Bloodshot - Cherie Priest [62]
After almost a full minute, the chain slid back on the other side and dropped swinging against the door with a clatter. The knob turned and the door opened, revealing a matched set of fifty-something Latinos who’d begun to look alike, as long-married couples sometimes do.
“Mr. and Mrs. deJesus?” I guessed.
They nodded. The mister was half a head taller than the missus, with a balding pate and a badly matched shirt and pants off the JCPenney specials rack orbiting his waistline. The missus was wearing a plain blue dress and flat shoes. The missus said, “Please come inside. You can sit down.”
“Thank you,” I said, and followed her. The mister stayed behind me and rebolted the locks. I liked him already, even if I wasn’t wholly keen on the idea of being secured within the smallish home with the Catholic-ish décor and worn green shag carpeting.
I followed them to a terrifying gold-and-cream couch and sat down on the end, on the edge. They sat across from me, interrogation-style, like they’d be the ones asking the questions.
“Our daughter has been missing for years,” the missus said flatly. “Why you here, now?”
I dug deep and called up every episode of relevant television I could recall and said, “I’m from a cold-case unit. It’s my job to take a second look at cases that were closed, or went … erm … cold. And I understand that your daughter’s case—”
“Our daughter’s case was closed.” The missus cut me off. There was no eagerness in her face, not like her husband’s. He wanted to talk, he wanted to ask questions. I could see it in the perk of his eyebrows. But she wasn’t going to let him. She’d run out of hope, and she refused to borrow any of his.
I told her, “I realize this. We think it might have been a clerical error. And I’d like to ask you about Isabelle. According to our records, police believed she ran away. They didn’t believe she’d been abducted. Do you think she left on her own?”
The mister shrugged quickly and said, “She left. We don’t know why.”
“But were you surprised?” I pressed.
Even the mister, the almost-optimist of the pair, was forced to admit, “No. She was unhappy. Her brother—”
At this, the missus seized hold of his arm and mumbled something accusatory in Spanish and, when the mister dug in his heels for a moment of back talk, they excused themselves to the kitchen, where they argued some more in that speedy clip of chatter.
Their behavior told me plenty, of course. The missus didn’t want to admit domestic disharmony, and since she didn’t believe Isabelle was coming home anyway, she didn’t see the point in being helpful. And the mister was daring to hope that maybe the APD was back and something new might come of his daughter’s case. It made me feel a little like a heel, that I was taking advantage of these people’s confidence. But the truth was, I did intend to do their daughter a favor if I could—and if I couldn’t, I’d use her experience to help other people.
Or other vampires. Whatever.
While the couple argued quietly in the other room, I scanned the living area and saw no pictures of Isabelle or her all-too-briefly mentioned brother. If I didn’t know better, I would’ve sworn that these two somber, matching older folks had never procreated. There were no awards, no family photos, no trophies or tokens of anybody’s childhood. Not even the ghosts of little pitter-pattering feet that once made the parents proud.
Somewhere off in the kitchen, the mister put his foot down long enough to come back into the living room and ask me, “Do you really mean to help? Are you really with the police?”
“Yes,” I said, my eyes as innocent and sincere as I could force them to look. “Absolutely. Look, sir, I can’t make you any promises, except that I promise to try. I know that the situation wasn’t handled very well the first time around; I know there were screwups and gaffes.” It was an easy guess. He didn