No Way Back: A Novel (15 page)

Someone in the courtroom gasped.

“And Eustavio’s occupation?” Harold asked. “Your brother wasn’t in the drug business, was he, Ms. Velez?”

“No.” She shook her head. “He was a postal clerk, Mr. Bachman.”

“And your sister Nina? When was the last time you saw her?”

“That same year. In August. She was killed in the beauty parlor where she worked. Along with twelve others who were there when the men came in. They filled her body with sixty bullets.”

“And your sister Maria?”

“Two and a half years ago,” Lauritzia said. “She lived in Juárez. She was shot dead in her car. My little cousin Theresa was killed too.”

The female judge shifted uncomfortably in her seat and cleared her throat.

“And your sister Rosa?” Harold continued. “Your
twin
, I might add. And the person, I remind the court, who originally filed this motion for asylum.”

Lauritzia nodded. She glanced at the judges and then back at Harold, who was nodding gently at her, as hard as it was to go through this. “My sister Rosa was killed too. She was here in Texas. In her home. Illegally, I know. She was five months pregnant with her first child, her son, who she intended to name Eustavio, after our brother.”

“That tragically makes four—three sisters and your brother. Murdered. How many remaining siblings do you have, Ms. Velez?

“I have none.” Lauritzia shook her head.

She allowed herself a glance toward the judges. The other male judge, a heavyset black man, appeared to wince with emotion, which she assumed was a positive sign.

“And if you would tell the court what happened on July twenty-fourth of this year?” Harold changed the questioning.

“At the Westchester Mall?” Lauritzia asked, to be sure.

Harold nodded. “Yes. At the mall.”

“As I was leaving, with the children I take care of . . .
your
children, Mr. Bachman . . . the elevator I was riding in was shot up by a man with a semiautomatic weapon. Three people in front of us were killed. Others were wounded. The assassin was clearly sent by Eduardo Cano, because they were Los Zetas, which he commands. It was only by the grace of God that I, or either of the kids, was not killed as well.”

“And how do you know this killer was sent to harm
you
, Ms. Velez, and not one of the others?”

“I saw the shooter’s neck. His tattoo. The skeleton with the dragon’s tail. It is common back home, for members of the drug cartels. Especially that of Los Zetas. The length of the tail marks the time that person has spent in prison.”

“But you chose not to come forward at that time, didn’t you, Ms. Velez? That you suspected that what had happened there was directed at you personally?”

“No.” Lauritzia nodded. “I didn’t.” She bowed and shook her head.

“Can you tell the court why?”

“Because I was afraid. Afraid if I did, I would be found out and sent home. I just wanted to run. To not put your family in any more danger. And I did run.”

“And what fate would you face if you were deported back to Mexico?”

“The same fate my entire family has met.” She looked at the judges. “Eduardo Cano has vowed to kill us all. I would be no different.”

The hearing took just over three hours, including the testimony of Sabrina
Stein, who stated that Eduardo Cano “was one of the two or three most ruthless killers operating in the higher echelons of the Mexican narcosphere right now,” and “what a short-sided mistake it had been for the government to have ever let him slip through our hands.”

“And you know this firsthand, don’t you, Agent Stein?” Harold asked her.

“Yes.” She nodded, looking down.

“Can you tell us how?”

“Because I lost two of my best agents. Rita Bienvienes and her husband, Dean, who both worked under me. They were the targets of the ambush that Ms. Velez’s father was prepared to testify on.”

“And you’re familiar with the dragon tattoo that Ms. Velez referred to, aren’t you? Which was on the body of the shooter at the Westchester Mall.”

“Yes.” The government witness nodded. “It’s a common mark of valor and loyalty in the Los Zetas drug cartel.”

The government prosecutor had his time. He argued that tragic as Ms. Velez’s
story was, it did not merit the “stay of removal,” in that she was not a member of any accepted persecuted class, only that of her own family, and that Mr. Cano’s vendetta against them did not constitute the type of “ethnic or political” persecution that merited a reversal. He also argued that Ms. Velez had not legally complied with the court’s original ruling but, in fact, had secretly hidden out in the United States “in direct opposition of it.”

