Maybe, for a split second, maybe she even thought she deserved it. Because her emotions were still raw about Alejandro. Because there was guilt there for the atrocities he had committed while she blindly followed him around the world. Maybe she thought it was a fitting punishment for her ignorance.
That. Shit. Would. Not. Stand.
If he made her think that way, if he made her question her own right to say no, to not have something forced upon her, then he deserved every moment of agony I inflicted upon him.
"Paula?" he gasped, eyes going huge, wondrous.
He thought he was seeing his dead sister.
That was a surefire way to know they were close.
The brain misfired in the last moments, brain cells dying off, creating visions that weren't real.
"Afraid not," I said, pulling the knife back, ready for the final blow, done, beyond done. "There is no afterlife; you just die." With that, with that last, final, brutal blow to not only his psyche, but his heart with my knife, Miguel Diaz had joined the ranks of Alejandro.
And good fucking riddance to bad fucking rubbish.
There wasn't a guilty bone in my body as I wiped the knife clean of fingerprints with his shirt and left it, as I walked to the sink to wash most of the blood off my hands.
There was nothing I could do about the fact that my shirt was literally saturated with blood. But it was dark out. Even if we happened upon someone on the way back, they wouldn't likely be able to see.
The evidence, well, that would have to be dealt with later.
Right now, what mattered was Evan.
On that thought, I turned, moving back toward the door, and stepping out into the humid night air.
I heard a click.
"Ev, it's me," I said, voice soft, moving toward the sound, coming from the side of the guest house where I had crouched just twenty minutes before. "It's me, doll," I added as I stepped into view, reaching to place my hand on the top of the gun, pushing it so the barrel was facing the ground before pulling it out of her shaking fingers.
I tucked it into the back waistband of my jeans, lowering myself down in front of her, not reaching for her yet because I wasn't sure if that was the right move. "It's over, okay? It's all over."
"He... he..." she stammered, shaking her head, trying to take a deep breath, but it made her entire body shake with the effort.
"Ev," I said, softly, but even I heard the pleading in my voice. Hearing it, maybe understanding how unusual it was for me, her gaze rose. Her eyes were red, the lids swollen, but she was holding back another wave of tears. I didn't want to ask. It felt wrong. It felt like I was asking something that was none of my business. But at the same time, I needed to know. I needed to know because I needed to know if I was going to be enough, or if maybe I needed to bring her to her mother's, to get help from someone who would understand. So I had to ask. "Did he rape you?"
The words tasted like battery acid on my tongue.
They made her cringe backward too even as her eyes closed for a long second and she swallowed hard, making my stomach lurch, sure what her answer was going to be.
But then her eyes opened, clear, her voice when she spoke was even. "No," she said, tone firm. "He was going to," she said, nodding a little frantically, losing the small bit of control she had over her swirling emotions. "He even told me he was going..."
"Sh," I said, shaking my head, reaching out for her face, tilting her chin up. "I was never gonna let that happen, okay?"
"You didn't know where..."
"Well, I found out," I said, forcing a small smile that I didn't feel in the least, but knowing my own dark mood was of no use to her.
"How?"
"Can we maybe talk about that back at the motel, doll?" I asked, stroking my finger down her cheek. "I need to do something about this cut to the side of your head, and you gotta be wanting some pain medicine right about now. Think we can get moving?"
She nodded, taking my hand when I offered it to help her up. "You smell like blood," she informed me, tone a little empty.
"Yes."
"He was screaming."
My stomach tensed as we started walking.
I knew this day would come.
I knew that at some point she would see beyond the guy who made her laugh and think and would take her on cross-countries adventure.
I knew that she would only be able to accept me for a short time before she saw who I really was.
Maybe I had been hoping, though, that it wouldn't be quite so soon.
"I know, Ev," I agreed, keeping my eyes forward as I tried to press the pace faster, wanting to get back to the motel and out of sight as soon as possible.
I knew that someday, someway, somehow, I was going to end up in jail or dead for my actions. I did very much prefer, though, that the jail wasn't in fucking Brazil.
"Am I a terrible person for being glad he's dead?" she asked after a long, drawn-out silence that had my heart thrumming hard against my ribcage.
I stopped short, turning fully to her, noticing it took her an excruciatingly long moment to make eye-contact. But I wouldn't answer until I had it.
"Evan, he wanted to rape you. He wanted to shove something inside your body. If that something was a knife instead of a dick, would you be questioning your right to wish him dead right now? I don't care if you wanted to slice off his cock with a dull butter knife, then shove it up his ass, and make him write a twenty-page dissertation on the concept of consent while he writhed in un-lubricated agony. I still wouldn't think you were a terrible person. Rabid dogs can't be tamed, Ev. They need to be put down."
"So you put him down."
"Yes."
"Do they bother you?" she asked, feet planting, seeming to need to hash this out, right there on the side of the street.
"The men I kill?" I clarified.
"Yeah."
