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“It’s a nice skill, and a relaxing chore. Do you bake?”
“Not much, and not really in a while.”
“It takes time.” Rosa punched a fist into the bowl of dough, and had Eve frowning. “Therapeutic.” Rosa laughed, then turned the dough onto the board, and began to pat and pull. “Now, how can I help you?”
“You lived in the neighborhood,” Eve said, “in the spring of 2043. There were two bombings.”
“Oh.” Rosa’s eyes clouded. “A terrible time. So much loss, pain, fear. My kids were just little guys. I kept them close, took them out of school for a month because I was afraid of what might happen next.”
“There were never any arrests.”
“No.”
“Did you know Lino Martinez?”
“If you lived in the neighborhood during that time, you knew Lino. He ran the Soldados, him and that gorilla Steve Chávez. To protect the neighborhood, he’d say. To keep what was ours. His poor mother. She worked so hard. She worked for my uncle, at the restaurant.”
“The investiga
tors suspected Lino for the bombing, but were never able to talk to him.”
“I always thought he had his hand in it. The gang was his religion, and he was, at that age, a fanatic. Violence was his answer. But he was gone before it happened—the second bombing, I mean. Most thought he’d planned it, set it in motion, then ran off to avoid arrest.”
She formed three long, narrow rolls of dough, and to Eve’s reluctant fascination, began to braid them like a woman braided hair. “He was supposed to be at that dance, when the first bomb went off,” Rosa continued. “He liked to dance. But he didn’t go. None of his inner circle, except Joe Inez, were there when it happened. Lupe Edwards’s daughter, Ronni, died in that bombing. She was barely sixteen.”
Eve cocked her head. “And neither Lino nor Chávez were there? That would’ve been unusual?”
“Yes. As I said, he liked to dance, and he liked to swagger and show off. I heard they were on their way there when the bomb went off. So, maybe that was true. In any case, Ronni was killed. A lot of kids were hurt, some seriously, and the rumor was Lino was the target. When he left, so soon after, a lot of people said it was because he knew the Skulls would try again. They said, some said, he left to prevent innocent people from being hurt.” Her lips twisted. “Like he was a hero.”
Eve studied Rosa’s face. “That’s not what you said.”
“No. I think he left because he was a coward. I think he ordered the second bombing and made sure he was far away when it happened.”
“There were no arrests on that bombing either.”
“No, but everyone knew it was the Soldados. Who else?”
Eve debated with herself a moment. “Did you ever have any trouble with Lino, you specifically?”
“No.” As she spoke, she turned the braided dough into a circle, set it on a baking sheet, then began to form three more strips. “I was older than he was, of course, and my kids too young to interest him as recruits. Plus, his mother worked for my family. He left me and mine alone. I know he tried to recruit some of the older kids, but my grandfather had a talk with him.”
“Hector Ortiz?”
“Yes. Lino respected my Poppy, I think, because of what he’d built, and my Poppy’s pride in the neighborhood. Lino left us alone.”
She stopped braiding the second batch to look at Eve. “I don’t understand. Lino’s been gone for years and years. Do you think he’s involved with Father Flores—well, whoever he was—with his death?”
“The man posing as Flores was Lino Martinez.”
Rosa’s hands jerked away from the dough as she took a stumbling step back. “But no. No, that can’t be. I knew him. I would have known. I cooked for him, and cleaned, and . . .”
“You knew him at seventeen, stayed out of his way, and he left you alone.”
“Yes. Yes. But still, he would come into the restaurant, or I’d see him on the street. How could I not know him? Penny Soto! At the bodega next to the church. She was . . . they were—”
“We know.”
Rosa went back to her dough, but now her eyes were hard. “Why would he come back like this? Pretend all this time. And I can promise you, she knew—the one at the bodega. And they would have gone to bed. They would have had sex while he wore the collar. It would’ve excited her. Bitch. Puta.”
