by Marie Reyes
The man nodded at Samuel, who made himself scarce. “She’s coming. You can call me Antonio, not that stupid nickname people insist on calling me.” He ran his fingers through his wild, curly hair. Michael wondered if he’d made his hair so tall to compensate for his height.
One of the men held Miguel down as the other man kicked him in the side repeatedly. Miguel rolled over onto his back groaning and the man stomped his foot into his gut at full force, and again, and again. The sound so visceral, Michael could feel it vicariously in his own stomach and put his hand in front of it, as if to protect it as he wondered what pain he would have to endure.
Josie stumbled in as Samuel dragged her by her arm that was tied behind her back. A deep blue and purple bruise took up most of the upper right hand-side of her face. They stared into each other’s eyes as if trying to connect on some greater level until Samuel pushed her down onto a chair by her shoulder. Even with the bruising, it was obvious she had been crying from her damp red face and swollen eyes.
“Why haven’t you killed us already?” He had avoided asking this question up until now, as he hadn’t been ready for the answer.
“I wanted everyone here for the surprise,” Antonio said casually, as if he was referring to a birthday cake.
“What surprise? Enough with the fucking games already.” He couldn’t believe he was saying this, to this man of all people. Michael had never been able to stand up for himself, and now it was the worst time to do so, but he couldn’t control the words from tumbling out of his mouth.
“The surprise isn’t here yet. Take a seat.” He pulled out a chair from a table on the other side of the room, and the chair legs scraped along the floor as he dragged it along and placed it next to Josie. Before he could sit down, Samuel patted him down, running his hands up and down his legs and sides.
“When will you learn?” He took the retractable knife from Michael’s pocket and thrust him down onto the hard chair, sending a twinge up his spine.
Michael turned to Josie. “I’m so glad you’re alive. What did they do to you?” The look in her eyes made the sting of tears well up behind his. “Sorry we took so long.”
“Don’t you dare be sorry.” Her tears picked up, trickling down like raindrops down a window. “I thought you were dead. The gun. The cenote. I know I’ve been awful. I’m so sorry.”
“Well, now you know the truth, there’s no need to feel guilty because of me. You did me a favor, Josie. At least my death will mean something now.”
“But it won’t. It will be for nothing. All of us. You. Me. Miguel. Aleksander. You warned me. You warned me, but I didn’t listen. I just couldn’t let it go. It’s all I thought about for over a year. It’s one of the things Tanya always had a go at me for. She’d always tell me to chill out. Just let whatever shall be… be. Maybe I should have listened to her, been more like her.”
Vibrations went off in Antonio’s pocket and he pulled his phone out, eagerly pushing the answer button as he lifted the phone to his ear and spoke in Spanish to the person at the other end of the phone. Once his conversation was finished, he gave Samuel a knowing nod. “It’s time. Don’t you go anywhere.” He flashed them his teeth before rushing to the front of the house, skipping over the corpse that lay in front of the door, being careful not to stand in the pool of blood that had accumulated beneath, and slipped out of the door.
“Any last words?” Josie asked, not taking her eyes away from the front door.
“I don’t know if there’s anything left to say,” he lied. The problem was there were too many things to say, yet no matter how bad things got, how vulnerable he was, he could never bring himself to say them.
The two men tied Miguel up, wrapping copious amounts of rope around his arms and feet. His belly was pressed against the floor, and despite one of them having a gun to his head, he resisted with every fiber of his being, his face contorted with the effort as he shuffled across the ground. They left him to squirm as they went to attend to the body. Each of them took a side and started shuffling the body across the room into a dark corner. They hadn’t bothered lifting the body fully, and the arched back dragged in the darkening blood, a crimson smear soaking into the concrete. After chucking a burlap covering over the body, they walked over to front of the sparse room and stood on each side of the front door, waiting, facing each other with their guns ready, down at a slight angle. The covering did little to conceal the body when there was such a prominent blood trail towards it.
