Long after midnight, Francisco Ybarra sat in the kitchen of his darkened home, keeping company with a bottle of Wild Turkey and worrying.
Frank wasn’t much of a drinker. Nonetheless, he poured himself another glassful of bourbon. The hundred-proof liquor warmed his gut as it went down. Maybe eventually sleep would come, but right now he was still wide awake.
Frank’s worries had two separate sources-his ailing wife, Yolanda, and Pepito. Hector had told him about the blond girl in the red truck, about how she had come by the station the previous afternoon and about how today Nacio had been in a foul mood all day long. Frank’s nephew had left the station after first lashing out at Hector. When he had returned to the station much later in the day, Hector claimed Pepito hadn’t been worth a plugged nickel.
Hector had long ago alerted Frank Ybarra to the existence of the girl in the red pickup truck-the one who came by the station, usually when Frank wasn’t there and sometimes even when he was. He knew about her long blond ponytail, her long tan legs, and her cute little ass. Frank was sure she had to be the same girl from Bisbee, the one Yolanda had been all over Pepito about last winter.
Frank had known from very early on about what was going on, but he had decided to let it go-to allow the affair to run its own course-because he was confident Pepito would get over it eventually. Now he wasn’t so sure.
From outside the house, came the sound of familiar tires crunching the gravel of the back alley. A pair of glowing head-lights dissolved into darkness. Not moving, not reaching for the light, Frank Ybarra sat in the dark and waited, listening for the telltale creak of the iron gate and for Nacio’s limping steps on the wooden planks of the back porch.
Stealthily, almost as though he were willing the sometimes fussy lock to silence, Nacio’s key clicked in the keyhole. The door opened. Almost simultaneously, the overhead light came on. Illumined in the glaring fluorescent glow, Ignacio Ybarra was a bruised and bloodied mess. His scraped and scabby face looked as though it had been dragged along a sidewalk. Underneath the torn material of a ragged shirt, Frank glimpsed a layer of bandages encircling the boy’s chest.
“What happened?” Frank asked, even though he thought he already knew the answer.
The door was still open when Nacio saw his uncle. He turned and would have fled back into the night, had Francisco Ybarra not stopped him. “I asked you, what happened?”
“I got in a fight,” Nacio said, slipping unconcernedly onto a chair and trying to sound casual. “A guy beat me up.”
Uncle Frank stood up, a little unsteadily, and walked around the table to the far side of Nacio’s chair. He stared down at his nephew for a moment, then, walking with great dignity, Frank returned to his chair. He had seen beatings before. He knew what they looked like.
“What guy?” he asked, his face going still and cold. “An Anglo?”
Nacio nodded.
“Which one?”
“Just a guy,” Nacio answered. “I can’t say.”
“The hell you can’t!” Uncle Frank returned savagely, pounding the table with his fist. He realized then he was more than a little drunk. “You can tell me, and you will. People can’t get away with this kind of shit anymore. You tell me who it was who did this. I’ll call the cops.”
“No,” Ignacio insisted. “No cops.”
“Why not, Pepito?” Frank’s voice grew softer suddenly, al-most cajoling. Nacio was the little boy he had raised from an infant, the one he loved almost as much or maybe even more than his own son. The fact that once again someone had hurt his beloved Pepito shook Francisco Ybarra to the core. His fury was made that much worse by the fact that it could so easily have been prevented. Frank knew that he himself should have put a stop to Nacio’s dangerous romance. If nothing else, he should have told his wife about it. Yoli would have handled it.
“Were you doing something wrong?” Frank asked gently. “Something you shouldn’t?”
Nacio’s chin trembled. His Adam’s apple wobbled up and own with the effort of speaking. “No,” he replied. “I wasn’t doing anything wrong. But still, no cops.”
He stood up then, walked over to the light, and switched it back off. “I’m going to bed, Uncle Frank. We can talk about his in the morning.”
Feeling sick, Frank Ybarra waited until the door swung shut before he reached for the bottle. This time, though, instead of pouring another drink, he grasped the bottle by the neck. Molding it in one knotted fist, he stood up and staggered as far as the back door. After wrenching open the door, Frank hurled the bottle as far as he could into the inky darkness of the backyard. The bottle splattered against the brick wall of the garage and splintered into a thousand pieces.
Frank stood for a moment longer, leaning against the doorjamb while his chest heaved and he fought with the knowledge that his worst fears had been realized. One of the reasons he hadn’t told Yoli about the girl was his firm belief that Pepito could take care of himself. Evidently, Frank had been wrong about that, too. Nacio might have tried to spare his uncle some of the gory details, but Frank was convinced he already knew them anyway. This was exactly the kind of shit Yoli had been worried about when she herself had warned Pepito to stay away from the girl.
Ignacio Salazar Ybarra wasn’t the first Hispanic boy to have the crap beaten out of him for messing with an Anglo girl, and he sure as hell wouldn’t be the last. But now, with Yoli so sick-in the hospital and facing surgery on Monday morning-how on earth would Frank ever be able to tell her?
Having Dennis Hacker hanging around in the bar made Angie nervous. Not that he did or said anything out of line. Not that he was obnoxious. He just sat there, chatting with the other customers, drinking coffee, and watching her. By last call, he had settled in with Archie and Willy at the far end of the bar, where the three entertained one another telling tall tales about the Huachucas and the Peloncillos. They were on such good terms that Hacker bought the two old men their last round of the evening.
All night long, Angie had waffled back and forth, wanting to go and not wanting to go. Now, though, at ten minutes before one and after the man had waited for her for hours, it was too late. She couldn’t very well tell him that she had changed her mind and wasn’t going.
Hacker, Willy, and Archie were the only customers left in the bar when Angie went into the back room to lug out the four locking wood panels that slipped into slots in the bar’s front to cover the supply of liquor. “Those look heavy. Would you like me to help you with them?” Dennis Hacker offered.
“It’s all right,” Angie said. “I can manage.”
“Hey, Angie,” Willy said. “This Brit knows all about birds. All kinds of birds. If you don’t believe me, just ask him.”
“Finish your drink, Willy,” she ordered. “You, too, Archie. It’s closing time.”
“What about him?” Archie whined.
“He’s drinking coffee,” Angie pointed out. “There’s no law against drinking coffee after hours, only booze. Besides, he’s with me.”
Archie’s toothless face collapsed in on itself. “You mean like a date?” he asked. “You’re not going to put her in that fancy damned Hummer of yours and pack her off, are you?” he demanded. “Angie’s the best thing that’s ever happened to this place.”
“What’d she say?” Willy asked.
“This guy’s her boyfriend,” Archie groused. “That’s why he can stay and we can’t.”
Flushing with embarrassment, Angie collected their glasses. “Out,” she ordered. “Time to go.”
Still grumbling, the two old men helped one another off their respective stools and shuffled toward the door. They shared a basement room in an old, moldering rooming house two buildings up the street, so Angie knew they were in no danger of driving a car. At the door, Archie turned around and shook an admonishing finger in Dennis Hacker’s direction.
“Remember,” he warned, “don’t you go carrying her off. Angie’s ours. We saw her first.”
Once they were out, Angie pushed the door shut and locked it behind them.
“I think they like you,” Dennis Hacker said.
Angie rolled her eyes in exasperation. “I guess they do,” she agreed.
Still nursing his coffee, Dennis Hacker waited while Angie finished her closing time chores, washing the last of
