Haunted

CHAPTER 23

“MY FATHER IS THE REASON MY MOTHER AND I are living like animals in a cage.” Gabriella turns away from me, looks out through the ruined doorway. “He is the reason my brother killed himself. Antonio could never be what my father pushed him to be. That last outrage was the breaking point. My father wanted him to fight back against the bullies tormenting him. When he wouldn’t, my father made it clear he thought Antonio a disgrace, a weakling. And then he took matters into his own hands.”

I’m trying to reconcile the story she is telling with the one her father told us. According to Ramon, Antonio never told anyone what happened to him. “Did your brother talk to you about what had been done to him? It sounds like you knew what happened to Antonio before you read his note?”

“What note?”

I stop, take a mental step back. Perhaps Gabriella didn’t know about the note. Ramon may have wanted to protect his daughter from the truth about the details of Antonio’s rape. I certainly have no intention of being the one to break it to her.

“I may have misunderstood. It’s not important anyway. What is important is that we’re going to make sure you and your mother are safe.”

Gabriella shakes her head and hands me the laptop. “Good luck with that,” she says, standing up. “My father is a hard-ass narco. If he can’t protect us, what chance do you think you have?”

She starts for the stairway, then stops, looking back at me. “I’m going to get something to eat. My mother loves to cook. At home, we have someone who cooks for us. I think she actually likes being here because she feels like she’s taking care of us again. Oh well. At least if we die, she’ll die happy.” She’s winding the cord for the earbuds around her iPod and when she’s done, she stuffs the thing into her jeans. “Don’t mention the iPod, okay? My father is paranoid. He thinks any electronic device can be bugged.”

I nod that her secret is safe. She takes a step toward the stairway.

“Gabriella?”

She stops again and turns around.

“You seemed really happy to see your father an hour ago. What’s changed?”

“I thought he came back to take us home. He hasn’t. Another promise broken.”

I raise my eyebrows and shake my head.

Her footsteps echo on the steps and then I hear the soft swish as the door opens into the living area. I’ve pushed the lever that returns the table to its position in the middle of the cabin and perch myself on the edge.

Gabriella’s cynicism lingers in my head. I’ve often wondered how the members of a gangster’s family square their lifestyle with the means by which it’s obtained. I have no idea how Ramon’s family lived before but if this hideaway is any indication, they must have had it pretty good. Gabriella is obviously well educated. Her teeth and skin flawless. Before they went into hiding, did she ever give a second thought to the bloodshed going on around her? Or was she immune because of who she was—or more precisely, because of who her father was?

That didn’t save her brother, though, did it? Even a hard-ass narco answers to somebody.

A click and a whirring sound emanate from beneath the table as the mechanism hums again to life. I jump away just as the table tilts inward, exposing the stairway.

Max trudges into view. He’s holding a plate brimming with tortillas, beans, meat and vegetables. More importantly, he’s carrying two bottles of Dos Equis. We set the table upright again and take seats slouching against the wall facing the door. I balance the laptop on my knees while Max balances his plate on his.

Max hands me one of the beers. “Brought you some food. Maria insisted. But I guess you can’t eat it, can you? Guess I’ll have to take care of it. Wouldn’t want Maria to think you didn’t like her cooking any more than you liked her taste in clothes.”

I punch his arm. “Nice going in there. They think I’m gay. In a good Catholic country like Mexico, I’m sure they feel real comfortable around me now.”

“More comfortable than they’d be if they knew what you really are?” He’s shoveling meat and beans into a tortilla.

“Didn’t you eat downstairs?” I ask. The smell makes my mouth water.

He takes a huge bite. My eyes trail the path from plate to mouth like a dog panting for table scraps.

“Yep. But damn, this is good. Maria is one hell of a cook.”

Great. I let him eat, finding a little consolation in my beer. After a moment, I ask, “What are they talking about?”

“Downstairs? Nothing important. Family stuff.”

“So what happens now? When do we go after Santiago?”

“Ramon told Culebra we’d talk tonight, after Maria and Gabriella go to bed.”

“Gabriella blames her father for Antonio’s death. She’s pretty antagonistic toward him.”

“She’s a teenager,” Max says. “She’s supposed to be antagonistic. It’s her job.”