To which Harold objected that it would have been a death sentence if she had complied. “Ms. Velez was not hiding out,” he said to the court. “She had a steady job. She was enrolled in school. She has embarked on a path to better herself. Coupled with the obvious threat should she be forced to leave, there is no more compelling case of someone who deserves to remain here.”

The U.S. attorney dropped this and brought up another appeals ruling—some Albanian gangster, who had gone on a similar spree of terror against a family here, who had been denied asylum—which, he claimed, acted as a precedent.

One of the male judges asked the government if Lauritzia’s father was still under U.S. protection, and the lawyer answered no. The female judge asked whether, if the government had known the tragic repercussions the Velez family would face, they would have argued against a stay.

Everything seemed to be going well.

“We made the right case,” Harold said in the hall outside the courtroom. “Two of the judges showed clear sensitivity to your story. That’s all we need. They’ll have to reverse it. It’s the only reasonable thing. Even the prosecutor wasn’t objecting strenuously.”

“Now what do we do?” Lauritzia asked as they were transported into the basement garage and into a black SUV.

“Now we just wait.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

S
he waited three weeks. Three more weeks of hiding, of not knowing her fate. Everyone seemed to think the chances were good. Certainly Mr. B felt that way. Lauritzia trusted him when he said that only a heartless person could not see what Cano had in store for her if she was denied. At least two of the judges had smiled at her and thanked her for her testimony. She deserved to be here. This was America, not Mexico. Sending her home would be sending her to her grave.

Lauritzia was reading one of her retail books when her cell phone rang. “It’s Harold,” said Mr. B. She got nervous. “The ruling is in. We need to talk with you.”

“Do you want me to come down to your office?”

“No. Roxanne and I are on our way. We’ll be there in an hour.”

An hour. Her blood raced for most of it, with alternating anticipation and excitement. But when she heard the knock at the door and ran to open it, she could see immediately in the lines of their downcast faces that it had not gone her way.

“How?
” Her hand went to her mouth.

“I’m sorry, Lauritzia. The court found two to one against our stay,” Harold said, giving her a bolstering hug.

They all sat at the kitchen table as Harold read from a printed-off ruling that had been posted on the Internet. “They claimed ‘the threat against Ms. Velez, sympathetic as it is, is nonetheless not due to her membership in “a persecuted class,” but to no more than Mr. Cano’s anger against her father for a personal transgression. Therefore it does not rise to the kind of threat that makes one eligible for protection under federal law.’ They cited this Demiraj case as precedent.”

She looked at him blankly. “So what does this mean?”

“It means the government is saying that whatever protection had been afforded your father for his testimony against Cano does not extend to you. The original ruling is intact. We’re ordered to turn you over to a court-appointed immigration agent in the next thirty days.”

A downcast silence settled over the room. For a while, no one spoke.

“Thirty days?” Lauritzia muttered. She looked at them, worry in her eyes.

Harold leaned against the kitchen counter. “Pending appeal.”

“Which means it’s not over,” Roxanne said, taking Lauritzia’s hand. “This was an appeals court, Lauritzia. It means we take this higher up, to the Supreme Court.”

“If they’ll agree to take it.” Harold shrugged. “Their ruling is a completely narrow reading of the asylum law. It totally ignores whatever is human about it. It’s like the government is somehow siding with this son of a bitch Cano. What they’ve come back with goes against the very spirit of the law it was designed to protect.”

“Thirty days . . .” Lauritzia sat down. “This is not right.” She felt numb. She had allowed herself to believe, and now once again it was clear who had won and who had lost. Harold was right, it
was
as if the government was siding with this monster.
Why?
In thirty days she could be sent back and—

“Lauritzia, we’re not done yet,” Roxanne said, bracing her by the shoulders. “I don’t want you to give up on this fight. And I don’t want you to give up on us either. Harold’s already agreed to go on.”

