by Lexie Ray
Those words stung a lot.
“I know that it had nothing to do with me,” I said quietly. “I am just concerned about you.”
“Are you?” he countered. Where was this anger coming from? Each misplayed chord in the symphony I’d wanted this reunion to be jarred against my nerves.
“I am,” I insisted. “I’ve been thinking about you … too much.”
“The feeling’s mutual,” he said, kicking at a pebble. It skittered atop the pavement, and somehow found its way through the chain-link fencing surrounding us.
“I’m glad to see you,” I tried, looking for some way to salvage the sweetness I felt for him, to save this encounter from spiraling further downward. “I did miss you. I wanted you to come back here.”
“So you could earn some more money?” he asked, seeming to casually watch me for my reaction, and suddenly I understood where all of this was coming from.
“You think I played you for the money,” I said, realization dawning over me. “You think that was all this was.”
“I was honest with you about how I felt about you,” he said. “I cared for you — I still do. Can you honestly tell me that you cared about me? That it wasn’t about the money?”
“Like everyone else in this world, I need money to live,” I said, drawing myself up. “This is my job, Xander. This is what I do. When you met me, you understood that. When you hired me to escort you that day, to take your mind off of everything that was happening, you understood that it was business.”
“So it was about the money,” he said, looking sick.
“I can’t say that it wasn’t,” I said. “But I’d also be lying if I didn’t say that there wasn’t something else there. Something real. You made me feel … whole again. Like I’d been missing some piece of me this whole time. Does that make sense?”
He nodded, looking grave. “That makes perfect sense. I felt the same way. I still feel that.”
“But things are just as complicated for me as they are for you,” I said. “I have things in my life that I couldn’t begin to explain to you. Everything’s so tangled it feels like it would take months to get the knots out.”
“Why can’t love be easy?” Xander blurted out, and my face went cold. I couldn’t help but look back on what Jennet had said that morning I’d blundered into the snack shop. Love. I loved Xander, and Xander loved me.
This couldn’t be. This could never be.
“I don’t know about that,” I said slowly, “but friendship sure is easy. I work at this snack shop in the mornings, but maybe I could call in sick and we could finish that bike tour we started. I’ve been wondering what other landmarks we missed out on. Or you could even come by the club and we could go at night together, just like we first met, only I bet the city lights would be beautiful.”
“That’s the thing, Sol,” Xander said. “I don’t want things to be like they were when we first met. I want something more.”
“More?” I echoed faintly, my head swimming.
“I can’t treat this like just some business transaction,” he explained. “Sol, I want to explore a relationship with you that isn’t based on commerce or money. We have feelings for each other that neither one of us has been able to ignore. What’s to keep us from just embracing them? Why would we fight something this real?”
I should’ve been honest with Xander from the beginning, but how was it my responsibility to inform a customer that I was taken, that I could go no further than a friendly business transaction because my heart was taken? How did dancers manage escorts in the same breath as boyfriends? I just didn’t think it was possible to maintain a healthy relationship while working at the club.
I should’ve told him the truth about Antonio that night, right after Xander had told me everything about his wife. I would’ve never had a better chance than then, but I’d disliked the idea of bringing up my boyfriend while in bed with another man.
I took a deep breath and a step toward Xander. If I’d missed my chance then, I’d just have to seize the opportunity now. Maybe there was just no good time or way to say this kind of thing.
“I have to tell you,” I began. “I have a boyfriend. He’s in Cuba right now, but I love him very much and we’re working to get him back to Miami.” That was as close to the truth as I could get right now.
“You have a boyfriend,” Xander repeated, dubious. “And how does he feel about you … doing what you do?”
I swallowed. Antonio had never been happy about what I was doing, but it had been a necessary evil, a way to earn money. I doubted that I would ever tell him just how far it had gone, what I’d had to do to secure his release.
That I’d enjoyed it.
“He knows I do what I must,” I said finally.
“You have to whore yourself?” Xander asked bitterly. “There’s nothing else in this entire city you can do?”
The words hit my like a physical slap. Maybe if I’d finished school, maybe if I had the proper documents to live and work here, maybe if I’d never been born in Honduras, but someplace else — anywhere else — then maybe I’d have a chance to do something different, to be someone different.
But this was my life. This was my life, and it was still better than what it would have been had I remained in Honduras. I didn’t even know if I’d still be living if I hadn’t left.
I wanted to tell Xander these things, but I didn’t want to make excuses. Maybe it would be better if he believed that I was irredeemable, that I did all of this because I wanted to. Then perhaps he wouldn’t torture himself about this and pine away after me. We couldn’t be together. This would be the kindest thing I could do for him.
I opened my mouth to tell him all of this, to set him free, but something entirely different came out.
“I don’t know if this would matter to you, but I’d never escorted before I went out with you,” I said. “You were the first customer I served outside of the club — the first and only.”
Xander considered this for a few long moments. “If it was all about the money, why am I the only one you’ve escorted?”
