by Karina Halle
“So what is our course of action if he wants her back?” The Doctor asked. “We shouldn’t give her over until everything is absolutely secure. We need proof of the shipping lane. We need physical evidence before we do anything. This might mean holding on to her for a few more days. But I’m sure Javier can handle that, can’t you boy?”
I barely heard him. My eyes willed the phone to ring, to get this fucking over with.
And, like God himself was the operator, the phone started dancing, vibrating on the desk. We all watched with bated breath before I snatched it up.
I waited a moment, that one golden moment where everything stayed the same, before I flipped it open.
“Hello,” I said into the receiver, relieved at how strong my voice was sounding. I could almost fool myself.
“Javier Bernal,” said Salvador, his voice dripping with false formality. “I’m glad you were waiting on my phone call. I almost forgot about it, you see. Nice to know you hadn’t.”
I pressed my lips together, hard, waiting for him to go on. He didn’t.
“No, I hadn’t,” I said with deliberation. “So what have you decided? Will you deal with me or not?”
There was a pause and the other end of the phone erupted with laughter. It was so loud that I knew The Doctor and Este could hear it. They exchanged a concerned glance with each other.
“Deal?” Salvador spat out when he calmed down. “What was the deal again? An Ephedra lane for my wife? Javier, Javier, Javier. Have you seen my wife? Have you tasted my wife?” His voice grew lower. “If you’re anything like me, you have.”
I’m not anything like you, I thought bitterly.
“But for her beauty and body,” he went on, “do you really think she’s worth a shipping lane? You just might be dumber than I thought.” He snorted and my chest constricted painfully. “The world is full of naïve, brainless, helpless women like her. I can pick up another one. In fact, I already have. Several. So no, Javier, I will not be making a deal with you.” He paused. “Chop her fucking head off.”
The line went dead.
Everything inside me went dead. I slowly removed the phone from my ear and stared at it in my hands.
I had been wrong. Luisa had been right. Salvador didn’t want her. I kidnapped her in vain. I wasn’t getting anything in return.
It seemed fitting for a man who loved to fuck so much that I had royally fucked myself over.
“Javier?” The Doctor asked carefully. “What happened?”
I glanced up, meeting Este’s eyes by accident. He immediately grimaced, knowing the look of failure.
“Shit,” he swore. “No fucking deal, hey.”
The Doctor made a tsking sound, leaning forward on his knees. “That is a shame. A real shame. All the time we wasted. And now we look like fools. Well, the only way we can recover from this, Javier,” he said my name sharply so that I would direct my attention to him, “is if we show we don’t mess around. And I know you don’t. Look what happened to Franco. No idle threats there.” He got out of his seat and peered down at me with curiosity. “You know we have to kill her and do it publicly.”
I raised one finger to silence him. It was oh so hard to think when you could barely even breathe. “Give me a minute,” I managed to say. My brain was working on overdrive, trying to figure out a way to save my pride, save my cartel, and save Luisa at the same time. I barely noticed Este leaving the room.
But I certainly noticed when he came back.
I looked up to see Luisa in the doorway looking beyond frightened, Juanito and Este with tight holds on either side of her. Her eyes flew to mine, and in an instant she knew exactly what was happening.
I’m sorry, I mouthed to her. I didn’t know what else to say.
“Ah,” The Doctor said, clapping his hands together gleefully. “Just the woman we wanted to see. Luisa, Javier has something very important and troubling that he’d like to tell you. Don’t you, Javier?”
I wanted nothing more than to chop his fucking head off. My eyes burned into his but he took no notice. He had that look on his face, that dreamy, wistful look that preceded his torturing someone.
I slid my gaze over to her. “Luisa,” I said thickly. “I just spoke with your husband. He doesn’t want to make a deal. You were right. He wants me to chop your head off instead.”
I suppose I could have said that more eloquently.
Her eyes widened for a moment before something passed over them, something that made them grow cold. She was retreating inside herself. I didn’t want that to happen. I wanted her to fight back. Her fight would give me courage to do the same.
“I see,” she said blankly. “Sometimes it’s horrible to be right.”
I nodded and looked to the men. “Do you guys mind excusing us? I need a moment with her alone.”
The Doctor narrowed his eyes. “Javier, you know you have to do what’s right for all of us. As gruesome as it may be.”
“Please go,” I said, my voice growing harder. “Now.”
Juanito, Este, and The Doctor all exchanged a worried look before they reluctantly left the room. As soon as the door shut behind them, I went up to it and locked it before turning to look at Luisa.
We stared at each other for a long moment. There was so much to say and yet so little.
“So this is it,” she said.
I shook my head and went over to her, grabbing her face in my hands. “No. This isn’t it. I won’t let this happen if you won’t. Tell me you’ll fight this. Promise me.”
She stared up at me in the open need to believe. “How can I fight?”
I licked my lips and looked away. “I don’t know. The cartel will suffer—I will suffer—if we don’t deliver. We all follow through on what we say we’re going to do. If we say we’re going to kill you, then we have to do it.”
