James Grippando - Beyond Suspicion

“You like?” asked Abuela.

Jack checked out the pine floors and vaulted ceiling with pecky-cypress beams. “It’s fabulous.”

“I knew you would like.”

A man emerged from the kitchen, Abuela ’s latest beau. Jack had met him before, the self-proclaimed best dancer in Little Havana. At age eighty-two he still seemed to glide through the living room as he came to greet Jack, smiling widely.

“Jack, how you been?”

He pronounced “been” like “bean,” but he insisted on speaking English to Jack, as did most of Abuela ’s friends, all of whom considered him thoroughly American, at best an honorary Cuban. Jack knew him only as El Rodeo , pronounced like “Rodeo Drive” in Beverly Hills, except when Jack was around and everyone referred to him as “The Rodeo,” as if Jack were a native Texan and his middle name was Bubba.

“Is beautiful, no?”

“I love it. How much is it?”

El Rodeo pulled out a pen and scribbled a phone number on the inside of a gum wrapper. “You call.”

“Whose number is this?”

He continued in broken English, and Jack was able to discern that the house was owned by El Rodeo ’s nephew, who had just relocated to Los Angeles. Jack tried asking for details in Spanish, but again El Rodeo insisted that English would be easier. They were doing fine until he started telling Jack more about his nephew, a guy whose name apparently was Chip, which struck Jack as odd for a Latino.

“Chip?”

“ Sí , chip.”

“He’s cheap,” said Abuela.

“Ah, cheap.”

“ Sí, sí. Chip.”

A nice enough guy, this El Rodeo, but if his English is better than my Spanish, I truly am a disgrace to my mother’s memory.

Jack tucked the phone number into his wallet. “I’ll call him tonight.”

“Call now,” said Abuela .

“I need to think about it. With everything Cindy and I have been through, I wonder if she’ll be afraid to move back in with me unless it’s a condo with twenty-four-hour security.”

“Don’t have fears control life. You and Cindy want children. House is better, no?”

He wasn’t thinking that far ahead, but her optimism warmed him. “I should at least see the rest of the house.”

“Okay.” Abuela took El Rodeo ’s arm and led him out the door. “We give you time to look around more on your own. You decide quick.”

Jack hadn’t intended to kick them out, but they were out the French doors before he could protest. He drifted toward the kitchen.

The window was open, and he could hear his abuela and El Rodeo outside on the patio talking about the busloads of tourists that cruised through Little Havana, where El Rodeo and his friends played dominoes in the park. It bothered El Rodeo to be treated as a spectacle, an ethnic oddity that these tourists only thought they understood. Not even Jack had understood until Abuela had moved to Miami. The evening newscasts had a way of conveying the impression that the only thing fueling the Cuban-American passion was hatred-hatred for Castro, hatred for any politician who wasn’t staunchly opposed to Castro, hatred of yet another Hollywood star who thought it was cool to shake hands and smoke cigars with the despot who’d murdered their parents, siblings, aunts, and uncles. That emotion was real, to be sure. But there were neighborhoods filled with people like El Rodeo, a man who’d quietly tended bar in Miami for the past four decades, a photograph of the restaurant he’d once owned hanging on the wall behind him, the keys from his old house in Havana resting in a jar atop the cash register. He just refused to give up on something he loved, refused to admit he’d never get it back.

Tonight, as Jack wandered through a house that might be his, without a wife for the foreseeable future, he could relate more than ever.

“Hello, Jack.”

He turned, startled by the sound of her voice. “Cindy? How’d you-”

“Same way you got here. Abuela invited me.”

“She has a way.”

“She definitely does. We had a nice talk in my studio. She got me to thinking.” Her voice quaked, not with anger but emotion. “Maybe I overreacted.”

“You believe me, then? That the tape of me and Jessie is B.C.? Before Cindy?”

She gave him a little smile, seeming to appreciate the humor. “Now that I’ve had time to think about it, yes, I believe you.”

“We’re going to prove it, if we have to.”

“I’m sure you will.”

“We hired an audio expert. It could still be tough, since we’re working from a copy.”

“The police won’t give you the original?”

“From what Clara Pierce tells me, there is no original. It was destroyed, which tells me that Jessie went the extra mile to make it look as if she and I were having a recent affair. I think she was getting ready to blackmail me into staying quiet about her viatical scam.”

“You don’t have to convince me. Once I sobered up, I realized that the tape couldn’t have been what it appeared to be. If you two were having an affair, I would have known it. I’m not that blind.”

He went to her and held her tightly.

“I’m sorry I doubted you,” she said.

“I understand. I mean, the way her body was found in our bathtub-”

“Let’s not recount the details, okay? Let’s just… be happy. Happy we have each other. That’s all I want, is to be happy.”

“Me, too,” he said, still holding her tight.

A squeal of delight emerged from the patio. They turned and saw Abuela standing at the French door and peering in through the glass, blowing them kisses.

Jack smiled and mouthed the word “Gracias.”

“Let’s go,” Cindy said softly. “It’s time to start packing.”

“I’m right behind you.”

In less than five minutes Jack was in his convertible following Cindy back to Pinecrest. It would take at least a couple of days to arrange for a mover to bring their furniture to the new house, so they would have a few more nights with his mother-in-law. The plan was for Cindy to arrive ten minutes ahead of Jack and break the news that Jack was moving back in until the rental was ready. Apparently, her mother was less convinced of Jack’s fidelity than Cindy was. Jack waited in his car in the driveway until Cindy came out to give him the all-clear.

His car phone rang, startling him. After the cellular swap, the car phone was his only wireless number. He answered. It was Mike Campbell.

“How’d you make out?” asked Jack.

“Well, there was a time in my life when it would have bothered me to follow a woman around for almost two hours and not even be noticed, but I guess in this context, that’s a success.”

“Nice work. Where’d she lead you?”

“Some pretty bad neighborhoods. She likes to mingle with the homeless. Especially if they’re junkies.”

“Damn. Sounds to me like she knew she was being followed. Took you on a wild goose chase.”

“Except that she didn’t seem to be wandering around aimlessly. She stopped at two places, and both times it looked to me as though it was her intended destination. As if she had some kind of business there.”

“You mean drug business?”

“No. Blood business.”

“Blood?”

“Yeah. She visited a couple of mobile blood units. You know, those big RV-looking things where people come in, let a nurse stick them in the arm, and walk out with cash.”

“What the hell’s that all about?”

“I didn’t want to give myself away by asking any questions. I was hoping it would mean something to you.”