The Slayer (Untamed Hearts #2) (49 page)

Tino thought about that for a moment and then turned back to look at the Russians. “What were you gonna do to him to get those fucking passwords? You were gonna torture my brother after you got done raping my best friend’s woman?”

They would never find out the answer. Two shots rang out as Nova did Tino’s job for him and killed both of the Russians.

Like Tino promised, they were dead almost instantly.

“What the fuck?” Tino and Chuito shouted in unison.

“I’m done with this party,” Nova said as he looked from Tino to Chuito. “Kill that motherfucker, Chuito. We need to go.”

Chuito looked back to Angel, who had tears running down his face, his eyes wide and silently pleading for death. “It’s too easy,” he whispered.

“It wasn’t that fucking easy. It’s gonna go pretty high on my list of shit I wish I could forget seeing.” Nova walked over and pointed his gun at Angel. “Do it or I will.”

Chuito lifted his gun and shot Angel in the face, because chest wounds bothered him ever since Juan.

Angel’s end was grim and dirty—the only way Chuito knew how to do it.

Tino and Nova gave Chuito another moment to just look at Angel’s dead body, before Tino finally asked, “So what do we do now?”

“Russians didn’t give up anything,” Nova offered. “Be pissed off about it when we go outside.”

“What?” Tino snapped. “You want us to just pretend we don’t know Aldo wants you dead?”

“Yeah, that’s what I want you to do.” Nova patted Tino’s cheek. “You don’t want the other players to know you can see their cards.”

“Nova—” Tino started, still sounding horrified, as if the entire day had just completely broken him.

“You think, after I killed his son, that I haven’t been expecting this.” Nova let out a bark of laugher. “It’s okay, Valentino. I’ve been playing Aldo’s game since I was fourteen. Now I get to play my own game. Let me play it. Don’t look so fucking miserable about it.” Nova looked back to Chuito. “Are we good, Chuito? Can we go?”

Chuito glanced to Angel’s body before he nodded. “Yeah, I think so.”

“Then let’s get outta here. Can we meet at your mother’s house? Regroup?” Nova asked. “I sorta need an alibi not just for us, but for my boys too. A gathering at your mother’s would make sense if she can accommodate everyone after they get rid of the bodies.”

Chuito looked to Tino, who glanced away as if the gravity of what he had done slammed into him, and he lost the veil of fierceness he’d been wearing since all this started.

“You didn’t know Junior was on our side,” Chuito whispered to Tino. “You thought you were selling Alaine to buy time.
Actually
selling her.”

“Look, it’s not like I had a lot of great choices. I did the best I could. I knew Nova was coming. That’s why I ran upstairs, to text him. Backup was coming, and even if it wasn’t, I knew we could take ’em if they dispersed a little. I just needed time.” Tino met Chuito’s gaze, his dark eyes glassy. “They were gonna put a bullet in her brain, and they were gonna let you watch her die. Then they were gonna kill you too, and I couldn’t let that happen. To any of us. You’re my brother, Chu. If Nova or Romeo had been in the same situation, if it had been Jules they were gonna shoot in front of Rome, I would’ve done the same fucking thing to prevent it, I promise.”

“You told them about my mother,” Chuito reminded him. “You used that.”

“They’re all dead now. I knew I was gonna kill them. I knew you were gonna help me kill them. Who gives a shit what a buncha dead motherfuckers think?” Tino shrugged as tears rolled down his cheeks. “I couldn’t let you die, but I am sorry. I’m so fucking sorry, Chu. I didn’t want this to happen.”

“Alaine didn’t know,” Chuito choked out. “I didn’t want her to know that about me.”

“I’m sorry,” Tino whispered again and swallowed hard as if he was fighting completely breaking down. “We’re gonna destroy the phones. No one’s gonna know what happened downstairs. That Junior motherfucker didn’t see what happened after he took her up.”

Chuito shook his head and turned to leave. “You can crash at my mother’s place. I own most of the street. We’ll make an alibi for your boys.”

“Chu—” Tino called out.

“Don’t talk to me,” Chuito said as he opened the front door. “You said you were willing to deal with me hating you. So fucking deal with it.”

Chapter Forty-Three

Alaine cried the whole way to Chuito’s mother’s house, and his cousin didn’t say a word. He let her cry like he understood her reasons for it. Not just for the trauma they had all suffered through, but knowing that they had left Chuito behind to deal with everything.

