Traci Tyne Hilton - Mitzi Neuhaus 02 - Eminent Domain Page 16

  “That’s probably a good idea. I’d hate for Mom to get into trouble,” Alonzo joked. He let Mitzy go so she could make her call.

  Mitzy left a message with Backman’s assistant and called it good.

  “Grandma?” Diego Jr.’s voice was scared and shaky as the agents walked him past his grandmother. She was surrounded by cops and handcuffed. “Grandma, what’s wrong?” he asked, his face crumpling as he tried to be calm.

  “I don’t know sweetie. It will be alright. You’re mom is on her way over and she’ll sort this out. You all will let us wait just a few moments, won’t you? His mom’s on the way over. Check, check, check my telephone,” Teresa said, “You can see on the, on the caller id, I was just talking to her.”

  The officers exchanged silent looks. One of them took a phone and scrolled the ids. He held the phone up to Diego Jr. “That your mom’s number?”

  “Yes! Yes it is my number! My mom’s number!” he said, bouncing in his chair. “Call her now! She’ll tell you its okay for me to be with grandma.” He clenched the seat cushion of the chair as he bounced on his seat.

  “Your mom has custody of you?” The officer asked.

  Diego Jr. looked at his grandma, “No?” He said like a question.

  “He means his parents aren’t divorced,” Teresa explained.

  “That true?” the officer asked.

  “Yeah!” Diego Jr. said. “I live with my mom and my dad!”

  “Okay then. We’ll call the number before we leave.”

  Carmella answered, “Mom,” she said before the officer could speak, “It was not okay for you to take Diego from school without telling me. We were scared to death. But we will be there in just a minute.”

  “Ahem.” The officer said, “This is Agent Charles of the special forces, child abduction unit. Is this Carmella Marquez?”

  “Yes this is! What are you doing at my mother’s house? She’s no child abductor!” Carmella yelled into the phone. “Who’s running this show? Put my mother on the phone.”

  “Just one minute. You just told me that she did not have permission to take your son. Is this true?” Agent Charles asked.

  “Of course it’s true. I was pissed off at her and not talking to her. But she’s the emergency contact at school and the alternative driver and she emailed me, I just deleted it. She didn’t abduct him. For the love! Put her on the phone.”

  “You can talk to her later. We’ll have some questions for all of you. You are coming to Teresa Miramontes’ home right now?”

  “Of course I am. My kid’s there. It’s a school night. I have to get him home. We’ll be right there and I think you are the one that can do the talking.” She hung up on the cop and dialed a new number, “Frankie,” she said, “I’m so glad you are there. We need you ASAP. Can you meet us at my mom’s house?”

  Teresa looked small, and angry, seated on her sofa with her hands cuffed behind her back. All the fear seemed to have fallen away from Diego Jr. and he had a giddy, glowing look, his eyes sparking and his face flushed.

  “Get those cuffs off of my mom!” Carmella said as soon as she saw her mother.

  “Let me do the talking,” Frankie Abalone said. “I’m their lawyer. Tell me what’s going on here.”

  “Diego Marquez Jr. was reported missing. We found him at this residence and had reason to believe he was here against his parent’s wishes. A clear case of family abduction.”

  “We didn’t press charges!” Carmella started yelling again but Frankie cut her off.

  “I said, let me do the talking. The Marquez family reported their son missing to the local police who found him in record time at his grandmother’s house. There had been a family misunderstanding due to an email that had not been read. No charges were made. Everyone was relieved at the result. What we have here is a situation of false arrest. I recommend you let Teresa Miramontes go now.”

  “We are under orders from our boss. The child was reported missing under suspicious circumstances to our department. What we have here, from our perspective is a case of false information given to federal agents.”

  “Federal agents?” Carmella said, sinking into a chair. “You’re not the guys who have been following my brother are you?”

  “You have reason to believe the child abduction unit is following your brother?” A different officer asked whipping out his notebook.

