Steven Havill - Privileged to Kill

“On the way over, there’s something else I want to tell you, sir. Something that I found out this afternoon.”

My smile was like the Cheshire cat’s as I got up from the table. “But one thing, sir,” Estelle added, reaching across and putting her hand over mine. “No going solo.”

“What’s that mean?”

“It means you don’t drive yourself, you don’t chase, and if there’s a medication that Francis wants to give you to even the odds a little, you’ll take it. Deal?”

At that point, I would have agreed to anything.

“We can’t let an off-balance teenager walk around with a loaded firearm just to make it convenient for us to find out who she wants to kill,” I said, and Officer Tom Pasquale nodded as if he’d thought the same thing, even though seconds before he had suggested that we let Vanessa Davila go about her business, leading us to her intended target.

If Vanessa had looked out the curtained window of her trailer, she would have seen a fair-sized convocation. We waited in the darkness for fifteen minutes while elsewhere in Posadas Judge Lester Hobart scribbled his signature on an appropriate warrant. When the paperwork arrived via Deputy Eddie Mitchell, we kept the performance low-key. No lights, no sirens, nothing to disturb the neighbors from their dinner tables.

Vanessa never looked out, and her mother appeared genuinely surprised when she opened the door. Sergeant Bob Torrez was so tall he nearly had to duck going in, but he didn’t wait for an invitation.

He snicked a set of handcuffs on an already blubbering Vanessa and helped her to the living room sofa. Her mother stood in the kitchen, wringing her hands. If I had been in a worse mood, I would have suggested snapping a set of cuffs on her, too. But it had been Vanessa who had done the burglary, and I fervently hoped that the awful sound of handcuffs would frighten her out of any last resolve.

“Vanessa,” Estelle Reyes-Guzman said, “where’s the gun?”

“I ain’t got no gun,” she said, and it was the first time I had heard her voice-low, husky, and really quite pleasant. She would have made a good announcer for an airline.

“You were observed breaking into a residence on Escondido just a few minutes ago,” Estelle said. She sat on the sofa beside the cuffed Vanessa, and she was just about half Vanessa’s size.

“Just a few minutes ago,” she repeated. “Do you understand that you will be charged for breaking and entering and for aggravated burglary? When you broke into that house and then armed yourself with a stolen weapon, you got yourself in considerable trouble.” Vanessa Davila didn’t react with any great contrition, but I got the impression that Estelle made the speech more for the mother’s benefit.

“I didn’t,” Vanessa said.

“We got you on video,” Tom Pasquale said from the doorway, and I turned, surprised to see him holding one of those small video cameras that’s not much bigger than a sandwich. I tried to keep the surprise off my face.

“Well, I didn’t take nothin’.”

“We saw you remove a handgun from the premises, Vanessa. Now before you get into more trouble, play it smart,” I said.

Vanessa shook her head, still crying.

Estelle took a deep breath. “Mrs. Davila, do you know anything about your daughter’s activities?”

“What?” Mrs. Davila said, and Estelle glanced at me and then heavenward. She stood up.

“All right. Begin with the girl’s room,” Estelle said. Torrez, Mitchell, and Pasquale clumped down the narrow hallway, back into the dark confines of the trailer. Estelle turned back to the women.

“Do you understand that if we find stolen items in a search the penalties are more severe than if you cooperate?” she said, but Vanessa was playing her last cards, figuring that maybe we’d go away.

But we didn’t go away. It took ten minutes before I heard Bob Torrez say, “Okay, here we go.”

He walked out into the living room holding an enormous stuffed kangaroo. In its pouch, a small stuffed joey snuggled up beside a semiautomatic pistol. By this time, Mrs. Davila had made her way over to the couch, where she sat on one of its arms and hugged her daughter.

“Oh, Vanessa,” she said. That about covered it.

Sergeant Torrez slipped his pen into the weapon’s barrel and lifted the gun out of the pouch. Thomas Pasquale was at his elbow, holding a large evidence bag. “The cocking indicator says it’s hot, so handle it gently until we get prints off it,” Torrez said, and Pasquale nodded as if he’d thought of that, too.

By this time, Vanessa had sagged sideways into her mother’s arms and rocked and quaked with sobs. Estelle reached out a hand and put it on top of Vanessa’s, just holding it, a slight contact that told the girl she was there.

“Vanessa,” she said finally, “did you take anything else from your cousin’s house?” It was the first time I’d heard that connection, but it didn’t surprise me. Half of Posadas was related in some fashion to the other half. Vanessa shook her head and for the first time turned and looked squarely at Estelle. I saw the muscles of Estelle’s forearm flex as she squeezed the girl’s hand and said, “You took just the gun?” Vanessa nodded, and Estelle turned to look up at Bob Torrez.

“Would you please uncuff her now?” Estelle had a handcuff key somewhere on her person, but Vanessa didn’t know that. Torrez nodded and bent over, removing the cuffs none too gently. That helped, too. Estelle kept her hand on Vanessa’s.

“Let us talk for a while, Officers,” she said, and Torrez nodded, ushering Tom Pasquale toward the door. Deputy Mitchell followed, the ghost of a smile crinkling around his eyes when he glanced at me as he went by. I closed the door and made my way toward a chair that looked like it would hold me.

“Vanessa,” Estelle said, “we know you’ve been upset since your friend died. Since Maria died.” She brought her other hand over and held Vanessa’s. “And you have every reason to be. But you can’t try to settle things by yourself.”

Vanessa sniffed and Estelle handed her a tissue. “Do you understand what I’m saying?” Vanessa nodded. “Was it Denny Wilton, Vanessa? Was that who you were going to go after?”

Vanessa nodded again, and the relief of knowing at least one small answer swept over me.

“Vanessa, were Ryan House and Denny Wilton with Maria the night she died?” Vanessa had experienced good luck with the nod, and she stuck with it. “Were you with them?” This time she shook her head. “Did you see them together?”

“Yes,” Vanessa said. “I saw them drive in to where Maria stayed.”

“How did you happen to see them?”

Vanessa shrugged. “I was walking over to see if Maria wanted to go downtown for a while.”

“And did they see you?”

“No.” Vanessa heaved a great breath and sat up a little straighter, shrugging off some of her mother’s weight. “I don’t think so.”

“Was it Denny Wilton’s truck that you saw? The dark blue one?”

Vanessa nodded.

“Did you see them again that evening? Thursday night?”

She shook her head.

“When did you hear about Maria?”

Vanessa took another shuddering breath. “Next morning at school.”

“You didn’t try to see her again that night? Thursday night?”

“No.” This time the reply was small and faint, as if Vanessa realized she’d made a mistake by letting her friend go off with the two boys that night.

“Why didn’t you come forward and tell someone, Vanessa?”

The girl shrugged and her lower lip thrust out. “’Cause.”

“Were you afraid?”

Vanessa shook her head. She didn’t look like the type who was afraid of much.