Chapter 11 #2
Once Humberto was in Bogotá, he got “lost” in the system for a while—Tío Enrique sentenced him to house arrest for the rest of his life.
The government was happy to see the end of a civil war within the ruling Cartel family—ours has always been the Cartel, and that’s why people think to challenge us.
“You’re lucky Papá and Tío Enrique are benevolent because you’ve been breathing for thirty-six years longer than you should’ve. Domingo’s dead because he refused to take defeat as graciously as you did.”
By graciously, I mean Humberto begged like a little bitch to live and cowered with his tail between his legs.
He was decent at running the low-level street hustles and overseeing our local business.
After Tío Matáis, Tía Catalina, and Alejandro moved to Queens, it was Tío Esteban who ensured Humberto followed orders.
He still lived in Bogotá with Tía Luciana and Tres J’s.
“Domingo’s dead because he broke his promise. He wasn’t the one who gave the information that allowed me to trap Josue and watch him die.”
“You didn’t even do that yourself. You didn’t have the huevos, so you hired someone else.”
Humberto shrugs but otherwise ignores my interjection.
“Because he wasn’t the one to give me what I needed, his debt remained unpaid.
Domingo figured if Esteban hadn’t wooed Luciana away, he would’ve gotten what he needed first. He was also pissed he couldn’t fuck Luciana anymore. I guess she was a good lay.”
“That’s your sobrina you’re talking about, you sick fuck.”
I switch to a metal pipe and bring it down on his sternum. He wheezes for a moment before grunting.
“Domingo shot at Luciana while she was in the car, leaving the party where she chose Esteban over him. It was a bulletproof vehicle, so Esteban didn’t kill him.
He drained his bank accounts instead. However, when he cornered Luciana one day and tried to force himself on her, he signed his death warrant.
Esteban killed him. His debt to me was still there. ”
I consider what he hasn’t told me as he rehashes history I already know.
I let him speak since he loves to hear his own voice.
Given the chance, he’ll tell me what I want to know simply because he’ll come up with more to say to keep the conversation going.
He thinks it’s buying him time to strategize an escape.
No prisoner comes down here and leaves as anything besides ash.
“Ernesto paying you monthly wasn’t enough recompense, was it?”
“Not once I discovered his granddaughter trained as a chemist in the States. She came back here because her mother had cancer a few years ago.”
That’s not something I wanted to have common with Flora.
“She trained to be a pharmacist instead because it gave her a less stressful job with more flexible hours to help her mother.”
“You decided the debt wasn’t about the money but the control. You forced Domingo to work for you, but you didn’t get what you wanted out of that. Rather than continue to extort Ernesto, you insisted Florencia work for you. It was still trading information.”
“You were always the smart one of your generation.”
There isn’t a man among my cousins and me who didn’t attend an Ivy League or Top Tier university on merit.
All the members of the Four Families earned their spots at the most competitive and rigorous universities in the States.
No parents bribed their kids’ way in with a massive donation or by being a legacy.
We all understand the value of education and networking, so we made sure we had the best of the best.
“Except you’d made sure los Aguilar never paid off the debt. You’d keep demanding more if you could. Ernesto decided to keep his money and sell his granddaughter to you.”
“It was working out well.”
“Was it, though? You didn’t have the finished product.
Florencia hadn’t even brought you a big enough sample to offer a buyer.
You don’t know where the lab is, so you’d still need her if you wanted the product you paid her to create.
The biggest problem you have now is that you’ll be dead before dawn.
Everything you smuggled and invested in trying to deal behind Tío Enrique’s back was for nothing. ”
He remains quiet because he knows I’m right.
We found out what he was doing, so Tío Enrique ran out of patience.
My job was to come down here, find the labs, get the product and recipe, then kill Humberto.
No one in my family will force Flora to reveal the location or formula because we won’t intimidate her.
I hope she volunteers it, but I won’t manipulate her to get it.
“You never got over the idea that Tío Esteban betrayed you and that killing Domingo took your bloodhound from you. Why’d you wait so long to have Tío murdered?”
“The fucker was too hard to kill. I tried over and over, but he kept finding out my plans. Ernesto wanted revenge even more than me. He happily took my money and passed it along to the men who finally got your tío. As usual, my hands were clean if anything went wrong since I didn’t hire anyone myself.
I realized the only way I could get him was while Tres J’s were nearby.
The mercenaries knew not to hurt them because no women and children, but the threat was enough to make Esteban expose himself to protect his sons.
He died thinking he was protecting them. ”
“If no women and children, then why’d you let men go after Tía Luciana and try to force her into remarrying? Try to assault her? Why let the street gangs you could’ve controlled attack Tres J’s?”
“Nothing happened to them.”
I flick open the knife I carry in my pocket while walking around to the other side of the table. I stab him in the shoulder.
“You sick fuck. You forced my cousins to kill to protect each other and themselves before they were even out of elementary school. You forced them to kill to protect their mother.”
“I needed to know whether they’d make excellent soldiers one day. They do.”
“They were never going to work for you!”