The door opened slowly, like the curtain unveiling a play that was about to start. The sliver of light grew bigger with dust particles dancing in its ray. He could only see their outlines at first as the sun shone from behind them, but once they stepped into the room, and Samuel’s head blocked out the bulk of the sun, he could make out the three figures stood there a little better. Samuel and Antonio on each side, but following slightly behind, the figure in the middle, in mid conversation, stopped just after their feet went over the threshold, and as they turned, they noticed the armed man waiting for them on the other side of the door. “What’s going on, Antonio? This doesn’t look like it would make a good hotel. I mean, there are no amenities nearby for a start. If it’s another lab you want to start, you should have said—” The voice stopped, and the person stepped away from the light, scanning the room as they blinked repeatedly. The men at the door closed in on her. The face. That angular chin. Those wide eyes. Black shiny hair falling poker straight at her shoulders. If it wasn’t for the blunt fringe, revealing outfit and tell-tale lines around her eyes, he would have sworn it was Josie.
Chapter Thirty Seven
Her hand fell away from her hip and hung limply at her side. With a look of shock as if she had been slapped, the color drained from her face, going from red to white in a heartbeat. “Antonio?” She turned to him as if looking for some sort of explanation and grabbed his hands, holding them in hers. “What’s going on?” Her head turned as the two men positioned themselves in front of the door, then turned back to him. “Antonio?”
Michael tore his eyes away from the doppelganger in front of him and looked at Josie, still as a statue, and pale as one too. It looked as if every last drop of blood had been drained from her body.
The woman walked across the room towards where he and Josie sat. Her heels stabbing the floor with each step. He had assumed that she had seen them before, but it was only as she got closer, that a look of recognition filled her eyes. Her lips moved as if she was going to speak, but only a stunted noise came out, barely making its way past her throat. Neither Josie nor the woman moved from their respective positions, they just looked at each other.
“Tanya.” The word came from Josie’s mouth, but it didn’t sound like one sister addressing another. Her lips struggled to form the name, as if her mouth was getting used to it for the first time. Antonio came up behind Tanya, his lips close to her ear. “I think you need to sit down.” He looked down at the chair that he had pulled out for her.
She just stood there, blinking, confused. “I don’t—”
“Someone came looking for you.” He glanced at Josie.
“What happened to her?” she asked shakily.
Michael couldn’t understand why she wasn’t addressing her sister directly and looking to Antonio for answers, but he couldn’t bring himself to react beyond a stunned silence.
“You weren’t supposed to come.” Tanya looked down at the floor rather than in Josie’s eyes.
“Tanya. You should really be sitting down for this.” Antonio grabbed her shoulders and forced her down on the chair. She looked up at him, eyes wide and pleading. “I didn’t know she would come,” she said, her hands reached out for his, but he instead, unholstered his weapon, and started polishing it with a corner of his shirt. “Come on. We knew this was never going to last. It always had an expiry date.” He took a dramatic step back from her, as if dissociating from her completely.
“But you left your wife for me. You said I was—”
“Jesus. People say things. We had some fun. You’ve been useful, and now you’re a liability.”
Tanya went to stand, but he impeded her momentum with a firm hand to the shoulder. “Don’t make this awkward, Tanya. No-one likes a woman who can’t take a hint. It’s over.”
“What are you doing?” She lurched forward, trying to snatch the weapon from his hand, but he grabbed her by the hair, pulling her head towards him, and digging the muzzle of his handgun into her forehead. Tanya started wailing. “You lied to me,” she screamed dramatically like the lead of a tele novella. She lifted her head up. Tears had already started making their way down her face. Following the curves of her cheeks and clinging to her chin for a moment before dripping down.
“But… the things we did… I love you. You weren’t faking it, I know you weren’t,” she shouted, red-faced.
Michael jumped in his chair when Josie sprung forward, propelling herself at her sister like a wrecking ball. Her chair crashed down behind her, and she launched Tanya off of hers, slamming her against the hard concrete floor.
