Toward the Light

by Bonnar Spring

  Again, Evan waited. Tiny gold balls in her ears glistened as her head swiveled slowly side to side, her mouth slack. When nothing more was forthcoming, he said, “I’m not going to tell Richard anything yet, Luz. You have to talk to me first.”

  Her head tipped to one side. She could be trying to process his words, but Evan sensed her thoughts were far away. He tried once more. “When you came to my house Tuesday night—” No, that wasn’t the right place to start. Margo was as irrelevant as her new boyfriend, but Richard sure as hell wasn’t. “You gave me a message for Richard,” said Evan. “He called yesterday, but I didn’t tell him what you said.”

  Her eyes and mouth opened round. Now she understood.

  “I won’t be an accessory to your throwing your life away. I want to—God, can we go inside and talk?”

  Luz closed her eyes and squeezed them tight, like an infant getting ready to wail. Instead of crying—or replying—she fumbled blindly in her bag. She produced a key and opened the gate, leaving it open after she walked through. So Evan followed.

  Luz staggered inside and dropped her bag on the floor. Yet another sleepless night packed with ghosts from the past. And now Evan. Evan, whose presence had become too desirable. Evan, who had ferreted out some of her secrets. Evan, whom she tried to push away by revealing her last secret.

  There was only one way to deal with vulnerability—attack—but where-oh-where was she going to find the energy? Luz retreated to the kitchen and opened cabinet doors as though her cupboards held a secret stash of resolve. While she rummaged, Evan said, “You have a choice, Luz. Like I did when I decided not to give Richard your message yesterday.”

  Choice—that was a laugh. Her father had never given her a choice. She hadn’t had a choice about leaving Guatemala. No choice about dying. Pressure built inside and provided necessary propulsion. “What the hell business is it of yours? I made my choice. Leave me alone.”

  “Richard has no business putting you up to this.”

  She whirled to face him “So what?”

  “So you’ll die,” he shouted. Die, die, echoed. Evan looked taken aback at his vehemence.

  Don’t think. Attack. “No shit. And so will you, someday. Unavoidable. Like taxes and baseball season.”

  “Luz, you know what I’m talking about. He’s using you—”

  “It runs in the family, I guess.”

  Evan went pale. He took a step back, steadying himself with a hand on the wall. That shot hit its target, thought Luz. He’ll go away. Now if she could only reassemble the tangled fragments of her convictions into a pattern that once again made sense.

  But Evan didn’t walk out. He said, “I messed up when we met. I should’ve told you about Margo. I should’ve done a lot of things differently. Sure—I slept with you when it was all about sex. So shoot me. It was wonderful.” A rueful grin mirrored his embarrassed smile from the bus the day they met. “And when you kept saying you’d only be in town for a short time, I convinced myself it was okay—a lousy excuse, I know.” He looked up and said, “But I didn’t know what you planned, what it meant when you said you wouldn’t be here very long.” Evan hunched his shoulders and jammed his hands into his jacket pockets. “Maybe you only wanted a warm body to take the edge off the strain. All the times you pushed me away, said ‘go home.’ I finally got the message, Luz. I—I won’t bother you about that anymore.”

  Evan stole a glance at her, as if to check her reaction. When Luz remained silent, he rolled his shoulders back and began to speak quickly. “I didn’t come over to argue with you. I came to offer my help. I have several ideas about your job, your real job.” Without any movement Luz could detect, he loomed closer. He crowded into her emotional space, still passionate, but without the touching. “I know how you can do what you really came to do. And do it without sacrificing yourself. Will you at least hear me out?”

  The room began to spin as though she’d tumbled into a fast-running stream of icy water, too disoriented to know how to reach the surface. Luz grabbed hold of the counter and waited for the vertigo to subside.

  Do what she came to do—he must mean the bombing. Evan wanted to help. If only she could trust him whatever she did. She had to have time to think.

  Luz pushed past Evan and flung open her front door. “I can’t do this now. You have to go.”

  “How about after work? I’ll come back.”

  “Why not,” said Luz, without responding to his repressed—but all-too-obvious—enthusiasm. She’d listen. Maybe by then she’d have figured out which way was up.

