Brenda Chiatovich:
Now you know one reason my daughter’s picture is here. But wait, there is more.
Tiffany Chiatovich Melendez:
So, did you guess? My Mom and my Grand Pop wanted the perfect name for the bad girl in this story. So they picked one of my nick-names, Peaches.
Oh, yes. I have other nick-names, but one will do for now.
“We need to get that flash drive to Collars,” Morgan said, eying the dark sky.
“I don’t trust him.” Delavera eyed the plastic bag with the flash drive in it.
“Ah, Collars is all right. He just thinks I got my last partner hurt is all. It’ll pass.”
“I don’t think that is it, Morgan. I think he has a lot more against you than that. I don’t know what it is but he hates you.”
Morgan laughed. “What could he possibly hate me about? Even if he did he is still a professional. He sees the evidence he will be a policeman and follow procedure wherever it leads. That’s what cops do.”
“He is a white man.”
“So am I. The kids in my neighborhood would have thought you were white too. They never heard of the ‘Mexican’ standoff thing. Odd, isn’t it that you can be a white person in one place and not in another?”
She looked up at him, serious coffee brown eyes unwavering. “Know what I am besides Mexican? I’m Ute. You know what the Utes are famous for?”
“Being Native American Indian?”
“Believing the white man. One group of Utes realized the white man was going to win. They believed all the promises the white man gave them about how they would be rewarded if they helped capture the Navajo. They weren’t on good terms with the Navajo at the time and it seemed like a reasonable deal.”
Morgan listened. “What happened?”
“The whites gave the Utes rifles, told them to help round up all the Navajos and bring them in. The Utes kept their part of the bargain. When it came time to march the Indians on the Trail of Tears, the white man turned their rifles on the Utes. Told them to drop their weapons and join the others.”
“That was a long time ago. It was a different world then.”
“It is a long time ago to you. Cortes was a long time ago too. Tell, me, Officer Morgan, were you ever beaten up in grade school by a bully?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“You remember it, don’t you?”
“Sure, why not?”
“I bet you the bully. He don’t remember.”
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The Homewrecker Series (tm) 
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