Camila felt water gather in the corner of one eye, which almost surprised her...that she had any tears left to shed.
She heard claws slide along the wire cage. Perhaps the animals knew their fate after watching their brothers and sisters, plucked away and thrown into the sealed room, the space where the final testing took place. Their high-pitched shrills pulled bile from her throat each and every time. The sound would haunt her until she took her final breath, most certainly.
Following the test she'd performed a dozen times, she would shovel up the stiff carcasses and toss them into the trash. The routine repulsed her, even if she wasn't dealing with people. What had these little varmints done to deserve such an unnatural death—one that Camila had created with her own mind?
How could she follow through with this devastating act of treason to the human race?
But how could she not?
She closed her eyes and pulled herself back in time, her body swaying in the rolling, blue Atlantic Ocean, her hair tangled in knots. At times she'd been able to hunt down a single fin, or maybe find a random piece of rusted metal that had blown off the top of someone's makeshift home that would allow her and Gustavo to drift out to sea, tempt fate, floating farther from shore, from any other human, almost to the point where they could hear nothing other than a seagull or pelican swooping down for dinner.
Gustavo wasn't as quick as his younger sister, who once caught a small fish in her hands, after watching the pelicans perform the same trick. While it represented one of her most memorable moments growing up in Rio, she only did it to survive. That night for dinner, she paid two reals to use a flamed grill under a rickety bridge, allowing her and her brother to eat cooked fish—an extravagance they experienced once a month, if lucky. She'd been just seven years old.
Her sunken, bruised eyes grew heavy, too much weight to stay awake, too much guilt to fall asleep. She sought peace and began to think about Juan, his wavy, blond hair blowing in the wind, swinging on his swing set, soaring as high as he could muster, with such a handsome, perfect smile, the kind you see on a beach tourism website, where people are in a constant state of laughter, happiness, and sheer joy. Her little Juan loved life, and all who approached him were good people, at least in his trusting mind.
But Camila knew better.
Suddenly, she felt pinned down, unable to move her arms. The more she pulled, the tighter the knot grew, like she was in a straightjacket. She flailed and kicked her legs, rising off the bed with each leg whip, and finally her arm popped loose. She plopped up on her knees and found it was only her sheet twisted around her limbs.
Her heart hammering her chest, she stepped onto the cold floor and walked four steps to the small sink, huddled next to her toilet. She splashed water on her face, then flipped her head and eyed the rats and hamsters.
She picked up her watch and found she'd only been in bed a little over thirty minutes. It wasn't even midnight. She wasn't sure how she could survive another sleepless night. But unlike all other nights when she yearned for the morning, something to occupy her mind, she knew that within eight hours, her lab would be swarming with a kind far worse than any rodent. A vulture came to mind. But vultures only tear apart flesh after death. The visitors, and even the hosts, would make vultures look like harmless blue jays.
Inside, she could feel it. She planted an arm on either side of the sink and clenched her jaw, preparing for another round of the fight. She prayed it would be the last round of the last fight. But what would be left of this world once she could finally hold Juan?
Focus, put your mind in a different place. You must, or....here it comes. The first wave from the depths of her gut, shooting flares, followed by a rush of lava-hot liquid seeping up her esophagus. More tears formed, and she wasn't sure she could withstand the attack. Her body felt like it had been invaded, like that American movie, Alien, and she could only watch in disbelief as her gut exploded, first inside her trembling body, then like a volcano, chunks of her insides shooting out of her like she'd merely been a host to their life.
Unable to control the violent tremors, she gripped the porcelain with her strong fingers, as another wave blew up, and the air was filled with bits and pieces of her, now in her hair, covering her skin, up her nose. She couldn't escape the horrific battering, and it came after her again and again and again, sapping every bit of energy from her body, and even from her mind. Until there was nothing left of her.
Camila sniffled and smelled that same putrid scent. With her head propped against the wall at an awkward angle, she raised a jittery hand and found a rag and doused it with water before her muscles gave out and she fell back to the floor. Slowly, she cleaned herself off, asking why this happened every night.
