I forced myself to keep going because I didn’t have the luxury of spiraling. “Rosa, you mentioned you’ve heard things.”
Her gaze snapped up. “I did not say that.”
“You didn’t,” I amended. “But you didn’t say you hadn’t.” It was a guess. A good one, based on how Rosa’s expression sharpened with suspicion.
I watched her compute the quick mental math of whether talking to us was worse than staying silent.
Rios didn’t push. He didn’t interrupt the flow of the questioning I’d picked up. He sat solid and still and let the silence do what it did.
I had always been good at silence in court. Let the witness fill it. Let the jury feel it.
Rosa’s throat worked. “There are rumors. Not… official. Just… women say things.”
“What things?” I asked.
Rosa shook her head once, frustrated. “Be careful. Don’t walk alone. Don’t take the back streets. Don’t go home late.”
All standard warnings most women received at some point or another. But this seemed like more.
“Because of this?” Rios asked, voice quieter now.
Rosa hesitated before nodding once. “Because sometimes women go and do not come back.”
My pulse stuttered. “How often?”
Rosa’s eyes narrowed like the question itself was naïve. “How would I know? We do not put it on Facebook.”
I swallowed. “Does anyone talk about where they go? If there’s a place? A person? A car?”
Rosa shook her head. “Just… gone.”
My stomach rolled.
This was exactly how predators thrived. Not through invisibility. Through disinterest. Through the world deciding a certain kind of missing person wasn’t a problem worth solving.
Rios’s voice cut in, controlled but edged. “Has anyone said it happened to someone they knew?”
Rosa nodded slowly. “One girl. Seasonal. She worked at the hotel. Not long. She stopped answering her phone. Her roommate said she left in the night.”
“And no one checked?” I couldn’t keep the anger out of my tone.
Rosa’s gaze sharpened. “Checked with who? Police? They ask for papers. They ask for names. They ask if she used drugs. They ask if she had a boyfriend. They say maybe she went with him.”
I pressed my lips together so hard they hurt.
“And another,” Rosa said quietly. “A girl who cleaned houses. People said she return to her country.”
“But she didn’t,” Rios said.
Rosa’s shoulders lifted in a tiny shrug. “I do not know.”
But her face said she did. Or at least, she believed she did.
I took a slow breath and forced myself back into control. Rage didn’t help. Rage made promises.
“And these rumors,” I asked, “do they stay within your community? Undocumented workers, seasonal people?—”
Rosa’s mouth tightened. “Not only.”
