Chapter Forty-Seven
"Did you hear something?" Marisa asked her mother, who had quietly attempted to sneak into the kitchen unnoticed. Marisa had just plopped down on the sofa, hoping to take her mind off the fact that Michael was flying into a possible hornet's nest south of the border. She realized the noise might have been the product of the area's latest spring storm.
“I'm sorry, Marisa, I didn't hear anything other than the thunder and storms outside.” Emilia poured a glass of juice. “Would you like anything, dear?”
Marisa heard the question but was in a foul mood and chose to ignore it. She was frustrated and powerless, not knowing the exact whereabouts or fate of her husband, despite his promise to text or call her as often as he could. And she really didn't want to deal with the ongoing saga with her mother.
“I know you must be thinking about Michael. I am as well,” Emilia said in a quiet voice.
The storms grew stronger as winds howled and trees swayed. Marisa searched for a distraction and picked up the remote control. Shit. The satellite was out. She clicked a number of channels, but white snow covered the screen.
Marisa trolled the house, longing to find a project to occupy her mind. She felt the watchful eye of her mother at every corner, although Mama Emilia never moved out of her living room chair, reading her book, a new novel about Irish Americans.
“Okay, Mother, I can't deal with this silent treatment.”
Emilia put down her reading glasses, closed her book, and looked up at her daughter.
“I only want to support you during this difficult time for you, Michael, and even Arthur,” she said with more feeling than Marisa wanted to hear.
“Then why did you keep this secret all these years?”
“You're an adult, Marisa, and I think you know how difficult it is to deal with certain items that hurt you or cause you to look in the mirror.”
Marisa walked slowly towards her mother, who rose out of her chair. They locked eyes and Emilia reached up and touched Marisa's face. Marisa felt a lump in her throat, realizing that her mother's affection was something she'd missed for too many years. Emilia took a step forward and hugged her daughter like she was six years old.
“It's just been so difficult to think about, Mama, realizing my father was a drug smuggler. It's going to take me a while. But I guess I wanted to say thank you for telling me now. And, thank you for seeing beyond this secret to help Arthur and Michael,” Marisa said through her sniffles.
“I did it for you especially,” said a red-eyed Emilia.
“For me,” said Marisa, acknowledging her mother's love.
***
Emilia hadn't cried in a lifetime, but as she held her daughter tightly, it took her back many years, before the unyielding guilt and all the other complications that had eroded her emotions. She loved her daughter more than life itself. Tears streamed down her face. Marisa's head popped back, appearing surprised at her mother's reaction.
“I think it's raining more inside than outside,” joked Marisa. “Let me get us some tissues.”
Emilia's thoughts of unconditional love for her daughter were quickly replaced with enormous shame. She had been living a lie for years now, increasing her wealth at the expense of drug users. How would Marisa ever be able to process that information? She could never know.
Suddenly, Emilia was jolted by a horrific realization—she had forgotten to reach out to her former employer to call off tonight's drug delivery to her historic home. Enrique's new team was also due in about the same time. Her eyes didn't blink. She had to make an important call immediately, one that would hopefully avoid a bloody confrontation.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Having washed up and eaten a handful of crackers to settle her stomach, Andi eventually made her way past the crazy kids in the hallways of the hotel to join Summer and friends at the pool. A quick spring storm had roared through the area and the blaring sun made her thankful that she'd remembered her sunglasses, not the most stylish, but very effective.
“Hey, you coming or not?” asked one of the girls in Summer's entourage as Andi approached.
“I thought we were hanging poolside.” Andi began to take in the lunacy surrounding the pool area. Kids, mostly drunk boys, jumped off huts into the pool, while anyone wearing clothes were quick targets to get tossed. Beer cans littered the walkway and lawn. And someone had even dropped a live tortoise in the deep end.
