Dirty Souls by Karina Halle
“Okay,” I say slowly, quietly. “I will go back with you to Mexico. I won’t struggle. I’ll make it as easy as possible. Let’s just leave here quietly. I don’t want her to see this.”
Parada stares at me in disbelief, cocking his head. “I’m afraid you are mistaken.”
My throat feels like it’s starting to close up.
“What?” I manage to say.
Parada jerks his head over to Violet. “We’re following orders, Vicente. And the orders are to bring the both of you. In fact, I believe your father would rather have her than you if it comes down to it.”
Now I’m stunned with horror.
“Why? Why does he want her? She’s nothing to him.”
Parada raises his brows. “I’m not your father’s psychologist. I don’t know and it’s not my job to question or care. You can ask him yourself when I bring you home. But she’s coming with you. Make no mistake about that. He specifically asked for the daughter of Ellie Watt.”
My eyes widen. I don’t have words.
I only know fear.
Fear that I’ve never known before.
It twists around me, choking me, a vine around a tree.
My father knows who Violet is.
He knows she’s Ellie’s daughter.
And I know, I know, that what he has planned for her will break the both of us.
The terror is tangible.
The guilt, the fucking guilt, is almost worse.
“You really think I don’t know everything about the two of you?” he goes on, coming closer, the gun still trained on me, a slow smile stretching across his lips. “You think I haven’t been following you both for weeks? Spying on you. I know everything, Vicente, just as your father does. The things you’ve said. In your hotel room, in your car. Fucking like animals all the time. Full of bravado and confidence that you never earned. Not a care in the world. No, Vicente, you acted like you owned the world. Now your father wants you home to show you that you don’t own anything. Not even her.”
Parada takes a moment to look at the man behind him, giving him a smirk.
I don’t think.
There’s no time.
Violet might weigh her pros and her cons in my position.
But I can only act.
Parada broke his wrist late last year.
I know he favors it, it’s not fully healed.
I position my body so Parada is a shield between me and the other guy, and strike out against his wrist. He yelps, hand flying open, and I take the gun from him, aiming it at the other man.
“Drop the gun,” I tell him, eyeing Parada briefly out of the corner of my eye. He’s shaking his wrist, biting back the pain, his eyes blazing at me in humiliation and anger. At this moment he can hear the conversation between him and my father play out, the disappointment in my father’s voice that he let his son get the best of him.
Or perhaps it would be pride, because I proved to be more of a handful than he originally thought.
I can’t focus on that right now.
I wave the gun at the man. “Drop it, now.”
And of course this is the moment that Violet begins to stir, moaning as she rolls over.
“I said drop the fucking weapon!” I scream at the man, the words just pouring out of me, “or I’ll blow your fucking head off!”
The man drops the gun.
Violet opens her eyes.
She sees what’s going on.
Screams.
“Violet,” I tell her, my voice harsher than I mean to, hoping my eyes can communicate everything. “It’s okay.”
She’s breathing hard, the whites of her eyes shining.
“Listen to me Violet,” I go on.
“What’s going on?” she cries out. “Who are these people?”
“No one to worry about,” I tell her. “Now I need you to get out of bed and slip on the house robe from the closet, grab the bike keys from the counter beside me and go to the door.”
She’s shaking from fear. She’s been through so much. Now I’m asking her to walk naked in front of these two men, men she knows are here to harm us.
“Parada, don’t you fucking look at her.” My eyes are cold steel as I stare at the hulking man. “Don’t you fucking look either. Go Violet, now!”
She gets out of bed. I have to watch her out of my peripheral because I don’t dare take my eyes off this big fucker. I know he’s got other guns on him. In fact, I know Parada does too, and he’ll make a move for it when he can. I’ve played it too easy until now. This is why we have to go.
Violet slips on the housecoat and heads over to me, a shaking, scurrying kind of run. She’s brought me a robe too but doesn’t dare give it to me now, knows I can’t look away, can’t be distracted.
“Get the keys, go to the bike,” I tell her. “Go.”
“Vicente,” she says, grabbing the keys and hovering by the door. “I’ll call the police.”
“Go to the bike,” I say again. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
“I’m not leaving you,” she says, and though her voice is wavering, she means it. She doesn’t leave. She hovers by the door.
“Violet, for fuck’s sake, leave!”
“I’m not leaving you!” she yells back. By now I’m sure the whole hotel is awake.
“I thought she’d be smarter,” Parada says in English. “I figured the daughter of a con artist would know when to get the fuck out of a bad situation.”
“What?” Violet says in a hush. “Who are you? What do you know about me?”
And now instead of leaving, she’s walking further into the room, over to Parada.
With the gun still trained on the man, I have to back up quickly into Violet, pushing her to the door. If she gets too close to Parada, he’ll grab her and then I’m really shit out of luck.
“Open the door,” I tell her.
We have only one shot now. We need to take it. We need to run.
I guess this time she can recognize the urgency in my voice.
I hear her undo the locks, the light from the hallway floods inside the room as the door opens.
