Lives Undone

by Aitana Moore

  James motioned toward the chairs. "Can we sit down and go back to how you don't know whether Luz is with her parents at this very moment?”

  "She would have called me!"

  "Because you're bffs?"

  Lee wouldn’t sit, so he pinched the bridge of his nose, looking at the ground. She began to get angry; why was he treating her as if she made no sense? Only because he wanted things to be over, and for them to go back to having a good time together. He didn’t know Luz, he didn’t have to care about her.

  "All right, Lee, we'll bring this to the attention of the right people, once you get your things and you're out of Diego's."

  "Who are the right people?"

  "The police."

  She scoffed. "You're going to the police with no proof, expecting them to investigate someone in that family?"

  "And what are we supposed to do, if not?"

  "I don't know what you will do, but I'll find out the truth."

  "What's this sudden division?" he asked almost angrily. "You'll do this, and you don't know what I'll do?"

  "Because, James, your sister — a beautiful rich girl — was threatened with a video and you were all over the case. You'd have walked to hell and back to make sure nothing even touched her. But these girls—"

  He clicked his tongue in annoyance. "Oh, for fuck's sake ..."

  "These girls, who are nothing and no one, can be buried under six feet of dirt and nobody needs to give a damn."

  "You think I don't give a shit if girls are murdered?"

  "Let's go to the Mexican police on the way to the airport and have a conversation with them about how a rich guy is killing his no-name girlfriends. Let's do it."

  "I guess you can see how crazy it looks."

  She stared at him for a moment. "I can see way more than that."

  As she turned inside and marched through the library, he was right behind her. She opened the front door and he slammed it shut, turning her around by the shoulder.

  "Stop this habit of running away when things don't go the way you'd like. You called me a child — what about you? We were talking, and you just storm off?"

  Lee felt a lifetime of fury rise in her. How had she not seen that James, born of privilege, would never understand what it was to be helpless? James was like the Aguirres, a man who had always had the attention of the world — who would always have it.

  "There's nothing I want to talk about."

  "Fine,” he said, “but you're not going back to that house and you're not going north."

  "Do you really think you can tell me what to do?”

  "They could put you in jail just for looking through their things. Or they might think you could start babbling about their stupid secrets."

  "And if I found out some stupid secrets, what would they do, according to you? Take my phone away, maybe? Cancel my spa membership?"

  A white rage which she had seen before fell over his face. "I don't want you to go back there," he said, almost between gritted teeth.

  She wasn't intimidated. "No, James? And do you know how much of a damn I give about what you want?"

  "Really? Is that how things are?"

  "That's how they are."

  He moved aside and opened the door so violently that the knob hit the wall and plaster fell to the floor. "Then by all means, have at it." He gestured outside. “Off you go, since you always want to leave.”

  Lee brushed by him and walked quickly toward the gate, although the sound of the slamming door rang like thunder in her ears.

  SEVENTEEN

  "Again?"

  James threw Sol a pained look. "This is serious."

  Sol motioned towards a waiter, "Un otro mojito," she asked, before she turned back to her lunch companion. "You really can't keep your temper, huh?"

  "Lee drives me insane."

  "Sure, must be her fault.”

  James leaned forward. "I want her out of Diego's house."

  "Really? She told me she's going north with him tomorrow."

  "What?"

  "To the grandfather's party."

  Rubbing a hand over his face, James cursed for a while.

  "What, Jim Tony? If he's not touching her and she wants to go to a party, let her. She might be doing it just to upset you, since you've acted like a Cro Magnon yet again." The mojitos arrived, and Sol took a sip of hers. "Mind you, not that women don't like a touch of the caveman, especially if he has a smooth brow and knows poetry, like you."

  "Look, it's a bit more complicated than I am able to tell you at the moment," James said. "She's not taking my calls and I desperately need to speak to her. Will you please dial, because otherwise I'll have to go the Paleolithic route and get into Diego's house to drag her out by the hair. I'd rather not do that."

  "Would you really do it?" Sol asked, her eyes wide with interest. His face, however, made her quickly add, "Oh, all right. I'm like your pinche phone service. Or maybe I'm Hermes, messenger of lovers?"

  Her eyes twinkled as she put the phone to her ear after speed dialing Lee. "Queridisima, are you alone? ... Just a couple of mojitos, as usual. Listen, I have a triply-contrite gentleman here ... No, my sweetheart, just listen to him for a moment ... Will you do it as a favor to me?"

  Sol handed James the phone with a wry whisper: "Try and be nice."

  He stood and moved away as Sol sucked her drink through a straw and strained to listen.

  "Lee."

  "James, leave me alone."

  "I can't do that."

  "I don’t care.”

  He took a deep breath, counting to seven. She was going to try to push him away and he couldn't let her. "Please meet me."

  "No. I know you want to talk me out of what I need to do."

  "Lee, please. I swear on Caitlin that I'll be calm. I won't touch you, I won't try to keep you from leaving, and I'll accept whatever you decide to do."

  She gasped in mock surprise. "Do you mean treat me as if I weren’t an idiot?"

  "Lee, I beg you."