“You fucking idiot. What the fuck did you do?” She sat on top of her and slapped her across the face. Her hand connecting with her sister’s cheek like a crack of thunder. The sound echoing around the room. Even witnessing the ferocity of it made Michael flinch and want to rub the side of his face to sooth the imagined pain. Tanya tried to push her sister off, but she slapped her again. And again. Each slap slightly lighter than the last as if the rage was dissipating with each strike. Samuel, Antonio, and their two sicarios watched on with a thinly concealed look of amusement.
From the corner of his eye, Michael could see Miguel had somehow managed to untie his arms and was yanking at the rope around his feet. If there was a time to act, it had to be now. If the police were coming though, was it worth holding back, biding time? Samuel and Antonio did not seem in any particular hurry. Maybe they knew something he didn’t. The two hit men were the closest now, they even had their backs turned, transfixed with the scuffle taking place on the floor.
Throwing logic out of the window, he dived for one of the men’s guns. He had it. It was heavy in his hand. He had no idea how to use it. The man whose gun he had snatched had barely noticed, and Michael grabbed the man in front of him as the other unnamed man aimed and pulled his trigger. The force of the bullet hitting the man in front made Michael stumble back, and he wondered if the bullet had traveled straight through his human shield. There was no pain. He just about managed not to fall, but the man in front of him slid down. Before the man could get out a second shot, Miguel had kicked him from his position down on the floor. He swiped the man’s legs with his feet, knocking the guy straight down like a bowling pin. Antonio marched towards him and Michael could see straight down the barrel of his gun. Michael had no idea what to do, squeezing the trigger to no effect as Antonio advanced. He thought the anticipation was the worst part until he felt the bullet travel through his shoulder like a red-hot poker.
He stumbled back, hitting the wall before sliding down. He refused to look down as he felt the warmth of blood gush down his front. As he moved, sharp pains radiated across his chest like fork lightning spreading off in a million directions. His brain imagined bone shattered into a million fragments, and everything went fuzzy around the edges.
“I thought about shooting you in the head. But you need to suffer.” Antonio smacked him across the top of the head with the butt of his gun and then swung his clenched fist upwards, threatening to separate his jawbone from the rest of his face. Something cracked as his brain reverberated in his skull. Michael wanted to scream so desperately, but his body couldn’t make a sound, besides a raspy gargle. His head lolled to the side and he could see Miguel. The rope that had been used to bind him was now wrapped around the other man’s neck. The course, twisted fibers digging into the man’s neck as his face got deep-red, and then purple.
Samuel aimed his gun towards Miguel, who tried to use the other man to cover himself from bullet-fire. Samuel put a bullet straight through his own hit-man with little emotion and pushed the body to one side. Michael had no idea how he managed it, but Miguel dove to one side and wrenched the gun from Samuel’s hand, twisting his arm as he head-butted him with such force, Michael could hear the cracking sound from the other side of the room.
“You killed them, you fucking worm. My wife. My kid. They did nothing to you.” He moved the angle of the gun down to his groin area. The deafening reverberations of the bullet were soon drowned out by the howling. The sound of pure, unadulterated pain.
As Tanya made a run for the front door, Antonio left Michael and darted across the room, dragging her back, yanking her arm hard and slapping her into submission. Antonio held Tanya by the hair, keeping her in one place as he went to turn his gun on Miguel at the same time. In the time that Antonio had taken to stop Tanya from escaping, Miguel had grabbed one of three large bottles of gasoline that were stashed in the corner. Michael assumed they had planned on burning the evidence afterwards. Miguel tipped the bottle in Antonio’s direction, liberally dowsing him in the liquid and accidentally splashing Josie and Tanya in the process.
He came closer until he was pouring it directly over Antonio’s head, and once it was empty, he hurled it across the room. Michael hoped that he wouldn’t let everyone burn just to get back at Samuel, but he knew he was single-minded and in pain so didn’t put it past him.