“Then find someone else,” she cried out, her eyes dancing feverishly. “Go into the village, go and find a woman, a hooker, someone, anyone, anyone that looks like me. Bring her back here and tie her up and film it. Cover up her face in a bag and take her fucking head right off!”
I jerked my chin into my neck. Where had this brutal Luisa come from?
She smiled and shook me. “It will work,” she assured me. “Killing another woman instead.”
“No,” I said, watching her closely. “It won’t. They might want proof of your actual head.”
“Then let me stay here,” she said. “You don’t have to kill me. You can tell them no. You’re their boss.”
“I know I am. But that doesn’t help with pride, with image.”
“Fuck your pride!” she yelled, her face contorted. “What the fuck has that ever gotten you?”
She didn’t understand. “It’s gotten me everything,” I told her.
She made a sweeping gesture to the room. “All these dear things you love so much,” she said sarcastically. “All your fucking flowers and your clothes and your money and the shitheads who work for you.”
I rubbed my face in my hands, trying to get a grip, trying to get control back. I felt like I’d lost it many days ago, somewhere deep inside of her. No matter what I chose, I was going to suffer in some way.
“Look,” I said carefully, slowly meeting her wild eyes. “If you stay here, even if the cartel can’t save face, what do you think happens to your parents? If you run off into the jungle, what do you think will happen to your parents? If we kill some other woman and pretend it’s you—what do you think will happen to your parents?” Her face fell and I took a step toward her again. “You’re not thinking straight. You’re thinking out of survival and instinct, and that’s good because that means you’re finally being selfish. But you’ve got a pure heart, my darling. You wouldn’t be able to be selfish for long. I don’t want you living or dying with that kind of regret on your shoulders.”
She seemed to think about that for some time, her eyes staring at a blank spot on my shirt. I could almost see the wheels turning inside, that fight to
survive and the fight to protect the ones she loved.
I hoped I wasn’t included on that list.
When she came to a conclusion it looked like she was wearing the weight of the world on her face. She looked me dead in the eye and said, “I have to go back to Salvador.”
I frowned, a bolt of panic going through me. “What? No.”
She nodded and raised her chin defiantly. “Yes. It’s the only way. I have to go back to him. I have to be his wife again. It’s the only way I can live and keep my parents alive at the same time.”
I grabbed her by the hand and squeezed hard, hoping to press some sense into her. “But you won’t be alive for long,” I hissed at her. “You know what that man will do to you. Christ, what happens when he sees my name on your back!”
“You never cared about that before.”
“But I do now! You can’t do this, this is a death wish for fuck’s sake.”
“I will do this,” she said, her voice growing calmer by the moment, as if she had made peace with the horrible fear. “You’ll let me go. Even better, you’ll have someone drop me off in Culiacán. I’ll wander around until someone spots me. The whole city knows who I am, the whole city is still under my power. I’ll tell them what happened—that I knew I was going to be executed. I’ll tell them I escaped and that I’ve come to beg my husband to take me back, that he made the right choice by picking his business, that there are no hard feelings. I will grovel. And to save his own face, to save his own fucking pride, he will take me back into his house.” She swallowed. “And I … I will be his wife again. Just as before.”
I was angry. So angry that my breath wouldn’t leave my lungs. It took all my concentration to calm down, to start breathing in and out of my nose. Why did she have to choose this of all things?
“Luisa, please,” I told her, hoping she could see the truth. “You will die. He will take you in on pride but you are nothing to him. Do you hear me? Nothing! You will last a week or two, and then he will kill you. And before that, you know what he’s going to do to you. He—” I broke off, unable to finish the sentence. I couldn’t even let myself think about it, but it was there, poking around in my brain. The sound of Salvador’s voice, the fear I’d seen in Luisa’s eyes, the brutality he’d proven he was capable of.
“And I will handle him as I handled him before,” she said, almost proud. “This is the only way. At least I can say I gave it a shot. One more shot at life, as pathetic as it may be. And you? You only have to lose your precious pride among your workers here. The rest of the world may laugh at your faulty security, but I’m sure it will be something they’ll soon forget. To Mexico, your cartel is still one to be reckoned with and your pride will remain intact. And you, Javier Bernal, will continue on as you had before. In a week, you won’t remember me.”
But she had to know, had to realize, how hard this was for me, too. If she did though, perhaps she didn’t quite care.
“All right,” I said, nodding at her. “If this is what you want, I can tell the others the plan. They won’t like it, but they won’t be able to do anything about it.”
“Thank you,” she said. She smiled at me with the strength of a million breaking hearts. It was the saddest thing I’d ever seen, and I’d seen a lot of sad things in my lifetime, things that would chase me to the grave.
And that’s when I knew, with nothing but a smile, my Luisa, my queen, had broken me.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Luisa
I slept alone that night. In fact, I spent most of the day alone as well. After I learned the news and after I had came up with my own horrid plan, Javier told his comrades about what we were to do. They didn’t take it well, as I figured. Este was pissed off like a whiny boy and even Juanito gazed upon Javier with an air of disrespect. I had to say, as much as I mocked him for his foolish pride, there was a moment where I felt almost sorry for him.