  There was silence, as if she had finally decided to pay attention to the earnestness of his tone.

  "Not at your house. Somewhere public."

  "All right. A restaurant?"

  "No. The museum. The anthropology one."

  "I'll meet you at the Mayan section." James moved back to the table, handing the phone to Sol. "Going toward Paseo de la Reforma. Can I give you a ride?"

  "Is all fine between the love birds?" Sol asked.

  "I don't think 'fine' is a word in Lee's vocabulary."

  Sol arched an eyebrow. "Is it in yours?"

  "At least I try." He kissed her and walked out, repeating. "I fucking try."

  The museum was one of James' favorite places in a city where he liked many places. It housed the precious artifacts of native Mexican culture, things so interesting that one could come back to look at them again and again, as he had. It was always particularly empty on weekdays before lunch. Today there was a group of noisy school children ambling about, and a few tourists dwarfed by the twelve halls on the lower floor.

  When Lee entered the Mayan section, James was studying a large terracotta panel. The room was full of shadows as she stood next to him.

  "It's beautiful," she said. "What is it?"

  "Xibalba. The underworld — or hell, according to the Mayans. It's supposed to have nine levels. People who died expected to find trials at each level, like a game the gods were playing with them."

  She moved around the model as he looked at her in the dim light of the display.

  "I don't want you to be angry at me,” he said.

  Lee stayed silent as she walked on to the jade mask of a long-dead man of importance.

  "Did you come here to say nothing?" he insisted as he followed her.

  "You want to keep me from what I have to do," she repeated.

  "Why do you have to do it?"

  "What's the point? You don't want to understand."

  The drawing before her showed a pyramid dep
icting the classes in Mayan society, with the slaves at the bottom.

  "Very apt," James said, nodding at it. "You think I'm one of the people sitting at the top and not giving a damn for the ones below, is that it?”

  "If some at the bottom go missing, who cares?"

  "You are right, the world is like that — but does it make me a caveman to say that I don't want you to go north with these people?"

  She faced him, her eyes hard and dark instead of green. It was as if she had become someone else again. "You said there was no danger, so you make no sense."

  Visitors had entered the hall, and he beckoned with his head for her to walk the opposite way. "I didn't say there was no danger."

  "If the Aguirres are so civilized that they can't harm a girl, then there is no danger to me, right?"

  "You have a way of finding trouble."

  "If there is no trouble, there is no trouble I can find," she insisted.

  He took her by the elbow to stop her, and she pulled away. James held up his hands. "Can you stand still for one second?"

  Again, she crossed her arms as she faced him. God, she was pushing every single one of his buttons, when he had so few. But he sounded calm as he said, "Maybe something happened to Luz. But how will it help her for you to go up there on your own?"

  "I'll try to find out where her parents live, where she went. Maybe someone at the ranch knows something."

  "How will you find out?"

  "I'll talk to people."

  He gave a wry nod. "Great idea."

  "I have done things infinitely more dangerous than this."

  "Yes, I saw the result of one of them — you, buried alive."

  "This is different."

  "This could be even worse."

  "Really, James? Being buried alive among the flowers in England is fine, but God forbid that in Mexico—"

  He interrupted her, "Robert was a bumbling idiot. The Aguirres are cool-headed people. I can't imagine what they'd do to you if you gave them a reason. You wouldn't even be found."

  "How do you know?”

  "I know people," he cried.

  She gave a small laugh. “You didn’t seem to know me.”

  Her words seemed to startle her. She stopped short and looked away, flushing.

  “If you mean that I didn’t figure out that you were a thief, you’re right,” he said. “But I’m glad I didn’t, because I’d have thrown you out, or called the police — and I was a lot more interested in what was beyond all the stupid secrets. The thing that’s making you care about a girl. That.”

  “You just don’t want to understand what I’m like …”

  "On the contrary. I think I have a better idea than you, at this point. And I understand you care about Luz, but there is cruelty in that father, in that brother. There is a coldness beyond ice in that mother — and Diego is a weak man with a secret. Things could get out of hand, so please don't go there."

  For a moment he thought she might relent, but instead she said, "What I do is none of your business."

  "It is absolutely all of my business."

  "Why?"

  James said nothing, and Lee walked away once more. With a muttered curse, he caught up with her and motioned toward a large carved wheel in the center of the hall. "Do you know what this is?"

  She peered at the tag. "The Stone of Tizoc?"

  "It was for human sacrifice. They'd carve out people's hearts on that thing."

  "What are you trying to say, that I'm breaking your heart?" she sneered.

  "Don't be hateful, Lee.”

  It seemed like the whole of her body had begun trembling as she stood there. It made him want to step forward and hold her, but her fake eyes had filled with venom.

  "You are hateful," she spat. "You, you sacrificed me. You made me feel things I didn't want to feel, then you sent me here so that I would suffer in someone else's bed."

  James was speechless for a moment, but he managed to say, "I was angry. I thought all your feelings were lies—"

  "You thought I was a whore.” She stopped and covered her mouth until she was able to continue. "And I was.”

  “Lee, no!”

