Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
Alex rolled into San Antonio with ten grand less than what he’d promised Ruben, along with ink and a second-hand coil tattoo machine stashed in the back of his car. It was time to do the best negotiating job he’d ever attempted.
Most men would be drenched in flop sweat at the thought of walking up to the head of gang’s house with too little cash and no weapons except his hands and his brain. But Alex was ice cold. So fucking frozen that it would take a pickax to chip away at him.
Ruben’s place was actually well kept, with a small patch of trimmed grass in the front. No flowers or girlie shit, but there were no couches or ass-flattened recliners on the front porch either.
Classy.
Alex gave the triple-tap knock that indicated he was one of them.
The door swung open to reveal a kid somewhere between thirteen and twenty wearing a red wifebeater, a flat-brimmed LA Kings cap, and saggy ass jeans. His punk-ass look was accessorized by a Lorcin .380 in his right hand. Kid’s chin jerked up aggressively. “You Tatuaje?”
Tatuaje. He sure as hell hadn’t missed being called Tattoo. Someone he’d been a lifetime ago. “Yeah.”
The kid, who had the crappily inked initials TP on his neck, glanced down at the bag in Alex’s hand as if silently calculating how many twenties could be stuffed inside. The size must’ve met his approval because he made a c’mon motion with the gun and opened the door wider. “He’s in the back.”
Unlike his brother before him, Ruben apparently didn’t keep a house full of cocky homeboys to ensure his personal safety.
Just the door opener and another guy kicked back on the new-looking recliner, watching reruns of Seinfeld.
The second guy looked carelessly over his shoulder at Alex’s escort and said, “You gotta watch this man. I’m laughing my ass off. ”
“In a minute,” Wifebeater Boy said. “Ruben’s got company.”
Reyes Negros, a rival gang in town, must not realize the Tejanos Pintados were getting soft. Alex sure as hell wouldn’t be the one to tell them.
The kid pointed his gun toward a hallway, indicating Alex should walk in front of him. Well, at least they hadn’t lost all sense of self-preservation. Which, strangely enough, relieved Alex. If they’d gotten lazy, that could also put Nicolás’s life in danger from those rival gangs.
Just as it had been from the outside, Ruben’s house was neat and clean. Not like some of the shithouses they’d crashed in years ago. But Ruben didn’t exactly live the high life since Tejanos Pintados wasn’t big enough to rival the gangs that were in bed with the south-of-the-border drug cartels.
They emerged from the dim hallway into a surprisingly bright kitchen. And there, at a rectangular wooden table in the center, sat Ruben. He’d grown a soul patch and had put some bulk on over the years. Then again, so had Alex.
Ruben stood and looked Alex over, sizing him up as well. “Looking good, ese.” A broad grin cracked his initially stoic expression, and he held out his hand for the complicated gang greeting.
Alex responded out of pure muscle memory, going through the hand grips and shoulder bumps as perfectly as if he’d been doing it every day for the past eight years. They pulled back from the pseudo-embrace and Alex said, “Looks like you’ve been packing away the tamales.”
They both laughed because Ruben was in excellent shape, no extra layer around his middle.
But the laughter quickly petered out. Alex wasn’t here to chat and joke. He was here to buy back his brother. Ruben hitched his chin toward the bag in Alex’s hand. “You got what you promised when you called me?”
This was where it all met the road. One about to be black with tire marks and stink of burned rubber. “Most of it.”
Ruben’s face closed down in a blink, and he crossed his arms. “You know that shit don’t fly. Get out.”
“We used to be friends.”
“Friends don’t run away from the Tejanos.”
“Friends don’t kill a friend’s brother.”
“You know I didn’t have a goddamn thing to do with what happened to Javi.”
“Your brother did.”
“It’s a new world. One where it’s a fuckload harder to attract new talent when the big boys can promise more money and more drugs.”
“You could fold and get sucked into one of them.”
“And become no more than a foot soldier. One with a target on his back at that.” Ruben shook his head and paced around his kitchen. “Not happening.”
Alex swallowed and pitched his voice low so the guys in the living room wouldn’t hear. “What about walking away altogether?”
“Like you did, Tatuaje?” Ruben whirled around.
“How’d that work out for you? You’re right back here standing in front of me.
I’m the one with the power. You’re the one on your knees.
A guy like me don’t never get out. I walk away from my boys and they’d just as soon pop a cap in my ass as look at me. ”
Ruben was right. His future was sealed into gang life one way or another, but Nicolás’s wasn’t. “I want to make a deal.”
