Chapter 18 Nina
Nina
Tuesday morning arrives with a marine layer so thick I can barely see the jacaranda tree from my office window. The fog makes everything feel muffled, suspended—appropriate for a day where I’m supposed to balance therapeutic integrity with intelligence gathering.
I’ve been up since five, reviewing the CIA’s “suggested conversation prompts” for the third time. They’re even worse than I remembered:
“How do you assess reliability in your professional associates?”
“What contingency plans exist for operational disruptions?”
“Describe your current business infrastructure.”
They read like an HR exit interview written by someone who learned English from technical manuals. I set the list aside and check my phone instead.
Nothing from Chris. Nothing from Wyatt.
They’ll both be at Mason’s tomorrow night. I’ll have to tell them about the pregnancy, the abortion, the sterilization scheduled for Friday. The weight of that conversation sits in my chest like swallowed glass.
But Friday is relief. Finally closing a door I should have locked years ago. The consultation was yesterday, straightforward and judgment-free. Dr. Keaton’s colleague, Dr. Cruz, went through everything carefully. Tubal ligation. Permanent. Irreversible.
“Are you certain?” she’d asked, not in challenge but in professional obligation.
“I’ve never been more certain of anything in my life.”
Three days. Then this particular sword stops hanging over my head.
Darius knocks gently. “They’re here.”
I smooth my blouse and stand. Professional smile. Steady hands.
The door opens and they enter with that same synchrony, but something’s different today. Vicente seems lighter, almost excited. Arturo appears contemplative, his pale eyes taking inventory.
“Gentlemen.” I gesture to their usual spots. “How are things?”
“Exciting,” Vicente says, settling into the sofa. His energy is brighter, almost boyish. “We’re planning Thanksgiving.”
Arturo sits beside him, closer than last week. “Our first one together in thirty years.”
Vicente’s grin widens. “Elena is furious with us for trying to help in the kitchen. We offered to make the turkey ourselves and she looked at us like we’d suggested burning the house down.”
“Elena?” I prompt.
“She manages the household,” Arturo explains. “Has for decades. But she is not adjusting well to us wanting to be involved rather than just... present.”
“We’ve been relegated to setting the table,” Vicente adds with mock solemnity. “And even that requires supervision.”
“She did give us the guest list, though,” Arturo says. “Complete control over who gets invited.”
Vicente’s grin turns mischievous. “Which she may come to regret. We’ve been adding names all week.”
“How many people are we talking about?” I ask.
“Twenty,” Arturo says. “Maybe twenty-five. Elena’s family, Celeste and her partners, Mason and Callie with Zoey, Elle and Toni if they’ll drive up from San Diego—”
“And you,” Vicente interjects smoothly. “If you’re free.”
I blink. “I’m sorry?”
“Thanksgiving,” he says, like it’s obvious. “You should come. Bring whomever you’d like.”
Arturo nods. “Elena always makes enough to feed an army. One more won’t make a difference.”
I keep my expression professionally neutral despite the boundary violation alarm bells going off in my head. “That’s very kind, but I’m not sure—”
“Think about it,” Vicente says easily. “The offer stands.”
They move on before I can formulate a proper response, and I file it away as a joke, a throwaway comment not meant to be taken seriously.
“So Elena manages the household,” I say. “Tell me about her role.”
Arturo’s expression softens. “Elena has her own house on the property. She has been with us since we built the compound in the late eighties—started as the housekeeper, but became family. After Lola was killed, Elena stepped in to mother Celeste.”
Vicente shifts slightly in his seat.
“She has been the constant,” Arturo continues. “She kept the household running, kept Celeste grounded when everything fell apart.”
“And your daughters,” I prompt, watching Vicente’s discomfort grow more visible. I already know about Celeste, Toni, and Elle from the wedding, but the tension in Vicente’s reaction makes me want to understand the dynamic better.
“Three daughters,” Arturo says, and there’s unmistakable pride in his voice. “Toni is mine and Elena’s. She and Celeste grew up together—inseparable since they were babies.”
“And Vicente’s arrival has changed the household dynamic,” I prompt gently.
Arturo’s expression shifts—guilt edged with resignation. “Elena has... struggled with the adjustment.”
“She hates me,” Vicente says flatly. “Let’s not pretend otherwise.”
“She doesn’t hate you,” Arturo says, but he doesn’t quite meet Vicente’s eyes.