“Maybe. But it seemed more than teenage angst. She said something about Ramon wanting Antonio to avenge himself against the bullies and when he wouldn’t, Ramon called him a disgrace, a weakling. And took matters into his own hands.”

Max takes a break from eating to look at me. “You think Ramon’s killing Rójan was premeditated?”

“I don’t know. But Gabriella seems to think so. She didn’t know anything about a suicide note, either. I’m not sure she knew he had been raped. In her mind, Antonio killed himself because he couldn’t live up to his father’s ‘standards.’”

Max lifts his shoulder and takes another bite. “You should probably let Culebra know. He seems to take everything Ramon says at face value.”

His words remind me of my conversation with Culebra the first night. “Maybe not.” I fill him in on the fact that Ramon does not know I’m vampire nor does he know Culebra is a shape-shifter. And that Culebra thought it best not to divulge our natures to Ramon.

Max has the same reaction I had. “Then what are we doing? Why did Culebra drag us into this thing if he doesn’t trust Ramon?”

My turn to shrug. “Culebra owes Ramon some kind of blood debt. One he feels obligated to repay. Besides, this is your big chance to get intel on Santiago, right? I’d think it wouldn’t matter to you how.”

“True.” He drags a tortilla across the plate, scooping up bits of meat and beans and with a look of pure contentment, slips the food into his mouth. When he sees me watching him, he smacks his lips appreciatively and grins.

Show-off. “I think you missed a bean. Maybe licking the plate would be more efficient?”

Max sniffs, still grinning. “Jealousy is such an ugly emotion.” He lays the plate on the table and looks out the door at the early evening sun blazing its lazy path across the winter sky. “We’ve got a lot of time to kill.”

I stand and hand him the laptop. “I’m going downstairs to take a nap. May as well rest while I can. I’ll bring the plate back to Maria and tell her how wonderful lunch was. You can stand guard.”

Max rubs his stomach. “Shit. I ate too much. Maybe I should go down for that nap.”

“Nope. I called it first.” I reach under the rim of the table and activate the lever. “You can jog around the cabin—work off a few of those calories. Those jeans look a little tight on you. Wouldn’t want you splitting any seams.”

He raises an eyebrow. “It’s not me,” he says. “Ramon doesn’t have my manly physique.”

“Yeah. Right.”

Max steps closer, too close.

“I can think of another way to work off a few calories.”

“Are you nuts?” I push him away with both hands. “You’d better lay off the mescal. We’re not a couple. Haven’t been for a long time. I have a boyfriend, Stephen, remember?”

“Maybe you do and maybe you don’t.”

His obvious glee at the thought that my days with Stephen are numbered makes me angry enough to tell him exactly what I’m thinking. “Stephen is not like you. He doesn’t judge me. He knows I didn’t choose to become a vampire. He loves me in spite of it.”

Max sniffs. “Does he? Is that why you didn’t tell him where you were going or who you were with? You saved his ass because you’re a vampire. He’s grateful. Now. Just wait until he has to live with it.”

“I saved your ass, too.” The words come out in a growl. “And you weren’t very grateful, were you? Thanks for reminding me, Max. You’re a real prick.”

I’m down the stairs quicker than Max can come up with a response. At the bottom, I work the combination and when the door opens, I’m facing three pairs of startled eyes.

Shit. I forgot. I should have knocked. Now they know I know the combination.

Too late. And right now, I’m too aggravated with Max to care what they know. I hand Maria the plate. “Thank you. The food was delicious.” I take a quick glance around. “Where’s Gabriella?”

Maria takes the plate. “She went to her room. Is Max keeping watch?”

“Yes. And if you don’t mind, I’d like to lie down for a while. We didn’t get much sleep last night.”

Ramon looks ready to ask me how I got the door open, but Culebra comes to my rescue. “Taking a nap is a good idea. We’ll be up late tonight. You get some rest. Ramon, Maria and I still have much to catch up on.” He smiles at them and for the moment, at least, they are caught up in his good humor.

Culebra can feel that I’m angry with Max, but he doesn’t intrude on my thoughts to ask why. I nod and make my escape, leaving them sitting around the table.

Just a warm, happy, cozy little family reunion.

What a fucking joke.