It was like she'd developed an allergy. To herself.
Perhaps this was God's way—to end one life before so many others would perish. But now she sounded like one of them. The Chosen Ones, and their fucking cause.
We must pledge our allegiance to the cause, to each other. But if one must perish, then the others must continue until they reach their goal. To change a culture, it takes sacrifice.
If one betrays our trust, then one life must end. But the cause will continue.
Fuck the cause. Fuck the Chosen Ones, and whatever justification they'd created in their sick minds.
Camila just wanted to hold her little Juan. The rest of the fucking world could go straight to hell.
That's just how she'd planned it.
Chapter Twenty-Five
There's really nothing less sexy than a girl, with whom you're sharing a bed, snoring. Not just a soft purr, but a sputtering, snorting, pig-like sound, ending with a prolonged, ear-piercing whistle.
Of course, with Andi, sharing a bed only meant sharing a place to sleep—or attempting to do so—for about six hours. Our relationship was as platonic as you could get, especially when she sounds like your Great-Uncle Bramlett. Yellow street lights illuminated our room—another reason I couldn't fall asleep.
Nothing against the tomboy to my left, but her appearance was almost as attractive as her clogged breathing. Glistening drool escaped her open mouth, dripping onto the pillow, her cheek smooshed into her nose, which, of course, bellowed like a foghorn. A true vision of loveliness.
I almost laughed out loud, but instead I blew into her face. Another snore, this time from the depths of her soul, with three extra snorts. Wow, this girl had skills. This time, I put a little effort into it, opened my lungs, and exhaled a steady stream at her eyes.
“Oooh, num, num, num,” she mumbled. Then, Andi—followed by more hair than one person should ever own—turned to face away from me. Two minutes later, the drunken-trombone-and-piccolo snoring performance continued.
“Geez,” I said out loud while releasing a tired breath. Still, she didn't wake up.
Ever since we'd returned from Satish's house/business in San Mateo, I'd been able to keep my mind occupied, focusing on changing the dressing on Andi's leg, cleaning up the place a bit. I think she sensed my need for a diversion and attempted to make small talk, asking me my opinion about whether the 49ers could get past the Seahawks this season. I told her I hoped they ended up in a tie, twice.
I turned to face the window and heard a dog bark in the distance. I wondered what Marisa would think of me...maybe she was looking down on me now. Was she proud that I was doing everything I could to figure out who murdered Camila's brother, and hopefully find out what had happened to Camila herself? There had to be some serious shit taking place, with the two thugs pounding in my head, chasing Andi and me down, and then attempting to kill us in the alley.
I closed my eyes, and realized—again—that we were damn lucky to be alive, damn lucky to hail a cab with a sixteen-year-old behind the wheel who just happened to be trained in the martial arts.
A pause in the snoring fest, and I twisted my neck to see if Andi was still breathing. Wait...
“Oh, num, num, num,” she mumbled.
I rele
ased a light chuckle and wished I had my phone on me. I couldn't miss this opportunity to share with Andi what it was like to sleep in a bed with her. Actually, I think I'd still be lying here, sleepless, wide awake, if we were in the same zip code. I reached just above my head and found my denim jeans, then maneuvered my way toward the back pocket and felt the rectangle outline of my phone. I slipped it out and clicked the time: twelve fifty-four a.m.
I flipped the phone around a few times and huffed through my nose. For a few seconds, I could feel Marisa's soft curls tickle my neck and chest. Here I was, sleeping with another woman—in the purest sense—yet I was still thinking about the sexy hair that drove me crazy, and the warm, compassionate smile of the most perfect woman I'd ever known. I imagined running my hands along the slope of her hip, caressing her face, kissing those supple lips, hearing her voice, which calmed and excited me at the same time. I knew she'd always looked at me as her rock—in more ways than one. I smiled. Yet she was the one who gave me a safe zone to be Michael, to feel comfortable giving all of me in a relationship...well, at least to her.