"I have a lot of demons that bother me, doll. These men are not one of them. I believe in what I do. I believe in ridding the world of people who only bring evil into it, even if that makes me evil in turn."
There was a long, excruciating silence following my words where Evan was just watching me with eyes I suddenly couldn't read.
Then she spoke, and her voice had more conviction than I had ever heard before. "You're not evil."
"Doll, you don't...."
"You saved me tonight," she cut me off. "You didn't have to do that. And you told me the truth about my fath... Alejandro. And my mother. You made me come here to meet her. You took time out of your life to make my life better. Evil people don't do that, Luce. Evil people just get off ruining peoples' lives. You might exist and work within a gray area, but you lean more light than dark."
With that little nugget, she turned, and started walking again, leaving me there standing dumbly for a long minute before I pulled it together and followed her.
"Shower," I demanded as soon as we walked in the door.
"I'm so tir..." she started to object, and my heart dropped.
I wanted to tell her that it was okay, that she could just climb into bed, that she could nurse her pounding head, and get a good nights' rest.
But I had to keep my head on straight.
In Navesink Bank, I could have called in someone else to do what had to be done that night so I could stay with her. In Brazil, I was on my own. If we wanted to get out of this country without spending a decade in prison, I needed to do everything by the book.
"I know, babe, I know. But you need to wash off the blood and evidence. Scrape under your nails. And I need your clothes."
It hadn't exactly escaped me that she was in my shirt. It was one of the first things I had noticed when I burst in that room, after the injuries and missing shorts.
She put on my shirt.
She had plenty of her own, but she wanted to wear mine.
I wouldn't claim to be an expert on women, but I was pretty sure that shit was clear.
"Oh, right," she agreed, eyes clearing a little. "You're..
."
"I can wait until you're done," I said, nodding at her to go ahead, figuring she wanted a few minutes.
Honestly, I did too.
I needed to figure out how to get rid of the body. And our clothes. I needed to handle any possible loose ends.
Evan came back out a few minutes later, wet, and so much more pale than before. "Wait," I said when she went to go to the bed. "I know," I said when she whined. "I know, doll. I just need to put something on that cut. It's gonna get infected."
I pulled her back into the bathroom, finding some peroxide in the cabinet, watering it down, and pressing it into all the open cuts on her face.
"You're leaving," she mumbled as she watched me.
"Not for long," I promised. "An hour. And you're keeping the gun and the door locked. I just want to make sure we don't end up spending any time in some backward Brazilian prison."
"Okay," she said, giving me a nod, understanding even if she didn't like it.
"One hour," I promised, walking with her back to the bedroom, pulling the blankets up when she laid down. I placed the gun on the nightstand, rummaged in my bag for some aspirin, and handed it to her.
I grabbed clothes, running into the bathroom, showering so fast that I was pretty sure I scratched my own damn skin in a rush to get the blood off. I took the liner out of the trash, throwing both our clothes in it, and went back out.
She was already out cold.
With a lump in my throat, I made my way out, making sure the door was locked, and making my way back to the Diaz house at a dead run.
I stripped his body and threw it into the bath, running the water toward scalding and pouring half a bottle of bleach on him. I didn't plan on the body being found until it was good and decomposed. But you could never be too careful.
I took all our clothes into the small top-and-bottom laundry in the closet, putting them in with about a third of what was left of the bleach as well as twice the laundry detergent that was actually needed. The bloodstains would turn orange. But I wasn't worried about that. The purpose was destroying the evidence. Once it was gone, the clothes were going to be burned.
As they washed and dried, I cleaned up the blood on the floor and walls, finding the familiar action almost comforting.
Body cleaned, clothes dried, I grabbed a wheelbarrow, tossed him in, took the clothes in another bathroom liner, grabbed a shovel, and made a move toward the woods behind his property.
So maybe I lied to Evan when I said an hour. It took me almost an hour to clean. It was going to take another hour to find a location, dig a grave, then discreetly burn the clothes at another location.
Then and only then could I make my way back.
"Here," I said, stopping outside the convenience store, getting more food, discreetly dropping off the other hoodie I was wearing in the dumpster out back, then approaching the men from the night before. "All yours. Don't worry, I didn't use it," I said when he eyed me. "Turns out she was out for a fucking walk," I said, rolling my eyes. "At two in the goddamn morning."
"Candelas são loucas," the leader snorted. "Making you run all over like a maniac. Hope her father beats her ass."
"Careful," I warned, making them all stiffen. "You don't want that talk getting around to Alejandro."
With that, I made my way back to the motel, finding Evan still passed out, the bruises even deeper after time, and yet again stripping, then washing and bleaching my clothes.
I was finally, finally content that things were handled at least enough for us to be able to spend a few hours with her mother, then get the hell back onto US soil.
As soon as fucking possible.
