Free Victim Six by Gregg Olsen Page A

else wants.
    “South Kitsap?” she asked.
    “That’s right.”
    “Any family here? You know, so I can talk to them about Celesta’s background.”
    Tulio shook his head. “Her dad died, and her mom and sister moved back to El Salvador. She’s only got me. I am her family. We were going to be married in August.”
    Serenity pointed to the photo of Celesta in the Christmas blouse, her hair thick and blue-black.
    “Taken at work,” Tulio said. “She is a restaurant hostess at Azteca. She was employee of the month earlier this year.”
    “You want us to publish these photos, right?” she asked.
    “Yes,” he said. “The police are doing nothing. We have to find her. I need help.”
    Serenity understood. She didn’t blame the Sheriff’s Office. They were understaffed and overworked just like anyone else. Maybe a little story could help.
    “Tell me everything about the day Celesta went missing.”
    Tulio took a deep breath. “Okay. We left early….”
     
    Within an hour of Tulio Pena’s departure, Serenity put the finishing touches on a short article about Celesta Delgado. The photo-imaging guy at the paper had done a reasonably decent job with the scans, holding the detail that would look beautiful online but surely would muddy up on the printing presses. She finished a bottled water with some leftover eggplant parmigiana that had at most one more day of survival in the refrigerator.
    Brush Picker Vanishes Near Sunnyslope
    A local woman disappeared while harvesting greens for a floral supply warehouse Sunday afternoon.
    The Kitsap County Sheriff responded to a call from Celesta Delgado’s boyfriend, Tulio Pena, at 3 p.m. just off the Sunnyslope highway fronting DNR land.
    Delgado, 22, and Pena, 27, were working as brush pickers, along with Pena’s two brothers. All carried permits issued by the state.
    “We were having a good day,” Pena said in an interview with the Lighthouse . “Celesta was taking a bag of salal back to the van, and the next thing we knew, she was gone. Something is wrong.”
    Kitsap Sheriff Jim McCray says that his office is investigating.
    “We are putting resources on it,” he said, “but we are concerned that this might be the case of a young woman who got tired of things here, or missed her family and went back home. She did the same thing three months ago.”
    McCray was referring to reports that Delgado left her job as a hostess at the East Bremerton Azteca Mexican Restaurant without giving any reason. However, a check by the Lighthouse indicated that the departure was a misunderstanding. Delgado was rehired by Azteca following a three-week absence.
    “Her sister in El Salvador was ill. She did not leave without warning that time,” Pena said.
    But this time, Pena says, is different.
    “Something has happened to Celesta,” Pena said. “Please help me find her. I am—we are—very, very worried.”
    If you’ve seen Celesta Delgado, please contact the Kitsap County Sheriff’s Detective Kendall Stark this newspaper.
    Serenity finished the article by writing extensive captions to accompany the photos. By providing the text with the images of Celesta, it would ensure that the overburdened copydesk would publish the pictures, at least online. She’d made a few calls to the numbers that Tulio provided. It seemed that everyone—the police, her employer, and her friends—believed that it was possible she left the country for her mother’s home in El Salvador
    Everyone considered it an option but Tulio Pena. He complained to his brothers when he read the paper the next morning: “They are treating Celesta like she doesn’t matter. Like we don’t know her. It is not right. She’s lost, or she’s been taken.”
    Or, as he was about to find out, something far worse.
     
    He looked at the article that Serenity Hutchins had published in the paper. Sure, it was only a small-town paper, but in time he’d see his hobby find a place in the pages of newspapers far bigger. More