by Reinke, Sara
Elías popped open the takeout box and unwrapped a pair of chopsticks. As he watched the sun set, he ate his dinner and missed his son. You know, he thought with a sad little smirk, the usual.
But he didn’t want to think about Manny or Nita anymore. Instead, he let his gaze wander along with his mind, unpleasant memories giving way to more pleasant topics—Pilar dancing, holding him captive with her dark, bewitching eyes, her hair bouncing in glossy dark curls past her shoulders, her perfect breasts tantalizingly within his reach.
You know, he thought again, the usual.
CHAPTER FIVE
It was well after midnight when Pilar opened her bedroom window and stole out into the yard like an errant teenager off to party. Dressed in black leggings, matching Chuck Taylors and hooded sweatshirt beneath a black leather riding jacket, she blended in with the shadows as she crept along the outside of the house toward the driveway.
She’d left her motorcycle parked outside. She swung her leg over the seat, settling herself lightly astride it. With a careful glance at the front windows—dark in the living room but still aglow from Valien’s room—she reached into the pocket of her sweatshirt and pulled out her cell phone. Flipping back the top, she checked it for at least the thousandth time in the last ten minutes.
Damn it, she thought when she saw no missed calls. Again. Where are you, Chita?
She’d been calling and texting her friend almost every ten minutes like clockwork for the past hour. It wasn’t like Chita to ignore her phone. For the life of her, Pilar couldn’t figure out why she hadn’t at least called back, pissed off by Pilar’s dogged persistence if nothing else.
I really need you tonight, she thought with a frown as she depressed the bike’s clutch, hooked the gearshift and kicked it up once, dropping the bike from first gear into neutral. She hadn’t wanted to take her motorcycle—it was too conspicuous and she was too potentially vulnerable on it—but realized she had no other choice. She was running out of time and opportunity to act.
It starts tonight, she thought grimly. Or never.
Next kicking off the side stand, Pilar began to walk the bike slowly backward down the driveway. Slowly, quietly, she rolled to the street, then turned the motorcycle around. She rolled it forward at an agonizingly slow pace, fully expecting at any minute to sense her brother’s presence behind her, making the downy hairs along her neck rise and tingle, or hear his voice in sharp, booming demand, asking where the hell she was going.
Once she’d made it three houses down the block, she felt safe enough to key the ignition and fire up the engine. If he heard it now, from that distance, Valien wouldn’t become suspicious. Jackie Jones had a motorcycle too, and Valien would probably dismiss the sound of the engine gunning for Jackie taking a late-night ride.
Here’s hoping, anyway, she thought as she pulled her helmet on and snapping down her face shield. Kicking the gearshift down into first, she took off, heading out of the small, quiet subdivision.
Her mind raced in tandem with the bike as she cut out onto the main highway leading into town, whipping in and out of traffic with a reckless sort of ease that would have undoubtedly resulted in Valien taking the motorcycle from her had he been around to see it.
She had no specific plan, only a basic outline of what she hoped to accomplish and a general idea of where to begin—Melaza. With less than a week left, she found herself faced with running out of both time and options. The strip club seemed as good a place as any to start.
She pulled into the parking lot across the street from the club and used her heel to push the kickstand down. Turning off the ignition, she settled back on the seat, balancing herself with her feet planted on either side of the bike. She kept her helmet on, the visor in place, her face hidden from view, her body disguised beneath the heavy, dark drape of her clothes.
Despite the late hour, the nightclub parking lot was packed, the exterior of the low-slung building brightly aglow with neon lights and fluorescent, life-size palm trees. Even from her vantage, she could still hear the dim vibrations of loud music emanating from inside. And by the main entrance, the VIP parking area reserved for Pepe and his friends, a cluster of motorcycles leaned together in a gleaming row.
He’s here, then, she thought, the corner of her mouth hooking in a grim smile. Good.
Pilar watched, waited and debated. Her heart hammered, her breathing rapid-fire and sharp as an almost constant tide of adrenaline ebbed and flowed within her veins. She could feel herself sweating anxiously beneath the thick leather coat and the heavy padding of her helmet, her palms growing slick with it, tacky against her handgrips. At long last—nearly an hour and a half after her arrival—four members of Los Pandilleros walked out the front door together, stumbling a bit drunkenly and laughing in deep, raucous voices.