My Marisa. My wife for life. Just hers, as it turned out.
I pinched the inner corners of my eyes and allowed my mind to veer off into the multitude of theories that has flashed in and out of my mind on the ride back from San Mateo. I rubbed my forehead and tried to imagine Camila as a high-priced call girl. Her natural beauty was unmistakable. Those sparkling, blue eyes could melt an ice cap, including mine apparently. The way she walked, even that day I saw her pounding the pavement just before she either jumped in the car across from the Fairmont or was kidnapped—she had a self-assured gait.
Yes, she had a purpose to life, and even after a bit of flirtatious fun at her place of business—at least on my part—she seemed like a kind soul, not someone who was about to lay down the gauntlet and give me a price sheet for her services.
I recalled Ji saying what a technology guru she was. Camila was different, maybe not entirely pure and innocent, but she gave off a vibe of wisdom. And she wasn't one of those intellectual snobs either. She had come so far since moving to the States from Brazil. Come to think of it, she didn't share much from her early years. Actually, she avoided the topic. And Ji didn't have any information from before she traveled north.
I turned my head and eyed the muddled glow of a smudged window, a lone electrical wire drooping horizontally across my view. I thought about childhood, the stories I heard from people who wished they'd never been born into their families. I wondered if—or what—Camila was hiding from the period of time before she moved to the States. And could events from her childhood somehow have crept back into her current life, possibly leading to Gustavo's murder?
I shook my head, and knew we had to learn more about her past. That chunk of time was associated with everything that had gone wrong in the last few weeks—I was sure of it.
My arm fell off to the side of the futon and landed on the plug adaptor, the same one dropped by the person who'd invaded our hotel room. Jet had found it on the floorboard of his dad's cab and dropped it off a few hours earlier, while we were visiting Satish. I thumbed one end for a moment, and wondered how the hell this piece of plastic had anything to do with this odd combination of events. Other than finding out the person wasn't on staff at the Fairmount, I couldn't fathom the motivation for the curly-headed guy busting into our room with a plug adaptor. But a plug adaptor? What harm could there be?
I huffed again and rubbed my temples, feeling the grip of fatigue beginning to take hold. The urge to pee pressed my bladder. To allow myself to turn and not plant my foot in Andi's gut, I reached my wrist over and bumped her rump. Part of me just wanted to smack it...just because it was there, and it would scare the shit out of her. I withheld the teenage urge, flipping on my knees and pushing upward to head to the bathroom.
As I was still on my way up, something—or someone—grabbed my ankle, just as I heard a sharp crackle, instantly followed by a jabbing sting at my ear. Seconds felt like a minute, as my body hung in the air, off-balance. Another crackle, a whiz above my head, then a thwack against the far wall, plaster chunks exploding on impact. This one didn't sting, and my brain slowly deciphered what was happening in my environment—gunshots fired through the window.
I finally fell like a brick to the floor, my elbows and knees shuddering from the unforgiving force of gravity. Instantly, a voice emerged from inside my head. It was Andi.
“Jesus Christ, what the hell just happened!” she screamed, covering her head, scurrying toward me near where I'd fallen by the bathroom.
My heart was either beating faster than a newborn bird, or nor at all. I couldn't tell, as my world still didn't seem real. Until...
“Blood!” Andi reached for my ear as I felt drops trickling onto my forearm.
I saw distress in her face. For a brief second, she covered her face with open hands, her eyes peeping through, frozen on my ear. I touched my lobe and felt tiny, prickly nuggets. I caught a hint of metallic, then I blinked and it hit me—a laser-like explosion of pain coming from about twenty separate points on my ear.
“Glass!” Andi shouted, her head on a swivel, trying to ascertain how much was around us. I glanced at the window, and I think I noticed just two holes. It felt like most of the shards had been implanted in my ear.
