Chapter 39
Aria
For weeks, Elliot has been telling me how one day he’s simply going to call one of the pilots that his family has on call and take me somewhere. He promised to fly me wherever I wanted in the privet jet.
Now that I’m sitting in it, flying directly to Austin, the excitement I thought I’d feel is nowhere to be found.
All because he decided I was ready to face Leo and Serena head on without talking or even asking me first.
You would think be sobbing in his damn arms would be clue enough that I needed to work up the courage to tell them what I did, but not even three hours later, here we are. On a damn plane to Austin.
God, I hate him.
Thinking that brings a pain in my chest.
I don’t hate him. I’m pretty sure I love the asshole, but I still pissed that he put me in this situation.
We’ve been up in the air for about two hours and it’s been over three since either one of us has said something to the other. With each passing second, as we near closer to Austin, the silence grows thicker.
This won’t be the only screaming match we have, but I didn’t realize the first would hurt this bad.
I move away from the small window and look over at Elliot who sits on the long couch the plane offers. He’s been on his computer since we took off. He looks tense, his shoulders, his face, everything about him looks like he’s seconds away from blowing up.
The urge to leave my seat and go over to him to help him relax is strong, but I stay in my place. With my head leaning against the wall and arms wrapped around my body.
But just because my body stays rooted doesn’t mean my mouth can’t move.
“You told me your mom was never found.” The statement comes out hoarse from not talking for hours.
I’ve been thinking about it since the words spilled out of him in the closet.
His mom is helping Jack bring down the Muertos.
When we spent the night at Lane Manor and he talked about his life, he mentioned his mother. He mentioned how she had gone missing and his dad going to search for her. But I just assumed when he said his dad never made it back, neither did she.
From how he reacted in the closet, I assumed wrong. I will also go as far as saying that he knew that piece of information.
Elliot doesn’t look up from his computer as he responds to my statement. “I said she went missing.”
I roll my eyes. “Yes, but you never said she had come back.”
My eyes stay on him as the words leave my mouth. His eyes grow distant, almost as if he is getting lost in a memory and not looking at the screen in front of him. I count the seconds and it takes him over forty to finally respond.
A sigh leaves him. “No, I didn’t say she came back, because she didn’t. Not really.”
I push away from the wall and sit up straight. “What does that mean?”
My voice doesn’t hold any anger in it anymore.
He finally looks up and over to me, his blue eyes are filled with hit and anger, but it’s not directed at me.
“It means that my mother came back, proved she was alive, but she didn’t stay.
” The last part of his sentence seems so final, like that is all he was going to say, give me no explanation, but he continues after a minute or so.
“A few years after my dad left us with Bennett, she showed up at the Manor. For the first time in I don’t know how long, I didn’t feel anger for being in Chicago, or hatred toward my uncle.
I had my mom back, that’s all I cared about.
That joy of having her back lasted about three weeks. ”
I feel myself dig my nails into my palm.
“Did something happen to her?”
Elliot shrugs. “Bennett told her to leave. Told me that it was to protect me and my siblings. It wasn’t until later that I found out that he caught her stealing from the manor. Even was able to get her hands on some money.”
“She didn’t fight him on it? She was your mom, maybe she was taking those things because she thought that was her way of giving you a better life.”
So much sadness coats his eyes. “She wasn’t.
It took me a while to learn this, but the only life Marisela wanted to make better was hers.
Otherwise, she would have come back. She would have done everything and anything to prove to Bennett and Henry that she wanted to be there for us. Instead, she disappeared again.”
God, why did this man have to go through so damn much? All I want to do, is go back in time and hug younger Elliot and tell him that everything will work out.
“Did you ever see her after that?”
He drops his eyes before he nods. “Once, when I was seventeen.”
“What happened?”
His lips roll. “I went in wanting my mom back, to get to know everything about her. In my head, I thought a few days would erase everything we went through. That maybe we would go back to Chicago and continue looking for Dad until we were a big happy family again. But joke was on me because she wanted none of that.”