“You don’t want to do that.” Antonio spluttered as gasoline dripped from his hair onto his face. The choking reek of chemicals filled the air.
“Why the fuck not?” He challenged him.
“Do you not want to know where your daughter is? I know Samuel said she was dead, but—”
Miguel pulled a silver flip lighter from his pocket. “Then you better tell me now or you burn.”
“I can take you to her. You and me just need to go for a little drive. Work this thing out. You’ve been loyal up until now. This can work out for everyone I swear.”
Michael wondered if a gunshot could ignite gasoline as he saw Antonio reach for his gun. They looked at each other, trying to figure each other out. Josie ran to Michael, her hands shaking profusely. “Oh god. I’m so sorry.” She repeated over and over like a record stuck on a loop. Her sister followed behind her. “Josie, I—”
“Shut up. Just shut up.” Josie shouted, taking her cardigan and pressing it against Michael’s chest, making him scream with the pressure. “It’s okay. It’s going to be fine,” she muttered as she put a hand on his forehead.
“Is there anything I can do?” Tanya uttered meekly, a look of shame plastered on her face.
“Oh, you’ve done enough.” Josie was trembling now, a combination of fear and rage.
“Why are you even here? I didn’t ask you here,” said Tanya, as if that would somehow make everything better.
“Because you’re my sister.”
“I loved him. I didn’t think. It just happened. It was—”
“Love.” Josie laughed spitefully. “You have got to be kidding me. You have no fucking idea what love is… the way you treat people.”
“If I’m so terrible, like you always said, then why the hell did you come in the first place?”
“Because that’s what people do. They care. They give and give and give. They sacrifice. All I have ever seen you do is take. You kept the money, didn’t you? Bankrupted mom and dad, then fucked around with some cartel member of all people.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“Oh, then do tell me, what exactly was it like? There is no way you can talk your way out of this, justify this. Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
As Michael lay there, the sisters’ shouting grew faint. He couldn’t believe the last words he would hear, would just be hate. Even now, she was too busy arguing to pay attention to what was happening, but then, hadn’t he been doing the exact same his entire life. Taking every part of his life, no matter how big or small, and turning it into an argu
ment, a conflict, a battle. Ignoring any good thing, dismissing any compliment. He hadn’t been paying attention. Never. But now, he couldn’t help but cling onto consciousness, any last bit of awareness he had to keep him anchored to this world. His whole life his sentience had been his greatest curse, but it was all he knew.
Everything happened in slow motion now as he saw Miguel and Antonio struggle, and the flame of the lighter traveled towards the ground. The porous concrete had sucked up the gasoline in like a sponge. The flames came quickly. Starting on the floor, and a whoosh, as the burning energy traveled along the floor, and leaped up Antonio’s body, surrounding him in white light. As he dropped to the ground sparks ignited the burlap blanket, taking the body of the first man with it. It didn’t take long for smoke to start catching Michael’s throat. The room had seemed so bare before, yet there were so many little things dotted around that fueled the fire. Flames spread across the walls, fingers of yellow and orange curling up to the ceiling, leaving a thick blanket of smoke.
The pain in Michael’s body when he moved that had forced him to stop trying, had now been surpassed by the pain of the heat of the fire—moving was the lesser of two evils. Josie helped him up, and he did everything he could to avoid passing out. The fire consumed the front of the building so they had no choice but to go out the back.
Miguel saw Josie, Tanya, and Michael stagger in his direction and tried the back door. Locked. He kicked the door at full pelt, cracking the wood, and tearing the frame away from the wall. He kicked again. The flames grew higher as the door burst open. It was becoming impossible to see, and just as they passed to the back of the house, the air grew cooler and cleaner. An old kitchen led to the back door. Almost bare except for some old pots crammed haphazardly onto a wooden shelf. Miguel wrestled with the bars on the exterior door. This door was also locked, and twice as sturdy as the other. He shook the door in desperation, “Come on,” he shouted as if trying to reason with the inanimate object.