“It just didn’t feel right after you,” I told him. “I felt something for you that I didn’t want to share with anyone else. I don’t know. That sounds so stupid. I can’t have feelings for you. I have a —”
Xander silenced my babbling with a swift and powerful kiss, and I leaned into him, almost relieved by the contact. How could my head scream no and my heart scream yes, two polar opposites? Why couldn’t it just be simple?
It was Xander who broke the kiss, gently stroking my jaw, holding my face with both of his hands.
“Why can’t I stop kissing you?” he asked softly, his lips nearly brushing mine again. “I understand there are complications, that everything is against us. But for some reason, that makes me want you even more. I don’t know what to do about that.”
“I wish I could tell you,” I breathed. “I wish I could tell myself.”
“Can’t we just be together?” he asked, his voice plaintive, wanting.
It would’ve been so easy just to say yes, to ride off into whatever sunrise beside this man I had such strong feelings for. But it wouldn’t have been right. I couldn’t just abandon Antonio like this, especially when I hadn’t finished paying the ransom.
“Things are too complicated right now,” I said, my heart breaking. Even as my chest clenched, I admonished myself. I didn’t have a right to feel like this. How could I have fallen so hard and fast for a man when my love was miles away? Was I just that weak? That lonely?
“I understand,” Xander said, backing away from me, muscles in his jaw twitching. He looked upset, and I hated that I had been the cause of that. What was rule number one? To be happy.
“Please,” I said, reaching out to him. “Don’t just disappear. I really did miss you. I don’t think I can bear just not hearing from you again, knowing that we’re sharing this city.”
“I don’t know what to do to make you happy, Sol,” he s
aid, his shoulders sagging. “I’d be with you in a heartbeat if you just said yes, but you tell me it can never be and that you can’t be without me in the same breath. Which is it?”
I trembled, paralyzed with indecision. I couldn’t have both Antonio and Xander. That much was abundantly clear. It wasn’t fair to either of them. But I couldn’t make a decision now, not with my head and heart threatening to rip my body apart. It was just too difficult, too painful.
“I don’t know,” I whispered. “Just don’t disappear.”
“I can’t deny you anything,” he said, tracing the shape of my lips with the very tip of his finger, making me shudder at the briefest of contacts. “What’s your cell number?”
I gave it to him, and he punched it on the touchscreen of his phone. Moments later, in my tiny purse that housed my tips, I felt a buzz.
“Now you have mine,” he said, giving me one last searing kiss before leaving the way he came, back through the club.
I watched him go, stunned and hopelessly entrenched in a war of feelings I didn’t think there was a way to win. Antonio might have been battling for his life, and Xander was fighting his own demons, ones I had no way of understanding.
I was fighting my own heart.
Chapter 7
The worst of everything that had happened in my past with my love, was that I didn’t get a chance to say good-bye to Antonio. I hated those people who said they hated good-byes. Good-byes should always be treated as necessities, as essential steps to take to keep yourself sane.
I didn’t get the opportunity to say good-bye to the man I loved more than anyone, and it killed me.
He’d been driving the car to the restaurant one afternoon, pleased to have picked up a shift, thankful at the chance to make more money for us.
But on the way, another car had struck his.
Antonio told me later that the collision had been so minor it was laughable. Our tank of a car had barely suffered a dent on the bumper, and the other car just had a broken headlight. If we’d had such a thing as insurance — meaning we could afford it and had all the proper documentation to obtain it — the other driver would’ve been found at fault, and nothing would’ve happened to us.
But Antonio driving without insurance was just the first issue.
When the police officer arrived to file a report for the insurance, he asked to see Antonio’s driver’s license.
Neither of us had one of those.
Maybe Antonio should’ve lied. Maybe he should’ve told the officer that he’d simply left the license at home, in another pair of pants, and accepted whatever fine or ticket such an infraction incurred.
But, for better or for worse, my love was a good man. He answered all of the officer’s questions truthfully, and another officer was called from the alphabet soup of authorities the United States boasted.
When he didn’t come home that night, I didn’t know who to call or what to do. Attempts to contact him on his cell phone went unanswered. I texted and texted, but to no avail.
Back in Honduras, when someone didn’t come home at night, it was generally safe to assume that they wouldn’t be coming home again. But Miami was different. America was different. Wasn’t it? It had to be, or else what had we fled from? All we’d endured on the journey here — was it for nothing? Was it out of the frying pan and into the fire?
I scraped together some of our precious money and took a taxi to the restaurant.
“No, he never even bothered to show up,” the manager informed me as I bit my fingernails and watched the meter on the cab continue to tick upward. “If you ask me, he’s long gone.”
“Long gone?” I repeated, hoping it was just some slang I didn’t understand yet. This country and its slang was a constant struggle for me. I knew I just had to give it time, but it was difficult to keep up.
“Nobody wants to work at a shitty restaurant all their life, trying to make ends meet,” the manager explained. “I’m betting he decided to strike out on his own, make his own living away from the home life.” He eyed me critically. “How many kids you got at home? Three? Five?”
I blinked several times, confused and a little taken aback. I’d never bring a child into this world unless I knew I could support it, until I was secure and happy and ready. What was this man suggesting?
“We have no children,” I told him, drawing myself up and setting my shoulders. “Antonio should have come here and he should have come home.”
