the one who wanted to bring the cops in from the beginning.”
Lucy turned away so that her friends wouldn’t see the mounting desperation in her eyes. What Paolo said was true. But in the end, so what? If she’d spoken up earlier, none of it would have happened.
She took a breath. “What are we going to say? Not to Grace and Candace, but to the cops?”
“How’s this,” suggested Maya. “We went to watch the sunset on a beach—El Matador. We took the rug from the house to have something to sit on. It got damaged by a barbecue fire, so we threw it out.”
“Works for me,” Paolo said.
“What did we do there, what did we talk about?” demanded Lucy. “They’re going to want some evidence that went up there.”
“If anyone asks, we say that Maya explained her new app to us,” John-Michael replied. “And if we don’t remember details, we’ll just be all like ‘jeez, dude, it was all so techie, I can hardly remember.’”
“They might buy that,” agreed Paolo. “It’s probably time you actually did explain Promisr to us. What’s so great that Alexa Nyborg wants to be your buddy?”
While Maya talked, Lucy’s thoughts drifted. Her former friend Ariana had told Dana Alexander that Lucy was ready to go the cops. Ariana was a spy for Dana, and Lucy had allowed her into their lives. Part of what had happened was on her.
Grace and Candace were returning to the house. The sound of their laughter pulled Lucy out her reverie.
“Maya’s telling us all about Promisr,” John-Michael said as they walked in. He offered Candace a platter of sliced bell peppers, carrots, radishes, and cucumber. She took a handful and began to nibble on a radish.
“Good! ’Cause I didn’t understand a thing you said about it so far,” Candace replied.
“Well, you know how hard it is to get anything done, right? Like, a project, but not something you really want to do. Something you have to do, like schoolwork or a diet or whatever,” Maya said.
Listening closely, Lucy took a handful of raw veggies. “So, Promisr is a way to tag friends and other people to help you do difficult stuff.”
“Why would anyone agree to be tagged?” asked Candace.
“It’s like, you scratch my back, I scratch yours. You learn Spanish, I bake you a pie. Now I’ve racked up some credit. I cash in that credit against another, future promise.”
“Sounds truly dumb,” pronounced Candace dismissively. “If I don’t learn my lines, I lose my job. That’s all the motivation I need.”
Normally, Maya would have snapped back at Candace. But the remark just seemed to roll right off her, like Maya was Teflon-coated.
This post–Malibu Canyon Maya was going to take some getting used to.
“This whole industry is run on optimism,” Maya admitted.
Lucy sniffed. “I could use some of that.” There were expectant looks from the housemates at this, but not from Maya.
Optimism, yeah, right. Maybe if we all just stop thinking about Malibu Canyon, we can just wish the whole thing away.
MAYA
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON STATE PARK, SUNDAY, JULY 5
Maya was the first one up the next morning, still on a code-lagged sleep schedule. She dressed quickly and headed out for a hike. It’d be good to be by herself for a while, away from the unspoken tension simmering between her friends.
She had experienced worse July fourths, but never in a place as beautiful as Flor de Canela, Alexa Nyborg’s home-away-from-home in the Napa Valley. Even the guesthouse where they were staying, the casita, was more luxurious than their place in Venice, and the beach house in Venice was great.
At first, the housemates had tried to act like normal rich kids enjoying their parents’ luxury home: putting just the right music on the poolside sound system, pretending to know which of the wines that Nyborg had thoughtfully left in the fridge went best with the food John-Michael had prepared. They’d eaten zingy ceviche made from delicate tilapia, followed by grilled chicken and snapper fillets with crunchy salads.
But what Candace referred to as the “Secret Thing” was ruining everything. The four who’d been in Malibu Canyon needed to talk about what happened there, which they couldn’t do—not with Candace and Grace around. By the time they’d moved on to dessert, they’d given up.
Now all Maya wanted to do was to take a look at the main house. She’d caught glimpses through the windows. It was magnificent: arched ceilings of white adobe, as pristine as a monastery, heavy oak floors polished to a hard sheen. The furniture was mission-style, and the walls and mantels were decorated with artesanía that could have come straight from a Mexican market.
Maya’s grandmother had probably worked in a house like this. She remembered stories of the grand house in Mexico City’s Polanco district, where Abuelita had worked as a cook—and where Maya’s mother had been raised, sharing a tiny room in the basement with her own mother. A house where even the regular main meal consisted of five courses—soup, salad, fish, meat, and dessert.
Maya’s mother had told her stories about that house, noting proudly how much better she’d been able to provide for her own daughter. The house in Polanco didn’t exist anymore. It had been turned to rubble, making way for Mexico City’s ring road. Maya’s mom spoke with pride that she’d lived in such a place. It didn’t seem to rankle that her mother had been a servant there.