My temper is getting the better of me. But I know what my cousins endured living down here without a father.
They have personas they developed once they moved to the States.
They thought they needed them to protect themselves like they would’ve needed them down here.
The other three families say they’re psychopaths and other shit like that.
We’re all something like a sociopath since we commit crimes and do heinous shit without remorse, knowing we’ll keep doing them.
But Javier is an introvert; Joaquin is shy; and Jorge has social anxiety. They’d all rather stay home than do anything else. That’s what Humberto’s plan did to them.
“They would’ve if Luciana married a man I chose. She would’ve had no choice but to let them if she wanted a peaceful home life with a man who treated her properly.”
“You really are stupid as fuck. The moment any man tried to hurt her around her children or targeted her children, she would’ve killed him.
She killed men to protect them. That’s why they moved to New York.
Besides, there’s no chance in hell she’ll ever remarry.
She’ll never move on from Tío Esteban. He was her soulmate.
She’d never force a man to live with her husband’s ghost in their marriage, and she’ll never give another man room in her heart. ”
There’s one more thing I want to know.
“You put a bounty on Florencia’s head. Make your last words to the outside word a command to call it off.”
“It’s far too late for that. There’s no way I can reach everyone who’s heard about it.
It’s on the dark web. Any mercenary who knows how to access shit like that has seen it by now.
There’s nowhere you can take her that’s safe.
She’ll spend the rest of her life looking over her shoulder.
You can’t protect her. You’ll fail like your father and tío did protecting my brother.
You’ll fail like your father and tío did protecting Esteban.
When you have to live with that, you’ll know that in the end—even when I’m dead—I still won. ”
“All you’ve done is shut yourself out of the most powerful family in Latin America.
You’ve spent decades in near solitary confinement rather than enjoying the freedom the rest of us have had.
You ate the food my tío allowed. You slept in the bed my tío allowed.
You breathed the air my tío allowed. Now you will die by the hand my tío allowed. You went after my woman.”
“Your family and your soulmates.” His voice drips with disgust.
“They are my family. You’re not part of it.”
I slice his throat from ear to ear, severing his jugular and carotid arteries. It geysers, splattering me. As it gurgles from his mouth and dribbles down his chin, his eyes dim. I lean in close, so the very last sound he hears—besides his own spluttering—is my voice.
“That’s why I feel no guilt killing you. You stopped being a Diaz the day you plotted my abuelo’s death.”
“Is it done?”
“Not yet, chiquita.”
Not the response Flora wanted.
She burrows against my chest, and my arms tighten around her.
I rub her back as I kiss the top of her head.
I practically scrubbed myself raw in the barracks’ shower.
I craved feeling my chica in my arms, but I wouldn’t go near her without being sure nothing lingered to remind her of what I did.
If she was watching the security screens, then I’m certain she saw how I came out of the basement.
Seeing it on a monitor is far different from seeing someone else’s blood on a person you want to touch.
As secure as this home is, I don’t need to leave any trace evidence either.
“Are we still safe here?”
“Yes, because no one else can find this place. I spoke to the head of security at Humberto’s estate. Apparently, he bribed some state official to use his private helicopter. The men who accompanied him weren’t our guards, but men on loan. It’s why we didn’t question them.”
Before we killed them.
“But he still left the estate. Did he tell anyone where he was going?”
“Our team leader said the helicopter arrived unexpectedly, tore up half the garden, and barely touched down before Humberto ran out. The guard had never seen Humberto move that fast, and the guard started working for Tío Enrique when he was in his twenties and is now in his fifties. As far as we’ve determined, no one on the inside helped him. It’s an ongoing investigation.”
In other words, we haven’t finished interrogating every guy who works on the estate. If we find anyone helped Humberto, the guy will pay for his crimes just like the others did. Whoever the official was is now on the short list for a death march.
“Could he have told the man he borrowed the helicopter from where he was going?”
“Possibly. The only way they found the compound was from Humberto telling the pilot where to go. We run signal and radar jammers around the clock. The property doesn’t exist as far as any local or national records show. But there’s the slim chance, so we need to leave.”
“New York?”
“Definitely not. Humberto ran many things down here for us, so he has connections around the world. He ran New York while my tío and father were in boarding school, then university. Since his banishment, Tío Enrique’s given him specific tasks to oversee several parts of our day-to-day business.
It was the condition of his house arrest. He knew if he didn’t remain useful, there was no reason to keep him around.
He told your abuelo he’d forgive the debt in exchange for you.
He believed you working for him would give him a leg up over us by undercutting our sales.
If he could do that, he thought he could outmaneuver us.
He realized this last stunt—especially involving you—made him redundant now. ”
Redundancy. The excuse corporations use to lay off people.
Here, it meant Humberto’s death regardless of the hit.
That just confirmed there was no way for him to escape the inevitable.
Flora’s probably wondering what information I got from Humberto before he died.
I made a couple calls before I left the barracks and learned more than what Humberto confessed.
I can’t tell her it was more than just about her family.
I consider sharing the full extent of her abuelo’s involvement.
“Pablo, please tell me what you learned about my family.”