“I don’t know what to tell you, lady,” the manager said. “Maybe he was hitting something on the side. Somebody else? A mistress, maybe?”
I shook my head, my indignation growing by the second. “There was no one else,” I insisted. “We love each other.”
“I’m not the one who needs convincing,” he said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to finish closing this place myself. It’s been a long day. We were short-staffed, you know.”
I snagged his arm as he tried to turn away, unsure of myself, of what I was doing. I didn’t know who to turn to, how to go about searching for my love in a city I was still getting to know. The more I explored it, the bigger it seemed to be.
“I need help,” I said. “Who do I call? Where do I look? I’m worried about Antonio.”
The manager shrugged, dislodging my grip. “Call the hospitals if you’re worried. Call the cops. I don’t know what you want me to do about it.”
He sauntered back to the restaurant, oblivious to the way my heart jumped into my throat. The hospitals? The police? What could have happened to Antonio? Surely not something as serious as either of those options.
I fretted over my dinky cell phone on the way back to the apartment, not sure where to begin my search, my imagination coming up with cruel and worrisome scenarios. Antonio had gotten mugged. Antonio had gotten beat up. Antonio had gotten drunk and lost — even though he had never been a big drinker.
I barely had enough money to cover the taxi ride to and from the restaurant, and certainly not enough to tip the man, who sighed and rolled his eyes at me before driving off in a huff.
Which scenario would be worse? Antonio in a hospital, or Antonio in a jail cell? If he was in the hospital, he was hurt or ill. The bills would mount, and we wouldn’t be able to afford whatever treatment he required. That was bad. But if he was in a jail cell, he was in trouble. Whatever legal services he needed would cost money we didn’t have. What if I couldn’t get the money for his bail? How long would he have to stay there? What had he done in the first place to deserve that cell?
I finally yanked a dusty phonebook from atop the refrigerator and started dialing the numbers that I found within it.
All of my inquiries at the hospital came up with nothing, which relieved me more than frustrated me. I hated the idea of Antonio hurt even if I now had to accept the idea that he could be in trouble.
I bit the bullet and dialed the number for the Miami Police Department. The man on the other end of the line had a kindly voice, but I refused to let myself be fooled. Many of the cops back home in Honduras were even worse than the criminals they were supposed to be protecting us from.
“I am having trouble finding a man,” I said cautiously.
“Is it someone you’re related to?” the officer asked. “Husband? Brother? Father?”
“My boyfriend,” I said, cringing. I hated that word, boyfriend. It seemed so inconsequential. Antonio and I were so much more than boyfriend and girlfriend, but that was the only way I could label our relationship in this language.
“A name would help,” the officer prompted. “Are we filing a missing persons report?”
That sounded very official and worrisome. “I … I don’t know,” I admitted. “I called all the hospitals in the city, but he isn’t there. I am worried.”
“It’s not like him to not check in?” the officer asked.
“He would’ve called,” I said. “I’ve called and called and texted and texted, but he doesn’t answer.”
“What’s his
name?”
“Antonio Lloras.”
“Let’s see here.” The officer was silent for a few long moments. All I could hear was the clacking of his fingers over a keyboard of a computer, the murmur of background noises, another night at the police station. How many calls like this had the officer fielded today? I had to wonder.
“Antonio Lloras,” the officer repeated, startling me. “He was involved in a minor wreck this afternoon.”
“A wreck!” I exclaimed, my hand flying up to my throat. “Is he hurt? I called all of the hospitals!”
“He didn’t have insurance or a driver’s license,” the officer continued, not acknowledging my outburst. “After further questioning, he admitted to being in the country illegally.”
My stomach dropped out from underneath me and I sat down hard on the kitchen floor. Why had he admitted that? We had to keep it secret to be safe and stay undetected.
“We still have to complete some of the steps, yes, but we will be granted asylum,” I babbled, desperate to make this man understand. “We only arrived from Cuba a few weeks ago, and it is hard to save the money for the lawyers to help with the paperwork.”
“Cuba?” the officer asked. “No. Antonio Lloras is from Honduras. He’s in the care of Immigration and Customs Enforcement now, but his car is impounded here.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement? The name made my heart turn to ice. We were in trouble, now. The chill of fear made my teeth clatter together. What would they do with him? Surely they wouldn’t send him back. They couldn’t. Not back to Honduras.
We’d agreed to be from Cuba. Why had Antonio admitted to Honduras? It was easier to stay in the United States if you were from Cuba, and Miami was the perfect cover. Why had he told them about Honduras? Had they beat it out of him?
“Ma’am? Ma’am?” The officer had been trying to get my attention for some time.
“Yes?” I asked faintly. What was I going to do? We’d been so careful. How had all of this fallen apart so quickly?
“I didn’t get your name,” the officer said.
“I didn’t give it to you,” I said, feeling suddenly suspicious. Why did he need my name? Would they call the Immigration and Customs Enforcement for me? As much as I loved Antonio, as much as I wanted to be reunited with him, it couldn’t be in Honduras. I couldn’t go back there. Those men had made that very clear.