“I need to find out the truth more than I need a shower.”
“God damn it,” Tristán replied, slapping a hand against his thigh while he hurriedly took another puff of his cigarette.
“Alma Montero, Clarimonde Bauer, and José López,” Montserrat said, holding three fingers up and counting them. “Those are the people Abel kept talking about, and those are the folks who can help us figure out what is going on and why Abel is dead. I’m going to find them.”
He closed his eyes and tried to focus on the rich taste of the cigarette coating his tongue.
“Maybe I don’t want to know why he died.”
“He was our friend and someone sliced his throat open.”
The bitter smoke escaped the corner of his mouth as he snapped his eyes open. Ahead of them another house had turned their Christmas lights on. They were green.
The first week of December. It was the season to devour empanadas, eat rosca de reyes, and listen to the fireworks exploding late at night. He was hoping to drink all the way through the posadas—he’d work off the calories in January. It was not the month to be chasing after murderers.
“Montserrat, the worst thing to do is to get involved in this mess.”
“Well, I’m going to go to his apartment to see if I can find a Rolodex and track down his contacts.”
“God, no! Breaking in—”
“You can stand guard or you can stay out of it, but I’m headed to your building and I’m picking that lock.”
“With what?”
“I know how to pick locks with a pencil cap, in case you don’t remember,” she said and gave him a brazen look he recognized well from their days playing by the warehouses stuffed with grain. He was acquainted with this iron stubbornness. There was no point in attempting to dissuade her.
“Maybe I could ask my contacts around Televisa and get a phone number for Alma Montero,” he ventured. “That way you don’t have to commit a crime to get your way.”
“I’m still going to have to look inside Abel’s apartment. The dub we made should be in there, and I want it.”
“The cops might have taken it.”
“Why would they take a can of film?”
“I don’t know what counts as evidence.”
Montserrat edged close to the green lights and away from the red ones. Half of her face was bathed in emerald green as she zipped up her jacket and tipped her chin up at him. “Well, are you with me?” she asked.
“Always,” he said, tossing his cigarette away and grabbing her by the arm with a cool aloofness that disguised his nerves. Then again, he was an actor and could play the part of the tough hero for a bit.
14
They hailed a cab and headed to Montserrat’s building. As soon as Montserrat walked into her apartment, she noticed the red button blinking on the answering machine. She tossed her purse on the couch. The first message was from Samuel.
“Hey, Montserrat. I have no shifts for you for the second half of December, but I might have something for you in January. I need to talk to you about the Christmas party. We’re doing a gift exchange. Phone me.”
She did not intend to go to the party and waste her time having to pretend she liked whatever idiotic gift the guys had picked. She’d get her bonus and tell Mario and his buddies that she had plans that day. She deleted the message. The next message was from her sister asking her to call her back.
“You didn’t tell her I was detained, did you?” Montserrat asked, turning to Tristán. But he shook his head no.
Montserrat dialed Araceli. Her sister sounded cheerful when she picked up. In the background she could hear the muffled sound of Christmas music. Great. She had started playing José Feliciano. Things would only get more insufferably cheery from there. Still, she was glad to hear Araceli’s voice after her forty-eight-hour marathon session fielding questions from cops.
“Hey, mom’s been calling you. She says you’re not picking up the phone.”
“She didn’t leave a message.”
“You know she hates machines.”
“She called you to tell me that?”
“Yup. She wants to know if you’re going to Morelia for Christmas. We could drive together.”
Montserrat’s relationship with her mother remained somewhat distant, but she made an effort to visit on her birthday and during Christmas. Araceli was closer to their mom; they talked often on the phone. Montserrat knew she was expected to make an appearance, but she couldn’t promise that, not with the way things were.
“I’ve got work,” she lied. “That’s why I haven’t been answering the phone. I’m in the middle of a research project.”
“I thought you were having trouble getting hours at Antares. Are they changing their mind?”
“Something like that. You should go, though.”
“You’ll be alone for the holidays if I drive to Morelia.”
“I’ll be with Tristán.”
“He doesn’t have a new hot date yet?”
Montserrat glanced at Tristán, who had plopped himself on her couch and was glancing at her curiously. “Status unknown.”
“Well, if you change your mind let me know. I’ll head out on the seventeenth, to avoid all the traffic. Work is slow and I might as well go there early. If you want me to take a gift for mom I can wrap it for you.”
“Sounds good.”
“You need to buy red-and-gold underwear, Montserrat.”
Red was for love, golden was money. Araceli followed her New Year’s superstitions rigorously. What would she say if Montserrat told her magic was real, and sorcerers might walk the streets of their city?
“Are you listening? It works. But you have to make sure the panties are red and the bra is gold.”
Araceli enumerated the cons of not wearing red underwear and Montserrat said her ahas and sures like a metronome. At last Araceli said goodbye and Montserrat hung up.
“Everything okay?” Tristán asked.
“My sister wanted me to go with her to Morelia. Are you spending Christmas with your parents?”
“So I can savor the recriminations?” Tristán replied. “No, thanks.”
If Montserrat and her mom treaded carefully around each other, then Tristán’s relationship with his parents was a tangled knot. It had been his mother, a dreamy woman who had an affinity for operas and named him after Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde, who nurtured her youngest son’s artistic pursuits. His father didn’t think much of it, and his brothers had raised their eyebrows at his acting career, especially when it careened out of control and Tristán wrestled with his addictions. In the old days, when Tristán’s escapades made the tabloids, his father had promptly picked up the phone, berating him. But the man had tired of calling, and now barely bothered asking Tristán about his personal life. Tristán’s mother was in touch more often. Sometimes she even called Montserrat, asking how her son was, begging her to keep an eye on him.
But Montserrat had thought they were on good terms that year.
“Something happen?”
“Not really, just the coverage about Karina’s death. The ten-year anniversary and everything. I can’t imagine what my mother thought, stopping by the newspaper stand and seeing our photos. De Telenovela practically ran a special on us.”