Maya peered into the kitchen of Nyborg’s home, looking for the telltale door leading to the basement. Did it lead to tiny, bare quarters that a maid would share with the laundry machines, with giant pink bars of carbolic soap and drying racks, as Abuelita had often described? Maya doubted it. To a wine cellar, more likely. Americans were less comfortable with the idea of humiliating their servants in their own homes. The help would arrive by day and leave at nightfall for some distant apartment; the wealthy didn’t have to lay eyes on the miserable living conditions of their domestic help.
Maya decided then and there—she wouldn’t decorate her own luxury home in such a foolishly romantic style as Flor de Canela. She’d go for something in white concrete and glass—clean, sterile, minimalist. Not something that would remind her in any way of her humble past. She’d build her house by the sea, with an infinity pool. Any servants would live in immaculately clean apartments on the same estate.
Maya’s phone buzzed. She checked it quickly and returned it to her back pocket. Jack Cato—again. She’d managed to avoid talking to him on the Fourth of July, but he hadn’t given up.
Jack was the nicest, smartest guy she’d ever known. An amazing kisser. And she was longing to hear his voice. But speaking to Jack right now would put six people’s lives at risk—and it could drag him into a world of legal trouble, too.
Every day apart from Jack made her appreciate him even more. The guy was adorable and brilliant. If he was here, Maya would feel safer and stronger, too. But he wasn’t. And it wasn’t fair to ask him to risk his own neck. She’d have to keep ignoring his calls.
One day she’d explain everything. When they were both rich.
Maya left the estate, following a trail that began close to the rear garden, which backed onto the lower reaches of the Robert Louis Stevenson State Park.
An hour later, wisps of cloud threaded across the hiking trail before her. Beyond, a mountain caught the midmorning light, a bright emerald contrasting with the mist-shrouded shadows of distant peaks. The sky was clearing and the rolling landscape opened before her. Vineyards striped the plain and climbed the lower slopes.
Last night, Grace and Lucy had seemed especially disturbed by the brittle atmosphere. Paolo seemed anxious, Candace was irritable, and John-Michael . . . ? As she strolled along a hiking trail at the top of a low ridge, Maya thought for a moment about John-Michael’s methodical silence as he’d prepared the evening meal. He didn’t show a lot, but then he never had.
As the evening had turned into night, the housemates’ gloom had only increased. In the kitchen, Maya had heard Candace say to Grace, “Honestly, wouldn’t you rather we were yelling and screaming at each other, like yesterday?”
Of the two sisters, Grace probably had the better grasp of how serious things really were, especially after the visit with her father in prison. The hollowness of her gaze, the drawn quality of her features . . . it all suggested that she knew something was fundamentally wrong.
Maya was fairly certain that Paolo, Lucy, and John-Michael had not yet leaked the truth, but you never could tell. People seemed unable to stop themselves from blabbing at the most inconvenient times. If only everyone had managed to keep quiet, none of this would have happened. Of course, Maya reflected, she was equally guilty. She’d accidentally let slip that Dana Alexander’s driver wasn’t really her aunt, but her mother. The news had gone down like a ton of bricks.
She turned and looked back down the slopes she’d just climbed, at the bright pink spots of bougainvillea dotted around Alexa Nyborg’s estate. What a place. It felt unreal.
Then again, Venice didn’t feel like a real place either, not to Maya. It was nothing like the cramped, fifth-floor apartment in the “Spanish” part of downtown LA, where she’d grown up. When all was said and done, Venice Beach had felt about as real as the swanky private school she’d been attending. It wasn’t easy to be around all those rich girls. People like Lucasta Jordan-Long, who took being rich for granted. Maya didn’t begrudge her housemates their comfortable upbringings, but when John-Michael talked quietly of his year living on the streets, she knew instantly that the two of them shared a bond the other four would never understand.
Last night in Venice Beach, when it had come to defending his friend, and later in Malibu Canyon, John-Michael had barely flinched. He’d turned into a killer.
Maya had talked about being the one to shoot the second hit man, but would she have actually done it?
Yes—she could have done it. It had come down to a question of us or them. For Maya, that wasn’t a question. She had to make good on her parents’ sacrifices, their hard work to ensure that their daughter, their only child, made a success of living in America.
So how would things unravel now? It was impossible to predict. Too many variables, like multiple software bugs that might cancel each other out when you ran the compiled code.
It was crucial to keep their location a secret. Not easy, now that Grace was so eager to invite a convicted criminal into their midst. This Peter Martens guy was supposed to protect them, but the whole thing made Maya nervous.
As for the bag full money, she’d have to find a better hiding place. Anyone who suspected they had something to hide would find it in minutes.
What would they do with the money? Every physical interaction with cash could put them in danger. If only it could exist as pure credit, floating in the ether, accessible at the touch of a button. Like Bitcoin, she thought. If only there were some way, quickly, to get ahold of that much Bitcoin.
