“Did Tony?”
“No. Well, I don’t know.” He shrugged again.
“Mauro, during the past week or so, have you seen anyone next door besides Kevin and Mr. Page? Anyone at all?”
The boy shook his head.
“They don’t have company very often?”
“I don’t see nobody there,” he said. “Just them two.”
“They don’t have other folks over? For dinners? Maybe backyard barbecues? That sort of thing?”
“No.”
“Does it bother you that Kevin and Mr. Page live next door, Mauro?”
His eyes became wary. “Why should it bother me?”
“I just thought that it might.”
Mauro shrugged. “Why, ’cause they’re queer? It don’t matter to me what they do.”
Estelle relaxed backward and rested a hand against the tree. “I understand that you’re a pretty talented mechanic. I saw your car, in the backyard.”
“It’s okay.”
“Maybe you’ll have it running one of these days.”
“I guess.”
“Did you offer to help Kevin change the tire on his truck?”
He looked puzzled. “What tire?”
Estelle nodded. “He had some trouble there. I thought maybe you knew about it.”
“I don’t know about no flat tire,” he replied with a flash of indignation, an instant assumption that some adult, somewhere, thought he was responsible for something he hadn’t done.
“Mauro, this is an important question. I want you to think hard before you answer, all right? Do you know anything-anything at all-about the attack on your sister? Do you know who might have done it?” He shook his head emphatically. “Who did she have an argument with?”
“She didn’t have no argument with nobody,” he said with considerable heat. “Not something like that. Not what happened to her.”
“What about the fight at the volleyball game?”
“That wasn’t nothing, man.”
“No problems with Paul Otero?”
He grimaced with disgust. “He’s a wuss.”
“Mauro, we need to find the person who broke into your house and attacked your sister. We’re going to need your help.”
For the first time, Mauro Acosta looked directly at Estelle, his dark brown eyes unblinking and unwavering. “If I knew who did that, I’d tell you,” he said, and for a moment he sounded a decade older than he was.
“Mauro, I want to tell you something,” Estelle said, and she lowered her voice another notch. “This is just between you and me, okay? Do you know why we’re curious about your neighbors?”
“Armand said that Kevin went missing.”
“That’s right, Mauro. And that’s too much of a coincidence, Kevin going missing just when your sister is attacked. Don’t you think so?”
“He didn’t have nothing to do with it,” Mauro said emphatically.
“How do you know that?”
“I just do,” he said simply. “Him and Page might be all queer and stuff like that, but he’s still okay. I mean, he always treats us okay.”
“He’s a good neighbor?”
“Yeah.”
“He’s been over once or twice for picnics, stuff like that?” She smiled at Mauro. “Maybe tried to break up a fight or two?”
The boy looked down at the cigarette butts, close to smiling himself.
“Yeah, maybe.”
“If Kevin saw someone next door attacking your sister, what do you think he’d do?”
Mauro shrugged. “He’d probably call the cops.”
“He’s always got a phone handy, doesn’t he.”
“Yeah. Or that radio of his in the truck.”
“Would he come over himself, do you think? Even before the cops got there? If there was really serious trouble?”
“Sure. He’d jump right in the middle of it. I mean, he’s pretty tough.”
“But he didn’t, this time.”
“That’s ’cause he wasn’t there. If he was, he woulda.”
Estelle drew a card from her pocket. “Mauro, I know that talking to the cops isn’t your favorite thing to do, but if you remember something-any little thing that you saw or heard-will you call me? Anytime. Even if you wake up in the middle of the night. Give me a call.”
He accepted the card, read it carefully, and tucked it into his back pocket. “Yeah,” he said. “Did you talk with Tony?”
“Not yet.”
He nodded and accepted that as a sufficient answer.
“I’m sorry about your sister, Mauro. We’re doing all we can. And I appreciate your help.” She reached out and squeezed his shoulder. He didn’t pull away.
Chapter Twenty-nine
Tony Acosta looked pleased to leave his Language Arts class, locked down as it was in the middle of a vocabulary test. What Bob Torrez would have described as Tony’s “shit-eating grin” faded when he saw Estelle.
“Tony, this is Undersheriff Guzman,” Maestas said after the classroom door had closed and they’d stepped far enough away that the other kids wouldn’t hear them. “She needs to talk to you for a little bit.” Maestas nodded and stretched out a hand toward Estelle. “Stop back by the office when you’re finished, all right?” Somehow, Maestas made the question sound as if he’d said, “I’m still the principal around here.”
“Thanks, sir,” Estelle said. She motioned toward the exit sign at the end of the hallway. “Let’s go outside,” she said to Tony. The door opened onto a small landing with a railing, a perfect outdoor conference area.
She read the worried look on Tony’s plump face correctly, because he visibly brightened when she said, “Carmen’s going to be all right, Tony. That’s the latest word from your folks.”
“Did they say when they’re coming back?” he asked.
“No…it might be a couple days yet. Look, I know one of the other deputies has talked to you already, but I had just a few questions, all right? A few things to clear up.”
“Sure.” He didn’t look sure. Estelle watched his face and decided that Tony didn’t have as much delinquency baggage as his little brother. The older boy had no trouble making eye contact. He favored simple jeans and a heavy-metal T-shirt that would have gotten him expelled a decade before. While Mauro worked at hiding his lean, trim form under baggy gangbanger clothes, Tony seemed relaxed inside his skin, his pudgy build making him seem the younger of the two brothers.
“When you and Mauro left school on Tuesday after your fifth-period classes-at noon-did you go home, or anywhere near Candelaria?”
“No, ma’am. I went over to a buddy’s apartment. I don’t know where Mauro went.” Tony’s version of the afternoon differed in essentials from Deena Hurtado’s scenario, but the boy might have forgotten his visit to the convenience store…or Deena might have fabricated it.
“So at no time on Tuesday did you happen to see any strangers around your street? Anyone you didn’t know?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Who does Carmen know that might have assaulted her like that? Is there anyone?” He shook his head. “Not Paul Otero?”
“Nah,” Tony said quickly.
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah. Paul’s a lover, not a fighter.” His cherubic face lit up in a broad smile that showed an expanse of braces. “Like me.”
“How well do you know Kevin Zeigler, Tony?”
The boy looked surprised. “Well enough to know he didn’t do it.”
“You sound pretty positive.”
“Well, I am. He just wouldn’t. He’s a friend. He’s our neighbor. Did you guys find out where he went yet?”
“No, not yet. Tell me about him.”
“About Mr. Zeigler? He’s a neat guy.” Tony stopped suddenly, looking as if he wished he could retract what he’d said. “I mean, you know. He’s okay.”
“You’ve gone riding a time or two with him and William Page, I understand.”
“Yeah. They got these really bad bikes, you know. I mean, they’re about as expensive as a car.”
“That’s what you rode when the three of you went up on the mesa a couple of weeks ago?”