The fear and horror of it made her arms shake, like she was freezing, though it was shockingly warm for October. She didn’t even care that she was going to meet Chuito’s mother for the first time practically naked save Chuito’s hoodie that still had his scent on it.

She was folded over in the seat, crying into her knees until Marcos pulled the truck to a stop and turned it off.

“Ay, bendito. Stay there.” Marcos hopped out of the car in that same quick way Tino was apt to do. Then he came around to the other side, opened her door, and reached for her. “Come on, chica, I got you.”

As horrible as it was, Alaine let him sweep her up in his arms, because she was still shaking and barefoot and crying, and Chuito’s cousin had an oddly soothing way about him.

“What happened?” a woman asked frantically as the front door opened. “Where’s Chu?”

Alaine covered her face with her hands and started sobbing harder.

“Ay Dios mio,” another woman choked out. “
¿Lo mataron? No, lo digas, Marc. Por favor no lo digas. ¿Está muerto mi hijo?
”

“
Cálmese, Tía
. He’s not dead,” Marcos said gently. “He’s coming behind us.” More car doors slammed in the driveway as Marcos walked into the house with Alaine in his arms. “Katie, deal with the boys. Tía, come with me.”

“But Alaine knows me,” Katie argued and then grasped her arm. “Honey—”

“No,” Marcos cut her off. “Katie, deal with the boys.”

“Is she naked under that?” Katie’s voice became low and panicked, and Alaine realized she was terrifying all of them. “What happened at that house? You just said Chu needed help. You didn’t say Alaine was with him. What happened?”

“I’m sorry,” Alaine sobbed, because the last thing she wanted to do was scare anyone else.

“Ay Dios,” the other woman whispered, as if she suddenly understood everything, and then switched to English. “Put her on the bed and then get out.”

“¿Que?” Marcos snapped.

“Get out!” the other woman shouted. “No muchachos! Katie can come in. You can’t. Tell Katie to bring food.”

Marcos laid Alaine on a huge bed and said, “This is my Tía Sofia. She’s gonna take care of you, okay, chica? He’s coming back.” He brushed her hair away from her face, so that Alaine was looking into his light eyes swimming with concern. “I promise you, he’s coming back.”

“Get out!” Sofia shouted behind him.

“You can’t just yell and scream! She’s had a hard day, Tía,” Marcos shot back at his tía and then switched to Spanish.

The two of them had a heated conversation, but all it resulted in was Marcos stepping back closer and closer to the door until Sofia finally slammed it in his face.

Sofia pushed her long dark hair away from her face and turned to Alaine. “Okay, no muchachos. That’s better, right?”

“I—” Alaine stared, because she was honestly stunned at how beautiful this woman was, with light eyes as startlingly blue as Marcos’s were, flawless, tanned skin, and a body Alaine would kill to have. “Um, yes.” She nodded as she fought the tears, and the shaking. “I’m sorry to inconvenience you and, um—”

“Oh, no, chica, it’s okay,” Sofia assured her. “You want to take a bath? A bath makes it better. Yes, you want one.”

“Please,” Alaine agreed because she couldn’t think of anything she wanted more in that moment than a bath, but she need not have bothered, because Sofia was already in the master bathroom, running the water. “What does, um,
tía
mean? Is that
sister
? Does that mean
s-sister
? Are you Marcos’s sister?”

“
Tía
means
aunt
, bendito. I’m his aunt,” Sofia called from the bathroom. “
Mamá
is better, right? Chu loves you. Marc says he loves you. So I like
mamá
, not
tía
. You call me mamá, and I’ll take care of you. That’s why he sent you here. He knows I’ll take care of you.”

“What?” Alaine turned and frowned at the bathroom.

“Is he okay?” Sofia asked as she came out of the bathroom, her light eyes watery. “Did they—” She gestured to Alaine. “Does Chu know they tried to hurt you? They didn’t, though, right? Junior, he helped you. Marc said he helped.”

“Yes, Junior helped. They didn’t do…anything,” Alaine whispered as she frowned at this stunningly beautiful woman, realizing that the argument she and Marcos had in Spanish obviously included a brief recap of what happened at the house. “Are you Chuito’s mother?”

“Yes,” Sofia said like she assumed Alaine had known all along. “Marcos said he sent you to me. Who else would I be?”

“I just—” Alaine was at a complete loss for words. “You’re so young and so pretty and—”

“Gracias, chica.” She smiled as she came to the bed. “You’re pretty too. Very pretty, but it’s not always such a gift. Sometimes it’s a curse. You tell me what happened. Tell me the woman version. You take a bath, and we’ll talk.”