Her phone buzzed again—an email from her mother. She read it swiftly, eyes widening in shock.
Why? Why did her mother choose today to deliver that kind of news?
JOHN-MICHAEL
GARDENS, FLOR DE CANELA, SUNDAY, JULY 5
I’m where I said I’d be, John-Michael texted Maya on her burner phone. Where are you?
“Right behind you,” she said, approaching from behind a tangerine tree.
“Okay, what’s up?” John-Michael probably sounded impatient, but Maya liked it when you cut to the chase. “You shouldn’t just go off like that, by the way. Grace and Candace were asking about you.”
“Were they worried?” Maya seemed a little surprised.
“Yeah, they were. They’re totally edgy right now. Haven’t you noticed?”
“Okay. Sorry.”
“All right. What’s this news from your mom?”
Maya showed him the email on her phone.
I’m done with trying to reach you by phone, Maya. Obviously you’re avoiding me. But I have to tell you why I did what I did because you’re not taking it seriously. I would have preferred to tell you face-to-face, but in the end it’s more important that you know right away. And maybe it’s better like this—you can have time to think before you respond.
Hija, you need to know the truth. The reason I’m so afraid of Dana Alexander is that she has seen our documents. Your birth certificate—the real one. The one that shows that you were born in Mexico. We lived there for over a year after your birth, and then we moved to the USA.
Maya, I had another baby girl, but she died. Your sister was born in a little hospital in San Ysidro, but she died suddenly, in her cot, five months later. We were still illegals at the time. She would have been fifteen at your last birthday. After she died, we didn’t report her death because we realized we could pass you off as your sister, and you would be registered as a US citizen.
John-Michael broke off. “Wait . . . you’re older than fifteen?”
“Close to seventeen, probably. I’ve been thinking about it. A few things are beginning to make sense. Like, Mexico. Technically, I’ve never been there. And yet I have these faint memories. I thought it was from TV, but I guess not.”
“Is Maya even your real name?”
“Nope; keep reading. Apparently it’s Julia. Maya was my little sister.”
He rubbed his forehead. “This is pretty crazy. You’re not really ‘Maya’?”
“Well, now I am.”
“You were born in Mexico.”
Maya nodded. “My mom has my real birth certificate.”
“How come Dana Alexander knows?”
“Mom doesn’t say. But nothing would surprise me about that woman. She’s super-paranoid. I bet she had my mother investigated.”
“Jeez. Why’s your mom telling you now?”
Maya shrugged. “Maybe because I’m getting older? Maybe she feels guilty?”
“What are you going to do?”
“What is there to do? Nothing. I’m not going to change my identity again. The official birth certificate is what validates my passport. And that says that I’m Maya Soto Padilla, born October 12, 1999. Not Julia.”
John-Michael thought for a couple of seconds. “Kind of handy though. A spare birth certificate, if you ever need it.”
“To switch identities? Yes,” Maya agreed. “Yeah. I could do that. There are people who have spare birth certificates from relatives who die. They sell them to undocumented people who can use them to apply for passports. Or to take on another identity if they need to stay off the grid.”
“Sounds like you’re considering a new line of business,” John-Michael said, grinning.
“Oh, John-Michael. What are we going to do?” Maya asked, flopping down next to him.
“About you actually being ‘Julia’ and being sixteen years old? Nothing. Probably. Although, it does give Alexander more leverage. All she has to do is to tell immigration she found your real documents.”
There was determination in Maya’s voice. “I’m not going back to Mexico.”
“Would you have to?” Maya grimaced, and John-Michael nodded. “I guess you would. But do you think Dana would really want to talk to the cops at a time like this? She must have guessed by now that something sketchy happened.”
“Who knows?” Maya said. “But what I meant to say, really, was—what are we going to do about the money? I’m starting to think it was a mistake to take it.”
“Lucy did warn us.”
“It’s done now,” Maya replied tartly. “Not a lot of point thinking about what-if and why-did-we.”
“I guess we should hide the cash,” he said. “I already checked for places in the casita, but there’s not much space.”
“Somewhere outside might be good,” Maya said. “That’s why I went hiking. You can see a long way once you get up onto the hills. This estate is pretty isolated. There’s a huge vineyard starting on just the other side of the road. That’s Nyborg’s closest neighbor. It goes on for miles.”
“Think we should bury the money somewhere on the estate?”
“No,” Maya said. “I may never get another invitation to stay here. No; I’ve started to think about something safer. Some kind of safe haven, no physical presence. Online.”
“I think someone at the local bank might notice if you deposited half a mil in cash.”
“If we find the right guy, there won’t be any questions.”
John-Michael found her attitude weirdly cryptic. “Huh? What ‘right guy’?”