  Luz wasn’t noticeably clearer by late afternoon when Dominga called for her to read. It was their third session, and for the first time, Martin Benavides was on the porch when Luz arrived. The rooftop structure that housed the elevator also included several rooms, which Luz had assumed were storerooms. Martin and Raul de la Vega stood talking by an open door. Behind them was a small room with a desk and walls lined with books. When de la Vega left, Martin moved a high-backed wooden chair from his study to the edge of Luz’s peripheral vision and listened. Distracted by his presence, Luz stumbled over words and lost her place so many times that Dominga finally plopped her fat hand on the side of her bed, scattering magazines and peanut hulls, and said, “Go now. Come back when you’ve remembered how to speak Spanish properly.”

  Luz returned to Cesar. Unless she could get her emotions under control, the door to Martin Benavides would slam shut as quickly as it had opened. She and Cesar had begun a game of cards when the doorknob rattled, and Bobby stuck his head into the room. He was back, as Delores had said he would be. Bobby looked different. Jazzed. Maybe even high on something. He jittered, hips thrusting, shoulders swinging. He licked his lips; sharp white teeth showed under his vacuous playboy grin.

  “We’re doing holiday photographs in the garden.” Bobby squinted at his son. “White shirt, a nice sweater. Blue, if he has one.” He snapped his fingers at Luz. “Comb his hair.”

  And he was gone again. Cesar, who’d jumped to his feet when he saw his father, flopped onto the couch. He buried his head in the cushion, his hands curled into fists at his side.

  Gently, Luz said, “Let’s get you dressed.”

  Asshole. How could he disappoint Cesar like that?

  Out in the garden fifteen minutes later, they encountered a mob scene of gardeners decorating the portico with holly garlands, a dozen strangers in casual clothes, some holding big white umbrella-things, some tinkering with little black boxes. Luz found Bobby and showed off a spiffy Cesar. The man looked his son up and down as Luz would have inspected a plucked chicken at the market.

  “Yes, that will do, señorita.”

  “Should I stick around?”

  “Ah.” Bobby edged closer, resting his fingers lightly on her arm. “Not necessary.” He squeezed her arm before releasing her. “I’ll bring him back when we’re done.”

  This was it. Lethargy forgotten, Luz rushed back to Cesar’s room and removed Richard’s replacement drive from its hiding place inside a hollow crucifix above Cesar’s bed. Tucking the flash drive into the pocket of her sweater, she jogged along the soft carpet to the seldom-used stairs where she’d have a greater chance of escaping notice than if she used the elevator. Luz pushed open the heavy stairwell door and dashed one flight down to the second floor. Bobby’s suite stretched the entire length of the north side of the corridor.

  Her hand rested on the doorknob. Someone could be waiting there for Bobby. She rubbed a damp hand across her forehead. Well, she was Cesar’s nanny, after all; she’d brazen it out. Luz inserted her duplicate key. It turned smoothly. She opened the door and walked in, head high as though she belonged.

  Luz stood near the door. The huge living room was quiet and empty. Although a muddy jacket and some unopened mail lay on one of the couches, no briefcase was visible. Luz tiptoed into the room.

  The briefcase was not under the jacket or on the floor or between the couches or under the coffee table or on the counter next
to his espresso machine. Taking care to stay away from the large windows at the back of the room, through which the photo shoot would be visible to her—and she to the milling participants—Luz searched the rest of the room. Not here.

  She tried his bedroom next. The room was an opulent throwback in midnight-blue and gold. A closed suitcase lay on the bed, dirty socks on the floor, but no briefcase.

  On to the last room. Unlike the rest of the suite, Bobby’s office lay in darkness. The light from the open door to the living room revealed dark paneling and heavy wine-red curtains on two narrow windows on the far wall. Portraits of sober dark-haired men with black jackets and mustaches. Built-in bookcases and thick oriental carpets. A large mahogany desk in the center of the room was heaped topsy-turvy with books, folders, ledgers, and paper-clipped sheaves of papers. There could be tons of information Richard might like to know, but he’d been clear: Nothing else was necessary. The thumb drive contained the entire history of the drug operation—suppliers, distributors, chapter and verse of who, what, when, where, and how.

  “Yeah, I skipped the why,” Richard had added with a chuckle, rubbing thumb and fingers together. Money.