But she doesn’t step outside.
I know she won’t without me.
I jerk the gun toward the bathroom. “Both of you, into the bathroom. Close the door. Come after me again and you’re going to get hurt. I don’t give a fuck who you work for. Now. Let’s go.”
With sighs of impatience rather than fear, the big man and Parada walk over to the bathroom. I’m not looking away for a second, knowing how easily they can reach for another gun. But if they had been lucky enough to see me shooting earlier, they’d know that’s a skill they don’t want to test from me. If they think I won’t kill them, they’re in for a rude awakening. These men are my father’s men, not mine. They don’t answer to me and probably never will. But they will answer to my gun. Tio and Nacho can attest to that.
Once they’re inside the bathroom and I hear and see the latch close, I grab Violet by the arm, spinning us both out of the room and immediately start running down the hall. I slip on my robe as I go, just in time for sleepy travelers to open their doors and peer out at the commotion.
They barely register. We burst into the stairwell, our bare feet slapping against the cement stairs, echoing along with our breaths as we go to the bottom and then out the side doors into the parking lot.
Gravel cuts into my soles as we run toward the middle of the lot, the gun in one hand, Violet’s forearm in my other.
Only the bike isn’t here.
“Shit!” I swear, looking around wildly. In the distance police sirens grow closer and I can see people starting to gather in the lobby, no doubt because of us. “Where the fuck is it?”
“Vicente,” she says, pulling at my sleeve. I follow her gaze to see the big man and Parada running out from the doors we just came from, guns at their sides, scanning the lot for us.
I immediately pull Violet down beside me so we’re hidden by the wheels of the mini-van,
“I’ll run to the lobby,” she says. “I’ll scream. People will come help.”
“There are two men out there who will prevent anyone from helping,” I tell her, tightening my grip on the gun. “They’ll shoot you in the leg before you get two steps from here.”
“Who are they? Why do they know me?”
I can hear the faint footfalls of my father’s men as the run along the cars. They’ll see us sooner or later. I close my eyes briefly and inhale, trying to keep my head on straight, to get ahead of the game.
All I can think of right now is to protect her. I have to do that at all costs.
And I have to tell her the truth.
“They’re with my father,” I tell her.
The truth is horrible.
“What?” Her face flinches as if I slapped her. I might as well have. “Your father?”
“They won’t lay a hand on you,” I implore her. “Trust me.”
“Why are your father’s men after you? Why do they have guns?” She shudders. “My god, what the fuck is going on? They’re from a cartel…your cartel…”
The fear, the reality, is starting to sink in.
She’s done her research. She knows what they can do.
“Mirlo,” I say, one hand going to her cheek, fingers pressing into her skin, trying to get her to see my heart. “They won’t touch you. I won’t let them. Anyone who does will die by my hand.”
“Even your father’s men?”
“Even my father himself. I will kill him before he has a chance.”
I can’t pretend that those words aren’t true.
“Vicente,” she says, starting to quiver. “I don’t understand, why is this happening, why…”
She trails off.
She can read my face in the shadows.
The fact that something is terribly wrong.
Everything is too silent. I don’t hear their footsteps anymore.
I duck my head down and see the shadows of two pairs of legs on the other side of the next car over, up by the front wheels, lit by the parking lot lights over there.
I know there’s really just one chance that I have.
Watch the shadows, wait to see if they step into the open. Take the shot underneath the cars, though I’ll only be able to get one of them before the other bolts and comes for me. And a shot to the leg, even both legs, won’t necessarily keep men like that down.
But then there is a second option.
“Violet,” I whisper harshly. “I need you to go behind me, stay low, and run to the Mustang. If we’re lucky, there still might be extra guns in the backseat. Break the windows if you have to. Don’t start the car. Get the guns and then get behind the car. I’ll cover you.”
“Then what?”
“I’ll join you. But you have to hurry.”
“But the lobby, we’ll be safe…”
“They’ll pick you off. You won’t reach it. Stay low, sneak around the cars. I’m watching them, if they move, I move. The Mustang is behind us and to the left, you’ll be covered by the cars. Go!”
“Vicente.”
Impulsively I grab her face, kissing her so deep, so urgently, that for one second the world disappears and all that’s left is light.
The moment our lips part, we’re plunged back into the terrible darkness.
“Fly, my mirlo,” I whisper.
She nods bravely, her lower lip trembling and then keeps low as she can, running at a crouch down along the minivan and then hooking behind the station wagon behind us. If she keeps this up, she might just make it. Parada and the big guy aren’t moving.
Then we’ll think of what’s next.
I don’t know how much time ticks on past after Violet has left. I should have told her I’d come to her in sixty seconds. Maybe more, maybe less. I had expected the goons to have gone after her or, if they hadn’t seen her scurry off, get back on their search for us.
But they still aren’t going anywhere. They aren’t dead on their feet – they sway back and forth, move ever so slightly, one foot to the other. They stand like they’re waiting.
Waiting for us to come out, I guess.
Like the cat waiting for the mice.