The Doctor seemed to take it worst of all. In that calm, cynical, monstrous way, he berated Javier in every way he could. He called him weak. Soft. Pussy-whipped. He talked about me as if I wasn’t even in the room, but those lewd insults about how well of a fuck I must be, well they meant nothing. All I cared about was putting my plan into action.
And, eventually, that’s what happened. Javier lost face among his men but they would protect the cartel as a whole. I would be let go. The next day, Juanito would take me to Culiacán. I would look like I had just escaped from somewhere. I would have a story to tell. And then I would hope for the best.
I knew Javier wasn’t happy with my choice—I wasn’t happy either. I was actually so scared that I’d grown numb. I didn’t let myself think about what might happen to me, I just knew it had to be done. My chances for survival were extremely low. My chances for vile abuse, torment, and torture were extremely high. Either way, I was in for a lot of pain.
But like I had done all week, I put that on the back burner. I tried to appreciate the last day I had in that house that, in the dying sun, became only golden and not a prison at all. I wished I had Javier by my side, but he was ignoring me, avoiding me. I knew it was for the best. I knew that if I was with him, in his bed, that it would make leaving even worse.
It’s not even that Javier and I were lovers. We weren’t really anything you could explain. What relationship we did have was fucked up beyond reasoning. It made no sense for me to feel more than just attraction to a man like him, and yet I did. I shouldn’t have let my emotions excuse the things he’d done, the person he was, but again, I did.
I should have been grateful that he didn’t kill me, that it wasn’t even an option to him. A week ago, I would have been certain he’d take my head off, and with glee. Now he was willing to take a hit to his ego, not just to resist killing me but to actually let me go. Not to mention actually let me go through with a plan that I, his hostage, had initiated.
And yet I still wished for more. I wanted him to ask me to stay again. I wanted him to protest just a little bit more. There could be other ways around all this. He could go and take my parents somewhere safe and then keep me here as his. I would gladly stay. There might have not been any love in this house, but it was better than a house of hate.
I couldn’t find the words. I didn’t see the point. It should have been enough that he did, finally, see me as a human being. It’s just that being a human being meant I also wanted what I couldn’t have.
Him.
The next morning, after a fitful sleep, I was awakened by a knock and Este bringing me my breakfast. He was one of the last people I wanted to see.
“Thought you deserved this in bed, since it’s your last meal with us and all,” he said, shutting the door behind him with his foot and bringing the tray to the bedside table. He shot me a sidelong glance. “It’s only because you’re leaving that I can trust you not to bash me over the head with the bowl of fruit or something.”
I didn’t smile, I merely stared at him.
“No jokes today, hey?” he asked with a shrug. He sat down on the end of the bed, and I instinctively drew my feet toward me. “You know, Luisa, I think we may have gotten off on the wrong foot here. But I just wanted you to know, I like you.”
I grimaced. “Is that supposed to be a good thing?”
“It’s not anything,” Este said. “I can see how Javier is so obsessed with you.”
“Obsessed?” This was news to me.
“Don’t be too flattered,” he said wryly. “Javier gets obsessed easily. Though it doesn’t happen very often with women. Considering the way things have gone for him in the past and his devotion to building an empire, I’m actually surprised at the way things have turned out.”
“But you’re unhappy about it,” I said.
“I am. I think he’s letting his feelings for you cloud his judgment. But things could be worse.”
Feelings for me? I wanted to ask him to elaborate, to tell me more. But I realized how damn inappropriate that was, considering my dire circumstances, and internally chasti
sed my heart for even skipping a beat.
Este studied my face. “Just so you know,” he said carefully, a knowing look in his eyes, “his feelings for you only mean that he’s not killing you. That’s all. You can’t get much more than that out of him. It’s like getting blood from a stone.”
“I know,” I said quickly. “I never figured otherwise.”
He nodded and patted the bed. “Good. Well, I suppose I should be off. I hope all of this is worth it, you know. You could just as easily disappear and get a new identity, a new life, a new everything.”
I shook my head. “I couldn’t do that. I have a conscience.”
“And that will be the death of you,” he said. “Juanito will come up and get you in an hour. It’s a long drive, as you know.” He got up and paused, as if remembering something. “Oh, and sorry again about Tasering you.”
I stared at him coldly. “Really? I’m still thinking about hitting you in the head with this tray, just because.”
He grinned. “I figured as much.”
He opened the door.
“Esteban,” I called after him. “Could you please send Javier up here?”
His face twisted doubtfully. “I’ll try.”
The door shut and I waited. When the hour ticked closer, I put on my dress and my running shoes, the only things I would be pretending I escaped in. I would have nothing else. No money, no ID, nothing. I stared at my face in the mirror. I wondered if Salvador would see the horror in my eyes and mistake it for where I had been, not where I was going. I hoped so.
Eventually, five minutes before the sand in the hourglass was up, Javier came to me. He wore a mask of elegance and indifference, his unusually handsome features taking on the appearance of a sculpture. But I had no idea what the artist was trying to say: Here’s a man in denial? Here’s a man without a soul? Here’s a man who will build empires and legacies, whose pride shaped the land? Or here is a man who for once in his life, doesn’t know who he is?