  The briefcase sat on a small table between the two windows. Luz checked her watch. It had only been six minutes since she’d left Cesar. All the preparation, the endless rehearsals—she was in the zone. Asshole Father of the Year was going to get exactly what was coming to him.

  Richard’s instructions about retrieving the thumb drive indicated it would be in a zippered pouch connected to the back pocket. Luz opened Bobby’s briefcase. Like the desk, it contained a messy variety of papers: travel documents, a collection of index cards held together with a rubber band, brochures for a timeshare in Rio, a pack of Post-its. Luz unzipped the little pouch and set the flash drive on the table. It glinted silver in the shadowy room.

  She pulled hers from her pocket and placed it next to Bobby’s. If Richard’s information was out-of-date and Bobby was using a different one, Luz was supposed to abort. But they were identical. Gotcha.

  A door opened. Someone walked into the living room. An adrenalin surge rocked her body—fight or flight. Neither was advisable: The only door led into the living room, and the intruder could easily be one of the Benavides’ armed guards. Luz grabbed both drives and squeezed into the opening under the desk, pulling the chair in behind her as far as it would fit.

  Someone, a soprano someone, called softly, “Bobby? Bobby, where are you? I’ve missed you.” Footsteps receded. The voice muffled, became inaudible. Then suddenly it was right outside the office door.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, are you working?”

  The oblong of light on the rug grew large as the door creaked all the way open. Someone stepped into the room, temporarily blocking the light. A whisper of fabric. The person paused on the other side of the desk, out of Luz’s line of vision. Silence.

  Then a soft shuffle of papers. The woman was looking through Bobby’s correspondence. She might’ve hoped to find Bobby—or pretended to—but she was snooping in the office. Like Luz, an unauthorized visitor.

  Rhythmic thrumming sounded overhead; long fingernails on polished wood. If she were doing that, Luz would be trying to decide what to do. A palm slapped lightly on the desk. Decision made. The woman was on the move, to the side of the desk, inches from Luz’s cramping left leg.

  High heels came into view—long, slender feet in the highest heels imaginable. Carmine toenails. Silky black pants. Gold-link ankle bracelet.

  Alicia! Martin’s assistant. So, Luz thought, she was either keeping an eye on his son or sleeping with him. Maybe both.

  Alicia rounded the desk. If she looked down, she’d see Luz’s knee. Papers swished and crackled. Don’t come closer. Don’t look in the drawers.

  “Hey, baby.” The voice, unmistakably Bobby at his most sultry, sounded practically in Luz’s ear. If she hadn’t been penned in by the chair and desk, she would have splattered on the ceiling.

  Alicia sighed. A rustle of clothing. A tiny metallic click.

  “Where are you?” asked Alicia.

  Where are you? Luz’s tremulous panting was so loud Alicia must hear it.

  Silence, then Alicia again. “Nope, I don’t know where she is. What is it with that drab little nanny? I simply do not get why you insisted—”

  Alicia stopped as though interrupted. Luz understood then. A phone call. Alicia had Bobby’s voice as a ringtone for his calls.

  “Where do you think I am? … Yeah, keeping your bed warm … Oh, cariño, I don’t know if I can … Mmmm, imagine me …” Alicia laughed, low and provocative. “Yeah, you, too. Bye.”

  A click. “Shit,” Alicia said. With one last drum roll of acrylic nails, she walked away.

  The office door slammed. Luz shuddered in sheer relief of being alone. Her elbow banged the chair, and it skidded away.

  Alicia and Bobby. Luz tried to make sense of it: Alicia who worked for Martin spying in Bobby’s office, Alicia undressing in his bedroom, Bobby—Shit, he’d told Alicia he was looking for her. That meant the photographers were done.

  Luz had to get out before Bobby returned. She scrambled out from under the desk, one flash drive in each of her pockets, quickly replaying those panicked seconds before Alicia came in. Positive she’d flung Bobby’s original into the left side, Luz thrust the replacement drive in the zippered pocket and closed the briefcase.