  “No… it was some other department. Immigration or something. But he said they had stopped following him. Who called you guys and complained?” Carmella asked, grabbing her son by the sleeve of his hoody and tugging him into her lap.

  “We’re not at liberty to say.”

  Frankie interrupted them, “Right now, all you have to do is let Teresa Miramontes go and let your boss know that this has been sorted out. We won’t feel the need to pursue our rights if you leave right now without taking any further action.”

  Agent Charles and the fellow who had cuffed Teresa exchanged a look that was not one of respect or fear. But the key was produced and Teresa was uncuffed anyway.

  “We’ll let you go this time,” Agent Charles said. “But we’ll be reporting the situation to our boss.”

  They left to sit in their unmarked cars in the street, ready to follow any cars that drove away from the scene and making several phone calls to the people in charge.

  Carmella tightened her arms around her son as he began to wiggle free from her arms.

  “The Marquez family does not have trouble with the law,” Diego said, looking at his wife. “This feud between you two has got to stop.”

  “But Diego, I didn’t call the cops on my Mom! I would never do that. That’s so trashy,” Carmella said.

  “Exactly. That is not how we operate. You two need to make up now.” Diego said to his wife.

  Diego turned to his mother in-law and moderated the tone of his voice, “Teresa, you can be proud of your daughter. She is going to make a success of her new job because she is smart and talented, not because she is working with her brother.” He turned again, looking at his wife and putting his hand gently on her knee, “Carmella, you need to agree that having your brother start up this business is a big deal. Without him we never could have gotten started. Don’t be jealous. Just agree, both of you, that I’m right.” Diego said.

  “Well I agree,” Teresa said, “You are smart Carmella, but without…” Diego cut her off.

  “No. Don’t say that. Just agree,” he said.

  “I agree,” Carmella said, between hiccoughs and sniffs.

  Teresa took a deep breath, “I agree,” she said.

  Diego did not ask them to hug and make up. Teresa offered them food. Carmella looked at her husband as he talked to Diego Jr. about school. She accepted the offer.

  Joan worked furiously at her drawing table, crumpled papers piled at her feet and a stack of colored pencils next to her. She had four plans going for the Miramontes Suite. Alonzo worked with architects, engineers, and public officials constantly. His old office may have been a scrap yard of cast-off equipment, but this office should be so much better. Joan’s staging business had been a little slow these last weeks, but that wasn’t the only reason she was trying to win Alonzo’s business. All of the public officials, architects, and engineers had homes that would eventually be sold and most likely need to be staged. His office suite would be a great advertisement for her skills.

  Of course, he’d have to sit down and see her genius on paper. She had one or two ideas for making that happen, though Mitzy wouldn’t like any of them.

  If she could get Alonzo alone upstairs…she had followed his schedule pretty closely for the last two weeks. He tended to come into the office around 8 at night to get some extra work done. Mitzy was almost always there. Joan had watched and waited for the day that Mitzy didn’t come in with Alonzo, but it hadn’t happened yet. A diversion was needed. Joan’s ideas for a diversion were sketchy at best. Hard to get a Realtor back down to her office. Obviously she didn’t need to go down to take
a call. And she’d hardly have a showing that late in the evening. But in the next day or two Joan would get it done. She loved that Mitzy, but it had been generally noticed that with Mitzy around Alonzo was worthless for conversation. He only had eyes and ears for her.

  She was waiting across the hall from the Miramontes Offices in her own space when she heard him slam into his office. It was just after 9 pm. Now was her best chance.

  It had been a long day. The kidnapping scare had come hot on the heels of a painful day at the city job. Making do with an austerity budget already, Alonzo had just been told to cut costs again. The stimulus money paying for the new Community Center was held up somewhere in the pipeline. He began to sweep things off of his desk to make room for the ream of budget sheets he had to go over. He found his Spoon book sitting under the morning’s newspapers.