“She rearranges my things. Schedules household meetings when she knows I’m with you. Refers to everything as ‘Arturo’s house,’ ‘Arturo’s preferences,’ like I’m a guest who’s overstayed his welcome.”
“You kidnapped our daughter,” Arturo says quietly.
The air shifts. I keep my face neutral, professional curiosity already cataloging this new layer—the household’s ability to absorb this kind of betrayal and still function, still plan holiday dinners together.
It’s fascinating in a way that should probably frighten me more than it does.
The recording’s running anyway. They know that. They said it anyway.
“That’s not quite fair,” Vicente says, but his voice lacks conviction.
“You took Toni to leverage Celeste,” Arturo continues. “Elena knows that. She may work for me, she may be professional about your presence, but she is allowed her feelings.”
I lean forward slightly. “When did this happen?”
“April,” Arturo says. “Right before Toni’s thirtieth birthday. Vicente took her to try to get to Celeste.”
“I didn’t hurt her,” Vicente says. “You kept Celeste from me for years. Even though you knew I saw her as my daughter, my heir. I only wanted her to know what she stood to inherit from me—”
“By taking our daughter?” Arturo’s voice goes hard. “By terrifying her mother? There were other ways, Vicente.”
“Don’t pretend she doesn’t have reasons to resent us both.” Vicente’s voice drops.
Arturo’s jaw tightens, but he doesn’t argue.
“In all that time you were apart,” I say carefully, “you never had children of your own?”
Vicente’s expression doesn’t flicker, but his eyes go briefly distant—too quick to read. “Celeste is mine. Biology is paperwork.”
The deflection is elegant, absolute. I don’t press.
“Elena has run the household for three decades. She knows you are family, but you are still the newcomer,” Arturo adds, softer now.
“So Thanksgiving is complicated,” I observe, “by more than just your history with each other.”
“Everything’s complicated,” Arturo agrees. “But we’re trying anyway. Between my daughters and their mothers, my daughters’ partners, Vicente now living there too… There is never a dull moment. But it doesn’t change the fact that we are still a family.”
My daughters and their mothers. Plural. The casual, factual way he said it, without shame or apology.
I think of the wedding where I met most of them.
Toni dancing with Sam. Celeste watching from the edge of the floor with Leo and Maddox.
Elle with her men, two of whom it hits me were Elena’s twin sons.
Elena and Marcella somewhere in the background.
Vicente and Arturo at the ceremony but gone before the reception—and now I understand why.
The sheer number of people in that room with legitimate grievances against them, all choosing to show up anyway.
Somehow they’re all planning to sit around a table together next week eating turkey.
The resilience required to navigate that kind of history—affairs, kidnappings, thirty years of war—and still call it family? It’s staggering. And here I am, can’t even tell two men I love about a pregnancy that’s already been terminated.
I redirect before my thoughts spiral further. “Vicente, Thanksgiving isn’t celebrated in Mexico. Is this your first one?”
“First in LA,” Vicente says. “We’re more inclined toward Día de los Muertos—we actually just celebrated a couple weeks ago. But not everyone in the family is Mexican, and this gives us another reason to gather.”
“I have been doing this for decades,” Arturo adds. “It was easier to adopt the tradition than fight it. But having Vicente here for this—it is strange. Good strange, but strange.”
The therapeutic content here is rich—reconstruction after trauma, the difference between parallel lives and shared ones, how relationships transform when geography no longer keeps them apart.
“Tell me about the other family dinners you have now,” I redirect slightly. “How do they work with such a complex household?”
“Complex.” Arturo considers the word. “That’s diplomatic.”
“It’s a found family,” Vicente says. “Biology stopped mattering years ago. Now it’s just about who shows up.”
“And everyone shows up,” Arturo says, though his expression shifts. “At least the ones who live close enough. Elle and Toni visit when they can.”
“Distance is difficult,” I offer.
“Celeste makes up for it,” Vicente says. “She and her partners are here. The house stays full enough.”
I first met Maddox when he flew to Denver during Mason’s crisis—he stepped up for his brother without hesitation. Leo and Celeste I only met briefly at the wedding, but their dynamic was impossible to miss.
“Celeste sets the tone,” Vicente continues with subtle pride. “She inherited her mother’s ability to make complicated things work.”
Arturo’s gaze drops slightly—pride weighted with worry. “She’s been carrying too much lately, though.”
I lean forward slightly. “Too much how?”
They exchange a look. Vicente answers first. “She’s taking over aspects of the family business. The legitimate parts, primarily, but the transitions are... complicated.”