If my heart didn’t break for him before, it’s shattering now. I can hear the pain in his words just as I did when he talked about his past in his old room.
Not giving a shit that I’m supposed to be mad at him, I get up from my seat and walk over the small space to him.
I take his hand in mine.
“What did she want?” the question rolls out as I tighten my fingers sound his palm, giving him comfort like he has done for me so many times.
“It’s not important right now.” His hand squeezes mine and I want to drop it just as he is so desperate to, but my mind can’t seem to.
“But it is. It’s part of who you are, so it’s important.” I’m pushing, but he once told me that he would give me everything, and I want every part of him. I don’t want the lies he hides behind, I want the truths.
Elliot sighs. “I get that. I get that its important, but my mother is complicated subject. Just know that what she wanted then, she didn’t get, and it hurt both of us.
So much so that I spent two or three years after hoping and keeping my fingers crossed that she would change and come be the mother we needed her to be, but she crushed that hope. ”
“How?”
His eyes become a dark shade of blue, almost black.
“About ten years ago, maybe three years after I saw her, Ella was taken. Turned out, there was a hit put on Bennett’s head by one of his disgruntled employees and my mother was the one that answered the call.
They plotted this whole scheme that resulted in Ella being taken, the employee dead and my mother running away.
From what I know she went back into hiding and only came back out recently.
I doubt Bennett even knows she’s spending time in Texas. ”
I think my mouth falls open. I’m trying to be caring and comforting, but all of this is like a damn telenovela. Something my mom would definitely binge watch. I wonder if this family is just out looking for bad luck or if it just finds them.
“Why would she hide?”
“Because Marisela is greedy and would do anything to fuel that greed including making enemies. Enemies that would kill her if they saw her. Hiding is her best option.”
To a certain extent, I understand that. She’s protecting her own life by hiding. In a way I did the same when I moved to Chicago. Instead of facing my indiscretions, I ran and hid away.
“Did she make enemies with the Muertos? Is that why you don’t want them finding out about her?”
Instead of answering the questions right away, Elliot sits with it, staring at the something across the aisle as if it’s a glorious painting. Second start circling in my head and I’m able to get to forty-two before he speaks.
“I don’t know. There’re rumors that she may have had a hand in the death of Leo’s mother, but it was never confirmed. So there’s a possibility. But if I had to truly ask myself why I want to keep who my mother is from is, I think the answer would be more about me than her.”
“Why do you say that?”
He shrugs. “I told myself it was because of the business I would lose, the connection to the cartel that I would have to give up, but if I’m being honest, I think it has more to do with not wanting to be associated to her and what she has done.
Her blood runs through my vein, in the eyes of some that could mean that I’m just like her and that would make me someone that can’t be trusted. ”
I move my hands up to his face and cradle his cheeks in my palms. “You are not like your mother.”
A small scoff escapes him. “You don’t know that.”
“I know the man in front of me would never leave a seventeen-year-old boy wanting a parent. He would care for him and make sure that he knows that he is loved every single day. The man I know would not hurt his child in the way your mother did. Her blood may be running in your veins but you two are not the same.”
A chaste kiss lands on my lips and for a few second the only thing that exist in the world is him and me. There is no argument floating over our heads. There no impending doom waiting for us when we get off this plane. It’s just the two of us for a few glorious seconds.
When he pulls away, I can’t help but to give him a small smile.
“What was that for?”
“An apology. I should have talked to you first before agreeing to this. Telling Leo and Serena your secrets should have been your choice, not mine and I’m sorry.”
I hear the sincerity in his voice and the anger I was feeling when I walked onto this plane start to dissipate.
Not completely but some.
Enough for me to lean my head against his shoulder and prepare myself as I seek comfort in his warmth, for what is waiting for me once the plane lands.