Ruben’s laugh wasn’t filled with good humor this time—it was tight and flat. “You’ve already screwed the deal.”
“You ever find another guy who can tat you up the way I could?”
One glance at the bag in Alex’s other hand, and Ruben’s eyes narrowed. “What are you saying?”
“That I can set you up right now.”
“Even your work ain’t worth the kinda lana you owe me.”
“How about we call this a deposit? I ink you, you let go of Nicolás, and I’ll send you another grand a month for the next year.”
“How about I take this—” Ruben grabbed the money bag from Alex’s grip, then shoved him in the chest with it, “—and you get the fuck outta my house.”
Greer’s phone rang at five in the morning, which would’ve been jarring had she actually been asleep. As many times as she’d closed her eyes, all she’d been able to see was that last conversation with Alex. Hear him asking what happened when one person didn’t get his prophecy boots.
When he rejected them.
Rejected her.
Still, her heart shifted into overdrive at the thought it could be him on the other end of the phone. She rolled to the edge of her bed and slapped her bedside table for her cell. It slipped from her grasp to crash between the mattress and the table.
“Don’t hang up. Don’t hang up,” she chanted, dropping to her knees to pat around under the bed. “Got you.” One jab of her thumb on the talk button. “Hello?”
“Hello, is this Greer Maddox?” a feminine, slightly accented voice said.
Disappointment so thick swamped Greer that she actually felt sick with it. She clutched a fist to her stomach trying to push it down.
“I am sorry to disturb you. I am calling for Alejandro’s friend.”
Alejandro. Alex. “Wait, wait, wait. This is Greer. I’m Alex’s…” She’d been way more than a friend, but a lot less than what she wanted to be to him. “Who is this?”
“Alejandro’s mamá.”
“Hi, Mrs. Villanueva. Yes, this is Greer, but if you’re looking for him, I hate to tell you that he left Prophecy yesterday and I haven’t heard from him since.
” And she had very little hope she’d hear from him ever again.
Especially since he’d left that simple—and oh so complicated—cream envelope crumpled on the ground.
“No, no. I know where Alejandro is. I need your help to bring him home. He’s about to do something very stupid. Something that will ruin his life. Alejandro is trying to make a deal with Ruben.”
That name froze Greer’s already tight midsection, and her mind spun through the conversations she and Alex had about the gang.
He’d been on the path to redemption for years.
Redemption for his brother’s death. For his part in it.
Only one thing could tempt him back into that life.
Nicolás. Greer clicked on the lamp and twisted her hair. “What kind of deal?”
The breath on the other end was a shaky exhale. ““I don’t know, but they are both gone—my Nicolás and Alejandro.”
“From your house? From the city? Where?”
“Most likely to Ruben himself.”
“Do you have an address?” But she was already grabbing a pair of jeans and a shirt smeared with paint.
“It’s dangerous, especially for someone like you—”
“If you didn’t want me to help, why did you call?”
“When…when Nicolás and I were in Prophecy, I saw the way you looked at Alejandro. You love him.”
God, she loved him so damn much, it was like a switchblade to the heart. She dug a pen out of her purse. “Give me the address.”
After the call from Alex’s mother, Greer wanted to rush out of the house, but she forced herself to make a plan.
Now she knew why he’d stuck around for the competition.
He’d needed that prize money to pay off his old gang.
To try to get Nicolás out of that life. No wonder Alex had been devastated when he lost.
But why hadn’t he come to her? Asked for her help?
Because at the very heart of it, Alex Villanueva was still a loner. Still didn’t believe he deserved to belong.
That was why he hadn’t asked.
She looked at the piece of leather she’d laid carefully on an empty pillowcase last night. He’d left it behind—just as he had her—like so much flotsam. But she knew exactly how much he cared about each piece he created. It couldn’t have been easy for him to abandon it.
And if that were true, maybe it hadn’t been easy for him to walk away from her either.
Maybe he cared more than she’d given him credit for.
And maybe, just maybe, she could bring him back home to Prophecy.
She snatched up the leather and, after a quick stop at Bostick’s for a roll of raffle tickets, headed to her brother’s house.
An hour later, a skeptical Cal and a perky, pregnant Delaney had agreed to help. They’d each taken off in a different direction, with Greer in charge of making the sweep through downtown. Before beating the street, she checked in with Alex’s mother.
“Have you heard from him?”
“No, he hasn’t answered my calls.”