Javier winked at me and went back down the hall. Camden went to the bar, snatched the booze off the table and then stormed out the front door and into the emptiness of the night, perhaps hoping to drink the rage out of him.
I didn’t know what direction to go. Camden wanted to be alone and I didn’t want to be with Javier.
I sighed and sat down on Alonso’s couch.
And waited.
CHAPTER SIX
“Ellie, do you mind sleeping with me tonight?”
I looked behind me at Violetta. I was pulling Jose up to the motel that Dom had recommended. It was actually a clean-looking place, quite busy, with noise thumping from the bar at the end of the row. That was where Dom had wanted to meet us.
“I’d love to,” I told her.
“If it’s not one Bernal, it’s another,” Javier remarked.
I glared at him though he didn’t seem to notice. Instead, he merely tapped the front of the seat so I could let him out. Camden was still asleep from the alcohol he downed, his head resting against the window.
We had been at Alonso’s for about an hour. Eventually Violetta was brought out to us, high as a kite on morphine and with a sling around her shoulder, protecting the makeshift cast covering her arm. Camden had successfully drunk half the bottle of mystery booze and had lapsed into an even more quiet and introverted state. Alonso didn’t seem to mind, he just wanted us out of his house and gone. I wondered if he really was a doctor, and if so, if he was still practicing. The more I learned about the cartels and the people tied to them, the more their history interested me. I couldn’t imagine someone like Javier being anything else before becoming a drug lord and I couldn’t see him going on to any other career if he had to. This was Javier’s past and future, this was his destiny, and nothing else would ever compare to that.
I certainly never did.
Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t feeling sorry for myself. I knew now what I didn’t know then, that for some people love was never enough. It’s just sad that I had to learn that twice, two lessons six years apart.
Okay, maybe I was feeling a little bit sorry for myself. It was hard not to when I was reminded of what I had with Camden and what my actions had cost me.
We stepped out of the car, Camden slowly stirring awake, and surveyed the area. So far so good. Nothing suspicious, no one out to kill us. Not yet, anyway.
“I’ll get us the rooms,” I said, about to walk off but Javier pulled me back.
“With what money?” he asked.
I pulled out my wallet from my back jean pocket and waved it at him. “There’s more than a few lives in that car, more than a few credit cards. One of them will work.”
He raised his brow. “Perhaps you should start taking inventory of your stuff before you begin making assumptions. You know what happens when you assume, don’t you?”
I rolled my eyes. “Yes, they make an ‘ass’ out of ‘u’ and ‘me’.”
“They get you killed,” he said quickly. He pushed me back slightly and took off for the motel office, tossing over his shoulder, “I’ll get this. And yes, I’ll make sure you and Violetta can share a room together.”
Oh, of course, like he was letting us. The ass always had to be in control.
I turned to see Violetta and Camden standing beside each other and leaning against the car in matching poses, her dark skin glistening in the heat of the night, his body, strong yet tired. Both of them were a little f**ked-up in the head at the moment, their eyes glazed, their half-smiles loopy. I had to admit, I was kind of envious. It would be nice to be oblivious to the shit going on around me at every given turn.
Javier did have a point though. Once he came back with the room keys – Violetta and I were sharing one but Camden and Javier had separate rooms, thank god – I decided to take everything out of my trunk and start going through them. My aliases needed organizing. If we ever did return to America, I’d have to choose a new life to live, a new person to become.
I was exhausted thinking about it.
Maybe, just maybe, I could pick one life and stick with it for a long time.
I looked over at Camden who was helping take stuff into my room, Ziploc bags of license plates, boxes of falsified papers, IDs, checks. This new life felt entirely dependent on one thing.
Him.
The motel room was a lot nicer than the one we stayed at before. Sort of a Best Western, middle-ground quality of place. No roaches on the floors, no geckos on the wall. Shit mattresses, I discovered as I pounded my fist on the bed, but I didn’t care.
Camden had just put the final box on my bed, Violetta sprawled out on hers in a state of drug-induced euphoria, when I noticed Javier lingering at the doorway.
“I’m going to be meeting Dom in about twenty minutes,” Javier said to me. “Is that enough time for you to get ready?”
I frowned and he quickly added, “You know he’ll want you there, if this is going to get anywhere. I figured you might want to shower and look nice.”
He rapped his fingers along the doorframe, his mouth opening as if to say something else, then he turned and walked off.
Camden eyed me. “I’m going with you.”
“You might be kind of drunk, Camden,” I told him, though the determination in his voice warmed me like the finest cognac.
“I’ve never felt better,” he said, enunciating each word. His eyes, my god they were still such a clear f**king blue, even in the pallid light of the hotel room. They bore into me with such startling clarity, sending shivers down my back like trailing fingertips. He would be coming with me.
I wished he’d be coming in me. A vision of us in this hotel room, alone, him nailing me to the bed, the headboard banging, slammed into my head.
“Are you okay with that?” he asked.
I suppressed the thought, the flare of heat between my legs, and smiled quickly. “Yes, of course.”
Meanwhile Violetta’s head flopped to the side, her arm still bound to her stiffly in the sling, and started snoring lightly. I motioned to her. “Do you think it’s safe to leave her here?”
He watched her for a few moments, blinking a few times, before saying, “I think she needs to sleep it off.” He went and sat down on my bed. “I’ll be here when you get out.”
I grabbed my bag of clothes I had brought out of the car and brought it into the bathroom. I had a quick shower, trying to rub off all the grime – both real and imagined – with the flimsy hotel soap, then picked through my clothes. Everything that had been in my trunk was musty and wrinkled, some even dirty. I had a packet of unopened (and decidedly unsexy) Hanes underwear, a bra, another pair of jeans, a pair of gladiator sandals that I thought were dressy enough, a pair of Timberland hiking boots, a plain white tee shirt, a couple of wife-beaters, a coral-colored blouse, a plaid shirt, and a light blue tank dress that went to the ground. I wasn’t exactly known for my fashion sense and even with the cherry blossoms covering the scars on my leg, bringing me beauty that I didn’t have before, I didn’t see myself branching out anytime soon. Dressing up in my old clothes for Javier hadn’t exactly helped either.