Pepe wasn’t among them, but Miguel Torres was.
She remembered how he’d dragged her by the hair and shoved her, belly-down, onto her father’s desk to assault her. When she tried to scream, realizing to her horror what he meant to do, he clapped his hand heavily over her mouth.
“Are you watching, Papito?” Pepe had laughed to her father, holding a pistol mashed against the back of Enrqiue’s skull and forcing him to look. “Are you enjoying the show, motherfucker?”
She watched the men get on their motorcycles, revving up the engines and pulling out in different directions as they left the parking lot and headed for home. After Miguel cut left and followed the mostly vacant road east, Pilar turned the key in her bike’s ignition and sang to herself in her mind, wanting to be sure enough time passed so that she could follow him unnoticed.
El coquí, el coquí siempre canta
es muy lindo el cantar del coquí…
Once she’d finished the song, she knocked the kickstand up with her heel, dropped the bike into gear and slipped into the sparse traffic, smooth and easy as a shark gliding through the shallows. It was late; few cars were out, and in no time, she caught sight of Miguel’s taillights ahead of her. She marked a cautious pace, trailing behind him, biding her time. As she rode, she pictured a map in her mind, the interlocking network of roads in front of her. The idea was to lure him away from town, out into the undeveloped marshlands surrounding Bayshore, where houses were scarce and passing traffic was even scarcer—and the alligators and pythons could easily dispose of whatever was left of him when she was finished.
County Road 1226, she thought. It’s about ten miles ahead on a turnoff and takes you out into the watershed.
Cranking back on the motorcycle handle and using the toe of her sneaker to shift gears, she increased speed, the speedometer needle jolting abruptly from its previously steady mark at 35 miles per hour and climbing. The fast she went, the closer Miguel’s taillights drew, until at last, at a stop light less than five blocks from the 1226 intersection, she pulled directly alongside him.
He wasn’t wearing a helmet, and she watched him turn to look at her. He could sense her in the same intrinsic, electrical way she could discern his presence and proximity—and knew she wasn’t Los Pandilleros.
“What the fuck are you looking at, faggot?” he asked at length, spitting a thick globule onto the pavement between them.
In response, Pilar cranked the handle accelerator again, gunning her engine loudly in challenge. Clearly understanding her meaning—let’s race—Miguel grinned.
“You sure about this, acho?” he asked, nearly shouting now as he revved his own engine up, making it roar beneath him. When she nodded, he laughed. “Who the fuck are you?”
The light turned green and Pilar kicked the bike into gear. She felt the back wheel skitter momentarily for uncertain purchase before gripping the asphalt, peeling away from the corner with a screech and the stink of searing rubber. Like a gunshot, she was off, rocketing ahead of Miguel, leaving him in a cloud of acrid exhaust behind her. Through her side mirrors, she could see Miguel’s blazing headlight behind her as he tore off in pursuit. The chase was on.
Folding herself over the Suzuki’s streamlined body, Pilar rocked her hips, leaning back and forth as she wove in and among passing cars. Wind buffeted her helmet and tore at her jacket, but she accelerated even more, the speedometer showing 55 miles per hour now, then 60, then 65 and 75—still rising.
Come on, she thought, glancing through the mirror again to make sure she hadn’t lost him. Come on, you son of a bitch. Stay with me.
Up ahead and on her right, she saw the turn off for 1226. Downshifting, feeling the bike wrench beneath her as the gears abruptly changed, she leaned sharply to the side, bringing her knee nearly to the asphalt as she cut the corner in a tight, whipping arc. Behind her, over the sound of her own engine, she heard the squall of Miguel’s tires as he struggled to match the turn. The headlight from his motorcycle veered wildly out of her view in the mirror as he nearly lost control and wiped out; as he righted himself, gunning his engines, tearing off even faster, the light reappeared, growing bigger and brighter as he quickly collapsed the distance between them.
