Chapter 27 - Marisol
The penthouse feels too small for two people who can’t look at each other.
I emerge from my bedroom at ten, having spent the night listing losses the way Nico lists threats.
Father dying, maybe already gone. Brother disappeared into God's arms. Club sealed by police tape.
Reputation shredded across every headline.
And now the man in the guest room who holds my secrets but won't hold me.
He's at his laptop in the kitchen, spine military-straight, fingers moving across keys with the efficiency of someone who measures worth in completed tasks.
"Morning." His voice carries all the warmth of a weather report.
"Morning."
I pour coffee into a mug, noting how he doesn't look up from his screen.
We're strangers sharing an Airbnb, two people whose lease happens to overlap. The silence stretches, filled with the tap of keys and the distant hum of Miami waking beyond the windows.
Something in my chest finalizes. Not breaking; that happened last night. This is the scar tissue forming, the walls rebuilding themselves from habit and necessity.
I sit across from him, the marble island between us like a negotiating table.
"I need to tell you something."
His fingers pause on the keyboard. Just for a second. Then continue. "Go ahead."
"I'm leaving today. Alone."
Now he looks up, those hazel eyes assessing threat levels rather than seeing me. "That's inadvisable. The Zayas situation—"
"I don't care about the Zayas."
"Marisol—"
"You can follow if your assignment requires it." I stand, already moving toward my room to get my bag. "But I'm leaving this apartment. Without you."
"I'll drive you."
"No."
"I can't let you—"
"You can't LET me?" The words come out sharp enough to cut. "You can trail me around like a puppy dog but you don’t get to decide how I live."
I grab my purse, phone, keys. Move toward the elevator before he can deploy more arguments about safety protocols and threat assessments.
The elevator arrives immediately, like it's been waiting for this moment. I step inside, turn to face him standing in the doorway of the kitchen, laptop abandoned, something cracking across his face that he won't let fully form.
"Nico—" I start, then stop. What would I say? That I love him? That he's breaking my heart? That if he asked me to stay, I would?
The doors close on his silence.
In the lobby, the doorman nods his usual greeting. The Miami heat slams into me as I exit, thick and wet and real in a way the penthouse's controlled environment never is.
I walk alone, and the city doesn't care that I'm shattering with every step.
Little Havana pulls me in like gravity, my feet finding the familiar streets without conscious thought. Past domino tables where old men argue in Spanish about baseball and politics and whose granddaughter married better.
I order a cortadito from the window, sweet enough to hurt your teeth, strong enough to wake the dead. The girl serving it looks maybe seventeen, and I wonder if her mother knew mine, if these streets hold their shared memories like sediment.
My phone buzzes against my thigh. Nico. Twelve messages now. I counted, damn him for teaching me that too. I don't read them but I can imagine: Your location shows Little Havana. Confirm status. Security concerns require immediate response.
It buzzes again. And again. The phone burns in my purse, each vibration a reminder that he can find me whenever he wants. He just chooses not to.
An hour passes. Maybe two. The sun climbs higher, turning the humidity into something that presses against my skin like wet wool.
A bar catches my eye, dark interior promising air conditioning and amnesia. My mother used to say I had her weakness for pretty bottles and ugly mornings. The pull is physical, muscle memory of a thousand nights trying to forget.
I stand outside for a full minute, hands fisting at my sides. The neon sign flickers: Havana Nights. Through the window I can see amber bottles lined up like soldiers. Like Nico's everything, ordered and disciplined and containing something that could destroy you if you let it.
I don't go in. Not because I'm strong. Because Nico ruined this escape route too: made me want to be present, to feel everything sharp and clear, and now I can't unknow what clarity tastes like.
My phone buzzes again. I glance at it, expecting another strategic check-in from my security assignment.
Cesar's name glows on the screen.
Mari. Your father is asking for you. He's lucid. Come now, before he fades again.
My heart stops. Restarts. Races.
Papa, asking for me. After days of being blocked, controlled, kept away: he wants to see his daughter. My dying father who might not survive the night, who I haven't been able to reach, whose last memories of me might be Cesar's poison rather than the truth.
Another text: He's been moved to a private facility for better care. Coastal, quieter. He's asking for you specifically.
