I had always wanted to go on a cruise. Now that I had money, I was going to treat myself to one. I booted up my laptop and did a Google search for “cruises.” The list was seemingly endless, and I was about to give up my search. I didn’t want just any old cruise. I needed to get away and anonymity was key. I refined my search to “celebrity cruises” because I knew they weren’t traveling on the average cruise ship. Bingo!
“‘Aw, sookie sookie now.’” I clapped my hands with enthusiasm. Suddenly things were looking brighter. I looked at the different videos and decided I was going to take a world cruise. Mapping out the different cities I wanted to visit, Cunard Cruise vacations, based out of England, seemed like a great choice. I saved the trip to my Yahoo! Trip Planner and looked at the logistics of getting there.
“This bitch is going to set me back about thirty stacks, but it will be worth it. At least I won’t have to worry about running into anybody I know. Hell, I might even see Oprah on the ship.” I was giddy with the possibilities, but I was also grateful for the break from my reality. Planning the cruise allowed me time to plan for a future and to forget the past. I double-clicked on the Queen Mary 2 and pulled up the 2011 itinerary.
“Oh shit, they have a cruise leaving on April thirteenth from New York.” I pulled out my BlackBerry and checked the date. Being locked up in this hotel room, I’d lost all concept of time.
It was March twenty-fifth so it only gave me a few weeks to get to New York and purchase some clothes for my upcoming trip. I spun around in my chair and started to check out flights to New York. If I could get out of Atlanta today, I was going for it. I’d been pushing my luck by staying in the city anyway. It was time for this eagle to spread her wings and fly.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
VERÓNICA RAMSEY
I didn’t want to admit it, but I was slightly relieved that Victória didn’t want to stay with me. I loved my sister and I was glad she was home, but I was still learning how to be a mother and balance my life. It also didn’t help that Moses and I were still getting to know each other. In fact, I was learning something new about him every day, and if I was truly honest, not all of them were good.
I felt a little guilty for not sharing all the dynamics of my relationship with Victória, but she had enough on her plate without carrying around my bullshit, too. Things between Moses and me had gotten better, but we were not the same two people who fell in love.
“Hello?” I could hear the television in the living room, but I needed to get a grip on my emotions before I went to check on the rest of my family.
“Yeah.”
I was a little put off at Moses’ greeting. He used to say “hey, beautiful” when I walked into the room, but I guessed now that he had me he felt he didn’t have to do and say all the things that made me fall in love with him in the first place. If Victória had been with me, I would have felt compelled to explain our evolution.
“Is everything okay?” I tried to keep the pain that I felt in my heart out of my voice.
“Yeah, why wouldn’t it be?”
Part of me wanted to pick up this ball and run with it, explaining to him all the things that could have gone down while I was away, but I didn’t want to spend the rest of the night arguing with him. Luckily, my father moved into Madre’s house so we didn’t have that added pressure to deal with, either.
“I didn’t mean it that way. I turned my phone off when I was in the hospital, so I wanted to make sure you weren’t trying to reach me.”
“If I needed you, I would have left you a voice mail.”
I ignored what I felt to be sarcasm in his voice. I let out a heavy sigh before I continued. “Where is the baby?”
“Walking down 285,” Moses responded.
Despite my resolve not to let his lack of enthusiasm bother me, I started to get mad. “Dammit, Moses. Would it hurt you to take your eyes off the television and pay me some attention?”
“What is wrong with you? Are you on your period?”
I wanted to hit him. Why do men think the only reason we argue with them is because we’re on our periods? Was it too much to ask that he at least acknowledge my presence with a kiss or something? Hell, he could have told me to kiss his ass and take the trash out on the way to doing it. Something. Shit.
“Never mind.” I started to walk away but he grabbed my hand.
“No, seriously, what’s up?”
I had his full attention now, but I didn’t know what to do with it. He’d made me mad and I wasn’t ready to get over it. I yanked my hand away. “Nothing. I’m going to take a walk on 285.”
“Aw, man, it was a joke. Don’t tell me you are going to take me seriously and shit. What happened to the woman who used to laugh at my jokes?”
“I don’t hear anything funny.” I folded my arms across my chest. I was still a tiny bit annoyed, but starting to come around.
“Where’s your sister?”
“She might not be staying here after all. She went by her apartment to see if her stuff was still there. If it is, she said she’s going to stay there.”
“What? She didn’t want to come play house with us?”
I laughed for the first time because of something Victória had said about the baby crying all night. “I guess not. How long has the baby been asleep?”
“That boy must have known you left the house because he cried almost the entire time you were gone.”
This was not what I wanted to hear, and I immediately started to panic. “Is he okay? Do you think he has a fever? Should I call a doctor?” I was throwing questions over my shoulder as I climbed the stairs.
“Honey, stop. He’s fine. I was just fucking with you.”
“Moses, that’s not something to joke about. Do you even know how hard it is for me to leave my baby? Don’t play around like that.”
“Honey, chill. I’m sorry.”