Within moments, they’d left the city’s outskirts behind. A few more after that, and the loosely scattered suburbs and retirement trailer parks melted away. On either side of the two-lane road lay nothing but marshes, clogged and choked with tropical foliage and untamed palm trees. Lights from the streets and buildings behind them soon faded, and only their headlights and the pale, ghostly glow of the moon were there to guide them. The air here was thick and humid, heady with a damp, earthen smell, like freshly overturned loam.
Pilar led Miguel farther and farther down the highway, farther and farther away from civilization, deeper and deeper into the watershed. In and among the shadows and silhouettes of trees shooting past, Pilar caught winks of light off shallow pools of standing, stagnant water. At last, feeling she’d gone far enough, she hit the brakes, rocking forward as the wind abruptly cut short against her and the bike slid to a skittering, begrudging halt. Kicking out her foot, she caught herself on one heel as the bike listed over, then balanced herself upright by planting the opposite foot against the ground.
Miguel streaked past, having not anticipated her unexpected halt. Again, his tires screeched against the asphalt, and his brake lights flared in twin angry strobes of bright red. He brought his bike to a stop several hundred yards from her, then, pissed off because she’d broken off their race, he revved his engine hard, making the back wheel scream and smoke as he turned around to pin her in his headlight’s beam.
“What the fuck’s your problem?” he shouted. Leaving his engine idling, his lights fully ablaze, he swung himself off his bike and stormed toward her, little more than a silhouette against the backdrop of glare.
Pilar’s heart was jackhammering, her body seized with a surge of bright, panic-driven adrenaline. She could feel it trembling through her as she dismounted from her bike, turning to face him.
“You chickenshit motherfucker—I had your sorry ass!” Miguel yelled. “Why’d you stop? You nearly made me crash. I’m going to fuck you up for that, man!”
Although she’d danced for him at Melaza before, he’d always been sitting down—she’d forgotten how tall he was, how big overall; one of the burliest among Pepe’s crew, he came at her like a Rottweiler turned off its leash.
Stepping lightly backward at his approach, Pilar reached behind her, beneath her coat. Here’s she’d secured a couple of supplies to the small of her back with a belt—one of which was a miniature Louisville Slugger baseball bat she pulled out now. It had belonged to Enrique, a makeshift weapon he’d kept tucked beside the driver’s seat in his car. He’d bored a deep channel down the center of the shaft and filled it by inserting a steel rod inside, giving the entire bat added strength and heft.
Miguel charged her, and when she swung at him, he caught it. Shit! she thought as he ripped it out of her hands and tossed it aside, sending it skittering across the road. A blur of movement caught her gaze, but before she could fully turn her head, his fist smashed into the side of her helmet. The force of the blow knocked her sideways, sending her to the ground in a crumpled heap.
“Take your helmet off,” Miguel said, hooking her beneath the arm from behind and hauling her to her feet. “Show me your face, you chickenshit faggot son of a bitch.”
He reached for her chin strap and, brows furrowed, she uttered a furious cry and rammed her elbow backward with all her might, striking him in the rib cage. It was enough to surprise him, to send him staggering in recoil, his grip on her loosening, and with a twist, she managed to stumble free.
My bat, she thought wildly. She caught sight of it on the far shoulder of the highway and scrambled toward it. Miguel’s footsteps pounded behind her in heavy pursuit; he’d recovered faster than she’d anticipated.
Just as she reached down, snatching frantically for the bat, he grabbed her again, spinning her around in a floundering semicircle to face him. Clasping one end of the bat between her hands, she rammed the other into his gut. In an instant, all the breath and fight went out of him, and he crashed down hard, eyes bulging, air whooshing from his mouth, his face twisting in bright, surprised pain.
He landed on his knees and Pilar swung the bat again, this time connecting with the back of his skull, putting enough force into the blow to knock his head forward in a clumsy nod and send him sprawling, face-first, to the ground.
Stepping lightly, nearly dancing like a boxer, she edged away from him, never averting her eyes as he lay in a groaning heap. His shoulders shuddered as he shoved his hands beneath him and tried to sit up; whipping the bat around in her hands, she brought it up in a tight swing, catching him squarely between the buttocks and mashing his testicles. He screamed, a choked, shrill sound, and collapsed again, hands darting to his crotch as he rolled and writhed on his side.