The girls headed to the beach just a hundred yards away. The teenagers laid out their towels and began to reapply their SPF-20 sunscreen. Andi searched through her bag for her higher level SPF sun block. Then she noticed the girls unhooking the tops to their bikinis while lying face down, asking for another friend to work in the sunscreen.
“Andi, do you mind, sweetie?” A brunette motioned to the undercover reporter, moving her hair to one side. Andi was shocked to see bulging breasts squeezing out the sides as the girl lay on her stomach. Two other girls followed suit with the same bulging breast result. She couldn't believe it. These girls looked like twenty-five-year-old swimsuit models, and here she was with her perky B cups.
“Would you mind doing the same?” Andi asked, trying to fit in, and she closed her eyes. As the oil went on, she noticed the girl's hands were much rougher and more firm than she would have thought. Then she heard a giggle. She saw a couple of the girls bounce up and put their hands over their mouths. Andi immediately turned around and was shocked to see a boy she'd never seen before grinning ear to ear like he'd just pulled off the biggest prank in the Western hemisphere.
“Excuse me,” Andi said, almost sounding a bit prudish. “If you want the fingers on those hands to remain attached to your hand, I'd take your paws off me, you little prick.”
She couldn't believe she'd said it. Maybe it was the rough night or her more instinctive defense mechanism kicking in. Who knows, but the boy backed off like she had an STD. In the background, a couple of other hormonal boys walked by and heard the interaction.
“Hey girl, I like your style. You don't take shit from anyone.” Zachary pulled down his sunglasses for a second. He popped them back in place and kept walking, apparently hoping Andi and the other girls would take notice.
Really, thought Andi? The Joint Boy actually thought he had a chance with her. Not surprising, given her newly developed reputation for being weak-kneed. Maybe, however, that wasn't a bad thing. She pondered the situation further. It's possible the drug crowd might think she was vulnerable, easy prey. Bring it on, she thought. Sly like a fox.
Chapter Forty-Nine
My first recognizable sign of life was loud voices from outside the plane.
“Usted arruino mi campo marijuana.” I had no clue what the person was yelling, but the sound of a voice meant we were stationary, on the ground, and alive.
I opened my eyes and realized I was lying face down on the carpeted floor of the plane, which was resting at a rather severe angle. I must have blacked out, but had feeling in my limbs and I could breathe. This wasn't a dream or some weird afterlife. I was alive and, I think, well.
I raised my head slowly, still hearing the person outside yelling from various spots around the plane. My body was intact, although my left forearm was sore, and I felt a rug burn on my forehead. Not too concerned about my lack of gracefulness while falling to earth, I tried to lift myself off the floor, putting my weight on my arms and shoulders. Shit. Better move all my weight to my right arm.
I got to my knees and noticed the small, round windows busted out, with what looked like tree limbs protruding through the jagged openings. I guess we landed in the jungle? Quickly, I turned my thoughts to Arthur and Francisco.
“Arthur, Arthur, are you okay?” I nudged my boss, my friend, who was still buckled in his seat. Without moving another muscle, both of his eyes opened instantly. He looked left and right, then focused on me.
“Michael, you're here. I'm here. We made it,” he said, wiping his face with his hand and touching his chest. He
tried to unbuckle his seat, but it was stuck. I tugged on it for a minute—jammed. I looked up front, wondering if I'd see Francisco moving or, God forbid, slumped over in his seat. He wasn't visible, so I crawled to the cabin, and he was nowhere to be found. Holy shit. The windshield had a gaping hole in it. He'd probably been thrown outside, but who knows if it came when we were still moving, or even worse, while in the air.
I scooted over to the cabin door and tried to open it, but it wouldn't budge. I then used my legs, with Arthur providing encouragement as he sat glued to his seat. The door slammed open, and I jumped about six feet to the soil. The pain in my arm shot to an eight on the Michael pain-Richter scale after being jarred from hitting the ground. I wondered if I'd broken it. I held it close to my body, trying to lessen the shaking. I realized the yelling I'd heard moments ago had subsided. Now, I heard more Spanish, possibly two people? I walked around the plane.
