Chapter 7
seven
Matias
California, Four Years Ago
The highway before us stretches out for miles, not a car in sight.
It’s a rare thing to see in California, much less the surrounding Los Angeles area.
My thumb dances on the steering wheel, tapping to the rhythm of the pop song blasting in the car.
Fluffy clouds amble in the bright blue sky above us, casting fat shadows on the black asphalt.
Natalia bounces in her seat, a wide smile on her face. She’s dressed in soft pinks, creams, and whites, like the first flower of spring after a dreadful winter.
“I love this song!” She tells me, like I didn’t see her physically plug in her phone and queue up her own playlist. She belts out the lyrics for a minute before lowering the passenger side window and almost sticking her entire upper body out of it.
The car swerves as I lunge across the center console and drag her into her seat.
“Are you crazy?” She laughs, not complaining when I lower the volume of the headache-inducing music. “You want to die before we even get on campus?”
“I thought you were a dangerous gangster, why are you being so dramatic?” She rolls her eyes when I roll up the window from the driver’s side. “I only stuck my head out the window.”
“People have died from less. Put on your seatbelt.”
“Okay, jeez. Sorry. It’s just such a good, beautiful day.”
“I have enough to worry about without you killing yourself.” It’s the wrong thing to say. She turns in her seat, eyes observant as she looks me up and down.
“Like what?”
“Forget it. Just worry about your class. It’s the first day of classes, you might have a test or something, right?”
“The professor is just going over the syllabus today.” She says, completely seeing through my distraction. “What are you worried about?”
I glance at her briefly before my eyes go back to the road. “Why do you care?”
She stares at her lap before answering, the big pretty bow holding her hair gleaming in the afternoon light. “Well…I’d like to think we’re friends.”
“We’re not friends.” I reply, my voice so gentle it sounds foreign to me.
I’m not used to sparing people’s feelings.
“You’re my buyer’s daughter. We talked about this.
You’re supposed to treat me like the help.
” I should have made her sit in the back seat, but when she jumped into the passenger seat with that big smile on her face, I couldn’t tell her no.
I just wanted to be close to that sweet energy of hers for as long as possible.
“Papa says you’re his business partner.” She crosses her arms and stares at me out of the corner of her eye.
I grunt noncommittally.
“Which is it?” She says after a moment, her eyes narrowing. “If you don’t want anything to do with me, you can tell me. I can take it. I can treat you like the help, if that’s what you want.”
I almost laugh at her bratty tone.
She’s got no idea the shit I’ve waded into in order to feed my sick obsession with her.
Because that’s the only name for it. I’ve become obsessed.
When I first met her in that church, I was intrigued by her soft voice and pretty eyes.
The innocent curiosity when I showed her how to use my favorite knife.
Her face lingered in the back of my mind for weeks, and I fed the craving.
I watched her, from a distance, soaking up her outings like a starved idiot.
“I’ve been selling drugs to your father. Now…I do more.”
“What kind of ‘more’?”
I glance at her and smirk. “Do you really want to know?”
I think of the men I’ve killed for Antonio Hernandez, all the dirty work he’s been too scared to do. I don’t regret it. It put me in his house, it put me within arms reach of the woman next to me and put some more money in my pocket. She quiets something inside of me.
“Um…no.” Natalia stares at her lap again, and I know exactly what she’s thinking. I haven’t answered her question, and she’s too shy to have her soft feelings hurt again. It doesn’t sit right with me.
“I don’t want you to treat me like the help.” I say quietly. “But…I don’t really have many friends. I have Santos. That’s it.”
“That’s the man with the face tattoo, right? The tear drop?”
“Yeah, that’s him.”
“I’ve seen him around the house a couple of times. He’s nice.” I laugh. Santos is an asshole to every person he meets.
“You could probably find something nice to say about the devil.”
She rolls her eyes, but a little smile toys at her lips. “That’s not true.”
“Alright, give me the name of one person you hate.” I might look them up and pay them a visit. She holds a finger to her chin for the longest time and frowns when I laugh at her.
“Give me a minute. It’ll come to me.”
“Take your time, Florecita.” She gives up after a minute and bends at the waist, sitting back up a moment later with a cooler laden with food.
“I packed lunch. You want some?”
“I’m good.”
I feel her gaze on the side of my face. “You didn’t eat breakfast.”
“How do you know that?”
“I overheard you talking to Santos. And you haven’t stopped anywhere for food.
” She zips open her cooler and stares inside.
“I packed extra food. In case you got hungry.” The vulnerable inflection in her voice makes something in my chest hurt.
I can’t remember the last time someone truly gave a shit if I even lived, let alone had something to eat.
“Okay, yeah.” A soft smile flashes over her face as she reaches in and comes out with a big sandwich a second later. She unwraps it and presses it into my hand, taking out her own sandwich and digging in a moment later.
“There’s a lot of veggies in here.” I comment, chewing past a particularly crunchy lettuce leaf. I chew discreetly on a chunky slice of tomato, pretending it doesn’t bother me as she watches me eat. I take another bite.