  The living room, empty. The bedroom door, closed. Luz crossed the space in seconds. Down the hall to the stairs. She flung open the stair door and ran right into Bobby.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Luz hit hard, the top of her head banging into Bobby’s chest. As she bounced off, he pitched backward and began to fall. His hands grabbed at her for stability. A grunt of discomfort, then, “What the hell!”

  It took a second of disorientation before Luz connected the dots—the solid flesh she’d encountered, the grunt, Bobby’s voice. Uh-oh.

  “I’m—” Luz’s mind went blank. She had no business on the second floor. The tiny thumb drive in her sweater pocket felt as heavy and round as a bowling ball.

  Think. She heard noises? She smelled smoke? That might do.

  But Bobby had recovered enough to notice something else round and solid. His hands cupped Luz’s breasts.

  “No!” Luz stepped back and put out her hands to ward him off.

  In a single, fluid move, Bobby captured her hands and pushed her against the wall, one hand pinning her arms above. “Yes,” he said quietly as his other hand tightened on her neck. Then more decisively, “Yes.”

  He shoved her chin up and pressed his mouth against hers. His tongue forced her mouth open. The man must be crazy to bother with this kind of macho feel-up to assert dominance. Bobby knew Alicia was in his bedroom.

  Bobby’s mouth released hers, and his tongue and teeth traced her jawline. Luz cried out, “Stop it! Let me go!”

  A searing pain—he’d bit her ear.

  “Shut up,” he whispered into the burning ear.

  His hand left her neck and traveled south. Luz wriggled and twisted. He wrestled with the buttons on her bulky sweater—the drive! When he began to lift her shirt, Luz hunched her shoulders and swung her head, using the top of her skull as a battering ram. This wasn’t a casual grope. There’d been his jittery arrogance before the photo shoot. Bobby was too keyed-up. As Luz writhed, he leaned in harder, immobilizing her with his hips, rigid and pulsing under the fabric of his pants. Dread started as a quivering cold chill in the pit of her stomach, a weakness in her legs.

  Perhaps Bobby was feeling the thrill of a predator with a squirming prey. He might lose interest if she played dead like a small forest animal, so Luz went limp to avoid any contact that might further excite him.

  But Bobby didn’t stop, and he was strong enough to restrain her arms with one hand while wiggling his other under her shirt and pushing down her bra. He rubbed his palm roughly from one breast to the other. Then his fingers closed on h
er nipple, and he began to twist. “No,” she yelled.

  Bobby’s fingers loosened. A second of blessed relief—until the back of his hand smashed her jaw. Her head struck the wall.

  “Yes,” Bobby said with a slow smile, “and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.” His free hand moved down again.

  Now she was icy with fear, and she began to thrash in earnest. There was no one in the stairwell. Only the maids used it regularly, and they were gone for the day. “Help,” she screamed, although the heavy steel doors would muffle her cries.

  Bobby slapped her again. This time, her tongue was caught between her teeth when her head slammed into the wall. Luz tasted blood.

  In the echoing stairwell, there was only the rasp of pounding, percussive breathing, Bobby grunting while he pulled at her clothes. His underarms smothered Luz’s face, damp and malodorous. She twisted her knee to the side and tried for his groin, but she couldn’t get any leverage.

  A quiet ringing joined Bobby’s hoarse grunts. Luz’s first thought was that she was losing consciousness. The sound became louder—a syncopated beee-bahh-beee—and all at once Luz recognized “Bobby.” Alicia was in the hall calling for him. Bobby must’ve heard it, too, for the pressure eased. With a burst of strength born of desperation, Luz swung her elbow into Bobby’s stomach. She ducked under his arm and darted for the door. He stuck out his leg. Luz stumbled toward the door, her momentum sapped.

  “Bobby?” Alicia’s voice was closer. Too close.

  Bobby knocked Luz to the floor with a savage backhand. “See you later.” Bobby settled his clothing, flashed a tight grin, and walked away.

  Luz covered her belly with her hands, shivering, and tried to warm herself. The all-encompassing misery gradually separated into discrete injuries: bruised, battered, lacerated. Bobby had tried to rape her, and he would come after her again. She’d kill him before she’d let him touch her. You will pay.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  After a long while curled into a tight ball in the stairwell, Luz sat up. Hands trembling, she buttoned her sweater and squeezed the thumb drive. Bobby was going to pay.