“Hola, Francisco!” I yelled out excitedly, walking over to the veteran pilot who guided us safely to the ground. He was speaking to another person, most likely the person yelling earlier. Thankfully, the scene appeared calm. As I approached the pair, Francisco turned, and I saw him holding a blood-soaked towel to the left side of his head.
“Man, are you all right?”
“Si, yes, I think so. I think the cut is pretty deep, and I've got a headache to go along with it.” He pulled the towel away to show the nasty gash.
“Is everything going to be okay?” I said, as my eyes shifted to the other man.
Francisco put his arm on the other man's shoulder.
“Si, after speaking with mi amigo, I realized we knew each other.”
“Back from your first life, as you call it?” I jumped in.
“Yes, my first life,” he said solemnly.
Francisco asked his old buddy for directions to the nearest town.
“He said we have about a three- to four-hour hike ahead of us. We have to travel over a mountain and a lot of it will be through a jungle-like forest,” Francisco interpreted.
“Can you ask to borrow one of his vehicles?”
“I did, but he only has a tractor and a mule.”
I noticed the jungle surrounding us, although the plane had cut a nice swath through the thick vegetation.
“By the way, what was the gentleman yelling about?” I said, as we stepped to the side.
“We ruined part of his marijuana field.”
“Wow. Amazing,” I said. “But he's okay now?”
“Once we realized we'd worked together many years ago, he calmed down. Then, he admitted that he had about two hundred acres of marijuana plants, and we only cut down a couple of acres. It was a hard landing.” Francisco peered back toward the sky where the clouds had broken apart and the sun peered through. “But now the sun will make it more difficult for us to hike. High humidity.”
“Hello, is anyone out there?” came a voice from the plane.
“Shit, I almost forgot. Arthur is stuck. His seatbelt is jammed.”
Francisco quickly joined me as we helped each other climb back into the aircraft.
“We didn't forget about you, Arthur. Just making sure the locals aren't going to revolt against us,” I said.
“Any ideas on how to get me out of this damn thing?” he said, still struggling with the buckle.
“Stand back,” ordered Francisco.
Out of nowhere, we saw a silver flash fly down toward Arthur's seat, slicing the buckle in half.
“Jesus, Francisco, you could have told us you have a frickin' machete,” I remarked.
The old pilot chuckled, sliding his hand along the wide-bladed sword.
“This will actually be quite useful as we make our way through the jungle,” he said, then grabbed the towel and pressed it against the wound on his head.
Arthur and I both tried to get a signal on our cell phones, but neither of us saw any bars on the mini screens.
“It probably won't work out here,” Francisco warned.
We each grabbed what we could carry, with Arthur's backpack the most precious item...that and a lot of water for the long, arduous hike ahead of us.
“If we wait here for a while, won't the authorities eventually try to rescue us?” Arthur inquired as we stood before the mountain and its jungle.
Francisco laughed. “Realize what you're saying, Arthur. This is a foreign country. If they find us, and they search us and find you with five hundred thousand in cash in the middle of a marijuana farm...well, have you seen the inside of a Mexican jail? I have, just once. It's not pretty, and your money and your wife would be gone.”
Francisco's words of experience and wisdom, along with his heroic effort to land the plane in the gravest of circumstances, provided me comforting evidence that our former drug runner was a man of integrity. And now that our original plans had gone to shit, we'd have to lean on him more than ever.
Chapter Fifty
“Wanna blast a roach?” the redheaded girl asked as Andi and a couple of her high school buddies casually walked down the hotel hallway. Their next door neighbor seemed quite friendly, but Andi kindly declined. That one experience with Zachary was enough experimentation for a lifetime, she thought. Plus, this girl couldn't even wait until it was dark before lighting it up? Jesus.
“Big plans tonight,” Summer said as she and the others put their faces on and debated their attire.