Even though I accepted his apology, I still went to check on LM. When I was satisfied that he was okay, I went back to the living room where Moses was watching the news. “How was your day?” I was trying to get things back on an even keel, and hopefully Moses and I would spend the rest of the night like the young lovers we really were instead of the boring parents we’d become.
“Huh?” Moses’ eyes were glued to the television, and he really wasn’t paying attention to me again.
Once again my feelings were hurt. I tried not to take it personally but twice in less than thirty minutes was a little too much for me to take in my moody condition. “Forget it.” I started to go into the kitchen to figure out what to fix for dinner. This was another thing I was rapidly getting tired of doing. I felt more like a fucking maid, but this maid wasn’t getting paid.
“Wait.” Moses pulled me down in his lap. “I just want to hear the rest of this story.”
I turned toward the television. A commercial was playing so I didn’t know what had captured his attention.
He started kissing a trail of kisses from my cheek to collarbone. “Mmm, you smell so good.” His lips acted like fire to brush, lighting a passionate flame that burned throughout my body.
“Ah,” I murmured, but Moses pumped the brakes when Barbara Walters came back on for her special report. Thirty Days and Thirty Nights was the name of the special. It wasn’t so special to me. I wanted to get back to the kissing, but Moses appeared to have lost interest.
He said, “Have you been following these stories?”
I wanted to tell him what I really felt but I bit my tongue. “No.” I was pouting and didn’t give a fuck what was on television.
“I have. The violence in Mexico is out of control. Ever since the raid on the Cali Cartel happened here, the drug violence over there has gone through the roof. They are cutting off people’s heads and leaving them in the streets with notes on them and shit. It’s crazy.”
He piqued my interest. Moses eased me off his lap while we both watched the set.
“How long has it been on? Did you record it on the DVR?”<
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“Sorry, babe, I didn’t even think about it.”
I got the remote off the table and started recording the show. I was sure Victória would want to see it when she was ready to catch up on the news.
The TV anchorwoman said, “The bodies of eighteen men were found in a mass grave in South Acapulco. Authorities suspect the bodies to be those of the missing members of a group of men who vanished while vacationing on September thirtieth—” The TV screen went to an emergency test broadcast.
“Nah, are they serious? I wanted more information.”
“Yo, this is crazy. What the fuck were eighteen men doing together on vacation? That’s what I want to know.”
“Eww, Moses, that’s just nasty.”
“I’m just saying. I don’t know ten motherfuckers willing to go on vacation together, let alone eighteen.”
The show came back on. “Gunman kills fifteen men at a carwash. Thirteen of the men worked at the carwash but they also were clients of a drug rehab center. Mexican authorities have apprehended a single gunman responsible for this latest massacre.”
“Damn, sounds like a pissed-off woman to me.”
Moses didn’t say anything, his eyes glued to the television.
The anchorwoman continued. “The case of the eighteen dead men doesn’t add up. Authorities say relatives of the men insist they were ordinary guys with no affiliation to the bloody drug wars plaguing Mexican cities. Police are skeptical about what the travelers were up to.”
Moses said, “But it’s more than that, boo. Mexico is showing its ass. Let me show you a chart I’m working on.” Moses moved, but I didn’t pay attention because I was so surprised by what I’d been watching on television.
As a nation we did not act like the people I saw looting and protesting in the streets. I could not imagine what could have happened to push them to the streets. Moses grabbed my hand and pulled me away from the set.
“Enlighten me because I don’t understand.” I was hurting inside for the state of the world. Tears rolled down my cheeks as I tried to forget the terror on the faces of the Mexican people.
“Honey, don’t cry. I probably shouldn’t have even let you see that with all that we’ve been through. Things are definitely getting out of hand over there.”
As we sat down at the kitchen table, I could hear LM beginning to stir around through our monitor.
“I’ll get him,” Moses offered.
I was glad because I really didn’t feel like dealing with him at the moment. I looked through the papers that Moses had given me. The pages extrapolated five years of violence and what appeared to be six months and counting of retaliation. The citizens of Mexico were fighting back, which made sense since Padre said the leaders of the cartel were leaving Mexico in droves.
“Do you see a trend to the violence?” Moses asked when he came back with LM.
“I see that the citizens are angry about the violence and they are fighting back. What do you see?” I already knew I had missed something fundamental, and I needed Moses to help me focus.
“So much of the violence is centered around the police. Yeah, there are some random shootings, but most of it is stemming from the people being tired of a corrupted government.”
Moses was so animated it was contagious, but I didn’t see where he was going with it. Why was it so important to him and he never lived there? I was watching Moses intently when a thought hit me so powerfully I felt like I’d been slapped. I didn’t even want to say out loud what I was thinking because I didn’t want it out in the universe, but I didn’t have a choice.
“This is about Tilo, isn’t it?” I wanted him to tell me that I was wrong. I was praying that he would say I was tripping, but his brilliant smile confirmed what I feared the most. My heart felt like it was skipping a beat.
“Yeah, I think so,” he whispered.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
MOSES RAMSEY
Verónica wasn’t exactly thrilled to hear Tilo’s name mentioned in our house. She forbade me to mention her, but I led her to cross the line with my painstakingly staged evidentiary trail. I really had no conclusive evidence that Tilo was involved in the upheaval in Mexico, but I played my long shot so I could work the case without ending up in divorce court.
