Chapter Fifteen
Mari
I was in a bedroom. A guest room, I thought. There was a bed, a dresser, and while the space was large, it was blank. The tan walls were a light shade to the dark green comforter on the bed. Nothing about this place felt like home. I was locked in the room, but free to roam where nothing could be found. There were no clues to even help me be aware of where I was or who had taken me. It brought back memories from the early days with Maricio before I had Yesnia and earned his trust.
I didn’t know how long I had been here. I arrived drugged and unconscious. The last thing I remembered was going outside to check the mail. A man was walking down the sidewalk which wasn’t unusual. He rushed up to me jabbing me in the neck with something. The drugs instantly hit my system and I couldn’t fight the blackness.
I woke up here. That was it.
I didn’t know who had me, why they had me, or what they knew of me. I could only hope that Yesnia was still in North Carolina packing for her return from school. Maricio promised me he had measures in place that protected her at all times. It was the only reason I allowed her to go so far away for college. Maricio said it was the best school for the set up he could provide to keep her safe and away from his enemies as well as Javi’s should someone figure out who she was.
My head pounded harder the more I tried to think or the more I stressed over my daughter. Whatever they had injected me with gave me a hangover type of feeling. My mouth was dry like I swallowed cotton, my stomach felt like it was floating, and my head continued to throb. I was trying to take everything in while clearing my mind. I needed to have my head on straight in order to escape.
Listening, I heard noises coming down the hallway in my direction. I was not prepared as Javier Almanza rushed into the room.
I froze.
After all these years, he still looked the same. His shoulders were broad. Muscles in his forearms rippled. His face was still stern with a strong jawline that was ticking in contained fury.
He yanked his sunglasses off and his eye flickered in pain, anger, hatred, and so much more. The energy rolling off him was dangerous.
My palms were sweating, my hands shook, and my heartbeat raced.
“Tell me the fucker in the basement is lying!” He roared and instantly I knew.
I just knew what he was talking about. There was only one thing that would cause Javier Almanza to look at me with murder in his eyes. The he in the basement had to be Maricio. And Maricio always said Yesnia was the key to everything. There was no doubt in my mind he would use her to save his own life if that’s what it took.
“Yesnia is your daughter,” I whispered. I could feel it, he found out about my baby girl who was now a beautiful young woman. I need not lie, especially if I wanted to protect her in any way.
“You fucking bitch!” He yelled so loudly I thought my ears would bleed.
“Javi, I didn’t know I was pregnant until he took me.” The tears fell down my face in steady streams. He didn’t care what I had gone through.
Javier Almanza didn’t look at me with love. He looked me dead in the eyes with nothing but hatred. Raw unhidden, unashamed, disdain, it was all there.
“I tried to escape.” I rambled needing to explain myself. “He told me about the bargain. You were going to marry me on an order. How does that make you any better than me or him?”
Javi began to pace the room, but I didn’t dare get close to him.
He glared at me. “I was going to marry you to save you and because I fucking loved you! I loved you!” He threw his hands up in frustration. “Mari, I didn’t look at other girls like I did you. I agreed, but only if you were willing to marry me. I never agreed to force you into it. I wanted you to want me, fucking hell.”
My body shook. The emotions were too much. Up, down, left, right, I didn’t know if my heart was coming or going. I couldn’t figure out if it was crumbling, shattering into a million pieces, or trying to be glued back together. For all these years, I didn’t think he loved me. Brick by brick, I built these walls around my heart. I told myself what we shared wasn’t real. Now, I felt nothing but regret, sorrow, and sadness.
The emotions inside me were at war. Conflicted.
“Where is she?” He ground out.
I weighed my options. For a moment, I thought about keeping the information to myself. I looked at Javi. I wondered if he would hurt me. How far would he go for the knowledge of his daughter’s whereabouts? In my gut, I could trust him. My mind however screamed to keep her away.
How far would I go to protect her?
But who was I protecting her from?
Maricio was a wild card. With me gone, I didn’t know what he would do to drag me back to the fold. Because I didn’t know if he thought I left on my own or I was taken. I tried to think of Javi’s words. He had him in the basement, possibly. If it wasn’t Maricio it was Paco, I wasn’t sure.