  Alonzo picked the white covered book up from the corner of his desk. He had never needed a relationship book before, and wasn’t interested in it now. He was relieved, in fact, when he realized Mitzy considered it a joke as well.

  He had brought it in his office by accident. It had just been stuck in another stack of papers. He’d probably just toss it in the recycling. He flipped it open and read the table of contents. “Balderdash and other games you shouldn’t play while dating,” “Monopoly is against the laws of love,” “Use your Cranium when planning dates,” “Playing for keeps—Are you ready?” He flinched at the last chapter title. Who was ever ready for that? He flipped open to one of the middle chapters, about using your “Cranium.” Of the many gems he scanned in that chapter, the one he found the most banal said that eating leftovers at home was the best way to “lose the game.”

  What was wrong with leftovers? He shut the book. Eating leftovers and talking about work with Mitzy was not dooming their relationship. He’d think of elaborate dates later when they had more time. And anyway, since they weren’t going to sleep together he couldn’t plan anything really romantic for her. No weekends at the coast until after the wedding.

  He hadn’t considered that when he got saved. Jesus totally eliminated weekends away with the girlfriend. It was a small loss compared with eternal salvation. But it required a significant paradigm shift. He considered his relationship with Mitzy as he stared at the pathetic cover. The foil papered silver spoon glinting under his desk light. What he had with Mitzy couldn’t be about right now. It was about the future or about nothing at all. Did he have a future with her? He opened the book to the last chapter, “Playing for keeps.” He didn’t flinch this time. If he wasn’t ready now, would he ever be?

  The door to his office flew open.

  Joan was a blur of floral prints as she rushed him at his desk. He flipped the book over as quickly as he could so she couldn’t read the title.

  “Yes?” he said, glaring at her.

  “Finally we get a chance to talk about this space!” She was beaming and covering his desk with sketch pads.

  He shook his head a little. “I don’t have time for this Joan,” he said. The sketch pads were followed immediately by fabric samples.

  “I know, I know. But we can have this one little meeting so quickly and it will be a relief to everyone. If you’ll just pick the colors we can get everything painted right now. Then I’ll be tied up shopping for just ages and completely out of your hair.”

  That sounded promising so he sat down.

  Joan pulled a chair up to his desk and sat down as well. “Professional. It has to be absolutely top notch professional. But do you prefer a gentleman’s club professional or a downtown high rise professional?”

  He thumped the pages covered with brown sketches.

  “So gentlemen’s club then.” She nodded and wrote herself a note. “I like that too. Our location isn’t really high rise compatible, I’d say. Heavy wood furniture? Leather upholstery with nail head trim?”

  “No to heavy furniture and yes to leather,” he said.

  “So what exactly?”

  “Craftsman. Not heavy. No Victorian clubroom business. Clean lines. We need real working desks and drafting tables. Leather in the reception room. Nothing from Ikea.”

  “Nothing?” She batted her eyes at him.

  “Go to Restoration Hardware. You like them better anyway.”

  She made another note and nodded. “Wall colors?”

  “Beige.”

  “No.” She thrust a small packet of paint chips bound at the top with a rivet at him. “Not beige. Pick anything else from this stack.”

  He fanned the pages out. “That one,” he said, pointing to something that looked like beige.

  “Café con Leche?” She looked at it. She passed the book back to him with her finger on the color below it. “This one.”

  It was dark beige but called Caramel Latte, “Fine,” he said. “Will you really start shopping and leave me alone?”

  “Absolutely. We’ll get Caramel Latte on your walls and I’ll be off shopping. Yes for Restoration. No for Ikea. And yes for all of my favorite little secret places.”

  He didn’t care if her stores were secret or not so long as she stayed in them and out of his hair. “If you need anything else, call Barb.”

  She gathered up her notebooks and samples. She had a color and permission to shop. It was all she needed for now.

  She reached for the door knob when it burst open again, knocking her to the side and spilling her books on the floor.