“I’m going to try to put together what they call amicus briefs from various law professors and immigration advocates—”

“Go on?” Lauritzia looked at them in confusion. “How can we go on? I can’t stay here forever. With you continuing to hide me and pay for me and—”

“We have another plan we’d like to propose.” Roxanne leaned forward, her blue eyes brimming with resolve. “We’re going to fly you out to our house in Edwards, Colorado. No one will know you’re there. You can stay there until we can determine the right legal move.” Lauritzia’s hand was trembling and Roxanne squeezed it tightly. “I know you want to give up . . . I know you don’t want to burden us. But the last thing we’re going to do is hand you over to the immigration department. That’s not going to happen.”

“You’ll go against your own law?”

“If we have to,” Roxanne said.

She looked at Harold. “And you agree, Mr. Bachman?”

He nodded. “We talked it over. Yes, I agree.”

Roxanne took her by the shoulders. “You’ll be safe out there. No one will know. I know it seems like you’ve lost, but we’re not done yet . . .”

“Not by a long shot,” Harold said.

Lauritzia pressed herself against Roxanne.
Thirty days . . .
She didn’t know, maybe the right thing was just to disappear. This was her fate, not theirs. She had already cost them enough. She felt love for them, these people who treated her like their own family. Yet she’d felt the bond of love before, and it had only turned to blood and tears.

She should go.

But she heard herself mutter back, “Thank you.” And felt the tears rush. Because it was a fight and she was not ready to give up. To pay her
cuota
. Not without one more battle.

She hugged Roxanne and said a prayer for those who had died.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

I
t would be so easy,
Roxanne thought, gazing out the window on their trip back home to Greenwich,
to simply let her go.

They’d already done more than anyone could have asked. More than Lauritzia herself even asked. She wasn’t their family, no matter how many times Roxanne declared it. She simply wasn’t. They had their own lives. Their own kids. They could so easily just say that they had tried their best. A trial. Standing by her. Protecting her when others would have turned their heads.

Simply let her go.

It was night when they made the ride back home down Interstate 95. She and Harold didn’t say much to each other. Most of what they wanted to say had already been said. They both felt dismal about the outcome. Angry. They felt as if they had let her down. Their friends already thought they were crazy to have gone as far as they had. It would be easy to have treated the whole thing as if it were some kind of charity. Just write the girl a check, without ever having to have put yourself on the line. After all, it wasn’t
their
fight.
Their
fate.

It was hers.

And maybe in another life, another moment, Roxanne could have done all this.
Before
what had happened at the mall.

But not now.

When those shots rang out, Lauritzia’s only instinct had been to protect their kids.
She’d
put herself on the line for
them
. She’d made them
her
fight.

Now it just seemed like the right thing, the
only
thing, to do the same for her.

Roxanne asked herself, if a hundred blessed things came into their life—if Harold was named head of the firm, or got some honor, if the kids won some big recognition in school or some prestigious trophy, if she was honored by the local hospital for her charitable work there—would it offset knowing that they had cast Lauritzia away to an unknown fate? That they hadn’t done all they could?

It would always haunt her.

She thought, life was safe here, seemingly protected from harm. But sometimes in that safe, predictable life, you had to risk it all. You had to go “all in.” Or else the rest didn’t mean anything. Love is simply love, Roxanne realized as she stared out the window. You couldn’t legislate how it came into your life. Or defend yourself against it when it’s inconvenient. Or divvy it up, like vegetables on a plate. When it enters, it becomes the only thing that matters. The only thing of meaning. The rest
. . .
the rest is not the painting, it’s just the painter signing his name.

She looked at Harold at the wheel. She reached over and put her hand on his arm. “Are we doing the right thing?” Roxanne asked. “People think we’re crazy.”

“I don’t know. I’m not sure there is a right thing.” He looked back at her. “The right thing is only what you feel with a hundred percent certainty inside that you have to do.”