I felt bad about deceiving Verónica; however, I could not think of any other way. Now that Victória was home from the hospital, Verónica was going to rely more and more on me to care for our son, so I had to make a way to bring my work home without any unnecessary cloak-and-dagger bullshit. I wanted to believe that Verónica would respect the privacy of my office when I was not there. But since she used to work for me, she might not believe in the same sanctity.
I pulled my phone from my hip as I went back downstairs. I quickly dialed the last number on my phone. Putting the phone up to my ear, I waited for it to be answered.
“Did you do it?” a man said.
“Yes, it’s done.” I peered upstairs to make sure that I was still alone.
“Good. Any problems?”
“No. Everything went fine.” I kept a close lookout for Verónica. I couldn’t let her sneak up on me.
“Okay. Now just try to relax and wait,” the man said.
My palms and armpits started to sweat. “That’s so much easier to say than do.”
“Well, you’re going to have to do the best that you can. You’ve waited this long, a few more weeks won’t hurt you.”
“I hear ya. Look, I’ve gotta go. Verónica’s father is pulling up in the driveway.” I closed my phone and went into the kitchen and pulled out a bottle of Absolut and two glasses from the cabinet. I carried the glasses into the living room and waited for Mr. Mendoza.
Verónica came into the living room looking sexy as ever.
“Are you feeling better?” I was a little tipsy and feeling pretty good.
She said, “My headache is gone. What are you doing other than having a few libations?”
“Your father and I were getting acquainted.”
Verónica looked around with a surprised expression on her face. “Padre? Where is he?”
“He left.” I drained my glass and was thinking about pouring another even though the ice had melted.
Verónica went into the kitchen and grabbed her own glass and joined me. “You know we don’t have long before little man gets up, right? Even though he’s not actually sucking my tit, my boobs start to get tight and feel real heavy right before it’s time to feed him. I guess they know it’s time to get the pump.”
“You want me to rub them for you?” I was only playing, but if she wanted to put her titty in my hand, I damn sure was gonna handle it. When she didn’t take me up on my offer, I went in the kitchen to get a bottle ready for the baby.
“Hey, what are you going to do with that?” She had a sexy smile on her face. For a minute it was almost the way it was in the beginning when we had fun and played with each other.
“I was hungry,” I jokingly replied. I missed those days of fun and flirtation before we became man and wife and I desperately wanted them back.
“Oh, really? Well, that bottle is reserved for the baby, but if you play your cards right, mister, I’ll let you taste the milk from the sprout! Fresh, not that bottled shit.”
“Oh, I love it when you cuss. You’re so sexy with it.” All of a sudden I was in a playful mood, and I wanted to recapture the passion that used to flow between us.
“Oh, daddy, I like when you talk to me like that, but it’s going to have to wait ’cause LM’s alarm is about to go off any minute.” She walked up close to me and gave me a deep, soul-searching kiss. I wrapped my arms around her and tried to hold on to the feeling. This was my biggest problem these days—holding on to the love that drew me to Verónica in the first place. It wasn’t another woman who drove a wedge between us, it was the fatherhood of our son. I couldn’t help but to feel cheated, even though I knew she was married when we first started dating.
I stepped away as soon as
I heard LM wailing in the speaker. I tried not to look at it as a mood killer, but my dick wasn’t listening. I pushed away from the counter as Verónica took the bottle and went upstairs. While I waited for her to return, I went through the mail stacked on the kitchen table. The stack, mainly bills, had been sitting on the table all day, but this was the first time that I’d bothered to look through them. One postcard-sized letter stood out. It was a blank card with no discernable postmark, which was odd. I looked closer at the card. Written on the card were the words:
Wish you were here—not! LOL.
I didn’t need a psychic to know who the card was from. The bitch was taunting me and it was pissing me the fuck off. It was bad enough she lied and got away with the money. Now she wanted to play games.
“Why is this bitch still fucking with me?” I slammed my fist into my hand. Every time I got to the point where I thought about letting it go and getting on with my life, she did something to stir the shit up again. There had to be a reason she was still fucking with me. She couldn’t be that stupid, so I had no choice but to find out why she couldn’t let it go, but neither could I.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
VICTÓRIA MENDOZA
It felt good being alone but it was also a little scary. I never had my own room until I moved into my apartment, but I shared the place with Tilo. Initially, we were roommates, but we soon became more than that. Much more. And it was hard for me to turn this part off. It tormented me in my sleep and caused me to doubt everything in my life.
I parked in front of our building with the engine idling. Part of me felt sure Tilo would be inside with an explanation on her lips. If it was true, I honestly didn’t know what I would do.
Our subdivision was quiet, but this afternoon it was almost too quiet. It seemed like the entire building was in mourning with me. Even though my brother had been dead since January, to me it was still fresh and a constant battle not to cry. It was warm in the car so I rolled down the window, but it was still too quiet and the silence was killing me. I turned on the radio but the music sounded foreign. I was trying to get up the nerve to go inside but my feet would not cooperate.
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