I wiped my hand on my athletic shorts without looking at the volume of blood. I could smell it, and that was good enough for me. My wits started to return—maybe it was my survival instinct, who knew?
“Don't raise your head, but do you see anything?” I queried Andi.
“No, nothing.” Kneeling on her hands and knees, her chin lifted up slightly, her eyes no more than three feet off the floor.
Think this through for just a second, Michael. I closed my eyes and licked my lips. I think I tasted blood. Not my idea of a late-night snack, I turned and saw two pairs of shoes.
“Here.” I flipped Andi her pair, and I realized my phone was still in my hand. I slipped it into my shorts pocket and threw on my shoes. “What's stopping them from crashing right through that door? Nothing. We're sitting ducks in here,“ I said, sweeping my gaze left, then right, searching for a weapon, a way out, anything to help us escape this assault.
“You think there's more than one?” Andi sounded out of breath as she tied her running shoes and slipped a sweatshirt over her night T-shirt, a nearly see-through white cotton number. Was that one of the reasons I couldn't sleep? Who cared at this point?
“I just assumed, I don't know why. Could be the same two who tracked us down in the alley?”
“How'd they find us here, at Chao Town?”
I glanced away, thought two seconds, then realized I couldn't figure anything out right now. “Who the hell knows?”
Right at that moment, I spotted a piece of torn corrugated box, about three feet long, maybe three feet wide. I grabbed one edge and dug my nails in. Slowly the firmness gave in, and I curled it into a makeshift pole.
“Toss me that rag.”
She didn't move; she just stared at my ear. “Michael, we've got to get you to a hospital. Your ear. My God.”
“Just give me the rag.”
Andi threw me one of the rags I'd used to clean her wound, and it was still wet.
I hung the rag over the pole I'd created and slid my body toward the window. I felt glass tingle around me, but I mostly heard my heart thumping like a bass drum against my chest. I exhaled and tried to steady my arm. I glanced over at Andi, who nodded, then I slowly raised the rag up above the edge of the windowsill.
I squeezed my entire face, bracing for a shot. Nothing. I moved the pole up and down, praying it wouldn't get knocked out of my hand, praying a sniper wasn't perched in a window across the alley ready to take us out like we were some highly valued target. Who the hell were we anyway? Why were people threatening me, assaulting us, trying to kill us? It made no fucking sense. But I couldn't hit replay.
“I think there's just one.”
Andi shrugged.
“If he had a partner, don't you think the sniper would still be sitting there ready to put a bullet between my eyeballs?”
“I guess. Maybe they can see you're holding a pole with a rag on it.”
“Thanks, smartass.”
She smirked, but I knew she was right. I tossed down my pole and bit my lip, wondering if I could play this game of Russian roulette. Before I talked myself out of it, I threw my arm upward and waved left then right...holding it within view of the window for five seconds, then quickly dropping it to my side. I noticed a small pool of blood next to my knee.
“I saw it just like you did,” Andi said of the blood, but I ignored her. I was getting good at that.
“One more time?” I asked but didn't mean it as a question. I jerked my arm up again and even more demonstratively waved it back and forth, maintaining the same posture for nearly half a minute.
“I think we're clear.”
I saw Andi's torso relax, allowing me to take in a breath, rub my eyes. I still didn't want to touch my ear. She picked up a towel and took a knee next to me and said, “This is going to hurt, but I don't give a shit. I'm going to do it anyway.”
She cradled my ear and squeezed it gently with the towel.
“Great bedside charm,” I said.
“Seems like we've done everything else together,” she said, then paused, realizing that wasn't quite true. I looked down.
“Did you hear that?” She ceased motion.
I only felt my pulse thumping in my neck. It morphed into a jabbing pain that reminded me shards of glass were embedded in my ear.
I winced. “I don't hear a damn thing.”
Her hand squeezed my shoulder, hard, the other held the towel up to the side of my head as I leaned against the wall.
GREED Box Set (Books 1-4) Page 86