“We actually going to eat dinner tonight?” Andi asked her three other roommates, then cursed herself. She did it again. She knew she sounded more like Aunt Andi than a true peer to the teenage kids.
“Tonight, it's all about the party. It's going to be awesome!” Summer declared to her legion of followers. Andi tried to understand how it would be different than any other night, which made her curious.
Each of the girls must have tried on about five outfits, swapping pieces and parts with each other. Andi tried to fit in, although she would have rather settled on a pair of shorts, a T-shirt, and flip-flops. And as they traded and bartered their attire, Andi couldn't exactly fill out the top half of the garment like the other girls. By the time they finished, the Bulging Breast Brigade looked more like the scantily clad dancers on Dancing with the Stars.
“Slinky and slutty,” said one of her roommates, who showed her true level of maturity by high-fiving the other roommate.
Andi went to the bathroom, if for nothing else, to enjoy the evening's final moment of silence. While there, she felt compelled to check in with her associate publisher and editor.
S-break = constant party, no surprise; big boob job crowd! Look and dress like 25, but act 14; hope 2 mk p-gress 2nite; More ltr. A
Andi took another look in the mirror, played with her hair, and washed her hands. As she reached for the doorknob, she received a reply on her text message.
Keep up good work. Be careful. Brandon
The intern-turned-undercover reporter took in a deep breath and realized she felt her first true professional connection. After waking up naked in a tub and having to rely on her teenage roommates to provide the sordid details on how she got in that position, the association with her journalistic purpose, her foundation, had faded a bit. It was funny how a few supportive words could help her reestablish her base and her link to a saner world back home. She knew this was part of growing up in the professional world. Yet, given the numerous teenage drug deaths that had plagued the community in recent months, and the risks she was taking—more than Michael and Brandon would ever find out—Andi didn't have the luxury of cutting her teeth over time, like many young reporters.
With the repercussions from last night's binge still fresh on Andi's mind, the group of partiers headed out. As a welcome, albeit brief, surprise, they actually stopped at a restaurant prior to hitting the hot party of the night.
“Here's the plan. Let's see how many shots we can down before we hit the ground running at the party,” said one girl, cramming down chips and salsa.
“Or hit the table sniffing,” said a
n unknown voice. Andi peered around the massive table of high schoolers, trying to determine who'd made the statement. As she looked around, she noticed Coach Wilson at one adjoining table, along with his top soccer player and a few other girls. From Andi's vantage point, she could see him rummaging through what looked like a man purse and, somewhat discreetly under the table, handing out what looked like baggies of joints. Something to add to her story for Michael and Brandon.
Was it possible that the coach was the ultimate drug supplier for all of these teenagers? Could he have killed Courtney after having sex with her? Andi studied him for a few minutes. He really seemed like a loser who used marijuana to infiltrate the younger crowd and, ultimately, try to have sex with the naïve young girls.
There goes his hand. Holy shit, he's actually running his fingers between Carlie's legs...and she's not stopping him. Actually, she's reciprocating!
Andi couldn't believe how bold they were. Maybe it was their drunken state of mind, maybe a sense of fearlessness, or just the fact that they were in a foreign country with no authoritative control. Still, she found it startling that Carlie, and especially the coach, wouldn't wonder what would be said after the spring break trip. Maybe it was true...what happens in Vallarta stays in Vallarta.
Chapter Fifty-One
The three of us entered the town of La Lima, haggard and searching for more substantive food and a ride into Puerto Vallarta. As the only speaker of the local language, Francisco, while trying not to raise suspicions, queried numerous villagers. Perhaps our appearance was a detracting factor—all three of us had scratches on our faces and arms and torn clothing from the rough terrain and dense vegetation. Francisco had his deep cut on his head, and I'd made a sling out of an old T-shirt so that my left forearm wouldn't be knocked around.
GREED Box Set (Books 1-4) Page 39