An address follows. Not the estate. Somewhere south.
I should call Nico.
My fingers hover over his name in my contacts. One call and he'd be here in minutes.
But Nico chose distance. Nico chose assignment over us. Nico looked at me becoming strong and decided I wasn't worth staying for.
A black sedan pulls up to the curb before I can second-guess further. The driver, someone I don't recognize, lowers the window.
"Ms. Delgado? Mr. Vega sent me."
Not Carlos. Not any of the regular drivers. This should be a red flag. It is a red flag. A massive, waving, neon-lit warning that this is probably a trap.
I get in anyway.
Because what's the worst that could happen? I die? At least that would end this feeling of being hollowed out from the inside.
The leather seats are cool despite the heat.
We head south immediately, the city thinning as we drive.
The familiar skyline retreats in the rearview mirror, replaced by glimpses of water between buildings, more green, fewer people.
The driver stays silent, and I'm grateful because if he spoke, I might scream or sob or both.
"How far is this facility?" I ask as we pass the third gated community.
"Not much further, Ms. Delgado."
My phone burns in my purse with Nico's unread messages.
We turn onto a coastal road. The ocean appears properly now, endless blue to our left, and my hands grip the seat before I can stop them.
Eight years since I've been this close to open water.
Eight years of avoiding pools, beaches, anything deep enough to submerge.
The therapist I saw once called it aquaphobia.
I called it survival: if I never go near the water, I never have to feel my mother's absence in the one place she was most alive.
A gate opens. We pull through.
Not a medical facility. Obviously.
The Mediterranean-style house perches on the cliff like it's been waiting for me. No medical vehicles in the circular drive. No nursing staff visible through windows. No sign of my dying father.
The driver doesn't turn off the engine, just sits waiting while I process what I already knew: this is a trap. Cesar lied. My father isn't here.
I get out anyway.
Because what else is there to do? Run? To where? Back to the penthouse where Nico will file a report about my "inadvisable choices"? Back to the streets where my mother's ghost sings on Thursday nights?
The front door stands open, revealing marble floors that gleam like ice despite the heat.
Through the house, I can see the terrace overlooking the cliff's edge and the ocean beyond.
I can smell Cesar's cologne already: that expensive French scent mixing with salt air, too heavy for the heat, like everything about him is slightly wrong for this climate.
Cesar stands on the terrace, silhouetted against the afternoon sun. Not rushing to greet me with fake concern. Not maintaining his uncle performance. Just waiting. I hear ice clink in a glass.
I cross through the house, my heels clicking on marble that feels cool despite the temperature. Each step echoes in the emptiness.
Up close, his face is different. The warm mask he's worn for thirty years has been set aside like a coat he no longer needs. What's underneath isn't evil, exactly. It's worse. It's practical.
"Where's my father?"
"At the estate. Where he's been all along." He doesn't even pretend to apologize. "Sit down, Mari."
"You lied."
"Yes. I needed you here, and I knew mentioning Jorge would bring you." He settles into a chair like we're having cocktails rather than whatever this is. "You're predictable that way: always coming for the people who hurt you."
The truth of that lands sharp. My father. Gabriel. Even Nico, in his way. I do keep returning to sources of pain like they might transform into something else.
"Or maybe I just have more hope than survival instinct," I say. "But you wouldn't understand that. You gave up decency decades ago."
His smile is thin, pleased that I'm reading him clearly now. "Thirty years. That's a long time to wait, carina."
Behind me, I hear the car pull away. The engine fades, leaving just the sound of waves hitting rocks below. Movement in my peripheral vision: shapes in the house. Three men, maybe four. We're not alone.
"Cleaning up Delgado messes while being told I'm not blood, not family.
" He takes a sip from his glass: whiskey, neat, because of course he drinks like a man who's never doubted his own choices.
"And what's my reward? Jorge is leaving everything to you.
The disaster daughter who can't stay sober for a week. "
Three men emerge from the house, positioning themselves between me and the exit. Not threatening, exactly. Just present. Just blocking any escape route I might consider.
"And the body? The Zayas girl?"
For the first time, something flickers across his face. Not guilt. Annoyance, like I'm asking about methodology when we should be discussing results.
"Collateral." The word drops between us like a stone in still water.