“Where is my brother?”
“He’s the fucker in my basement who told me I had a daughter.” Okay so I was in Javi’s home. He continued, “The only reason he’s still breathing is because I can’t trust you. If you lie to me, he will be the one to tell me. Either way, I don’t give a single shit if either of you die. Just know, I will have my daughter’s location by the time the day ends so I can end you both.”
Chills ran through me and a lump formed in my throat. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind I would die by Javier Almanza’s hand. Did I trust Yesnia out on her own alone? She didn’t even know the truth.
All the lies over the years we had told her about family, her father, and even my own mother’s death killed me. She thought everything was different than what it really was. I needed to be the one to explain.
“If I tell you, can I see her before I die?” I asked words no mother ever wanted to ask. In my mind I began to prepare my goodbye. “I know you hate me. I know there is so much that hurt us both. But Javi, I love my daughter. Please let me have a chance to tell her one more time. Let me hold her one more time.”
He studied me as I fell apart inside. I blinked thinking of her long dark hair and how even now she still asked me to braid it. I inhaled and in my mind I could still smell the vanilla of her favorite soap. I remembered the first time she told me she loved me. I thought about the time she scraped her knee trying to ride a bike and I told her she had to push on no matter what life gave her.
Would she remember the little lessons I gave her? Would my love be tainted by my lies?
“If what you say about her location brings her to me then I will give you time with her. If what you say is a dead end, you will die in the bottom of Lake Michigan where she will never see your body or give you a proper service.”
Anything we once shared was gone. In its place was a distrust and hatred that ran as deep as a river was wide. I swallowed hard. I wanted to curl into a ball and cry the world away. I couldn’t. Because this was my only chance to be the one to tell my daughter the truth about her life myself. This was the only hope I had to say goodbye to the girl I loved more than my life itself.
“She’s in North Carolina. UNC- Charlotte. She just graduated from college.”
Javier glared at me for one second before he rushed from the room locking me back in my cage.
In a few moments he returned. My stomach was in knots.
He held out a phone in his palm.
“Hola, Tío Maricio,” Yesnia greeted from the other end of the line. She sounded normal and my heart sank for what she was about to learn.
“Yesnia, this is not your beloved Tío. I am a very important man, though.” Javi’s voice was stern and commanding. “For the safety of your mother, I request your presence in Chicago.”
“What is wrong with my mother?” I could tell she was fighting to remain calm.
“She’s tied up at the moment.” His words cause chills to run down my spine. “But I have your code word so you know to go with the man who will be arriving to pick you up soon.”
“My uncle will come for her,” She muttered trying to be strong.
“Your uncle holds no power over me.” Javi’s sinister laugh radiates through the phone. “I am Javi Almanza. Your mother, she is with me.”
She had been told her entire life that Javier Almanza was dangerous, he was the enemy.
And he had me, her mother.
“My mother would never give you the word, nor would she want me with you.” The code word. This was a proud mom moment that she was firmly sticking to the safety measures I had given her. No one knew the code word and without it she wouldn’t leave.
“Muñeca, you need to listen.” I gasp at his use of my code word for Yesnia—doll. How did he know this? “Now, I have someone coming for you in an hour. You will pack a single bag with the necessities only. The rest of your belongings will be picked up by my associates tomorrow.”
He ended the call without another word.
“How did you know the word?”
He smirked. “It was the very word I gave you when we were young in the event something happened to Maricio or myself. I wanted you to know whoever came for you was someone you could trust.”
“What happens next?”
“I send a video to our daughter. One where you are going to tell her to go with the man on the motorcycle coming of her. You will tell her she will see me tomorrow.”
I did as he requested because this gave me hope that I would see my daughter one more time.
Hush little baby don’t say a word, momma’s gonna buy you a mockingbird. I hummed the lullaby I used to hum as I bathed her when she was first born.
The many promises I made and never could keep ran through my head.
I had failed her again.
And this was a failure I wouldn’t get a chance to make right.