“Mother…fucker!” Miguel wheezed, tears streaming down his cheeks, his brows furrowed with anger and pain as he lurched to his feet. “You…son of a bitch…”
El cambio had come over her, the changes in her eyes and mouth that meant her Nahual nature had been aroused. Her fangs were extending, dropping down to push her mouth ajar, forcing her lips apart, and through her widening pupils, hypersensitive to even the faintest hint of light, the glare of her motorcycle’s headlight became dazzling, nearly blinding.
“Huelebicho!” Miguel glared at Pilar, blood trailing from his nose in a dark, glistening stream. Like her, he was changing, his rage fueling his bloodlust, his teeth elongating, forcing him to speak with a lisp. “I’m…going to kick…your ass!”
He reached into the pocket of his jeans, pulling out a chrome-handled butterfly blade. He snapped it open in his hand and toyed with it for a moment, making the moonlight wink off its length before settling his thick fingers in a comfortable grip. “You wanna play games, faggot?” he asked, turning his head and spitting out a thick mouthful of blood. “Come on.” With his free hand, he motioned in furious beckon. “Bailemos.” Let’s dance.
He darted forward, knife thrust out. Pilar darted sideways and felt the edge of the blade drag against her jacket, slicing through the leather as it grazed past. She swung her hand around, knocking his hand sideways, then pivoted to grab his wrist. She twisted, ducking beneath him, and as she moved, she hyperextended both his shoulder and wrist, making him cry out in pained surprise. His fingers splayed wide and the knife fell to the ground.
“You fucker!” Miguel howled, his voice ripping up shrill octaves as she forced his hand farther toward the midline of his back, threatening to wrench his shoulder out of socket. Immobilized, helpless, he staggered, knees buckling. With his free hand, he fumbled blindly for his fallen knife, an effort he quickly abandoned as again, she jerked against his arm. “Let go of me!” he wailed.
Keeping his wrist clasped with one hand, Pilar reached with the other beneath her coat once more. She’d dropped the bat but didn’t need it now, opting instead for the seven-inch carbon-steel butcher knife she wore in a makeshift holster from her belt. When she pulled it out, Miguel caught
sight of it and his eyes widened.
“What are you…?” he hiccupped in a small, strained voice, almost pleading. “No, man, no, come on now, don’t—”
With a furious cry, Pilar shoved the blade into his chest, into the section of his rib cage covering his heart and lungs left vulnerably exposed by her aikido hold. Because her teeth were fully down now, her body singing with a surge of bloodthirsty, brutal instincts and strength, it took only this single thrust to run him through, to punch into the meat of his heart.
As she turned loose of his arm and stepped back, Pilar watched him fall, his cheek smacking into the concrete. His eyes were wide and stunned, his breath gurgling, leaving bubbles of blood on his chin, dribbling in ever-widening rivulets from his mouth and nose. He pawed weakly at the hilt of the knife protruding from his ribs, but it was too late. A Nahual could heal from almost any injury or wound except for one that was, if not immediately fatal, then damn near close.
“Quién…eres tu…?” he groaned, his fingers scrabbling against the pavement now, his feet moving in slow, feeble, pedaling motions. Who are you?
Pilar ducked her head and pulled off her helmet, letting her hair spill out in a windswept corona to frame her face. She didn’t say a word, just stood over him, staring, her eyes black and round, her fangs glinting in the moonlight.
She opened her mind to see if he recognized her, to see if he understood what had happened to him and why, but it was too late. The knife had done its job; his heart had shuddered to a jarring halt.
Miguel Torres was dead.
CHAPTER SIX
“What a mess,” Sam Mueller remarked, tipping his head back and grimacing as the sip of coffee he took from a paper cup proved too hot to manage.
Elías stood beside him on the shoulder of county road 1226 at a little past seven o’clock in the morning. The sun was a suggestion in the sky, a slight orange glow. Despite the early hour, the air was already humid and thick. Elías could feel damp patches forming between his shoulder blades, and beneath his jacket, his shirt wanted to stick to his skin.