  “Yes, a woman who exchanges sex for money or jewels is a whore. I did what I did before because I couldn't feel anything. But then you sent me off to Diego like someone who was worth nothing." She pointed to the stone. "You made me the sacrifice, James, to your pride."

  "I thought you forgave me.”

  "There you go then, I haven't. And I don't care if you forgive me."

  She would have walked away, and James thought he might go around breaking glass cases in fury, but he blocked her way without touching her. "Do you know what I think? That you're sabotaging things."

  "What are you even talking about?"

  "It's time now, isn't it, to make a choice? You want to find a reason not to leave Mexico with me.” He nodded. “You're afraid."

  "Afraid of you?"

  "Afraid of being with me. Afraid of being happy.”

  "There's no happiness in—"

  "In what?" he took a step toward her as she took one back. "In what, Lee?"

  Her face was naked, devoid of a plan as she lifted it to him. "In wanting so much."

  "You're wrong,” he said softly.

  "Didn't you learn from wise people that things are just hunks of matter and there is only error in human exchange? Look around." She gestured toward the sculptures. "It's always misery that's immortalized because—"

  "Are you really going to say that it's because it's all there is? There can be happiness in life. It doesn't have to be this grim loneliness of yours."

  The guard sitting on a stool by the big doors watched them with narrow eyes that didn't blink. James took Lee's hand and moved her toward a nook in the wall. "I will help you find out what happened to Luz because it’s important to you.”

  “You’ll only try to show me that my fears are silly. Why do you care if I take time to find out?”

  “Because you’re planning to run again,” he said. “I know that you ran away to make me mad, so I’d forget about you. You were afraid, Lee, but you didn’t know how to admit it.”

  She didn’t say anything, but she looked miserable; it made him miserable that she wouldn’t trust him.

  “I heard one of those bloody boleros the other day,” he went on. “A man was singing that he didn't know where a woman was anymore and never would again. And then I thought, why am I feeling sad, Lee's here.” He stepped closer to her, carefully so as not to scare her away. “Why should we be unhappy, Lee? Why won't you let me not let you go back to the Aguirres? Why do you mind that I mind?"

  "I don't know how to live like that," she said in a voice so low he almost didn't hear her.

  "What is it that scares you? Stop sacrificing yourself. Does he look happy to you?" James pointed at a huge round depiction of a man falling to his death while the sun above him burned.

  Lee smiled, then gave a small shake of the head. He moved to touch her, but she shrank away.

  "Don't, don't,” she said. “It will be awful of you to convince me that way."

  His hands dropped. "How did we get to this? I only wanted to stop you from going north. I only want you to be safe."

  "It will be like that forever.” She looked fierce, like a cornered animal. "You butting in, telling me what to do. I don't want you to."

  "Who's talking about forever?" he asked. She was being hateful, and he didn't have the patience of a saint — not nearly. He knew how to be horrible as well.

  The pain in her eyes was gone as soon as it appeared. Things hurtle the wrong way so fast, he thought. And once they did, there was no putting them right.

  "Get away from me, James," she hissed. "Go to hell."

  She moved past him and this time he didn’t follow. He only said, in spite of the guard still looking at them, "You go to hell, Lee. To all fucking nine of them."

  EIGHTEEN

  Luz Guadalupe, María Jimena, María Ro
sa, Susana Araceli.

  The names of the four girls rang in Lee's mind as she held the reins of her horse in a gloved grip and narrowed her eyes against the sun.

  Eduardo Aguirre's ranch, Los Felices, was not far from the desert between Sonora state and Arizona. The land was flat but rimmed by blue hills, and the cattle grazed on yellow grass as high as a person's knees. The colors seemed to come from a roll of old film that had spoiled but achieved an interesting effect.

  It was convenient that James should have taught Lee how to ride, as she had earned the old man's good graces for waking up at dawn and getting on a horse to visit his estate.

  Eduardo was pleasant, but he was a politician, and she wasn’t interested in his explanations about the importance of ecology and sustainability for Sonora. She wanted to find a shed somewhere on the property, or any construction where Luz and the other girls might be kept by David. Her sight became blurry at the thought that Luz might be gone forever.

  "Is the sun hurting you?" Eduardo asked. "Ay, I should have given you a hat!"

  Lee touched the corner of her eye and wiped away a tear. "It's the dust."

  He cackled. "Oh, we have lots of that."

  They were riding with one of Eduardo's foremen, and the old man sometimes turned to ask his employee a question, point out something he wanted fixed or something else he was happy about.

  Luz Guadalupe, María Jimena, María Rosa, Susana Araceli. The internet had told Lee that those four girls had come and gone in David's life since he had returned to Mexico from Harvard: all poor, all estranged from their families.

  Rosa, as she had apparently liked to be called, might be the key to catching David. She was the daughter of legal immigrants to the United States but had left her family behind to return with the older Aguirre brother. More to the point, Rosa was an American citizen, and if Lee could get proof of her disappearance, the FBI might get involved. The Americans might not think twice about taking on the Aguirres, especially if James were the one bearing the information to them.

  Lee just needed to convince James of what she already knew in her heart: that something had happened to those girls.