  Alonzo looked up “What’s this?” he yelled, not at Joan but at the person who had just disturbed his hard fought peace.

  A young man with spiky hair and thick black glasses was gathering Joan’s things and apologizing. When he had her sorted he approached Alonzo, hand out.

  “Geo. Geo from the city. Do you have a minute?”

  It was after 9 pm and he had figured the building was locked for the night. But as he and Joan had still been in it, obviously neither of them had locked it.

  “No. Call my secretary and make an appointment.” He turned abruptly away and sat down at his desk. Joan had retreated quietly to her own office.

  “I don’t have time for that. I’m from the city, well, I am working with them on the Baltimore project. And we need to talk.”

  Alonzo looked up from his computer. “Then you need to make an appointment.”

  Geo stood his ground. “Putting me off won’t stop the tram. I’m well aware that you are opposed to it. However, we are just minutes away from having your property condemned. We need to get on the land and start our surveys right now. Once it starts raining we could get a whole season off and the tax-payers would be very unhappy.”

  “Do you need me to speak another language, Geo? I can say it in Italian if you want. Make an appointment. It’s after hours and we’re closed.” Alonzo stood up and squared off against the young urban professional.

  “You have been remarkably difficult to make an appointment with. If you can give me five minutes…” Geo looked at the impassable face of Alonzo and stopped. He’d have to make an appointment. “I’ll call your office again and try for an appointment. But keep in mind that we will move ahead whether or not you and I have this conversation. The city does not want to get behind on the project.”

  Government didn’t want to get behind on a building project? It was hardly worth responding to. But that didn’t stop him. “I would hate for the HuddingtonCommunity Center to fall behind because a potential tram line that services no particular group of people going to nowhere in particular might have to be put off for a few months. The city would have some words to say about that, I’m sure. For example, they might say, ‘Why don’t we put the tram somewhere it might do some good like—’ ” Alonzo stopped. His choice words and inappropriate suggestion arrested. His self-control was improving. He took a deep breath. “Make an appointment,” he said.

  The next morning Martin and Geo met to discuss the tram. Geo had planned on convincing Alonzo Miramontes of the great idea before this particular coffee. But his failure with Miramontes was
n’t the worst of the news.

  “Bob pulled?” Geo asked.

  “Yes,” Martin said.

  The two men sat in a Starbucks, in the far corner at a blonde wood table. They had coffee roasted too dark and with too much syrup in it on the table. They weren’t drinking it.

  “He’s just one man. The project doesn’t hinge on his investment,” Geo said.

  “It shouldn’t hinge on one man’s investment. That would be ridiculous. But it did hinge on funding from Bob’s Trust.” Martin opened the manila file folder that was on the table.

  “We can’t get the federal matching grant without the money from the Television Trust. Without those two sources the Mayor won’t let us put the bond measure on the ballet.”

  Geo dismissed the papers with a wave of his hand. “We don’t need the Mayor to get on the ballot! We just need a voter initiative. We’ll get the voter initiative to approve it and fund the whole project with the bond measure.” He sat back and crossed his arms on his chest.

  Martin sighed and slumped back in his chair. “How many voter initiatives have you been a part of George?”

  “Call me Geo, Marty.”

  Martin cleared his throat. “Have you ever tried to gather voter signatures in support of a funding issue?”

  “There is a first time for everything.” Geo continued to smirk. He picked up his coffee drink and took a sip, getting whipping cream on his upper lip.

  “Say you did gather 1000 valid signatures for a spending issue. Anyone who then opposed it has 15 days to bring their issues to the courts.”

  “They can only oppose it for issues on the wording. We wouldn’t have any trouble with that.”

  “Yes, I know Geo. You were a copy writer before you got on the council. But the attorney general gets to write the ballot. The important part is, if someone has an issue with it, and I can think of a few people who would, the courts can take as long as they want to deal with it. It could be years before we even got the ballot to the voters.”