Did she put cucumbers in here?
“Sorry, I was in a rush. Also, I don’t cook that often–and I’m trying to make healthier meals. I’m trying to get better with what I eat, but Ramona…well, she won’t let me go near the kitchen. I had to make these in my room.”
I can’t help the bark of laughter. “What?”
“Ramona won’t let me in the kitchen.”
“Why?” I don’t even bother bringing up the ‘getting better with what I eat’ part, because if she gives me some infuriating weight-loss reason I’m going to ruin her day before we even get started. She’s perfect the way she is.
“Because–she thinks I don’t belong there. I wonder if Papa put her up to it. He wants me to be some spoiled housewife. He didn’t want me to take the class–you know what he told me at first?”
I give her a curious look over my shoulder.
“He said I should quit school because ‘it’s time to get married’.” She scoffs and laughs humorlessly. “Some dad he is.”
The wave of dark possession that surges into my stomach takes me off guard.
“Did he give you a name?”
“No.” She crosses her arms and huffs. It’s just as well, cause if she had a name I’d be driving to the fucker’s house tonight with a gun.
“I can’t believe he would say that.” She says quietly after a moment.
“I’m more than someone’s future wife or mom.
There’s so much I haven’t done, and he just wants to stuff me from one cage to another. ”
I pull into the right lane so a speeding convertible can pass us, letting her words hang heavy in the air before speaking.
“What would you do first?”
“Probably run away.” She says with a sad laugh. “I don’t know. I just want to live without this…life…hanging over me like some storm cloud.”
I know what she means. Even more, I know how nervous she is to say it, because she thinks someone is going to write her off as a dumb brat who doesn’t know what she’s wishing for.
“You were raised to be a good girl. To listen.” I tell her quietly, satisfied when she turns to watch me with serious eyes. Because what I’m about to tell her is very serious. I need her to understand.
“Sometimes, you need to take the life you want. Even if it means disappointing someone. The life you want is never going to come if you play nice, Florecita. You’ll have to fight for it.
Sacrifice for it.” We amble to the highway exit ramp leading to the university.
The freakishly clean sidewalks glow in the distance like a beacon, the newer buildings covered in windows coming out of the ground like giant glass shards.
She sits up straight in her seat, pressing her face into the passenger window as we slowly roll into campus.
“You have to figure out how badly you want it.”
Her solemn acceptance of my words seem to vanish as soon as we park.
Natalia jumps out of the car, bouncing on her feet, barely able to contain her excitement.
She leads the way to her classroom without once looking at any of the maps around campus, like she’s memorized this place through a computer screen.
She stalks around the building with satisfied nods, putting names to places she’s never stepped in.
I’m young enough not to stick out too much, so I settle for following her quietly, watching clueless students flit around her.
No one here cares who she is, but I don’t let my guard down.
The finance building where her class takes place is modern, big TVs flashing everywhere about all of the different clubs, activities, and job fairs.
She lingers in a large, open-concept study area filled with minimalistic furniture, big glass windows overlooking one of the central courtyards outside.
Something contracts in my chest when a big, wide smile erupts on her face.
We end up in a big lecture hall. People are already gathering, the first three rows filled with students. Natalia pulls me aside as a pair of students walk in behind us, two girls that stare at me curiously but scurry by without a word.
She watches them pass by before giving me a look.
“What?”
“...You can’t sit with me.”
I almost laugh. “Excuse me?”
“I mean it. I won’t make friends if you linger right behind me like the grim reaper.”
“I won’t say anything.”
She shakes her head. “It doesn't matter. You’re too intimidating for the boys and too attractive to everyone else.” As if on cue, a girl sitting in the front row looks over at me and does a double take, her eyes tracking me from head to toe.
“Thanks for the compliment, but I have a job to do.” I say with a pointed glance. “We should get our seats now before you’re having your lesson from the nosebleeds.”
“Matias, please.” She reaches over and wraps her hand around my forearm, and my brain short circuits.
I don’t think it’s the first time she’s touched me, but it is the first time she’s touched me with those big, pleading brown eyes.
I stare down at her hand, the contrast of her creamy skin on my sun-browned body takes me somewhere far away from this college campus.
She follows my gaze, ripping her hand away a moment later.
“Sorry.”
“I’ll sit up here, but I want you in my line of sight. Don’t just wander off.” I murmur, clearing my throat. She puffs up and almost floats away like a balloon.
“Okay.” She bites her lip. “Thanks!” I watch her go as she travels deeper into the lecture hall, finding a group she must recognize from her online classes and approaching them with a nervous expression on her face.
I want to soothe it away immediately. How could anyone not like her? I watch her classmates carefully as they greet her, a blonde girl smiling big and throwing her arm around Natalia’s shoulder before making room on one of the chairs next to her.
Natalia relaxes little by little. She stops playing with the silk of the bow in her hair.
I sit all the way in the back, watching her from a distance, suddenly craving a bowl of strawberries and cream.
The craving distracts me, and it takes me a moment to notice a male classmate watching her… with the same hungry look on his face.