I didn't like not knowing the major players. I didn't like not having backup. True, I never used it in Navesink Bank, but it was there if I somehow did need it; no questions asked. There would be Barrett, Jstorm, Alex, Pagan... any number of people I had helped over time. They would step up with their various skills and help me in any way I needed.
I needed to get back to that.
But I knew I couldn't just wake up Ev and force her to hop two buses and a plane when she was just hours away from a beating and almost-rape. She needed time. She needed sleep. She needed to keep her plans with her mother. She needed a little softness.
I was beginning to know her, so I knew she wouldn't need a week before she would crawl out of bed. She was going to get some sleep, get some food in her stomach, talk it out with her mom, then she was going to be ready to compartmentalize that and move forward.
She was resilient.
And, as much as I hated to give the bastard any credit, it must have been at least in part from the way Alejandro raised her.
I had barely gotten in bed with her, closing my eyes, when I felt her fingertips hesitantly touch my bare arm.
"You're here."
My arm slid around her hips, pulling her closer, keeping her against me tight.
"Yeah, doll. I'm right here."
And I had the oddest, strongest, almost overpowering feeling that that was where I would always want to be.
That shit?
Yeah, it was insane.
But I let myself think it as I fell asleep with her in my arms.
THIRTEEN
Evan
I hadn't lived a sheltered life. I had seen so many things. And not all of those things had been pretty. I had seen malnourished babies dying of starvation. I had seen bodies dead in the road from civil and gang wars. I had seen child prostitutes and grown women brutalized by the very male relatives who were supposed to protect them from such horrors.
The world could be a beautiful place.
But it could also be inhumanely ugly.
And, unfortunately, the recipient of most of that ugliness was women.
I had never been unaware of that fact.
But I had personally been sheltered from having those ugly fingers touch me before. I had always been protected by my fath... Alejandro's reputation, by his hovering presence.
It had never occurred to me before that I could be in danger because of him.
I barely had a chance to actually think anything through.
First, I was knocked cold within a minute of the man showing up at my door.
Second, when I woke up in an unfamiliar room, in pain, confused, towered over by a man I knew wanted to make me hurt worse than he already had, I was too worried about trying to de-escalate the situation to think about how Alejandro's sins were coming to haunt me.
I don't think it ever really clicked until he had me on my back, until my face was nothing but throbbing pain from his fists, that it finally clicked what he was doing.
He was going to rape me because my father raped people he loved.
And that was a whole new level of twisted I had never even considered before.
Who raped to avenge a rape victim?
Twisted people.
People that my fath... that Alejandro had twisted to be that way through his actions and the repercussions of them.
There was maybe even a moment of character weakness where I wondered if maybe I deserved it, maybe it was only right.
But then his hands moved to pull my pants and panties down and... I shut that shit right down and tried to hit, kick, scream, anything.
Then there was Luce, looking like some dark, avenging angel, gun raised, knife catching the moonlight in the other.
As I sat outside with the gun clutched so hard that I had marks in my hand for several long minutes after I let it go, I could hear almost everything inside.
I could hear the hisses of pain.
I could hear the begging, the crying, the calls to God.
And mixed with that, I could hear Luce's calm, almost eerily controlled voice through it all.
But then he came out, he got me home, he got the evidence off me, he got me medicine, and he got me in bed.
He was a true dichotomy if I ever saw one.
He was capable of such coldness, but such warmth at the same time.
When I woke up to find him curled up with me, his hair still wet from another shower, the sun starting to peek through the windows, there was a strong, almost overwhelming warm, swelling sensation in my chest.
I had only felt touches of it before in my life, just vague, pathetic facsimiles of what I was feeling right then with Luce.
But I had felt it enough to know exactly what it was.
I was falling in love with him.
Was it crazy?
Absolutely.
Was he someone I should have chosen?
No, of course not.
But that was the thing, wasn't it?
Love wasn't always a choice.
Sometimes it came to you slowly over time, getting to know someone for months and years before that sensation blossomed across your chest because, quite frankly, you knew them too well not to love them.
But sometimes the choice was out of your hands.
Sometimes it happened in a moment.
Sometimes the universe chose for you.
That's not to say you don't have a choice. There is always a choice. To stay. To walk away. To make the decision that was smart, not just the one that felt good.
You couldn't pick the feelings, but you could choose what to do about them.
The problem was, I didn't know what to do.
The smart decision was, of course, to stop it before it got out of hand. He was a wild card. He was a vigilante by profession. He didn't make connections with, well, anyone but me. He hadn't opened up to me about his past. Perhaps he never would.
That being said, this was a man who hadn't held a grudge about me kidnapping him and holding him hostage. He had given me the truth about my parentage thanks to his obsessive brand of need-to-knowing. He had accompanied me with barely a pause. To Texas. To Brazil. He had sweated in misery with me. He had made my body come alive with his touch.
He had killed for me.
Maybe his past didn't matter.
Maybe all that mattered was the way I felt more myself around him, how I felt safe with him, how I felt free to be someone other than who Alejandro Cruz had made me to be.
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