Still, something about this strikes me as wrong.
Their stance is too casual.
They aren’t hunting anymore.
A second after that thought, Violet’s muffled scream rings out across the parking lot.
I snap to my feet, looking over the hoods of the cars, straight over to the Mustang, not caring that Parada can see me now.
A tall, broad-shouldered but otherwise lanky man has his arms around Violet. One large hand at her mouth, the other with a gun to her side.
La Mueca.
Otherwise known as Oscar Barrera. My father’s right-hand man.
His sicario.
The worst person I could think possible to be in possession of Violet.
But here he is, staring at me with little glee, just a cool, cold warning I can feel across the pavement. My father must have really been worried about me to bring him all the way over here. La Mueca rarely leaves the country. He’s wanted by too many here. All over the world, really.
I should be flattered that he was dispatched.
But I don’t feel anything.
It’s like the blood is draining out of me.
My veins are replaced with pure desperation.
That’s all that will fuel me now.
“Come on over here, Vicente,” La Mueca says calmly in Spanish. “It’s all over now. No shame in that.”
Violet can’t understand. Her eyes are wide with fear, roaming in their sockets. I wish I could tell her everything will be all right. All I’ll be able to do is beg.
“Move along,” Parada says from behind me. He and the big guy have their guns at the side. The sirens are getting closer. They need me to hurry but they know I won’t run off. They know that in the end, they’ll leave me here to the police if they have to, and take Violet, the real prize.
I would drown in self-pity if I gave myself half an inch.
I’m a dead man walking as I go toward La Mueca.
To the naked eye, the man seems relaxed and casual, like he’s about to dig into a bag of chips while holding Violet hostage at his side. His suit is tan linen, white shirt partially open. Guns visibly tucked into both sides of his waistband.
His face looks the same as ever. Perpetually frowning, eyes squinting, lips pursed above his goatee. His nickname “La Mueca” is because he’s always making this face, more of a grimace than a humorous one.
Especially now.
His eyes are hard as they stare into me and I can almost see all the lives he’s taken over the years. There’s no mercy inside him.
“Let her go,” I tell him, hoping he can see the same inside me, my fingers itching to pull the trigger.
“Mmmm,” he pretends to consider. “No. No, I don’t think I’ll do that.” He presses his gun harder into her side, enough to make Violet squirm. “She’s a fighter. I’ll give her that. Or perhaps you’re the one who taught her.” He pauses, looking her over in a way that makes my blood boil before glancing back at me. “You know I like you a lot, Vicente. I’m not old enough to be your father, so I guess in some ways you’re like a brother to me. But even brothers can kill each other if it comes to the matter of survival. You understand this is survival now, yes?”
“La Mueca. Please. I know what my father has asked of you,” I tell him, feeling Parada and the big guy closing in at my back. I couldn’t run even if I wanted to and I would never leave Violet. Their presence at this point is unnecessary. “And I will do absolutely anything you want if you just let her go.”
“What could you give me that I don’t already have?” he asks, his words so slow and deliberate, his accent light when he’s speaking English. He fakes enlightenment. “Ah, I do know what you have and I don’t.” He takes his gun and slips it down the center of her robe, slow
Violet shudders, her eyes pinching shut as if to turn off the world.
Rage roars through me, a kick to the gut.
I fly at La Mueca, ready to rip his head off without thought to reason or consequence.
Parada and the big guy grab me from behind before I can get far.
It’s just as well.
“I will blow her fucking tit off,” La Mueca barks at me.
I back off. Coming to a stop. Relinquish into Parada’s hold. My eyes are glued to Violet’s and I’m trying to tell her how sorry I am that I failed. I failed us both. I thought we were above it all.
“Now we didn’t want to do this the hard way,” La Mueca says smoothly, back to being composed. “But you’ve made it so, Vicente, so anything and everything that happens to her going forth will be on your head. You understand? Yes? Good. Good, then let’s just do this quickly and easily.”
“Do what?”
La Mueca nods at Parada who brushes past me and comes at Violet with a syringe in his hand. Her attempts to wriggle loose from La Mueca’s grasp fades the moment Parada plunges the needle into the side of her neck.
“No!” I scream, the sound ripping from my throat.
But it too fades once I feel the sharp pinch into my neck too.
The big guy has done the same to me.
The world wavers on its legs for a moment. I try to keep my eyes on Violet, try in vain to keep her in my vision. The fear that once I lose sight of her I’ll lose her forever is greater than life.
And probably true.
Then the world fades to grey. I fall to the ground.
And drift into the black.
Chapter Nine
Ellie
If they could have flown with carry-on baggage full of guns and been there in an hour, they would have.
But for Ellie, Camden, Ben and Gus, the drive down to Palm Valley took seven hours.
It should have taken a half hour longer, but El Segundo can really rip it on the open highway and Camden wasn’t the least bit shy with the gas pedal. Ellie knew that during any other time, he would have relished the feel of the car beneath him, the burn of the disappearing pavement. However, he drove with absolute necessity.