Ditch Rider Read Online Free PDF Page A

unlikely gang members would be so willing to forgive and forget.
    â€œReally?” Her sense of relief was so strong that for a minute her fingers stopped fidgeting and she forgot how much she needed a cigarette.
    â€œReally. Did Cheyanne know Juan Padilla?”
    â€œHe used to hang out around the place some, but when he got in a gang I told him I didn’t want him comin’ around no more. I don’t want gangs rankin’ in my boy, Danny. Look, I gotta go back to work this afternoon. I need to get some sleep, and I’ll sleep a whole lot better if you’ll just tell me you’ll represent Cheyanne.”
    â€œShe hasn’t been charged with anything yet,” I pointed out. “A witness fingered a guy named Ron Cade, who’s a member of a Heights gang. The police are looking for him. Did he hang out around the place, too?”
    â€œNot as far as I know.”
    â€œThe shooting happened Friday night. Do you know where Cheyanne was then?”
    She shook her head. “I was working.”
    â€œAnd after work?”
    â€œI went to see my boyfriend. Will you help us? Please. Cheyanne’ll be better off in the Girls’ School for two years than she will on the street. My boy’s always been good as can be, but I never could do nothin’ with her.”
    â€œI need to talk to Cheyanne before I make a decision.”
    Sonia stood up. “I’ll go get her.”
    â€œI need to talk to her alone,” I said.
    â€œYou think she’s gonna tell you something she didn’t tell me?”
    â€œ She might.”
    â€œShe’s my daughter,” Sonia insisted.
    â€œShe’ll be my client,” I replied.
    â€œYou lawyerin’ me?”
    â€œJust doing my job,” I said.
    Sonia was too tired to argue. “All right.” The minute she was out of the house she lit up, Marlboro Reds. If she was a drinker I figured her for Jack Daniel’s, a smooth, cool, seductive drink, a gambler’s drink, a drink that tasted good. Jack Daniel’s could make you believe it would make things better. My preference, Cuervo Gold, didn’t taste good enough to make any promises. All it offered and all it delivered was to kill the pain. I opened the street door for Sonia and saw Danny waiting on his souped-up bike.
    â€œHi, darlin’.” Sonia gave him a hug with one hand and tousled his hair with the other, leaving the cigarette to dangle from her lip. “You’re on your way to school?”
    He nodded.
    â€œDo me a favor, will you, and get your sister.”
    â€œOkay.” Danny pedaled away on his bike.
    â€œThat’s my good kid,” Sonia said while Danny was still within earshot. “My nine-year-old.”
    Good kid. Bad kid. Some roles are assigned early, and once they are it’s hard not to live up to them. I knew that because I’d been the bad kid myself. “Danny’s Cheyanne’s brother?” I asked.
    â€œHalf brother. They have different fathers. You know how that is. Danny’s father’s Hispanic. Cheyanne says you have a Hispanic guy living here.”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œMexican men can be rough, but they can be kind, too, if you know what I mean.”
    Actually, I did. “He’s not Mexican. He was born in Argentina.”
    â€œWell, he speaks Spanish, right?”
    â€œRight.”
    â€œSpanish guys in this country get treated like women, so they know how that feels. It can make them gentle if it don’t make them mean. Cheyanne’s father was a mean son of a bitch. He was gone before she was even out of the womb. But Danny’s father, he keeps in touch. He works, gives me money for Danny. He does things with his boy and he’d do ’em with Cheyanne too if she’d let him. Cheyanne likes to think her father is an Indian. Does she look like she has any Indian blood to you?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œShe gave herself the name Cheyanne, but