“Okay.” Alaine nodded and got off the bed, finding that her legs were still weak. “I’m usually stronger than this. I don’t know why I’m so shaky.”

“We’re strong.” Chuito’s mother wrapped an arm around Alaine’s waist and walked with her to the bathroom. “We’ll cry together. No muchachos here to know about it.”

After stripping down for Junior, getting naked and crawling into the bath in front of Chuito’s mother wasn’t a big deal, especially because the water was so warm. Sofia had one of those big, luxurious garden tubs, with candles and all sorts of soaps and bath oils decorating the bathroom.

It was like stepping into a spa.

Alaine was grateful when Sofia dumped a copious amount of something oily that smelled of flowers into the bath, making it foam up so fast around her that even if she were prone to being shy at this point in the game, it wouldn’t have mattered.

Alaine just lay back and closed her eyes, appreciating the warm bath in a way she hadn’t before and smelling the flowers that were oddly soothing. “What is that scent?”

“Lavender,” Sofia offered. “It’s good for stress.”

Alaine let out a broken laugh. “There is not enough lavender for the amount of stress I’ve been through in the past twenty-four hours.”

“Yeah, well, it’s a good start,” Sofia said and sat down on the floor on the other side of the tub. Then she reached out and touched the curve of Alaine’s neck. “Did they do that?”

Alaine cupped her neck self-consciously, for the first time remembering the love bites. “No, um, those were—” She felt her cheeks heat. “That was from before.”

“From Chu?”

Alaine second-guessed her decision not to be shy. “I’m sorry.”

“Why be sorry? You know, Chu, I used to worry about him when he was young. He wasn’t like Marcos. So angry. No women. No love. No fun. Only anger.” Sofia sighed. “But he really does love you?”

Alaine nodded. “I think he does, yes. Enough to—” She choked on the words and closed her eyes. “Maybe too much.”

“That’s not your fault. His anger. It’s my fault. Do you know how he got here?” Sofia asked softly.

Alaine nodded, knowing what she was asking. “I do.”

“I didn’t want him to know, but people, they talk.” She looked away, tears brimming in her eyes. “I should have left Puerto Rico before I had him. Gone somewhere that no one knew, but I was young. So young, chica. I needed my family. My sister, she helped me. I moved in with her because it made my mamá so sad to see it. My father too, but my sister, she understood. She loved him like I love him.”

“I’m so sorry about what happened,” Alaine whispered, feeling tears roll down her face when she thought about Tino’s confession in the house. Knowing Chuito was a child of rape and looking at this beautiful, loving woman who gave birth to him was a humbling experience. “But thank you so much for having him. I love him so much.”

“Well.” Sofia gave Alaine a dazzling smile. “I didn’t have him for you. I had him for me. I earned him. I hurt for him, but God gave him to me to make it better. He was my gift. Good things come out of even the most horrible mierda you can imagine. Chu is good. He’s always been good, even if he doesn’t know it. He bought me this house, you know?”

“It’s beautiful,” Alaine said, because from what she’d seen, it was.

“I’m proud of him.” Sofia smiled again. “And I’m happy he found a nice woman. I’ve wanted that for him. I’m sorry this happened to you, chica. To both of you.”

“I’ve loved him for a long time,” Alaine whispered as she looked down at the bubbles. “I didn’t want him to stay in that house. I think he—”

She covered her face with her hand and cried again, knowing that Chuito had lost another part of his soul in that house. She couldn’t get the image of the dead Russian lying on the floor in that bedroom out of her mind. Or the smell downstairs, coppery and pungent, like the scent of death just setting in. She was so glad she didn’t give in to curiosity and look; smelling it had been bad enough.

Then she thought about Chuito’s screams from downstairs, his agony, and knowing that her fake cries for help made it worse for him.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, because she couldn’t seem to stop crying.

“You cry, chica,” his mother said softly. “Cry until he gets here; then you can be strong again. Chu needs you to be strong for him.”

So Alaine cried, and Sofia cried with her, because it was obvious she knew even if no one told her that Chuito had stayed back to kill Angel and whoever else had been left after all that gunfire downstairs.

Katie brought food, but Alaine couldn’t eat it, though she should be starving. Sofia tried to urge her to eat, using the excuse of not wasting food, which was exactly what Chuito would have said.