“Complicated because you’re under house arrest?”
“Complicated because nature abhors a vacuum,” Arturo says carefully. “When Vicente stepped back, others tried to fill the gaps.”
There’s intelligence here, floating just under the surface. I think of the CIA’s clunky prompts and try to reframe them through a therapeutic lens.
“When you stepped away from your operations in Mexico,” I say, keeping my voice curious before I lead into another CIA prompt, “was there anyone you trusted to maintain what you’d built? Someone you were mentoring, perhaps?”
The question sounds like I’m asking about emotional investment in legacy—the kind of thing a therapist might explore. But Vicente’s eyes narrow slightly, reading the subtext. He knows I’m fishing for something specific, even if I don’t know what.
“No one inherits what I built,” he says carefully. “Not Mexico. The infrastructure there died with my arrest. Anyone claiming otherwise is building on a grave.”
“But it’s a circle of life,” Arturo says. “The old guard falls, new players emerge. It’s ecology.”
“Some of them are quite ambitious,” Vicente adds, stretching the word like he’s tasting it. “Especially the Eastern Europeans. They see opportunity in chaos.”
“But they don’t understand infrastructure,” Arturo says. “They think violence is power. It’s not. Systems are power. Relationships. Legitimate cover.”
“Like our family’s import business,” Vicente says. “The contracts at the port. Beautiful irony—the authorities protect our legitimate interests while missing everything else.”
I make a note, trying to look therapeutic rather than tactical. “It sounds like you’re proud of Celeste’s business acumen.”
“Proud and terrified,” Arturo admits. “She’s swimming with sharks who think they’re dragons.”
“Dragons?” I prompt.
Vicente’s expression doesn’t change, but his focus sharpens. “Men who hoard wealth and guard it viciously. Who think accumulation equals power. They don’t understand that real power is in distribution, in networks.”
“Celeste understands,” Arturo says. “She’s been consolidating the legitimate holdings while letting others fight over scraps.”
“Is that safe?”
“Nothing’s safe,” Vicente says simply. “But she’s smart. She knows they’re too busy fighting each other to notice her building something new.”
“These dragons,” I say carefully, “are they a direct threat?”
“Not to us,” Arturo says. “We are neutered. No power, no territory, no product. Vicente is under house arrest, I am under constant surveillance. Just two old men the agencies watch like hawks.”
It’s such a bald-faced lie that I almost laugh.
Two neutered old men don’t travel with security—the bodyguards who wait in my lobby every week, sharp-suited and watchful, gang tattoos creeping up from their collars and past their cuffs, one with a teardrop marking his face.
Two neutered old men don’t make Elena rearrange her entire household to accommodate them.
They’ve adapted, certainly. But powerless? Not even close.
“But to Celeste?”
They exchange another look, longer this time.
“Everyone’s a threat to Celeste,” Vicente says finally. “She’s young, brilliant, and sitting on infrastructure worth billions. The Europeans want her connections. The Mexicans want her routes. The Americans want her cooperation.”
“And what does Celeste want?”
“To be left alone to run her business,” Arturo says. “But that’s not how our world works. There’s always someone who thinks they deserve what you’ve built.”
“Someone specific?” I press gently, returning to safer ground.
Vicente leans back, studying me. For a moment, I think he’s going to deflect. Then he says, “There’s always someone specific. But the clever ones don’t announce themselves. They move through proxies, through legitimate channels. They think patience makes them invisible.”
“But you see them.”
“We see patterns,” Arturo corrects. “Old habits. The Eastern Europeans always move the same way—through the ports first, then inland. They think water makes them safe.”
Water. Ports. Dragons. The pieces are there, but coded, layered.
“How does that make you feel?” I ask, returning to the therapeutic frame. “Seeing these patterns but being unable to act?”
“Relief,” Vicente says immediately. “Do you know how exhausting it is to be responsible for everyone’s safety? To know that any decision could get someone killed?”
“Now it’s Celeste’s burden,” I observe.
“Yes.” Arturo’s voice is heavy. “And we can’t protect her from it.”
“Would you, if you could?”
“No,” Vicente says, surprising me. “She needs to build her own empire. Make her own mistakes. We can offer wisdom, but she has to learn the cost herself.”
“And what is the cost?”
“Everything demands sacrifice,” Arturo says. “We sacrificed each other for thirty years. Now we’re sacrificing relevance for freedom. Celeste will sacrifice something too. We just hope it’s not herself or the men she loves.”